In the Torah (Bereishit 2:16 and 2:17) we read: ‘and the Lord G-d commanded man, saying ‘Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat, but of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil you shall not eat it, for on the day that you eat thereof, you shall surely die.’
But when the Serpent talked to Eve about the eating the forbidden fruit he said: (Bereishit 3:4) ‘you will surely not die.’
From the Torah we know that after having eaten the forbidden fruit Adam lived 930 years. Here there is an obvious contradiction which forced the sages to come up with two explanations.
- The first explanation interpreted the passage ‘you shall surely die, as ‘you become mortal’.
- The second explanation was that 1,000 years for us meant one day for G-d.
The Kabbala of Information accepts neither of them.
The position of the author is that Adam and Eve died Instantaneously after having eaten the forbidden fruit and their death was relative to Gan Eden (Paradise).
The above-mentioned statement requires an explanation.
In the book ‘The Tree of Life’(Etz Chayim - Hebrew) in the chapter ‘Palace 7’ we read ‘and the explanation is that the secret of the death is the discourse of the separation of the thing, and his uprooting from his World and his place in order to go towards another World below it.’
In the same book in the chapter ‘The Palace of Points’ we read ‘only what moved from one world to another world and is separated from its own world is called death’.
Let me remind the reader that according to Kabbala Of Information death means the irreversible cessation of the information exchange between the soul and body in a particular world. The cessation of information exchange is caused by the change of the information content of the soul or the body which leads to the increase of the distance between them in the information space. The result of the death is the loss of agency in a particular world.
It is clear that eating of the forbidden fruit caused the change of the information content of the souls of Adam and Eve. After the Sin Adam and Eve acquired new information about Good and Evil and ‘the eyes of both of them were opened’ i.e. their perception of the world was radically changed. It is important to note that before the Sin Adam did not give the particular name to his wife, he called her ‘woman’ (Isha – Hebrew). The name Eve was given after the eating of the forbidden fruit.
We can find the confirmation of the above-mentioned idea in the seminal work of Rabbi Itzhak Luria (Arizal) ‘Gates of Reincarnation’.
In the chapter ‘Souls Leaving the Kelipot’ we read ‘Adam had a nefesh from Asiya, a ruach from Yetzira, a neshama from Beriya, and above this is nefesh, ruach, neshama from Atzilut, from the Nukva of Zeir Anpin and from Imma (respectively).
The three from the world of Atzilut are called zrhir ila’a of Adam, and are explained in the Zorah in the Sitrei Torah (Secrets of the Torah) section (Kedoshim 83a)
Before Cain and Abel were born, Adam sinned and the zehira ila’a was removed from him, that is the three portions we mentioned from Atzilut. In this manner, the decree of G-d was fulfilled: ‘On the day you eat from it you shall surely die’ – for the three portions of Atzilut were removed from him and there is no harsher death than this.’
Here Arizal clearly mentions the death of Adam relatively to the World of Atzilut.
In the chapter ‘Sparks Retained’ we read ‘when Adam sinned, he lost the ‘Supernal Radiance’ which is the levels of the parts of his soul from the World of Atzilut.’
From this we can conclude that as a result of the Sin the information content of the soul of Adam was radically changed, the information exchange between the soul of Adam after the Sin and his original body stopped.
The dimensionality of the soul of Adam was diminished, he was given a new body ‘ and the Lord G-d made for Adam and for his wife shirts of skin, and he dressed them. (Bereishit 3:21)
As a result of the expulsion from Gan Eden Adam lost agency i.e. instantaneously died relative to Gan Eden and with a new soul and body was transferred to our World of Asiya.
Based on the above we can conclude that there exist three types of relative death in the Creation:
- Death on ‘descent’
- Death on ‘ascent’
- Death ‘by the kiss’
In the succession of the worlds Atzilut – Beria-Yetzira – Assiya the Shannon’s entropy as well as dimensionality and complexity diminish. That means that in the process of death on ‘descent’ some dimensions of the soul should be blocked. They remain with the soul but in a state of potentiality.
The transition from the zones with high entropy to the zones with low entropy requires continuous work and from that we can explain the existence of the force which brings information entities into existence and continuously supports them. That is why Adam was forced (expelled) out of Gan Eden.
The same idea is reflected in the thesis about the ‘Perpetual Creation’. The sages stated that G-d continuously creates the worlds and if He had stopped for a moment the Creation would have disappeared.
We can also find the confirmation of this idea by analysing the events which took place before and after the Primordial Sin.
Almost all the commentators of the Torah stated that after having eaten the forbidden fruit Adam acquired knowledge about Evil. In my view as a result of the Sin Adam acquired knowledge about Good and Evil according to the name of the Tree – The Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. That means that before the Sin the soul of Adam was in the highly entropical state of not knowing neither Good nor Evil. Such a state of the soul is not known to us. After the sin the degree of order of the soul of Adam increased, the entropy of his soul decreased and he was transferred to the low entropical world of Assiya.
In order to ascent to the informational worlds with high entropy (after the relative death in our world) the soul should have maximal likeness with The Tree of Sefirot and minimal connection to the information Zone of Evil (Sitra Ahera). Since the Zone of Evil contains concepts of anti-commandments, the necessary condition for the smooth ascent of the soul is the fulfilment of the commandments of the Torah during a lifetime in our world. From that we can also understand why it is necessary to block the connections between the soul (after the death relative to our world) and Zone of Evil - that is the idea of Hell (Gehinom).
Another very important aspect is the amount of knowledge of the Torah and science acquired by the soul during a lifetime. According to the Law of Correspondence of the information space of Creation every information concept of our world has its prototypes in an information worlds with higher complexity and dimensionality, consequently the acquisition of knowledge in our world entails the connection between the soul and more complex and highly dimensional prototypes and provide a smooth ascent.
To purchase Eduard Shyfrin’s book ‘From Infinity to Man: The Fundamental Ideas of Kabbalah Within the Framework of Information Theory and Quantum Physics’ please click here. To purchase Eduard Shyfrin’s book ‘Travels with Sushi in the Land of the Mind’ please click here.