Good Environment – 11.30.10

My Good Environment – Questions of the Day

The Glass To Scoop The Light With

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How can I keep holding the correct intention during the lesson? Is it by thinking more about the mutual guarantee than trying to sort out what I am reading about?

Answer: Imagine that you are driving a car. What do you worry the most about? Is it how to press on the gas pedal or navigating the steering wheel? If you need time to figure out the answer, it frightens me, and I am not going with you.

Obviously, the key is to steer the wheel. That is what we call “intention.” Intention is the direction in which I am driving. When it is correct, I can start pressing on the gas pedal to increase or decrease the speed as necessary to fit the traffic.

In other words, I press the gas full force only after I have picked the right direction. Otherwise, it may be best not to start driving at all and remain stationary, to prevent myself from going back. This is how we should ensure the correct direction, and to the degree that we are confident in its correctness, we may press the gas and increase the speed.

A person is designed so that he constantly looks for benefit, and during the lesson, there are three possibilities: 1) to understand more; 2) to feel more; or 3) to attain more. These three benefits are not related to each other because I feel in the corporeal desire, understand in the corporeal mind, but attain in the spiritual Kli (vessel).

In other words, experience and understanding come through my egoistic desire, but attainment becomes possible solely in accordance with the law of equivalence of form, intention “to bestow.” This intention is my primary concern.

Therefore, I am not worried about what I will understand and feel. The key is to receive the Kli that bestows, the desire, the intention which is something spiritual, “in order to bestow.” Before anything else, I worry about where to find spirituality.

Sages say that the Light is always there; take as much as you wish. However, what vessel can we bring to this ocean and scoop bestowal from it? We need some vessel of bestowal, some kind of container, even if it’s just a small glass. This place into which we may receive the Light is what we should be thinking about.
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From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/24/10, Beit Shaar HaKavanot

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The Ship Of Our Intentions

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: If, while reading The Zohar, I can’t keep the intention and don’t understand why it is needed, does it mean that I am “drilling a hole in the boat?”

Answer: First of all, I have to discern if I need the “boat” at all, and do I intend to achieve something or not? The “boat” is the sum of our intentions, whereas desires without intention are nothing but a big hole. Intentions that we can create above desires build the “boat” for us, the beginning (Rosh) of a degree, the screen and the Reflected Light, the spiritual vessel (Kli). The Kli is not a desire, but the intention above it.

Question: What is my responsibility before the group?

Answer: If I am trying to think about the goal, thereby, I take responsibility for my friends that they will also be thinking about it. If I am protecting our “boat” with my intentions and want us to build it up as a complete Kli which has the screen and Reflected Light, and if I am taking care of it with all my heart so that my friends also constantly think about it, thereby, I keep them in the intention.

This is what is called the guarantee. What do I guarantee? I ensure that they won’t abandon the goal.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/24/10, The Zohar

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Between Slumber And Awakening

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: During the study, if I feel a strong pain from an injury, how do I focus on the intention and not on the pain?

Answer: We understand that we are undergoing a certain process. As we continue along this process, to the best of our ability, we draw the Light that Reforms. The Light’s influence determines everything for us.

This action is dependent on the general system which contains the souls that have already merited the revelation, the souls that still remain in deep slumber, and the souls that are on the path to awakening. We are found in between the sleeping and those who are actively working in the general system, doing all they can to help others. With the help of the advice of the Kabbalists, we are trying to understand how to wake up, to transition from slumber to revelation, to true action as fast as possible.

We were given an opportunity in the group, the teacher, and the original sources. We are supported by souls in the spiritual world who yearn to help us the way adults help children. All that is needed is our efforts.

Now, we need to really clarify what specifically depends on us so that we don’t scatter our meager strength and only confuse ourselves. Indeed, if a person doesn’t know what to do, it is best he sit still and do nothing. If he does act, he must do precisely what’s required. After all, the world is full of foolishness and excess, and if we add our own part to it, we will simply bury ourselves under useless actions and turn too far off the path.

The most powerful means of advancement is the Light. Its influence, drawn as a result of every bit of our effort, completes every step taken toward correction. Therefore, in every state, we must first and foremost see the Light’s doing.

Having realized and accepted the fact that the Light is behind everything, we must be grateful for this and recognize our state as optimal for our advancement. As a rule, every state is correct if I realize that it comes from Above. This is enough for now I have a link to the cause, thanks to which I can awaken to independent action.

This action lies in being grateful for what is happening, positive and negative alike, and trying to achieve unity and revelation of the Creator, the quality of bestowal, out of the current state. If a person is no longer in deep slumber and can consciously connect his state with the Light, the Creator, and the group, regardless of what he may be feeling, that is certainly a good thing.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/24/10, The Zohar, Introduction, Article “”Among All the Sages of the Nations of the World, There Are None Like You”

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Sound Yet Irrelevant Complaints

Dr. Michael LaitmanThe Book of Zohar, Introduction, Article “Among All the Sages of the Nations of the World, There Are None Like You,” Item 161: Rabbi Shimon said… “Once, a philosopher from the nations of the world came to me. He told me, ‘You say that your God rules over the whole of the heaven, and all the armies and the camps do not attain or know His whereabouts.’ This verse does not give Him much respect, for it is written, ‘For among all the sages of the nations and in all their kingdoms, there is none like You.’ Why this comparison to people, who have no persistence?”

On the spiritual path, questions arise in a person; it is as if a philosopher starts talking in him. In this case, this happened to Rabbi Shimon. A philosophical thought crossed his mind, a quite logical and rational question of this world about the Creator.

Surely, this “philosopher” is intelligent, and his postulates and arguments are true. It is said, “Believe the wisdom of the nations.” In other words, nothing in this world can withstand logic and common sense.

The wisdom of Kabbalah does not reject this. It’s just that it uses a different program, a different mind, a different approach. That’s why it’s unintelligent to apply the logic of our world to the spiritual reality. These are two incomparable things, different Kelim (vessels).

Needless to say, questions cross your mind, and there’s no doubt that you can prove your case to everyone since others use the same type of logic as you. According to the information inside the egoistic desire, your complaints are reasonable. The starting point, the approach, the analysis, and the result, everything is correct. Everything to do with our world obeys its laws.

However, we are talking about the study of the spiritual world where our laws don’t work, where our logic and perception are helpless. This is what the authors of The Book of Zohar are trying to explain.

In this case, what can I do at all? Without mind and perception, what have I got? A drop of seed? Exactly. I’ve been given the point in the heart, and from the very first moment my work on it is above the level of this world. I unite with the other points which I was brought to, I attract the force of unity with the help of the books that also do not belong to this world, and all this is to reveal the force of bestowal.

The field of my action from beginning to end is separated from our world. The earthly approach is forbidden here. This is an altogether different “territory,” a state of a higher order where the questions of “philosophers” lose their ground.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/24/10, The Zohar, Introduction, Article “”Among All the Sages of the Nations of the World, There Are None Like You”

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Everyone Can Do It

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Can a scrooge reach bestowal?

Answer: There is no person who wouldn’t be able to change, provided he is mentally sound. We are all “sinners” and “transgressors.” This is why we turn to the wisdom of Kabbalah: We want the Light to correct us so that we will merit it, will become similar to it.

Nothing in a person can become an insurmountable obstacle. Everybody has an opportunity to correct himself if he avoids quibbling with and scorning spiritual work.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/29/10, The Zohar, Introduction, “The Rose”

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Kabbalists About Kabbalah Today, Part 3

Dr. Michael LaitmanDear Friends, please ask questions about these passages from the great Kabbalists. The commentaries in brackets are mine.

Proof that Our Generation Has Reached the Days of the Messiah

Since the whole of the wisdom of Kabbalah speaks of the revelation of the Creator, naturally, there is no more successful teaching for its task. This is what the Kabbalists aimed for—to arrange it so it is suitable for studying. And so they studied it in concealment (as it was agreed to conceal it for a certain reason); however, this was only for a certain time, and not forever, as it is written in The Zohar, “This wisdom is destined to be revealed at the end of days.”
Baal HaSulam, “The Teaching of the Kabbalah and its Essence
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Numbers Indicate Quality, Not Quantity

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: What is “a rose that has thirteen petals”?

Answer: Numbers in Kabbalah characterize a state. In general, we study the states of our desire relative to the Creator. There are only two players in this game: the desire to enjoy and the Light, the Creator. Kabbalists describe their interrelationships to us.

There are different ways to do it. One of the options is numeric characteristics. Numbers do not designate a numeric value; rather, they point to characteristics of the states. Each number carries a specific inner essence and symbolizes something.

Th number 13 indicates addition, meaning the additional Sefirot HaGaT. All other numbers and their numeric value (Gematria) are calculated according to the same principle.

In general, there are no colors, distances, noises, or forms in spirituality. Whatever the Kabbalists describe to us, they always point to the character of the interaction between desire and the Light. Everything comes down to a single parameter: to what measure desire becomes similar to the Light in all of its properties.

Each desire consists of 10 Sefirot or 613 parts. Hence, each desire can be considered to be a certain totality or volume; it is not a singular stroke, but a set of multitude details of perception. As a result, we attribute it a name, characterize it with a certain light, sound, and form. But ultimately, we always compare desire with the Light.

Similarly, all objects of our world, from solid ones to gases, can be pictured in the form of waves of a certain length, which draw images in our consciousness.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/29/10, The Zohar, Introduction, “The Rose”

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