Writings of Rabash “Purpose of Society”
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The Book of Zohar – Selected Chapter “Beresheet (Genesis),” “And the Land Was Tohu (Chaos),” Item 17, Lesson 10
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Writings of Rabash, Letter #40
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We have done a great deal of preparation. We had great hopes and expectations, and we were in a wonderful embrace over the three days of the convention. All of this continues and will continue.
Yet, there are still people among us who consider this lesson to be the last. But will we not continue to meet at our daily lessons tomorrow? This is why there is no first or last lesson, but a continuous chain of our development.
It is only when we attain an even greater connection during our meetings that we must erase the attained connection, without dispersing the warmth we have attained that reigns between us. We must aspire toward an even greater sensation of immersion in the cloud of warmth, reciprocity, union, and common embrace and continue it in life.
As descents appear, we will connect them to the same embrace, making it even stronger than during the convention. After all, two forces must participate in spiritual birth: There is a force that forms us, restrains, and a force that pushes us out into the new world. We will not be born without their fight within us.
This is why we need to become accustomed to the feeling of love and contradiction. Becoming distant and coming together manifest in us simultaneously. We will experience our spiritual birth between them.
[62746]
From Lesson 8, The World Arvut Convention 12/8/2011
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The creature is the desire created by the Light. There is the source of the upper Light and filters that stand in the way to the desire and do not allow this enormous Light, which comes from the world of Infinity, to reach us. This Light gradually becomes dimmer, and at the end only a very slight glow reaches us.
The upper system that controls the desire is called the system of the worlds. This is simply an inanimate environment that restricts that Light of different kinds. It’s made in such a way that it already knows how to make itself suit the desire.
And desire is raw material. But the desire gets polished and acquires various forms through a multitude of actions which it performs under the direction and guidance from Above. The actual desire is simply the desire to enjoy, receive fulfillment, that changes and develops under the influence of Light from the source, the world of Infinity, which comes through the system of the worlds. Thus, there are three components: the world of Infinity, the system of its concealments (worlds), and the desire to enjoy that needs to be brought to a state similar to the world of Infinity.
The quality of absolute bestowal rules in the world of Infinity. On the other hand, absolute reception rules in this world, and these two qualities are completely opposite. We learn how the desire to enjoy acquires the form of bestowal. The desire to enjoy remains, but it acquires different forms: First of all, it learns the things it can enjoy. All these forms become included within it, and then they form into bestowal from their perceptions of the ways to enjoy.
We can’t do it any other way because initially we don’t even know the forms of enjoyment. We are like a baby who gives his pacifier to an adult wishing to please him. He only understands this pleasure, and he thinks that everyone else will also enjoy it.
In other words, initially an imprint is made in this animal body, a form, where it is possible to enjoy. And then we can turn this action of pleasure in a different direction, meaning in the direction of a fellow human being. And then it will be referred to as “bring enjoyment,” bestow.
This is why the system of the worlds must initially imprint the form of pleasures in this clay, this dough, or carve it in marble. And then it has to create an opportunity to turn these forms of individual pleasure into bestowal and to enjoy the ability to bestow.
The difference is that when a person receives for himself, he is isolated from others and only perceives his own desires and qualities, as if he existed alone. This state is called this world. But when a person comes out of himself and begins to bestow, he has no one to bestow to but the Creator, and he begins to perceive Him. As he plans to bestow to the Creator, he begins to understand what he bestows, who he bestows to, the pleasure he gives the Creator, and then he reaches His degree.
[62495]
From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/29/2011, TES
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Love towards friends is necessary for achieving the similarity with the upper force. To the extent that we connect with each other, we change our state.
All the time, we are in the state of creation and gradually reveal more and more of it, and thus advance. In essence, we return to the understanding and feeling of what it means to be similar to the Creator, and how to come from disparity to similarity. This is our path.
That is why, we never have bad states on the way, they are always in the direction of good. Every action, which we perform for connection, is aimed at the achieving of a good state, toward when we break the barriers that divide us, the walls of egoism, and inside the common circle reveal what happens there in reality.
Concealment, created by partitions, separating us from each other, is disappearing, and we connect more strongly. When these walls fall, which is called the end of correction (Gmar Tikkun), in our unity, we will reveal ourselves as one creature. Through this, we will achieve equivalence of form with the Creator, who is also One.
All the laws of the group and our corrections follow from here. All corrections are intended for the correction of these partitions, which should stop dividing us. And while we are all different, but despite these differences which we do not destroy, we rise above all the barriers, differences, and there reveal the Creator fully.
We are now in the final state, only this infinite spiritual state is concealed from us, and we see only a material group in front of us. But if we begin to connect with the group without any barriers that hinder our unity and connection, then it suddenly turns into a structure similar to the Creator.
The first time we can feel, instead of an average group a single formation, similar to the Creator, we discover His manifestation at least to a small measure. This means to rise above the Machsom to the first spiritual degree.
There are 125 degrees of ascent or the likeness with the upper force, the Creator, due to our connection with each other.
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Baal HaSulam, “The Essence of Religion and It’s Purpose”: It turns out that our final aim is to be qualified for adhesion with Him—for Him to reside within us. That aim is a certainty and there is no way to deviate from it, since His guidance supervises us in both paths, which are the path of suffering and the path of Torah.
There is an upper force that has created the desire to receive and has raised it. It gave the desire everything it needs to grow, but when it grew, it suddenly discovered that it feels bad, and that it actually doesn’t get what it desires. In its youth, while it was growing up everything was fine: It got everything that it desired. Then it desired more and received it. But now when it is grown, everything is different; it doesn’t get the filling automatically. On the contrary, the more it wants, the less it receives. So the desire thinks to itself: “Who or what is the cause of this bad feeling?”
Humanity is divided into several categories when it comes to this question. There are those ninety-nine percent who simply go on, attracted from the bad to the good, enjoying life as much as they can. There are those who go out searching for the truth, meaning looking for the reason for what is happening.
Humanity is trying to explain this contrast in the leadership that changes so dramatically when a person grows up. At first everyone treats him nicely until the real change comes and now everyone demands something from him and treats him badly. This contrast and this conflict are very confusing, and so there are those who begin to look for a solution. The upper force that has created the desire to receive and that has raised it to a great egoism can eventually bring it to the right state.
There are two forces that operate in reality and help us reach that state: there is the pulling force and the pushing force. The egoistic desire loves pleasures and hates suffering. In other words, it loves the filling and hates the emptiness. So it can be managed by these two states. When it is emptied, it runs away looking for a filling. When it is filled, it is drawn to it. By using these two reins we can do whatever we want with it.
But what’s the use if the desire totally obeys the Creator’s reins? After all, the inanimate, vegetative, and animate levels develop this way, so what’s the need for creation? After all, in this way there is no uniqueness and man is also led by pleasures and suffering in life. The originality and the uniqueness of creation, of the worlds, among the created beings can only be revealed in unique creatures that can operate between these two “reins.”
This means even if the desire totally obeys the upper guidance and has nowhere to run, as the forces totally surround him even if they are concealed. The main thing is that these creatures want to attain the actions: What are they? What are they for? Which desires do they affect? They want to attain their own system by themselves and according to it they begin to understand who manages their desires. Thus, according to the principle of “we know You by Your actions,” they attain the operating mind, the force that operates in creation.
So when we grow and discover the two forces that operate upon us, the positive force and the negative one, when we see the “reins” that control our running, it’s a good sign. It means that we have moved from the ninety-nine percent to the one unique per cent, for which creation was meant.
When we discover the Creator’s bestowal in the form of suffering and pleasure, good and bad, coldness and heat, hunger and satiation, we should understand that it’s all in order to make us aware that the Creator is the Absolute Good. The wisdom of Kabbalah is the wisdom for the revelation of the Creator, for the revelation of His actions. Therefore, we constantly study ourselves: “Who am I and what am I? All of reality including the group is inside me.” Eventually I discover that deep inside me it’s the Creator, the Absolute Good that operates inside me.
[61976]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/28/11
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Baal HaSulam, “The Essence of Religion and its Purpose“: He has created the creatures only to bestow upon them. Thus we learn that He has only a desire to bestow goodness, and it is utterly impossible that any harmfulness might be in His domain, which could emit from Him. Hence we have defined Him as “The Absolute Good.”
It is hard to accept this. After all we are living in our egoistic desire which has serious complaints about the source, the Creator, nature, or other things. The world in which I feel myself summons many complaints. Internally I can’t accept the fact that everyone else doesn’t obey me. I can’t accept the fact that infinite pleasure doesn’t constantly fill me. I only encounter problems all the time, so how can I accept the fact that the One who runs the world is good and benevolent?
If I could create the world by myself, I would do it in a totally different way: Everything that is in it would only be to serve me. But the world is the opposite, everyone sees it right to complain about creation. So on what grounds can we speak about the Creator as the Absolute Good? On the basis that He is the first and primordial.
The desire to receive was created and is prompted by abundance, by bestowal. The abundance, the bestowal, doesn’t need any preliminary factor. Therefore the term “first” can be characterized by one world only: wholeness. In other words, the “first” cannot have any deficiencies, no matter what. The wholeness generates only one deficiency: to expand the wholeness. Here there is also a big problem: Where does the Creator get such a desire from? Does He really lack anything? Yes, He lacks bestowal, giving.
Can we see it as a deficiency? Unfortunately we can’t grasp these concepts now. They are perceived as lack of evidence, since we lack the feeling, the understanding, and the acceptance. There is nothing we can do here, since until we enter the spiritual world we will not know how to check and how to measure them, not to mention of how to feel them. It will always be a “lame” explanation, so we can accept it to a certain extent, but not completely. We can’t understand that the Creator is the Absolute Good, and we can’t reach that without the influence of the environment that can provide us with everything that we need including that.
So if we eventually perceive our source as the Absolute Good, we have to see that all the problems and the defects are in us. We still have to reach this conclusion, and then another question will come up, are we all corrupt? Or are all the defects in me while the others are in a state of wholeness like the Creator?
My examination becomes more clarified. When I admit that it is only me who is imperfect, I begin to clarify: Where exactly am I not whole, in which desires, which relationships? And is it only in relation to the world? Or is it in relation to myself as well, with the group, with the Creator? And so I advance and go deeper and deeper and my examination always reveals the imperfection compared to the whole.
The greatest division is that the Creator is whole and we are not. In the second stage, I draw the line between myself and the perfect reality. Then I perform the next examination, according to the revelation of the vessels.
[61859]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/27/11, “The Essence of Religion and Its Purpose”
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Question: Can we get rid of the beliefs if we need to believe in something that we haven’t attained yet?
Answer: Abraham attained his degree after he had shattered all the idols. In the second degree he went into the “furnace.” At these stages a person detaches himself from all the imaginary connections between the “beastly” reality that he discovers in his five senses and the spiritual reality.
This is very difficult. You cannot get rid of the myths, the habits, and the prejudices completely until you enter the spiritual world. Having no choice, a person still imagines spirituality parallel to corporeality, which rules his desires, his attributes, and his feelings.
Only the revelation of the Light can help a person get rid of all the imaginings and the mystical images to which he is accustomed. Until then the “angels” and the “devils,” the “ghosts,” the Creator and the created being, the “halls” and the “heavens” will still be depicted as something external. Even if he understands that they are all forces, he still thinks that they operate on the outside and not inside him. He simply hasn’t discovered them inside of him yet.
So I have to bring them into me, to identify them as the forces of my soul. There is nothing else besides them, including what I feel now, including the group, reality, the Creator. I feel all this in my desires. I have no perception outside them. But we can live in this internal image only if we reach revelation. Only then will our attitude towards philosophy, beliefs, and myths and the wrong perceptions that we got used to change, but not before.
In the meantime a person can tie a red string around his wrist, meditate and imagine different things and even feel good by doing so, but only in the short term, on the corporeal level. He calms himself psychologically and acquires an imaginary sense of security….
But we are speaking about the real perception, about a qualitative internal change, when we correct ourselves and rise and thanks to this treat our problems correctly. After all, they come so that I will identify them and immediately change my attitude from receiving to bestowal.
But instead, I buy holy water and give to charity, etc. In other words I don’t correct the reason for the wrong that I feel in one of my desires, but rather buy myself a psychological compensation if I have the money for that, of course. This is absolutely contrary to the wisdom of Kabbalah, which points out the great harm that such methods are causing by only drawing a person away form correction
[61853]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/27/11
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Question: After two years of studying, I realize that intention is the main thing on the spiritual path. How do I overcome my unwillingness to become included into the group? It has suddenly pounced on me and won’t let me keep the intention.
Answer: Pay somebody to bring you to the lesson every day. Sign a commitment where you will lose something if you don’t perform certain tasks in the group. If you are capable of building your life only inside the corporeal framework, bind yourself to the group in the same way you are bound to your family or job so that a failure to fulfill obligations will lead to a real loss.
“Marry” the group and provide for it the same way you provide for your wife and children. A person must work on himself. You are waiting until you have a desire to take the spiritual path. Well, you may take your time. Such desire will never appear. On the contrary, it will become even easier to justify your idleness with a sober and realistic approach.
You probably will be sent more sufferings and spite toward this world. One way or another, something will happen. If your desire doesn’t burn now, then wait and see.
The world is going through such stages now that it is much easier for people to rise above everyday life. This is being done on purpose in order to help the spiritually weak layers of society come closer to the upper world. The current crises are required exactly for that purpose, but strong people are being given opportunities to fight their matter during times of material bloom and prosperity.
The spiritual world is built on freedom of choice. If a person doesn’t commit to the group and the group doesn’t commit to him, then he must not be pressured because he is not in the family. He hasn’t taken the burden. Thus, nothing can be done. He is free to make his choice.
What kind of requests can a person who has not bound himself physically to the group make? How can he ask the group to become an elevator raising him to a higher degree? It is silly to complain about a lack of desire. It is better to act physically. Catch a brief moment of bursting desire and sign an agreement with the group, which will obligate you later when desire ceases.
Put yourself into a hopeless position, trick yourself just like a bitter enemy, so as to continue with the path even when you don’t want to. Do you like your boss? Nevertheless, you go to work since you have no choice.
If we don’t work on binding ourselves hard to the group, we won’t be able to build a vessel of mutual guarantee. At the Arava Convention, we achieved an important preparatory step toward the December convention; we gained a common feeling. Now, we must sustain it. We must commit to holding onto this feeling with all our might, bring it to the convention, and with it, light up thousands of participants and the millions of people around the world who are connected to us.
To the degree that each person invests physically into this preparation, he binds himself to the group. It is not accidental that Kabbalists from the groups of Ramchal and the Ari signed customary agreements among themselves. After signing, you cannot escape. You must fulfill the obligation. The same happens in life: You sign an employment contract to receive salary. However, here, instead of money, you will receive a different kind of reward, a higher and more valuable one.
Let us hope to meet at the convention prepared and united. Then, we will be able to actually rise and become a Light for the entire world.
[61773]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/20/2011, “The Arvut (Mutual Guarantee)”
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Preface to The Book of Zohar, Item 22, Lesson 9
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Writings of Baal HaSulam “The Peace,” “Second Method: Two Authorities,” Lesson 3
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Question: When we try to realize the force that the upper degree sends to us, we discover that it’s impossible…
Answer: That’s absolutely correct. We are endeavoring the impossible, something that is beyond our ability.
Can we ask a donkey to sing us an aria from an opera? It is incapable of that both by its development and physical ability. But we are in a much more dire situation. A donkey at least has auditory and vocal faculties, while we don’t have anything from the spiritual world. We are absolutely cut off from it.
That’s because the spiritual world is the quality of bestowal. So how can we feel it in the egoistic desire? Can bestowal dress into reception? Can fire dress into water? Of course not.
Therefore, our enormous desire is not just aimed at an abstract idea, but at having the upper Light correct us. Three components must be welded in this desire: Israel, Torah, and the Creator. Stated differently: me, the group, and the upper Light. The Light is what corrects me; I will never achieve anything alone.
Therefore, at the Mutual Guarantee Convention, we raise MAN—a desire, a plea, a need for the upper force to correct us. This is the entire essence and objective of the convention.
[62266]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/1/11, “The Essence of Religion and Its Purpose”
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