Kabbalah Moments: Prayer
Posted on February 6th, 2011
Question: How can we tell whether we are working correctly? After all, sometimes the reward seems pleasant and sometimes unpleasant. So how can we tell?
Answer: You shouldn’t judge it by a sweet or bitter taste, but by the scale of “true versus false.” Only then can a person understand whether or not he advances.
You might suggest: “Then let’s make bitterness a criterion. The more bitter it is, the closer I am to spirituality.”
But where is this written? Why does it have to be precisely this way? On the contrary, it’s only in order to make an analysis that you should ascend above the bitter and sweet taste to truth and falsehood in order to discern them and merge with the truth. However, when merging with it, you have to attain the state where truth and sweetness will be one. You have to raise sweetness to truth so that “the darkness will shine as Light,” so the bitter will become sweet.
Then everything will unite in the truth. It is written that truth will be cast onto the ground and will grow through from the ground. In other words, the truth will grow through inside of you and it will already contain all the other details of perception: bitterness, sweetness, and falsehood.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/6/11, Writings of Rabash
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Question: Can we say that now, after the convention in Berlin, we are united?
Answer: We have reached a new state in our unity. I am happy about what took place in Berlin and after that in Paris. We have reached unity, cohesion. For the first time we discovered many friends in Europe who already understand the path and feel the development. I was really pleasantly surprised by some events.
Ahead of us we have an April convention in New Jersey. Let’s hope that we will come to a new degree of unity in the United States as well. Thus, by uniting during the conventions we will accumulate the necessary force for the revelation of the Creator to the creature.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/4/2011, “When the Creator Loves Man”
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Spiritual attainment comes very slowly because it is the manifestation of a new structure within a person. We cannot even imagine what it means to acquire a second nature. This does not exist and has never existed in our world, in the entire Universe; it has never happened over the entire course of history.
The nature that we acquire is built very gradually on the basis of many individual details and states, which appear inside us. This is the upper Light’s rigorous, slow, and incessant work upon us.
There is a latency period in the process of spiritual attainment whereby much work on the preparation of spiritual properties takes place within man. This literally represents a new birth.
But we are not just to be born additionally in the spiritual world; we need to go through changes on all the levels of our desire: 0 (Shoresh, root), 1 (Aleph), 2 (Bet), 3 (Gimel), and 4 (Dalet). Only then will we feel that something is happening to us. Until this last level 4 (Dalet), everything happens in an unclear manner that is concealed from us.
It is as if we were going from the zero point of creation to the state when our desire for the spiritual slightly begins to awaken. This is not even the actual desire; it is a certain understanding of this desire, a separation from whatever now exists in us. At first this happens in one’s sensations and then in the mind. This is how the upper Light influences us.
This is why it is unrealistic to expect for everything to happen in a second, even though one must wish for it with all his might. In other words, every moment must be the last one, and if he did not succeed, then let it be the beginning of the next moment.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/26/2010, Baal HaSulam, Letter 52
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"Introduction of The Book of Zohar," Article “The Donkey Driver,” Item 85: Rabbi Elazar and Rabbi Aba came down from their donkeys and kissed the donkey driver. They said, “What is all that wisdom that is under your hand, while you are driving our donkeys? Who are you?” He told them, “Ask not who I am, but I and you shall walk and engage in Torah, and each shall say words of wisdom to illuminate the way.”
Question: Is “the donkey driver,” the one who drives from behind, a necessary step on our path, or can he also walk in front of the donkey?
Answer: This changes in accordance with man’s attitude. In the beginning he goes in front, and his “donkey” goes behind. And then he understands that he advances through his “donkey” and not on his own, and this entire path consists of transferring the “donkey” from one degree to another with the help of the point of "human" within him. Then the “donkey” becomes important.
A person can easily master this path since “human” is a point of Bina, a point in the heart. If this point is not in him, it can easily rise since it came down specifically to take all the ego, the “donkey,” Malchut, the desire to receive pleasure, and transfer it up.
This is why what matters is not the two people, the sages walking along the road that The Zohar describes, but the “donkey” with its entire load. And if so, then "the donkey driver" is important. These two sages are merely a point trying to attain the goal. Granted, it is important, and this is man’s entire free will, the beginning of the work that he agrees with and its direction. But the realization of this work only happens through the “driver.”
If they don’t employ the Torah (the Light that Reforms) to acquire a connection with the upper force which descended to lead their ego up, they do not correct themselves, their path, and they do not ascend. In other words, they study the Torah on the same “donkey,” with its entire heavy load, with the help of the “donkey driver.”
It turns out that the “donkey driver” teaches them how to walk, where to approach and how. He becomes specifically the teacher of the sages, and not of the “donkey.” And this is why they can rise.
This is the mutual inclusion of Bina and Malchut. At first I think that what matters most is these two sages (the "human" within me that needs to rise). Then I begin to notice that this "human" is only needed to bring the “donkey” from the foot of the mountain towards the Creator’s palace.
Then I understand that what matters most is the “donkey driver,” and he must help me lead the “donkey.” Consequently I realize that I need the “donkey driver” so he would teach me.
This is how their roles and the importance of each one of them change. But at the end everything joins together: You go on the “donkey,” the “donkey” goes on you, and everything works out.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/10/2011, "Introduction of The Book of Zohar," Article "The Donkey Driver"
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Question: Mentally, everyone believes that he is ready and willing to unite with all, but when the time comes to actualize this desire, we fail.
Answer: You fail in only one thing: Each of you separately is ready for it, but together, you are not. Egyptian exile is unlike all others. Why was it through Joseph that they entered Egypt? It was Joseph (from the Hebrew word “Osef,” “gathers”) because he is the sum of all forces and foundations.
Evil is impossible to expose, even if everyone is willing. In order to achieve this, one condition has to be met: There has to be willingness to unite. Joseph’s brothers were righteous, and each of them wanted to serve the Creator, but they were unwilling to unite. They didn’t agree to link together in Joseph who is the ground for it.
But when they were forced to enter Egypt with Joseph’s help, they started to see how much they hated and resented the idea of oneness. And the exile itself was the revelation of hatred toward unification. Only when this hate reaches its full force and one starts feeling its reign over himself (meaning that on one hand, he is subordinate to Pharaoh, but on the other, deeply suffers from it and is unable to accomplish anything), the breakthrough occurs.
But all of this takes place thanks to the effort to unite, having risen above one’s own desire to do so. Thereby, they overcome exile. As to us, we are standing at the Egyptian border, hanging about. The aspiration to be one manifests in mutual inner concern, when everyone is thinking and worrying about our internal unification.
As a result, we feel that there is something between us that connects us, and we all will become as one heart. At this point, we are a spiritual heart, a spiritual desire, where we are connected with the Creator and need the Light that will link us so that from our mutual desire we will be performing acts of bestowal to the Creator.
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From the Talk on Spiritual Work 12/17/2010
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Question: Sometimes during the lesson we ask questions that demonstrate our weakness that we are not advancing and succeeding as expected. I see that you do not reject such questions, but rather keep trying to answer them over and over again.
Answer: We study that the more a person advances, the more he feels worthless, powerless, and small. Do not feel ashamed because we do not measure ourselves against roosters in the coop but against the Creator.
If I am in a chicken coop, then I definitely feel like a hero. But if the Creator reveals Himself to me, it is only natural to submit myself. There is no shame in it. Neither do I judge such things and ignore a person if he tells me that he is weak. I am well familiar with such states. Weakness isn’t a problem at this point. On the contrary, weakness is the attainment of self in its authentic form on the background of the Upper Light.
But a question arises: Is any desire to reach the goal still left in a person at the moment when he has lost faith in his strength, and does he still passionately wish to achieve it? That’s when he cries out for help correctly.
Obviously, everyone has to experience it individually as well as to explain to all our friends around the world that the attainment of personal lowliness and the awareness of the value of the goal, both of these conditions are mandatory in order to break through the Machsom (the barrier separating us from spirituality).
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From the Talk on Spiritual Work 12/17/2010
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As we ascend the spiritual degrees, we experience different contradictory, confusing states when we do not understand anything. It happens that you as if completely lose your mind. After all, when you go from one state to another, your desire changes.
The mind is acquired together with the desire; it only serves the desire. The greater the desire, the more your mind grows to serve it, to help it get fulfilled. This is the way we operate.
When your desire becomes replaced with another one, you acquire a new desire, and your previous mind disappears. And between degrees you feel as if all the information was deleted from your “computer,” and you no longer know how to operate. They say that Baal Shem Tov even forgot letters and had to learn to read “from the beginning.”
This is a special state. This way man is being shown that he is just a machine. A desire disappears, memory disappears, and you feel that you no longer know how to do the simplest hand or leg movements, not to mention having to remember the names of people or things that happen around you.
This can appear to be a mental abnormality. But at the same time, a person understands and feels that all of this is happening to him; he as though analyzes himself from aside. There is a point where you feel: “This is happening to me. Look at me! Right now I am an empty vessel that lacks sensations and mind. I will receive a new sensation and mind!”
This is an absolute replacement. You acquire a new “computer,” and you need to load it with new programs; everything has to be done from the beginning. This is how we advance.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/24/2011, Writings of Rabash
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Until unity becomes a vital need, it will not come to life. We have two options: Either we emphasize the importance of unity among us, or all our other actions except unification will still bring the Light that Reforms, but it will be affecting us negatively, by demonstrating to us how disconnected we are. Then, we will finally unite out of necessity, as a result of pain and suffering.
Suppose I don’t wish to maintain my health and gradually ruin my organism until I start feeling that it is in trouble. This feeling forces me to begin the rehabilitation of my body.
Neither do we in the group maintain spiritual health; we don’t maintain unity. However, we do study, circulate Kabbalah, and perform various different kinds of actions. These acts draw the Light that Reforms. In the end, it will show us what the problem is. If we were not doing all this, we wouldn’t feel there is a problem. So, there is a certain benefit to it: It will help us realize that we are missing the point.
You want to find the Creator. Think about the “place,” the desire, where He is revealed. There is no Light without a Kli (vessel).
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/24/2011, Writings of Rabash
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