Rav Abraham Isaac Hakohen Kook

The Souls of the World of Chaos

Translated and Introduced by Bezalel Naor

Copyright © 2021 by Bezalel Naor

This classic piece, a chapter of the collection Zer‘onim (“Seeds”), first appeared in 1913 in the short-lived journal Ha-Tarbut ha-Yisraelit (The Israelite Civilization), edited by Tsevi Yehudah Kook. Since 1950, it has been included in standard editions of Orot, Rav Kook’s seminal work.

“The Souls of the World of Chaos” speaks specifically to the soul of the Second Aliyah, the second wave of immigration to Erets Yisrael in modern times. Typically, these founders of the kibbutz movement were young Russian Jews who espoused ideals of Socialism while rebelling against the traditional Jewish lifestyle and mores. Like any classic work of literature, this essay is of perennial value and continues to resonate throughout the ages, whenever there is a concerted breakdown of the established order and a new world order, yet hazy and ill-defined, looms on the horizon.

Though Rav Kook witnessed a total shattering of the old and familiar, he remains resilient and uncannily optimistic—in stark contrast to most of his rabbinic peers. “But in truth, there is nothing to fear; only sinners, weak souls and flatterers fear and tremble.” The Rav is confident that this very revolutionary power, a cause of consternation to many, will be appropriated by “the righteous, strong as lions, who will reveal the truth of the tikkun and the building.”

Our essay draws on the Lurianic trope of the World of Chaos (‘Olam ha-Tohu) which precedes the World of Establishment (‘Olam ha-Tikkun). That kabbalistic motif in turn echoes the ancient Midrash that before Bereshit, God was “building worlds and destroying them.” What typifies the World of Chaos and brings about its destruction is that the “vessels” (kelim) cannot contain the “lights” (’orot), which prove overwhelming and cause the shattering of the vessels.

A century after Isaac Luria, Nathan of Gaza would shift the nomenclature, writing of the infinite “light that does not contain thought” (’or she-ein bo mahshavah) and the finite “light that contains thought” (’or she-yesh bo mahshavah). The former “seeks destruction” (mehader batar hurbana), while the latter “seeks construction” (mehader batar binyana).

In his notes published at the conclusion of Orot, the author’s son, Rabbi Tsevi Yehuda Kook, sources the crucial term “neshamot shel ‘Olam ha-Tohu” (“souls of the World of Chaos”), or simply “neshamot de-Tohu” (“souls of chaos,” today oftentimes rendered conveniently as “chaotic souls”) in both the kabbalistic traditions that arose in eighteenth-century Lita, that of Rabbi Elijah, the Gaon of Vilna, and that of his opposite number, Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi (founder of the HaBaD school of Hasidism).

It seems that in Lubavitch the kabbalistic terms “Tohu” and “Tikkun” were actually invoked in regard to certain individuals. Rabbi Joseph Isaac Schneersohn quoted his ancestor, the Tsemah Tsedek, as saying: “Mikhel Apotzker was a tohu’diker, and Grandfather [Rabbi Shneur Zalman]’s direction and blessing made Reb Mikhel into a tikkun’nik” (Sefer ha-Sihot 5701, p. 97).

The Souls of the World of Chaos

The ordinary direction of simplicity and rectitude, along with observance of good character traits and religious law—this is the way of the World of Establishment (‘Olam ha-Tikkun). And any breach of this—whether brought about by lightheadedness and wantonness, or by intellectual ascent and higher inspiration—belongs to the World of Chaos (‘Olam ha-Tohu), except that there is a great difference when it comes to the details of the World of Chaos itself and its tendencies to the right and to the left.

The great idealists want a beautiful and good order, so firm and mighty, that it has no comparison or foundation in the world—therefore they destroy that which is built in conformity to the world. The better [idealists] know also to [re]build the world [that they have] destroyed, but the worse [idealists], who have been touched ever so lightly by the higher idealism, they only damage and destroy. The latter are rooted in the World of Chaos at its lowest.

Souls of chaos (neshamot de-tohu) are higher than souls of establishment (neshamot de-tikkun). They are very great; they seek much of existence, that which their vessels (kelim) cannot support. They seek a very great light; they cannot tolerate whatever is finite, defined and estimable. They descended from their elevation, from the beginning of the birthing of existence; they rose up as a flame and were extinguished. Their infinite longing will not end. They are garbed in various vessels; they aspire way beyond the limit; they aspire and fall. They see that they are imprisoned in laws, in circumscribed conditions that do not allow [one] to expand beyond limit to unstoppable heights, and they fall into depression, into resignation, into anger, and from rage—into wickedness, malice, lowliness, ugliness, abomination, destruction, and all manner of evil. Their agitation knows no quiet.

These [souls of chaos] are revealed in the brazen of the generation. The principled wicked (ha-resha‘im ba‘alei ha-prinzipim), the sinners who flaunt their sins (le-hakh‘is ve-lo le-tei’avon), their soul is very high—from the lights of chaos (’orot de-tohu). They have chosen destruction and they destroy; the world is rubbed out by them, and they with it. But the essence of courage contained in their will is the point of holiness (nekudah shel kodesh). When that [point] is absorbed into the souls that are limited in their approach, it gives them the strength of life.

[The souls of chaos] are especially revealed at an end-of-days, at a period preceding the birth of a world; preceding a new and wonderful creative existence; on the verge of the expansion of borders; in the prelude to the birth of a law above laws.

In times of redemption, hutzpah (insolence) waxes. A storm brews; breach after breach; hutzpah greater than hutzpah; dissatisfaction with the entire store of goodness of the limited, finite light, because it fails to satisfy all the wants; because it does not remove all the masks covering the face (cf. Isaiah 25:7); [because] it does not reveal all the mysteries and does not satiate all the desires. [The souls of chaos] kick it all: the good portion, the grains of happiness that leads to rest and eternal calm, to eternal pleasure, to everlasting uplift. They kick and rage, break and destroy, go down to pasture in foreign fields “and are contented with alien ideologies” (cf. Isaiah 2:6). They desecrate the pride, the beauty, and there is no satisfaction.

These fiery souls show their strength, that no fence or limit can restrain them, and the weak in the world that has been built, masters of manners and measures, are terrified by them. “Who of us can dwell with a devouring fire? Who of us can dwell with a never-dying blaze?” (Isaiah 33:14). But in truth, there is nothing to fear; only sinners, weak souls and flatterers fear and tremble. But warriors know that this show of strength is one of the visions that come for the need of perfecting the world, for the need of fortifying the powers of the nation, mankind and the world. Just that at the beginning, the power is revealed in the form of chaos (tohu), and at the end, it will be taken from the hands of the wicked and given over to the hands of the righteous, strong as lions, who will reveal the truth of the tikkun and the building, with a mighty spirit of strong and clear intellect, with the courage of feeling, and with permanent, decisive deed.

These storms will yield bounteous rains; these dark clouds will be the preparation for great lights. “And from darkness and obscurity the eyes of the blind shall see” (Isaiah 29:18).