This is what the prophet Yeshaya said regarding the time of Exile, (and this verse was established to be recited in the Tikun Chatzos prayer): “Why Hashem do You allow us to stray from Your paths, and harden our heart from being able to fear You, return for the sake of Your servants, the Shevatim who are Your heritage.” (Yeshaya 63:17)
Explanation: The meaning of “Your paths” is a reference to the aspect of Avraham, which is the path of the love of Hashem, as it says: “He [Avraham] travelled continually towards the ‘south.’” (Bereishis 12:9)
As illustrated, if a person is facing east, then north-צפון is on his left, and south-דרום is on his right. Since the right side corresponds to Chesed-Kindness, so south also corresponds to Kindness, which is an expression of love, in this case, the love of Hashem. Thus, Avraham travelled continually towards a higher level of love of Hashem. It is this path of attaining love of Hashem that the verse is referring to.
The meaning of “from the fear of You,” is the aspect of Yitzchok, who embodied the fear of Hashem.
The prophet Yeshaya complains to Hashem: “Why do you let us stray from Your paths, and harden our hearts” from experiencing the aspects of Avraham and Yitzchok, the love and fear of Hashem, distancing us from perceiving the Light of Hashem’s Countenance, and instead we causing us to be in the Exile of “Edom,” meaning excess emotional attachment to worldly matters?
Nonetheless, through the fact that the revelation manifest in the forefathers descends by way of the intermediary level of the Shevatim, this revelation can reach the soul of every Jew. The implication is that we are asking: Why are we blocked off from even the revelation through the Shevatim in the time of Exile, to the point that our love and fear is for physical matters instead for Hashem?
Thus, the meaning of “return for the sake of Your servants, the Shevatim who are Your heritage!” is as follows: We ask Hashem to return His revelation to us, so that we should some level of love and fear of him, and this is possible by bringing down His revelation through the souls of the Shevatim so that it can reach us on our level.
This can be compared to an electrical current transformer, that reduces the intensity of the electrical current, so that the resulting current can be used to power household devices. The transformer can receive a high voltage current but give off a low voltage current. Similarly, the angels of the Merkava of Beriah and the souls of the Shevatim are able to receive the attributes of Love, Fear, and Mercy from Malchus of Atzilus and reduce the intensity to a level that an average Jewish person can handle. (The difference between these angels and the Shevatim is that angels receive a more external aspect of the revelation of Malchus of Atzilus, whereas the Shevatim receive the inner aspect of the revelation of Malchus of Atzilus, a much deeper level.)
