Musar על תענית 9:31

The expansion of the גיד הנשה is the “מרכבה,” vehicle, of Samael in our world which touched, i.e. hurt, the thigh joint of Jacob. The Arizal explains Genesis 32, 26: וירא כי לא יוכל לו, ויגע בכף ירכו, "When he saw that he could not overpower him, he touched his thigh joint," as referring to Jacob's descendants. Samael, the guardian angel of Esau, left his mark on all the צדיקים, righteous people, who would stem from Jacob, i.e. any generation in which Jews would abandon their religion, etc. The words ותקע כף ירך יעקב, "Jacob's thigh joint was disjointed" (ibid.), are an allusion to the negative effect of the destruction of the Temple on this earth on the Celestial Regions. G–d swore an oath that He would not take up residence in the Jerusalem of the Heavenly Regions until the Jerusalem on earth had been restored and He would be able to take up residence there. This concept is known to us as "the name of G–d is not complete, neither is His throne complete, until matters on earth are developing to G–d's satisfaction."Put differently: "what happens down here is called גיד הנשה. The Talmud speaks about גזרות קשות כגידים, decrees as tough as sinews." The sinews referred to in such statements are the branches of the גיד הנשה. This גיד is the "evil" sinew of the 365 sinews in our bodies because it strengthens the power of Samael, i.e. the power of Esau. The damage to the Celestial Regions is done in a single "day." The word "day" in those regions is the one thousand years that Bereshit Rabbah 8, 2 describes as the length of G–d's day. [Because of this definition of "day," Adam could live almost one thousand years in terms of our days, though G–d had said he would die on the day he would eat from the fruit of the tree of knowledge. Ed.] The Zohar, commenting on Lamentations 1, 13: נתנני שוממה כל היום דוה, "He has made me desolate, I am in misery a whole day," states that this verse proves that when the destruction of the Temple was decreed, the exile was meant to last at least one thousand years.

The concept of שלמות הבנין and the acquisition by Jacob of the merit of חסד של אמת converge into one overall concept. The word ארץ appears here three times, (verses 3-4-7) We also encounter the expression היכל השם three times in Jeremiah 7,4. The Sanctuary called היכל השם is situated in a sacred ארץ. In commenting on Isaiah 12,6: כי גדול בקרבך קדוש ישראל, "For The Holy One of Israel will be great in your midst," our sages state that G–d will not take up residence in the Jerusalem "above" until He has been able to do so in the Jerusalem "below." The plain meaning of that statement is that the Jerusalem "below" is the Sanctuary in the Holy Land, ארץ ישראל, the Temple whose speedy rebuilding we pine for every day. This Temple is on a site that corresponds to the Sanctuary in the Celestial Regions. The Sanctuary in the Celestial Regions in turn is the סוד, mystical dimension of the ארץ העליונה, the "Earth" of the upper regions, also known as ארץ חפץ. Chabakuk 2,20 says of that land: וה' בהיכל קדשו הס מפניו כל הארץ, "And the Lord is in His Sanctuary, be silent before Him all the earth!" The Sanctuary of G–d, היכל, discussed here is that of the attribute known as א-ד-נ-י, the numerical value of which equals 65, the same as the numerical value of the word היכל. These two words also have the same numerical value as the word הס in the verse from Chabakuk quoted. The היכל is the ארץ של ישראל סבא, the land of the founding father of the Jewish people, Israel, otherwise known as תפארת ישראל a mystical dimension of the Ineffable Name.