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“Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot,” Item 144, Lesson 37
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The Book of Zohar – Selected Excerpt, Parashat “Naso,” Item 179, Lesson 21
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Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol. 3, Part 9, Item 2, Lesson 15
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Writings of Baal HaSulam “600,000 Souls,” (Starting with: “Yet, saying that”), Lesson 2
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In what state do we currently find ourselves? Who is organizing this state for us? Who “resets” us, who prepares us by leaving us only one correct action, which in so doing we will succeed?
We see that everything is determined in Nature. We are in a rigid system that chains us in on all sides and doesn’t let us move freely by even one millimeter. On the contrary, every movement you make shakes the system and it responds immediately. If you understand that, then your reactions are correct. Imagine that you are standing naked, completely surrounded by needles that almost touch your skin. You can’t even make the slightest movement, and at the most you may be able to move your eyes a little.
This is how the laws of nature “wrap” us. It’s even much more than that since they operate both in our mind and our emotions (in the heart), and I have to check: Do I have any free will? Does anything exist except this nature? If so, then this is where my self is. But can anyone exist on the outside? In the meantime I am totally, internally and externally, surrounded by needles and can’t move independently at all.
So we have to clarify what there can be besides nature. Has it left one of its creatures called “Adam – man” something that enables him to become free of it? And besides, how can this be if the whole universe is a system of absolute fixed laws? We are in a system that is totally mutually connected and each day we discover its integrality more and more, that it is deterministic and that there is no freedom in it; so how can it be that there is something outside its whole laws and frameworks? It’s a serious problem: Who is outside the laws? Of course, it isn’t our animal body, which we can study thoroughly since we have all the necessary data for that.
On the whole, we all totally obey nature’s laws, and if we are satisfied with that, then everything can keep on flowing that way, but if we can discover at least one grain of freedom that would really be a wonder. For what is the freedom intended? How and for what has nature made room in itself for it, why has it restricted itself and not entered this zone? What is this space in which the real created being who is not under the influence of nature actually exists? What is this created being actually? Does it have any laws of its own according to which it operates?
There are many questions to answer here. Spinoza and Kant mainly dealt with these questions. It’s a complex system that belongs to us since we ask the question about the meaning of life by refusing to accept the deterministic approach, aspiring to be above the predetermined corporeal state, and to find something else….
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/4/13, “The Peace”
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Our correction depends on our receiving a new attire called Masach (screen), or an intention, because we were created from the matter of the desire to receive, which is totally opposite from the Creator. This enables us to use our desire to receive in order to bestow in the same way that the Creator treats us since adhesion is possible only according to the equivalence of form.
So, all our work is first to discover how opposite we are from the Creator and then, according to our sorrow because of this oppositeness, to ask for correction, equivalence of form. This is, in fact, all we must do.
So, why must we go through such a long path. Isn’t it possible to ask the Creator to make us whole, right away? In fact, the Creator has created everything whole. We are in the world of Ein Sof (Infinity), identifying with Him, equal to Him, and in absolute adhesion with the Creator, and only our recognition of this state is missing. This recognition determines our independence.
Adhesion was created by the Creator, but on our part, we only have to be like a drop of semen that is adhered to the mother’s womb but hasn’t developed into a human being yet. It doesn’t feel its “self” yet. It doesn’t feel that it exists as an independent being. In order to discover its self-existence, this drop of semen must draw away from the Creator in its feeling of independent existence to the distance in which they were strongly adhered.
On the one hand, from the perspective of the nature of this drop, it will draw further and further away from the Creator according to the size of its desire until the entire desire contracts into a point, into a zero, into “nothing,” and totally disappears. However, on the other hand, the way back will be revealed to us: the need to overcome this great distance because of the differences in our nature and to attain equivalence of form.
When we reach equality and connection above the distance between us, we attain the Creator’s form and understand and feel Him, His plan, and this entire program. This is why, on one hand, we become independent, and on the other hand, we adhere to Him according to our own desire and freewill.
Thus, we discover all of creation. In this process, it becomes increasingly clearer to us. It is impossible to do that all at once since the heart must understand this process and not only the cold mind.
The revelation is possible only where there is concealment. The darker it is, the more the Light that arrives can illuminate all its dark caves, all the opposite forms of the darkness. Then, as a result of the connection of all the direct and inverse forms, the recognition is born, the attainment, as it is written, “The advantage of the Light is knowable only from the darkness.”
Our world is built in the exact same way. If a person doesn’t understand a certain phenomenon, he may pass by it and not even notice it. In order to discover a new, natural phenomenon, a person must study a lot and be in the vanguard, at the forefront of the scientific discoveries. He must know everything that is revealed to us and then suddenly see what is beyond the boundaries of the attainable, which means to discover something new. In order to do that, he needs to attain and recognize all the vessels that he has attained so far.
The same rules operate in the wisdom of Kabbalah. People who are ready to be in the dark in order to attain spirituality draw upon themselves the Light into the darkness, and then, in the gap between them, they begin to discover the spiritual attainment and the equivalence to the Creator and the adhesion to Him.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/3/13, “The Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot”
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Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot,” Item 134: You should know this law, that there is disclosure only in a place where there was concealment. This is similar to matters of this world where the absence precedes the existence, since the growth of wheat appears only where it was sown and rotted.
It is the same with higher matters, where concealment and disclosure relate to each other as the wick to the light that catches it. This is because any concealment, once it is corrected, is a reason for disclosure of the Light related to that kind of concealment, and the Light that appears clings to it like flame to a wick. Remember this on all your ways.
The oil itself cannot burn. In order to light it, we need a wick. The wick represents the opposite property, on one hand, and on the other hand, the connection between the Light, the fire that needs air and oil to burn.
The wick connects the oil, the fuel, and the air. The wick itself is meaningless. It can be made of some material that is not consumed. It is only the link that connects the oil, which we need to light, and the air that is necessary for combustion. If there is a connection between Malchut and Bina, the fuel and the air, then in the gap between their attributes there can be fire, the Light.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/3/13, “The Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot”
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Spiritual qualities are given different names: Nefesh (soul), Ruach (spirit), Neshama (soul). We begin to join the spiritual world by receiving the level of Ruach.
Nefesh, is the level of the inanimate of Holiness, when a person cannot move by himself. He comes to the lesson and thinks that everything is fine, that nothing more is required of him: today is the same as yesterday and tomorrow will be the same as today. He doesn’t explode and doesn’t feel sorry that he remains in the same state, but is rather happy that another day has gone by and that everything is fine. He accepts the daily routine.
But it is also an achievement if a person is in the group, trying not to interfere with its advancement, ready to join everyone, and to support it. He supports what the others are doing. But doesn’t show any special initiative; he doesn’t have the level of Ruach. There is no new force growing in him. And so he is called Nefesh de Kedusha (of Holiness).
But he still comes to the lessons and studies. I wish the whole world were on the level of Nefesh of Holiness. Nevertheless, this is called “spirituality” of the level of Ruach. Ruach means that a person already has something he can add. He doesn’t agree to remain on the level of the still nature. If he sees that nothing has changed since yesterday and that it won’t change tomorrow, then for him it is like being dead.
It isn’t just a state of motionless still nature, but a feeling of death, which means that it is the worst state. And so he asks himself, what else he can add. In the meantime, the only thing he can add is his actions. Baal HaSulam says in the article “The Freedom” that a person has no other means to change his state but by choosing the right environment.
A person who chooses a stronger influence of the environment is praiseworthy. It is through this that he can advance and not thanks to good deeds. He cannot do any good deeds, since we are not the masters of our actions. But thanks to having chosen a good environment that can influence him strongly, he begins to move.
In order to start moving by yourself and turning from the inanimate into the vegetative level, to rise from the level of Nefesh to the level of Ruach, to become a spiritual person, I have to constantly evoke those around me and to choose an increasingly stronger environment that will influence me more and more strongly and help me become more spiritual.
By such actions I constantly add from myself to the group and it constantly influences me and I yearn for spirituality, for bestowal, more and more. It turns out that I add to bestowal and finally I attain the next level that is called Neshama.
I act towards all the others and am influenced by them through the group that influences me. Thus, with its help, I constantly influence myself and raise myself. The environment serves as a lever to raise me higher and higher.
I rise through the environment and I want to start evoking myself, to connect to it in the most efficient and practical way. I want to increase my hold on spirituality so as not to be passive under its influence and wait for it to change me, but I want to bestow upon the environment myself, to make it stronger, so that it will influence me more strongly. Then we connect with the environment and raise one another to the spiritual world, this means that I attain the level of Neshama.
The main thing here is not to relax so that “each day is like the other.” There must be constant renewal, every moment, if not, then you will immediately fall to a state of death. It isn’t so easy to rise from the state of death. It is impossible to do it by one leap in order to return to the previous state. It is impossible to return to the same state. We have to make a correction: a new birth and new growth, everything anew.
But if a person doesn’t feel that he has to rise anew, it means that he doesn’t even feel his death, but that he has actually lost his consciousness.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/28/13, Writings of Rabash
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“Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot,” Item 141, Lesson 36
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The Book of Zohar – Selected Excerpt, Parashat “Naso,” Item 165, Lesson 20
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“60,000 Souls”
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Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot,” Item 133: It is rather like a king who wished to select for himself the most loyal of his subjects in the country and bring them in to work inside his palace. What did he do? He issued a decree that anyone who wished, young or old, would come to his palace to engage in the work inside his palace.
However, he appointed many of his servants to guard the palace gate and all the roads leading to it, and ordered them to cunningly deflect all those nearing his palace and divert them from the way that leads to the palace…
And only the heroes among them, whose patience endured, defeated the guards and opened the gate. And they were instantly awarded seeing the King’s face, who appointed each of them in his right place.
The guards are appointed in order to guard a person. He mustn’t come near the King’s palace and pass the place where the guards stand, unless he establishes an inner guard.
The Creator has many policemen and they are on each of the 125 degrees, preventing a person from coming nearer. They show you that you are allowed to rise only to a specific level, and you are not allowed to pass above that for the time being. It is because they see that you are not ready for the upper level yet. This is what happens each time.
The guards make sure that a person will not advance any further (although it is impossible, since there are rigid laws of conformity in the spiritual world). The guards reveal deficiencies to a person—a place for self-checking. They evoke him and don’t let him relax in his current state by bringing him all kinds of troubles.
They guard the person; the Light and the Creator don’t need to be guarded because it is impossible to harm them if you are not worthy of seeing them. It is all done according to the equivalence of form; if I am not suitable for a higher level, I don’t recognize it.
What does it mean that I cannot advance? Do I see that the road before me is blocked? If I haven’t corrected myself yet on the previous level, I cannot advance and climb the mountain a few meters further, but the guards help me and point me at the problematic point. They are there in order to protect me, to hasten me, to bring me closer, and to help me reach the necessary discernments. Everything is in a person’s favor and for his correction.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/2/13, “The Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot”
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Question: How do the guards guard me?
Answer: Let’s imagine a corrected world. A policeman, a guard, a teacher, and several other people come to you and start telling you what is wrong with you, and you are surprised and don’t agree with them.
But they say: “You are judging according to old standards. It is true that a month ago there were different conditions, and so then we didn’t have any complaints against you. But now we see that your behavior is undesirable. If you go on behaving like this and don’t correct yourself, then gradually your behavior will turn from undesirable behavior to intolerable.”
“You must correct your attitude towards the environment. Everyone suffers since they cannot advance because of you. You are delaying the general correction and do not allow everyone else to reach a good life! They are ready to do everything, but you don’t respond, so what can you do? You have to subdue yourself before the environment, to connect to it, to be correctly integrated with the others, and thus reach the end of correction. We speak for everyone, they have told us to talk to you and to tell you what is wrong with you.”
This is how a police car or a public representative comes to you and tells you all this, they worry that you may go on living like you have been living so far and that you may not advance. After all, the demands, the Reshimot (spiritual genes) are constantly renewed, revealing a new world, but you see it like you did before, and for you nothing changes. This means that you are on the “animate” level, and with regard to the spiritual world you are even on the level of “still nature.” You simply float with the currents of life wherever they take you, and this is wrong.
On the advanced levels, the guards and the policemen come to you and point out the fine details and special conditions that you have to pay attention to, but cannot identify. Then they tell you that you have to go down to that level. There is no place for you in this “neighborhood,” and there is no time to wait. You have to leave the city and move to the suburbs, to a neighborhood of thieves, and live among criminals.
You resent this, “How can this be!” But they tell you that you are not worthy of living among good, corrected people who are open to one another, since you don’t behave like them. You thought that you were worthy! But the guards tell you that they have checked and seen that you are not… there is nothing they can do.
At that moment you resent this and are angry at everyone, but later you look at things objectively and agree that it is really so, and that you are not worthy of living in this place with your wife and kids.
I must constantly adapt myself to an increasingly more advanced generation and even set an example for others. This is what Baal HaSulam says in his article “The Last Generation.”
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/2/13, “The Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot”
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Rabash, “What is Thou Shall Not Add and Thou Shall Not Detract, in the Work”: The matter of “right” means to the right.
This means that a person should believe above reason and depict to himself as if he has already been awarded with God’s faith, feeling it in his body, seeing and feeling that the Creator rules the whole world and is totally good and benevolent. And although when he sees things within reason, he sees the opposite, in any case he has to work above reason and he should feel as if he already feels it in his body, that that’s the way things actually are, that the Creator rules the world as the good and the benevolent.
And he feels that he has the power to say to the Creator, “You have chosen us of all the nations, You have loved us and wanted us,” since he already has something to be grateful for with regard to the Creator. And according to the importance of spirituality that he feels, he arranges the Creator’s praise.
After a person already feels the importance of spirituality, which is called, “a person should always arrange the Creator’s praise,” then it is time for him to move to the left line and check how he really feels the importance of the King within reason, and whether he is really ready to work only for the Creator’s benefit.
And when within reason he sees he has no strength for this, and that the importance of spirituality is only above reason for him, this calculation can generate a deficiency for him, pain and sorrow since he is in a state of absolute lowliness, and he can then pray a true prayer from the bottom of his heart, for what he lacks.
A person should imagine two points: to what extent he is “within reason” and “above reason.” Then he will really want to rise “above reason” and draw himself to the upper level and come to a prayer. Thus he can advance.
A person should examine his current state and rise above it in “faith above reason,” in order to see that the Creator, the ruler, is good and benevolent in everything a person has. He examines himself in every way and justifies the Creator “above reason.”
Then he checks whether “within reason” he is also ready to reach the same conclusion and sees that it isn’t so, since his reason is based on what his eyes see. Then a prayer grows in the gap between what he sees “within reason” and “above reason.”
But this is true if a person feels happy. The right prayer in spirituality is made of opposite discernments. On the one hand, I should be happy since I am in contact with the Creator and I have someone to turn to. I am sure that He will help me and that He is good and benevolent and everything is fine!
I never ask the Creator to improve my situation, but I ask Him to change my perception of my situation. It is because now I see that I am in a sea of absolute love and that there is nothing else besides that. But because I am not corrected I see something else. We have never left the world of Ein Sof (Infinity), but we have to determine the right attitude towards it.
Each time new details are revealed to me, I have to change my attitude, which means my intention. This is why I pray to the Creator to correct me, to allow me to see Him as revealed mercies. It is a very important moment. I shouldn’t ask the Creator to correct my state, as if I ask the Creator to correct His actions, but rather to correct me so that I will see His creation as it actually is, which means only in a positive way.
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From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/1/13
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Question: Who are the “guards?” Are they some forces that throw a person backward if he isn’t ready for the next level?
Answer: A person should create such guards for himself. It is written: “Make yourself guards and policemen in all your gates.” If you are thrown without your knowing, then it isn’t guards and policemen. Guards and policemen are those a person is in contact with and uses to check himself.
Guards and policemen are a person’s internal clarifications as to whether he is suitable or not suitable and what else he has to correct internally in order to get closer to the goal. It is a perpetual movement: a step to the right, a step to the left, when the Gevurot and the Dinim increase on the next levels.
A person discovers all this himself and asks the court for an internal trial. He wants to know what else can be done in order to advance. He checks his attitude towards the environment; he wants the environment to help him, to act on his side. This depends on how strong his connection with the environment is.
All the 125 spiritual degrees are determined according to how strongly a person adheres to the environment. Now too, we see ourselves through the environment. If I didn’t feel anything outside myself, I wouldn’t feel that I exist. One individual cannot exist; he feels that he exists since he feels the difference between himself and the environment. This is also how the concept of life and death is determined.
The final corrected state means the absolute, inclusive connection between everyone and the return to one soul, without any distinction, in which the light of NRNHY is revealed equally for everyone, becomes infinite and limitless, identically for all the parts of the soul. This is why I always check myself with regard to the environment.
If I attain such a level in which I constantly check and assess myself according to the degree of my connection with the friends and see my advancement only in this, seeing this as the only measuring tool, it means that I am already at the beginning of the spiritual ladder.
Unless I discover these guards and policemen inside me and clarify all the conditions my level presents to me, meaning, until I discover what is considered good and regret that I haven’t reached it, I will not start looking for the means to fulfill these conditions that will eventually fulfill them: Until I go through all these stages, I will not make one step forward.
The guards and policemen become my spiritual vessels.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/2/13, “The Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot”
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