The Zohar tells us what happens in the spiritual world. It describes the creature’s actions of bestowal. However, because we are incapable of such actions yet, we are unable to understand them. We exist in our egoistic desire. We only know about receiving pleasure and fulfillment and the actions that get us there.

Therefore, the actions described by The Zohar appear to us like they are written in some foreign language, like a secret code. It seems to speak about something utterly unreal. It doesn’t matter whether it’s written in the language of Kabbalah with Sefirot, Partzufim, and worlds or in fairytale-like allegories with the sun, the moon, mountains, people, animals, and so on. We don’t understand or feel any of it because we don’t exist in the quality (meaning, nature) of bestowal, but in the quality of reception.

If our corporeal egoistic qualities were replaced from Above with spiritual qualities of love and bestowal, we would immediately understand what The Zohar is telling us. As we read it, we would reveal the Upper World. It would be revealed not just in our imagination like when reading an adventure novel, but in reality.

Although we don’t have these spiritual qualities yet and the text remains unreal for us, our reading of The Book of Zohar is called Segula, a special remedy. Even if we don’t understand it, we read it and try to draw onto us the forces from that other world described in the book. By wishing to change and to feel the text, it “shines” on us with the “Light that Reforms,” (Ohr Makif – the Surrounding Light).

This force influences us and reveals new qualities of bestowal inside us, which are described by The Zohar. It was written in the nature of bestowal, not reception, and thus it can only be understood in keeping with the nature of bestowal.

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A question I received: I know you and your group only through the television screen. I’m scared of going to the Zohar Convention 2010 and feeling alone in a room full of people. How do I deal with this fear?

My Answer: This is a common question. People are scared of coming to the Congress and feeling alone in a room filled with 6,000 people. Don’t worry, you won’t feel alone. If a person is really determined and aimed at the goal, he really mustn’t miss a Congress. Don’t be deterred by fear or any other worries. Simply close your eyes and come. You will be inspired by such a large gathering of people who all share one common goal. We will listen, study, and sing together.

You simply don’t have any other opportunity to attain this kind of unity. It’s impossible to attain it through a television screen. However, once it has been attained, this unity will work on you. Then, you can return to the TV screen for several more months of study.

You must be present for all three days because it’s not quite as simple as walking in and connecting right away. It’s a good thing that you are scared for your work lies in overcoming your fear.

On the first day, you’re only beginning to enter the spiritual work. Toward the middle of the second day, we begin to feel the connection, the warmth and the unity. A certain spiritual sensation begins to emerge within us. It’s very small, but it begins to prepare us for spiritual revelation. The third day brings the anticipation of parting, but the unity has been achieved, even if only for a moment.

In the spiritual world, a moment is all you need. If a contact has been made, it remains forever. Nothing is lost in the spiritual world. When you return to the TV screen, that sensation you’ve experienced and that contact you’ve established will continue to develop within you.

Everyone has to come to the Congress to feel together with everyone else. In doing this, you will give your soul a magnificent present.

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A question I received: How could Aba ve Ima (father and mother) allow the shattering of Kelim, since it was their fault that it occurred? In other words, did they allow the Light to descend because of too much love?

My Answer: No, this wasn’t a case of too much love, or the lack of understanding or weakness associated with a mother who is over-caring. The reason was the lack of knowledge of the one and only factor which was impossible to predict ahead of time.

Aba ve Ima (father and mother) didn’t know that when the connection with the Creator was revealed it would bring such tremendous pleasure to the creature. However, the creature didn’t have a screen (the correct intention to receive it).

Let’s recall the example of the guest and the host. The host wants to treat the guest from the bottom of his heart because he loves him. The guest, however, refuses and finally agrees to be treated only to please the host. In this way the guest expresses his love to the host rather than simply satisfying his own appetite, even though he is very hungry.

A person who wants to love the Creator and give everything he has to Him sees the treats laid out before him and knows he’ll get them; all the pleasures from this table have already been tried. However, he repays the Host with everything he received from Him.

By doing so, a person uncovers who he really gives back to. One reveals the Creator’s greatness as well as tremendous pleasure originating from the connection between that person and the Creator. And he has no power to resist that pleasure. This state is impossible to imagine before we receive the Light (the treat). By acting so, a person gradually rises to the level of the Creator and comes to receive the status of the Host.

Moreover, this sensation cannot be revealed from the start because the Creator wanted the creature to make this revelation independently in order to achieve this status on its own. All other actions of the creature are not independent, since they simply unfold through the chain of Reshimot (one’s inner informational genes).

The point of free action on the creature’s part lies in attaining the Creator’s status as well as making all the revelations that accompany this process. This point of free action is revealed precisely by virtue of the shattering of vessels (Shevirat Kelim).

The Creator cannot give this attainment directly to the creature, but only by way of a “detour”; so that the creature makes this discovery on its own and shatters. Shattering means that one understands that he can’t do it himself because it is beyond him. A person is unable to give away that much and sacrifice such tremendous pleasure. Thus, a shattering occurs.

After the shattering, a person acquires the chance to attain this status. It happens gradually, in small portions, with the exception of the “stoney heart” – the point at which the pleasure of attaining the status of Creator is concentrated at the moment of the shattering. However, eventually even this point is corrected.

In other words, the shattering is the great revelation of the chasm which separates the Creator and the creature, which the Creator doesn’t allow the creature to feel directly. This is why the creature must shatter and reveal its evil.

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The Book of Zohar – Selections, Chapter “Miketz (At The End),” Item 79
This world means that Malchut remains with its qualities. The world to come means that Malchut obtains the quality of Bina.
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“Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah,” Item 134, Lesson 58
During the correction process we must built the World of Atzilut within us.
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“Introduction to the Book of Zohar,” Item 20, Lesson 10
In the state of Infinity, the only thing I receive is the ability to love, which gives me boundless pleasure.
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It only seems like there are many other people around you who are studying together with you. You see external desires around you only because your vision is flawed. But now imagine that they are all your inner desires, which you aren’t able to control. It’s similar to how you cannot take control over your evil inclination. This is why these desires seem external to you and you have to connect them together.

If you connect these qualities and control them, you will see that everything on the outside actually belongs to you. It is an imprint of what you have inside. Inside of you there are many qualities, desires, and aspirations, but you have no power over them. This is why you see many people outside of you and a whole world made of stars, planets, still, vegetative, and animate objects, people who act in opposition to you, and people whom you want to use for your needs, or even people you want to kill or run away from.

All of this is because you are built this way inside; this is why you see the world this way. If you receive a force from Above that will give you power over all your desires, then you will immediately reveal that the whole world belongs to you, that other people are not separate from you and are not outside of you at all. You will feel your own self inside each of them.

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A question I received: You said that The Zohar can only be studied when you become a part of the vessel of the common soul. How do I become a part of it?

My Answer: A person cannot do anything on his own; it is the Creator’s work. You must only expect for Him to do this, meaning to desire, hope, and influence things in such a way that will make this happen, as much as you are able. You have to put all your energy into this and hope that the Creator’s salvation will come. That is all we can do.

We are standing around Mount Sinai and screaming, as it is written, “The sons of Israel cried out from the work.” The unity of the common desire attracts the Surrounding Light according to the principle of equivalence of form, because the Surrounding Light comes from one source. When we desire to become as one man in order to reveal the common vessel of the soul (the Kli), then it becomes revealed.

We have to prepare for the The Zohar Convention 2010 in February so we will be able to unite our desire and reveal one, common desire. It can only be revealed inside everyone together, inside the whole nation, which includes men and women. This is what we read in the story about the reception of the Torah at the foot of Mount Sinai, as well as the exodus from Egypt. It is written that this became possible thanks to the righteous women.

All of our desires have to unite, whether they are coming from the left side or the right, whether they are great or small – they have to become as one. We hope that when we undertake this mutual action, we will reveal a sufficient desire to be influenced by the Surrounding Light.

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How does the “spiritual elevator” work? It’s like an incredible spiritual escalator where we are all connected in such a way that everyone can help each another ascend. Every person has his upper half within the Upper Level, and his lower half within the lower level.

Therefore, each of us is always connected to the Upper Level, because the upper part of his spiritual Partzuf (Galgalta ve Eynaim) enters the lower part (AHP) of the Upper Degree.

However, a person feels the AHP of the Upper Degree as darkness because it is more bestowing. A greater degree of bestowal is felt as darkness because we do not want it. Yet, if a person overcomes his egoism and makes himself “small” by using just the Galgalta ve Eynaim, just the bestowing Kelim, and if he desires to connect to the Upper Level regardless of what is happening on that level, then he cancels his ego, AHP, the egoistic desire. If a person does not wish to feel it, as if it does not exist, then he connects to the Upper One and they become one whole. His Galgalta ve Eynaim (Keter and Hochma) and the AHP of the Upper One (Bina, Zeir Anpin, and Malchut) together form an whole Partzuf with ten complete Sefirot (Gadlut de Min Ha Aleph).

The Upper One, in turn, has the same kind of connection with the Upper One in relation to him. This way we all unite and operate as one common body. We are all connected as a chain where every link runs through another link and the two share a common part. The only difference between a regular chain and us is that there are no free parts at all inside the chain of our souls – my upper part is always connected to the Upper Degree, and my lower part is connected to the lower degree. There is nothing in me that’s free from being connected with one part or another. I am always completely connected to everyone else; in fact, this is my entire essence,

Our salvation lies in becoming aware of this connection. This is why regardless of my state, regardless of whether I feel good or bad, I must always turn to the people near me for help. They are the people who aspire to the same goal as I do. If I unite with them, I will be able to absorb all the energy that they have. I have everything I need to do this because I am connected to them; I just need to awaken this connection.

If a person finds himself in a state where he does not understand or feels anything, he is indifferent and experiences darkness, and he is in a bad mood, this means that he is not active enough. It all depends on him because everything that he needs has already been prepared for him.
[10506]

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Only by correcting what is not already corrected can we learn to understand the Creator and become similar to Him. In our world a child learns by building a house out of blocks or by assembling a puzzle. Everything builds from broken pieces to the whole. First a child has to pull a toy apart to see what’s inside, then he puts all the pieces back together again to regain its perfect shape; this is how he develops.

In spirituality, we advance the same way. We have to know what our flaws or misdeeds are, where the shattering took place and how to fix it – connecting the disjointed parts more and more each time, and putting more of the broken pieces back together again. Perception and attainment come from the Creator to the creation, from the whole and perfect to the imperfect. The greater the distance between perfection and imperfection, the more connections to one another there will be and the more significant the resulting wisdom will be. Wisdom is born out of their union under the condition that there is disparity of form and separation between them. Therefore, the more broken, separated, confused, deluded, and opposite to perfection I am, the better.

If I am capable of applying all possible efforts, using all the resources available to me, then I should begin to assemble perfection out of imperfection, in order to let “darkness shine as Light,” and bring all parts into harmony and balance within one source. This means that I will come to understand who the Creator is – the One who created this broken creation. The word “creation” (Beria) means “taken beyond His limits.” In the beginning the Creator made evil, a property which is opposite to Him and gave us a chance to know Him only by setting up the right connections and going through the process of correction. This is why we shouldn’t complain about our hardships; they come to us so that by correcting them, we build perfection.

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The Book of Zohar – Selections, Chapter “Miketz (At The End),” Item 27
All connections run through the middle line. It is like a connecting thread that provides all the changes and accents.
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“Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah,” Item 132, Lesson 57
An analysis is always built by comparing two systems. Otherwise at some point I will become unhappy in my world, but without a reason or a solution.
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“Introduction to the Book of Zohar,” Item 19, Lesson 9
Human progress is an attempt to fence off from the influence of outer and inner forces. Instead of correcting the evil within us, we mask it.
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