Question: Was it hard for you to communicate with your teacher RABASH from the standpoint of mentality?
Answer: Absolutely not. In terms of mentality, we were very close. He was a Polish Jew from the beginning of the last century. I was a Belarusian Jew who grew up on the outskirts of Vitebsk in a town where many Jews once lived. The spirit, the way of life, the habits—it all lingered there, and I somehow picked it up.
In principle, when you study Kabbalah, all of this does not matter. But I understood RABASH as a person, with all his habits. I grew up in a town with just a few houses: my grandparents lived in one, some relatives in another, a little farther away lived more relatives, and so on. It was all very natural for me.
From childhood, I had memories that exactly matched the stories of RABASH. So in terms of everyday life, I had no conflicts or problems with him.
Of course, he had his own habits that he picked up in Israel, after emigrating from Poland. He loved coffee very much because he had lived for many years in Jerusalem with his father Baal HaSulam, who was a great coffee lover. They would pour boiling water over a spoonful of ground black coffee and drink it. Baal HaSulam needed twenty of these glasses a day, if not more, and cigarettes.
My teacher also smoked, not ordinary cigarettes, but very strong tobacco, first without a filter, then with one.
They experienced many upheavals in life. After Baal HaSulam was forbidden to publish a newspaper, he suffered a heart attack, and shortly after, he was diagnosed with cancer.
My teacher went through the death of his daughter and her husband, who passed away just six months apart. Her husband had been the right hand of RABASH, his helper in everything. They died a year before I came to him. Yes, he had serious problems. All Kabbalists do.
That is why I think we are the first and the happiest, probably because we are weak and unworthy of serious trials. Very little is given to us. On the contrary, we receive good feedback for whatever we do. That is why we are able to spread Kabbalah, develop, hold congresses, attract hundreds, thousands, even more people.
Baal HaSulam and RABASH were not granted any of this. They lived in terrible conditions, worked a thousand times harder than we do, suffered, and in the end received a meager result compared to us if you look at it from the outside. And they died in despair: What is next?
And how did the ARI die? It is documented that when his students asked: “Where are you going from us?” He answered: “If you were worthy, I would have stayed. If you wanted to hear me and listened to what I was saying, they would not have taken me.” This was said by a great Kabbalist, who died at thirty-seven. He knew his students would not continue his work, and before dying, he forbade them to study Kabbalah.
Can you imagine a greater punishment for students than to hear: “I forbid you to study! Go back to your animal state and live.” And you do not dare disobey your teacher.
What happened to most of the students of the ARI we know almost nothing. He allowed only one to continue studying Kabbalah: Chaim Vital, who collected all his writings. The ARI ordered these writings to be buried with him. Some time later, his grave was opened, the writings were taken out, and from them his works were compiled, on which Baal HaSulam based The Study of the Ten Sefirot and other writings. So the Kabbalists of the past went through horrific states!
And Rashbi, who wrote The Book of Zohar? He lived in a cramped cave, near a tiny spring and a carob tree with sweet pods. That is what he and his son ate. In such harsh conditions, they dug into the sand, and they studied Kabbalah. Later eight more students joined them, and together they wrote The Book of Zohar, sitting in that cave, in the cold, in the north of the country! The horror!
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From KabTV’s “I Got A Call. The Links of the Kabbalist Chain from ARI to Rabash” 9/4/10
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Comment: We talk about self-sacrifice, but at the same time we feel a kind of gain, inclusion, and merging more. A person does not feel that he is giving something up.
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