Kabbalah Keluaran 3:5: Zohar & Sha'arei Kedusha

The Shekinah does not gather him in, and he is driven to and fro about the world, but God has pity on him and bids his brother redeem him so that he may be set right by means of other dust.

We see that when bad character traits are embedded in a Jew, they obstruct him from fulfilling Torah and mitzvot. Even if he does fulfill them, it will not be for the sake of Heaven and they will be very burdensome to him. About such a person scripture states,⁴⁷Proverbs 11 “A golden ring in the snout of a pig,” because his impurity is still within him, vested within the Kelipot. This is as our sages, of blessed memory said,⁴⁸Talmud Bavli, Yoma 75 “If a person is meritorious, his Torah learning becomes a life-giving elixir. However, if he is not meritorious, it becomes fatally poisonous.” However, if a person rises up to overcome his evil inclination and battles against it, until through great effort he rids himself of his bad character traits, and thus truly fulfills Torah and mitzvot; he is called a “Perfect Tzaddik,” a “God Fearing Person” and a “Mighty Warrior who conquers his evil inclination.” Moreover, if a Jew advances in this, accustoming himself to it to an even greater degree, until he completely rids himself of all bad traits, to the point that his soul no longer lusts after them at all, and he acquires good traits to the point that they literally become natural to him, in that he no longer needs to battle against the evil inclination, since both his body and elemental soul have become thoroughly cleansed of all physical dross, as Sefer HaTikkunim comments⁴⁹Tikkunei Zohar, Tikun 31 and 48 on the verse,⁵⁰Exodus 3:5 “Take your shoes off your feet” in regard to Moshe; then the four letters of the Name HaShem-יהו"ה become invested in him and he becomes a holy seat for HaShem’s-יהו"ה chariot (Merkavah), blessed is He. Such a person is called a “Friend of HaShem-יהו"ה out of love.” He is called a “Perfect Chassid” – one who is perfect with every kind of perfection.

We thus find that there are various kinds of separating veils. There could be a separating veil between the vegetative soul (Nefesh HaTzomachat) and that which is above it, because of the blemish of having eaten forbidden foods, which gave vitality to his vegetative soul (Nefesh HaTzomachat). It could be because of bad character traits or sins that are motivated by lust that arouses and blemishes the animate soul (Nefesh HaChayah). If they are sins of speech, they blemish the speaking soul (Nefesh HaMedaberet) from which they stem, and if they are sins of thought, they blemish the intellectual soul (Nefesh HaSeechleet). Now, understand that as we already explained, all these blemishes are only in that particular spark of that particular soul, in each particular level of each particular world. At times, if the blemishes have become strengthened by force of habit, because of the above-mentioned separating veil, the bond of that soul can become cut off from the body of the tree, which is called, “the light of the source of the souls.” This is the inner meaning of what our sages, of blessed memory, stated,⁸⁶⁷Talmud Bavli, Brachot 18b “The wicked are called ‘dead’ even while they are alive.”