There is a very interesting section from the Talmud (Succah 45b) quoting Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai.

Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai says that I, Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, can remove any judgment. I can do the work, I have the merit, my Light is enough to do the work to remove the judgment for all the people that lived in the world. For the millions of people who had been in the world from the moment of Rabbi Shimon’s birth until at least his death.

And then he says, and with my son Rabbi Elazar I can remove judgment from all the people from the time of Creation until now.

And then he says with Yotam ben Uziyahu, with one of the great, righteous kings, if the three of us were together, me, Rabbi Elazar and Yotam ben Uziyahu, we can remove the judgment from the time of Creation until the end of times, until the Gamar Hatikun.

There are a lot of things that need to be understood here.

First of all, so why didn’t they do it? Rabbi Shimon makes the statement that he can absolve the whole world of judgment. So do it. If you can do it, do it. What are you waiting for?

And then he says and if Rabbi Elazar was with me we can do even more; we can do from the time of Creation until now. Rabbi Elazar was with you. Why didn’t you do it?

Then he says and if Yotam ben Uziyahu would be with us we can absolve the whole world from Creation until the Gamar Hatikun.

It doesn’t make any sense. Rabbi Shimon is the greater soul. Doesn’t it make sense that Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai himself can do, let’s say a thousand of years. With Rabbi Elazar’s help he can do another five hundred. And with Yotam ben Uziyahu maybe another five hundred. But it’s the opposite. Rabbi Shimon by himself can only do maybe eighty years. With the help of Rabbi Elazar they can do thousands of years. With the help of Yotam ben Uziyahu they can do everything.

We need to understand the idea of unity, to understand that the magnitude, the growth of Light that shines once you have unity is way beyond the merit of even the soul of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai.

This is the second point. I asked why if Rabbi Shimon can do it with Rabbi Elazar and with Yotam why didn’t they do it? The point is they did it. They did it, but they’re waiting for us to reveal it.

I think what Rabbi Shimon was telling us, first of all, he’s telling us it’s there. Rabbi Shimon, together with Rabbi Elazar, together with Yotam did the work.

There’s a lot here, but two concepts we should, at least, walk away with.

One. We have to make sure that the work that we’re doing is attached to the work of Rabbi Shimon, Rabbi Elazar and Yotam. They did the work. All we need to do is attach ourselves to them and then it can shine as it was meant to.

And the second to understand the power of unity.

We have some conception of the greatness of the soul of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai. But what he was telling us is that even I, Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, can do a lot more with unity than I could do with my merit.

Rabbi Shimon is saying, I with all the work, with the revelation of the Zohar, I can only take care of maybe eighty years. With unity with one other person, with my son Rabbi Elazar, we can do a few thousand years. With one other person, with unity amongst three people, we can do the work for all of humanity for all time.

If we understand what that means, there’s nothing that one can do of the spiritual work that can come close to what he can do with true unity. None of us will ever achieve the heights of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai. So if we’re hoping to help the world through our spiritual work, that’s not going to happen.

But what can happen is through unity. If we understand how necessary unity is we can put everything else to the side. Everything else pales in the comparison to the power of unity.

The second thing is to make sure that we are attaching whatever little work that we’re doing to the work to Rabbi Shimon, Rabbi Elazar, Yotam, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

Because only by attaching ourselves constantly to their work does our work make any difference. If we’re doing our work in our own little universe it’s not worth it. It’s a very important work of consciousness to constantly be attaching ourselves back to the work they did. Then we can end the work that they began.