Zohar 2:250a

Jewish Mysticism
It is written [“My beloved is like a gazelle or like a young stag; there he stands behind our wall] gazing through the windows” (Cant. 2-9). These exist so that he might see all those worshippers who come first to the Synagogue and are counted amongst the first ten [cf. b. Berakhot 47b]. Then they ascend and are written above for they are called comrades (haverim) in relation to Him, as it is written. “Lovers (haverim) are listening; let me hear your voice” (ibid., 8- 13). Happy are the righteous who know how to set their prayer as is appropriate, for when that prayer began to ascend they ascend by means of that prayer, and they enter all the heavens and all the palaces until the gate of the upper opening [i.e., the Shekhinah] and that prayer enters before the King to be crowned.

Translated by Elliot Wolfson in “Forms of Visionary Ascent and Ecstatic Experience,” in Gershom Scholem’s Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism 50 Years After 209-235. Edited by J. Dan and P. Schafer, Tubingen- J. C. B. Mohr, 1993.