The Illusion of Separation
“The Ego”
As outlined in the previous chapter, there is a quiet and grave error at the root of man’s own image which resides at the core of his constitution and it is this: he places himself apart from everything and everyone else. Yet this is only part of the misplacement, for man is not merely separate he is, simultaneously, at the centre of all that he perceives.
Every motive, every action, every thought, every fleeting imagination is rooted in the self and emanates from his own ego. He cannot act without reference to it, cannot desire without its whisper, cannot think without its echo. This self-centred orbit is so subtle, so intimate, that it masquerades as free will and choice, yet it is always a reflection of the egotistic self, spinning endlessly around its own axis. No matter how cunningly he fashions his intellect, how far he extends his imagination, or how nobly he seeks to act, every deed remains filtered through the prism of self and how he can get ahead, get pleasure, advance and be better and so on. The world, for him, is never apprehended in its full and unconditioned reality as it is always experienced as a stage upon which his own self performs, his own self judges, his own self desires. He is never outside of himself; he is never participating in reality as it is at all as he is bound to the egotistic inward image and egotistic desires. Every thought, every gesture, every aspiration is inevitably a projection of this inward gaze, a shadow of the self mistaken for the whole.
Thus, all of man’s striving, all of his moral reasoning, all of his attempts at understanding, are subtly constrained by this ego and the sense of self which is so deeply ingrained in his nature. He believes he is observing the world objectively, yet the very act of observation is coloured and guided by the imperceptible but unyielding pull of the self. To live in truth and to truly partake in reality, he must first recognise this dual placement: that he is at once apart from and yet inevitably at the centre, and that until he disentangles his perception from the self’s constant claim on every motive, he cannot see life as it truly is with no partaking of reality to any degree whatsoever. It is this egotistical self which bars mankind from acting freely at all; every desire he wants to fulfill, every drive he pursues, is fed to him from outside from advertisement, from what others possess, from what he perceives he should be having, appeasing his greed, ego, lust and passions conveyed to him from the outside and not of his own making at all and all of this is guided and magnified by the egotistical self masquerading as the true self.
Consider this, and let it sink in, for it is not immediately apparent; it lies in a blind spot, beyond immediate perception or fleeting thought. As Ziad K. Abdelnour warns:
“Don’t promise when you are happy, don’t reply when you’re angry, and don’t decide when you’re sad.”
Reflect on this carefully, it demonstrates how profoundly our judgment is altered by the sway of our own moods, desires, and thoughts, all those wants that arise within the egotistical realm, the restless voice of the self that pulls, urges, and misleads and this points to the very beast within that must be tamed before true clarity and action can emerge.
And yet this is egotistic condition we are in is as old as intellect itself. At the dawn of man, when conscious awareness and the intellect first blossomed, a new realm of possibility was born, and with it, a perilous inclination. No longer bound solely by instinct, man could deliberate, plan, and envision, perceiving the world not merely as it was but as he might shape it for himself. From that very moment, knowledge became a double-edged gift, a tool capable of elevating or enslaving the individual. Assisted by intellect, he surpassed the beast and the ape, yet in this surpassing lay a profound danger: the very faculties that could have guided him toward unity and understanding were, more often than not, deployed for the self alone. The ape, in its simplicity, acts without malice, without desire to conquer beyond its need. Man, however, with cunning reason and foresight, could stoop far lower than any animal ever could, using the higher power of his Intellectual Thought not to harmonize with life, but to manipulate, dominate, and claim advantage for himself.
The great traditions the world over speak with one voice on this point: the shame of the world is born from working not for the whole, but for the self, and all acts of sin and suffering arise from this singular deviation and conflation of the ego with the true self. It is this inclination, this relentless egotistical striving, that has haunted humanity from the first moment intellect touched him, beautifully illustrated in the vision of 2001: A Space Odyssey: the ape at the waterhole, the first flicker of understanding, grasping a bone not as a mere object, but as a means to assert power, to take for himself, to elevate the self above all else. And yet, for all its selfish cunning, this same spark of intellect has propelled man beyond the imaginings of the ape, from the first crude tool to the moon landings, and on toward a vast expanse of understanding yet unknown to humanity.
The egotistical self, though a source of dire shame, is also the vehicle of astonishing potential, a reminder that the powers given to man carry both the weight of peril and the promise of transcendence.
In his ego, each man looks outward and sees a world of separate objects, distinct forms, isolated beings, each standing apart and existing in its own right, and because this perception appears immediate and self-evident, he never pauses to question whether it is true in itself or only true within the limits of his own selfishness and misidentification. Thus the error is not recognised as an error, but accepted as reality, and from this acceptance all further misunderstanding unfolds.
From this imagined separation the deeper layers of the unconscious, those primal stirrings ancient and unrefined, begin to rise and find expression within the conscious realm, and here lies the critical turning point, for man, unlike the animal, has been endowed with intellect, a faculty of immense power, yet when this faculty is placed in the service of a divided perception it does not close the division, it sharpens it, gives it language, structure, and continuity, and so what might have remained simple becomes complex, and what might have remained contained becomes extended without limit.
Thus what begins as a slight misidentification becomes a vast and far-reaching distortion of reality amplified by our own ego. The animal acts in accordance with its nature and cannot deviate from it, but mankind, through the power of intellect, can not only deviate but justify his deviation, refine it, and pursue it with persistence. What is in the animal a passing and instinct impulse becomes in man a sustained force. Hunger becomes greed, self-preservation becomes domination, attraction becomes obsession, and the simple movements of life are extended far beyond their animistic bounds.
In this condition man imagines himself to be master of his actions, yet he is driven by forces he neither sees nor understands, for the unconscious desires which in the animal are bounded by necessity are and restricted by his instinct, in mankind, given greater voice and direction through the intellect, and so they rise not as momentary impulses but as organised tendencies, shaping his choices, his ambitions, and the very structure of his world.
At the same time there arises from the sensory process a powerful and convincing illusion, the sense of being a separate “I,” an inner centre which stands apart from an outer world in which he observes, judges, acts, and reacts. This sensation of separateness feels immediate and undeniable, it appears as the most certain fact of each man’s experience, yet it too is part of the construction, a product of perception rather than a truth of ultimate reality.
As taught by Isaac Luria, what appears as separation is not present in reality itself but arises from the limitation of the vessel through which reality is perceived, for the light remains whole, continuous, and undivided. Yehuda Ashlag brings this to a point of precision when he writes:
“We have no perception or attainment whatsoever in anything outside of us.”
This statement overturns the entire ordinary conception of reality, for it means that what we experience is not the world as it is, but the world as it appears within us, shaped by the structure of our senses, our memory, and our intellect and swayed eternally by this dire ego we are cursed with. The “I” which stands at the centre of our experience is therefore not an independent entity, but a process, assembled moment by moment from sensation and interpretation, convincing beyond doubt yet entirely dependent upon the very conditions that give rise to it.
Man, however, takes this constructed centre to be absolute and without quaeation. He mistakes the appearance for the essence and in doing so he becomes bound within the limits of his own perception and desires, unable to see that he is not outside of Nature, but within it, of it, and inseparable from it.
How We Construct Reality Around the Self
In the language of Kabbalah this condition is described with exactness, for the separation that man experiences is not merely intellectual but existential, rooted in the will to receive for oneself alone, which divides the seamless unity of reality into the perceiver and perceived, subject and object, self and other. What is apprehended is therefore never the Whole, but only the imprint of the Whole upon a divided perception, and thus all knowledge, as ordinarily understood, is partial, conditioned, and relative.
The sages do not therefore speak of knowledge as accumulation, but of equivalence of form, for only that which shares the nature of a thing may truly enter into it. So long as mankind remains in opposition to the whole, he cannot perceive it as it is, but only as it appears through the lens of separation.
As Isaac Luria explains through the doctrine of the Tzimtzum, the apparent concealment of the Infinite is not a withdrawal in space, but a concealment in perception and this is how sees the whole world. The light remains unbounded and ever-present, yet the vessel, limited by its own form, experiences absence, fragmentation, and multiplicity, and thus what is in truth unified appears as divided.
Maimonides who eaplained the same truth from another direction, insists that the First Cause cannot be described by any attribute whatsoever, for to attribute is to limit, and the Absolute admits of no limitation. Yehuda Ashlag echoes this when he states that even the term existence fails before the Infinite, for it is the root of both existence and non-existence alike.
Chaim Vital records in the writings of his teacher that “Before all emanations, the simple upper light filled all existence, and there was no vacant place,” a statement which, when stripped of its symbolic language, indicates that the division we perceive is not present in reality itself, but only in our apprehension of it.
From this boundless ground there proceeds a continual movement, an outflow and return, which gives rise to all worlds and all forms. Moses Cordovero writes that “All is bound together and interwoven,” so that what appears as separate processes are in truth aspects of a single, unified movement.
Even in modern thought there are echoes of this unity. Albert Einstein observed that “The most incomprehensible thing about the universe is that it is comprehensible,” pointing toward an underlying coherence which binds all phenomena into a single intelligible order.
Yet man, confined within the structure of his perception, experiences reality as fragmented and incomplete. His awareness is temporal, fleeting, each moment replacing the last, never revealing the whole. Beyond the five senses lies not merely what is unseen, but what is presently inconceivable, for the categories required to grasp it do not yet exist within the human framework.
Kabbalah expresses this through the principle of roots and branches, the visible world being the branch, an expression of deeper forces which remain concealed. As taught by Isaac Luria, “The visible world is only the outer expression of deeper processes beyond direct perception.” We observe effects, yet the causes remain hidden, sensed only indirectly through their manifestations.
Thus man constructs his reality from fragments, assembling a coherent picture from limited data, and then takes that construction to be complete. He does not see that what he calls reality is an interface, a meeting point between the infinite and the limited, shaped entirely by the nature of the vessel through which it is perceived, and so long as that vessel remains unchanged, his perception cannot but remain partial.
The Ego and the
Dire Condition of Mankind
From this misidentification of the self with a separate and constructed “I” there arises the condition which governs the whole of the human life, the ego, not as a superficial trait, but as the central axis around which all man’s thoughts, desires, and actions revolve when each lives for themself alone.
This ego is not something foreign imposed upon man, it is the natural consequence of his wrongful sense of separation. When the self is perceived as isolated, it must secure itself, defend itself, expand itself, and so all faculties, powers and motives are drawn into its service. The intellect, instead of correcting the error, becomes its most subtle and dangerous instrument, giving justification, strategy, and persistence to the desires rooted in the unconscious. Yehuda Ashlag states:
“The will to receive for oneself alone is the root of all evil.”
This is not a moral judgement but a structural fact. This “evil” is the misuse of the power allotted to man, and it appears repeatedly throughout the world in different forms and languages. When desire is directed solely inward, seeking only to satisfy the self and its endless cravings, it stands in direct opposition to the whole. From this opposition arise the conditions that traditions across the world have named in different ways, known to most as sin, suffering, trespass, transgression, karma, or aveira.
Action driven by self-interest is precisely that which draws man down, as depicted in countless traditions. And it must be understood that the voice of the ego is not the true self. It is a false self, sometimes referred to as the lower man, sometimes as the inner adversary, the shadow within, or the beast of desire—that relentless stirrer of cravings and illusions. It must be brought home directly.
Have you ever questioned the voice of the ego within you? that ceaseless whisper, the relentless urge that persuades, insists, and commands? It demands this, it demands that, and yet, the moment it attains what it seeks, it turns away as though it had never hungered for it at all.
“One’s desire to receive for oneself without an inclination to give to anyone else is an egoistic desire. It is impossible to satisfy it, and such attempts only lead to an increase of demands … the more one receives, the more one wants.” — Baal HaSulam
And,
“Our egoistic nature was created with a will to receive, and this drives all our cravings and dissatisfaction; it grows ever stronger, demanding more without end, because its fulfillment from physical pleasures alone only reveals yet greater emptiness.” — Baal HaSulam
Have you observed how what seemed indispensable yesterday becomes trivial today, and how today’s pursuit will, in its turn, be cast aside tomorrow? Everything man does around the axis of himself is drawn into this unending orbit, each fleeting pleasure dissolving the instant it is grasped, leaving him hollow, unsated, and already reaching for the next shadow of fulfilment.
Have you questioned its authority, or have you simply followed it, step by step, year after year, calling its demands your own. This voice measures and compares. It looks to others and finds itself lacking. It acquires, yet is not satisfied. It reaches, yet never arrives. It promises fulfilment, yet delivers only a brief and fading satisfaction, followed by a new desire, a new lack, a new pursuit. Oscar Wilde captured this condition with disarming simplicity when he said, “There are only two tragedies in life: one is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it.”
For if you do not obtain what you desire, you suffer in the wanting, and if you do obtain it, you suffer in the emptiness that follows, or in the burden of maintaining it, protecting it, fearing its loss. And even if you succeed beyond measure, if you gather wealth, property, influence, and power, another anxiety arises, for you cannot take any of it with you, and so your thoughts turn to preservation, inheritance, and control, all the while knowing that it must inevitably pass from your hands.
And while this restless pursuit unfolds, most of humanity remain in conditions of hardship, poverty, war, famine, and deprivation, not as isolated misfortunes but as the wider expression of a system driven by acquisition without unity, by separation without correction.
Michael Laitman writes that the ego“constantly grows and demands more, yet never allows a person to feel fulfilled,” for man is driven by a force which expands without limit yet cannot satisfy itself, and so it produces a condition of perpetual dissatisfaction, regardless of circumstance. So one must ask plainly, is this the mark of progress, is this the condition in which man takes pride, this endless cycle of chasing, acquiring, comparing, and discarding, this confinement within a narrow band of desires relating to food, sex, money, honour, power, control, and even knowledge, beyond which he seldom looks, and within which he finds no lasting peace.
This is what the great traditions have termed sin and evil, not as isolated acts, but as a condition of being, the misuse of man’s highest faculties in the service of separation, the turning of intelligence against unity, the employment of thought to justify division and sustain it.
Baruch Ashlag explains that man does not perceive this ego as foreign to him, but as his very self, and therefore he defends it, justifies it, and lives through it, even when it leads him into conflict and suffering. And so man becomes alienated from the very power of life itself. Not because that power is absent, but because he stands opposed to it in perception and in conduct. The same unified force which sustains all existence continues to operate without interruption, yet man, identifying as separate, moves against it, and in doing so experiences friction, resistance, and unrest. Nature does not yield to this condition. It is exact, unified, and unyielding. Where there is opposition to it, there must be consequence, not as punishment, but as law. A part that acts against the whole cannot remain in harmony, and so the tensions within the individual and within humanity at large intensify until the contradiction can no longer be sustained.
The great injunction, to love the other as oneself, stands therefore not as a moral aspiration but as a statement of reality. It is the correction of perception and the restoration of alignment. Until this is realised, man remains divided within himself and against the world, and no external advancement can resolve that division.
And so we arrive at a sober and unavoidable conclusion. Everything which man undergoes, the suffering, the relentless pursuit of material gain, the dissatisfaction that follows attainment, the conflicts that arise between individuals and nations, all of it proceeds from this single misidentification. It is a backward road, however advanced it may appear, and it must be retraced, not in theory, but in lived understanding, for only in the correction of this error does man return to the great current of life, and only there does the restless voice lose its authority, not through suppression, but because its illusion has been seen for what it is, and in that seeing, its power dissolves.
From these and what went with these, through suffering, toil, and war; through bestiality, savagery, barbarism; through slavery, greed, effort; through conquests infinite, through defeats overwhelming, through struggle unending; through ages of aimless semi-brutal existence; through subsistence on berries and roots; through the use of the casually found stone or stick; through life in deep forests, with nuts and seeds, and on the shores of waters with molluscs, crustaceans, and fish for food; through that greatest, perhaps, of human victories, the domestication and subjugation of fire; through the invention and art of the bow and arrow; through the taming of animals and the breaking of them to labour; through the long learning which led to the cultivation of the soil; through the adobe brick and the building of houses therefrom; through the smelting of metals and the slow birth of the arts which rest upon these; through the slow making of alphabets and the evolution of the written word. In short, through thousands of centuries of human life, of human aspiration, of human growth, sprang the world of men and women as it stands before us and within us today with all its achievements and possessions.”
“For some hundreds of thousands of years, upon the general plane of self-consciousness, an ascent, to the human eye gradually, but from the point of view of cosmic evolution rapid, has been made. In a race, large brained, walking erect, gregarious, brutal, but king of all other brutes;man in appearance but not in fact, was from the highest simple consciousness born the basic human faculty self-consciousness, and its twin, language.