Habit Becomes Second Nature

Through accustoming oneself to something, that thing becomes second nature for that person. Hence, there is nothing in the world that one cannot feel its existence. This means that although one has no sensation of the thing, by accustoming to that thing, one can still come to feel it.

We must know that there is a difference between the Creator and the creatures regarding sensations. For the creatures, there is the feeler and the felt, the attaining and the attained. This means that we have a feeler, which is connected to some reality.

However, a reality without a feeler is only the Creator Himself. In Him, “there is no thought and perception whatsoever.” This is not so with a person: his whole existence is only through the sensation of reality, and even the validity of reality is evaluated only with respect to the one who senses the reality.

In other words, what the feeler tastes is what he considers true. If one tastes a bitter taste in reality, meaning he feels bad in the state he is in, and suffers because of that state, that person is considered wicked, in the work. This is because he condemns the Creator, since the Creator is called “the good who does good,” because He bestows only goodness to the world. Yet, with respect to that person’s feeling, the person feels that he has received the opposite from the Creator, meaning the state he is in is bad.

We should therefore understand what is written (Berachot p 61), “The world was created only for complete righteous or complete wicked.” This means the following: either one tastes and feels a good taste in the world, and then one justifies the Creator and says that the Creator gives only goodness to the world, or, if one feels and tastes a bitter taste in the world, then one is wicked, since he condemns the Creator.

It turns out that everything is measured according to one’s own sensation. However, all these sensations have no relation to the Creator, as it written in the Poem of Unification: “As she, so you will always be, shortage and surplus in you will not be.” Hence, all the worlds and all the changes are only with respect to the receivers, according to the attaining individual.