The Book of Zohar, Chapter “Truma” (Donation), Item 75: One who wishes to set out to the road should rise while it is still night, watch by observing the hour on the east side, and see in a vision the letters that strike the firmament, one going up, the other going down. This is the sparkling of the letters with which the heaven and earth were created.

Of course, all these phenomena take place within us, within each person, and we have to look for and recognize them inside ourselves. We are talking about the connection between us, its kinds and nature. This is how Kabbalists talk about it. After all, there is nothing else.

Ultimately, we reveal the perfect network of connection between us called Malchut of Infinity and on the way, see it partially, in various forms. Consequently, when we reach the final correction, there are no more forms. Everything is dissolved in the white Light. As it is written, “He and His Name are one.”

However, for the time being, there are all kinds of forms, properties, worlds, and concealments hiding perfection from us, which we reveal once again through the structure of all these worlds. Concealment was created from above downward; from below upward, revelation takes place by the same steps, in the same worlds.

That is why we should try to imagine the entire text in the connection between us: what it talks about and about what forms of connection.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/31/2011, The Zohar

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All that occurs after the four phases of the Light’s expansion in the will to receive is nothing but the creature’s reaction to its discovering the Creator. The entire creation outside of Malchut of the world of Infinity is its impressions of what it finds inside itself, which is regarded as the worlds, expansion from above downward, the breaking, and returning back up, from below upward.

Everything unfolds solely inside Malchut, and beyond this, there is nothing else. The entire reality is made of emotions and feelings, Malchut’s response, until it reaches the final clarification, the “End of Correction.”

The tip of the letter "Yod,” containing the active, abstract force of the Creator, is where His action ends. It results in the following: matter, form clothed in matter, the abstract form, and the essence. Besides that, the upper one, the creative force, doesn’t work on the creature any further. His job was finished once He stamped His name on it.

As to the lower one, it has to find this Name with the help of all other names, meaning its experiences and impressions. Whenever I feel that I exist as a consequence of the act of the upper force, what I experience is the Creator’s name.

This is why He has so many names. The entire Torah is the holy names of the Creator, even Pharaoh and the other wicked such as Bilam and Balak. There is nothing else except for what matter and Light experience together since the Light has imprinted matter with it. When all of this unfolds, it will be the "End of Correction."

This is why in the world of Infinity, where “He and His Name are one,” the Light imprints desire with its entire form, and this is all He can give to Malchut. Further on, Malchut works on its own with the Light that it now contains.

It conceals itself so as not to feel Him, then disappears from Him, connects with Him, and creates all possible combinations with Him regarded as Partzufim. However, all of this is a game it plays by using the screen, the game with the infinite Light that fills it.
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From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/31/2011, Talmud Eser Sefirot

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Until the Light spreads in the will to receive by the four phases of HaVaYaH, the creative force will not unfold in the creature. Therefore, the authentic desire of pleasure will not be revealed, which otherwise allows the determination of what this creature is, what it wants, and how it responds to the Creator.

Hence, HaVaYaH is regarded as the holy name of the Creator. Why is it holy if a name is always what the created being assigns? This name is holy because only in this form, after all the four phases of the Light’s impact on desire, does the Creator’s property unfold in the creature, which affects and imprints His form in it. This is why it is called the Creator’s name. This imprint, left by the Light within desire, imparts desire with the form of the Light.

The Light as it is has no shape, and there is no way to describe what it is and how it looks. It is something transient and unknown, some kind of abstract form. How, then, can the creature learn anything about it, connect and exchange impressions with it, and form a relationship with it?

For this to take place, the Creator, the very tip of the letter “Yod,” the leading creative force, aims its influence at the matter created by Him “from absence” and starts imprinting Himself in it. Consequently, similar to playdough or clay, this matter starts showing the Light’s stamp. Matter begins to demonstrate to us what the Light is, which cannot reveal itself otherwise.

All world forces are related to the Light. It runs through everything such as electricity, magnets, and nuclear and sub-nuclear reactions. We think that there are a variety of forces in the world, but, essentially, everything is underlain by this single force of Light that we can’t see. We see it only in action, and when the Light’s actions are revealed in matter, it is described as the Creator’s name, the Light’s expression of itself in the matter.

This is a wonder that we are unable to comprehend. How can the Creator’s shape, His very own property, unfold in the matrix of HaVaYaH, its creation? To make this possible, the creature has to undergo all four phases of development. Only at the final, fourth one can it begin to understand and recognize itself.

But how will it recognize itself? It will do so while coming to know the Creator, and that is what the creature is.
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From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/31/2011, Talmud Eser Sefirot

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We are entering a new world that is abandoning luxuries and restricting itself to rational consumption, to what a regular person needs. We won’t be able to produce washing machines that go out of order in three years, while today it’s being done intentionally so that instead of fixing it, one would buy a new one.

We’ll have to move into a new state of existence. That’s what the governments of the world must understand. But how are they going to keep their nations pacified? How will they educate and explain all the facts to them?

This is why we must prepare a package of educational resources that stands on a firm foundation and demonstrates this with absolute clarity that we will offer to everyone. There is no other option: We must study the new world.

You won’t have to go to work. You will be going to school instead, but not for the sake of learning. You will study how to receive real pleasure from life. Is it worth it? You won’t be able to continue working anyway; nobody needs you anymore. The Great Depression was part of the development, an intermediate decline in the cyclic process, but today it all has changed. We are running out of resources. We’ve come to the threshold of a new phase. Plenty has been written about it.

Hence, our job is to inform the public that the old era has come to its end. There aren’t and won’t be any more jobs. How will people make a living then? Well, let’s make only goods that we need and just enough for everyone, while we learn how to distribute them properly and how to live in the new world.

We have to tell them about human evolution and history, the growth of egoism up to its final stage, the stage of integration and the laws by which the integral system operates, the interconnection of all its parts, and how reciprocity and the real connection unfold in it. This is our only option for this is what nature is forcing us to do.

We are supposed to come to a state of balanced consumption, like the animals who take from nature only as much as they need to sustain themselves. They do it instinctively, without calculating, whereas we must structure our relationship with nature consciously, sensibly, through learning, restricting ourselves, and taming our evil inclination, simply because we understand that we can’t afford to do otherwise.

Yet, how will we satisfy our egos when man wants to consume the world and he is asked to be happy with just food and shelter? “Is that all? What am I, a bear in a cave, a bird in a cage?” "Certainly not, you will receive even greater fulfillment than you wished for before, but never got. It can be done. Let’s find out how to get there."

Thus, we obligate the public to learn, lead them toward it. No one will want to do it unilaterally; everybody seeks immediate gratification. So, we have to prepare a package of educational resources and a system of public education. It will start slowly. Right now, we can’t openly tell this to the world, but it’s time we devise and disseminate materials about what’s causing a crisis. This will shed light on the solution. After all, there is nothing else out there. Like it or not, you will have to do what you have to do.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/31/2011, "The Peace"

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Question: During the reading of The Zohar, I feel very strong disturbances and hardly feel the text itself. How can I overcome this obstacle?

Answer: Everything depends on the persistence in one’s thoughts. During my life, I have talked to many people suffering from serious illnesses. They fathom their illnesses in great details and are familiar with all the medical terms known only to the specialists in this area. Why? Their lives depend on that. The desire to survive forced people to learn the causes of their illnesses and to seek remedies and various methods of treatment.

We don’t fully realize that we are dependent on our understanding of the “disease,” on the search for its cure. I shouldn’t rely on anyone else; I have to invest all of my effort into finding the cause of my illness, the remedy appropriate for my condition so that finally this remedy takes effect.

If people really feel danger, this forces them to learn how to save themselves. You are saying: “I hardly feel anything…” True, you do not feel the “disease.” Thus, the group has to work harder on you, and you should try to be persistent in your thoughts and pray that you will be shown from Above that we are talking about you.

The abyss between the world of Infinity and your current state can be seen in this obvious demonstration that The Zohar is now showing within you. Imagine this: If you were corrected now, you would feel the world of Infinity, the entire Zohar would be revealed within you, and you would see everything. To sense this, you lack only the vessels of perception, the corrected desires. At least realize what is happening.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/24/2011, The Zohar

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Question: What is so special about the Torah that even The Book of Zohar is just a commentary on it?

Answer: The records that Moses made on parchment are the earthly expression, through material symbols, of spiritual actions of Light on desire. Moses wrote down everything he taught his students in a book. Over the course of 40 years of wandering in the desert, they wrote down the whole Torah, going through the entire process in record, as well as in bodies, and in spirituality. This is the entire path from the Egyptian exile (earthly and spiritual), through the desert (earthly and spiritual), and into the land of Israel (earthly and spiritual). All of this came true in the connection between the root and the branch. Moses expressed this entire process in this concrete, symbolic form.

The Zohar expresses the same process on a different level, in a different form because the general desire to enjoy that the Creator created had by that time advanced several steps forward and was perfected by the influence of the Light. Therefore, this desire, which went through ascents and descents, the destruction of the First and Second Temple, the exile, and then reached the last breakage before the last exile, had to be given the method that is appropriate for the end of the exile, for our time.

That is why The Book of Zohar was written, whose authors were the successors of many generations of Kabbalists, starting from Abraham until the destruction of the Temple. Rabbi Shimon was the student of Rabbi Akiva, who revealed a great Light, and therefore he was able to express this in The Book of Zohar.

The Torah itself is divided into two parts: oral and written. This comes from the difference between Zeir Anpin and Malchut. Zeir Anpin of the world of Atzilut is the “oral Torah,” while Malchut of the world of Atzilut is the “written Torah.”

The Torah is the revelation of Light. The Light that comes to Malchut contains everything that is necessary for changing Malchut. But this Light still hasn’t come true in practice, and is therefore called “the oral Torah.” For now this is work with the screens.

Under the influence of the same Light in Malchut, inner changes take place and are impressed in Malchut, this is called “the written Torah.” This is talking only about actions of the Light in the desires from the beginning of creation and until its end. That’s because there is nothing in existence besides desires.

Among these desires some feel that they exist by themselves, separate from all the others. This is us. These desires contain qualities that can help them on the path of correction. And that is why we receive a sensation of lacking, our own lack of correction, the realization of evil. This is how we perceive ourselves.

These are exactly the desires that need to be given “the Torah”—the instructions explaining how they can participate in their own corrections out of their own free choice, how they can attract the Light by wishing to become corrected faster, instead of waiting for the Light to come and shake them up.
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/29/11, Shamati
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Question: People can understand the need to make concessions to one another, but how can you explain the Light of correction to a regular person?

Answer: The Light is the quality of bestowal, the upper force that is present in nature, which advances us, gives us life, corrects us, and moves us forward. Throughout the millennia of man’s existence on earth (without considering the millions of years of development of the still, vegetative, and animate levels of nature) we developed coercively, by means of the force hidden within nature. There is a certain program inside of it, an engine that operates by that program, setting all of creation in motion and causing its development.

Scientists are revealing that 15 billion years ago our universe began to develop as a result of the Big Bang. That is to say, the universe contains a developmental force. And now this force continues to develop us further, which is called “the natural course of history” (Beito).

However, we have the opportunity to develop “faster than time” (Ahishena), not by means of the harsh force of nature which pushes us to develop with a “strong arm,” through “judgement and restriction,” but by awakening “mercy” upon us, as it is written, “As He is merciful, so you shall become merciful.”

This means that I awaken good forces of development in nature. If I agree with the development, desire it, and aspire to the same goal myself, awakening the desire inside of me even before nature starts putting pressure on me, then I will feel good and comfortable! I will merit understanding and will shorten my path. In essence, this is all that we have to do!

We have to run forward ourselves, like a mouse running away from a cat. When a person becomes wiser, he understands that the developmental press is moving upon him. On the other hand, there are people who still don’t notice or feel this press that is catching up to them. That means it still hasn’t gotten close enough to them and does not evoke great suffering.

Imagine that you are running down a road and a huge press is chasing you, just about to crush you. If you already feel this, then you will look for a way to be saved from it. You have nowhere to run. On both sides of you there are buildings stretching out for many miles, and you are running down a narrow road between them, while the press is rolling forward right behind you. This is an astonishing picture…. You don’t want the press to squish you into the asphalt, do you?

Some people already feel that they are in this state, while others don’t feel it yet. Nevertheless, it’s all a matter of time. Maybe you feel good for now, like a person falling from the 10th story, and while passing the 8th floor he tells his neighbor who’s staring out the window, “How are you? Everything’s OK for now.” This is how the world is “OK” today, but it doesn’t understand it yet.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/30/11, Talmud Eser Sefirot

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We have only the desire to receive and the form of bestowal with which we must clothe desire time after time. This is man’s work which can only be performed by connecting to the group, the right environment, and assuming its form. There is no other place where I can learn the correct form which I need to assume.

The environment “sculpts” a person. By continually connecting to the group and performing his role, taking his place, in it, a person begins to assume the form of “Man.”

The group is like a template which imparts to a person the correct contours. The breaking of the vessels and the process of preparation are all that we need for everyone to seek out his own place, time after time, perfecting our efforts until we become a single whole.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/24/2011, “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah”

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Question: I can request only correction. Does this mean that I decide or define something myself?

Answer: I have the line of the Light and the line of the vessel. I build myself as the third line between them. I take as much as I can from the desire to receive and from the Light and build the final form, the sum of these forces (Σ).

This form is a human being. Even though the components are not mine, I have to combine them and decide the right combination. I decide this myself.

To do that, I first have to feel the shame that I do not resemble the Giver, determine the working material, and find the force that corrects it. I am required to create a human being within me, to desire that he become formed. I already have the forces and material. I have only to check the form, and I perform this check every time on the 125 degrees of similarity to the Giver.

I check myself relative to the upper one and identify my abilities. This is a very big job. Thanks to it, I begin to accept, feel, and understand Him. I “format” or “draw” myself in search of exact solutions. As a result, I become like the Creator, not according to superiority, but according to bestowal. In receiving in order to bestow, I make myself similar to Him.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/24/2011, "Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah"

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Question: On one of the lessons I heard you say that when we read The Book of Zohar, a kind of flow arises that connects us. How do we join this flow, despite the various disturbances that awaken during the lesson?

Answer: This happens gradually. You must get used to it, to exert a certain amount of effort, to discover how to approach the text, how to connect it to yourself, to the state in the group, to the world; to learn where you get confused and where you don’t.

You must unify yourself and the Torah in one. Then, to the extent of your desire to connect to the Torah which speaks of your inner state, you begin to receive the Inner Light contained in it, which influences you, allowing you to see within the system it describes.

This happens in the process of the study, when the Light (the Creator) teaches you. If you try to move straight toward the goal, as much as you can, to use the group and the study correctly, if you’re ready to relinquish your egoistic aspirations and plans at least a little, then the Torah teaches you—the subsequent spiritual states are revealed in you.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/31/2011, The Zohar

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