Evening Zohar Lesson – 04.26.10
Posted on April 26th, 2010
Rabbi Akiva said, “Love your neighbor as yourself; that is the great rule of the Torah!” Why is love for one’s neighbor a great rule, the foundation that categorically divides us into two halves: animate and human? If I love myself, then I am an animal, and if I love my neighbor, then I am human. As an animal, I only feel this material life, but when I begin to love others, I feel the Creator and the spiritual world.
Spirituality is felt inside the force of love that is called my spiritual vessel or Kli. Right now my vessel is egoistic love, the desire to love myself. The world I feel today is felt inside this desire. In this egoistic reality, I reveal only that which is good or bad for me.
I reveal the world and the entire diversity of its shades only in relation to myself. All of the colors and sounds in the world depend on what is useful to me and what is harmful. I am afraid of one thing and I desire something else. I repel one thing and attract something else. Every influence is revealed inside my senses, which operate in relation to my love for myself. Therefore, I don’t see anything that does not pertain to my self-love; I simply don’t perceive its existence.
The fact is that I am facing infinity, but I don’t feel it. In relation to me it seems not to exist at all because it does not make me feel good or bad. Egoistic love determines the volume of the universe that I feel. Thus, out of the entire World of Infinity, I feel just a tiny sphere, my world.
When I start to come out of myself, then in my previous desire I feel what is good for others. In other words, I start to love my neighbor. This is called the Upper, spiritual world. When I reveal it, I reveal an entirely different universe.
If I tune out of egoistic thoughts about myself, even in a purely material sense, and start to think about my friend, then I will feel a completely different world, with completely different problems and solutions. When I reveal what is good for someone else, then in relation to me it will be called the Upper, spiritual world. That person will see the same thing as his material, egoistic world, but when I desire to dress into his reality and reveal his world from within him, it will turn into my spiritual world.
This exercise enables me to come out of myself and feel the Creator. I will feel Him inside of you, as it is written, “The Creator dwells inside His nation.”
From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/26/10, “Matan Torah”
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A question I received: How does my point of view actually change when I come out of egoistic self-love and see the world through the desires of others? Will I see a different room, a different glass on the table in front of me, and will I see all these people differently?
My Answer: An animal will always remain an animal, and that pertains to every one of us. You always remain inside the point of your “self”; however, when you attain spirituality, you add a completely different sense (vessel or Kli) to that point – the desires of other people.
The Creator created a desire consisting of ten parts or Sefirot, called HaVaYaH. Right now you only feel the lowest layer of this desire, a black point. As you are born, live, and die, you return to the same ten Sefirot of your egoism, which is the sensation of this world. This continues from one generation to the next, from one life cycle to the next (or from one Partzuf to the next), each time going through the same states: embryo, feeding, and maturation (or from one Partzuf to the next), and then once again: embryo, feeding, maturation, and so on.
How can you feel the world in a different way, not just from within the black point, but through the desires of other people who are outside of you? When this happens, your “I” still remains, and your world won’t change. If you were to disappear, then in relation to what would you feel others? You have to feel others opposite of you, and see them as opposite and hateful to you. Moreover, this feeling has to keep growing.
An example of this is the group of Rabbi Shimon: They revealed the greatest possible hatred among themsleves. But above it, they built love and thus attained the revelation of the Light of The Zohar. When you have great hatred inside and great love above it, this provides the necessary contrast in which the Light of Hochma, the Light of Attainment, shines. There is enormous egoism inside, and above it there is a screen. That is the only way to reveal a great Light.
From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/26/10, “Matan Torah”
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I can desire correction for bestowal only if the environment supports me in this. The desire to bestow manifests and acts only in my connection with the others, and thus I need their assistance in the form of “mutual guarantee.” To the extent that I support them, they support me. This is a system. To the extent that I activate it, I receive from it.
By desiring to join the group and connect with the others, I trigger a counter-reaction toward me. The others pass me the correct forms of our connection without even being aware of it. Since we exist in a network, they show me the type of connection we have.
This connection is not simply a desire to bestow; rather, it is a guarantee that cements our connection. This results in response to my request. Then, I turn to them with my prepared vessel (Kli), with a prepared system of connections that consists of 613 (Taryag) elements. Without knowing it, I activate the whole system. Thus by connecting with each other we revive the whole system among us.
Mutual guarantee is a very deep concept. It refers to life and the activation of the inner system of connection between us. We only need to retrieve it from within and start using it.
Otherwise, I can scream about my desire to be connected with the others, but how can I know how to do it? Do I understand how to connect with each person and with everybody all together? It is because I awaken them that they begin to influence me and pass to me the forms of our connection. They may be aware of it; it’s not important. We nevertheless activate this system of connections.
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/25/10, The Zohar
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A question I received: The authors of The Zohar wrote the book for our generation. I just started my spiritual path. Why do they so scrupulously describe such high degrees? What meaning can I derive from these commentaries for myself?
My Answer: The degrees and the states described in The Zohar are in fact the states of the World of Atzilut. These states bear a relationship to every degree, even the lowest, when a person is merely reading this book without understanding any of it.
It is not important exactly what we read about in The Zohar. A person who opens this book for the first time can read about the most remote systems of the spiritual world. Most importantly, a person’s desire connects him with the Upper Root. From there, he needs to attract the Light upon himself and let this Light elevate him to its Source.
That’s why Baal HaSulam didn’t confine himself to only one book on Kabbalah that one could read and refer to over and over again. Rather, he wrote two thousand pages of Talmud Eser Sefirot to describe the Upper Roots and convey all that’s necessary for our ascent.
However, it doesn’t mean that a person needs to read all the books. By being connected with the text, he awakens the influence of his Upper Roots upon him. Hence, it’s worth reading any text regardless of whether we understand it or not.
In the course of preparing The Zohar for All for publication, we present the whole Zohar except for the parts that describe the research and comparison of sources. We do so because this can be of interest only to researchers, but not to those who strive to attain similarity to the Creator.
Our primary concern is to help people “enter” spirituality, to reveal the Upper Light, and to establish contact with the Creator. This is the reason we prepare The Zohar in a slightly simplified version, but nonetheless, a version certainly sufficient to allow one to enter spirituality.
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/21/10, The Zohar
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A question I received: If a person is higher than his environment, can he influence and correct it?
My Answer: A person cannot rise above his environment. He totally depends on it. Even if his environment consists of simple people and he is a great Kabbalist, they will nevertheless influence him.
Imagine that you take a magnificent fruit bearing tree, pull it out of the ground, and plant it in the center of the desert. What will happen to it? Will it turn the desert into a blossoming garden? Similar to the tree’s dependence on its environment, our soul depends on our environment.
The goal of the creation, the group, our personal work, and the Creator are positioned inside one point. Imagine that your whole life depends on this one point that you have to clarify. It determines your life and death every given moment. To draw an analogy, say you can’t breathe unless you push an oxygen button. If you don’t do it (and connect with the others), oxygen is not supplied for you.
From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/18/10, Article “The Freedom”
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If we place our “seed” in a good environment, it develops. If we put it in “bad soil” (environment), even the very best seed will wither. Everything depends solely on the environment. This means that we need people around us who reveal the evil of egoism within themselves and want to correct it.
I have to place myself in such environment and aspire to absorb from it all that’s possible: moisture, minerals, and warmth or, in other words, everything that soil can provide for a seed.
As Baal HaSulam writes in the article “The Freedom,” at the time of his death a person can’t take anything with him from this world except for the property of bestowal that he attained. One can attain bestowal only in this world, but while in this world, he can sense himself. It’s written, “See your world during your life.” However, if you have not attained anything, then you remain only as a seed which will be placed into the soil again, and thus will get another chance.
From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/18/10, Article “The Freedom”
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Preparation to the Lesson, Shamati #78 “The Torah, the Creator, and Israel Are One”
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The Book of Zohar – Selections, Chapter “BaHar(On Mount Sinai),” Item 65
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Beit Shaar HaKavanot, Item 94, Lesson 33
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A question I received: Why were Aba ve Ima so blind to not have noticed the “stony heart” in the world of Nekudim, and consequently to have performed an action that resulted in the breaking of the vessels? Why wasn’t it clarified to begin with?
My Answer: Clarification is only possible when one requires it. If one doesn’t feel a necessity for it, what is there to clarify? Clarification follows the breaking of the Kelim, when they have all intermixed, when we find ourselves in front of fragments of desires, and don’t know how to sort them.
It is then that the Upper Light descends and illuminates what is what: which desires belongs to the right line, which to the left, which desires are on top or at the bottom, and so on. The desires are assigned Sefirot in accordance with the screens they lost, the Lights that departed from them, and with the Aviut that remained in them.
Everything was prepared for this action for the sake of bestowal; however, it wasn’t known in advance what would happen. This is because the property of Malchut de Malchut, which refuses bestowal, has never been revealed in creation before.
Malchut de Malchut reveals itself at this point because it meets GAR of the Light of Hochma (an enormous Light of the End of Correction). The desires, which were “built from nothing” (Yesh mi Ayin) and constitute the most inner core of creation were not revealed until that time because the Upper Light had always ruled over these desires.
“The breaking of the vessels” means that the Upper Light ceases to control the desires. As an example, imagine that you are constantly under my influence and control; I ruled over you and dictated to you how to act for the sake of bestowal. Suddenly, it is clear to you that I no longer control a certain quality of yours. In other words, you found a point of independence from me within you. Hence, you revealed something that doesn’t depend on and relate to me.
You’re not a slave; the Upper One doesn’t have complete power over you. He cannot control your stony heart by obligating your desire to act for the sake of bestowal. It is the beginning of your point of independence. That’s why the breaking is not a bad thing; it opens the door to the correction and ascent of humanity.
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/18/10, Beit Shaar HaKavanot
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