Technical Writing and Kabbalah

Now that I am back on the Kabbalah and Chassidut band wagon (at least for a little bit), I want to share an idea regarding my two careers: Rabbinics and Technical Writing. I am going to boldly go where no human has gone before. I have already done the Google search and behold - this is the first piece on the ENTIRE Internet that attempts to combine Technical Writing and Kabbalah. Folks, do not try this at home - I am a highly trained professional.

The picture that you see before you is a humble CAT-5 cable. It contains 8 individual wires which are twisted together and then covered to form one fairly thick cable. In layman's terms a CAT-5 cable is capable of transmitting speeds up to 100 Megabits per second. There are other types of cables that are slower than a CAT-5 cable, and some that are faster. In more scientific terms used by us Technical Writers, a CAT-5 wire transmits data "in the blink of an eye." A CAT-4 cable is a little slower (has smaller bandwidth) and can only transmit data "in three blinks of an eye." CAT-6 cable can transmit data even faster, "in the wink of an eye." And then there are fiber optic cables which are so fast that they use, "pre-wink data transfer protocol." (PWDTP for short) I apologize for all of that technical mumbo-jumbo, but it is an necessary part of the trade. The bottom line is, almost all of you probably use CAT-5 cable to connect to the Internet so that you can receive spam and watch YouTube at blindingly fast speeds.

Kabbalistically speaking, each of us has a connection to HaShem and it transmits the impact of our mitzvot and aveirot to the higher worlds. You can think of this connection as a network cable. If your connection with HaShem is a CAT-5 cable, then that defines how much you are able to affect the higher worlds. The greater the bandwidth of your connection with HaShem, the greater impact that you can have on these worlds. To carry this metaphor farther than it should be carried, let's pretend that you have a connection to HaShem that is comparable to a CAT-4 cable. Every time you do a mitzvah or an aveirah, that CAT-4 cable transmits that mitzvah or aveirah to the higher worlds. Your impact on the higher worlds is limited by the bandwidth of your connection with HaShem. Thus, if you do teshuvah and improve yourself, you can create a stronger connection to HaShem and "upgrade" to a CAT-5 cable. According to this משל, the Tzaddikim in this world would have a fiber optic connection to HaShem. Not only does would this connection give them a special relationship with HaShem, but according to the stories, it would even allow them to affect miraculous changes in this world.

One final word about fiber optic Jews - according to Chassidut and Kabbalah, doing mitzvot and learning Torah are not enough to "upgrade" your connection to HaShem. Torah and mitzvot are the "data" that are transmitted across your connection. Only by learning Kabbalah and Chassidut can you learn how to "upgrade" your connection with HaShem.