In the News (from Oxfam’s Report): “According to a new report from Oxfam, a broken food system and environmental crisis are now reversing decades of progress in the fight against global hunger. Oxfam projects that spiraling food prices will create millions of hungry people unless we radically transform the way we grow and share food. …

“Oxfam identifies the various symptoms of our broken food system: growing hunger, flat lining crop yields, lack of fertile soil and water, and rising food crisis. The organization says that we have entered a new age of crisis where depletion of the earth’s natural resources and increasingly severe climate change impacts will create millions more hungry people. Naturally, poor countries will be affected dramatically more than industrialized nations. Oxfam projects that the price of staple food such as maize, already at an all time high, will more than double in the next 20 years. Half of this price increase will be directly linked to climate change. The world’s poorest people, who spend 80 percent of their income on food, will be hit in the harshest way.

“By 2050, Oxfam predicts that demand for food will rise by 70 percent. Yet our capacity to increase food production is in decline. The average growth rate in agricultural yield has declined by almost 50 percent since 1990, and it is set to decline even further in the coming decade. …Four global companies control the movement of the world’s food. Three corporations- Archer Daniels Midland, Bunge and Cargill- control around 90 percent of the global grain trade. Their speculative activities drive volatile food prices and they profit from it. For example, in the first quarter of 2008, at the top of a global food crisis, Cargill’s profits were up by 86 percent. In 2011, Cargill is heading for its most profitable year on record. Needless to say, this speculation on food prices will further disrupt global food supplies.

“’For too long governments have put the interests of big businesses and powerful elites above the interest of the seven billion of us who produce and consume the food.’”

My Comment: Governments are powerless against corporations or they serve them. We have created a trap for ourselves—our egoism; although it’s destroying itself, it doesn’t want, like the Pharaoh, to release us from bondage, even if this leads to the destruction of Egypt—our egoistic world.
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Question: What are the 125 degrees actually?

Answer: Your whole desire to receive is divided into 125 degrees of thickness: how cruel and tough you can be on the zero level that is hardly revealed, like a mosquito, up to a wild beast on the level of minus Ein Sof (Infinity).

These are the 125 degrees that we count from our state up to the world of Ein Sof. 5 worlds times 5 Partzufim times 5 Sefirot, this is how the Ha-Va-Ya-H is divided.

We have to correct this whole desire to receive. It wakes up at another part of the 125 degrees each time by being added to you, and you have to correct it. Therefore, you constantly feel a growing darkness and you correct it, and from this darkness you attain the “dressing of Hassadim” where you discover the Light. The darkness is the same Light but without the dressing of Hassadim.

First, in the world of Ein Sof the Light doesn’t need the dressing of Hassadim. But later after Malchut of Ein Sof decides that it receives only in order to bestow, the Light disappears and illuminates, which means that it is awakened in the vessel, (since it actually doesn’t disappear at all, but we only say that it does), only in the dressing of Hassadim. To the extent of the dressing, you receive the Light. It is as if you have a certain lamp and according to its strength you discover the power of the Light that you receive.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/16/12, The Book of Zohar

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Why did the Creator create everything so strangely? He built a palace, invited all His beloved guests, and then placed guards and policemen around the palace who are testing and checking the guests, not letting them pass and causing them pain and suffering. Didn’t the Creator know in advance who would be loyal to Him, who loves Him and who doesn’t? Why does the Creator reject us all? Is it so that only those who can overcome all the obstacles will pass, in order to prove their loyalty and readiness?

The point is that it is in this struggle that our desire is formed; a vessel for receiving the filling in the King’s palace is built and stabilized. Otherwise, how would we be able to build this vessel? After all, it wasn’t given to us readymade from Above. If we were not allowed to pass without a reason, would that be justified? It is as if I yearn for the Creator with all my heart, and here some guard throws me down the mountain.

The point is that I am totally opposite to the attributes required to reach the top of the mountain. I am not the person I should be to become a guest at the King’s palace. It is only thanks to the guards that I constantly change by becoming more and more adapted.

These forces, of course, are depicted in my ego as vicious, cruel guards who don’t let me pass. The Creator is the cruelest of them all because He is the one who posted all these guards and policemen. He created my evil inclination and all the problems and suffering that relate to it. It is as if he gave birth to a poor, sick child and instead of feeling sorry for him, He even beats him, as if the child is guilty of something.

Apparently, all our complaints are justified, but the point is that the only way to build the right vessel is with the help of the right attributes that we receive, which we don’t have from the start. So the right approach is to divide myself into two. From one perspective you see what there is in your egoistic desire. From a second perspective, you see what there is in your desire to bestow, in your yearning to resemble the Creator, which means according to the ascent up the mountain, on top of which there is the King’s palace.

Following these two perspectives is called the “middle line.” With regard to your desire to receive this is the most terrible way in which there is no justice but actually only the opposite! You will not be able to justify the desire to bestow or to support it so much. This is because we should exert ourselves on both sides, both from the side of the ego and from the side of the yearning for bestowal.

What’s important is that you are looking at these two points independently from a neutral zone. It is as if you rose to Keter and from there you are watching this machine, like the Creator. It doesn’t belong to you, but it is yours only if it helps you resemble Him. Thanks to it, you can become like Him, reach adhesion with Him, and look at everything else as a means to attain that.

Thus you can justify, understand, and go through all these trials “above reason”: both as the egoist and as the one that bestows. This is because this bestowal is also totally based on receiving.

You want to adhere to the Creator instead of being connected to your desire to receive. The desire to receive is merely a tool for you to attain the Creator. With the help of the Torah, (the Reforming Light), you have to turn this evil inclination into the good inclination with which you will adhere to the Creator.

In order to adhere to the Creator, you need the good inclination, but in order for this good inclination to be able to help you adhere to it, you should approach it from the side of the evil inclination by using the Torah. All of creation was created in order to reach adhesion with the Creator. From this point of adhesion, which we want to attain, we have to look at the whole process we are going through. Then you will cut yourself off the egoistic perspective and not look at yourself through your desire to receive, through your ego. You will constantly be above it and look at it from the side, as at a means for achieving a goal.

This is why it is so important to constantly raise the greatness of the goal, the Creator, the group, and the friends. Because this will help you relate to everything else as to tools.
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From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/15/12, The Study of the Ten Sefirot

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Question: How can we be equal to others? How can we measure if we are equal? After all, otherwise we can’t be friends and create the conditions for the Creator’s revelation between us.

Answer: You can feel either above or below others, but only those who achieve equality among themselves become friends. In other types of relationships, when you either bestow or receive, you’re not a friend but rather a teacher or a student.

People become equal if they desire simultaneously:

1. To give everything, like an adult to a child, to care for them,

2. They are ready to learn from any friend like a student from a teacher (as it is written, “Mi Kol Talmiday Iskalti” – “I’ve learned from all my students”).

It is precisely by combining these two attitudes toward another that I become equal to him, that is, I become his friend.
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Question: Why is it much easier to keep the right intention when reading the Study of the Ten Sefirot than when reading The Zohar?

Answer: The thing is that we need a language for explanations. After all, there are no words in the spiritual world and Kabbalists have to speak the language of branches, which confuses us.

The language of branches is good for those who already are in the spiritual world. If I am above the Machsom, I do not have a problem with understanding no matter the language of explanation. This is because I really feel this world, I understand it, and I perceive it on the level of the 125 degrees to which I have ascended. I will understand what is happening from the explanation the same way I understand a tale about this world with which I am familiar.

But if I am beneath the Machsom, I am unable to understand the allegorical language of branches. It is easier for me to understand the language of TES, which speaks in technical terms and uses spiritual definitions, names of Lights, Sefirot, Partzufim, and the heights of levels. I can somehow understand this; at least it is clear to me that the 120th degree is lower than the 125th degree, and Nefesh is smaller than Ruach.

Even if I do not understand what this is, I can still somehow compare and gauge them. And this is very important. Even if I do not feel these concepts in my heart, I can at least separate them into levels in my mind: Reshimot Dalet/Gimel, Gimel/Bet, Partzufim AB, SAG, MA, BON.

Here everyone can be wise if he has studied the material. Even if he has not practically attained anything, he has at least learned the terminology and can explain himself. This is why it is so necessary for us and we would not be able to express anything at all without it. After all, Kabbalists must establish a certain connection with us in order to use it to bring the Reforming Light to us.

They need a certain thread that connects them with us to be able to constantly pour medicine into us through it. Otherwise we are unable to connect with them because they are in another world that is separated from us. We do not see the channels through which information flows to us.

Kabbalists create this channel by telling us about Partzufim AB, SAG, MA, and BON. And as we study them theoretically and establish an external connection with them, essentially without any understanding, but only obediently repeating words after them, in this way we express our desire to receive the medicine from them, the Light of correction, and this is why we receive it. But this connection is necessary.

If Kabbalists, instead of speaking the language of TES (Talmud Eser Sefirot – The Study of the Ten Sefirot), speak the language of the Tanakh, you immediately imagine that they are speaking about this world and that you understand everything. This is the entire problem, people do not understand that the legend pertains to the spiritual world, actions of bestowal (called the Holy Bina, the quality of bestowal), and they attribute it to this world, which begets all the religions and beliefs.

However, as the notions of the group, connection, and dissemination become closer to you, you will feel that the material in TES is becoming clearer. You will never be able to understand it purely theoretically with your mind. You can memorize all the words, but you will not advance past this. If a person wishes to advance through sensory attainment inside his desire, then he will not understand TES until he connects it with some already attained private correction of himself. Already before the Machsom, he will begin to perceive the inner meaning of the notions, and it will become easier for him to study.

When a person advances correctly, attainment goes from feeling to mind. This is why one does not need to have a big mind to learn. Theoretical knowledge is not connected to spiritual advancement in any way.
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From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/16/12, The Study of the Ten Sefirot

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Preparation to the Lesson

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Lesson: Talk  About Past Conventions 

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The Book of Zohaar – Selected Excerpts, “Beresheet (Genesis),” “If My Convenant Is Not Day or Night,” Item 359

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Talmud Eser Sefirot, Part 7, Item 2

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Listen to an Audio Version of the Blog
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In order to be balanced with the Creator, to connect with Him, I have to change myself. How is that possible? How can I resemble Him? After all, balance is resemblance.

In order to do this, we were given an environment. Balance with the Creator is attained by balancing with the environment in which I discover Him. The Reshimot (reminiscences) that are awoken inside present the group to me, and my work becomes real, now I’m dealing with something that’s familiar, everything is solved among friends.

How is it possible to find balance with the group? Through mutual guarantee that is the force, the law of balance.

According to this law the entire world is mutually connected, just like cogwheels in a certain system. None of the cogwheels can turn independently without turning all the other wheels and being turned by them. It’s just like two clutch discs when they touch each other.

But the law of development operates in this mechanism. First, the clutch pedal is pressed and the connection between them is still weak. At this point we don’t disturb but rather help one another by spinning and not feeling that we are connected to one whole. The states and nations are separated; some don’t even know that others exist.

With time, the inner ego grows and the cogwheels become more closely connected. In other words the clutch pedal is released and the discs get progressively closer to one another, until they are very tightly connected. This is how all of humanity develops towards mutual cooperation: Countries establish connections, new continents are discovered, international commerce and industry flourish, societies change, the number of different professions grow, and people are becoming increasingly interdependent until they are totally interdependent.

This development is very difficult because the ego and the Reshimot that develop bring us closer together and crowd us, until at a certain moment when this overly tight connection begins to worry us. We can’t detach ourselves from one another to live without each other, even if we want to. Therefore, nature, the Creator, brings us to a new state in which we discover that we can’t break apart any more. If we don’t work out the right mutual connection among us, then we may be destroying ourselves.

Thus mutual guarantee obliges us to be mutually responsible for one another. We are like cogwheels: Any wheel that turns, turns all the others. The clutch pedal is left untouched and the discs come together, the teeth enter each other and we all find ourselves in one huge interconnected system, that doesn’t allow any cogwheel to turn freely. Now all the others have to agree with it, to agree about the direction and the speed. Without this agreement, no one will be able to move.

Eventually everyone will discover a “strange hand around his neck.” Imagine a person lying with an IV without which he may die, but there are several billion taps installed on the tube in which the vital fluid flows. Everyone can turn off his own tap and then, that’s the end.

We will soon feel that we’re in a very unpleasant situation. That is why the wisdom of Kabbalah is revealed to us in advance, in order to prepare our life to the new conditions. After all, everything comes for the purpose of correction; the question is only how to look at this whole thing. If we know in advance that everything comes to serve the search for the right mutual connection among us, meaning mutual guarantee, then the cogwheels will be arranged as they should and will turn in the right direction, in harmony. Moreover, the mutual balance will help them become balanced with the general force that locks them in the one system together with the Creator. This is how the world will reach the desired correction.
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From the One Convention in New Jersey 5/12/12, Lesson 3

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Question: How can we be sure that our connection in the group is enough for the work that we want to actualize?

Answer: You can actually discover this if in spite of the friction, you try to connect and work together. Then you work on two levels: Below are arguments, hatred, rejection, and lack of understanding, in other words the ego that separates between us, and above, you are the opposite, connected in love.

In our maintaining both of these levels, you constantly rise in both of them: The ego grows above love, and you hate each other, and then love elevates above the ego, and this happens again and again; similar to how we walk on two legs. The positive and negative constantly substitute each other, like swallowing and regurgitation. The whole life is built on sequence, and it is impossible to advance in any other way.

But if the hatred that grew is depressing love and you agree to this, then the connection between you will be torn, and the group will be destroyed. Thus, one always needs to remember what the Creator says: “I created the evil inclination.” He constantly renews your ego, so that you constantly will rise above it to the good inclination.

In this way you connect to Him again and again. He strengthens your self-love specifically so that you will stretch the connection and ask for help. This process must be as clear to you as the light of the sun. Only in this way, we advance as a group; otherwise, we can expect a collapse.
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From the Brazil Convention 5/06/12, Lesson 5

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Question: What efforts should the group make in order to attain correction in the same lifetime in which its members discover the wisdom of Kabbalah?

Answer: The efforts should be not to judge any member of the group according to the state he is in. We are all “rags,” as Rabash used to say; we are all uncorrected. All the sins and negative attributes are in each of us.

A person who attains the high spiritual levels discovers on the way disgusting and repulsive desires that he has, and he is shocked by the fact that he can have such desires. It is even impossible to imagine! As a result of the shattering, everyone has all the kinds of desires inside him. Therefore, we mustn’t see anyone as corrupt.

“It takes one to know one.” If I see a flaw in someone, it is only because I am corrupt. If I were corrected, I could see the other according to my level of correction, as totally corrected, because all these degrees already exist. What I see now is the reflection of my ego. It is my ego that depicts this picture for me.

So the main work in the group is to accept every member as your beloved baby. No matter what he does: If he doesn’t let you rest, if he makes a mess, if he breaks everything, you know that it is your baby. This is how you should treat the friend. It is a sign of love.

I speak about a friend and mean that a person can treat others this way too and not someone who just came in and joined the group. Mutual help means to consider the personal states of every individual.
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From the One Convention in New Jersey 5/12/12, Lesson 2

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