On the biblical level, the beginning of exile can be seen in the conflict between Jacob and Esau. The Torah gives a list of eight Kings of Edom, descended from Esau, who ‘ruled before there was a King in Israel’. While this can be understood as referring only to the Biblical epoch, it can also be interpreted as defining the rule of Edom which precedes the coming of the Messiah.
Kabbalistically, Esau expresses the World of Chaos (Tohu), and Jacob expresses the World of Tikkun, Repair. Exile is the rule of Chaos rather than Tikkun. Further, the Kabbalah links the list of Edomite Kings with specific Sefirot. The first King represents the Sefirah Da’at, Knowledge. This links to the earliest Biblical definition of Exile: the account of Adam and Eve eating from the Tree of Knowledge in the Garden of Eden.
In this sense ‘Knowledge’ means ‘feeling’, in terms which are too coarse and material.
Man and woman are endowed with two kinds of palate: a physical palate and a spiritual one. When we eat (for example) sweet food, our physical palate enjoys the sensation of sweetness. We can also try to train our spiritual palate to be sensitive to the spiritual dimension which underlies that pleasant taste.
This is our normal experience after Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of Knowledge. Before they did so, the mode of experiencing physicality was different. A person’s physical palate – or any organ of pleasure - would enjoy the spirituality in the encounter, whether of food or of any other kind of activity. The Torah tells us that Adam and Eve were naked but were not ashamed, because when they engaged in intimacy they felt it was an activity which was as pure and spiritual as, for example, putting on Tefilin.
At the same time their spiritual palate would enjoy any physical pleasure on a very exalted level, as an expression of Torah teaching.
Eating from the Tree of Knowledge disturbed this idyllic situation. They still had some sensitivity to the spiritual, through their ‘spiritual’ palate. But the physical palate and all organs of sensation were now sensitive primarily to physical pleasure, with all its attendant complexities. Now they realised they were naked, and therefore subject to wayward physical desire. They were ashamed, and understood they needed to wear clothes.
This paradigm relates to the way each individual experiences the world. If there is a flow of ‘Da’at’, the inwardness of knowledge, from the mind to the heart, then the feelings we experience have the quality of selflessness. We tap their spiritual aspect, rather than merely the physical. This is a form of inner Redemption.
Thus a famous description of the time of the General Redemption, the advent of the Messiah, presents this in terms of Knowledge of G-d: “the world will be filled with knowledge of G-d as the waters cover the sea” (Isaiah 11:9). Purified knowledge means Redemption, whether on the individual or global level.
This leads the person to perceive the world in all its details as a constant expression of the Divine, and this means that even the physical experiences which the person encounters are understood in spiritual terms. He or she has regained the state of consciousness before the eating of the Tree of Knowledge. The quality of ‘Knowledge’ has been redeemed.
With the redemption from the power of the first of the Kings of Edom, Jacob is redeemed from all aspects of the power of Esau. The relationship of the Jewish people to the nations of the world, contemporary Edom, changes. There is now a world of peace, in which opposites can join, in harmony. All negative dimensions are not merely subjugated to the positive, they are transformed and become positive themselves.
Thus Jacob’s words to his father Yitzhak, when he was disguised as Esau, at last come true: “I am Esau your firstborn”. Esau, the firstborn, manifesting the powerful rule of the World of Chaos, truly becomes Jacob, the World of Tikkun. The Jewish people and the world are redeemed, and the world is filled with Knowledge of G-d, as the waters cover the sea.
