Gevurah, strength, severity, judgment, is the fifth Sefirah, facing Chesed on the left column. Elijah calls it "the left arm." If Chesed gives without measure, Gevurah measures, restrains, limits: it says no. Without it, kindness would drown the world; without Chesed, severity would burn it. The verse of Chronicles names it second: "and the might." Rabbi Akiva reads: "the might, this is the plague of the firstborn"; Rabbi Shila, in the same passage, sees in it "the exodus from Egypt," the strong hand. The severity of G-d is not cruelty, but a strength that cuts and sets free.
Its root is ancient: Etz Chaim notes that tzimtzum itself has as its purpose "to reveal the root of the judgments," in order then to give the worlds the measure of judgment. Every limit, including the one that makes creation possible, belongs to Gevurah. Its figure is Isaac: "G-d of Isaac: Gevurah," says the Pardes. Jacob himself calls G-d "the fear of Isaac." Isaac is the one who was bound on the altar and who accepted the absolute limit; he is also the one who digs wells.
The Tomer Devorah approaches Gevurah from an unexpected angle: the inclination. "Know that all the actions that arouse the evil inclination truly arouse the strong severities." A person was created with two inclinations, the good and the evil, "one Chesed, the other Gevurah." But Cordovero cites the Zohar on Bereshit: the good inclination was created for the person himself, and the evil inclination "for the need of his wife." He marvels at the sweetness of this saying: Tiferet, the master of kindness, leans to the right; the woman is of the left side, that of Gevurah; so a man must not arouse the evil inclination for his own benefit, for he would arouse the supernal Man in severity and destroy the world. Hence, he adds, the gravity of anger, which strengthens the harsh severities.
How then to cultivate Gevurah? By turning its strength toward the home. "For the need of his wife," writes Cordovero, a man will arouse his inclination "gently, on the side of the sweetened severities: for instance, to clothe her, to prepare a house for her." And he will say: in clothing her, I repair the Shekhinah, who adorns herself with Binah, which is Gevurah including all the severities, sweetened by the abundance of her mercy. "Therefore all the repairs of the house are repairs of the Shekhinah." He specifies that a man will seek no enjoyment in it for himself, but the intention to repair; then severity becomes service.
Gevurah is also awe, discipline, the capacity to stand firm. But Cordovero warns: the evil inclination must be "tied and bound," not for desire, not for money, not for anger, not for honor; and even what he arouses for his home, he will afterward bind to the right, to sweeten all the severities. True strength, says the Mishnah, is the strength that masters its inclination.
Keep Isaac's measure: the strength that accepts a limit and protects. A no said out of love builds as much as a yes.
