How The Book Of Zohar Refocuses Our Vision

prophet The Book of Zohar explains your relationship with the Creator, which is the only thing you have to learn about. The only things existing in our entire reality are the Creator and the creature, and they are the only things that The Book of Zohar speaks of.

Even in our regular lives, where the picture of this world prevents us from seeing the truth (that the Creator and you are the only things in existence), everything around you is actually your relationship with the Creator, although this is not yet apparent to you. There is nothing else besides the Creator and the creature.

Although there are no images in spirituality, The Zohar first takes us into what seems like “corporeal” situations, telling us about actions and images well known to us in this world. But then, The Zohar begins to explain what happens behind the scenes of this picture – what happens to forces, desires and qualities on a higher, parallel level. In this way, we are gradually trained to discern the higher “images” or qualities, and to see everything as our relationship with the Creator.

Plant Your Spiritual Seed In A Blessed Field

naive Only the environment can instill the importance of the goal and of spirituality in you. This is the only thing you should demand from the environment: the importance of the quality of bestowal which you wish to feel inside. When you do, you will reveal the Creator. This constitutes our work and the purpose of our existence in this world.

It seems to us that this revelation will occur somewhere far away, outside of us, but actually it occurs inside each of us. Later on you will see that everything has already occurred – all the spiritual actions that are described in books and all the worlds, starting from the World of Infinity to our world; all of this already exists within you. It is all contained in that tiny grain of desire which brought you to begin studying Kabbalah. In fact, this grain encompasses the whole world, all the degrees of the spiritual worlds’ expansion from above downwards, and all the spiritual qualities. They don’t exist anywhere else but in you; the whole revelation occurs inside of you, never outside.

However, in order to feel this, you need the right environment. You have to plant your seed in good soil and make sure that it doesn’t dry up or rot!

Kabbalah Books Are The Buffer Between The Material And Spiritual Worlds

patent We have to rise from the world we exist in up to the Upper World. This is the only purpose of our world. People who have revealed the path to the Upper World are called Kabbalists, starting from Adam HaRishon and on. They discovered that only the Upper Light can draw us into the spiritual world and help us achieve correction. Only the Upper Light is capable of correcting us and raising us along the spiritual degrees.

We can draw this Light by belonging to its system. Currently we do not belong to it because our nature is opposite to the Light. Our nature is reception, while the system is giving.

In order to draw the Light of correction, an “adapter” was created, or a buffer between the two systems. This buffer is Kabbalah books that connect us with the souls of the Kabbalists who wrote them. When we read these books with our “material” eyes, we unconsciously connect our souls (or the embryo of the soul that exists in us) to the soul of the author, and through his soul, we receive an illumination.

Some Kabbalists wrote books for each other, describing the Upper System in order to perfect their attainment and give joy to the Creator, or in order to prepare the Upper World to accept the souls that will later ascend to it. Other Kabbalists wrote for us, those who exist in this world, but they used four different languages.

Three of the languages – the Mikra, Halacha, and Hagaddah, do not allow us to adhere to the Upper Level. They can only be effectively used by people with a particularly refined soul. In addition, because we are living in a special time, we now need a different kind of language; the only language intended for our generation is that of Kabbalah. Only it can help us draw the Surrounding Light and ascend.

Moreover, out of all the Kabbalists who wrote in the language of Kabbalah, we single out the Ari and Baal HaSulam. Their language is most appropriate in order for us to find the connection with the Upper Level. The effect of their texts on us is the strongest, since the Surrounding Light that comes from their books is the most appropriate for our souls. So, of all the sacred books, the only ones that suit us are the books of Baal HaSulam, who adapted Kabbalah for our souls.

Besides this, there is The Book of Zohar, which is absolutely unique. It isn’t even a book, but a tool we can use together with the commentary of Baal HaSulam, who wrote it specifically for us. Besides these books, we cannot establish any contact with any of the other sacred books. Although they are sacred (meaning, they talk about the Upper World), they cannot help us correct our souls and realize the purpose of our existence.

5 Minutes Of Light From The Daily Lesson: The Language Of Bestowal

Moments From The Daily Lesson: Communication

The Design Of Desire

Laitman_2009-05-xx_ny_0031 Everything occurs inside the desire to receive pleasure that was created by the Creator. As it develops, this desire goes through changes. Initially I agree with that desire and am not in conflict with it. In fact, what conflict could be there if I don’t separate myself from the desire and act according to its orders?

I still have no clue that it is not me who wants anything, but rather it is the desire commanding me. I don’t yet realize or distinguish myself separately as:

  1. A desire
  2. A human being

When the point in the heart (the Creator) awakens in me and gives me the aspiration to bestow, then I realize that the desire is not my own. Now there is:

  1. A desire
  2. Me (the point in the heart)

By attempting to change the desires, I separate them from myself more and more and begin feeling that I am enslaved to them. Regardless of whether I enjoy my desires or suffer from them, I begin to understand that desires are being sent to me. My reality then seems to consist of three elements:

  1. The Creator
  2. The desires sent by Him
  3. Me

Kabbalah explains that I have free choice to raise the importance of the spiritual goal above the interests of my body and my current life. This can be done under the influence of the group and the Upper Light. I can then change my desires in order to reach the goal. In this way, I will build my equivalence to the Creator, bestowal.

Our Desire To Enjoy Was Created So That We Might Come To Know The Creator

Laitman_2009-05-xx_ny_5048 The only thing created in the whole of creation was the desire to enjoy and nothing exists but this. The Light, the quality of bestowal, created this desire for pleasure as opposite to Itself. The Creator, the quality of bestowal, wants the creation, the desire to enjoy, to feel Him, to understand Him and to reach the state of perfection.

The perfect state is to be in equivalence to the Creator, to the Light, to the quality of bestowal. Therefore, after creating a desire to enjoy, the Creator left it neither empty, nor filled it in an unchangeable state, but rather embedded in it His quality, a desire to bestow. The Creator did not just give the feeling of pleasure or lack of it (suffering), but embedded in it His quality, so that there would also be the understanding of what receiving and giving mean.

The ability to discern bitter from sweet is called “feeling,” and the ability to differentiate between receiving and giving is called “mind.” Mind is also a feeling, a sensation that is inside the desire, but this already exists as “reason.”

It turns out that the desire was created to perceive:

  • fulfillment or lack of fulfillment as sweet/bitter
  • receiving or giving as false/true

Since the creation consists of two parts, the creation and the Creator, or the quality of creation and quality of the Creator, therefore the desire (the creation) permanently exists in the identity of this relationship to itself.

These two components build inside the desire four possible combinations (states) that the science of Kabbalah calls the “Four-letter Unpronounced Name of the Creator” (Yud-Hey-Vav-Hey). This matrix includes all revelations of the Creator within the creation, from the simplest to the most complex forms.

Each of the four increasingly advanced stages includes all preceding stages, growing out of each previous stage to the next one. It is in this manner that the desire to enjoy comes to its full development.

You Need A Kabbalah Teacher To Learn The Program Of Connecting With The Creator

Dr. Michael LaitmanThe word Kabbalah can be interpreted in different ways. One of its meanings is “passing something on,” because the language of Kabbalah can only be passed on through a connection between a student and teacher. All other languages (Tanach, Halacha and Haggadah) can be learned on your own, provided that you receive books from previous generations explaining the key concepts, and that you have someone to advise you. However, when learning these other languages, you don’t have to have a close connection with a teacher; you don’t have to learn how he thinks, feels and relates to everything. You don’t have to absorb anything from him or copy his attitude and worldview.

However, in order to attain the language of Kabbalah, you have to cling to a teacher. That’s because he is higher and you are lower. He gives you his AHP and you have to view it as something positive and wanted, in spite of the external appearance that deliberately repels you. Of course, you won’t agree with the teacher and you won’t want him. You will push him away and even hate him. However, in reality this is in order to show you how much you don’t want spirituality.

You have to receive the language or program that already operates in the teacher but still not in you. You have to try to copy the examples you are given. When there is a teacher who is next to you, in the same world and with the same senses, you can use this to help you enter spirituality. You are able to cling to the teacher’s attitude to spirituality, in spite of the external obstacles that try to block your opportunity to attain an inner connection. If it were not for these examples given to you by the Creator, you would be totally cut off from spirituality and would have no hope of ever reaching it.

It is impossible to extract spirituality from the books, because it cannot be attained with the earthly mind. A person has to nullify his egoism and destroy the barrier between him and the teacher in order to see the teacher’s inner content. Only when observing this condition does the student absorb the teacher’s inner worldview as much as he is able to.

If you are able to perceive the program of the teacher’s connection with the Creator, then you can continue onwards; otherwise, you cannot. This is exactly what the Ari meant when he said before his death that only one of his students, Chaim Vital, can continue studying Kabbalah, because he has learned the basics of the language, the program of connecting the Creator, from the Ari, while others did not.

Daily Kabbalah Lesson – 11.10.09

Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson
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“Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah,” item 18, Lesson 7
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Baal HaSulam’s article, “The Wisdom of Kabbalah and its Essence,” Lesson 7
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The Language Of Kabbalah Is Bestowal

chance A question I received: Are there rules for how to study Kabbalah that a student has to follow in order to learn the language of Kabbalah?

My Answer: The language of Kabbalah is the language of bestowal. All four languages of Kabbalah (the languages of the Tanach, Halacha, Hagaddah, and Kabbalah) explain how to bestow. This is what you should be learning when reading all the books and explanations. You should always remember that everything you are reading and hearing is teaching you about bestowal.

Language is a program that you place inside you and set in motion. This program makes you think and want differently, and gives you a new attitude to the world. So, the language of Kabbalah is the language of bestowal.