Chapter 4
However, there is one more thing a person needs to take into consideration regarding these two types of “wine” (of joy and of bitterness) mentioned above: It is the saying of our Sages (Zohar I, 45b) on the verse (Bereishis 1:4): “and He [Hashem] saw that the Light was good,” meaning “that it was good to hide [the Light.]”
The explanation of this matter is: It is written regarding a Jew’s connection to Hashem (Shir HaShirim 3:1-4): “I have sought the One that my soul has loved...I grabbed onto Him and I will not let Him go of Him, until I bring Him to the house of ‘my mother,’ and to the room of ‘הוֹרָּתִי-my teacher,’” ‘the house of my mother’ refers to the Written Torah (Tanach), which corresponds to the level of Bina of Atzilus, referred to as the “the mother” of Ze’eir Anpin and Malchus, and ‘the room of הוֹרָּתִי-my teacher’ refers to the Oral Torah (Mishna and Gemara), since the word “הוֹרָּתִּי” (which literally means my parent) can also be read “הוראתי-the one who instructs me,” (see Vayikra Rabbah 1:10).
In other words, when a Jew connects to Hashem in prayer, whether in a way of joy or bitterness, he needs to brings down that perception of Hashem into the “vessels” of the letters of the Torah. Since these letters of Torah are the ‘vessels’ that can contain Hashem’s revelation, they are the aspect of “the cup of Pharoh,” of Holiness, Malchus of Atzilus, that receives the “wine” of love and bitterness for Hashem, as it is written (Tehillim 116:13): “I lift up the cup of salvation,” only then, in this “cup” will the “wine” be able to last, which is not the case if there are no “vessels,” then the “Light” will leave the person, as in known.
If a person does not invest his holy feelings and awareness of Hashem into the action of mitzvos and letters of Torah, then this awareness and feeling will eventually leave the person.
A person should further remember the following concept: That his good deeds should not be performed only for the sake of his own spiritual self, rather, they should be performed in order to cause delight to Hashem, by becoming a “place for Him to dwell,” and a “home for Hashem in the lowest world,” i.e., in the physical world. Meaning, that he should establish Hashem’s Light in the letters of the Torah, which are the “vessels” for His Light.
This is an aspect referred to as “Yosef,” meaning, that the person’s intention in his good deeds is “to increase” pleasure and delight for Hashem. The name “Yosef” means to add or increase. Thus, his name represents a state of mind that the person wants to increase delight for Hashem through his good deeds.
This is what the verse says (see beginning of the maamar) “the butler [of Pharoh] did not remember “Yosef” and forgot about him...and then it was at the end [of two years that Pharoh had dreams...]” Meaning, through the fact that he did not remember “Yosef,” i.e., that a person forgets to have the intention to increase enjoyment for Hashem through his good deeds, this brings about a situation that “it was at the end,” meaning this brings about an end and discontinuation of the aspect referred to as “two years,” meaning, this causes that the person could G-d forbid cease to have the aspect of Torah study, which is called “two ‘years of days,’” as it is written regarding the Torah (Mishlei 8:30): “and I [the Torah] was a delight for Him [Hashem] day after day,” which is interpreted by the Sages (Bereishis Rabbah 8:2) to mean “the Torah existed two thousand years before the world.”
The Sages interpret as follows: Since it says in Tehillim (90:4) that “a thousand years in Your eyes is like a day that has passed,” when the verse in Mishlei says that the Torah was delight for Hashem “day after day,” i.e., two days, it means Hashem’s “days” of a thousand year, thus two thousand years. The maamar (seemingly based on the Zohar, Parshas Mikeitz 193b) is bringing this to interpret the verse “two ‘years of days,’” to mean a level referred to as “two days,” which is the Torah that is Hashem’s delight “day after day,” i.e., two “days” of Hashem, which are also two sets of human years, i.e., two sets of a thousand years.
The meaning of these “two days” are two levels of the Torah, connected to the two Sefiros of Chochma and Binah, as is it written in the Tikunei Zohar (17b) “He [Hashem] has Chochma-Wisdom, but not wisdom that is knowable to us, He has Bina-Understanding, but not that understanding that is knowable to us.” The level of Chochma corresponds to the Written Torah, and the level of Bina to the Orah Torah. In other words, the “two days” mentioned in Mishlei, or the “two years of days” mentioned in Parshas Mikeitz refer to two revelations of Torah, that of the Written Torah and the Oral Torah, which are derived from the two Sefiros of Chochma and Bina.
