Question: What does it mean to ask to be above Pharaoh?

Answer: To be the slave of Pharaoh means to clarify with certainty, with mind and heart, that I am not ready to do anything except what the ego, the desire for pleasure, dictates to me now. That is how I discover Pharaoh,  the power that controls me now.

However, how can I know that this is Pharaoh? It is on condition that the Creator invites me to go with Him, when He says: “Come to Pharaoh.”

This means that the second power is revealed, the Creator,  the power of bestowal in contrast to the power of reception. And then I can clarify relative to every one of the forces and decide when I am under the control of the Creator and when under the control of Pharaoh. Ultimately, “the children of Israel sighed from the labor”, we are not prepared to remain in slavery to Pharaoh any longer.

99.9% of the time of my entire life, I am under the control of Pharaoh and am not ready to be freed from this control. The more that I advance, this percentage grows to just about 100%. First I didn’t think that I belonged to Pharaoh 100%; I thought that I fell into the ego rarely, like all people.

Then I felt myself in the Egyptian exile and I didn’t feel this at first. For the first seven years of plenty, I was also under the control of Pharaoh and fulfilled all of his orders, but I agreed to this and therefore everything was wonderful. I didn’t feel myself in Egypt, in slavery. I had knowledge, control (Joseph managed all of Egypt), and I was filled with plenty.

However after that it became clear that all of this wasn’t good. In reality nothing changed except my assessment. What seemed to me as good, spiritual, causing advancement, now seems completely otherwise now. I see that all of this was egoistic, not spiritual, but absolutely materialistic, and there is no advancement in it, rather the opposite. Therefore this is called the “seven years of famine.”

No change took place except in our perception. Everything is determined by a person’s attitude, but outside nothing changes.

Question: If I am completely under the control of Pharaoh, how can a request for redemption be built within me?

Answer: When I discover that this is Pharaoh, then the opportunity to ask is created. If I begin to understand that I have business with Pharaoh, this means that the second force already exists in opposition to him, the power of the Creator. Otherwise, I would not have discerned that Pharaoh is in front of me; rather, I would have lived a normal, good life, advancing in studying, in dissemination, and in the group.

Why is it suddenly bad for me? It is because I determine that this life is bad. Apparently what do I lack? Yesterday everything was still okay. Right, only today everything is no longer okay because I have new demands and I don’t agree with a life like this. Here the seven years of famine begin.

Question: What is the difference between my request to rise above Pharaoh and the state where I am found beneath him?

Answer: One of the criteria is: Who wins: the power of reception or the power of bestowal? Where do I get the reward I deserve in exchange for my efforts? No one works for nothing and I also want a profit.

My profit can be in the vessels of reception or in the vessels of bestowal: either I feel that the profit belongs to me or to someone else. And this someone could be close to me or far away and even a hated enemy. This depends upon the degree of correction of my desires of bestowal.
[131540]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/2/14, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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Rabash, “What is the Blessing ‘that a miracle happened to me in this place’ in the Work”: And at the same time it says, “remember that you were a slave in Egypt.” This means that a slave is a bad thing, and still a person sometimes wants to remain a slave since the slave said, “I love my master.”

However, the matter of exile is according to the measure of suffering and pain that one feels in exile. To that extent, one can feel joy at his redemption. The sufferings one feels is the vessel that can receive the Light if he is freed from the sufferings.

The sufferings one feels should be suffering from being in exile, from his inability to perform true acts of bestowal. This is called exile and slavery

However, if a person doesn’t suffer, he may be an Egyptian or even a minister of Pharaoh. Slavery must be against one’s will. He may want to be a slave until he reaches a state where he wants to escape from slavery with all his might and all the means that he has.

We must imagine what exile and slavery mean—how, through them, I accept my nature as foreign domination that is inside me. Pharaoh enters me like a bacteria or a snake. He fills me, and doesn’t let me move or even breathe freely. If I do something, he swallows all the fruits of my work, thus turning everything to his benefit.

If I don’t distinguish between him and me, I do everything for his sake without any account or recognition. I think that I want to fill myself and not Pharaoh because I identify with him. This is called the animate level.

If I begin to consciously work for Pharaoh, it is already a real sin. It is a Klipa (shell). If I begin to hate him and to object to his domination, it is the work in exile. This is how the seven years of famine arrive in which I see that I cannot do anything, and everything turns out to be for the sake of Pharaoh. However, I don’t want it and won’t accept it! Thus, our struggle is ignited until it reaches its end.
[131522]
From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/1/14, Writings of Rabash

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Question: There are types of dissemination that require all of us to be out in front of the public. But what should be done if not everyone has the ability and talent required for that?

Answer: I only know one thing. If I want to execute an action correctly, I need to put myself into the hands of the group so that it will decide and determine what I should do. It could be that they will say, “Sit and don’t do anything since you will spoil it all.” And so that will be my participation in the dissemination.

I can be a driver, an usher, a lecturer. It doesn’t matter what I do. But it is preferred that the group decide that for me and that I don’t decide anything for myself. That means being a slave. I am in spiritual work.

And then I am released from all the doubts: I was told and I do it in the best and most completely naïve way, without entering my mind into it. My mind is only for understanding what they want me to do and to carrying it out in the best way without going into my “I,” into my initiative.

Thus, there needs to be the leadership that includes experts in dissemination who decide and determine what to do, who themselves participate in all these activities in order to be an example to everyone. And everyone needs to follow them. And those who don’t want are drilling a hole in the general boat, and we don’t need him at all in the group.

A person needs to understand that he needs to purify himself from all these forms of the ego, from the worry of it not being pleasant, from the doubts about doing this or that. If you simply cannot carry out what the group decides, then leave the group. After all, you must rise above your beast.

The group is stronger than you, and if you receive its protection, then execute and be happy that you now have the opportunity to do it. And if not, then you will stay with your ego and have no chance to advance. In this case, no need to bother the others. Go rest, we will meet in the next incarnation.
[130595]
From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/20/14, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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Writings of Rabash “Shlavei HaSulam,” Article 40

Workshop

The Book of Zohar — Selected Excerpts, “Parashat,” “BeShalach“

Writings of Rabash, “Shlavei HaSulam,” Article 16   

Writings of the Ari, “Shaar HaKavanot,” Pesach 

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Exile differs from redemption since it lacks the letter “Aleph,” which means that the Creator is revealed in the time of redemption. Thus, we prepare our deficiency for Him.

I must picture my connection with the Creator even when I am in exile. It is like a void, a place of deficiency, that later is filled by something. However, this deficiency already has the form of the future redemption. It begins to take on the right formation. According to it, I begin to understand what the exile should be and what I expect of it.

It isn’t redemption from the pots of beef, onions, and garlic. So, what is the redemption exactly? Perhaps I suffer and feel the exile on the animal level or the level of a plant, but not on a level of a human being, Adam, who resembles (Domeh) the Creator.

The entire difference between exile and redemption is the presence of the Creator. At the end of the exile, I must picture what it is like when this is the only thing missing. It turns out that I already have an impression, that I know what must be revealed.

I must be ready for it, to expect it, as if I already can taste what the redemption should bring me, what liberation, and what freedom from the angel of death. What symbolizes life and death for me? Life is redemption and slavery is death.
[131513]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/1/14, Shamati #190

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 Question: There is a reception where people appreciate our investment in others, our helping someone, and being loved for that.  Is it worthwhile to use this as a technique in the family so that the children will invest in the family more, in the mother and in the father, so that they will value them more, or doesn’t this work with adolescents?

Answer: This doesn’t work because a young person should be directed forward in his life, in his future family, his future children, but not in his parents.

Don’t obstruct the children, don’t pull them back; they will not develop. People like these, in general, are so deeply into their parents that they won’t live their lives without their mother, and as long as she is alive, the child lives with them. They may be fifty years old already and still living with their mother.

You cannot do this. This is a very big ego. On the contrary, you need to educate and develop independence in children.
[131494]
From KabTV’s “Conversations with Michael Laitman” 12/11/13

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Question: In the wisdom of connection there is an exercise called “the ideal husband.” Is it worthwhile to change this into a game where each of the members of the family describes the others to himself as ideal?

Answer: Certainly; this is very interesting. But, at the same time, we must always leave some kind of delta (incremental change) that, in the meantime, we are far from being the ideal; rather, we only agree about an ideal relationship between us; we want to reach it, so we are drawn towards it somewhat.

This standard is, in fact, unattainable because all of us are human and everyone has his own ego. But we need to yearn to rise above ourselves as much as possible, to connect together, to value this state and consider it as the ideal.

Such a state must become a shared general familial standard. If we play with this correctly with the children, they will be much happier than we are because we come to this in the second half of our lives.

Question: There is a similar game called “Joy of Concession.” Indeed it is difficult for us to concede something to each other, but this is easy in the form of a game. Suppose a daughter says, “I’ll be back from the party at 11 o’clock.”  The father says, “At 10.” “Well Dad,” says the daughter,”Let’s play ‘Joy of Concession.’ Lost! At 11.” And he concedes. Is the game useful like this?

Answer: Only if this is mutual and to a certain degree of reasonableness. First of all, the child doesn’t need to manipulate with this. Second, he must understand that with this he is entering into the trust of others, inviting them to trust him, he must take all of this into account.

In other words, the parents give the child their trust, but together with this, the child should accordingly carry out what they require of him. Suppose that they let their daughter come home at eleven o’clock at night, but this is on condition that someone will accompany her or meet her. They must demand that she be responsible for what she does.
[131496]
From KabTV’s “Conversations with Michael Laitman” 12/11/13

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The Torah, “Exodus” (Pekudei), 38:22: Bezalel, son of Uri, son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah, had made all that the LORD commanded Moses.

Bezalel means “in the shadow of the Creator” which means the Masach (screen) that the ego builds in resembling the Light according to the materials in us. They are all upgraded according to the level of Aviut (thickness).

The Torah, “Exodus” (Pekudei), 38:24: All the gold that had been used for the work in all the work of the Holy the gold of the weaving was twenty nine talents, seven hundred and thirty shekels, according to the holy shekel.

Shekels are not coins but a measurement of gold since everything was measured by its weight in ancient times.

Here we have a full account of the gold and silver and other materials that were used in the holy work.

There are materials that belong to the level of the still, like clay, gravel, etc.; materials from the vegetative world, such as wool and different plants, and materials from the animal world like hides and cotton used to make cloth etc. They all symbolize desires from the still, vegetative, and animate levels of nature.

In spiritual work, we raise these desires to the uppermost level called Adam (a human being) and create the Tabernacle, the vessel for the revelation of the Creator.

All the desires are inside a person, and the person is the vessel for the whole world. It is because the world is inside me and not on the outside, although I feel that it is corporeal, material, real, and that it exists outside of me.

When I feel these dualities, I can calibrate myself to return as often as possible to the right picture of the world. This helps me re-examine my attitude to those around me, to the ecological environment and to all of humanity.

All the wars in the world are actually inside me. They occur before my eyes since I am like a projector that projects before me everything that happens inside me: battles, problems, explosions, space, etc.

This feeling is gradually revealed inside me under the influence of the Light, and I begin to feel that all the troubles and the problems in the world are a projection of my uncorrected attributes. First, I have to correct myself, and by that I correct the whole world. This is the correct perception of reality.

Unfortunately, we want the opposite: to correct everything around us so that we will feel good internally. But this happens according to the thought of creation in order to focus on the right attitude, the correct perception of the world.
[131487]
From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 10/16/13

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