Fixing Your Fire [Honor] - 013 Higher Honor – The Root of Change

1. Fire-of-Fire: Higher Honor

With siyata d’shmaya, we continue here to discuss honor, which stems from the element of fire. In this chapter, we are up to discussing the particular kind of honor which stems from earth-of-fire-of-fire.

Fire rises higher, and “fire”-of-fire refers to a yearning to keep going higher. With regards to honor, it will manifest as a desire to experience more and more honor. However, it is not simply a desire to receive more honor, in quantity – rather, it is a desire to keep experiencing a higher quality kind of honor. This is a desire in the soul to experience higher kinds of honor, as opposed to a person who simply wants to be honored on all fronts.

2. Earth-of-Fire-of-Fire: A Desire To Be Honored In A Particular Manner

“Earth”-of-fire-of-fire is when a person has certain boundaries of how he wants to be honored, at the level that he wants it to be. He will want more of that honor, but only if it is the kind of honor he wants, because there is a certain line he will not cross.

For example, there are people who wish for others to honor them, but they will only want to receive certain, specific kinds of honor. They don’t necessarily want to be honored by prestigious individuals - they just want honor in the way they want it. They have their limits of how much they want to receive honor. They will want to receive more and more of the kind of honor that they want to receive, and they will not just run after any honor, but only the “higher” kind of honor that they desire - and that is the boundary of how far they will go to get honor.

But there is also a deeper understanding of this.

3. Breaking Boundaries – The Essence of Honor

Honor is a force that breaks boundaries [see Chapter 7], for it is a revelation of the upper realms within the lower realms, and therefore honor by its very essence is a trait that breaks boundaries. Fire-of-fire is when a person wants to go higher and higher, and in doing so, he breaks boundaries. Fire’s nature of constant ascension is the root of the trait of conceit (gaavah), whereas fire’s aspect of breaking boundaries is the root of the trait of honor (kavod). The idea of breaking boundaries is therefore not a branch of being conceited, but an aspect of pursuing honor.

Thus, fire-of-fire, the nature to break boundaries, is at the very essence of honor. Earth-of-fire-of-fire provides a boundary for this fire-of-fire and limits it - but this will not stop the essence of fire-of-fire which seeks to break boundaries. In the coming chapters, when we will discuss the “wind” and “fire” aspects within fire-of-fire, we will learn about an unbridled kind of fire-of-fire, which has no “earth” to stabilize it and place limits on it.

With earth-of-fire-of-fire, we can learn much about the nature of all the middos (character traits) and how the middos cross their proper boundaries [which is what we recognize as “bad middos”]. The idea of breaking boundaries is found in the very idea of pursuing honor – in particular, in honor that stems from fire-of-fire. In “earth”-of-fire-of-fire, the fire-of-fire is restrained on some level by an aspect of “earth”, but it will still break bounds.

4. The Deep Roots of Bad Middos

Based upon the above, let’s proceed to understand the following.

Every person has his bad middos, which stay with him throughout his life. What is the root of bad middos?

There are several parts to this matter.

4a) The “Kings of Edom” - The earliest root of bad middos is depicted in the words of a Midrash about the “kings of Edom” who ruled before the creation of this world. These “kings of Edom” are the roots of all evil, as explained in sefarim hakedoshim.

When Hashem had the first thought to create the Jewish people before creating the world, the bad middos rooted in the kings of Edom were already in place, and every Jew’s soul received some of these bad middos differently. Part of a person’s self-work is to uproot the bad middos that have become part of his soul makeup [which will be referred to here as the negative character traits that have become of one’s “soul root”], which came from the “kings of Edom” that preceded Creation, and for this reason, each person has a unique self-work when it comes to his middos.

4b) The Eitz HaDaas - In addition to this factor, every soul was once part of Adam’s soul, and once Adam sinned by eating of the Eitz HaDaas Tov V’Ra (the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil) which was a mixture of good and evil, the bad middos in every soul expanded, becoming an even more complex presence in the soul.

For this reason, every soul that is reincarnated throughout several lifetimes contains these two roots of bad middos: the bad middos that it inherited since before creation, and the evil which latched onto it ever since the sin of Adam.

4c) Previous Lifetimes – In addition to the above two factors, for every lifetime that the soul goes through on this world, it has accumulated more and more of this evil, until its current lifetime today.

Thus, there are three general parts to the bad middos found in every soul. There is the evil it inherited from a point that was before Creation, the evil it inherited from the sin of Adam when he ate from the Eitz HaDaas, and all of the evil that has piled up from each of the lifetimes that the soul has gone through.

5. Fire-of-Fire: The Power To Change Middos

We can now reflect about the following.

Each person’s soul has a certain “boundary” placed on his particular bad middos, at their root. However, a person can either enlarge or lessen this “boundary” – he can change it.

Although these are two opposite abilities, they are both rooted in the same idea: the fact that a bad middah can be changed. What is the root force that can change a middah? It is essentially the particular kind of honor which stems from fire-of-fire, which breaks bounds.

The word “middos” is from the word medidah, “measurement”, because the middos are each limited and within certain boundaries. What is the idea of breaking those boundaries?

One way how the boundaries of the middos are broken is through the power of “medameh”, the imagination, which is also related to the word “middah”. The medameh\imagination can expand the bounds of a middah, and that is one way of how the bounds of a middah are crossed. Another force which can break bounds stems from within the middos themselves – the trait of honor; in particular, honor that stems from fire-of-fire.

Medameh\imagination does not stem from within the middos, whereas honor (fire-of-fire) does, and it is a force that breaks the boundaries of the middos from within the middos themselves.

In honor, we can see how there is a character trait that can break its own bounds. It can ‘break’ the bounds of a character trait either through enlarging the boundary\limitation placed upon one’s middos, or it can ‘break’ the boundary of the character trait by lessening the boundary\limitation placed upon that particular character trait.

6. Using “Fire-of-Fire” – The Power To Change Limitations – As A Way To Fix Our Middos

Based upon the above, we can now proceed to understand the following.

The root of our task to improve our middos is not to work with the middos directly. This is because middos are not just middos per se. Rather, Hashem has made it that middos can be changed, and it is honor\fire-of-fire which is the root of this change. Thus, the root of working on our middos is the power we are describing here: fire-of-fire, which can change middos.

7. The Three Areas of Character Improvement

We can now understand a root, fundamental aspect in all of our inner avodah.

The power to enlarge the boundaries\limitations of any of the middos began with the sin of Adam. Chazal state that when Adam ate from the Eitz HaDaas, he said, “I ate, and I will eat again.” In other words, he continued to want to go past his limits. Every soul in this lifetime as well has this nature of “I will eat again”. Before Creation, there was the raw state of our middos, which contained evil that were inherited from the kings of Edom. After the sin of Adam, an additional aspect of evil entered the soul, of breaking bounds. Every lifetime of the soul since then has seen additional aspects of evil which were added onto it. In any case, however, a middah can be changed.

To improve a middah at its very essence, in its raw state, can only be worked upon if a person accesses the root of the soul.

Most people cannot work on their middos on a foundational level even if their current lifetime, but the truth is that there are three stages of middos, as we have explained here, and one needs to work on all of them: (1) The bad middos found at the soul root of a person, (2) The bad middos which entered the soul after the sin of Adam, and (3) The bad middos which have been accumulated on his soul throughout all lifetimes.

8. The Depth of Character Improvement

That is why working on middos is such a massive task, and this concept is not known to most people. We are describing here the essence of all bad middos. When a person is not clear of the difference between the bad middos of his soul root and the bad middos that became added onto him since the sin of Adam, he won’t be clear of what his avodah is, with regards to working on his middos.

If a person only has a superficial perspective, he will not care what the difference is. But there is a vast difference between these two groups of bad middos in the soul. There is the bad middah itself, and there is the “expanded” version of the bad middah, which became added onto the soul later, after the sin of Adam. If a person only removes the “expanded” version of the bad middah, he doesn’t succeed in removing the bad middah itself, at its essence.

We are dealing here with a concept that pertains to the roots of all our avodah, and although these are very deep and subtle words, we should learn about it at least on an intellectual level, so that we can have a better understanding of our task in working on our middos, at least once in our life.

The difference between the task of working on our root bad middah, with working on the “expanded version” of the root bad middah which only came later upon our soul, is as follows.

9. Three Models of the Stages of Character Improvement

There are several different terminologies that describe our avodah with regards to fixing our middos.

According to one model, our avodah is divided between two levels – is-kafya (forcing), and is-hap-c’ha (transforming).[1] In different terminology, these two concepts are divided between three stages – hachna’ah (subjugation), havdalah (separation), and hamtakah (sweetening).[2] In a third terminology, these three stages are called “kevishah” (conquering) and “tikun” (rectification) of the middos.[3] That terminology is used by Reb Yisrael Salanter[4], and that is the terminology we will use here.

10. “Conquering” and “Rectifying” a Negative Character Trait

The power to “conquer” a bad middah is when the essence of the bad middah remains as it is, but a person controls it and tames it, putting restraint on it. The negative character trait is still there in a potential state, but the person has it under control, so that isn’t causing problematic behavior. He has self-control over the bad middah - even though it is still there. A deeper level than this is to be able to “rectify” the middah, to transform it from an evil trait to a good trait.

Reb Yisrael Salanter says that in youth, a person has these two abilities, to “conquer” and “rectify” a bad trait, but in old age, a person no longer has the task to “conquer” the bad middah, but to “rectify” the bad middah. He explained that this is because when a person is younger, he is more energetic and therefore he has more self-control over himself, so that is the time to engage in “conquering” the bad character traits.

Understandably, this is only true for someone who works on himself to uncover this power. But, relatively speaking, when a person is more energetic, he has stronger self-control over his character. With old age, a person has less self-control over his character, and the traits which he had control over when he was younger will now come out in full force, in old age.

Why does is suddenly explode outward? The middah remained as it was all along. It has only been restrained until now, and now that the person can’t restrain himself as much, the bad middah breaks out again in full force. But if someone already reached the stage of “tikkun” on his middos, he has fixed the middah at its root, and he has transformed it from bad to good, so when old age arrives, it remains fixed. That is why tikun hamiddos in old age is more difficult, because it involves hamtakah\tikun of the middos (for one who reaches this stage in old age).

11) It Is Easier To Improve “Extended” Negative Character Traits Then To Improve The Negative Character Traits of the Soul’s Root

To understand this deeply – I will repeat and emphasize that this is one of the deepest points to know about the task of working on middos – we mentioned that there are two different kinds of middos to improve. There is one kind of inner work in which we can improve a bad middah at its root, and there is a separate work to improve the additional aspects of evil that have been added onto the soul.

These are two totally different kinds of inner work. It is much easier to separate from evil that has become attached to the soul which was not part of the original soul makeup of the person, because this evil was not always a part of one’s soul and therefore it is somewhat less difficult to remove. This is not to say that it’s easy, of course, but it is far less difficult than working to improve the bad middah that has always been a part of one’s soul root.

The negative middah itself, which has always been part of one’s soul root, is part of one’s unique task on this world. It is part of his unique soul root, and he has received specific negative traits to fix, and this “package” that he has received has been turned into a part of his very being, as it were. The truth is that this only relative, because if one has reached deeper parts in himself than his “middos”, his root negative characters are not a part of his being. But since we exist on the plane of “the world of middos”, the root negative character traits in oneself are perceived as part of one’s very being. That is why it is very, very difficult to remove these negative traits.

It is therefore possible that a person is heavily involved in character improvement, but he is unaware of the concepts here and therefore he does not recognize the design of his soul properly – and then what will happen? He will very likely be working only to improve the “additional” negative character traits which have accumulated on his soul, but he is not working with the root negative character trait, which is the main part of his inner work.

The inner way to live life and to fulfill one’s personal duty on this world is to reach one’s root negative trait, the very core and essence of the negative middah itself, and this is the main aspect of one’s duty on this world to change his character, which he must work hard at. One who is not dealing with this part in himself is not really working with the core of his negative character traits, only with additional aspects in his character, which do not represent his main inner work on this world.

12. How “Higher Honor” is the Root of Change

Based upon the above, let’s understand the following.

The power to change a negative trait (which we have described here as the power to break a boundary\limitation) includes the additional aspects of evil which have accumulated upon the soul (as mentioned earlier, there are three stages of the negative character traits: the raw state of the soul, the evil that came upon the soul after the sin with the Eitz HaDaas, and the evil that has accumulated upon the soul from all of its lifetimes). As explained, these aspects of evil can all be conquered through using the power to break bounds, the honor that stems from fire-of-fire. The power to change\break bounds can either enlarge or lessen the bound.

This is where the depth of life lays in. It is explained in Igros Ramchal that the purpose of the entire Creation, and man’s personal task in his lifetime, is to recognize the truth of the Creator’s existence. The power to change one’s middos is really through the power of honor. Honor is a force that descends from the upper, Heavenly realms onto the lower realms. That is why honor can change things on the lower realm - because it comes from a higher realm.

As an example, Chazal state that the evil inclination of man gets stronger every day and wants to destroy him, and if not for Hashem’s help, man cannot overcome it.[5] How indeed does Hashem help a person overcome it? Simply speaking, it is siyata d’shmaya (assistance from Heaven). True, but how does this siyata d’shmaya work? One of the fundamental ways of understanding this is through the revelation of honor in one’s soul. The honor, which comes from a higher realm, can change one’s reality on this lower realm.

This is depth of honoring parents. When the son honors the father, this can change the spiritual level of the son, allowing all of the father’s chinuch (education) to have a positive result on the son. If the son does not honor the father, the father’s chinuch on his son cannot have a full effect on the son, and the son won’t be able to gain from it. The father needs to sometimes punish the child because in that way, the child is enabled to honor the father and accept his as authority, and through this honor, the father’s chinuch on the child can then have a positive effect on the child.

This is also the depth of honoring one’s rebbi, who teaches the student and who brings him to eternal life in the World To Come. Through honoring the rebbi, one is brought to the Torah, which is also called kavod\honor. Torah scholars are also called kavod. Through honoring the level that is above you (parent or teacher), you receive a power from a higher realm that is now exposed within you, and herein lays the depth of changing one’s middos.

13. The Root Perspective of Approaching Character Improvement

If you understand what we are implying here, it brings a huge overhaul to how you view working on your middos.

Usually when people want to work on their middos, they will want to work on uprooting their anger, or their lustful desires, or their conceitedness, etc. If you recognize anyone who tries to do this, you know that they almost never succeed at uprooting the negative trait, and they can barely even fight it at all. This is because we cannot transform a negative character trait if we do not receive a power from the higher realm for this.

Perhaps we can fight or conquer the negative trait, because we can all attain some level of self-control (and this, too, requires siyata d’shmaya). But we cannot rectify\overturn a negative trait totally unless we receive the power to change a trait. The power to change oneself does not come from persistently trying to improve oneself, like water dripping on a rock. That is not how it works. Real, permanent change only comes from receiving a power from a higher realm.

The Rambam describes all of the middos as “Hilchos De’os”, because the inner essence behind all of the middos is de’os, “perspectives.” Each of the de’os is a revelation of the “honor” of one’s holy intellect (for the holy intellect is the intellect of the Torah, and Torah is called kavod\honor), which descends into the heart (and the numerical value of the Hebrew word for heart, lev, is kavod).

The power to change the inner essence of middos is not simply through trying to use our mind to control our emotions, which is a war of conquering and fighting the negative character traits. That is needed too, but the final stage of overcoming negative character traits is tikun\rectifying, or hamtakah\sweetening, which is only possible through receiving a power from the higher realm, which can change the lower realm. The power to change one’s inner character, from within, is through the revelation of the “higher honor” – the holy intellect of the Torah.

14. Studying the Wisdom of the Middos vs. Actively Trying to Uproot Them

Therefore, we can understand that there is an awesome depth contained in our inner work of improving our middos.

If you look at most of the statements of our Sages and our holy sefarim about middos, you will see that most of it does not deal with how to actively overcome the middos – rather, their words are mainly dealing with a conceptual definition of each of the middos; from that understanding, one is then able to work on improving his middos. They first studied the definition of the particular middah and from there, they could settle the matter upon their hearts and thereby overturn\rectify the middah. (This was not the approach in every single case, but it is the approach in most of their words).

You can see this apparent in sefer Nesivos Olam of the Maharal, which describes the definition of each of the middos, and the purpose of this approach is to first study the intellectual definition of the middah and then internalize the knowledge upon the heart. But even in other works of our leaders, such as sefer Mesillas Yesharim, where this is not as apparent to the untrained eye, this is also the approach. The Mesillas Yesharim is providing the inner definitions behind the middos, and when a person studies them well, he can thereby change his middos. Reb Yeruchem Levovitz and others said that sefer Mesillas Yesharim contains all of the Ramchal’s secret wisdom of the Torah. Thus, sefer Mesillas Yesharim is really a sefer about a certain chochmah, a deep wisdom, and studying this wisdom leads to change in one’s character.

15. Becoming Aware To The Concept of Higher Honor – And Its Importance

Here we are explaining that the depth behind all change is contained in the particular kind of honor which stems from “fire-of-fire”, the power that breaks bounds. When this power is used for evil, a person will continuously pursue honor and prestige from honorable individuals. But this power is used for holiness when one uses it to rectify his character traits, for the entire power to change one’s middos is through revealing a power from a higher realm within the reality of this lower realm.

We really cannot change our middos based on any of the powers found on this lower realm. All change can only be enabled through a power from above. We cannot change simply from within our own power to do so. Rather, we can only change when we receive a power from above, from a higher realm. The ability to change our middos therefore is not possible from within the middos themselves. The power that can change the middos is through the concept of honor of fire-of-fire which we have explained here. Upon understanding this, we can now realize that in order to change our middos, we first need to open our souls to what the concept of honor is.

When a person remains at a superficial level, he may attempt to reach his personal duty on this world through simply studying Gemara and through learning halachah. But when one has the deeper perspective, from studying the words of our Sages about these matters, he is aware that recognizing the glory of Hashem on this world is the central aspect of life. (On a deeper level, there is the very essence (atzmiyus) of Hashem, which is above His kavod\glory).

The concept of the kavod\glory of Hashem is at the very core of character improvement and inner work. On the highest level, one recognizes the glory of Hashem on the world, and on a personal level, one understands that this higher honor can change his own character.

Thus, the way to go about our inner work is not through simply recognizing our individual middos as they are, but through recognizing and studying the definition of the root of middos – which is essentially the “higher honor” that descends from the higher realm onto our lower realm. The more a person connects to the concept of recognizing the glory of Hashem on this world, and through connecting to the concept of higher honor as the root power that can change his middos on a core level – he receives the deep power which can change his middos on a very deep level.

The more a person expands his mind [through the study of Torah] and he becomes more aware of what “higher honor” is and its role in his life, he will be able to have more control over the emotions in his heart, for as mentioned earlier, the numerical value of the Hebrew word for “heart”, “lev”, is “kavod”, honor.

16. Higher Honor Is The Design of Creation - Therefore It Is The Root Power That Enables Change

To most people who read and hear this, these words will seem like a closed riddle. They will wonder: What is the connection between the avodah of recognizing the concept of higher kavod\honor, with our avodah of changing our middos? What do these two concepts have to do with each other?

However, for this, we can turn to the verse, “All has been created in My Name, and for My glory, I created it.” Thus, the very “blood” that runs throughout the design of Creation is the honor that results from the Creation. That is why anything in this Creation can only be changed from the “honor” that results from it.

From a superficial perspective, all we see is many different negative middos which need to be changed, and we do not see how the concept kavod contains the key to changing all of the middos. But when we understand more about the depth of the design of our life, since “All has been created in My Name, and for My glory”, all of this Creation must result in “honor”, and this is also the reason why the very neshamah (soul) of all of Creation is defined as the kavod\honor in Creation.

Therefore, it is only kavod (higher honor) which can change anything, for everything in Creation is for the purpose of revealing the higher kavod of Hashem’s glory upon the Creation. This higher kavod is what moves all of Creation, and that is why kavod is the power that can change everything.

17. In Conclusion

Thus, in summary, in order to simply fight and overcome negative traits, we can do this by working with our middos directly, but if we want to overturn\rectify\sweeten the negative traits, we can only do so through accessing the soul’s power of higher kavod\honor.

We explained that this is used on an evil level when one uses the “fire-of-fire” in his soul, which we have begun to explain about in this chapter, and this is somewhat restrained by the “earth” aspect of fire-of-fire. But when we use this power on a holy level, it is the ability to change all of our middos, for it is the very inner essence behind all of the middos, and it is the core reason of how they are rectified.