I must try to open my heart towards the friends and that all of their desires, thoughts, and expectations for spirituality will enter directly into my heart without any opposition and criticism from my side. For the right intention, we need the Creator in the center of the group all the time and to accept this state with an open heart. All of us must concentrate around this point and focus all of our efforts on it. Only in this is our free choice, which we must realize. This stance surrounding the Creator found within the group is similar to the stance around Mount Sinai. Exactly as there, Arvut (mutual guarantee) and mutual support is required of us; through them we can reach a constant intention.

In spirituality nothing is measured according to the quantity of power; rather, it’s according to the quality. A strong intention is an intention never stops. A weak intention can be stopped. But a strong intention cannot be stopped and is constant, and therefore it is said to be high. Certainly all kinds of disturbances will come, both general and particular, but in the face of all the disturbances we must be concerned about only one thing: such a strong intention that is never stopped. Precisely with this we must strengthen each other, and this is the mutual guarantee that is realized.

From a small and weak intention, we must come to a great and strong intention; that is, from regular breaks, from a loss of spiritual yearning, we must pass to one heart, to the center of the group, in which the Creator is discovered, so that all of us will connect together there in a single embrace with Him. We must help each other with mutual guarantee, that the intention will not be stopped in any of us. For with this he would be boring a hole in the hull of our common boat, in our common heart. If we approach the convention with efforts like these, then success is assured for us.
[125590]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/15/14, Workshop

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In the idea of the intention, the principle: “Each one will help his friend” is active. For “A prisoner cannot free himself from prison,” but only the friends can get him out. The support of the friends is called, “Arvut” and if it is found, then even for a moment, I will not forget about the intention and my heart will always be open in the right direction.

I am not prepared to do this by myself but only with the friends. My heart is found in the hands of the friends, and only they can direct it towards the Creator who is found in the center of the group. Therefore, I depend on them completely. How must I compensate them in exchange for work like this? I compensate them with the same coin; that is, in an identical manner I think about them, I am concerned for their intentions. Not one of them is able to do this alone either, and he also requires the help of the friends.

If together we think and are concerned that the right intention will not cease in others, that their hearts will always remain open and ready for the discovery of the Creator in the center of the group, then with this we assure ourselves of that same concern and that same treatment from others. In the end, I will discover that everyone is already in the final corrected state and I did not see this with my corrupted eyes, as it is written: “Everyone who rejects something does so with his own flaws.” And if I direct myself correctly towards work with the friends, bestowing to them, then I will discover their bestowal towards me.

This is to say that all of the work that I do on myself I do through work on the others. In the meantime I do this for egoistic reasons (Lo Lishma), in that I am directed towards correcting myself in this way. But in spite of all this, it is already being done in the right direction: from myself outwards. From Lo Lishma like this, we come to Lishma, to bestowal.
[125588]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/15/14, Workshop

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Question: How can we reach the right prayer as quickly as possible?

Answer: Our effort, just like all the spiritual discernments, isn’t measured according to the number of actions but according to their quality. Sometimes we can see a person who tries very hard and does many things spinning like a humming fan. Everyone may admire his energy but the benefit of such actions can be minimal. As it says, “little with the right intention is better.”

The spiritual world is made of qualities: either in order to receive or in order to bestow. Everything depends on that, on how much either one weighs and not the actual number of actions. Therefore it says,” A person can attain his world in one hour!” But how is that possible if one spends a thousand hours or a million hours?! All of humanity wastes billions of hours and doesn’t reach the goal, and there are people who attain their world in one hour and reach revelation. Is this fair?

It’s possible due to the quality that is more important than the quantity. So if you want to reach the right prayer as quickly as possible, you should make an effort in quality and not in the quantity with regard to actions and intentions. Quality should come first.

A qualitative effort means constantly clarifying what receiving and bestowal mean, one with regard to the other. This is what we should look for in every aspect of life, in all our relations with others.

The qualitative effort is measured by how much my heart is involved. The heart should be the criterion and not the mind. There are very clever people and I actually used to envy them in the past when I saw how quickly they could grasp the material, understand things, and delve into details. But eventually I discovered that “it isn’t the wise who learns.” You can understand only through your feelings, and I didn’t really consider that as something serious but rather as something frivolous, some feminine sentiments.

I believed that one’s power is in the mind, but that isn’t true. First everything must go through the feelings and only then a person understands. The mind reads and perceives only what goes through the heart. So we have to try and expand our feelings as much as possible in the right direction, of course. The feelings expand only by the Light that Reforms.
[125502]
From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/12/14, The Zohar

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Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar“, Item 23: It turns out that once dressed in a human body, it (the soul) generates needs and desires and ideas to satisfy its desire to bestow to the fullest, meaning to bestow contentment upon its Maker, according to the size of its desire.

Question: On one hand it says that we should be guided only by what we see, but on the other hand, we have to detach from the ordinary corporeal terms”body” and “soul,” so how we can integrate the two things?

Answer: I see the corporeal world in which I live now. We study about it in universities and not in Kabbalah lessons. We, on the other hand, study about something that is above that, the spiritual reality. It is not before my eyes, and I am supposed to acquire a new sight in order to see it. I don’t need corporeal eyes for that but spiritual ones.

Kabbalists tell us that just like the corporeal body, there is also a spiritual body, and it is bestowal. The life in it is the Light that fills it. The spiritual body is actually the Returning Light (Ohr Hozer) and we feel the body according to its measure.

I am attracted to bestowal upon others according to the level of the Returning Light, and bestowal upon the other is my soul. This is exactly where it is, in others, and not in the flesh that lives and dies. We need the flesh only for the time in which I have to annul my desire to receive. Then the need for the corporeal body disappears. When I attain the first spiritual level, I understand that it has nothing to do with the body. I was simply given such conditions in which I can exist before the revelation. This state is essential in order to enter the spiritual world. It’s the area where I fulfill the preconditions.

It’s as if I stand in front of a door and I am told: “You can enter only if you have a ticket. Don’t you have a ticket? So go to work and buy a ticket and then you can enter.” So I work in this world in order to buy a ticket for the spiritual reality and during the lessons we speak about what happens behind the door.

Question: So in what way are we different from the philosophers who seem to say the same thing?

Answer: First, we are right in that we don’t wish, like them, to indulge into fantasies like they do; we understand that we must actually feel and see what we speak about firsthand. This is a healthy approach that protects against making mistakes and delivers a clear scientific framework.

Philosophers are mistaken in the fact that they speak about things which they don’t feel that are beyond their perception and is devoid of any factual basis. And they are comfortable with this situation: first, because they are being paid for it and second, because they want to have something to do with “spirituality.”

In principle, a person reaches for a certain “spiritual bridgehead” but without working on himself. This is the reason that Kabbalists hate philosophy. There is a philosopher in each of us because we would also like to enter spirituality without effort and we love to bring up different unfounded theories.

At the same time, we have to explain everything: “Although I sometimes feel like philosophizing, it is merely my ego.” The truth is that we cannot actually discuss the spiritual world before we attain it, it is said: “We cannot know by name or word anything that we don’t attain.”

We reject the philosophical approach and hate the philosophers in us although it’s impossible to do it without them, because everyone includes the whole world in him. So we only speak about what happens in our hearts.
[125302]
From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/12/14, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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Question: Why does the “raspberry ball” disappear all the time and the only way to hold onto it and grow it is to go to the outer community?

Answer: Every activity in spirituality is an innovation. Even in our world it happens this way, but we simply don’t pay attention to this. Nothing returns as it was: All the time new clarifications and corrections are happening, a new discovery of evil and its correction for the good.

In spirituality there cannot be a stop, there cannot be a static state. Every state must be renewed all the time. This is like in love, like in relationships between people, where we must constantly take care of our relationships. If we want to keep them, we must constantly develop and grow them, opening new states.

In this world, until the end of correction, we receive a gift, a favor, help in the work: We reveal broken desires specifically granted by the Creator so that we will have material for renewal. Thanks to this we can renew relationships and develop our feelings each time.

But if there had been no shattering, what would we rely on to build our innovations and changes? And when we rise from physical states to spiritual states, then we see that spirituality is constant change. Without them, the spiritual world doesn’t exist. Even in our world, according to quantum physics, the electron cannot exist without movement.

If we stop it, it disappears. The entire universe of elementary particles, which rotate around their axes at tremendous speeds and move in orbits, is in movement and change. The entire micro world works at higher frequencies that approach the speed of light.

In our lives the speed of the changes also grows, and all technical apparatus, electronics, computers, everything, works at greater and greater speed. This says something about the number of changes that we are ready to include in a unit of time, a unit of influence. Everything depends on the speed, the frequency, with which changes happen.

Every Partzuf includes ten Sefirot, and each one of them includes another ten, and so on ad infinitum. Therefore, there must be a very high frequency in every interval in order to include all these infinite changes of mutual integration of this into that and that into this, and so forth. The changes must be constant and at a very high velocity.

So when we reach the raspberry ball, we begin to feel that it’s impossible to hold. Here we begin to understand all of our psychology: If we don’t work on some kind of sensation, some kind of observation, all the time, then it disappears. It’s not revealed clearly in this life because we are becoming a unique compound of beast and human. And the beast in me exists without change, like all the rest of the beasts. And if my head is only involved with taking care of my beast, then I feel that everything is completely okay with me.

But if I begin to take care of the human in me with my mind, then I will need all the changes there. Then I constantly, incessantly,will need to decide what is more important for me, the beast in me or the human? Is the man riding the donkey or the donkey riding the man; who is carrying whom?
[125172]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/7/14, Lesson on the Topic: “Preparation for the Convention”

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Preparation to the Lesson

Workshop 

The Book of Zohar— Selected Excerpts

Talmud Eser Sefirot

Writings of Baal HaSulam “Introduction to The Book of Zohar” 

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Question: On the one hand, we must reach a permanent and strong intention. But on the other hand, it is written: “For the Torah shall come out of Zion”; that is, specifically from the “exits” from spirituality and the returns. How is it possible to combine the two opposites?

Answer: We must continue always towards a permanent intention so that the Creator will be discovered in the center of the group, within our connected hearts, without any dividers between them. This picture must always be before me. And I must be concerned that my friends will be directed towards that thing and will not abandon this intention. That is how I assure myself automatically that I will also remain in that intention. By this means I summon upon myself the Light that Reforms which strengthens me in the right intention.

But together with this, new desires, new conditions, are discovered and awakened in me all the time since in the meantime my Kli is not fully corrected. Therefore I am found in exits all the time. Additional density is discovered and it throws me out, and I must again and again return to the center of the group. But these exits must come from Above. I am not weakened in my intention; rather, it’s as if I lost consciousness: Every new egoistic desire throws me to the boards from which I must rise.

It’s said that the Torah specifically emerges from such “exits.” After all, I must overcome them and specifically above them I will construct the new me.
[125572]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/15/14, Workshop

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Baal HaSulam, “The Teaching of the Kabbalah and Its Essence”: This is the source of Rav Baal Shem Tov’s mistake: he interpreted the Guide for the Perplexed according to the wisdom of Kabbalah… Of course, the Guide for the Perplexed did not refer at all to what Rav Baal Shem Tov interpreted, and he did not see how…

Question: Does it mean that Kabbalists make mistakes?

Answer: Of course they do; the same as scientists do. As an example, I can mention the world-renowned Stephen Hawking who publicly admitted his mistake several years ago. His confession makes him really great. He said: “You believed me, but I was wrong.” My teacher, Rabash, made notes on book margins; then he crossed them out and wrote “Wrong!” on top of them, and then made new comments over and over again.

It’s a science, a researcher’s study. A Kabbalist is a person who develops his vessels,desires, to the extent that he starts perceiving the Divine. Kabbalists divulge the upper world to the degree their vessels are advanced. If they have not completed certain stages, their vision of some phenomena is quite remote and it’s possible that they make mistakes. Things that are closer to them are clearer, whereas things that are farther are blurred and vague.

A Kabbalist is a researcher. For example in his book, Gatehouse of Intentions, Baal HaSulam seriously criticizes Rashash (Rabbi Shalom Sharabi) , who was a great Kabbalist. Yet, he failed to reveal and understand some things. I have no ability to judge at a level this high, but possibly Rashash didn’t realize what exactly he was overlooking. It happens.

There is a hidden part in the wisdom of Kabbalah that is still vague. Many issues are intentionally veiled because of some specific conditions. At very high levels (mainly in the world of Atzilut) these things are very numerous, same as in any other science.

We have to understand that we do not directly attain the Creator, but rather we know Him from His actions to the degree of our correspondence to and similarity with Him. Only at the end of correction “everybody will know Him, from the least of them unto the greatest of them…;” then, “nobody will teach one’s neighbor.” When all vessels will be corrected, we will fully reveal Him. However, even at this point, our revelation of Him will be limited to the desire He made.

One way or the other, our vessels will be filled to the degree of their correctness. The Upper Light is in a state of absolute tranquility. The power of bestowal rules the world. The rest depends on us. If you know how to use it, please do so! If you can’t, then don’t. You should not artificially apply superfluous “initiative” or “enterprise” to the upper force. You should get rid of these stereotypes.

There is a good force that does good to both the virtuous and wicked. It’s ready to act in accordance with the properties of each of us. There is a potential, a “rope” that we can pull on, a “socket” that we can use. Unless we are connected to it, we won’t know what it is exactly.

Let’s say you turn on your oven. You will come to the conclusion that a socket that is connected to it is a “heating force.” If we plug a refrigerator into the same socket, it will turn into a “freezing force.” So, is it warming or cooling? Neither: We are the ones who warm or cool.

Let’s summarize what we should always keep in mind:

1. Kabbalah is a science.
2. A Kabbalist is a researcher who conducts empirical studies and reveals the Creator from His actions.
3. The Goal of the Creator is to have everybody know Him.
4. “Faith” is not a blind belief, but the power of bestowal. The degree of our attainment always matches the level of our faith. If we don’t expand our faith, we will achieve nothing.
5. The Creator is absolutely good and does good. The absolute never changes. We are the ones who change.

This approach has to be utterly clear. However, humanity refuses to hear this information since it means that it’s we who have started working. It obligates us to modify ourselves instead of altering Him. We cannot “toss a coin” and wait for a positive reaction from Above. It’s all about actual self-restructuring.

However, the current epoch forces us to acknowledge and clarify the path that we have already traversed. People are changing, even religions are rapidly transforming. Humanity is growing.
[122632]
From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/9/13, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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Question: If the Creator lacks any desire to receive, why did He create us?

Answer: The Creator delights in us. He does have the desire, although not the receiving one.

Let’s call His desire a “force,” and everything will fall into places. We always associate any desire with ourselves: It’s always “I” who wants something. While we regard the notion of “force” as completely neutral: It is something that has potential to act.  In this case, it is not just a force but the desire to bestow, a force that wants to perform an act of bestowal.

Baal HaSulam writes in his article “The Essence of Religion and Its Purpose” that the Creator is absolute good. How did he come to this conclusion? Regrettably, other people have never witnessed anything like that. Sometimes, we experience positive sensations, but it’s usually because the amount of negative sensations goes down. Something we call the “good” is only a way to escape the evil. We wish we could use “absolute good” the way we want….

HaSulam continues “… it is utterly impossible that He would ever cause any sorrow to any person.” The Creator is Good that does only Good. This fact contradicts our sensations. If we admit that the upper force exists and yet we often feel bad, it means that the reason for our negative situations must be the upper force. Can we really accuse anybody around us of being the source of our bad feelings?

Why then does Baal HaSulam describe the Creator’s absolute benevolence as the initial axiom that doesn’t originate from anything else? He writes: “…our common sense clearly shows that the basis for any evil-doing in the world stems only from the will to receive. That means that the eagerness to benefit ourselves makes us harm our fellow persons, due to our will to receive self-gratification.”

In other words, we realize our desire to receive not only in order to benefit ourselves, but also to harm others, and preferably do it in one shot. It is called “theft”: A person steals from the other to benefit himself, and it is called a double profit. If for any reason we are unable to steal from the other, then we at least “give a present” to oneself. Otherwise we are unable to satisfy our needs. We desperately need it; this urge is instilled in us. It’s similar to how a child is driven by a rampant impulse that makes him run, jump, break things, etc. Our egoistic desire is eager to fulfill itself by harming others.

Baal HaSulam continues: “Thus, if no being would find contentment in favoring itself, no being would ever harm another.” So, the desire to receive is the cause for all the evil in the world. Because it is totally in the Creator’s hands, we don’t have the slightest chance to do something with ourselves without His assistance.

“And if we sometimes find some being that harms another, without any will to receive self-gratification, it does that only because of an old habit that originated in the will to receive, which now rids it of the need to find a new reason.” Let me reiterate: A cycle of repeated actions that were originated by a desire that used to “burn” in us automatically continues these actions. Pure “mechanics” becomes our second nature even though it is not accompanied by any intentions or thoughts, nor it is driven by actual necessity. Deficiency no longer exists, but in the meantime we acquired a desire that grew on the basis on “mechanical body movements,” and now we need them.

As a result, even if there is no need to steal, a person continues to steal. Why? What for? One has no idea, it’s a habit.… This is exactly what happened with Shura Balaganov, a character from “The Little Golden Calf”: Right after Shura received a big sum of money as a present, he was arrested for pick-pocketing. He simply couldn’t resist stealing since it had become part of his nature.

Frankly, we don’t even realize that we are “stealing”; that is, we perform actions that are not beneficial to us anymore. At some point in the future, each one of us will “catch” oneself and notice how many mechanical actions one makes during a day. Quite often, there is no chance to stop these actions since our habits are extremely durable.

“And because we realize that the Creator is, in and of Himself, complete and needs no one to help Him to completion, since He precedes everything, it is therefore clear that He does not have any will to receive.” The One who precedes everything cannot have any desire to receive whatsoever. He is primordial and original. Who can He receive from? “And because He has no will to receive, He is fundamentally devoid of a desire to harm anyone; it is as simple as that.”

The Creator is not at all the desire to receive or the need for self-gratification. He is perfect. The question is: Can the Perfect One also be the absolute good with external actions addressed to the creation that He made?

Baal HaSulam defines this aspect as “basic,” meaning not subject to any analysis and beyond the initial agreement; it’s the attribute of the precursor of everything. So, “…it is completely agreeable to our mind as the first concept, that He possesses a desire to bestow goodness upon others, meaning to His creatures.”

Let’s return to the current, actual picture of the reality in which we don’t see anything like that. Our world is full of affliction; it’s as if our universe works tirelessly to “swell” desperation, and yet Baal HaSulam explains that everything is quite opposite.

The fact of the matter is that we lack objectivity and common sense; we are bound by our current primitive egoistic intellect and are unable to conduct a “pure” investigation. For years, even I could not agree with many Kabbalistic postulates.

Only after we become corrected, we start thinking differently, by using our widened mind. Then everything takes its place, but not because of habit or a forced consent; rather, it is based on a true, logical, rational, uncompromising analysis. New vessels-desires open within you, and on their basis, you state the facts.
[119211]
From the 4th part the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/28/13, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar,” Item 24: And since the essence of the soul is but a desire to bestow, and all its manifestations and possessions are fulfillments of that desire to bestow, which already exists in the eternal first state, as well as in the future third state, it is immortal and irreplaceable. Rather, it and all its possessions are eternal and exist forever. Absence does not affect whatsoever at the departure of the body.

“The death of the body” refers to the death of the egoistic desire to receive. The moment it gets rid of the intention of in order to receive, it means that it becomes the body for the soul.

Each and every part of the egoistic desire to receive in order to receive is called a corrupt and impure body. When it makes a restriction (Tzimtzum) on itself, it “dies,” and then it receives the power and acquires the intention of in order to bestow. When the intention of in order to bestow “rides” on the desire to receive, it fills it with the Upper Light and gives it the power of bestowal, the Returning Light (Ohr Hozer).

Then the Returning Light and the Direct Light, which meet in the corrected desire that has the right intention, fill it with life. Then the desire is in equivalence of form with the Light and becomes the body of the soul or the Partzuf. The Light that fills it is called the Light of life that is in it. There is nothing other than that; there is no Heaven or Hell after the corporeal body dies, as it seems to us.

In fact, this body doesn’t exist at all. The world that we see is merely a hologram. The truth is that the desire to receive with the intention of in order to receive doesn’t exist. It’s only depicted to us this way as a fictitious picture with which we have to work and learn to change our intention to in order to bestow.

In our current state in this world, we are detached from the spiritual ladder so that we will enter each spiritual level from a neutral state that is external to spiritually. Thus we acquire the spiritual world by ourselves. This is why this world is important and this is why we were given this fictitious state. Without it we wouldn’t be able to enter spirituality. But still, this world remains external to the real categories of our existence.

The whole system of the shells, which brings so many troubles, problems, and death doesn’t exist either. It only exists as a replica, the opposite side, the oppositeness, of the Creator. In fact, the system of the shells is not more than a reflection, a shadow; it exists only when there is a flaw, a barrier, that blocks the Light.
[125423]
From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/13/14, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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