When I see my wife each day, I see her physical form, hear her voice, and say, "Yes, you are my wife". But I've never seen the soul of my wife; even she has not seen it. Does this mean I've never seen or known my wife?
The relationship of the Manifestations of God to God is one of the great mysteries. I find it eloquently expressed in the tradition:
Manifold and mysterious is My relationship with God. I am He, Himself, and He is I, Myself, except that I am that I am, and He is that He is.
I read this as meaning that if we regard the Manifestation of God and say that He is equal to God, we both are right and err in the same breath, and must be cautious of making any distinctions, or of not making a distinction, depending on the plane to which we refer: the plane of unity, or the plane of differentiation. For He effectively is God, all that we will ever know of God, and the entirety of the meaning of "God" for human beings; but He is also not God, nor will anything ever represent God, such that the word "God" cannot even have meaning for human beings.
If you look at a perfect mirror, you see what it reflects as clearly as if were standing there itself. You see the sun in the mirror and say, "This is the sun", rather than "This is the mirror, shining brightly"; but you could also say, "That is the mirror", or "That is the sun, reflecting its image", and be just as correct.
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