In the Kabbalistic view of the world, the soul (neshama in Hebrew) is the source of all wisdom and goodness. The neshama seeks constantly to communicate to us — to our consciousness on the physical plane. The soul is trying to guide us, sustain us, restore us. But there is a force operating in opposition to the neshama. This entity, the yetzer hara, is a self-sustaining and cunning intelligence whose sole aim is to block us from accessing the neshama and to block the neshama from communicating to us.
