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This series is a continuation and should be read in order. If you are not familiar with previous posts you may have trouble understanding later ones.
So, does the Infinite Light have Sfiros or not? The sources seem to be contradictory - some say yes some no.
To explain this the Rebbe brings up the concept of Heyuli (from the Greek Helios the root of helium) meaning an ethereal prepotential state.
The difference between a potential and a Heyuli is like the difference between the fire in a piece of wood (potential) and the Heyuli for fire in a flintstone (heyuli). There is no actual fire in a flintstone yet it can be brought out.
Another more refined example is a talent. Did Mozart's symphonies exist within his talent when he was born? Not actually - But the heyuli of the symphonies did.
The difference between a potential and a Heyuli is also called a hiddenness which is in existence and a hiddenness which is not in existence (like the fire in the wood and the flint).
This type of inclusion of the Sfiros within the Simple Unity of the Infinite Light is also in the way of a Heyuli. This type of inclusion is impossible to truly understand, being that we as limited creations have no true concept of infinity, both by definition of us being limited beings and infinity being infinite and therefore incomprehensible. However, we can understand that this must be the case. Meaning that such a unity must exist, for if not nothing else could exist Also, we can gain some sort of a perception of it by allegorizing from our soul. It is this concept of the Heyuli as well as the three levels or stages in the revelation of ten Sfiros and eventually our world out of G-d’s infinite light (these levels being the aforementioned Yachid, Echad and Kadmoan) that will be explained in the rest of this chapter and the next one. In the rest of this chapter the Mittler Rebbe will give the various key analogies necessary to understand these three levels and then in chapter eleven he will explain how these analogies correspond in the analog of the G-dly light and the creation of the world.
First, a parallel in the Zohar.
This being the general concept represented by the first teaching of the Zohar that Beraish Hurmenah De’Malkah Glyph Glyphu BiThehiru Ilaa "In the beginning of the rule of the King He engraved an engraving (Glyph) in the upper purity." Meaning that in the aforementioned essence of the revelation of His simple light, which is called the upper purity - "He engraved an engraving" - which is the concept of engraving letters (note: the term letters is used in Kabbalistic and Chassidic literature to represent any type of specific revelation or expression. {See Likkutei Dibburim for full explanation}). Now "In the beginning of the rule of the King," which represents when the desire to create the world arose in His simple will - that is the level of Kesser (Crown) and the level of the letters that He engraved is the level of Malchus (Kingdom) of the Infinite Light. If so this statement would seem to imply that there is a beginning and an end - Kesser and Malchus even within the level of the essence of the Infinite Light, which is, as we have just finished explaining, impossible to say about the Infinite Light. However, the explanation of this opening statement of the Zohar is that it came up in G-d’s simple thought and will "I will be rule" and all this still within His essence, yet before the idea that He estimated within Himself in a strictly potential manner what would be His revealed will for kingship which this revealed will is after the "empty place" Tzimtzum etc.
Meaning that G-d from His very self and essence, already possessed within Himself the ability of desiring to be King and to create a kingdom over which to reign as well as the knowledge of what to want and how to create it. All of this is not (G-d forbid) to say that He is limited in anyway by this or any other attribute, but rather only to say that everything that exists has its first source in G-d Himself. This is aside from the most important and not to be forgotten fact that whenever human descriptions are used to describe G-d, even be they as lofty as will or thought, they must be understood in purely metaphorical terms, for "He has nothing to do with any of these attributes at all" and as per the verse "My thought are not your thought; nor are My ways your ways. As the distance from east to west is the distance of My ways from your ways." for G-d is absolutely simple and unlimited, as is explained in many places.
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The material in this series is copyrighted by Rabbi Yossi Markel