Kabbalah Moments: Why Am I Not Eternal
Posted on February 23rd, 2011
Question: How will The Book of Zohar bring about the correction of the Internet?
Answer: The Book of Zohar can help correct the Internet because people using the net are looking for a real connection. However, they do not understand their own desire yet and it seems to them that it’s enough for them to just make contacts, to chat with each other, and to entertain themselves with games and other such things.
But later people will see that this doesn’t help, that all of this is limited and a waste of time that does not bring any benefit, and that the “social networks” do not really connect people with each other. Nevertheless, as long as people are spending time there, they reveal the evil contained there. They reach the understanding that all of this is false, that it exists for the sake of making a buck, and is an attempt to lie to and rob each other. They will understand that this entire Internet connection only harms them.
It would seem: How could the connection between us harm us? But the matter is that we are egoists and cannot connect well and usefully. We cannot create a network that brings us pleasure. And this will bring about the realization of evil.
Then we will have to give people the explanation that inside of this Internet network there exists one small network that lives by different laws. The people that have gathered there desire to attain goodness. This is exactly what our television channel’s motto says, “We’re connecting to goodness.”
There are completely different rules and people operating there—people who want to be brothers. And by virtue of that they reveal the upper life, instead of simply hugging and attempting to keep everything polite and pretty on the outside.
These people attain the state where inside of their relationships they begin to feel the upper, spiritual life, which is perfect and eternal. They reveal the Creator, the spiritual world, the upper force that is concealed inside of that network!
[36174]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/23/11, “Introduction to the book Panim Meirot uMasbirot”
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Question: How can I, during the preparation period, when I haven’t reached spiritual revelation yet, determine that each day I value bestowal more and more?
Answer: You can evaluate it by your own internal sensation, thoughts, goals, and importance of the group, by how much you appreciate and hear the friends, by how strongly you feel that you need them all the time, like an infusion, and that if you don’t receive their support, you will fall.
This feeling is very important. To depend on the environment is to be free from your ego! You must strive to always depend on the friends and feel them as strongly as possible so that they influence and protect you as much as possible, which means to constantly receive from them a special illumination, an impact of the force.
We need to try feeling that only this keeps us in the correct direction. If the environment doesn’t impact me from the outside, I lose the aim for the Creator.
And then, try to connect everything in one place, in one integral desire: yourself, the friends, and the Creator. I, they, and the Creator should not exist separately, like the vertices of a triangle; rather, we have to came together into a single desire, in the same area.
And if I and they are concerned with each other, care about, and bestow to each other, it means we free between us the space for the Creator’s revelation. He becomes revealed between us!
If the environment doesn’t affect me, I am not able to break free from my egoism and think about something outside of its interests. And hence, to depend on them is to be free from egoism. If the society influences me, I feel how it directs me to the goal.
I appeal to the environment (1); the environment influences me (2); I aim myself to the Creator (3). It cannot be otherwise! If not, I will be pulled back into my egoism. I will actually feel how it is sinking me and pulling my legs down. But the environment will immediately give me strength to tear away from it and ascend, and then I will become one with the Creator.
Every time you feel that it starts pulling you down more and more, give it another round (1-2-3).
[35610]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/17/2011, “Introduction to the Book, Panim Meirot uMasbirot”
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Question: You say that The Book of Zohar is the only means that can help us attain correction and unite. But it’s unclear how the world will be able to use it since it’s impossible to understand anything in this book!
Answer: But we correct ourselves in our world using the same unclear means! I come to a doctor without understanding anything about the treatment or the means. This person sticks needles into my body and pumps out blood with a tube, and I even pay him money and say "Thank you"!
Then he prescribes some kind of chemicals for me to take that contain nothing but poison. Surely, you must know that every medicine is poison; in fact, the very symbol of medicine is a serpent with a cup of poison. We pay a lot of money for this medicine and we don’t understand how it works, and there is no doubt that it is based on poison. But I swallow it and it helps me! I get better!
My body was sick so I added more poison to it, and it suddenly became healthy. Can you explain that?! But that’s how it works! Is this logical in any shape or form?
In the same way, we have to inject “poison” inside of us because the upper Light is the most real poison there is for us. We have to take it inside of us and then we will get better! We need something completely opposite to our nature and this seems completely illogical.
But even in our world, taking medicine is an illogical action, and it is more so if we are talking about spiritual correction. Tell me, do I really need the upper Light that will teach me to bestow and love the neighbor? I feel nauseous even thinking about it. I don’t want to see anyone and I hate everyone, cursing this entire life and the Creator. But I am told that you have to add a bit more poison and bring the Light, the Creator, closer to you.
But what am I bringing closer? The force of bestowal, the Light that seems to bring me more of what I hate! And this is exactly what I do not want! This works as a double negative, an opposite over an opposite—and that is the entire meaning and logic! It’s just hard for us to understand it.
[36177]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/23/11, “Introduction to the book Panim Meirot uMasbirot”
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Question: What force lifts the worlds on Saturday after Adam HaRishon is born and before he falls into sin?
Answer: There is a force regarded as an “awakening from Above” (Itaruta de-Leila). It could simply be seen as the upper Light expanding from the world of Infinity while we don’t know how and why. But in truth, there is no “awakening from Above” without an “awakening from below” (Itaruta de-Letata), from the creature itself.
There is a chain of informational genes (Reshimot) that must unfold and become clarified one by one, which descend from the still, vegetative, animate, and speaking degrees. Reshimot of the still, vegetative, and animate degrees unfold naturally, subconsciously, on their own, because there is no free will at these degrees.
They unfold one by one and gradually arrive at the state when there is a leap to a new degree. Where it comes from, we don’t know. But it occurs due to the fact that the preparation at the still, vegetative, and animate degrees has been completed, and you suddenly start to feel how your state has changed. You start thinking, seeing things, and feeling everything differently.
The reason is that the Reshimot which are below your awareness, understanding, preparation, free will and which get naturally discerned have been actualized. The Creator prepares all the conditions for you to use your free will, and you must perform on your own now.
It is similar to how you don’t control the processes in your corporeal body. You don’t need to think about how all the atoms and molecules are moving in it, how metabolism and various internal systems work. Imagine how complex these processes with an infinite number of conditions are, and all of it works automatically.
Spiritual development is the same: The upper force brings us to the point where our free will begins. And this expands to the entire system, the entire desire created by the Creator, the entire still, vegetative, and animate nature, its enormous systems. But it isn’t our job and is automatic, thanks to the interaction of the Light and desires.
The Light affects desires; desires respond to the Light; and this is how the whole world, the entire universe, everything strives to achieve equilibrium. The only exception is man!
So it is today in our world: All of nature exists in balance, but the problem is in man who has to exercise free will and establish this balance. As it is in the spiritual world, all events that were taking place before Adam’s fall into sin, including the fall itself, were occurring under control of the force from Above (Itaruta de-Leila), through the chain of Reshimot, until we reach the place of free will. And there, everything freezes and waits until man will make a decision.
That is what is actually happening in our world today: Nature is waiting for us to make our choice. It will pressure us since while it is waiting, the Reshimot of the still, vegetative, and animate degrees get accumulated and bring us numerous problems on all planes of the external world, until we finally decide, at our speaking degree, that we must go forth for the correction.
The still, vegetative, and animate nature pressures us so we may continue on the path of correction at our human degree.
[35603]
From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/17/2011, Talmud Eser Sefirot
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The only thing we can take from our study is to turn it into a “miraculous quality” (Segula), to attract “the Light that Reforms” to us. That is why we choose to study the books recommended to us by Kabbalists, the people who have already realized their correction, have attained the revelation of the Creator, adhesion with Him, the upper attainment, and have returned to the root of their soul.
That is to say, they carried out their task, which is incumbent on every person in this world, and attained their finally corrected state, Gmar Tikkun, the world of Infinity, unity with the Creator. That is why we listen to their instructions, and what they advise us is to study only the Kabbalistic books because they contain the Light that Reforms.
The Light contained in other books that also speak about the spiritual world (such as Torah, Mishnah, and Talmud) is insufficiently powerful to return our souls to the source. That does not mean they do not have spirituality! They were all written by great Kabbalists who had spiritual attainment, but these books are not intended to give us the force of correction. That is why we use them only as a small addition, while the entire study is based on The Book of Zohar with Baal HaSulam’s commentaries, as well as Talmud Eser Sefirot.
These are precisely the books that bring us the surrounding Light that is most suitable for the souls of our generation and have the force to correct us. A person who studies these books is called a sage or “a student of a sage” (Talmid Hacham) because he learns from the Creator (a sage) about the quality of bestowal. That person is “wise of heart” because he wants to correct his “heart,” his will to enjoy in order to turn it into a vessel for the Light of Hochma.
That is how we regard our study, group, teacher, dissemination, and our entire lives, so all of it will turn into a means to acquire this “miraculous force” (Segula), the Light that Reforms. This is the only thing we should think about from morning to night and from night to morning! After all, a person’s entire success in life depends on this Light.
[36181]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/23/11, “Introduction to the book Panim Meirot uMasbirot”
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On the spiritual path I ask myself what seems like an insolvable question about how to overcome my evil inclination, egoism. Kabbalists tell you, "You have to try." Understand this: The Creator really is opposite to your nature; the quality of bestowal is extremely hateful to you; you cannot even think about love for the neighbor, not to mention its implementation.
So what should you do? Move gradually. Make actions that will bring you to the prayer. Resort to all possible means and tricks in order to nevertheless feel the importance of the quality of bestowal and to place it above the quality of reception. Even if it’s repulsive to your nature, even if you feel that you don’t want to bestow because you find bestowal very bitter to the taste, then at least with your mind you will nevertheless begin to value this quality for its height and greatness for the fact that it is the quality of the Creator. It governs the world and it is respected by the environment which you have entered.
By using various tricks, you will evoke the Light that Reforms. In other words, by studying, working in the group, and disseminating, you will prepare your intention: “I want the influence of the Light. I want the Light, the force of bestowal that created my desire, meaning the force of reception, to influence me, to influence my desire, and to add the intention of bestowal to it.”
You do not know exactly what you are asking for, but try it anyway. After all, you want to reveal the Creator, meaning the quality of bestowal. You want to feel the upper world, to live in the quality of bestowal. You want to reveal the common Kli, the common soul, meaning to live with the care for all the other desires, which will become revealed to you in the form of the system of the single soul. Gradually, thanks to the intention before and during the study, together with the friends you will reach something called a “miracle” and will begin to feel that more and more, you really do respect and value the quality of bestowal.
Suddenly, it becomes very important to you. It reigns in the whole world because bestowal does not have to be expressed. It is primary; in fact, it is the entire life force in all of reality. This quality supports the still level, raises the vegetative level, gives vital forces to the animate level, and gives man unity and connection with the Creator.
When this “miracle” happens to a person, he suddenly feels love and connection with that quality. A special feeling emerges inside of him in relation to the quality of bestowal. He is ready to receive from it everything that it wants to give, to do anything just to become similar to it and to give it pleasure. A person feels that he is able to do this and that he thereby brings goodness to the quality of bestowal, the Creator.
All of this happens inside of me under the influence of the Light. However, it only happens to the extent of my efforts, in conformity with their quality and quantity. Before studying, I prepare myself by asking: What am I studying for? Why am I opening up the book? The answer is that it’s only in order to acquire the quality of bestowal, to reveal the force of bestowal, to reveal the Creator and merge with Him. In other words, it’s in order to unite with the force of bestowal so it will rule inside of me, so it would turn into my intention above the desire.
That is how a person advances until the entire egoistic desire becomes revealed in him, whereas the force of bestowal will become an intention to him, the bestowing desire above the receiving desire. Then the receiving desire and the intention for the sake of bestowal will be together and a person will reach adhesion with the Creator.
That is how we realize ourselves correctly. It is written about this that “Israel carries out the Creator’s will.”
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/23/11, Writings of Rabash
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Question: If our spiritual advancement does not depend on theoretical knowledge of the structure of the worlds and Partzufim, why then do we discuss it in such detail and ask questions during the TES (Talmud Eser Sefirot) lessons?
Answer: If you understand something about the structure of the world incorrectly, it won’t prevent you from spiritual advancement. But it is necessary to study in order to draw the Light.
Due to your aspiration to understand what it is written in The Study of Ten Sefirot, you will want to reveal this state and experience the spiritual worlds yourself. You will eventually realize that without true revelation, you will not understand anything.
You should use all your eagerness to understand what is written in order to finally realize that understanding comes not in the mind but solely through the revelation. And when you start wishing for this revelation, you will receive correction. In truth, revelation implies authentic sensation and not some theoretical comprehension by way of reason. When you get to know the spiritual world, you will understand it based on your own experience, which is regarded as “the heart understands.”
But at present, you are trying to understand by way of reason where and what Sefira is located geometrically, where it goes up and down along the squares on the paper, instead of thinking how they are connected by their properties, their internal essence.
It is very important to be aware of this; otherwise, you will lose big time. You will lose not some few Sefirot drawn on the chart on the paper—you will lose the Light that Reforms.
[35606]
From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/17/2011, Talmud Eser Sefirot
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Kabbalists teach us the path to the root so each of us would attain the root of his soul. They tell us that the most important thing is the intention. There is a force Above intended to correct us and lead us through all the phases to the final, exalted state. However, we have to precede the ascent with our own actions by anticipating it with our request or desire.
In the end we have to feel something that we are unable to currently perceive. We do not have anything to grab hold of, no opportunity to. This “something” appears insignificant and meaningless. Why is that? The reason is because the phenomenon we have to feel is bestowal and love for the neighbor. This is the force of the Creator, the quality called “the Creator” which envelops and fills all of reality.
We don’t understand it or feel it, and are unable to come closer to it. We were deliberately created opposite in order to see the Light from the darkness, and then to understand, feel, and manifest it.
The simple Light as such would blind us. Therefore, we exist and develop in the quality of reception, gradually acquiring more and more details of perception. Then comes a moment when we despair of reception and acquire an impetus toward the quality of bestowal. This spark that awakens inside us is called “the point in the heart.”
Then we are brought closer to realizing it. We are brought to an instructor, books, and environment. Now we can develop this spark into the real quality of bestowal and love for the neighbor. Our work lies in making all the possible actions that can help us increase our value of the instructor, the primary sources, and the environment. When we elevate them above our egoism, above the quality of reception, the quality of bestowal becomes more important to us and we start to feel greater respect for the Light than the darkness, or for the Creator than creation.
I read about this in the primary sources, and that means I have to make efforts to this end. However, when I come face to face with it, when I make a plan to begin respecting and raising bestowal over reception in my eyes, what I discover inside is futility and lack of all interest in the subject. I feel that I don’t care one bit about the instructor, the group, or the books. Everything loses flavor.
Why? It’s because my egoism, my desire for pleasure does not smell any profit here. On the contrary, from that moment on it feels that what lies ahead are losses.
How can I cause anything bad to myself if I am entirely the will to enjoy? I am simply incapable of this. The possibility of harming myself is not inherent in me.
So what should I do? It turns out that my advancement towards the Creator lies in constantly separating from what now appears as “goodness” to me. Moreover, it is coming closer to “evil.” Is that even possible?
The answer to this question can only be received from the science of Kabbalah.
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/23/11, Writings of Rabash
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