On Idols And The Creator

[Ms Tercy Lonan]

ON IDOLS AND THE CREATOR
Terah, Abraham’s father, sold statues of idols, and Abraham
did all he could to convince people not to buy them: “One
day his father had to leave on a trip, and he left his shop to
be looked after by Abraham, who was now grown.”
He gave his son the following instructions: “The larger
the size of the idol, the higher should be your asking price.
If an important person comes in, offer them a larger idol,
and to an unimportant customer offer a smaller idol.” With
these words, Terah departed.
Some time later, an impressive, broad-shouldered man
walked into the shop. “Give me a large idol, as befits my
standing!” he addressed the boy haughtily. Abraham handed
him the largest idol he could find on the shelf, and the man
took out a large sum of money from his purse.
“How old are you,” Abraham asked him.
“Fifty,” the man replied.
“And you’re not embarrassed to worship an idol that’s
only one day old?” Abraham asked. “My father only made
it yesterday!”
The man felt ashamed, took his money back and left the
shop.
An old woman came in. She said to the young shopkeeper
that thieves had come into her house at night and stolen all
her idols.
“Is that so,” Abraham said. “If your idols are unable to
protect themselves from burglars, why do you hope that they
will protect you?”
“You are right,” the woman admitted. “But whom else
shall I serve?”
“The Creator of the heavens and the earth, He who has
made me, and you, and all people,” Abraham answered.
The woman left the shop without buying anything.
Another woman came in, carrying with her a bowl filled
with flour as an offering to idols. Abraham took an axe and
shattered all the idols except for the biggest one. When Terah
returned and saw the destruction in his shop, he shouted,
“What happened here?”
“Why should I conceal the truth from you?” Abraham
answered. “While you were gone, a woman came in and
made an offering of flour to the idols. Every one of the idols
exclaimed that he wanted to eat it first. The biggest idol
grew angry, grabbed the axe, and shattered all the others.”


“What is this nonsense?” Terah asked angrily, “You know
as well as I do that idols don’t eat and don’t move, to say
nothing of fighting.”
“Is that right?” Abraham countered. “But if what you say
is true, why do you serve them?”
Here your Abraham springs into action. He begins to
explain to your other desires, great and small, men and
women, about the ego that rules over you. That is, the first
time Abraham is revealed in you, it is as a teacher. He says
to you the following: “The ego cannot protect you; it cannot
raise you or fulfill you. It cannot!”
What’s interesting here is that Abraham appeals to you,
an egoist, saying that your egoistic desires will never be
fulfilled. Or rather, he appeals to the ego to seek out new
ways to fulfill itself. The search for self-fulfillment is egoistic,
to be sure, but it is precisely this search that will bring you
to the Creator. Essentially, the ego willingly embarks on the
path of self-destruction.
The great Kabbalist, Baal HaSulam, says the same thing
when he explains how emptiness (lack of fulfillment) emerges
within man, who then begins to ask, “What do I live for?”
“What is the meaning of my life?” Though the questions are
egoistic, they end up bringing man to a new way of using his
desires, which is no longer egoistic. This is how the ego leads
itself toward the goal of its correct utilization.
Why and how does this happen inside you? It’s because
you are special in that the point in the heart has already
awakened within you. You have the quality of Bina, which
lives inside every one of us. Otherwise you wouldn’t be able
to grasp this material; you wouldn’t have gotten past the first


few pages of this book! It is this point of Bina that’s called
the “human” (Adam) within you.
So, the quality of Bina gradually begins to point at your
ego and tell you that you’re using it incorrectly. This is done
by the Abraham in you. “You aren’t working with your nature
correctly, so it cannot protect you or give you anything. It is
inanimate, like all of these idols, made simply out of clay.”
Let us return to the Midrash: “Abraham took an axe and
shattered all the idols except for the biggest one. When Terah
returned and saw the destruction in his shop, he shouted,
‘What happened here?’”
“Why should I conceal the truth from you?” Abraham
answered. “While you were gone, a woman came in and
made an offering of flour to the idols. Every one of the idols
exclaimed that he wanted to eat it first. The biggest idol
grew angry, grabbed the axe and shattered all the others into
many pieces.”
“What is this nonsense?” Terah asked angrily, “You know
as well as I do that the idols don’t eat and don’t move, to say
nothing of fighting.”
“Is that right?” Abraham countered. “But if what you say
is true, why do you serve them?”
The Terah inside you understands which idols he
worships. Let’s face it, you understand perfectly that you
deify the ego, which you can never fulfill. You understand
that these are inanimate desires, which means the Light
simply cannot enter them, since the Light’s very nature is
opposite to them. The Terah in you understands all this,
just as you understand that these desires dominate you and
you cannot escape them.


You also understand that Abraham is the degree that
follows Terah. And that is the most important thing to
understand. You understand that you are born an egoist,
and you already feel that the only way to defeat your nature
is to reveal the Abraham within, the Creator’s quality of
love, the desire to bestow.
There are two forces within you, battling one another.
One says that this is your world, everyone lives this way and
there’s no escaping it. It is how you were born, and so you
must continue to sell and buy “idols,” meaning use your
ego to receive pleasures, however shallow and transitory
they may be. Conversely, the other force is persuading you
that all this is a lie, that the whole world, which deifies the
ego—the pleasures and all these “idols” that have no divinity
to them because they are not connected in any way to the
Creator—is false and fictitious.
You don’t yet see that inside and behind every single
thing in this world stands the Creator, deliberately confusing
you. But you are ready to accept the degree of Abraham as
a more progressive degree; you understand that it will help
you make sense of everything.
It is written in the Midrash that the king ordered his
soldiers to find Abraham. Abraham and Terah show up
at the castle. “Nimrod sat on his throne.” Anyone who
approached the throne had to bow down before the king,
but when Abraham was led into the throne room, he
remained standing.
Nimrod is sitting on the throne because it’s your nature,
your “I,” your essence, which comes down to everything
working for your benefit, a foundation that appears
unshakable. But your Abraham doesn’t want to bow before
this ideology of exploiting others for self-gratification.


He admits that his nature is such that he desires pleasure.
However, he wishes to use this desire for the sake of others,
rather than for himself. He wishes to learn to bestow. And
you are with him. This marks your step-by-step breakaway
from the egoistic desire, which will later become an order
directly from the Creator: “Get thee out of thy country,”
which means to reject your egoistic desire. We will talk
about that later, but for now you are beginning to break
away from your ego. You no longer wish to receive any
egoistic pleasures.
Once you’ve achieved this goal by rising above your
nature, and have connected with your Abraham, a new and
far more complicated phase will begin, but no less necessary.
In it, you’ll need to reconnect with your ego, but with a
different intention. You will delight in bestowing to others.
For now there is an argument between your Abraham
and your Nimrod. According to the Midrash, Nimrod said,
“My rule extends over the sun, the moon and the stars!”
Abraham replied, “Every day the sun rises in the east and
sets in the west. Order the sun tomorrow to rise in the west
and set in the east… or [if you are all-powerful] grant me
another request. Tell me what I’m thinking right now and
what I’m planning on doing.” Finally, Abraham concluded
in the presence of all the nobles: “You are no god!”
“Guards!” Nimrod cried out, “put this rebel in prison at
once!”
What’s happening here is that your Abraham wants to
show your Nimrod that your ego controls neither itself nor
Nature. For all of its confidence in being a god, it knows not
the forces that govern it.


We think we are in control because we exist in a state of
concealment. Think back to who you were only a little while
ago. Didn’t you think that you were in complete control,
autonomous and free to make your choices? Now Abraham
is exposing this delusion, making it clear that you have no
control over your actions or fate. Indeed, this is a revelation
for your Nimrod.
It follows that without Abraham it is impossible to
see your true limitations. And this discovery is far from
pleasant.