The Sefirot
– God emanates ten vessels through which the world is created, called sefirot, which are both part of God and created by God. These vessels are channels of light or water, and they also are light. They are God and of God, but they cannot define God or limit God – what is truly God is wholly beyond these descriptions, beyond the first sefirah, called Keter or crown, denoted by the term Ein Sof – without limit, without end.
Other Words for the Sefirot include: ma'amarot (Sefer Bahir), d'rag or darga, plur. d'ragin (Zohar), midot (measures – Nachmanides). They are vessels to receive light from the perspective of what is above them (i.e. Binah or understanding is a vessel receiving light from Chokhmah or wisdom), and they are light pouring into the vessels from the perspective of what is below them. A (secular) technical term for how they function is that they are "hypostases" (sing. "hypostasis") – that is, abstract concepts imagined as beings or as parts of a reality that is more real than the physical world around us.
The Order of the Sefirot – the ten Sefirot are ordered from top to bottom and right to left in the most common depiction of the Tree of Life. They are in triads: Keter-Chokhmah-Binah, Chesed-Gevurah-Tif'eret, Netsach-Hod-Yesod, Malkhut (see Structure below. Each of the Sefirot contains all the others in its own structure.
Their names, from the highest to the most manifest, mean: Keter Crown, Chokhmah Wisdom, Binah Understanding, Chesed Lovingkindness (or Gedulah Expansiveness), Gevurah Might (Din Judgment), Tif'eret Beauty (also called Rachamim Compassion in very old texts), Netsach Victory or Eternity, Hod Majesty, Yesod Foundation, and Malkhut Kingdom (Shekhinah, the Indwelling Presence of God, also called Atarah Crown in older texts). It is no accident that the name for the first and the last are synonyms - for as Sefer Yetsirah teaches: "their end is wedged in their beginning".
The Structure of the Sefirot – for the Zohar, an essential aspect of this world is that the Sefirot are emanated in the form of a Mishkal or balance scale, with a center, right and left, which can be imagined as the form of the triangle or triad. This allowed each Sefirah to share the force of creation with those around it, so that none would shatter because of the influx of God's energy. The triads were: Keter Chokhmah Binah, Chesed G'vurah Tif'eret, Netsach Hod Yesod. Later Kabbalists emphasized different ways of organizing the Sefirot.
Moshe Cordovero (the Rama"k) emphasized the four worlds, which organize the Sefirot into these levels: Atsilut – emanation (Keter plus Chokhmah); B'riyah – creation/creating (Binah); Y'tsirah – formation/forming (Tif'eret plus the five 'limbs' of Tif'eret—Chesed-Gevurah-Netsach-Hod-Yesod—making a total of six k'tsavot or directions); and 'Asiyah – making or doing (Malkhut). The levels also correspond to the letters of the name of God, YHVH, with the very tip of the letter Yod pointing to what is beyond Keter.
In the view of Lurianic Kabbalah (the Ari), the Sefirot were re-organized after they broke in the previous creation to become the Partsufim, faces or persons: Atika Kadisha – Holy Ancient One, Arikh Anpin Long Face (both of these are aspects of Keter), Aba – Father (Chokhmah), Ima – Mother (Binah), Z'eir Anpin– Short Face (Tif'eret plus the five, son or the lower masculine) and Nukva – Female (Malkhut, daughter or the lower feminine).
While Chasidut drew on all of these pictures and systems, most Chasidic rebbes emphasized two dynamics within the Sefirot: 1) the drive toward unification of Tif'eret and Malkhut, and 2) shifting of the balance of the cosmos from G'vurah toward Chesed.
The Image of God in the Body – everything is created through the Sefirot and in the shape or configuration of the Sefirot. This includes especially the human body – it is because we are such a clear representation of the Sefirot that we are said to be in God's image. The soul and the body are both images of God – in this respect Kabbalah also rejected pre-Kabbalistic philosophy, which taught that the soul or mind was the image of God within the human being, and not the body.
The body as a whole represents the structure of the Sefirot: the three brains = Keter-Chokhmah-Binah, also the crown of the head and the two eyes; the two arms and the torso = Chesed-Gevurah-Tiferet; the two legs and the genitals = Netsach-Hod-Yesod, and Malkhut/Shekhinah, the feminine, often seen as companion to the (male) body delineated above, like the earth or moon to the sun, but also as the culmination of the genitals (actually described in some texts as the glans or clitoris). Each part of the body is also an image of the Sefirot – e.g. for the face we have: place of the tefilin or perhaps crown chakra as Keter; right eye as Chokhmah; left eye – Binah; nose – Tif'eret; nostrils or ears – Netsach and Hod; tongue – Yesod; mouth – Malkhut.
The Image of God Beyond the Body – Other dimensions or beings in the physical world also reflect this image or structure – including fruit trees, birds, the colors of the rainbow. Since the image of God is sometimes called the secret or mystery (Sod or Raza), the chariot, or the name YHVH – and so sometimes we find a statement that a certain thing exists in or through "the secret of the name YHVH" or "the mystery of the chariot".
