Question: How is it possible to check whose servant you are: a servant of Pharaoh or a servant of the Creator? How is this examination realized, intellectually or emotionally?

Answer: We check with the mind what we feel in our heart. A heart is all the desires of a person, and I need to check who controls my desires: the will to receive with an intention in order to receive or with an intention in order to bestow. The will to receive is always there; it is the substance of creation, but I must examine for what I am working.

This examination is done only through the group. In our physical world we cannot measure anything without a scale of measurement. We require some unit of measurement: a meter, a kilogram, Hertz, a measurement scale with which I will be able to measure and weigh some phenomenon.

How can I weigh a desire and my intention that controls it? This is only possible depending on how I adhere to the group and associate myself with the whole. Through this I can measure myself and change something within me. Otherwise, I will always be mistaken.

Therefore, “And you shall love your neighbor as yourself” is called the fundamental rule in the Torah for it controls everything. If I do not place myself correctly relative to society, I will not be able to see where I am at all. With my measurements, I will not be able to discern any error, neither the smallest nor the largest.
[103981]
From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/31/13

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Rabash, “Dargot HaSulam,” Article 932, “The First Innovation”: All innovations begin only after the person merits leaving acquisition for himself. And before then, he is absolutely immersed in his desire for pleasure, and this desire dominates him. Therefore, no innovation can happen in him, everything comes only from his ego. An innovation can come only through the power of another nature, which a person doesn’t have yet. For this reason, all innovations begin only after the person leaves his ego, the desire to receive for himself, which is to say, he leaves Egypt.

And this is the idea that it is forbidden to teach Torah to idol worshippers.

One who serves other gods is a person who still doesn’t have contact with the Creator, who hasn’t exited Egypt. This is the name of a spiritual level, so, a regular person of this world is not to be called this. Idol worshippers are people like us who are drawn to the Creator, but they still ascribe particular importance to material values, to reception for oneself.

For this reason they are called AKUMA (an acronym for “Servants of stars and constellations,” and also round-about (Akum), “indirect”). You see they are not directed “straight to the Creator” (Yashar-El), like Israel rather they worship stars and fate, which is to say, they are found dominated by various egoistic forces and values.

It is forbidden to teach Torah to idol worshippers. “Forbidden” means impossible. You see the Torah is the Light, the entire upper system, all the spiritual worlds, the relationships between a person and the Creator. It is impossible to teach this to an idol worshipper, who is found in egoistic receptivity and has no connection to the system of bestowal.

And indeed, when the person is in Egypt, which is to say in egoistic receptivity, he cannot be a Yehudi, (from the word “Yichud” – unity, which is to say uniting himself with the entire creation and with the Creator), for he is enslaved to Pharaoh, the king of Egypt. The person is enslaved by his ego, the king of the material world.

And when he is a slave to Pharaoh, he cannot be a servant of the Creator. It is either Pharaoh or the Creator, because everything depends on the intention, with what a person identifies himself and what he wants to serve: personal benefit or bestowal.

“And this is the idea, ‘For the children of Israel are mine,’ they are my servants,” the Creator says, “and don’t be a slave to slaves.” You see, Pharaoh is also a servant of the Creator, he is an angel, and he is a system which carries out the thought of creation from compulsion, without any free choice. Pharaoh is an angel; you see it is written: “I created the evil inclination.” The entire creation, the entire ego is found in the hands of the Creator. And if the person serves in the name of Pharaoh, he is called a “slave to slaves,” for he serves the slave and not the Master.

When a person serves himself, he cannot be a servant of the Creator, for it is impossible to serve two kings at the same time. And only after the person leaves Egypt—after he receives enough Light that Reforms, raising him above his desire for pleasure—which is from reception for oneself, then he can be a servant of the Creator. But in order to remain a servant of the Creator, he needs to choose this all the time: in each and every moment, with every desire. And then he is ready to merit to the Torah. What follows from this is that the first innovation is the departure from Egypt.

The Torah begins with the departure from Egypt and onward; therefore, after this the giving of the Torah happens. The Torah includes all the Light of Infinity, all the upper Light, which fills the upper worlds and is designed for the gradual correction of the will to receive of the creature until he reaches equivalence of form with the Creator.
[103938]
From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/31/13

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Question: What is the meaning of adhering to the group?

Answer: To adhere to the group is to be with the friends in the entire process through which they are passing, to perform the tasks, to participate in all the events: in studies, dissemination, duties, gatherings of friends, workshops, and paying maaser. I need to try to be a useful and active participant in all this. These are mechanical actions of joining a group, which are visible.

Besides this, within myself, I wholeheartedly try to be included in this image called a “group,” to disappear, to melt there. I want to be absorbed within this concept of the “group,” the “society,” so that nothing of me remains.

If I try to do this according to my egoistic motives, to the extent of my efforts, I become closer to the Light, and It brings me thoughts about this and shows how appropriate I am to it or not. So, I begin to demand that the Light correct me more. I begin to relate to my inclusion in a group in a more practical way, connecting this inclusion with the Light that influences me and helps me to enter a group.

It follows that the more I am included in it, the more states I begin to discern: greater or smaller inclusion, how much I forget about myself, how much more I belong to the friends, how much more or less I love them. Only according to this do I evaluate my ascents and descents, since no other ascents and descents exist.

And so together with everyone, I turn to the upper Light that makes of us one whole. And here the work begins. All measurements and evaluations take place only in regard to the group because without this there is no correct measuring scale, there is no correction with which I would be able to examine myself.

I have no indication and evaluation of my emotions, not in relation to the Creator and not in relation to myself, if we don’t do this within the group. The group is the place where I feel, measure, and carry out all spiritual actions.

There is no other place outside of it! There, in the group, I need to discover hatred and my ego, all of my characteristics. All that is discovered outside the group doesn’t require any correction. Only what is discovered in the relationships between the friends, this is the only thing that we need to correct. Pharaoh, the ego is the force of mutual rejection and of hatred that is discovered in a group. And outside the group, this is all the physical life of the animal body.
[103976]
From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/31/13

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When the descent ends, you begin to realize that it would be better to control it and to ask for a Masach (screen) that would enable you to transcend such state. Then, despite the inner repulsion, you would be able to aspire to the friends and to still feel love and connection. You understand that this is the better way.

The first time it happens, you can’t make any decisions while in the state of descent. You only feel how total darkness falls on you, burying you under it. Then you examine yourself and think that it could be good to learn to somehow control such states. The next time darkness comes, you try to somehow resist it and ask for help.

You don’t really succeed, but when the darkness disappears, you examine yourself again and think with what to arm yourself for the next round of darkness so as to ask for a screen. Thus, each time you grow wiser since “there is no wiser than the experienced.” Eventually, your reach a state in which you begin to demand a screen—you begin to work with the Light.

This is the most important moment in our work: being able to see the Creator as your partner and to actually start working with Him, as it says, “I am for my beloved and my beloved is for me.”
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From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/28/13

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Preparation to the Lesson

Shamati #61 “Round About Him it Stormeth Mightily“

The Book of Zohar – Selected Excerpt, “Va’Etchanan,” Item 164, Lesson 9

Writings of Rabash, “Igrot,” Letter 59

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Question: In what way can each of us invest effort in the common Kli; what do we need to do?

Answer: Every one simply needs to think about what he would want to have happen to him, to the group, and to the entire world: men, women, children, the old, all the peoples, all of humanity. Today, we are all in the same boat, a real Noah’s Ark.

It is said about Noah’s Ark that all were stowed in it and nobody ate anyone else, rather all lived in peace. For this ark is the characteristic of Bina, which encompasses and holds everything within itself. And therefore they were saved from the deluge, from the great ego, that erupted outside the walls of the ark and appeared in all its terrible forms: volcanic eruptions, hurricanes, tsunamis, blizzards, and burning fire.

The ark protected all who were found within it, for they wanted to save it. The more we protect the ark, the more the ark will protect us. For the ark is the characteristic of Bina. Entering the characteristic of Bina is like entering a womb, into an ark that will protect you from all bad and harmful external influences; nothing can harm you anymore.

This is what specifically needs to be explained to the world—that all the problems of humanity are derived from its raging ego. But if we all build an ark for ourselves and do not eat each other, instead, all of us will dwell together within it, in our small closed world; if we make an ark from our small closed world, then we will be saved. Otherwise, what happened to all those who remained outside of the walls of Noah’s Ark will happen to us, all of us will sink into the waters of the deluge.
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From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/28/13, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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Baal HaSulam, Shamati, Article 35, “Concerning the Vitality of Kedusha“: Hence, it is a correction that each time one extends something and has a descent, he must begin anew, meaning new scrutinies. And what one had from the past has fallen into the Sitra Achra, and she holds it in her authority as a deposit. Afterwards one receives everything that she had received from him this whole time.

Thus we can see that everything that happens is in our favor. Thanks to the desires that the Creator has shattered and thrown into the sea of the impure forces (Sitra Achra), to the other side, into egoistic desire to enjoy, we have a chance to advance towards Holiness, towards desires to bestow. These desires to receive force us to draw more and more Light.

At the moment we draw a little Light and the desires of the Sitra Achra immediately swallow it. This happens over and over again until the measure is filled, and then the ego “vomits” everything it has swallowed, and we get back all the Light that we have managed to draw for a while but were unable to keep. Thus the Sitra Achra helps a person accumulate his exertion, collect all the tiny Lights, and then give it back to him as one full measure that enables him to attain the spiritual level.

This is why we create the “holy animals” from the descents, from the states we usually don’t want and don’t like. But we have to understand how grateful we have to be for all the mechanisms in the system of the upper Providence and especially for the system of the forces of impurity, which rules over us during the whole period of preparation, until we enter the authority of Holiness, of the desire to bestow.

As long as the force of impurity dominates us, it fulfills its role with utmost dedication, which is even greater than the dedication of the system of Holiness. After all, the Sitra Achra must work in the opposite manner from the Creator, in a form opposite to Him. It’s a special “angel,” a unique system, which follows the Creator’s command, His desire, and performs actions that are opposite to Holiness according to a decree from Above.

A similar story is told in one of Baal HaSulam’s letters: A king appoints different villains to rule over his subject whom he has decided to raise to the rank of the first minister. In order to do so, the king sends his servants to him dressed as criminals and murderers, and thanks to the struggle with them the loyal slave grows more and more.

All the “villains” who had to fight him are fulfilling their job with all the viciousness and the creative cunningness only because it is the king’s order and not because it’s their own will. The force of impurity, our internal systems that seem so horrible to us, works in the exact same way.

All the crimes that take place in the world, the murders and the falls, seem to contradict the Creator’s desire and we have to hate them. However, we should understand that there is no evil—there are no criminals in the King’s palace and it’s all His systems that operate from two directions: from the good side and from the bad side. We should only hate our own laziness because we cannot fulfill our free will in choosing our environment, the group, the only place where we are free.

We shouldn’t complain about any event in our life, except for one: our inability to hurry at the right time, to use the environment and with its help to advance and to hasten (sanctify) time.
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From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/29/13

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Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar,” p. 29: For if we didn’t have this damaged will to receive within us, we could not correct it at all, for nobody can correct something that isn’t in him. And therefore that amount of will to receive that is embedded in the body from its birth into the air of the world is not enough. Rather, it is further compelled to be a vehicle for unclean Klipot for no less than 13 years.

It follows that even if I possess a great will to receive, this is still not enough. From the start the Creator says to us, “Come to Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart.” He will inundate you with blows, so you will want to flee from him. It’s impossible to take me out of the evil inclination until it has reached a level where I can no longer endure it. But first it’s necessary to become completely aware of this evil.

In our world, we educate children to be careful, “Don’t go there, don’t do this…” But in the spiritual world, there is nothing like this. There it’s the opposite; they send me to “criminals” and “thieves,” “alcoholics” and “drug addicts,” into the arms of Haman, Balaam, Balak, Esau, and so forth. Otherwise, how can I correct these characteristics? In fact, these are uncorrected parts of my soul. Therefore, I must own them, feel them as mine, recognize the evil hidden within them, and be released from them, to rise above them.

Question: Does it follow that I must be evil in order to advance spiritually?

Answer: How should I answer you? Yes. It’s possible to correct only what is within you. And in spite of it all, this doesn’t say that I must just become evil. It’s one thing if, like a terrorist, I want to kill someone. It’s another thing if I want to love, and at the same time I discover within me a readiness to kill. These are two absolutely different approaches. And the difference here is that I discover the evil in opposition to it, I see that in myself I am evil, but I don’t kill someone who seems evil to me.

“13 years” among the unclean Klipot is not time according to the calendar, rather this is a level, and the stage is very high. I aspire to love, to bestow, so I discover my evil inclination. This is the condition; otherwise, I wouldn’t advance at all on my spiritual way towards correction, towards the Creator.

I want to be close to Him, to embrace Him, to kiss Him, to give Him pleasure according to the principle: “Don’t do to your friend what is hateful to you,” and love the other as thyself. And likewise, for 13 years, I discover the opposite of bestowal within me. In other words, I discover within myself characteristics, desires, and inclinations, which I didn’t even know existed because they are spiritual and come from the four impure worlds of ABYA. They dwell above the “beastly” comprehension of our world, and therefore, this is already an ascent.

Here the principle: “One against the other” acts. Aspiring to the good, I discover the evil, again and again. And so it goes for some time!

If I don’t maintain the position and stop, everything disappears. And if I don’t want to stop, then I turn to a group, to studies, to the Creator, resorting to all the means that will help me to hold on to the way, to tilt it favorably.

And only then are the “malicious” and “erroneous” things discovered in me, defects that seemed not to exist before then. I never felt what the 613 broken desires were and now they are apparent. If I hadn’t advanced, I would have remained on a level that in a spiritual sense is neither good nor bad. Conversely, if a person advances properly, he becomes worse.

But he works on himself; he understands what is happening with him; he is found in an inner struggle; he helps others, and they help him. It’s as if he “crushes” his ego with millstones, chews and grinds it, so that it will be possible to “swallow,” to “digest” it. During these difficult times we must help and support each other.

Imagine a car show, where the new car sparkles and glimmers, all shiny, clean, and beautiful—a real pleasure. And now look at a car repair shop: the stench, the garbage, the mess….It all depends on where and what they sell to you.

So at this stage, we do most of the “dirty work.” To correct the Human in me: What can be worse? And on the other hand, what can be higher?
[103435]
From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/20/13, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar”

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Preparation to the Lesson

Shamati #36 “What Are the Three Bodies in a Man“

The Book of Zohar – Selected Excerpt, “Va’Etchanan”

Writings of Rabash “Article 23″

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Question: This evening we are arranging a special lesson symbolizing the end of the Passover holiday, the departure from the ego. How do we need to approach this with a maximum request to cross the Machsom?

Answer: This comes suddenly. Nobody knows exactly when, nobody can predict anything. But Baal HaSulam writes that the time of Passover is a very important time; in our world it’s a special time regarding the Surrounding Lights.

Indeed, the departure can take place any time, any day, but at the same time we need to do as much as possible according to the communication of the physical branch with the spiritual root. We have a chance, and for this a great cooperative effort is required, likewise a little chutzpah (audacity).

– We deserve it!

– Why?

– Because!

This is compulsory. Regarding this it’s said: “My sons have defeated me.” Though I know that I don’t deserve it, in spite of it all, I demand, apply pressure, and this audacity is very useful because it shows that I am going beyond the limits of my ego, I believe that I depend on the Creator and it’s specifically from Him that I demand what I want. Here lies not just an emotional outburst but a deliberate shout, a necessary assault in His direction: “Do it!” That is how new Kelim, additional deficiencies, are aroused in me.

Question: What is needed in order to build this demand throughout the day?

Answer: It is necessary to concentrate on the opposition formed at the time of the departure from “Egypt,” on connection and elevation above our individual and collective ego. In general, we require a demand with the addition of audacity. And the main thing is unity. And don’t be distracted by anything else.

Question: How must one be audacious about this request and at the same time ask on behalf of everyone, together with everyone?

Answer: It’s written that we leave Egypt in the dark of night. This doesn’t say that it’s necessary to wait until it gets dark outside and to turn out the lights at home. No, this is darkness of the ego, which we feel inside of us when nothing more can save us and there is no possibility of escape.

We need to run toward the center of the group, toward love of friends, toward love of another. It’s necessary to concentrate on this; we require the importance of only this. The Light reveals the Kelim and corrects them. Everything comes from that except for the request for help.
[103943]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/31/13, Writings of Rabash

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