Zoharic Influenced Personal Tractate on the Story of Azazel and Creation

Zoharic Fragment on Azazel and the Inclinations

Rabbi Shimon opened and said: “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness” (Gen. 1:26). Come and see! Who is the “Us” and who is the “Our”? Not the angels, for they have no likeness of man. Rather, the Holy One, blessed be He, spoke to His own mystery, to the two inclinations that dwell hidden within Him: the right hand of Mercy and the left hand of Severity.

For as He is whole in opposites, so too man must be whole, fashioned with the yetzer tov and the yetzer ra, that he may stand between light and shadow. This is the likeness.

Rabbi Eleazar said: And who came forth from the shadow side? Azazel, the prince of the wasteland. When the Holy One bound the two inclinations within Adam, Azazel looked and lusted after the fire of Severity. He said: “This flame is mine, for I will draw it down to the sons of man.”

So he descended, tearing sparks from the Left, and he clothed them in weapons, in sorcery, in colors of vanity. He gave them to the daughters of men and the sons of men, and they strayed after him. This is the theft of Azazel.

Rabbi Abba said: But see the wisdom of the Holy One! He set for Israel the scapegoat, one to YHWH and one to Azazel. Why to Azazel? To return to him that which he stole, to feed him with husks so that holiness may ascend purified. Thus is written: “The goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities to a land cut off” (Lev. 16:22).

Not as a gift, but as a chain! For the wilderness is his dwelling, and the wilderness is a prison, and there he is bound until the time decreed.

Rabbi Shimon wept and said: Happy are those who return, for in the place where the repentant stand, not even the wholly righteous may stand. Why? Because the righteous know only the right hand, but the penitent have touched the left, and in their turning they unite right and left as one.

Thus the theft of Azazel becomes the path of teshuvah, and the shadow becomes the crown of light.

Secret of the matter: The Holy One, blessed be He, spoke to Himself, and Azazel heard. He stole the shadow, but Torah is the middle pillar that heals the rift. And the soul that falls and rises loves Him more than the soul that never fell once.