The Zohar, Chapter “Miketz (At the End),” Item 33: “Them that await His mercy.” “Them that await His mercy” are those who engage in Torah at night and partake with Divinity. And when the morning comes, they await His mercy.

The Zohar also talks about this in the article, “The Night of the Bride.” It describes all the days of exile as a dark night, during which we prepare our desires (Kelim) for the connection between the Groom and the Bride that will happen in the morning.

All who prepare for this meeting are called the dwellers of the King’s palace. The moment that they complete building the wedding canopy (Huppah, symbolizing a screen and the Reflected Light), the Creator (Zeir Anpin) unites with His Shechina, which is the union of all souls. This is the vessel for receiving the Light. Then the Bride unites with the Groom; the two compliment each other and attain a state of perfection and peace.

When a person engages in Torah at night, a thread of mercy extends upon him during the day….

It is impossible to engage in the Torah during the day, because the day is when unification happens. At that point, everything is revealed and there is no more work to be done. Our work lies in exercising our freedom of choice, while in fact we already exist in the perfect state. We just need to “prefer” it, meaning to choose day over night.

When we decide that bestowal is day, we will reveal it as being day. Through the Reflected Light, we awaken day and Light instead of darkness. This is why all the work happens at night; it’s because all our choice and efforts are concentrated there. There is no work that can be done during the “day.”

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The Zohar, Chapter “Ki Tissa (When You Take),” Item 16: “All those who are angered at you will be shamed and dishonored.” The Creator is destined to do unto Israel all that good, which He had said through the prophets of truth, and for which Israel greatly suffered in the exile. Had it not been for all that good that they await and see, which is written in the Torah, they would have been unable to tolerate and stand the exile.

This means that a person gains a greater desire for correction, called “Isra-el” (directly to the Creator), by anticipating the goodness and abundance that will come later on. And moreover, his desire grows even stronger when he gains an initial connection with that goodness.

In our world, a person feels like he knows that he will receive a future reward for his suffering. But in spirituality, this is not the case. There, a person doesn’t receive psychological relief by thinking that evil will turn into goodness. One who is studying Kabbalah relates to this differently. When a person is on the path of truth, he knows that evil is there to help him attain goodness. He sees that the evil is actually within him and he has to correct it instead of simply enduring it. Then, instead of feeling the evil, he feels goodness.

A person does not expect a lucky streak to follow a bad one, but knows that the “unlucky streak” he is experiencing is the revelation of evil within him, which he has to reveal and then correct. In this manner, he attains goodness within. It’s not that the suffering takes place in one place and the reward comes in another, or that he makes an effort here and receives a payment there. Rather, by carrying out the correction, he transforms the “evil inclination” into the “good inclination” – and that’s the reward.

That is why a person rejoices when the “wicked are revealed” – because this gives him something to work on and to correct. It is thanks to this work that he attains spirituality, the Creator, the property of bestowal. Yet, everything happens in the same place: the desire to enjoy.

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The most important thing in studying Kabbalah is our feelings. It is impossible for us to reveal a spiritual impression within our external, earthly senses. It can only be felt within our internal vessels of the soul (Kelim).

Kabbalah books use the language of branches, where each word points to and is connected to its Upper, Spiritual Root. Each spiritual root has its corresponding branch in our world; however, the related word itself isn’t able to convey a feeling. This is because we actually need to be in the feeling itself.

A word represents a vessel with its fulfillment. This is the skeleton of the Kli, meaning a screen and the Reflected Light, and a state inside it which is the four-letter name of the Creator, HaVaYaH.

We build words and sentences from “pieces” called “Taamim” (tastes), “Nekudot” (the points under letters), “Tagin” (little crowns above letters), and “Otiot” (letters). This enables us to somehow describe spiritual states, connections, relationships, and the entire process of transitioning between states.

However, we cannot convey the states themselves because each of us has a unique vessel of comprehension. The only thing we can convey to one other is the external information about the preparation of the spiritual vessel and the level of connection between forces. Yet we are unable to convey actual feelings. Therefore, each of us must internally “visualize” (feel in his heart) the actions that are described by words.

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The Zohar, Chapter “Ki Tissa (When You Take),” Item 24: “As the pregnant woman approaches the time to give birth, she writhes and cries out in her birth pangs,” since it is the nature of a pregnant woman to wait nine whole months.

This is talking about the fact that it takes time for us to feel all of the evil contained within us. At first we simply start to feel it slightly, but this doesn’t mean anything yet. Every state has to go through all four stages until we attain it fully along with its root and decide that it isn’t something accidental or temporary, but it is evil from the beginning, at the very root, and come to the realization that we have to get rid of it. Only then do we have the power to eradicate the evil.

But there are quite a few in the world who go through only one or two days of the ninth month, while all the pains and pangs of the pregnant woman are on the ninth. Hence, even if she only went through one day of the ninth month, it is considered as though the whole of the ninth month had passed for her.

Here The Zohar speaks about the revelation of evil, exile, and redemption. It says that we don’t have to wait for the end of 6000 years if we already feel that we have started the ninth month of “pregnancy” and the birth pangs of the exile. This means that we are already capable of completing the entire correction process.

So are Israel: Since they tasted the taste of exile, if they repent, it is considered as though they had experienced all the troubles that are written in the Torah, especially that they had experienced several pangs since the beginning of the exile.

This is saying that the duration of the exile does not depend on time. That is to say, it depends on time only until the “nine months” mark. We have to go through “eight months” of being burdened – this is certain. But when we start feeling even the first day of the ninth month, from then on everything depends on this sensation and our full realization of our evil in relation to the root. Then we will be able to come out of exile because “it is considered as though we had already gone through all of the misfortunes.”

The period called “the initial eight months” is the preparation period, the period of exile that we have to go through. There is no way to avoid or reduce it. This was the period before the Ari. Starting with the Ari onward, a different time began, which can be reduced the more we advance. This will increase the “pangs of birth” of our development and enable us to complete our development long before the end of 6000 years.

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A question I received: I have a friend who wants to find out about Kabbalah and The Book of Zohar. Should I bring him to the preparation evening to The Zohar Convention 2010 and to the Congress itself?

My Answer: I think you should definitely invite him. Even if a person is “accidentally” walking down the street and happens to pass by the place where the Congress is held, and he’s never heard anything about Kabbalah, but he has nothing to do today and is just walking around and suddenly sees this place where he can come in to see what’s happening there – then let him enter! There are no accidents!

If I have a friend who can bring me to the Congress, then he was somehow placed by my side on purpose. It’s a sign that I was invited there from Above. If a person was just walking by and decided to “drop in” on the Congress, to me this is a sign from Above.

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The Book of Zohar – Selections, Chapter “Ki Tissa (When You Take),” Item 16
One’s calculations always take place in the desire to receive, whereas the solution always is in the desire to bestow.
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“Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah,” Item 150, Lesson 62
All timelines are predetermined from Above. However, there is no one preventing us from accelerating them.
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“Introduction to the Book of Zohar,” Item 29, Lesson 14
The evil that was once concealed reveals itself only so it can disappear.
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We all came from the World of Infinity, which is a single desire in which we’re all connected together as cells of a common body. The connection that existed before our descent into this world was maintained by the force of the Creator; He “suppressed” us with His Light and united us forcefully.

Then He left us, “restricted Himself,” and the Light disappeared. The desire began descending lower and lower as it moved further away from the Light, until it broke completely into small fragments. As a result, every fragment felt separated from the others and absolutely unconnected to them.

But then, we went through an even deeper downfall, and now we are beginning to reveal that we are connected to others; however, our connection is negative, making us want to use or even kill each other. Our connection is negative and opposite to what it ought to be.

We have to arrive at this realization in order to then start ascending toward a connection among us, to the same Malchut of the World of Infinity. However, this time we will rise to it on our own, by preparing ourselves with the help of the study and various actions, and by desiring to advance toward the corrected state.

The entire correction amounts to us uniting together. That’s why it’s written, “’Love your neighbor as yourself’ is the main rule of the Torah.” As the desire becomes corrected, it is filled with Light. According to the law of the equivalence of form, the more the desire opens itself up to bestowal, the more the Light will fill it. From the side of the Light there are no restrictions; all the restrictions are always done from the side of the desire.

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“Beginning to Study Zohar,” Lesson 14
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If you bestow less than you are able, then it’s not bestowal. This is how the middle line is built. It cannot emerge unless there is a precise measure of maximal bestowal.

The middle line does not exist initially and we do not know its measure, but it constitutes the entire “human being” inside us. We have to create this human being so he will be equal to the Creator. So how do we build and create the middle line in the Creator’s image, if it is to consist of two forces: male and female, right and left? We don’t know what this connection is or what form this creature called “man” should have. When he is born, he will be called our “self.” But before that happens, it’s as if we don’t exist at all.

We cannot know any of this ahead of time because we don’t see the Creator. When we complete this work and build precisely ten Sefirot, rather than nine or eleven, then the result will be called the Creator – “Come and See” (Bo- Re). We will reveal ourselves and the Creator together because a person cannot be revealed without the Creator and the Creator – without man; they can only exist together.

We don’t have any example or image of what the middle line is. We have to search and ask for it in order to begin finding the examples and the connection. That is how we start to see the game that the Creator is playing with us by awakening different feelings in us; this is His way of giving us hints to help us find the middle line.

Otherwise we won’t be able to understand it; we can only find the middle line by searching for it and trying to imagine it while in the darkness. This is the entire art and work of building the “Temple” – the manifestation of the Creator’s image on all levels of our desire: still, vegetative, animate, and human.

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