Question: If the exodus from Egypt occurs in a hurry, then why is preparation necessary?

Answer: One has nothing to do with the other. Preparation is necessary in order for me to be able to come to fulfillment. I need to experience a lack for this. After all, we come out of Egypt with our desires rather than with our feet, from one desire into another.

If I don’t have a need for a new state, it means that I haven’t prepared myself for coming out of Egypt. I need to desire to reach bestowal to such an extent that I see only this in front of me. Let the force of bestowal unite us as one whole: This is what I desire.

Let us all dissolve and merge into one without any differences: No one exists individually, and there is only one common force of bestowal. And then the upper Light will fill us.

Do I have a need for this? If not, I am not ready to come out of Egypt. Possibly I still don’t feel that I am in exile, and I have not completed the “seven years of famine.” Everything is fine for me, the group studies,  joint meals, picnics, conventions…. Only when the state becomes unbearable, meaning when we must unite with each other and that this will specifically be redemption for us, then we prepare for the exodus from Egypt.

Question cont.: Then why do we come out in a hurry?

Answer: A person cannot know ahead of time when the cup of his efforts will be filled. There is no time in spirituality. As soon as the cup is filled, as soon as you have exerted your desire to a sufficient extent, immediately a leap occurs and you come to the action: the escape from Egypt. Yet even a moment prior to this, you still don’t know that the cup is just about to be full. On the contrary, the previous moment may seem the most distant from redemption to you: Egyptian darkness and disasters that befall you….

Up to the very last moment you associate yourself with Pharaoh, until you break away from him. Therefore, you experience very intense and heavy blows, and you see no chance of coming out of this storm. Every blow only shows you how weak and incapable you are.

Then suddenly, precisely in the midst of this darkness, a force is revealed, and using it, you can run away from Pharaoh. Darkness is revealed to you, and this aids you in your escape. And as soon as the desire is finally revealed, the redemption begins immediately.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/10/2011, Preparation to Going Out From Egypt

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Kabbalists advise us not to philosophize (since our mind is egoistic and can only halt us), but rather to make more practical efforts. Clearly, my thoughts and desires will only keep me in my egoism, but with my actions I can bestow. And it’s all right that I may be giving because I intend to receive something for myself because otherwise, I wouldn’t give anything whatsoever.

But if I perform the actions recommended to me by Kabbalists, there is a spiritual element in it already. At this point, it’s not only about my personal benefit, but it may give me some spiritual result that I cannot think of directly. It works in such a roundabout way.

In other words, we advance indirectly. And with every action we perform, we build wonderful cities for our egoism, which turn into poor cities for Israel (“Yashar Kel,” those who aspire “straight to the Creator.”)

And herein hides one more additional obstacle. If I worked for Pharaoh by building cities for him but at the same time could see that parallel to that, as a “byproduct” of my egoistic work, I am gaining the properties of bestowal, faith, love, unity, and adhesion, then it would be great and clear! I would know that hoping for an egoistic reward, I will gradually acquire the desires of bestowal.

But that’s not how it works. Not only do I not gain desires of bestowal, but I also realize that I lose twice! In my ego, I see that I have earned great cities; I didn’t want them but I had no choice in it. But for Israel that is within me I lost twice as much: Instead of having advanced, I received destitute cities.

If next to the beautiful cities for Pharaoh there would also rise beautiful cities for Israel, if a successful spiritual “business” would bloom there, it would be fine. But there is nothing! I see that my ego, my Pharaoh, has won, whereas my striving for the Creator has lost and only removed me further from Him.

And then I get confused and start worrying: What is this path after all?! What will bring me closer to bestowal? And herein lies the stumbling block that can halt a person on his path since from this point on, a person must move toward the plea, a personal outcry to the Creator. He will realize that on his own, he can’t fight with Pharaoh and lead himself out of the bondage of slavery and that there has to be a third force.

Until now, he didn’t feel the need for the Creator and hence, he used to forget about Him. He thought that it was some kind of accompanying, additional force that gets revealed in the very end of the path. He didn’t see it as something necessary. Also looking at Moses’ story, we notice that it is the Creator who tells him: “Let’s go to Pharaoh”; the Creator Himself appears before Moses as a burning bush.

This means man still faces great obstacles that prevent him from getting connected with the Creator and appeal to Him in order to work together, as partners, against Pharaoh.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/12/2011, Shamati No. 86

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Egyptian Slavery Means You Have No Right To Bestow

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Question: What can we take away from this whole process of the exodus from Egypt in terms of our daily inner work?

Answer: We need to aspire for one thing only: unity in the group. The group is a mini-humanity. We cannot immediately act in a global scale, in the masses of humanity, but in the group we can work out all the principles of human connection.

There we will reveal all the states: “the descent into Egypt,” “the immersion into Egypt,” and “the exodus from Egypt.” We will feel the hatred for Pharaoh (our ego), the blows we receive from him, and the scrutiny of our nature.

This is all scrutinized in one place: in my connection with the friends. I need the group, my “friends,” for I cannot come to love the whole world. For me, the group represents the whole humanity, and in the group I can work out all my inner qualities.

Each time I try to unite with the friends, I discover the breaking within, the hatred and repulsion of others, and I perform new inner scrutinies. It could be that these scrutinies still pertain to the work “in Egypt” or even “before” that. None of that matters.

We cannot yet clearly make out these phases. On the whole, we cannot see anything clearly until we leave Egypt. Only afterward do we begin to understand what exactly we’ve gone through. After all, this work is done in the darkness, under the rule of egoistic desire, when I try to somehow exist in it, together with it or against it. That is why these scrutinies are unclear to us.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/13/11, The Book of Zohar

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Writings of Rabash, Dargot HaSulam “The Need for the Action from Below”
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The Book of Zohar – Selections, Passover, “BeShalach (When Pharaoh Had Let the People Go,” “Pharaoh’s Merkavot [Chariots/Structures] and His Army),” Item 260
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Explanation of the Article, “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah,” Item 11, Lesson 5
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Rav Yehuda Ashlag “Love of Friends”
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My Good Environment – Dr. Laitman’s Daily Advice for the Week

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The Book of Zohar, Weekly Torah Portion “Acharei Mot,” Selected Excerpts
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Over the course of the entire spiritual path, our rod constantly turns into a snake and then becomes a rod again that supports us on the spiritual path. That is to say, we either walk below reason, in reason, or by faith above reason.

When you ascend again after you had fallen and started judging what is good for you with your mind, you have to beware for the return to faith above reason to not be an egoistic decision which the mind obligates you to make. Otherwise it will turn out that you are walking by faith below reason instead of above it, and that your faith, which is inside reason, descends even lower.

This is a very fine and acute discernment which jabs our heart. We have to be able to look truth into the eyes so the Creator won’t be able to trick us and force us to fall. After all, we have to catch this “snake” by the tail and pick it up from the ground so it would turn into a rod again, instead of falling under the burden of these states, under the weight of this snake.

It takes time for a person to form these concepts inside and to begin to understand whether he is in this work or not, whether he makes these discernments. Work with the “rod and the snake” is already work with your egoism when a person is between these two forces that influence him—Pharaoh and the Creator.

Everything depends on what he does with his rod—will he drop it on the ground or pick it up? By doing the latter he will build his own spiritual vessel (Kli), his “self.”

This does not simply mean being a good psychologist or knowing how to seemingly come out of yourself or look at yourself from aside in order to check what is going on. These are purely psychological tricks, but not inner spiritual work.

We are talking about discernments that take place in a person who has already established some kind of attitude to the Creator and to himself. From these two points he begins to build Pharaoh and the Creator, and himself in the middle.

Then he can wrestle with love for himself, which aspires so strongly to sweep him away, and by virtue of this hatred for this egoistic quality, he can ascend above his egoism.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/13/11, Shamati

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Shamati #59, “About the Rod and the Serpent”: “And Moses answered and said: ‘But, behold, they will not believe me,’” etc. “And the Lord said unto him: ‘What is that in thy hand?’ And he said: ‘A rod.’ And He said: ‘Cast it on the ground…’ and it became a serpent; and Moses fled from before it” (Exodus 4).

We must understand that there are not more than two degrees, either Kedusha (Sanctity) or Sitra Achra (Other Side). There is no intermediary state, but the same rod itself becomes a serpent, if thrown to the ground.

…This is the meaning of the question, “What is that in thy hand?” A hand means attainment, from the words, “and if a hand attains.” A rod (Mateh in Hebrew) means that all one’s attainments are built on the discernment of inferior importance [Mata in Hebrew], which is faith above reason. This is because faith is regarded as having inferior importance, and as lowness….

There is one very fine discernment that is made constantly and that a person has to make in order advance by the path of the soul’s correction. It is called “the rod and the serpent.” You can check yourself this way: If I have a strong desire to do something and it’s clear that it is for my own sake, and I realize that this is how my egoism is expressed, which is blazing inside of me, then the same moment I understand this, I have to try to rise above this.

Even though I have a big inner desire to judge my friend in order to decide whether I should come closer to him or move farther away, yet above all of this I have to make an effort and raise my entire hatred, repulsion, disappointment and expectations of others—the friends, the teacher, and the Creator, and advance by faith above reason.

I must instead understand that precisely the conditions that I have been given are the “rod” that I have to pick up and take into my hands. Then it will become a symbol of my faith and will help me to advance.

However, if I throw the rod on the ground according to my desire (“earth” – Aretz, is “desire” – Ratzon), then it turns into a serpent.

I have to make this discernment in order to feel these two points inside of me, which are constantly present and contradict one another. My ego is blazing and wants to judge everyone—the friends, the teacher, and the Creator. And its complaints and anger are completely justified. It is sincerely indignant inside against all of them. But above this, I work on loving them, justifying them, and giving to them from my entire open heart by faith above reason.

When I feel these two points together, that means I correctly balance myself in my current state. These points are what make up my path toward the goal of creation.

On this path I will see that I am continuously overtaken by new calculations and criticism, new disagreements between myself and the environment, and this happens in order to make me think once again that I am right and they are wrong. This work begins right away, as soon as the group gets organized.

Either people will advance by faith above reason, or they will drown in these disagreements and will walk together with the snake, throwing their rod onto the ground, meaning, instead of faith above knowledge on the path they will go by faith inside knowledge or below it. Then the only thing left to do will be to wait for them to wake up, and that might take a very long amount of time—in fact, no one knows when that might happen.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/13/11, Shamati

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