Question: How does the need for a scientific approach go with the principle of “We will do and we will hear?”

Answer: These goes together very well. “We will do and we will hear” is a pure scientific approach which exists in true science. This is because science constantly reveals phenomena that were previously concealed from us. We had no factual knowledge nor connection to them. All we had was our desire to reveal, develop our perception and abilities, in order to grasp new, additional phenomena, test them on us, on our own flesh, on our senses, and register them. Relying on this data, we gathered a more robust image of reality where we exist.

The same approach operates in Kabbalah. It is a science just like a regular science as it is our aspiration to reveal a new reality. There is no difference.

However, in the regular natural sciences of this world, we are not required to change our senses. We only need to expand them. The research instrument already exists: It is our desire to receive pleasure. We simply must expand it through different microscopes, telescopes, and other tools that raise our sensitivity toward previously concealed phenomena.

The entirety of reality divides into two halves: reception and bestowal. In order to check, examine, and study the reality that is based on bestowal instead of reception, we primarily need to arm ourselves with the corresponding instruments of perception (Kelim, vessels).

It is no longer enough to simply expand our senses. We need to build new organs based on bestowal from scratch. This is called birth in the spiritual world.

In the spiritual world, a different nature where we study the force of bestowal, our ability to test, examine, and register data depends on the expansion and development of our senses. It happens the same way as with our egoistic organs of perception when we build different auxiliary tools.

This is how a higher science called Kabbalah appears. It is referred to as “higher” because it works with the force of bestowal in nature, while the sciences of our world examine the egoistic force of reception.

However, in the end, we discover that there is only one source for both the force of reception and that of bestowal. This is because this division only exists in relation to us; we divide reality this way. However, in truth, they both come from one source: the upper force.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/27/2011, “The Wisdom of Kabbalah and Philosophy”

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There is an ancient connection between Kabbalah and philosophy. Philosophy seems to be the foundation of all the sciences. There were no separate sciences a thousand years ago such as mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology, geography, and astronomy. A scientist did everything and was even a doctor at the same time.

This general knowledge was called philosophy which translates as “love of wisdom,” knowledge. Johann Reuchlin, a famous philosopher of the sixteenth century wrote, ”My teacher Pythagoras, the father of philosophy, took his teaching from Kabbalists … he was the first who translated the word Kabbalah, unknown to his contemporaries, to the Greek word philosophy.”

The connection between Kabbalah and philosophy, and all the sciences in general is very deep. Really, science is already a part of the revelation of the Creator, His actions, which are not just revealed through the sensations of the body, but through the mechanism in us which is called “man” and already pertains to the human degree, even though this is still a person of this world, nevertheless.

Before its connection to Kabbalah, ancient science was developing on the animate degree. It was only after Kabbalah became revealed to the first man, Adam HaRishon, and developed for twenty generations until Abraham and on, as it revealed the Creator’s actions, that the modern science of this world could appear upon this foundation.

We as though do not see a connection between the one and the other. After all, regular science is built on the basis of the human mind and sensations, an egoistic desire to receive pleasure where we reveal the world, and seems to be disconnected from Kabbalah and the spiritual world. However, in reality, this is not the way it is because it examines the same actions of the Creator, which only become revealed in a different, egoistic matter.

These are the Creator’s actions which point to the connection between the parts of reality. For this reason, even the regular, natural sciences are also a sort of a revelation of the Creator, only on our earthly level.

This is because nothing but the Creator exists in the universe, and everything that we reveal are His actions. Only we can reveal Him in our egoistic desire, and then this is called natural sciences. We can also reveal Him in the desire to bestow, and then this is called Kabbalah.

However, it is revelation of the Creator in both cases. The Creator is one, and He does not divide in two. It is we, the researchers, who divide Him this way, depending on the desires where we perceive Him.

From the Creator’s side there are no separation; all the divisions happen in relation to us. This is how we get the eternal problem of how one thing connects to another and how they influence each another.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/27/2011, “The Wisdom of Kabbalah and Philosophy”

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Question: What does it mean to constantly accelerate in relation to the spiritual goal, and how can we “push on the gas” as much as possible now, before the convention?

Answer: In the spiritual space, acceleration is movement. That’s because if you don’t make a certain action now, then none of your previous merits will count and you will lose all of the speed you have accumulated until now by all the previous actions. The spiritual space is like an empty cosmos where there is no other system from which to start counting, and if you don’t accelerate then you don’t move at all.

A constant state is equivalent to zero. Even if you are flying at the speed of 10 miles a second, this is not considered motion and it’s the same as if you were just hanging in the air. In the spiritual sense acceleration means speed, and in essence it is the action.

Therefore, there are no “gaps” between spiritual actions. Wherever one action ends, that is where the next action immediately begins, just like during the birth of spiritual Partzufim. This indicates that a person’s attitude to the group and the group’s attitude to him must be such that it will constantly awaken him to act and always renew his desire.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/28/11, Preparation to the WE! Convention

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From “The Principles of Global Education”: The essence of our development lies in the recognition of evil.

We are able to perform act after act only according to our recognition of evil, to the degree of our sensitivity to good and evil. Everything depends on the level to which our properties allow us to measure the difference between them.

My desire is like a measuring instrument. Its pointer moves one measurement if, say, I change the inner tension or weigh something on my inner scale. There are scales with divisions of 100 pounds for cars and precise scales which measure milligrams.

My measurements also depend on sensitivity. As soon as I feel within myself some gap between the two forces, it triggers my action, my response. I feel bad because of this gap; I am unsatisfied and concerned. Then an impulse emerges within me and it pushes me back towards the point of balance where we originate from.

This is why everything depends on the recognition of evil. I have to intensify this feeling again and again by pushing the “button” which is fine-tuned more and more. Just like the initial point of creation felt that it differs from the Light until this dissimilarity turned into the darkness of their complete oppositeness, the same way I raise the sensitivity to the Light within myself in order to ultimately achieve correction.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/37/2011, The Principles of Global Education

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Question: What is the connection between the natural balance and the unification of people?

Answer: The unification of people is the highest form of balance in nature. In general, the natural balance is the integration of all of its forces. In the end they all become expressed in man, on the human level.

The true problem is not in the environment around us, not the tsunami, the earthquakes, the volcano eruptions or explosions in the sun, and not the problems in the vegetative and animate levels of nature, and not even the diseases of our bodies. The entire problem lies on the human level – its imbalance or balance covers all the other forces operating below. By balancing ourselves out, we will balance out all the rest of nature from the still to the animate levels.

Man is not supposed to do this instinctively or by force, but consciously, aware, by his own desire, in spite of his own temperament and his own nature, in spite of the extremely powerful forces of hatred, passion, pride, and love of power. That is how he builds himself. It doesn’t happen by balancing the forces of nature around him, but his own inner forces, his essence.

After all, I am the one who hates, I want to lie, steal, kill, and all the rest. In the end, I want to rule over others in various ways. But then I form my new self in balance with this aspiration. I build an inner model of a balanced state of two opposite forces, which is called my “soul.”

Through the prism of this balance I already look at the world differently. I acquire a new perspective. I no longer want to use the world to satisfy my desires, but on the contrary, from my balance I look for balance in it. Then I see that the whole world is balanced. It turns out that the whole world, inside and outside, is a balanced expression of two forces.

That is how I attain peace and conciliation. The state I experience is the soul filled by the clothing of the upper Light. The sensation of balance of two forces gives me a new reality.
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/28/11 on Global Education

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Prayer for the society is the aspiration to bestow to the other, which gets born in the person. At first, he feels that only his group, its inner desires, is “the other.” But then he realizes that the entire world is unified and filled with the Shechina, the Divine presence. And then the spiritual world, the upper reality becomes revealed to him.

Now he begins to understand why he had to go through hatred. This is how the process of his development was arranged from Above. Instead of fortifying his egoism through the society and using the others for his own profit, he had to come to the group in order to lower himself, to bow before the force hidden in the society, to develop the desire to connect with this force of bestowal, unite with it, and simply drawn in it.

This is the prayer of the many since he asks for peace for this society, meaning that he aspires to reach the property of bestowal, until he establishes such a connection with this society that there remains no difference between them, and they merge into one whole.

When a person acquires the form of the society, completely unites with it, this signifies their unity, “mating while striking” (Zivug de Hakaa) since untimately, this unity works against his egoism. He strikes his ego in order to unite with the others and in that extent builds his spiritual Partzufim, the forms of unification, and acquires the Creator’s properties.

The form he conceived in his head now becomes realized in him; it spreads in his “body,” fills it, and assumes the form of the Upper One. By receiving the intention “for the sake of bestowal” and clothing in the Light of Hassadim (Mercy), the desire to enjoy becomes fit to receive fulfillment, the Light of Hochma (Wisdom): the Creator’s form.

The Light of Hassadim lacks form; it spreads in breadth, as the gifts of a “generous hand”: for all and without any restriction. But when the Light of pleasure, Hochma, starts to clothe the desire, it imparts it with a certain form of bestowal called “the name of the Creator,” the form of the Upper One. Thus, by virtue of Zivug de Hakaa man attains the Creator.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/27/11, Preparation for the WE! Convention

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On one hand, nature treats me lovingly. Even if I can’t see this with the naked eye, when penetrating a bit deeper, I can see its true attitude. People who are close to nature feel that it is entirely good.

At the same time, externally it is very harsh, similar to a loving but demanding father who scrupulously takes a child through the phases of development. That is how we must view what is happening. Otherwise we won’t understand good and evil and will only get confused.

If I want to feel nature this way, then I must reject the externality and immerse myself inwards. Precisely from nature’s external attitude, which seems negative to me, I must start to develop based on the realization of evil. In reality nature is showing me a negative of myself. By correcting it, I will enter inside and will feel its love.

All the negative external phenomena are intended to show me what I must correct in order to attain love. It’s exactly how parents raise a child: The father looks at him with a strict gaze and the mother is nervous. It’s very hard to recognize their love. But this is the discernment that I have to be very sensitive to while developing the inner feeling of the realization of evil.

Perhaps I don’t notice the negative. The parents are only giving me hints, but I don’t understand what they want from me or perhaps I don’t feel that they need something from me at all. Instead I continue fooling around. Then they tell it to me directly, but I still don’t listen. At the end, after all the persuasions and warnings, the troubles start, and that is something I understand very well. “Why didn’t you tell me that right away?” I wonder.

This is the problem of all of us and of each of us separately – a lack of sensitivity. If I now felt what I lack in order to discern nature’s love, then I would immediately correct myself. Therefore, we have to take care of just one thing – our receptivity to the realization of evil between us and to the love coming from the Creator.

We don’t lack examples. Open your eyes and you will see them. So what is standing in our way? The problem is that the world does not imbue us with a basic attitude to goodness. I need a society or environment in which I will reveal goodness and compare it to my own evil.

The realization of evil begins the moment a person feels that he is worse than those around him. He sees them all as interconnected and united by love for one another, but he cannot join them and feel that he shares that unity. This gap is the evil that a person has to reveal and correct.

By realizing the evil and by trying to correct it, a person discovers that he does not have the slightest shred to grab hold of or the slightest access. He clearly sees that the friends are united and he is separated from them, and he does not see any opportunity to join them, having no loophole into their unity. For that he needs the Light that reforms. Only the Creator’s help will save him.

That is where we finally come in contact with the unity of Israel, the Torah, and the Creator.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/27/11 on Global Education

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Many people think that spirituality is an ordinary method to fulfill oneself. A person thinks that very soon the Creator will be revealed to him, and then he will be able to get the whole world at his feet. But it is a false idea because in truth, spirituality is bestowal.

In other words, I am fulfilled not by what is being revealed to me, but rather, if I open myself correctly, I get filled with bestowal. After all, the Light never enters a Kli, desire, directly but only when dressed in the Reflected Light. Hence, I must become a giver and enjoy bestowal. But how do I accomplish that?

To achieve this, a person needs the environment that would influence him so that he would think that bestowal is a very profound, exalted property, that it is fulfillment. Everybody must elevate the value of bestowal in the eyes of the friend, passing to him his part of the mutual guarantee thereby. And then, thanks his awareness of the importance of this goal, a person receives illumination that assists him in spiritual advancement.

But on top of that, a person must understand that it is a game since from his present condition, he cannot see the goal. And hence, all of this work is regarded as ascending to the state which for now is unclear, imperceptible to him, opposite to what he is able to comprehend today. In other words, a person should constantly think about the importance of some false goal. But it is false only for him because it opposes his egoistic desire.

Therefore, the environment must educate a person, provide the correct scale of values for him, and be fairly strong in order to override his egoistic nature. As to the person, he must assist his environment, lower himself before it, submit to, and literally dissolve in it. And then he will be able to receive from it the importance of the goal, despite his ego that unfolds in him more and more.

Otherwise, he won’t be able to advance since there are two forces that participate in it: the force that rejects and one that attracts. The force of rejection, resistance, surfaces naturally: It is his ego. And the question lies only in whether he will manage to oppose it with the force greater in value, the force of the environment that will draw him into spirituality.

Therefore, everyone must be preoccupied with how to arrange the right environment for oneself. This is what is implied in what Rabash describes as: “We have gathered here to rise to the degree of man.”
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/4/2011, Writings of Rabash

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Question: How can an egoistic heart ask for bestowal?

Answer: Of course, an egoistic heart is unable to ask for bestowal. It prays for something that it deems better for itself. It doesn’t know how to pray in any other way.

However, the nature in which a person exists is one thing, but how he uses that mechanism is a different matter. Even though he is an egoist and his prayer and attitude to others are egoistic, nevertheless he arranges this entire mechanism in such a way that lets him attract the Light that reforms.

How does the Torah, the Light that reforms act? I am an egoist and I plan on using it egoistically, but through that I activate a mechanism that attracts Light to me that turns me into the opposite of what I am today. This means that this Light returns me back to its source.

If I was already asking for bestowal on my own, then I would not need to be brought back to the source. Everything would already be clear. However, everything is arranged so that even when I shout for bestowal, this is still reception in disguise.

The same thing happens on every level. When I ascend to a certain level and check: What did I pray for? What did I do? What love for the neighbor did I talk about? What I find is that it was all egoistic. What seemed like holiness on the lower level appears as “garbage” when you look at it from above.

But there is a special mechanism of ascent: the connection between AHP of the upper one and Galgalta Eynaim of the lower one. If I face darkness and confusion, and I lower myself before the society that helps me to do so, then I attract the Light that reforms. I mix Malchut with Bina – mercy that reigns in the upper one, with the force of judgment that is in me. That is how I attain my correction.

Therefore, we are not required to be holy from the beginning, but only to organize everything to the extent we are able in order to attract holiness to us. Before that, I am opposite to it! Otherwise, how would it be possible to correct yourself after the breaking?

Every time we receive any new state, all the previous states are erased from our memory so as not to confuse us. The current state is also not very clear to us and from this darkness we have to start arranging everything so as to attract the influence of the upper force to us – the influence of the higher level, the quality of bestowal that we don’t have. We continuously receive a new force and become a new creation.

This is what the common prayer is all about. It is the prayer to acquire the force to be included in society and to feel care for the neighbor.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/27/11, Preparation to the WE! Convention

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Question: Could you tell us about your intention while reading The Book of Zohar?

Answer: Kabbalists teach us what the intention should be. Every person has to actualize what he read to the extent he understands it.

It is impossible to tell you about the intention. This is something that cannot be explained to another person since the intention comes from a person’s inner state which he reveals.

I am in a state that’s unknown to me. I reveal it as it unfolds inside of me. From this state that becomes revealed to me, I create the intention.

In essence, it is impossible to clothe this intention into words. There are no words for it. That’s because it includes a person’s inner desire (Hissaron) and the degree of his connection with the upper reality through his attempts to find the means that will bring him to the highest possible closeness to the Host, the Creator – to adhesion (Zivug de Hakaa) with Him.

What are those means? They are the books, the teacher, and the group. A person includes everything that he understands and feels from their entire sum total, and through them attains unity with the Creator.

All of these means have to be present. If you miss even one of them, then you don’t have the right contact. And in addition, each of them must be properly balanced with the others.
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/28/11, The Zohar

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