Question: Do Kabbalah conventions serve as a final result of our practical work? What can you say about the upcoming convention in North America?

Answer: My attitude to such gatherings is very positive, and I think they provide an opportunity for great advancement. I see that with every convention, I get better and better at giving simpler explanations which are easier for people to digest. They start to understand me better, and we become closer to one another.

Every such meeting is a leap up. One visit to a Kabbalah convention is worth a month of daily studies. It gives a person internal and external impressions and many positive results. Once a year, we organize a congress in North America, so try not to let this opportunity pass by.

If you do have the opportunity, but it appears to you like there isn’t enough time or finances, this is an obstacle that was placed intentionally before you. You should honestly examine yourself, being aware that you stand before a profound decision. A person who has such an opportunity once a year and doesn’t come will lose a great deal since he loses the bond with this path.

Surely, there may be objective reasons which prevent a person from coming, such as being incarcerated in prison. However, if one is able to, but it is difficult for him, that is not an excuse. It is a test from Above, and he should leap over the obstacle placed in his way.

Many groups and individuals will gather. It is a very different kind of power, and we connect to the whole world from there. I will do my best to pass an internal charge to the people who will be so close in front of me at that moment. People keep feeling it later, after the event, unlike those who could come and did not.

It probably doesn’t matter that much how one studies day by day, whether in the virtual group or a physical one. It depends on a person and the relationships in the group. However, neither a physical nor virtual group can replace a collective gathering such as a convention where hundreds or thousands of people get together and unify.

There are those who left a group for different reasons, but a convention is something else, and everyone should go there without making any calculations regarding attitudes within the group or what have you. He just comes in order to unify with the world Kli (vessel) and ascend the new spiritual rung thereby.

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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/4/2011, Writings of Rabash

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Question: Will the tendency to move toward internal values cause the disappearance of occupations involved in film production, fashion, and so on?

Answer: In any case, our world stands at the threshold of great transformations in regard to all the previously existing values. It will manifest in abandoning the external preferences that used to be meaningful to people until now. Even today, we have witnessed quite a noticeable popularity of casualness in everyday dress codes, and it is for a good reason.

I often participate in global congresses and conferences, and every year I notice a growing tendency for a negligent attitude toward external values. There are fewer restrictions, and the participants are given much more freedom in the form they wish to use for their presentations. People have grown impatient of various ceremonies and everything that would push them into a certain square.

This is a common trend which confirms people’s gravitation toward internal values. They need to know the essence of things, not their external expression. This is how our ego advances us. I am certain that many professions related to fashion and design will eventually vanish.

People’s attitude toward external attributes only emphasizes the growth of their interest in internal values and demonstrates that nothing external attracts them any longer. Hence, we dress and act the way we do, and as for me, I am happy to see this status quo in the world.
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From the Introductory Lecture Series 2/22/2011, “Preference for the Internal Over the External”

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To influence the men in a wholesome and powerful way, the women must also unite, but they should unite with an understanding of the principles of our work and what exactly to demand from the men. To do so, they must know what the Light is that the men need to draw and what it has to beget.

A woman in spirituality is a force even greater than a man. A man is just a force, a screen, whereas a woman is the place where all kinds of changes occur. She begets a new rung and nourishes it. Conception, nurturing, and maturing to adulthood, all of it lies within the female’s part of the collective or individual soul.

As regards a man, he only delivers the Light. It is said that he “provides the whitening,” and that completes his role, as it were. After that, he resides within a mother and through her, supplies the forces to develop the souls.

As regards the offspring, everything comes from the mother, the female part. All spiritual growth goes through a woman, and it is the female part that begets souls. The same is mentioned in the Torah. For example, “Abraham” and “Sarah” are two parts of the soul who beget a new soul, and their more advanced state is regarded as “Isaac.” Who gives birth to him? Obviously, it is Sarah.

We must function as nature dictates. Having aligned ourselves with the material nature, we will move on from it to the spiritual one, thanks to which we will accomplish what we set out to do without harming ourselves.

Vice versa, the more harm we inflict by indulging our egoism, the more we will scream about the “equality” that in reality ruins families and society, and the fewer our chances will become. Some politicians may benefit from it, but it won’t be us.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/6/11 on Women

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Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot,” Item 133: And only the heroes among them, whose patience endured, defeated the guards and opened the gate. And they were instantly awarded seeing the King’s face….

Question: What is the degree of “patience endured?”

Answer: A person arrives at the wisdom of Kabbalah “dying” to attain everything and all at once, but when he or she doesn’t succeed, they start getting angry at themselves, the Creator, and the whole world. This is how a person’s healthy, strong egoistic desire expresses itself when it realizes that it doesn’t have any chance to be fulfilled because it’s totally opposite to the source of fulfillment.

The degree of patience is formed in a person when he begins to understand what the spiritual path entails and comprehends the necessity of each stage. As if with a pair of tweezers, grain by grain, he collects his accumulated impressions, fully aware that without them, he cannot assemble the “building blocks” of his soul. After all, a person’s soul contains thousands of various details within it, each of which must be refined, and that is why it is impossible to leap over a certain stage.

Baal HaSulam writes that it is only the one who walks a long path to corrections that wins the most due to the fact that he or she undergoes deeper discernments. In fact, our soul is not just a two-dimensional puzzle, but rather a complex structure that expands in depth in every direction because each soul must contain all souls within it.

It is a multidimensional spiritual space where a person with his body is connected with absolutely every soul as if besides himself, there is no one else. Therefore, a person has to perform very big discernments.

So, the measure of patience doesn’t imply the degree of your self-composure or, conversely, impatience. The Creator is an immutable law of nature, and there is nothing you can do. For example, in truth, you can yell at a machine all you want when you can’t make it work, but it won’t help whatsoever.

The degree of patience is when a person strives to obtain the correct approach to his spiritual advancement with the help of his environment. In other words, until we all unify, our Kli (vessel) will not be complete, and we will not be able to enter the Creator’s chambers. We must reach a certain minimal degree, a so-called Seah (amount of efforts). This requires patience.

You must constantly turn to the group and ask it for support and learn patience from the others. However, it is only regarded as patience when, in fact, it is mutual engagement with the others.

Patience is when I know that I will not obtain spirituality before the others. I have to work together with them, advance them, and then, in the last turn, I will enter the spiritual world.
It is precisely the awareness of my being the last one which defines the degree of my patience. It is a very important property that derives from the fact that there is nothing but a single Kli (vessel) and the Light, while I only stimulate them toward unification.

That is, when everyone strives to reach the summit of a mountain and step into the King’s palace, I don’t run ahead of them all, but push them from behind. I am the last in line. If I am willing to do that, it means that I have the endurance of patience. If I assist everyone, then after they become transformed, I, too, will be reformed.

No one can come to correction before his or her environment. It is regarded as: A person is unable to raise himself above his circle since it is a wholesome system where all its parts interact with each other.

How, then, will there be one part that is corrected within it while another is not? Therefore, the more a person strives to elevate his environment, the more exalted he or she becomes. Only this kind of approach leads to success.

Also, the degree of one’s patience is measured by his or her ability to turn suffering from having to compose oneself into bestowal and pleasure. In that case, that measure of patience that “endured” this work turns into a great Kli (desire).

After all, all impatience is an authentic expression of ego that is “burning” with desire to be fulfilled and hates everything that holds it from getting such fulfillment. The degree of a person’s patience tames this ego, reforms it, and becomes the criterion of the spiritual advancement of man.

Ultimately, the measure of patience is the very same uncorrected Kelim that separate me from the Creator since it is in them where I feel the impatience.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/25/2011, “Introduction to The Study of the Ten Sefirot”

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Our method of raising children is not to tame and terrorize them into developing habits; only the few habits necessary for daily life should be instilled. The key in upbringing is to give the young the instruments they can use to understand the place and significance of every phenomenon in their life and to develop a clear system of values: First, there is the importance of the group, above it there is the importance of the Creator, and below it everything that leads to this. The rest doesn’t have any connection to free will and should be utilized as dictated by a simple decision of how essential it is to life.

Thus, a child’s surroundings should be divided into two parts: 1) living necessities, and 2) everything that relates to spirituality, the importance of which we wish to increase by way of our free will with the help of the group, unity, and studies. This system is the priority for him or her. A child must constantly be in it in order to find themselves as the most important thing in the world which must be realized.

Therefore, we cannot outline for the children the norms of behavior for their entire life since this method doesn’t work any longer for the new generation. They need to receive the tools that will remain with them for life. They will act by employing these devices, deciding “pro” or “con” each step of the way, every moment in their lives.

Hence, we are passing along the method, but habits should be cultivated in the group. The more time a child spends in the group, the better he or she understands its influence on him or her, senses its response, engages in it, and evolves.

There a youngster finds connection, strength, support, and the field for work. There a child advances, and if he or she fails at some point, then they employ study and prayer. Having gained the forces to rise, they fall yet again, and this process can occur only in the group. With the rest of the world, a child may interact as necessary.

These principles should be assimilated within children as much as possible while we raise them. Part of it will enter them as habitual behavior which depends on each child’s personality and the peculiarities of their souls, while the rest will be acquired during work in the group. However, in order for it to stay with them, children must know how to live, starting with the first years of their lives.

After all, it is the “human” part in the new generation that has to undergo transformation, not the animate one. Previously, all of us were as animals, and that is why there weren’t any specific changes.

Children used to receive education that was sufficient for life. The failure in upbringing can be explained by the fact that in the new generation, a “human” part of our desire is developing and changing constantly. Hence, nobody understands what is happening with the children and what it is that they want.

They don’t understand it either. The human part that is developing in the young generation requires a method of correction. If we give this method to this part of man and provide his animate part with habitual behavior acquired in childhood that will become his second nature, thereby, we will give him everything that’s needed.

He will govern both parts on his own. For the animate part, he will have a set of habits, and he will have the method to work with the human part.
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From the Talk on Education 2/18/2011

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In the corporeal world, our perception of beauty constantly changes, and we are forced to follow the opinion of the majority. After all, we live in a human society and respect its values whether we like it or not. This is our nature. At the end, every person will esteem the things that the majority in his environment respects.

We do not even realize how unreasonable these values are. So frequently fashions change in education, culture, the industrial sector, creativity, and even food. We see them come and go, without any actual value. Everything beyond the limits of our animate existence that the body requires (simple shelter, family, and food) has value in our eyes only because the society appreciates it.

But spirituality is different because nobody is dragging us there. We need to build our own society and awaken it ourselves so it would pull us after it and through it, to spirituality. In other words, we are given free will in the spiritual development, and no one will force us there!

Of course, the Creator stimulates us: He arranges a hard life for us in this world and deprives us of fulfillment. But on the other hand, life is no longer as difficult as it was in the past, and we are not starving. Yet, we feel an inner emptiness that pushes us to develop. And when we discover this emptiness and start thinking about the purpose, the meaning, and the secret of life, but are unable to answer these questions, we realize that no one can tell or explain it to us, nobody pulls us after them.

We look around and fail to see any examples. We receive examples in everything else in life: the choice of a profession, the style of our home, the kind of things to buy, what to do, who to be like. The human society gives us examples of everything. And only spirituality remains without examples, as if you existed in an empty vacuum, and every day, even every moment you are faced with the questions: what to do, where to go, where to get examples of spiritual values and purpose?

This is a big problem. But on the other hand, this is a consequence of the freedom given to us! This is because when a person enters spirituality, he builds his own soul. Nobody teaches him. There are many advices and books, but all of them are merely general explanations around this topic, which only support us a little.

Ultimately, everything depends on the person himself. He needs to build his own environment which would provide him with the spiritual values and direction and be just as sound as the environment in our world with all its examples. Without this, he naturally would not know how to advance.

This is the main difference between the spiritual and the corporeal advancement.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/4/2011, Writings of Rabash

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Everyone Can Reveal the Creator In Our Time

In previous times, revelation of the Creator was impossible without the prior study of the seven external sciences and severe asceticism. Yet despite it all, only a few found mercy in the Creator’s eyes [revealed Him].

However, after we merited the teaching of the Ari and the spiritual work according to the system of Baal Shem Tov, it is truly suitable for every person, and people no longer need the aforementioned preparation.
– Baal HaSulam, Fruit of the Wise, Letters, Letter 38, 1927
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In the process of gradual descent from the world of Infinity, the vessels (Kelim) receive the Lights. On the way downward, there lie the worlds of Adam Kadmon, Atzilut, Beria, Yetzira, and Assiya.

Their ladder is a gradually decreasing reception of the Light for the sake of the Creator. In the world of Adam Kadmon, there is a big Light of Yechida; in the world of Aztilut, the Light of Haya; in the world of Beria, the Light of Neshama; in the world of Yetzira, the Light of Ruach; and in the world of Assiya, the Light of Nefesh.

In the end, all the Lights in all of the vessels expire, and we find ourselves at the bottom, in the state of “this world.” There are neither Lights nor vessels in it, but only a life force, a material desire. Over the course of the entire descent, the screen kept reducing from 100% to a zero. As a result, we don’t have the force of resistance or a thought of bestowal, nothing. We reside in the material world, that is, in the egoistic desire.

And at this point, we must evolve to the condition when we will desire to go back to the world of Infinity: starting from zero, from below upward, to climb the five worlds that we descended through. By doing so we essentially realize the purpose of creation.

Thus, having fallen to this world, we existed in it over the course of history until we reached the year 2011, the beginning of ascent. From here on, all souls are beginning to rise upward. The path from Above downward and from below upward extends over 125 degrees since each of the five worlds consists of five Partzufim that each contains five Sefirot.

Basically, everything is preset and premeasured in the universe; everything is purposeful. We only need to disclose our next state of existence, time after time, and carefully step into it: everybody in his or her individual manner. Everything is prearranged, and in the world of Infinity (Ein Sof), we come to our final, perfect state of being.

Before we descended from there, we existed in state 1, and then through the broken and confused state 2, we return to Infinity, state 3. What do we “earn” thereby? We earn autonomy. After all, it is we who walk this path to Infinity, we who act, and we who attain the Creator’s creation and actions. Gaining awareness of who He is, we become like Him and understand how to act without Him. We learn, as a child does, until we reach a rung at which we are able to work instead of the Creator in all of reality, in all creation.

The Creator is only a force, but it is we who set it in motion. And this is why in the third state, there are only the Creator and the created being, equal and similar in all. That is what we earn. This is the goal the Creator placed before us so that we, the created beings, may become equal to Him.

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From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/4/2011, “Explanation to the Article, Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah”

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Question: How can we bring our inner movements to match the text of The Book of Zohar?

Answer: Relative to other Kabbalistic sources, this is actually easy to do with The Zohar because the speed and reading of the text are such that all you have to do is feel out how to “flow” together with it. But this does not mean that you are hearing its sound like the noise of a river that flows by.

“Flowing together with it” means that you are trying very calmly, as it is written, “The words of the sages are heard in calmness.” You are going together with the authors of The Zohar without any resistance, arranging your inner motions to suit the sound of the words. If you missed a few words and did not hear them, don’t worry and keep going with the following words. Thus, you continue with the flow like a wooden chip on waves, repeating all of the nuances of the water.

That is how we should enable our qualities, desires, and sensations to flow together with the text of The Zohar as if on the water’s surface, trying to suit this flow, trying to find where these qualities and desires The Zohar describes are inside of us. But we should look for them very simply and easily. The most important thing is to let this flow pass through you. After all, we are just a vessel or Kli through which this entire flow of words has to enter us.

When reading The Zohar, we do not try to activate the mind or discern the inner definitions. Even in places where The Zohar seems to use technical, scientific terms, using the language of Kabbalah, we should also try to let this text pass through the sensations rather than the mind, meaning to try to listen to our own feelings and impressions, trying to feel how every word echoes inside us regardless of the language that The Zohar uses.
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/9/11, The Zohar

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