Male and Female: A Mystical Partnership

For the first time in many months, I experienced sheer joy — despite living in a country that is so divided and flooded by negativity, fear and insecurity, as well as growing numbers of those testing positive and dying from a horrific virus and facing the consequences of a disastrous financial crisis.

Despite this reality, an overwhelming sense of happiness and hope filled me when I heard Joe Biden chose Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) to be his running mate as vice president of the United States. Being the first black woman to have this honor is a great historical moment. For young girls and women of color, it must seem an enormous achievement and recognition of how far we’ve come in this country. 

I also realized these two people — together — radiated a wholeness. It is the expression of the male and female energy reflected in the kabbalistic tree of life, the Etz Chayyim. It is a model that incorporates three columns: one on the left, one on the right and one in the center. The right side is male energy, representing loving kindness, assertion and action. The left side is female energy, representing strength, judgment, boundary setting and containment. The center is the balance point that represents the harmonious integration of both sides. It also is the place of foundation and generativity, where both sides connect to create a partnership and a sense of intimacy reflected in their friendship and level of respect and honor for the other. On a deeper, more mystical level, it represents the Divine presence in the world through the expression of our ethics, values and behavior toward one another.

Neither Biden nor Harris is perfect, but as a partnership … they are a mighty pair.

The tree, as the emanation of Divine presence, expresses both male and female divinity; what Jewish mysticism describes as Kaddosh Baruch Hu (the Holy One, blessed be He), the transcendent God, and Shekhinah (Divine indwelling), the imminent God. The physical world we live in also is a counterpart to the heavenly world; the kabbalists say, “so above, so below” and “so below, so above.”

Well, “below” we have a partnership that represents this model: Biden and Harris, the male and the female, a combination of loving kindness and action, and judgment and boundary setting. They have the potential to bring the U.S. back to some semblance of harmony, balance and elevated functioning.

Harris is this representation, the Shekhinah we need now — someone with strength, resilience, positivity and judgment, and the ability to stand up for what this country needs and what individuals are fighting for: dignity. Biden brings compassion and empathy, something our present leadership abundantly lacks; the man and father who traveled back and forth daily from Washington to Delaware during his years as a senator after his wife and daughter died in a tragic accident, to tuck in his children at night and make breakfast for them in the morning. This kind of compassion and giving is the building block for caring for the people in this country.

We currently have a man in the Oval Office who neither has compassion nor loving kindness, nor the ability to set boundaries and limits upon himself. He lacks the basic building blocks for mature and intelligent leadership. In fact, he probably has the arrested development of a young child. It is sad for him and his family, but it is dangerous for us. Loss of financial stability, loss of health and, worst of all, loss of life are the results of his inability to lead effectively, morally, intelligently and maturely.

Neither Biden nor Harris is perfect, but as a partnership of male and female, with strength of character, wisdom and experience of years, and humane, compassionate action, they are a mighty pair. This country and the world are in great need of recovery. The universe aches for an expression of divine attributes, to lift us and bless us.

It is a joy to feel joy. It is good to have hope. It is comforting to feel the universe sing a new song.

Eva Robbins is a rabbi, cantor, artist and the author of “Spiritual Surgery: A Journey of Healing Mind, Body and Spirit.”