Question: Is there a connection between the individual and collective governance?

Answer: Yes, there is a two-way connection between them. The collective governance is related to certain parts and, at the same time, affects the entire system of souls, all of which correlates with each individual response.

The souls residing within the circle of the system must ultimately comprise a singular line. In order for all of them to find their own place in it, each of them has to be managed individually. Therefore, there is a program of general and particular management in the system which works from Above downward (marked yellow in the diagram below).

However, this isn’t enough. Now, everybody has to provide an individual feedback: To what degree do I wish to advance and exert additional effort toward the pressure that the management is applying on me? Am I adding my own power to the force of the Light?

The Light affects me “in its time,” pushing me forward by blows whether I like it or not. This process is regarded as “Beito.” However, there is another way: I can accelerate my development and engage in this process before the Light will begin to act. Such acceleration of advancement is regarded as “Achishena.” I align my desire with the desire of the Creator, with correction, the final complete state of existence.

Therefore, the essence of my work is in bringing forth all of my power, thereby neutralizing the power of the Light. I wish to accept the program of governance, understand and implement it independently. This is the reason we received the point in the heart, and, in truth, our sole aspiration is to know and carry out the program of creation.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/15/10, “The Essence of Religion and Its Purpose”

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Question: What is the collective and individual governance?

Answer: We reside in reality the essence of which is the desire to enjoy, the force of reception. In addition, the force of bestowal, the force of the Light, acts in this reality.

What is the formula of their interaction? Suppose one force is X and the other Y, and they are equalized by a quotient K. In truth, the formula is this: The two variables, X and Y, are the will to receive and bestow pleasure, respectively, and the screen, K, is between them.

In the beginning of our reality, the desire to receive pleasure (0) opposes the desire to bestow (1). However, in the end, upon the completion of the 125th spiritual action, they become equal (1-1).

Hence, the formula is simple: From mutual opposition, we have to bring these desires to equivalence of properties. The will to receive has to acquire the attribute of bestowal.

Now, we know the rule and its result. The point is that two opposing yet interacting forces act in reality, and every instant of their interaction must lead to the final outcome in the most efficient manner.

Hence, Nature operates in everything there is according to the rule of "minimal input with maximal output." This mechanism affects us, and by experiencing the effects of its impact, we regard them as “governance.”

Governance can be individual and collective. The individual one applies to each cell of the organism and defines how a certain part has to advance by acquiring its individual form to fit the advancement of the collective system. We can see this type of governance in the example of the step-by-step formation of an embryo’s organs. Its body grows according to the collective governance that establishes the order of development of all other parts.

Then, from the general governance, the individual ties branch off, which get connected with each part in its respective place in accordance with its role in the process of the collective evolution. Thereby, the common program of development underlies the individual programs that govern us.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/15/10, “The Essence of Religion and Its Purpose”

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The Book of Zohar – Selections, Chapter “Hakdama, BeLaila De Kala (The Night of the Bride),” Item 129
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The Book of Zohar — Selections, Chapter “Tzav (Command),” Item 18
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Baal HaSulam, “Beit Shaar HaKavanot,” Lesson 19
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Rav Yehuda Ashlag, “The Essence of Religion and Its Purpose,” Lesson 4
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Question: If there is no reward and punishment in this world, where do they exist?

Answer: There is reward and punishment in our world, good and bad people, and everything else that you see and understand. It is written: “The world behaves according to fixed laws.” Within the scope of our world, each society, country, and civilization has their own laws.

If you come to a kindergarten, a school, or some adult establishment, in each place you’ll find specific laws of communication and reward and punishment for their observance. Wherever you may end up, there will be a charter of laws for a group of people, whether a society or a nation.

But with respect to profits and losses concerning the spiritual world, your corporeal actions have no bearing on the spiritual degree. They affect the soul’s future reincarnations, but not on the Creator’s revelation to the creatures, the revelation of the spiritual world, which is described as “see your world in this life.” And, as the Torah explains, a person who has only performed corporeal actions is considered to have done nothing at all.

We study that your only free action in this world is the exertion to unify in the group; all of your other actions are not yours. We are evaluated only with respect to choosing the best environment every time so as to achieve the purpose of creation.
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From Lesson 2, World Kabbalah Convention 2010, 11/9/10

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Question: When we cross the Machsom (the barrier separating us from spirituality), do we do it together or each of us in our time?

Answer: The Machsom is a potential border. If I aspire to unity with the friends and from separation between us yearn to reach greater closeness, if I try as much as I can to annihilate this distance, but am unable to do so, then I appeal to the Creator, the Light, and break through the Machsom. In other words, my ego remains, but I wish to rise above it despite the fact that at the previous stages, I didn’t especially desire this and was accepting of its presence in me.

This is how it was before the Machsom. However, above it, there are two forms of connection: “to bestow in order to bestow,” the level of Bina, and “to receive in order to bestow,” the level of Hochma and Keter.

Where, then, do I realize the Machsom? I do so in the connection between us. In it, I am not subject to our external actions concerning each other and expressions of personal likes. Here, I need to work solely within.

I have to feel an inner ability to bond with them within myself, in our desires, so that all our sparks of bestowal connect together. As soon as I start desiring it, I cross the Machsom. Yet, all our egoistic attributes remain. After all, we haven’t corrected our ego, but rose above it, eager to unify our passionate desire for spirituality, the property of bestowal.

If our sparks of bestowal are bound together, they form a vessel for the Light of Hassadim (Mercy) because such a vessel already has the attribute of Hafetz Hesed (presiding above one’s egoism). That’s when a person starts perceiving the Upper Light ruling over everything there is.

Below the Machsom, the same Upper Light fills the entire reality, but we don’t perceive it. As soon as our points in the hearts begin connecting, in a bond, density, compression between them I suddenly start feeling the Light that permeates everything . However, the sparks had already “found” the Light and become its “gauge.”

We are now in the same condition, and we don’t need to zoom into another dimension or other galaxies. The Light resides between us, and we just lack sensitivity for it, an organ of perception. The closer our hearts get, the more we discover the Light that dwells among us. We arrive at this in mutual bestowal and desire it to take place.
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From Lesson 2, World Kabbalah Convention 2010, 11/9/10

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Question: Where and how Arvut (mutual responsibility or guarantee) is described in The Zohar?

Answer: The Book of Zohar describes it as follows:
שהשפעת ו״ק דחכמה, הנוהגת בקו האמצעי, מכונה עדות, which translates as: Expansion of small illumination of the Light of Hochma that occurs in the middle line is called testament. In other words, when a person develops a capacity to arrange the three lines, the Light within him holds him in spirituality, bestowal, and this is what guarantees that a person will not fall into egoism ever again.
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Perception of reality, as the wisdom of Kabbalah teaches us, is very subjective. Reality is perceived solely in relation to us and our sensory organs. But outside of them, there is no reality; it doesn’t exist. We receive it as an image on the screen located in the “hind” part of our brain, as if reality exists irrespective of us, on the outside.

As The Book of Zohar explains, I see parts of my will to receive to the extent that it differs from the Light, to the degree that my desire to receive varies from the attribute of bestowal that characterizes the Light.

Our collective desire, the single creature, was initially in the state of “Infinity.” Then it descended from the property of “Infinity” to that of “our world” by experiencing the breaking, meaning changing its property from bestowal to reception.

Through the breaking, this big soul divided into 600,000 individual souls and then into a multitude of parts that ended up in “our world,” an egoistic property. This is why we feel that there are many of us, although in truth, each of us sees only parts of his own soul.

We study that the soul is comprised of 10 Sefirot. They are divided into GE (Galgalta ve Eynaim) and AHP (Awzen, Hotem, Peh). GE contains the Sefirot of Keter, Hochma, Bina, Hesed, Gevura, and Tifferet, which are the vessels (desires) of bestowal, whereas AHP contains Netzah, Hod, Yesod, and Malchut, the vessels of reception.

It turns out that I perceive reality by means of these ten vessels or desires. What I perceive within GE is my self, my “I,” and what I perceive in AHP is the illusory, external world I see outside of myself.

Essentially, I have experienced an internal tearing of the vessels of GE and AHP. I perceive my greatest desires that were supposed to bring me the greatest pleasures as alien, like all of you, for example. You all are the vessels of my AHP. I experience “I,” myself, and everything related to me in GE of my soul. In my ego, I am constantly preoccupied with this specific part, and all my calculations aim at my personal benefit.

I perceive the part referred to AHP as completely alien to me. Moreover, I am willing to use it in any way I can for as long it may serve my benefit. Hence, it looks like I am constantly trying to fool, lie to, and steal from myself, but I am neither aware of it nor feel it.

Later, when a person begins discerning it, he arrives to great disappointment. Therefore, the method of Kabbalah, before anything else, stresses the need to unite, although it must not occur in the corporeal plane (between you and me). The entire method is aimed at the necessity to unify and correct the soul, meaning that I must unify these two parts in my perception.

So now, what I see outside of myself and experience within myself, these two parts, have to become one whole. Then, we will truly see that there is nothing but a person, and what I observe inwardly and outwardly is my “self,” my “I,” or my will to receive (desire).
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From Lesson 2, World Kabbalah Convention 2010, 11/9/10

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Everything depends on the support of the environment; without it, it is impossible to advance spiritually. When you acquire a spiritual environment, then all the great Kabbalists who attained the spiritual world during their lives in this world, all of their souls will become your group.

You will enter the “Upper Assembly” of Rabbi Shimon (the spiritual level called by that name). You can connect to higher sources, but only to the degree it is necessary! Now you simply do not need this power.

If you needed the group that includes Baal HaSulam, Rabash, the Ari, Rashbi, and other great Kabbalists of the past from Abraham until today, then you would receive it. However, right now you do not need it. As soon as you need it, you will reveal the spiritual group in addition to the material one. Perhaps you won’t even need a material group because just the spiritual one will be sufficient.

If the souls start to help you directly, it is called “a donkey driver.” The Creator sends a high soul called “a donkey driver” so it will always help a person. But this help comes in response to your plea that you need spiritual ascension.

It’s similar to how Rabbi Abba and Rabbi Yossi, whom The Book of Zohar talks about, are on the path where they open the Torah and discover that they cannot reach correction on their own. They need the revelation of a special force that will help them to ascend.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/16/10, “The Essence of Religion and Its Purpose”

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The Zohar, "Introduction of The Zohar," Chapter "BeLaila DeKala (On the Night of the Bride)": …at the great Zivug of the end of correction, the light of the moon will be as the light of the sun, as it is written, “When in the evening time there will be light.” Thus, her degrees are doubled, since during the 6,000 years in the state of the moon she was “and there was evening and there was morning.”

Eventually all of our descents, all of the dark nights join the Light of day, the revelation of the Light. Day and night become one whole. In reality this isn’t talking about "doubling" or even multiplying by 620 times, the way it is written.

At first the Creator gave me a small spark, and did not give me anything else. Then, by working on my desire, I turn to the Creator, the Light, and demand corrections. Thanks to these corrections I become similar to the Light with my qualities and the Light clothes into me.

Inside my desire the Light is perceived as infinite and boundless. Why? The matter is that when the desire for pleasure begins to grow inside us, it discerns and forms itself independently. The previous sensation was left to it from the Reshimot that descended from Above downwards, and they are completely different from the ones it now realizes.

As a person ascends, on every level he realizes himself according to previous Reshimot, but he adds his aspiration, efforts, and descents to them. He reveals the gap between himself and the Light, the gap which was never revealed before.

A person is separated from the Light and aspires after it. The Light comes, but then a descent comes; this happens again and again, and thanks to all of these experiences, which throw him from end to end, a person finds new details in his desire.

He discovers unprecedented depth, a completely new Kli, an independent yearning, an unheard of aspiration to the Light. Previously not one desire or Reshimo were recorded in his account, but now, when he makes efforts, even if it is done in a childish manner, it forms new Kelim inside him.

That is why the Light that now becomes revealed incomparably exceeds the Light that filled the desire before the breaking, before our work on the path upwards. The descent of the worlds and all the efforts until now were just a general preparation to the real correction. In it the smallest Light, the Light of Nefesh, is revealed.

Baal HaSulam writes that very small Lights were revealed before, but now, when our generation begins to correct itself, it attracts the greatest Light in all the worlds – the Light of NaRaNHY.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/16/10, The Zohar

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