The Day of Yom Kippur offers a tremendous opportunity to connect in a way we cannot connect any other day of the year.

To understand the Light, not only to connect in our mind, we will read from the Zohar because the words of the Zohar are the way to awaken this Light.

In reading and listening, we are not simply learning, but are awakening for ourselves, and for the world, the Light of Yom Kippur.

The Zohar writes, come and see, on the day of Rosh Hashanah, Malchut is concealed. The Light of the Malchut does not shine until the 10th day of the month. On the day of Yom Kippur, all people, or those who know, have cleansed themselves of the negativity, have done the process of t’shuvah, of returning, and Binah, our supernal mother, shines down to Malchut, which is our vessel.

On this day, the Light of Binah shines so brightly that there is joy in all the worlds. And that’s why it says this day is called the day in plural terms, Yom HaKippurim, not just the day. There are two that shine down into Malchut and that reveal all the joy in the world.

The Zohar explains the process. It’s important to understand. In the time when the Temple was around, they would take two goats there. One was brought as a sacrifice. It says that they would put all the sins, all the negativity, on the second goat and send him out to the desert. The person chosen to do this action was connected to the Left Column.

The spiritual process is explained by the Zohar. As we read this, we not only understand, but we also awaken this Light.

Rabbi Yosi said, we learned Aaron, when he was the High Priest, would throw a lottery to choose which goat would be the channel for Light and which the channel for the negativity, for darkness.

The Zohar asks: Why on this day of Yom Kippur do we give so much strength, so much importance, to the negative side? The Zohar answers: The angel of the negative side has gathered up all the negativity of the world on this day. So in order to shield ourselves from all the negativity that we have created, that the world has created, this process of the two goats, the spiritual process that the physical process indicates, was created.

On Yom Kippur, the negative angel is waiting for us to recount all those negative things we have done. We think about them, we say them, and we give them over to him, to the negative side. The negative angel thinks he will take all that negativity and bring it down onto us for this coming year. Fortunately for us, he doesn’t understand the process and the power of Yom Kippur.

Two things occur. First we awaken all of that negativity, all the memories of what we have done. All the words we say are codes to awaken what we remember, and even things we forget. We give them over to the negative side.

Then, the next step, which the negative side doesn’t know about, is that we shield, bathe, and clothe ourselves in the overwhelming Light of Binah that is available today. He has no place to enter, no place to come in. That negativity remains with him and can no longer be put back onto us.

In the reading today we will talk about this process — the personal process that each of us needs to go through as we read this connection and make the connection in the Musaf.

First we awaken all our negativity, and give it over the Sameach-Mem, the negative angel. Then we continue the process with the High Priest walking into the Holy of Holies, and we walk in with him. Then we are completely shielded by the Light of Binah. The negativity must remain in the negative side.

When the Zohar talks of the goat being sent to the desert, it is talking about the process we will go through today. We awaken all the things we, and the world, have done of a negative nature. He is happy with it.

As the Zohar says, he is excited to accept all this negativity. He thinks he can come back to us with it. But he can’t. As we continue the process, go to the Holy of Holies, encapsulate ourselves in the Light of Binah, the negative side can no longer touch us.

The first step is the reading, putting the negative actions on the goat, awakening and giving over the negative. The second step is the Musaf that completely enclothes us in the Light of Binah in the Holy of Holies. Then the negativity must remain separate from us.

If we understand this process, we understand the gift of Yom Kippur. We have the power to awaken all the negativity that is part of us, give it over, and never have it come back to us. There is no other day of the year when we can completely accomplish this task.

The second thing, that I just discovered today, is a tremendous revelation for Yom Kippur.

In the reading, we will read about the process of the goat. Hopefully we have an appreciation for the process.

There is a first part of the reading. It speaks about the death of Nadav and Avihu, the two children of Aaron. Why do we read about the death of the two children of Aaron on Yom Kippur? We know there are no coincidences. There is a reason this story precedes the discussion of the process of Yom Kippur.

We also know today is the death anniversary of Rabbi Akiva, the death anniversary of Rav Ashlag. All those three are not a coincidence.

How do we understand that and how do we put it together? It says that when Rabbi Akiva was about to leave this world, it was a time when the Romans ruled the land of Israel. They did not want Rabbi Akiva to continue to teach, but he did, and was captured by the Romans.

The story is the Romans took combs of steel and were scraping his skin from his body to make his death what they thought was the most torturous possible.

As this process was happening, Rabbi Akiva began to say the Sh’ma. As he was beginning the process of leaving this world, his students said, don’t continue the prayer. Because they knew if he completed the prayer he would leave this world.

Rabbi Akiva said, all my life I have been waiting and worried about this verse, which speaks about giving over ourselves completely. When will I be able to completely do this process? Now I have the opportunity. How can I give it up?

Rabbi Akiva ended the Sh’ma and, as he said the word echad, his soul left. The kabbalists explain that every action that we do, every spiritual action that we do, is meant to completely connect us to the Light of the Creator, completely unite us with the Light.

Rav Ashlag revealed many things, but at the core of his teaching was the concept of dvchut, complete union with the Light.

The kabbalists teach a very interesting concept, that every action we do of sharing, of connection, is an action that has within it the power to achieve complete dvchut, complete union with the Light of the Creator. Not only that, the truly righteous, the true kabbalists, did that. When they came to the morning connection, they would put all of their life force into that connection. So how did they stay alive after the prayer?

The kabbalists teach that within the action itself is Light that returns the soul to the body. Because it’s a day to talk about truly high concepts, the true kabbalists completely gave themselves over in every connection that they made. They made that union, that dvchut, in every action of connection. Their entire being, their entire soul, went into that action.

The only reason their soul came back to their body is because the Light shines back to them. This is a battle for true righteous people to hold themselves back and keep their soul in their body. When they made that connection to the Light within the action, their soul wanted to connect completely. For a kabbalist, a truly righteous person, the physical body limits their ability to connect to the Light. They never want to return to their body after they make a connection, but the Creator says, you still have a job to do in your body.

Rabbi Akiva, when he was saying the Kriat Sh’ma, injected his entire being into this connection. He saw the Romans were in the process of physically killing his body. He took the opportunity. He said, today there is no reason to limit myself anymore. The Romans are ending my physical body anyway. He told the students, I’m not going to hold back anymore. Today I am going to make that connection complete.

It says his soul left his body with the word one, the word echad, with complete unity. The beauty of this understanding, he was not doing anything different. Every time he made the connection, his soul left his body, he achieved complete union. But throughout his life, the Creator actually pushed him back. The Creator said, you still have work to do. On this day there was no pushing back. There was complete union. He created for us, on this day, the power of complete union.

Now let’s go back to the story in the Torah about Nadav and Avihu, the sons of Aaron. The Tabernacle was built — a place where unification could occur. When a person does an action, when a righteous person does an action of unification, they are part of the process set up for us. There is that push back from the Creator. The Creator says, don’t completely unify yet, you still have work in this world.

When Nadav and Avihu made their connection on the day of Yom Kippur, we know Aaron was supposed to make that connection. The framework of pushback was not set up for what Nadav and Avihu did. It was set up for Aaron. Aaron was able to go and make that connection and then be pushed back by the Creator. Nadav and Avihu were not part of that process. The framework was not set up for them.

It’s so beautiful. They only did something wrong in the sense they were beyond the set-up process. Their desire, their feeling, their singular purpose for going into the Holy of Holies was to unify completely with the Light of the Creator. The work every one of us has, they accomplished on this day. They achieved the level of dvchut with the Creator.

Because it was not part of what was supposed to occur, there was no pushback. The Creator did not tell them they had work to do. Therefore their souls left their bodies.

We know on Yom Kippur we connect to Binah, the Holy of Holies. What occurs on Yom Kippur, if you put it in one word, every single person in the world has the ability to achieve complete union with the Light of the Creator. We don’t eat or drink because we are like angels today. We can achieve dvchut on this day of Yom Kippur.

There is one more step to this process. We spoke about the mikveh yesterday, the place of water, and the specific dimensions. When you build a mikveh, you build two parts: the place where the water is, and very often the water that is filled into that hole is regular water; then there is a place where rain water or well water is gathered.

How do you make the regular water as powerful in the Light of Binah as the well water or the rain water? You build a little tunnel between the regular water and the water of Binah. That pipeline opened up between these two holes makes even the regular water pure and powerful. Through the pipeline all the water, even the regular water, is made pure and connected to the Light of Binah.

The kabbalists explain that Nadav and Avihu are our pipeline into the tremendous, powerful Light of Binah. Their unselfish action, their completely giving of themselves, their complete unification with the Light of the Creator on Yom Kippur, makes it possible for us, who are not as pure, to connect to the Light of Binah on Yom Kippur.

This is such an amazing and powerful understanding. Previously we might have seen the reading, but now we understand this is a beautiful set-up of the process. If not for what they did, we could never connect, or it would be very difficult for us. What they created was a conduit of dvchut, of complete unification, so that every single one of us can connect to the Light of Yom Kippur.

We have the two connections, and see Nadav and Avihu as the channel between them. It is only through the channel they created that we can connect to the awesome power of Yom Kippur.

If we want to have protection from all the negativity we have ever created, we have to connect to Binah. We have to connect to Nadav and Avihu.

I cannot tell you how excited about this understanding I am. This puts all the pieces into place. This is the one day of the year in which all people can achieve this level that Rav Ashlag wrote and spoke about and begged that we make our life’s work. Yom Kippur is the day of complete dvchut.

We take all our negativity, the barrier between ourselves and the Holy of Holies. Today we awaken all that, give it all over to the negative side, and then we follow the channel Nadav and Avihu set up for us, and bring the amazing Light of Binah that is Yom Kippur.

It’s so beautiful. Rabbi Akiva, Nadav and Avihu, the power of Yom Kippur, and then Rav Ashlag, all did the same thing on this day so every single one of us can make this connection.

What we need to do if we want to maximize the gift of this day is make a deep connection with their souls. And with the assistance of Rabbi Akiva, Nadav and Avihu, Rav Ashlag, we are led up to the connection.

When in the process we all enter into the Holy of Holies, we say Ana Hashem. Alef-nun–alef, the letters of the word Ana, are an acronym for Eliyahu, Nadav and Avihu. We will enter in and envelope ourselves in the Light of Binah, complete dvchut with the Light.

Tomorrow we probably won’t be as connected as we can accomplish today. But all that amazing Light we can connect to will continue with us for the rest of the year. As we have this reading, continue the process of Musaf; as we enter with the High Priest into the Holy of Holies, we can have this consciousness. The one word of Rav Ashlag, dvchut, we accomplish today through this understanding. These tools connect us to complete unification and protection that will give us the year we want, when all the negativity remains in the negative side. We can be protected through the complete union with the Light of Binah.