The First Creation Of Adam: Can we make G-d work?

In the article The First Creation of Adam – Where, When, Why? I put forward the idea that initially Adam was created in the information zone of Sephira Malchut of the World of Atzilut. My statement was based on: 

1. The analysis of the unsurmountable contradictions between the two accounts of the creation of Adam given the Torah.
2. The principle that G-d never does unnecessary work for the execution of His Plan, or that G-d always achieves His goals with a minimal amount of work.

In the article First Creation of Adam: does G-d use Ockham’s Razor, I analyzed the family of ‘minimal principles’ in our reality, which govern the majority of existing theories in physics.

One of the principles of Kabbalah of Information is the hierarchy of concepts. This means that each concept of our world has a corresponding concept that is more complex and highly dimensional in the information space.  

In this article, I will consider the ‘minimal principles’ in Creation and try to answer the question: what is the reason for their existence?

‘Minimal principles’ in Creation

First, let me remind the reader about the Ockham’s Razor principle, which states that entities are not to be multiplied beyond necessity. In modern philosophy, this principle is described as ontological simplicity (parsimony) - the number and complexity of things postulated.

Below are some reflections of ontological simplicity in Creation: 

• G-d created just one entity – information – and then shaped and formed it.
• The structure of the Worlds Beriyah, Yetzirah, and Assiya is exactly the same as the structure of the World Atzilut. It is written in Etz Chayim that these Worlds are ‘just the seals of the World of Atzilut’.
• The structure of Adam Kadmon (Primordial Adam) and Adam Harishon (First Man) is the same. 
• The initial act of Creation – Tzimzum – is consistently repeated in a process of transition from one informational world to another. 
• The structure of the soul is a copy of the structure of the Tree of Sephirot.
• Eve was created out of the existing material of Adam’s body.
• In the article The Address of G-d, I showed that the Arc of the Covenant, which was in the Holy of Holiest of the Tabernacle, coincided in many dimensions with the Sephira Malchut of the World of Atzilut. This means that the distance in the information space between the Arc of Covenant and the Sephira Malchut was minimal. 
• Abraham and the Angels. In the chapter Vayera (18:2) we read: ‘and he (Abraham) lifted his eyes and saw, and behold, three men were standing beside him… And he took cream and milk and the calf that he had prepared, and he placed (them) before them, and he was standing over them under the tree, and they ate (18:8).”

According to the commentaries of the Sages, the abovementioned three men were the Angels Michael, Gabriel and Raphael. But the opinion of the Sages on the nature of this event diverged. Maimonides (Rambam) stated that the Angels could be seen only in a vision. Nachmanides (Ramban), on the contrary, stated that the visitors were real.

As far as eating is concerned, the Sages said that Angels appeared to be eating and inside them was a fire which consumed the food. 

I am convinced that, having said that the Sages stated the principle of the ‘minimal work’, it was necessary and sufficient to show Abraham the appearance of the people and it was not necessary to do the extra work to create real people. 

Can we make G-d work?

The answer is – YES. 

Let me remind the reader of the Participatory principle of the Kabbalah of Information: actions of G-d affect Man, Actions of Man affect G-d’.

There are two ways in which we can make G-d do extra work: 

1. By sinning
2. By asking questions

The Sins:

• The sin of Adam caused G-d to create and sustain the Worlds Beriyah, Yatzirah and Assiya.
• The sins of the antediluvian generation caused G-d to destroy the world.  
• The sins of the people of Sdom and Amorra caused G-d to do extra work and destroyed the cities. 
• The sin of the spies caused G-d to perform the miracle of Man for extra 40 years. 

The Questions

In his book At home in Universe John Archibald Wheeler put forward the principle ‘No Question – No Answer’.

In the famous double slit experiment, when we don’t pose the question about which slit the electron goes through, it goes through both slits. When we do pose the question by installing the detector, we receive the answer; the electron goes through one of the slits.  

Why the Creation is Governed by the Minimum Principles?

In order to answer this question, we should employ one of the main principles of the Kabbalah of Information: any phenomenon in creation must be analysed from the point of view of its necessity for the creation and existence of Man.

Here an analogy from science is very helpful.

In 1948 the Noble Prize winner Richard Feynman developed the ‘path integral formulation’ of quantum mechanics. In brief, his idea was to calculate all possible trajectories of a quantum particle between points A and B by employing the principle of least action (PLA), which I described in the article First Creation of Adam: Does G-d use Ockham’s Razor?

Similarly, in the information space, an individual can move from point A to point B along different trajectories. The question is, which trajectory is most efficient and complies with the principle of the least action? My answer is: the path of the Torah. This is the most effective and efficient path for us; it doesn’t require G-d to make unnecessary work. 

But we can pose another question. If G-d has infinite resources, why was it necessary for Him to establish the minimal principles?

Let’s refer to the description of the process of Tzimzum (The first act of Creation) given by Arizal:

‘Know that before any emanations were emanated or any creations created, there was one simple (complete and perfect), supernal (exalted, transcendental) Light that filled all existence. There was no empty “place”, no empty “space” or void. All reality was filled with that simple Ohr Ein Sof (Light Without End, or simply Infinite Light). There was no category of “beginning” and no category of “end”. All was one, unified, simple, undifferentiated, ubiquitous and homogeneous, Infinite Light, called “Ohr Ein Sof”.

When it arose in His simple (i.e. perfect) Will to create worlds and emanate emanations, to bring to light (i.e. express) the perfection of His actions, His Names, and His Attributes – which was actually the purpose for creating all the universes… He constricted His Infinite Essence away from the centre point of His Being, that is, from the very centre of His Light. He thus constricted that Light, distancing it to the extremities around this centre point, leaving a vacated space and hollow void…

Behold, after this constriction, which resulted in the creation of a “vacated space” and “hollow void” in the very midst of the infinite Light of Ein Sof, there was a “place” for all that was to be emanated (Atzilut), created (Beriyah), formed (Yetzira), and completed (Assiya).

He then drew forth a single, straight Ray from his Infinite Surrounding Light (and extended it down) into the vacated space. This Ray descended in stages into the vacated space. The upper extremity of this Ray touched and was drawn forth from the Infinite Light of Ein Sof (that surrounded the space) and extended down (into the vacated space towards the centre), but not all the way to the bottom extremity (so as not to cause the vacated space to collapse and merge back into G-d’s Infinite Light). It was through this Ray (serving as a conduit) that the Light of Ein Sof was drawn down and spread out below. In this vacated space, He then emanated, created, formed, and made/completed all the worlds. Through this Ray, which serves as a constricted conduit, the outpouring Supernal Light of Ein Sof spreads forth and flows down into the universes that are located within that Space and Void….’

From the description above, we can draw a definitive conclusion that the size of the information space of Creation and, consequently, the maximum amount of information in the Creation are finite. 

Under the constraint of finite information and the size of Creation, minimal principles were established in order to make it possible to make the exact amount of work necessary for the execution of the G-ds Plan.