Audio Version Of The Blog – 10/28/25
Posted on October 28th, 2025
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41. What is a “circle” ?
If there is no discernment of above and below among the four phases of the will to receive, it is regarded as a circle (like an image of a corporeal circle, where there is no discernment of up or down). Because of that, the four phases are regarded as four concentric circles one inside the other, where it is impossible to distinguish up from down in them (The Study of the Ten Sefirot, Part 1, “Questions and Answers on the Meaning of Words”).
A “circle,” in which there is no difference between top and bottom, does not mean a desire that simply cannot be measured or evaluated, and therefore we cannot tell what is more important (higher) or less important (lower) in it. Nor does it mean a single, solid desire that contains no components and naturally has neither top nor bottom.
A “round desire” is a verified set of desires united by a special mutual connection in which they are completely equal and have neither “top” nor “bottom.” This is what is called a “circle” or a “sphere.”
But in relation to what can we measure and confirm that all these desires are equal and form a circle? Within this circle, there is one special point common to all these desires—the center of the circle. And in relation to this center, all the points (desires) are equal; therefore, they form a circle.
This center is not some additional, separate desire. It is their common unity, and they themselves create this center. And therefore, in relation to this center, each acts equally toward the others. Each one may possess his own strength and character, but in their relative form there remains complete equality—and that is why it is a circle.
This is precisely how a group is built in the form of a circle if each one acts with one hundred percent of his ability in relation to the common desire (the central point).
If all the desires of Malchut of the world of infinity, an infinite multitude of desires, unite together in one common center, and each applies proportionally equal effort, then the resulting form is a circle.
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From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/27/11, “The Study of the Ten Sefirot“
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Question: On what thought should one concentrate in order for the potential of receiving upper light to be truly realized? What should I think about?
Answer: You should think about how to understand your teacher, what Baal HaSulam, wrote for you.
I don’t know how many times I have read it, but probably not less than a hundred times. Try to imagine all the time that you are participating in this action.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/21/25, “The Study of the Ten Sefirot“
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Сomment: The wisdom of the Chinese people is often very profound. For example:
“The one who points out your flaws is not always your enemy, and the one who praises your virtues is not always your friend.”
My Response: This is absolutely true. The most important thing for a person is to correct oneself along life’s path. And someone who points out your flaws is doing enormous work on your behalf.
In order to discover these flaws on your own (let alone correct them), you would encounter countless obstacles, bang your head against them, and get into trouble. People sometimes end up in prison, get free after a few years, and have to start all over again. But if someone can truly point out your shortcomings, and you are able to feel them, understand them, and recognize them, that person spares you enormous suffering.
Comment: Yet we often consider such a person an enemy: “He exposed my flaws, he humiliated me.”
My Response: Humiliation is a different matter. I can feel my flaws and still rejoice that someone has pointed them out to me. But the one who says nothing, or even flatters me, perhaps he does so maliciously so that I will not pay attention to the corrections I need to make.
Question: So it is not in vain you keep saying that someone who criticizes you is closer to you than someone who praises you?
Answer: Yes, of course.
Question: Do you listen to someone who suddenly tells you something about yourself?
Answer: I very much wish I could.
Quote: “What happens, happens at the right time.”
My Response: We must accept this apriori as an axiom. The thing is that everything comes from the world around us and has its own path of development. Therefore, all that unfolds in front of us comes from this great mechanism in which we exist as small participants.
We need to understand that everything happening around us in society or in the universe as a whole occurs according to a vast plan, and we are within this plan. Our task is to fit into this plan, not to change the external flow by any means, but to correct ourselves so that we adapt to it.
Question: And then I will feel that whatever has happened, has come at the right time?
Answer: Yes. It has come on time, properly and correctly. And suddenly I begin to understand the correctness of everything that happens and how perfectly it suits me.
Question: And I have no regrets?
Answer: There is nothing to regret because everything happens outside of me, before me. And what I am shown are just the steps that I must take within myself to perceive everything correctly, to agree with it, to connect with it, and to move forward in resonance with it.
Question: That is, in harmony with it?
Answer: Yes, in agreement with it.
Quote: “He who drinks the water must remember those who dug the well.”
My Response: Beautifully said. And one must be grateful to them because the one who dug the well was not thinking only of himself, he was thinking also of me, anticipating my need.
Therefore, I am deeply grateful to him and must, in some way, repay him, whether simply with my heartfelt attitude, or perhaps by doing something good around that well myself. In general, even a warm, grateful feeling toward the one who opened a source of life for me already helps to correct the world.
Question: This sounds very much like a Kabbalistic approach. That is, instead of focusing on the pleasure I receive from the water, I turn my thoughts to the one who dug the well for me. Should a person behave this way in life, for example, by digging wells for others in turn?
Answer: A person must feel that everything he has around him and in the world was given to us by our ancestors who left it behind. And we must do the same for others, and for future generations.
Quote: “Misfortune enters through the door that was opened to it.”
My Response: That depends only on the person.
Question: Am I the one who opens the door to misfortune?
Answer: Yes, naturally. It is us who do all this.
In fact, the world is filled with boundless, absolute happiness, but by our own attitude, we turn it into the opposite. This is why it is said allegorically that we “open the door” to misfortune.
Question: And what if I were filled with the thought that the world around me is absolute happiness? If I constantly thought about this and strove toward it, would I still open the door to misfortune? Would misfortune still come to me?
Answer: This is our egoism. In truth, it exists within us so that we may learn to recognize and open far more doors to what is good. But we use it incorrectly; that is the problem.
A person is essentially unhappy. He is given an egoistic desire, a foundation, a character, an aspiration, but only so that he may correctly sense in advance what to avoid and how to adjust himself. Yet he uses this desire in the wrong way.
Question: Is that why he opens the door to misfortune?
Answer: Exactly. He keeps stepping on the same rake. Imagine there are “rakes” placed on the ground to show you the right path and to guide you to walk between them. But instead, you constantly step directly on them. This wrong perception of life stems from the fact that we relate to it totally incorrectly. That is, in fact, we fail to understand that egoism itself shows us how to walk properly and what to avoid. But we use it in its direct sense, and so we step on the rake again and again.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman,” 11/10/24
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Akudim are regarded as the ten Sefirot of the Toch of the first Partzuf the reality that follows the first restriction, called Adam Kadmon. Prior to that there weren’t any Rosh, Toch, Sof in the upper light, but rather the upper light filled the entire reality (Baal HaSulam, “Study of the Ten Sefirot,” Vol. 1, Part 4, Chapter 1, Inner Light, Item 8).
Question: What are the ten Sefirot of the world of Akudim?
Answer: The collective ten Sefirot related to this entire structure are called “Akudim.”
These are Kelim, desires that are filled with lights and exist around us in order to let some part of the upper light through to us. With their help we can gradually, step by step, approach the upper light, begin to feel it, enter into some kind of connection with it, and thus go further higher and higher.
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From Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/18/25, “The Study of the Ten Sefirot“
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Prayer must be in a group, otherwise the Creator will not hear it. We learn this from the structure of the ten Sefirot, from all of our spiritual work.
The Creator is Keter (the crown), above which there is what is called Kutso shel Yud, the highest point of Keter, the highest Sefira. That is contact with Him.
Only after I “grasp” all my friends, am ready to include them in myself and do everything necessary for them to agree to unite, am ready to be the lowest, the smallest in relation to them, then I can hope that they will respond to me in kind and a group will be formed, i.e., a structure in which the quality of bestowal, the Creator, will be revealed.
In this movement it doesn’t matter how much I fall, because advancement cannot be continuous. It is always start-stop, like the swinging of a pendulum in a clock. We cannot swallow a great egoism and rise above it, then take on another great egoism and rise again. We can only work with milliseconds, microseconds. It is by such micro-doses that we move forward.
Therefore, to the extent that we have mutual guarantee (Arvut) and the support of the group, we can receive a greater descent from the Creator and accordingly make a greater ascent.
Our descent comes from the Creator. It is always calculated by Him in advance so that we can rise voluntarily and consciously. He never gives us descents in which we collapse without knowing where we have fallen. They are always, as in a mother-child relationship, measured and precisely calibrated so that by gathering ourselves a little after the fall, we can find some strength within and begin to rise again.
So we must not think that the Creator wants to break us. He only wants to lower us slightly so that we may see the next level of our already broken egoism and begin to raise it. Just as we draw water from a well bucketful by bucketful, lifting it upward, that is how we work.
The fact that we seemingly lose the higher degree is not a loss, but precisely the first stage of ascent, the left side. Movement forward begins with the left foot, with the revelation of evil that the Creator prepared in advance. Then comes its compensation by the right line. That is how we advance.
That is why Baal HaSulam says that as soon as we wake up in the morning, we must immediately take upon ourselves the work of uniting with one another and with the Creator, from that very moment. This is extremely important! If I keep this thought in me at all times, then everything works out quickly and easily.
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From the International Kabbalah Congress in Moldova 9/7/19, Lesson 4
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Question: In TES (The Study of the Ten Sefirot) it is said that the true Kelim exist in the world of Atzilut. But we also study that at that stage there is still no separation from the Creator. At the same time, we learn that the entire system was created precisely to enable free choice and that the true Kli exists where there is free choice. So is there free choice in the world of Atzilut?
Answer: No, in the world of Atzilut there is still no free choice.
While on our level, we try to gather all the actions that belong to the lower and raise them to the higher, so that the illumination from a higher level would influence us and so we could gradually, step by step, reveal the forces of increasingly higher degrees.
Question: Then what is the true Kli? What parameters are included in it if it is not free choice?
Answer: Free choice is not yet a Kli. It is only a certain intention from below upward. Therefore, free choice takes place when the lower ones, that is, people in our world, feel some influence of the light upon themselves and strive toward their higher root.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/16/25, “The Study of the Ten Sefirot“
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Preparation to the Lesson
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1st part of the Lesson — Writings of Baal HaSulam, Shamati #113 “The Eighteen Prayer” (12.22.2021)
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2nd part of the Lesson — Writings of Baal HaSulam, “Study of the Ten Sefirot,” Vol. 1, Part 4, Chapter 2, Item 1
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3rd part of the Lesson — The Book of Zohar, “Beresheet – 1, ‘The Brightness of the Firmament'”
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