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In discussing the roots of souls, let's explain a little about Reincarnation.

The basis of Jewish thought is that there are two ways to rectify and remove a sin: Repentance and Reincarnation.

It is a basic Torah precept that a person has to accomplish all 613 commandments in their life. However, this task is impossible to achieve - not in every lifetime does a person get divorced (that’s a commandment). And not in every lifetime, for example, is a person a Cohen – nor, unfortunately, does a Temple exist in one's lifetime and therefore we are unable to carry out certain required commandments. Also, if you are a woman you can’t do the commandments that a man has to do. It’s basically impossible to do all six hundred and thirteen commandments in one lifetime, thus, we are reincarnated a few times.

This means that if a person has done some repentance in their lifetime they have partially fulfilled their task on this earth. If a person hasn’t repented and, on top of that, perhaps has done many sins, that person has to rectify what has gone wrong in his present life and past lives.

The Kabbalistic book, "Gates of Reincarnation" reveals to us a basic understanding of these two levels. ["Spheres": Keter [crown] is the highest sphere--then Chochmah [wisdom/knowledge], and then Binah [understanding]. "Repentance" is from the sphere of Deep Understanding/ Binah while "Reincarnation" is from the sphere of Deep Wisdom/ Chochmah. Reincarnation is on a higher level because it comes from a higher sphere than Repentance. This whole subject of "coming back" as a rectification comes from even a higher sphere than Repentance. G-d enables a person to rectify a return through reincarnation. 

When a person returns, they never return in the same way because whatever rectifications they've done already, [those sparks of soul] will elevate to the upper worlds. Now they just have to deal with the sparks that they have not rectified. When that person is reincarnated again it’s going to be very different from the first time. For example, a person in their first lifetime was Jewish. In his second lifetime that person was born to a non-Jewish mother. In the third lifetime they were born into a Jewish family.

In another example in the first lifetime the person was a male and then in the second life time, a female. It’s possible that a person was a Gaon (brilliant) and then can come back as a not-so gifted person. So that’s G-d’s [sphere of] Knowledge/Chochmah to decide what to do with every soul in each reincarnation.According to the book "Chessed leAvraham", when the soul comes down again and G-d has His plan for the soul, the soul is asked, "Do you agree?" "Do you agree that you come down as "male or female'", "gifted or not gifted", "beautiful or not beautiful"?. And if the soul doesn’t agree then it is not going to happen.

So each time it’s going to be different.

There are two different types of souls: 1] a person/soul who has finished their rectification, and, 2] a person/soul who has not finished their rectification. 

• One would think that a person who has finished their rectification would not need to reincarnate further. However, there is a situation in which such a soul would reincarnate anyway. This is mentioned in the works of the Arizal in 1570. He mentions that a woman may reincarnate so that she could live with her husband again. Her husband is judged if he's worthy of having his soul mate reincarnate with him even though she has finished her rectification. 
• A person who has not finished their rectification has to reincarnate again, but he may reincarnate in a different generation than his soul mate because the soul needs a different rectification. 

This was the situation in the generation of the Arizal. Already at this time there were many people/souls that did not reincarnate with their soul mates because they were not worthy of them or they were reincarnated in a different generation. If this occurred then [in the1500's], today the situation is probably more chaotic.

 

From Kabbalistic sources we learn that we all come from different sources or roots of souls, it’s called in Hebrew, shorashim/roots.

Basically, there are chronologically, at least, six hundred thousand sources: 60 x 10,000 = 600,000. This is the basic number of the sources of a Jewish soul. 
It says in "The Gates of Reincarnation:"

 

The first all-inclusive soul was Adam. 
The second level are the three Patriarchs. 
The third level are the twelve tribes. 
The fourth level are the seventy souls that went down to Egypt. 
The fifth level are the 600,000 souls that were born from these 70 souls. This number is the number of the roots of souls of Israel in all times.

Connected to each root of the six hundred thousand are many, many souls. So this is how the souls are divided: 1, 3, 12, 70, 600,000.

To learn more about these levels and other basic Kabbalistic principles about "Roots of Souls" visit our Purchase and Learning Center.

This information was written, published and compiled by Atarah Gur and kabbalahtorah.com. 
Copyright © 2007Atarah C. Gur