However, this Residue could have come into being in two ways. Either it could have been subject to a single imperfect law governing imperfect creatures in such a way that they could never overcome their imperfections. Alternatively, it could come into being subject to a single law through which its very deficiencies are gradually corrected until they attain the perfection that was concealed at the outset.
Let me illustrate this with an example. Reward and punishment indicate a lack of perfection, for in a state of complete perfection, everything must be good. With the concealment of perfection, the government hangs in the balance whether to confer goodness or the opposite, depending on men’s deeds in the lower world. This is rooted in the Residue, which contains everything connected with reward on the one hand and punishment on the other: everything is prepared and ready, waiting for the arousal from below – men’s initiatives in the lower world. But things could have gone on this way forever, with the righteous receiving their reward and the wicked being punished. This would have been the case were it not for the fact that the Residue is governed by the Unlimited. However, since everything in the Residue is governed by the Unlimited, it must be that the pathways of the Residue do not remain as they are but continue until they reach perfection. For this reason, there is a limit to the period of choice, reward and punishment: “The world will exist for six thousand years” (Sanhedrin 97a). The Residue is thus like a wheel that turns through just so many degrees until it completes the entire cycle, and at the very end there will be perfect rest.