נפש הגרThe Convert's Soul

nefesh ha-gerIn Gamatria ↗

A borrowed lantern carries a homeless wind back home.

Converts' souls are the lowest grade, staying only three days in the upper womb. When a gentile comes to convert, he first receives a nefesh drawn from the klippah of nogah (in one version, from the offspring of souls of the righteous in the earthly Garden of Eden). Once converted, he also receives a holy nefesh like any Jew, and the first one can still pull him toward sin. Sages such as Ben Azzai and R. Akiva 'made souls' for converts through their Torah study. A ruach that must return without its own nefesh is clothed in a convert's nefesh, and the two then rise together and remain neighbours in the world to come.

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