In the last few weeks, we’ve discussed how the inner intention of the morning routine of a Yid, including washing Neggel Vasser and going to the bathroom, is part of a process of ridding our bodies of the klippos that attach to us during the night. This week, we asked the B’yam Darkecha to give us a better understanding of what “klippos” are.
Klippos literally means “the outer shell” or “the peel.” They are a spiritual barrier that forms over our neshamos that causes us to feel more distant from Hashem and Yiddishkeit. We all have spiritual highs, when we are passionate about davening, learning, and doing mitzvos, and spiritual lows, when one feels ‘burnt out,’ and his heart pulls him to the darker side. We tend to call this the “yetzer hara” and “yetzer tov,” but there is a deeper understanding of this as well.
There is a very real concept of both good and bad spiritual energy. (This is not a theoretical and abstract concept. It is as real as a table and chair, but since it is a spiritual entity that we cannot see with our eyes, we are calling it “energy.”) When you are feeling pulled towards good things, and aveiros do not interest you at all, that means you are living with your neshama, and a positive spiritual energy has taken you over. You can feel this holy spiritual energy radiating out of a tzadik, and you can be uplifted to a higher spiritual place just by being in the presence of this spiritual energy.
On the other hand, there is a real negative spiritual energy called “klippos” that can cover over one’s neshama, and pull him down to a low place and towards sin and temptation. This means that the person has been ‘hijacked’ by the klippos, which don’t let him see past them. A hijacked neshama will feel turned off from spirituality, and this is pnimiyus of the way the yetzer tov and yetzer hara try to influence us.
Just as we know from the mental health field that there are challenges and illnesses that the eye cannot see, we must believe that there is a very real spiritual world that we cannot see. Since Chazal teach us that these negative spiritual energies enter us while we sleep, this is real and true even though we cannot see them (although there were some tzadikim who were able to see it). Just as we take a shower even if we don’t see dirt on us, we need to cleanse ourselves of spiritual impurities, which are like germs that we cannot see.
This is why it is important not to go to places where there are a lot of klippos (an inappropriate or sinful environment). Even if you close your eyes, you can still be affected by them. They are contagious, and later on you may feel spiritually disconnected because of the ‘spiritual disease’ that you caught in that place.
The more we live with this understanding, the more we will enjoy living with kedusha. This helps us make the right decisions, because it’s not just a matter of “do I want to do the right thing or the wrong thing?” but rather “do I want to absorb spiritual energies that will connect me to Hashem and make me want more and more spirituality, or ch”v the opposite.”
This can also guide the way we try to uplift our fellow Jew. Rather than telling other people what they should or should not do, we can invite them into holy places of Torah and mitzvos, and to visit a tzadik, so that we can draw them away from a spiritually polluted environment and lead them to a holy one that will infuse them with spiritual energy! May we be zoche soon for the day when Ru’ach hatum’ah avir min ha’aretz, the spirit of impurity will be removed from the world (Zecharia 13:2), and all of the klippos will disappear with the arrival of Moshiach tzikeinu!
