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Writings of Rabash “Shlavei HaSulam,” “The Agenda of the Assembly 2“
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The Book of Zohar – Introduction
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Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol. 3, Part 10, “Histaklut Pnimit,” Item 11, Lesson 51
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Writings of Baal HaSulam, “The Love for the Creator and Love for the Created Beings,” Lesson 6
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Baal Hasulam, “The Peace”: These are the words of Rabbi Akiva: “The book is open and the hand writes.” Any state that the generation is in is like a book, and all the evildoers are as writing hands because each evil is carved and written in the book until they accumulate to an amount that the public can no longer bear. At that time, they ruin that evil state and rearrange into a more desirable state. Thus, each and every act is calculated and written in the book, meaning in the state.
And he says, “All who wish to borrow may come and borrow.” This means that he believes that this world is not like an open store without an owner, but that there is an owner present, a shopkeeper who stands in his store and demands of each customer the right price for the merchandise he is taking from the store, meaning toil in His work while he is nourished by that store, in a manner that is certain to bring him to the purpose of creation, as He pleases.
His goal is to attain bestowal. However, a person requires powers to realize this, and he doesn’t have these powers. He takes them on loan, even though he intends it all for bestowal. What is more, this is even if he wants to repay, that is, not to use anything for himself. He uses the entire world for bestowal.
According to the standards of our world, it is impossible to declare that a person like this is taking something on loan. You see that we get a loan for personal benefit. Here, everything is otherwise. Incidentally, the Torah’s prohibition against giving a loan with interest is derived from this. In the spiritual world, no loan must be paid back with more than what had been received.
So, the forces that I don’t have from the start I take on loan, but I am not taking for myself. They are not mine, I only add to them a desire for the sake of bestowal. Instead of the Creator, I bestow to everyone, and my entire goal is only to convey this bestowal skillfully, as if it were from His hands. I have nothing of my own besides my altruistic self that contracts the egoistic desire within it and acts above it. Therefore, essentially, I don’t have anything to return.
Question: In spite of all this, it is not clear: How can a person ask for a loan for himself in spirituality?
Answer: So, I said that this is another kind of loan. You see, I don’t have my own powers of bestowal. Additionally, I (specifically, I) want to give just as the Creator does. I have to transmit and give that which He wishes for the world.
This state is described allegorically with a metaphor that says that the Creator wanted to give the nations of the world the method of correction. However, they could not accept it. So, He used a transitional group called Israel, which means “straight to the Creator.” The people of Israel are like coordinators that connect the upper Light with the AHP. Thanks to this, Malchut can rise to Bina and be “sweetened” there so as to pass the Light from above downward.
So, this is called a loan only because a person doesn’t have the power of bestowal, and he receives this from the Creator. However, he doesn’t use it for himself, as it is customary in our egoistic world. In this world, a person seeks benefit for himself first of all, and afterward, he thinks about benefit for others, whether this is financial matters, well-being, or net pleasure. In spirituality, I ask not for myself. I want to participate in the life of the Creator. This participation is intended entirely for bestowal. For the sake of this, I activate all of my desire to the maximum possible level. Everything else I temporarily keep “locked up” under the restriction.
Question: So, how is it necessary to ask for a loan like this for the goal of bestowal?
Answer: This is called ascent, a request for correction (MAN). From the Creator, I request power to be able to examine, to correct, the deed itself. I want Him to do this, as it is written: “Be clothed in me and perform the deed of bestowal.” It is like an infant asks for help from his mother or simply cries, and the mother comes and helps. The entire problem is to turn into a “crying infant” internally. And it takes time to learn this….
[105531]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/19/13, “The Peace”
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Rabash, “Concerning Above Reason”: It turns out that a person has qualities that his parents bequeathed to their children, and he has qualities that he acquired from the society, which are a new possession. And this comes to him only through bonding with the society and the envy that he feels toward the friends when he sees that they have better qualities than his own. It motivates him to acquire their good qualities, which he doesn’t have and of which he is jealous.
Thus, through the society, he gains new qualities that he adopts by seeing that they are at a higher degree than his, and he is envious of them. This is the reason why now he can be greater than when he didn’t have a society, since he acquires new powers through the society.”
A person is born a small animal, and what he grows up to be depends on the upbringing. If we are talking about an ordinary, earthly upbringing, then a person develops due to society. He envies others and longs for pleasure, money, power, fame, and knowledge, and that is why he learns from society how he can achieve these goals, that is, success in this world. If he has prerequisites for spiritual development, he finds himself in the environment that can instill in him new properties —spiritual.
In the material society, a person develops naturally, by instinctively adopting the values of society and seeking to learn from it how to reach worldly success. But spiritual upbringing is different because it requires a person to cancel himself, that is, it gives him the freedom of choice: to adopt its spiritual values from the environment or not.
Only to the extent of his self-nullification will a person be able to see the society as higher than himself. He will have to apply much effort to look at society from the bottom up, and then he will be able to receive from the society its values, the importance and greatness of the goal, and thus advance spiritually.
Spiritual success depends not only on the environment, but also on how a person uses it, that is, how much he annuls himself and appreciates society, whether he agrees to suffer, seeing others higher than himself. Envy forces a person to feel humiliated, but he needs to understand that it is for his own benefit to see the others as great. If he is capable of such an attitude, then he will advance. In the end, a person has to enjoy that he can stand against his egoism and trample over it in order to attain spiritual values and get closer to the spiritual goal.
That is why advancement in the material society is completely opposite to spiritual advancement. And success in the material world does not guarantee that a person will be able to succeed in spirituality because it is determined by the free choice of the person himself.
[108940]
From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/2/13
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Question: What is so special about the love of friends that allows me to cover all sins?
Answer: Love of friends covers all sins. After all, if we work on connecting our sparks in the group, then all the other desires surrender to the Light of love despite the fact that they are so opposite from one another to the extent that they actually hate one another. This Light operates on us from above, from the upper level, when it covers us with one blanket, one umbrella, a Sukkah of peace, and obligates all of us to unite, although internally we remain very different.
Question: Do I choose the friend once or anew every day?
Answer: I don’t choose according to corporeal criteria. In the meantime we don’t know why we have been brought into one group from above, he and I. It depends on the root of the soul, on the sentence of the souls, which we will learn about later. But because we are in a group we have to fulfill our freewill and to connect into one system, one group.
Choosing a friend means being loyal to him despite the repulsion and the doubts. I shouldn’t feel any difference between him and me. Every moment the thought and the desire change in me, I have to choose him in the exact same manner, I examine myself and him.
[108153]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/22/13, Writings of Rabash
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Question: What is the most important criterion I can use to check what kind of friends I should adhere to?
Answer: You should get closer to those who constantly attend the lessons, engage in dissemination, and take part in the duties. These people can be a role model for me even by their external behavior and by their corporeal earthly actions. Therefore, I want to adhere to them.
It makes no difference what a person’s character is and exactly what kind of work he does in the group. What’s important is that he comes every day and takes part in everything. It is best to adhere to such people who don’t stand out in the group because of their special attributes but are loyal to it and give it all their powers.
[108798]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/30/13, Writings of Rabash
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Question: What is it exactly that makes the group strong? What attributes should we work on?
Answer: We shouldn’t value the power of the group by the number of people in it; that is a wrong estimation since there is a difference between the number of different people and their inner preparation. So, it is impossible to judge everyone according to the same parameters.
In Russia, for example, it is easy to organize a group of more than a hundred people while, in the US, it is difficult to gather even ten people. We cannot compare success by the size of the group. What’s important is the quality, which is hard to identify.
All of Eastern Europe, and especially Russia, is where Kabbalists were very active in the last generations. The most important Kabbalist in the history of the wisdom of Kabbalah after the Ari was Baal Shem Tov, who had many followers and students all over Belarus and the Ukraine who simply “plowed the ground” there so that their ideas were in the air. As a result, there were a great number of Kabbalists there from Poland, Galicia, and further to the east.
Consequently, the people who live there, and especially the Russian people, have a special sense, a special inclination for Kabbalah. That’s how the influence of the surrounding Light is revealed. Therefore, it is impossible to compare this region with Western Europe where just as many Jews and intelligent, educated people live and still the great inclination for spirituality has not been revealed. This is called “ancestral merit.”
[108790]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/30/13, Writings of Rabash
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Question: Why do some groups succeed in providing their friends with strong support and protection from external influences, while some groups find it very hard to do so? What should we focus on in order to strengthen the group?
Answer: The main thing that kills us is the routine. A person likes to calculate what he has earned at the end of every day when he comes back from work. We must understand what our profit adds up to, whether I can add things up and be glad although I don’t see any payment in my vessels of receiving.
However, I can value and praise the profit I have made, the work that was done, and the efforts that were made during the day. I didn’t get any corporeal profit as a result, but I helped to correct the world, and, through the world, I helped the Creator. This is the profit I should praise constantly, and this is where the environment should support me.
If a person doesn’t understand that he needs a strong group for that and doesn’t demand such support from it, he cannot advance since he has no fuel. We should check this and accordingly see if we feel enough energy and motivation.
We should establish the environment by our collective powers and not wait for someone else to do it for us. We are lucky to have the chance to study, to have books, the right intention, and a teacher. We should use all that as quickly as possible!
[108786]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/30/13, Writings of Rabash
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Preparation to the Lesson
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Writings of Rabash “Shlavei HaSulam,” “Concerning Above Reason,” Lesson 2
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The Book of Zohar – Introduction, “The Letters of Rav Hamnuna Saba,” “Lock and Key,” Item 43, Lesson 24
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Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol. 3, Part 10, “Histaklut Pnimit,” Item 10, Lesson 50
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Writings of Baal HaSulam, “The Love for the Creator and Love for the Created Beings,” Lesson 5
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Rabash, “The Need For the Love of Friends”: Therefore, one must cling to the society…There is a special power in the adhesion of friends. Since views and thoughts pass from one to the other through the adhesion between them, each is mingled with the power of the other, and by that each person in the group has the power of the entire group.
In corporeal life a person is unconsciously drawn to society since his evil inclination pushes him to look for greater success and profit, and the greatest success for him is to establish himself in the eyes of others. Therefore, a person constantly examines what those around him consider good or bad and what is important for them. Accordingly, he establishes the parameters and determines his attitude to everything that happens. He is not even aware of that, but his opinion is totally based on what society appreciates, and without this a person would remain an animal.
The method of Kabbalah also raises a person from the animate to the human level but in a different manner. A person has to forcefully exert himself, in order to adhere to the right society; he has to know what it is exactly that he wants to buy from it. It’s only possible to acquire the values of society if one submits himself before it. Besides, he also needs to rise above the friends in order to bestow upon them the greatness of the goal and to uplift their spirits.
In these two ways of treating others, from below and from above, a person acquires the powers that he lacks. The powers that come to him are not egoistic, his ego isn’t increased like in this world where thanks to the influence of society a person receives an egoistic force that is ten times greater than his single egoistic force. Here he concedes and annuls himself, wanting to establish good relations and to convey joy and the greatness of the goal so that everyone, including himself, will submit themselves with regard to it and accept it by “faith above reason” no matter what. By that he doesn’t receive only a greater force than he had before, but a totally different force, the force of bestowal.
Thanks to his efforts, he receives the force of bestowal from the upper Light. If there is a group of ten (Minyan), then through it each one receives the force of bestowal from the source of bestowal above. Thus, a person acquires a force that is ten times greater, and is even corrected, with which he can advance.
This is the first phase of the spiritual path, and a person must constantly examine himself as to whether he really submits himself before the group. Perhaps it’s the ego speaking from inside him, thus confusing him in different ways. He should try to outwit this cunning snake that prevents him from being incorporated in the group.
This first level is the most difficult, and the sages say that “a thousand enter a room but only one comes out to the Light.” We have to take into account that our “school” is meant for unique individuals. The test is only in a group of ten. If we don’t look at the whole world, at yourself, and at the friends through the group of ten, you are always wrong.
A person can be part of a group, of some committee, or of some department, but if he doesn’t work in a group of ten, he cannot see anything but his ego.
[108710]
From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/30/13
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Question: Yesterday, you spoke about Abraham who discovered the wisdom of Kabbalah by introspection. What is that?
Answer: All of reality is in a person. What is more, reality doesn’t actually exist, there is a picture of it that I develop inside me. It is felt in the vessels, in my desires, by a certain sensor, by inner frames of a photographic film that reflect the reactions to the upper Light that depict my lack of equivalence of form with it.
A “flashlight” of the simple white Light is directed at me, but I am made of 613 different desires, different attributes that form a colorful, three dimensional picture of the world filled with sounds, scents and things I can touch on the background of the white Light. In other words, I actually “draw” or design the world in which I live.
However, according to my perception of reality, everything depends on my attributes and not on anyone else. It turns out that, if I change, the world will change. This is what we can do by introspection when I understand that I can change the world by the changes I make in me.
So, how can I change? I cannot do that by myself. I only have an unpleasant feeling in the current reality, and I cannot pull myself up by the hair out of the swamp. After all, even the thoughts about a change are part of this swamp.
This is exactly where the force of the shattering helps me. In my fictitious reality, there are people around me who tell me, “You know, we also think about that.” I see that the other parts of the still, vegetative, animate, and speaking nature are managed by one general mechanism, but my imagination draws people who have the exact same vector as I do, and this enables me to practice and to exercise. Now, I can see myself from the side. I can work with them just as I work with myself, like with an external reflection of myself.
When I work with them, I discover that this game is very creative. The relationship with the images of the friends helps me advance by acquiring a new perception, a new feeling. They don’t develop my old attributes and don’t add to the previous mind and previous feelings, but rather develop new qualitative attributes in me, attributes that I didn’t have before.
For example, a multi-dimensional perception or rising above the concept of time: Before, I could see the past, present, and the future, and now I stop feeling time. The external movements disappear and I perceive everything internally and connect it with the inner movements. I change, and as a result I feel changes on the background of the white Light.
If I work with the images of the friends that I see this way, I understand that it is true that they are depicted by my imagination, but the right attitude toward them allows me to acquire a special means for inner changes. Through the mutual efforts with these images, I attribute a certain independence to them—to the extent that I want to be independent. Eventually, when I play with them this way, I acquire the perception that takes me out of the current picture that is drawn on the screen of my consciousness to a new reality.
[108593]
From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/29/13, Writings of Baal HaSulam
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