Chasidut zu Schemot 24:11

Here is the difference [between holy objects and the spirit of prophecy]: Regarding the commandments, even one who does not perceive, but merely believes in, their holiness, and performs the commandments because God has so commanded, has fulfilled the commandment (for the essential thing is in the performance, and indeed he has performed them). This is not the case when it comes to prophecy. For God’s intent when it comes to prophecy was that the person should perceive, and that there should be no separation between him and God. ‘And they beheld God.’²²⁶Exodus 24:11. As a function of consciousness, prophecy must be actively and consciously experienced. If the prophet is unaware of what he is experiencing, the separation between the holy and material remains. Thus, it is only when one sees his Father opposite him and He is not again hidden from him thereafter, that the Father’s will is satisfied. This is why the prophets other than the forty-eight were required for each generation.²²⁷The function of the forty-eight prophets was to act as conduits of divinity, illuminating the material world with divine light. It is this function which R. Shapiro will claim is still necessary and to be performed by those who reach the avodah of the prophetic level—the kabbalists and the true hasidim.

Due to our sins, we no longer have prophets to prepare our generations and we, alongside the world of Asiyah, have descended, and have become further despised within enclothment and concealments, especially after the Destruction, as we cited above the end of the first chapter from Etz Hayyim, on the verse ‘He threw from heaven to earth…”²⁶⁴See above, end of Chapter 1: A. We thus find that the words of the prophets are closed up in in the world of Asiyah. They themselves struggled mightily to draw the illumination of holiness to Asiyah so there too the naked, supernal light should be visible, till their entire generation was prepared by their efforts to see it. Just as Moses, the greatest of the prophets, went up to heaven and brought down the written Torah, the greatest source of light and holiness, to Asiyah. His generation and those after saw supernal lights in Torah and in the world, in the sense of “and they beheld God.”²⁶⁵Exodus 24:11. But now that we do not have those to prepare us as such, we find the light of their prophecy where they left it, in Asiyah, but enclothed and closed, without the light being seen as it is. (All we see is) chastisement on observing the sabbath and idolatry, on justice etc. We see in them only Asiyah [except for the person who arises and prepares himself].²⁶⁶This parenthetical aside is significant. R. Shapiro claims here that there is another way to see the light: self-work. This resonates with his introductory letter to Hovat haTalmidim, when he notes that nowadays, children have to be taught to see themselves as their own teachers.

The second universe is atzilus. Atzilus means “next to,” “noble,” and “emanated or given off.” This world is “next to” God; it is the first light that God gave off. An atzil is a nobleman;¹⁷⁴See further Exod. 24:11, Ve-el atzilei bnei Yisrael, “And to the noblemen of the Children of Israel….” he has power and importance because of his proximity to the king. Similarly, this universe is next to the King of Kings and that is where its importance stems from.

A different explanation of Asher’s blessing; the highest ‎achievement a G’d-serving person can look forward to is to be ‎granted the privilege to contemplate G’d’s greatness visually, i.e. ‎with his mind’s eye. [This editor is reminded of Exodus 24,11 ‎where the spiritual nobility of the Jewish people are described as ‎ויחזו את האלוקים‎, ‘they experienced as intense a revelation of G’d as ‎if they had seen Him with their eyes.’” (my translation) Ed.] It is ‎our experience in life that however powerful and overwhelming ‎an experience we are privy to, this will gradually pale into relative ‎insignificance when we experience that same phenomenon again ‎and again. [The example I quoted illustrates this; ‎according to our sages, seeing that Nadav and Avihu, based on the ‎Torah’s description in Exodus 24, continued their “business as ‎usual” daily routine in spite of having been privileged to witness ‎such revelations. Ed.]‎