Shemos: 28:35. It shall be on Aaron when he performs the service, and its sound shall be heard when he enters the Holy before the Lord and when he leaves, so that he will not die.
This is the Ephod that Aaron is wearing. It is a garment made up entirely of blue wool. Blue is the color of Kabbalah meaning that this Ephod is yet another instrument to awaken the awareness of Hashem through acute listening and attention.
The sound that is heard comes from the golden bells that are ringed along with pomegranates at the bottom edge of this half skirt. It’s sound reminds the Kohen Hagadol (high-priest) of the holiness that he encounters entering into the holy of holies.
A bell makes a very present sound cutting through the awareness making itself known. In the same way our attention is prepared to reach up for Hashem as we focus our prayers and thoughts on that which is above. We want this connection to be maintained and not to ‘die’ in the middle of our meditations. This teaches us to be mindful of what or whom we are approaching and be careful to maintain that connection without pause.
Because the ephod is mostly shown in the back the Zohar connects this with ‘seeing through a cloudy glass in the sense of our spirituality. The breastplate or choshen worn on the front with its jewels refers to a clear sense of the spiritual, a direct experience face to face. Another reference from the Zohar ascribes Zeir Anpin to the choshen and Nukva to the ephod. Zeir Anpin receives its light directly from the above sephiroth while Nukva receives only reflected light. So too the choshen there in front receives the emanation of Hashem directly while the ephod in back receives this light indirectly or in a reflected fashion.
Shemos:28:36. And you shall make a showplate (Tzitz) of pure gold, and you shall engrave upon it like the engraving of a seal: Holy to the Lord."
The showplate or Tzitz is the crown that the high priest wears. It is engraved in a similar manner as the two shoham stones that are worn on the shoulder; the difference being that on the shoulder are the names of the tribes of Israel while on the headband-crown or Tzitz is engraved ‘holy to the Lord.’
Consider these three elements (choshen, ephod, tzitz) as the priest wears them. The ephod represents Nukva (Malchus) flowing down to the feet, the choshen – Zeir Anpin and the tzitz the upper sephiroth including the Keter the crown completing the partzuf (image of the ten sephiroth expressed as a unity).
The Nukva grounds the reflection of the image above 'holy to the Lord' while passing through Zeir Anpin where all of Israel is represented through four rows of three stones each. Our actions too represent this unity of above and below and the totality of Israel is effected by our prayers and thoughts directed on high.
The high priest through the actions of being clothed in these garments acts thereby to step from the mundane into the spiritual. Now in this stepping forward from one state into another there is a seamless transformation. It is one that remembers or is still attached to the former while being one hundred percent there in the latter.
There is a mnemonic device called a Memory Castle where you place the things you want to remember in specific places and then recall these items whatever they are by going to each place and retrieving whatever it was you were trying to remember.
In a similar fashion these garments represents our inner awareness. When we imagine that we are entering a holy place these are the garments of connection that we are wearing. We want to be connected above seamlessly while maintaining a grounded presence below. All of this if for the sake of the unification of above and below also called mystically the unification of YK and VK.
There are however a few more steps in this process. Prior to entering this holy state there must be sanctification between above and below. We will discuss this next…stay tuned!
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