The Poet of Kabbala

I am broken hearted and devastated at the news of the passing of Rav Chaim HaKohen Ferachya, otherwise known as HaChalban. Although I never had the merit to meet him, my connection to him began in 2013 when one of my sons was seriously hurt in an accident and I went to Israel to see him post-surgery. The day after he got out of the hospital two of my friends came to visit and mentioned that they were on the way to Tel Aviv to receive Berachos from a Mekubal known as HaChalban. Despite the fact that I had been a student of Kabbala for a decade, I had never heard of him as his works were not then available in the United States.
The next day I traveled to Yerushalaim to see another one of my sons and I stopped into a small bookstore on Rechov Straus (it closed recently) and I discovered that this Mekubal named HaChalban had authored a few Seforim. I purchased his Sefer on Shemos, which we were about to begin reading in Shul, and I could not put it down the entire flight back to America. Shortly thereafter I began learning his Seforim with a small group in Baltimore which continued for five years.
How can I put into words the deep effect on my heart his teachings have had? ליבא לפומא לא גליא. The depth, profundity, breadth and originality of his works are breathtaking. Other Kabbalists write works that teach you Kabbala, that take you step by step through the Kabbalistic world-view. HaChalban kept you in this world, but taught you how to see it through the lens of Kabbala. The beauty and passion with which he writes have led me to refer to him as The Poet of Kabbala.
His masterwork, in my opinion, is הקיצו ורננו which I refer to as HaChalban Manifesto. You cannot truly appreciate his other works unless you first grasp his underlying philosophy. The first half of the work is dedicated to his explaining the Love for Eretz Yisroel. The second half, which is amazingly profound, is where he explains how man is responsible for his fellow man. As with many of his works, the real nuggets are often found in the Appendices in the back. One of the question he deals with is one that I have often wondered about; he is the only one who addresses it. He speaks about the need for outreach to Jews who are no longer connected to Torah. But he points out that no one will ever figure out how to accomplish that unless they can first answer a very basic question. Why has God orchestrated matters that today the majority of the Jewish nation is no longer Torah observant? How does this fit into God's plan for the world. If we don't understand that, we can't possibly affect that phenomenon in a positive manner.
His Seforim on the various books of Chumash attempt to tackle some of the most difficult incidents that we find described therein. At the beginning of Bereshis he gives a list of numerous reasons cited in Midrashim and later commentators as to why God created the world. he carefully explains and analyzes each one, and then he painstakingly shows how really the many reasons can be boiled down to a smaller number and then demonstrates how rather than arguing they are referring to different points.
His Seforim on the various Yomim Tovim serve as inspirational guides to understand the inner meaning of each holiday. My personal favorite is the first one he published on the holiday of Sukkos, specifically on the Mitzva of Sukkah. He weaves the Ushpizin with the Halachos of Sukkah to offer insights into the symbolism of each of our Patriarchs as well as the meaning behind different aspects of Hilchos Sukkah.
HaChalban takes Rav Kook at the center of many of his teachings, taking the often inscrutable words of Rav Kook and painting a Kabbalistic tapestry into which his words fit beautifully. This is especially evident in his work on the prayer Ana B'Koach. His mastery of many of the Kabbalistic classics is evident throughout his writings, especially the writings of the Baal HaLeshem (HaChalban was taught Kabbala by a student of the Leshem) as well as the Shaarei Orah.
He offers tantalizing teases that there are more Seforim to come, unfortunately, over the past few years all the works under the title of טללי חיים have been authored by Rav Reuven Sasson, who helped to write the Seforim of HaChalban, and are not the teachings of Rav Chaim himself. While they are worth works in their own right, they are clearly different than those of HaChalban. One hopes that there are more treasures that will appear posthumously.
It is a profoundly sad day for me. One of the lights of our times has been extinguished. We should all merit to learn from his Seforim and his example in order to shine our own lights to make up for what we have lost.