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Love Grows From Awe

511.01The very first step in attaining love and bestowal is to attain awe.

It is similar to a mother who is constantly in fear, worrying about her infant and everything that happens to him. This natural, innate fear constantly vibrates within her and does not give her peace.

We must attain the same attitude and care toward the Creator. We need to have constant worry and awe. I need to check myself if i am thinking about Him or if I can add anything more to my care?

If I want to attain the quality of Bina, then the one to whom I want to give is like my child to me. It does not matter that I call Him the Creator! I worry and care for Him as for an infant because I want to be a bestower!

This is where a person’s connection with the Creator begins. But before that, we must attain the same awe-filled connection with humanity or at least with a small part of it, with our group. I must learn to care for it as for a very beloved and dear person.

We are given similar examples in our world in caring for our children or parents, that is, for someone outside ourselves but bound to us with unbreakable ties.

An inner fear, awe must live within me: will I be able to help them and bring them good? This is the quality of Bina from which everything begins, and upon it, we start to build bestowal and love.

The Creator gives us such exercises inside our egoism so that we can gradually attain another reality, an altruistic one, so that we have examples and a foundation from which we build within ourselves the quality of Bina, of bestowal.
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From Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/22/10, Writings of Rabash “You Stand Today, All of You”

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The Innovation of Rabash

 961.1Question: You say Rabash was the first to outline the rules for working in a group. Didn’t Baal HaSulam describe them?

Answer: Kabbalists did not talk much about it; they hid such things, considering them very personal.

They simply described the structure of the upper worlds so that by reading their works you could attract the upper light. But prior to that, how you should shape yourself, you and the group, the desire to move forward, and the ascent to greater bestowal for which you need the upper light was practically not discussed. This is each person’s inner work, his work in the heart.

Therefore, before Rabash, humanity did not need a massive explanation and the implementation of group work. Rabash described the rules of interacting in the group very clearly, but did not disclose his writings because the time had not yet come.

We see that his method of working in a group is the most important thing he has done for the world. In fact, he has done a lot, but this is the most important and most necessary thing for us. Right now, this technique can be implemented in our organization and in us.

There is a reason we are called by his name: Bnei Baruch. Indeed, apart from that, we do not need anything else. As Baal HaSulam said, love of friends covers absolutely all our problems.
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From KabTV’s “I Got A Call. Virtual Community, Part 4” 5/17/10

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All the Problems Are Because of Me

249.01Comment: As a rule, a person associates himself with good people and not with murderers, perverts, or maniacs. Why do those kind of people even exist?

My Response: Each of us has negative qualities, and that is why they exist in the world. Any pathological manifestation of anything appears in some individual because he is a collection of all our negative qualities.

There is a rapist living in me, in you, and in millions of other people, but we restrain ourselves. The desire for violence gathers into one big force, is invested in one person, and he performs this function. If we did not have this in each of us, there would not be a rapist. And so it is in everything else. This is how we complement each other. But there are people in whom it manifests itself in a special way in full force.

Question: What is their role anyway? Let’s say wolves eat animals, but they eat sick animals. And what role do those killers play?

Answer: Any negative property must manifest itself in our world and only then be corrected.

It cannot manifest itself in you and in me, because we suppress such drives in ourselves. But in every person there is absolutely everything: murderers, rapists, thieves, deceivers—only in different proportions, in different percentages, in different interrelations. An ordinary person holds himself back with fear and all sorts of forces.

And there are some people who cannot restrain themselves, and they allow these properties to be realized. They are the bearers of our negative qualities, and they realize them for us. For us!

Imagine that an organ in the body is damaged because all other organs could not keep it in a state of proper functioning, and it became ill. It turns out that it is not the only one to blame. Or vice versa, this organ got sick, and it helps everyone else.

The heart itself does not hurt. There are huge disruptions to the functioning of the entire body, or to the nervous system—maybe blood pressure, and so on—and therefore this pump refuses to work. Something happens in the brain due to pressure fluctuations or due to some kind of stress. That is, there is not a single organ that would cease to function on its own; everything is interconnected.

Based on this, you need to understand that if there are any problems in the world, it is only because of me. This is what it says at the end of the “Foreword of The Book of Zohar” by Baal HaSulam. Therefore everyone should say that there is a part of him in it, and not even just a part. He must feel that with this part he has added the last percentage to 100%, and therefore a murderer has spoken from within another person, and something bad has happened.

Question: Then what is the point of punishing these people?

Answer: You are approaching a very good topic! I was waiting for this, although at first I did not want to touch it.

Now you can open the Talmud and study spiritual laws. They are prescribed based on the fact that we are all in the same system, we define each other, we depend on each other, and we are responsible for each other. Now you understand what surety (Arvut) means: mutual responsibility.

And now, based on this, we are building a new society and the laws that should be in it. It is a completely different system, a completely different philosophy.
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From KabTV’s “I Got A Call. Negative Properties” 6/14/10

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Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 84


Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 84

What Is the Importance of Subjugation to the Friends?

Baal HaSulam writes that awareness of the force of the Creator’s greatness and the goal’s importance propels us to spirituality. We acquire such a force from society. However, we can only receive it if we feel in our heart that we are small compared to our friends.

If we feel no subjugation in our heart, then we can perform actions as though we feel it. However, true subjugation must be a feeling in the heart. If we can feel subjugation before the society, we can receive something from it and become inspired by our friends. From this state of subjugation, we can gain the strength to spiritually progress.

Therefore, we need to start untangling the chain from its end: to progress in spirituality, there should be an attraction to the Creator in addition to the spark we receive from above. We can obtain this additional force from the society. To receive it from society, we need to see ourselves as smaller compared to the society, according to the principle that only the small can receive from the great. To feel smaller than the society, we must conduct specific actions to feel in our heart, even before we intellectually understand, that we are indeed small.

Even if everyone praises us and says how great we are, we should nevertheless feel small. Yet, even then, we might become haughty to conceal our smallness. The more we feel ourselves as small, the more we will receive strength from the society, which is the only way we can spiritually progress.

We need to be forceful in this matter, strive for the time when we will genuinely feel small, and wonder how to bring about our smallness. We must demand from the society, above all, to provide us with reasons for this, time and again. By nature, we lack this sense of smallness. It is the role of the society to help us feel small. Friends should approach one another and speak of each other’s virtues, saying, for instance, “I heard that this or that friend acted or said such and such, and what they did or said was truly remarkable. They are so wise and wonderful,” and so on. As it is written, “Counters’ envy increases wisdom.”

We need to use the forces at our disposal, including envy. Envy is the main force. It is written that three things bring a person out of this world. What are they? Envy, lust, and honor. We can aim lust at the Creator, which in itself is a great feat. We can also honor the Creator. But envy is of lesser value, a feeling that we primarily direct at friends. We should thus use, cultivate, and tie these traits to the goal so they work to benefit our spiritual progress.

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International Kabbalah Convention “Unite In Lishma” – 2/21/25

International Kabbalah Convention, “Preparation to the Lesson 3”

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International Kabbalah Convention, “Only the Creator Can Help Achieve Lishma,” Lesson 3

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International Kabbalah Convention, “Preparation to the Lesson 4”

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International Kabbalah Convention, “Raising a Prayer for Lishma,” Lesson 4

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