Lesson on the Topic: “European Convention,” Lesson #2
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Writings of Rabash “Rungs of the Ladder,” “What Is the Foundation on Which Kedusha (Holiness) Is Built”
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The Book of Zohar — Selected Excerpts, Chapter “Divinity,” “His Will Is Always to Malchut“
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Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol. 6, Part 16, Item 84
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Question: Everyone is very familiar with opposite concepts such as light and darkness, love and hate, and other theories regarding human existence. Are these pluses and minuses really necessary?
Answer: The point is that we exist only in a minus, in the negative force, as it is written, “I have created the evil inclination; I have created the Torah as a spice.” The Torah is a special Light that is opposite from the ego, which we can draw and thus balance egoism.
Unfortunately, we don’t do that and this is the reason that our world exists only under the influence of the negative egoistic force. We have to complement our nature by discovering the other positive force that isn’t part of our world.
Our world advances only by the force of the ego, while we have to draw the positive force that balances it with the help of the wisdom of Kabbalah. Then in the balance and harmony between the two forces we will begin to feel the upper world, which means the next level of recognition and attainment of our existence. This is how we can reach a state that is beyond our body, which is called existence in the soul. Our body, on the other hand, is a form of existence in our egoistic attribute only.
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From an Interview on RTN, New York, 21/7/15
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Humans began to develop from the animate level, not because they began to walk on two legs hundreds of thousands of years ago, but because they began to develop social relationships. These were relationships not only within their pack, family or tribe, where they felt that everyone was as close to them as they felt themselves. They truly began to feel others and developed a connection with them.
Something like this doesn’t exist among animals. They live in families and packs, but there is no connection between the different packs. And humans developed beyond familial connections. This connection is egoistic, natural, and through this connection it is possible to exploit others as much as possible; I exploit you and you exploit me. Everything depends on the benefit that I can derive from the connection. You could catch a person and eat him, turn him into a slave, take his property from him and kill him if he resisted, or you could make an alliance with him. All of the egoistic relationships have existed until today. There is no difference between what was thousands of years ago and what exists today, this is the same form of behavior—to exploit others maximally for my benefit or for the benefit of my tribe, people, or nation.
That is how it always was and that is how it is today too. But now we have reached a very interesting point in history that has not yet been discovered. It arouses intense pressure and pain and tragic situations whose purpose is to awaken this point.
All of the families, tribes, packs, nations, and peoples who were formerly separate are suddenly beginning to feel that they are connected with each other and depend on each other. And this dependence obligates them to behave differently. On the one hand, from an egoistic point of view, I would want to exploit everyone. But on the other hand, I understand that I depend on them and need everyone.
In the meantime, this is only the beginning of development. But ultimately we will reach a situation in which a person will be forced to accept everyone as one family, meaning that he will see how much he depends on them, even though the ego won’t disappear, as happens in a real family.
We don’t feel an egoistic intention regarding people who are close to us; on the contrary, we want to do everything for their benefit. We behave with them nicely and well, for we feel that they are close parts of us as if we were one body.
So what do we do if, on the one hand, the mind tells us that strangers are close to us and we depend on them one hundred percent, and on the other hand, the ego still doesn’t disappear, as happens in a family? We find ourselves between two opposing forces. One force commands me to love others! And the second force turns around and says that I hate others! What can be done when there is a split like this?
In the framework of our world there is nothing be done and this is a great tragedy! Sometimes this happens in a family, and then there is nothing to fix. This is an unsolvable conflict like the commands that Abraham received from the Creator: “Through Isaac your seed shall be called and now you should bring him up for a sacrifice: And God said to Abraham, Be not displeased concerning your handmaid; whatever Sarah tells you, hearken to her voice, for in Isaac will be called your seed.” (Genesis 21:12).
“And He said, Please take your son, your only one, whom you love, yea, Isaac, and go away to the land of Moriah and bring him up there for a burnt offering on one of the mountains, of which I will tell you.” (Genesis 22:2).
If this happens in a family, it is not terrible, it is possible to get along and settle the conflict. But what is to be done if our natural development brings us to a conflict like this, where our life or death depends on the ability to get close to others so much that we become one body, like one person with one heart?
Our entire society, our entire civilization of seven billion will have to reach this discovery. The ego is disturbing me and doesn’t make it possible for me to approach others, and on the other hand, I depend on them one hundred percent.
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From the Preparation for the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/25/14
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Opinion (David Corovich, Physicist, Ecologist): “The Eurozone is on the way to a deep depression. During the course of the coming economic shock, infection could spread faster in the global supply chains, triggering a global economic crisis.
“Our mutual dependence means that we all find ourselves in this together. The financial upheaval can spread around the world in a number of seconds. In the great modern cities there are inventories of food for three days.
“When the economy sinks, the ability to take care of old debts disappears, and debtors become devoid of the ability to repay the debts. The growing complexity pushes the system further and further away from balance. Tens of billions of mutual connections in the supply chain are too complex for someone to understand them fully.
“The political decisions are based upon models for obsolete stable economic conditions. The economic crisis causes a fragmentation in society. Spreading fears and the growth of nationalism are signs of the economic crisis.
“Expanding large-scale manufacture in the large areas of production like the United States and India will only exacerbate the situation. The coming crisis will be immense, the world cannot prepare for it. The growing tension in the global economy makes it less and less flexible.”
My Comment: This is why we cannot wait for better conditions for disseminating the method of correction of the world; we need to invest all our efforts so that the true reasons for the crisis and the way out of it will be known to everyone.
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The Torah, “Exodus” 34:27 – 34:28: The Lord said to Moses: Inscribe these words for yourself, for according to these words I have formed a covenant with you and with Israel. He was there with the Lord for forty days and forty nights; he ate no bread and drank no water, and He inscribed upon the tablets the words of the Covenant, the Ten Commandments. (Exodus 34:27 – 28)
This speaks about the ascent of Malchut to Bina.
“Forty” is a stage in which a person goes completely out of his egoistic state, rises above it in forty steps (the level of Bina, bestowal) and achieves the characteristic of “Moses.”
The Torah gives a person the method for his elevation to the level of “Adam” where he is released from all of his egoistic characteristics. But this doesn’t mean that he becomes an ascetic, fasts, stops being involved in regular things, stops working, and has no family, no! Simply within himself he only begins to go deeper into an intention for the sake of bestowal.
In everything else he manages a normal way of life: He works, takes care of his family, and communicates with the whole world. But all of this is now built only in the direction of approaching the characteristic of bestowal.
All the necessities remain, and everything that is unnecessary is gradually sifted out and the person moves on by rising to a level where one pure intention remains for him—to reach the characteristic of bestowal, which is called “ascent in forty steps.”
“…forty days and forty nights; he did neither eat bread, nor drink water,” this signifies that the person is only involved with bestowal and attains it when he already enters into contact with the Creator on the level of Bina.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 9/30/13
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The Torah, “Numbers,” 13:3 – 13:5: So Moses sent them from the desert of Paran by the word of the Lord. All of them were men of distinction; they were the heads of the children of Israel. These are their names: For the tribe of Reuben, Shammua the son of Zakkur. For the tribe of Simeon, Shaphat the son of Hori.
All the names in the Torah, and especially the names of the spies, have a special inner meaning. Their numerology symbolizes attributes by which the future land of Israel can be explored. This is the reason that we have to reveal and expose these attributes inside us, prepare ourselves for them, and make them a group. In this group, made of the heads of tribes, they are correctly united. Thanks to this force of unity, they advance towards a gradual equality of their attributes with those that are in the land of Canaan and see to what extent they cannot fight them.
In other words, the force of togetherness, connection, and unity that they attained is not enough to overcome the force of the ego that can overcome them and tear them to pieces. They simply don’t understand how to overcome and dominate it. But the state they are in is absolutely correct. It is impossible to say that they had missed something while exploring the land and that they couldn’t clarify things. Everything is correct! All the attributes by which a person intends to conquer the land of Canaan are not enough to conquer it.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 3/30/15
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Question: What is so special about the education method that you suggest? After all they also speak about love of others in schools and about the need to treat friends nicely, but we see that it isn’t working.
Answer: Talking about how to behave has nothing to do with education, since education is based on learning from examples. Only examples operate on and influence a child. If we want an adult to be well educated, he too needs to have the right examples, just like a child. We have no choice. We need to establish systems that will set an example of the right relations between people. But from where can we take such examples if everyone mutually hates one another? Who will set the example for us?
Therefore it is necessary to organize special workshops in small groups called tens for all sectors and social classes within the population. We hold such circles all over the country in Israel: in Eilat, in the Tel Aviv harbor, in Tiberias, and in other cities. Many people already know us. If a person participates in such a circle, this circle becomes an example for him and he begins to feel that something special is going on within it.
Strangers who find themselves sitting next to one another by chance begin to communicate in the circle according to certain rules and about a certain topic and begin to discover feelings of connection, unity, warmth, and understanding. Their eyes shine and they look at one another in a totally different way than they did when the workshop began. People totally change during this 15-20 minutes. All this disappears, of course when they go home afterward. A person has to repeat this process every day and then after a week or a month he will change.
What I say is based on the great experience I have had. I have many students in Israel and all over the world who thus are changing and so are the new people who know what the success of the world depends on and how we can rise from the general global crisis that is founded on mutual hatred between all the countries, peoples, and individuals.
We can overcome it instead of advancing towards terrible destruction. The Torah says that we will reach a state in which “a person’s enemies are in his home,” which means that a person will see that everyone rejects him, is distant from him, and refuses to understand him, within his own home.
Is it possible to live this way?! After all, we know that our body lives and operates in harmony between all its parts while a dead body is destroyed. So let’s choose the right way!
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From the Israeli Radio Program 103FM, 8/2/15
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The Torah “Numbers” 11:4 – 11:6: But the multitude among them began to have strong cravings. Then even the children of Israel once again began to cry, and they said, “Who will feed us meat? We remember the fish that we ate in Egypt free of charge, the cucumbers, the watermelons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic. But now, our bodies are dried out, for there is nothing at all; we have nothing but manna to look at.”
For what reason did the nation begin to complain, after all, there weren’t any previous assumptions? Since in their midst was “Erev Rav (the mixed multitude).” That means that all the desires of the nation had not yet been purified from the ego, and since these desires called, “Erev Rav” were so close by, they were afraid of the Creator, but worked for their own benefit, for the benefit of their “Pharaoh.”
Imagine a man who has fear of the Creator and executes all that is written in the holy books: in the prayer books, in the Shulchan Aruch. For what? I carry out all that which is spoken about, and You should carry out what you promised me! That is called, “Erev Rav.” The person, as if, exists near the Creator, and as if, provides for himself a future in the Garden of Eden. He can even die knowing that before him awaits Nirvana (complete rest). There are known cases when, at the last moment, terrorists were arrested, they shouted that they wanted to die. This is because they were ready to enter heaven in another moment.
The Erev Rav incites the nation, meaning man’s desires, and he begins to complain. He doesn’t accept what he should. This is because all the movements in the desert are empty movements. A person doesn’t receive anything. He just needs to move forward. He is given just a small sign that he is going for something, a small, fabricated cloud. When can he feel the presence of the Creator more clearly? When he performs some violation and gets punished for it, “Oh! I came to know that that’s forbidden.” And then it turns out that one must do something. These egotistic desires are saying, “We don’t want to settle for the Creator’s request.”
Since what is the meaning of MAN (Mayin Nukvin – Female Water) in the desert? Specifically thanks to my being in the desert, I have nothing. It is from the state of complete hopelessness that I can find the one and only way, the way to the Creator. I no longer have anyone to turn to! When I turn to him, it is called MAN. This means that MAN is the raising of my prayer, specifically my request to the Creator and only in the desert! Only when I am completely empty and I have nothing, not for the benefit of the body and for the sake of those near me, and not even for the next world. So then I can turn to Him. And by doing that I fill myself, this turning to the Creator fills me.
Actually, I don’t receive anything except a one-sided connection with the Creator. If I act in this way, then MAN comes to me from the sky, and I am nourished from it and begin to fill my soul. But it is filled only by my turning to the Creator! Thus, we are not talking about MAD (Mayin Duchrin – Male Waters), which is the filling from above (answer from the Creator), but specifically from the fabricated referral, one-sided, unanswered, not based on anything for the Creator, from within the state of hopelessness.
I don’t want any favors or pleasures of this world, I don’t want anything except the desert that makes it possible for me to turn to him in a one-sided manner (that’s because it’s not known if I turn to Him or not), and that’s enough for me. That fills my soul. If in this way I can move forward, then I go into the desert and pass through it. It is said that the manna had all kinds of flavors. Everything that I feel in the manna depends on how much I can connect the egoistic desires to my relation to the Creator. Then accordingly, I feel that I, as if, am filled with all kinds of things.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 2/11/15
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