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Shamati #6 “What Is Support in the Torah, in the Work“
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The Book of Zohar – Selected Excerpt, Parashat “Balak,” Item 391
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Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol 3, Part 10, Item 36, Lesson 15
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“Introduction to The Book of Zohar,” Item 14, Lesson 9
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We are in the world of Ein Sof (Infinity). But in the world of Ein Sof there is a very small Light: Nefesh of Nefesh that created the created being as “something from nothing,” as a tiny grain of the desire to receive. This is the first phase, the “root phase” of the world of Ein Sof. So why is it called infinite?
It is because there is nothing but the tiny spark of Light and the tiny speck of matter. Everything else comes on the account of the greatness of the Light in the feelings of the speck of the created being, by the great respect towards the Light that has created it and which takes care of it. From the recognition of this greatness comes the feeling of the world of Ein Sof.
Then this speck begins to develop and become increasingly more independent, and whole worlds are born in its feelings. First it happens instinctively, under the influence of the Light. But eventually its development reaches the point we are in now. If now, from this state, we rise back by using all the preparations that were made for us, we will reach the true recognition of the Light.
But we can call it real only conditionally since it is impossible to attain the Creator’s real essence and height with regard to the created being. But when we rise again, we discover the Light of NRNHY, the extent to which the Creator allows us to attain Him called “adhesion.” To that extent, according to His will, we have to be like Him.
It says, “He raiseth up the poor out of the dust” (Psalm 113). But we don’t demand that He should raise us from the dust in order to be rich, but rather, we want to rise only so that we will respect and praise the Creator. This is the only reason that we ask Him to raise us from the dust: in order to attain His greatness and not in order to improve our own condition.
This ascent is in order to understand who created us and who has taken care of us. The matter itself can remain in absolute poverty since what is important for us is to join the upper Light, the attribute of bestowal, not for our own sake but in order to bring the Creator contentment. This is our only hope. Thus we bring ourselves to perfectly match the picture, the image, that is in the world of Ein Sof: a speck of matter next to the spark of Light, and everything else is the infinite greatness of the Creator.
[102097]
From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/7/13
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The main thing is to correct our attitude to reality and to understand that all of reality is the Shechina, the revelation of the Creator. Now, however, it is revealed to me as still nature, the vegetative and the animate levels, as human beings, and the whole world that surrounds me that I believe to be external to me. In fact, all this is the revelation of the Creator who, in the meantime, is concealed in the opposite form of what we should see.
This whole opposite picture is explained only by the oppositeness of our attributes. It is possible to correct it only if we try hard to see this reality through the teacher, the group, the books, and dissemination by trying to perceive it as the whole reality, to look for what we lack in order to attain such an attitude and to be strengthened by the environment. Then gradually, by the efforts that we make, as “many pennies add up to a big account,” we begin to feel that we only need to correct ourselves and that everything which is external to us is the Holy Shechina or the soul.
Every moment we have an opportunity to work on our evil thoughts and on our criticism of reality, of the upper Providence, and even of myself, of my attributes, of the inner incompleteness or the external incompleteness, in order to clarify them, to overcome the criticism, and to judge everything to the scale of merit. Then the true, whole reality will be revealed.
Then we will see that all the deviations from wholeness—all the deficiencies that we constantly feel, the self-corruption and the corruption of the external world—were merely forces that were meant to strengthen and increase a person’s connection with the Creator. Reality is now revealed to us as an illuminated field glowing in the Light of many rays, in different discernments of wholeness. Thus a person meets the goal of creation.
[102091]
From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/6/13
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Baal HaSulam “Introduction to the Book of Zohar,” Item 10: It is so because He has no interest in reception, only in bestowal, whereas the Klipot want nothing of bestowal, but only to receive for themselves, for their own delight, and there is no greater oppositeness than that.
Question: What is a Klipa?
Answer: The Klipa is something that prevents me from getting closer to the Creator. I recognize it as the force that puts obstacles in front of me.
Actually, what can prevent me?
I want to enjoy, and this means that all kinds of pleasures prevent me; they distract me, take me away from the likeness to the Creator, and keep me from advancing towards unity and bestowal. These are the pleasures that are called “filth.”
So, the Klipa is something extremely pleasant. Let’s say, I like to relax at home more than to participate in the gathering of friends. It is more pleasant for me not to think about the world and correction but about what will happen to me personally. It is dearer to me to take care of my own children, not the neighbors’.
But the real Klipa is when I feel that I advance towards the Creator along a certain path and thus can bring Him pleasure but suddenly I find out that it is more pleasant and comfortable to deviate somewhere, become distracted by something. This is what the Klipa is: It seems to cling to my clothing and pull me back.
We cannot understand all this until we acquire the intention above the desire, until we get out of the desire and begin to act on the basis of intention.
To act on the basis of intention means to apply restriction (Tzimtzum) to the desire to receive. I must be independent of it and be completely free to choose. In other words, independently from the desire, I can decide for myself that I will work with it in order to receive. I have the opportunity to work in order to bestow, but I decide to the contrary. This is what filth is. Conversely, if I have no choice, there is nothing to ask from me. To receive with the egoistic intention is the Klipa that runs through all our ascents until the end of correction. And we are always required to make a difficult decision—how to act, in order to receive or in order to bestow?
We are talking about the work with the Lights and vessels of the egoistic desire, not just about the rejection of the “small” pleasures of our world. I am required to make a decision of a high order when I begin to feel that there is a king, egoistic by nature. This is the flipside of the Creator, and I think that it dominates the world. So it should be, and I decide in these conditions.
Moreover, the decision is possible only if I rise above the restriction, if I am independent. This is when I decide to enjoy for the sake of reception, and turn into a Klipa.
In general, the forces of filth energetically propel a person to the goal. They awaken him in such a way that, like a mountaineer, he must climb above them, overcome them, and ascend to the summit to the King’s palace. And his every move is a rise above filth.
The Klipa is the essence of the material of creation, the desire to receive that took its egoistic form and appears to us in this way. That is why it is impossible to make a step forward without being connected to the Klipa.
But of course, we don’t connect to it ourselves. We always must keep in the right line, and then the forces of filth come at the right time and in the right form.
[102088]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/5/13,”Introduction to The Book of Zohar”
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Question: How can we change our negative attitude to reality if this is how we feel it?
Answer: This negative feeling is given to us on purpose. Everything is measured accurately according to the relations between the Light and the vessels. The Creator measures it according to the created being in the shattered system so that we will exert ourselves in order to correct ourselves and thus attain bestowal. Then we will feel the good correct state.
If we didn’t have negative feelings now, we would never feel the state we are in. Our vessels of perception are vessels of assessment: I feel only what I assess as good or bad.
If I see something, then it is a sign that it is important for me: I am either afraid of it or love it, want to get close to it or draw away from it. I feel only what I care about. The attribute of bestowal doesn’t interest us at all, and so it doesn’t exist in our world, and we are all only in the attribute of receiving.
But if, according to nature’s program, we have to reach the attribute of bestowal, then we are given a chance to bring ourselves to it from the attribute of receiving, meaning from the corrupted attribute opposite to bestowal. This is called the “shattering.” There was a good program that worked well but then it broke down. Now we have to learn how to move from the corrupt state to the corrected state.
Thus we will learn the program itself, so as not to exist in it like angels. When I correct the program myself and see all the evil and the corruptions in it, understanding how good it can be if it operates correctly in the system, in its opposite form, then I discover the actual essence of the program, the program planner, and I get to know His thoughts towards the created beings, which is called the “thought of creation.” I am actively incorporated in this program and I acquire the Creator’s nature that is dressed in me. He begins to operate in me, forcing my muscles, my bones, and my brain to move. At the same time, I feel that it is the Creator who is dressed in me, not some unknown force.
First I was operated by my ego but didn’t realize it. Then there was the inner split when I discovered that the ego operates me, that there are two: I and the ego with disparity between them. Then I wanted the attribute of bestowal to manage me instead of the ego. Then, in the attribute of bestowal, I felt the upper root that created both the ego and the good force, and thus I reach adhesion.
[102084]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/5/13, Writings of Baal HaSulam
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Question: If the Creator created a desire for correction to similarity with Him, what is our role? Where is our choice? What is our action? Is this our work or the work of the Creator?
Answer: All our work is to give the Creator an opportunity to work because we cannot do anything ourselves. Although we are a feeling, conscious material—that is, we have the heart and the mind—but it gives us nothing except the opportunity to realize what we would like to change. However, we can change nothing.
That is why all our attempts to change the world lead to nothing. Don’t try to change anything. You need only to try to draw the upper Light that can change everything.
If the desired changes are in accordance with the upper Light, then It will make these changes and we will get what we want. Otherwise, we will remain with our unfulfilled desires.
That is why all our work is to understand what changes are desirable in us, and then the Light will do it.
[102074]
From the Virtual Lesson 3/3/13
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Question: When do I begin to bring contentment to the Creator consciously?
Answer: At the stage of spiritual maturity (13 years), when I already have vessels of receiving that are ready for correction in which I can receive the Light with the intention of in order to bestow; to the extent that I receive, I actually bring contentment to the Creator.
Until then there is only the preparation, the state of “smallness” in which we are not required to do “mature” things yet and are treated forgivingly. We demand from a child because we want to educate him and not because he must. He doesn’t have to fill all the requirements.
Question: How many years does it take to reach maturity?
Answer: There is no time in spirituality. “13 years” is a level and we really yearn for it, really want to enter the state of Ibur (gestation), to enter the upper system, and to feel it as a womb, a friendly environment, an environment in which my friends think only about how to help me and the teacher guides us towards the goal. I adhere to them and through them, like through the umbilical cord, am “nourished” by the Lights that influence me. This environment is a womb for me, something round, whole, a round sphere that I am in. I am also like a sphere and I don’t limit anything, but constantly restrict myself in order to adhere, nothing more than that.
I value the wholeness of the external environment, the friends and the teacher, and they reflect and project the right attributes on me. Then my “piece of flesh,” my desire, begins to take on the form of Adam, a human being. The environment imprints its form on me, not the environment that I see today, but a different environment that I value more and more.
Thus I develop like an embryo, constantly adhering to the environment, although I am constantly sent different interruptions and complaints regarding the whole group or each of the friends. I accept everything in “faith above reason” and continue working not towards the Creator but rather towards the environment, the friends among whom I already identify the inner essence.
Then, after I feel them, I want to receive their imprint, their impression. I wait for their bestowal because I discover wholeness in them. I want them to “imprint” themselves in me forcefully. I am ready for that and I make efforts so that it will happen. I actually match myself to them and ask that they don’t leave, that they will work with me and imprint themselves in me.
Everything depends on the Ibur, it is the most dangerous stage in our development. If it is successful, then the rest is much easier. Every time I receive a greater defending force, a stronger force of inner overcoming that allows me to overcome all the negative things I see in the group. It is because I look at the desire to bestow of the friends through my ego and I discover terrible things.
But I continue to rise in faith above reason and tell them to continue working on me, to process me, to continue imprinting me with their stamp. I want it! I lower my head before them and I am ready in advance to accept everything that comes from them.
If a person really wants that, he receives a full imprint and then he is ready to be born.
Question: But, at the same time, I still don’t reach an equivalence of form with the environment.
Answer: True, but not more is required at this stage. It is as if I am standing before a puzzle in which one piece is missing—my part. And I shove my piece of clay in the gap so that its shape corresponds to the contours of the other parts.
The Creator is revealed in this puzzle when it is whole. We design the correct desire, build the corrected Malchut, and in it we discover the Creator according to the principle of “come and see,” Bo-re (Creator in Hebrew). There is no other way; we can only do it together, only if we put together at least one piece of the human puzzle. The bigger this piece is, the greater the revelation will be.
Question: How important is it that I enter this puzzle consciously?
Answer: You must agree that the group will imprint itself, its external form, in you. In order to do that you have to agree with the friends on every issue that is related to spirituality, value them as the greatest in our generation, ask them to influence you, and lower your head before them since the Creator lives in them.
Question: But if I see something that is totally opposite…
Answer: This is exactly our work. The egoistic desire remains (in black), but on the outside, it takes on a form, the form of bestowal (in red). This is our spiritual education, which is a “formative” education. Simple matter that is a desire to receive isn’t enough. Everything depends on the form; when two different types of matter make different forms, we receive an education which means that we begin to understand reality.
Answer: Because here the evil inclination is increasingly revealed to me. Each time new “thorns” are revealed and I have to take on a new form each time, to give in, to annul myself, and to look at all these problems in faith above reason.
Only yesterday everything was fine but today it isn’t anymore, and I have to work on myself again in order to see, in the obstacles, the right forms that belong to the embryo’s body. The next day, the hardships increase and demand that I change my attitude. Thus I constantly rise above the interruptions in faith above reason and correct myself.
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Question: How do you suggest we prepare for the convention in Germany at the end of the month?
Answer: We should understand that on the first level we are in now we are operating in the framework of time, motion, and place. These are corporeal limitations against which we are powerless for the time being and are under their strong influence.
When we get to the spiritual levels it will be much easier and we will not have to feel the corporeal presence. We will already live in a different reality; the spiritual life will be part of the corporeal life.
In the meantime I don’t see any way of leaping over time and distance. This problem is only on the current level of preparation.
The first spiritual level already brings us together internally, totally freeing us from corporeal limitations. But in order to break through to the spiritual world, we have to work on this current level and to connect as if time and place do not exist.
It is exactly for this reason that we have workshops and conventions, which unite us, connect us physically, and strengthen the ties between us. There is no other choice since this physical feeling still operates on us. It isn’t by chance that this world was created, and it isn’t by chance that we feel this first level in it. Without any contact between the shattered desires, without being able to feel one another, we wouldn’t be able to advance.
It is just like a corporeal couple in which a man and a woman have to be together, not just next to one another, but actually enter one another. We have to learn from these corporeal examples that the new continuity is born of this close connection.
So we have to come to the convention and reach this strong embrace. It doesn’t matter if we actually embrace one another or not, what’s important is that we will actually feel the closeness by sitting next to each other, by studying together, by eating, singing, dancing, and having discussions. There has to be a physical contact of at least two or three days a year or every couple of months. This already leaves an impression that enables us to later feel it over and over again as and to feel one another better.
If we never see each other, we don’t use the means we were given. It is impossible to advance without it. Kabbalists were always together. Baal HaSulam brought equipment for tanning hides to Israel and wanted to open a small plant for tanning in Jerusalem. He thought that his students would work on these machines, make a living, and also study there.
Tanning is a dirty work accompanied by a terrible stench. It is impossible to be near a tanner because of this smell; Baal HaSulam wanted to open this plant so that people would keep away from his group. Usually such plants are far from the living quarters of a city.
He worked as a rabbinical judge in Warsaw, but he decided to deal with this dirty work because he dreamed of a close Kabbalistic group.
This means that it is impossible to succeed without physical contact. I cannot imagine a student who refuses to come to the convention and meet with me although he can. If a person has a will, then he will be ready to walk for a month if he has no money for a plane or train ticket. I remember that many times on the way to Rehovot (where I used to live) my car would get breakdown since it had a problem with the carburetor. Then I would leave the car on the side of the road, hitchhike to a certain point, and then walk the rest of the way. All this is also part of one’s exertion.
But without physical contact, without sitting next to each other at the table during the lesson or in a workshop, singing together or dancing, it is impossible to advance.
[102023]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/5/13, Writings of Baal HaSulam
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