Question: Is there some special reason why in the article “Why the Speech of Shabbat Must Not Be as the Speech of a Weekday, in the Work” Rabash addresses the religious and not the secular?

Answer: This is indeed so because there is a necessity to perform the commandments on the material level.

We are built from two parts: intention and action. We need to make sure that intention is the determining factor, and action is the consequence of intention, rather than having intention without action, as if we are simply “fluttering” like angels.

If we perform an action without intention in which there is nothing, then we act like an animal that carries out commands. That is, a person who performs commands without the involvement of his personal desire is similar to an animal.

Therefore, it is said that “a commandment without intention is like a body without a soul.” As Baal HaSulam writes in the “Introduction to The Study of the Ten Sefirot,” a person must study, at least from a short guide, how to observe the commandments and truly fulfill them. But in addition to this, one must perfect oneself and constantly care about the intention through which you grow from below upward to the state of equivalence with the Creator, to the purpose of creation.
[354102]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/14/26, Rabash, “Why the Speech of Shabbat Must Not Be as the Speech of a Weekday, in the Work”

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Preparation to the Lesson

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1st part of the Lesson — Writings of Rabash, Article 5 “What Is, ‘When Israel Are in Exile, the Shechina Is with Them,’ in the Work?” (1988) (2.11.2003)

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2nd part of the Lesson — Writings of the Baal HaSulam, “Study of the Ten Sefirot,” Vol. 6, Part 15, Item 5 (4.11.2016)

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3rd part of the Lesson — Pharoah

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Question: How is the analysis of truth and falsehood carried out?

Answer: In a group, this happens incomparably faster than when a person does it alone. In a group, you instantly see the reaction of your friends, how you relate to them, how they relate to you, whether you give to some extent or not.

Then you understand that you are not giving, but only receiving. In that case you can quickly determine that this is the state of “night,” since the group does not welcome the manifestation of a desire to receive, but wants to see you as a bestower.

With the help of the reaction of the group, you very quickly determine your state and come to a conclusion: are these qualities in you day or night, good or evil, truth or falsehood, sweet or bitter.

But you are not the only one looking at the group. The group itself must also constantly provide you with its reactions, its inspiration, new standards and measuring tools that are constantly changing toward greater precision and greater heights that the group demands from its members.

It turns out that whether you want it or not, the group constantly energizes you and sets you in motion.

Without this, it will take a long time for a person to transition from one state to another. If one is not in a group, if one makes efforts alone, this can stretch for months or years, whereas in a group you can go through it in one day and immediately receive criticism and see what is happening.
[353969]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/11/26, Rabash, “What Are Day and Night in the Work?”

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Question: How can I correct my 613 desires if I am not familiar with them?

Answer: Of course you are not familiar with them. That is exactly what is called concealment.

However, when I want to attain the goal, when I immerse myself in it head first, at that very instant, disturbances begin to come to me. Let us consider a disturbance that comes to me in its pure form, although in reality this almost never happens.

This disturbance is called my desire that is awakening in me now; it is uncorrected and exists with the intention for the sake of receiving, and I declare that I want to fill it through various external actions. And if, against the background of this disturbance, I nevertheless enter the group and demand greater love for the Creator through work in the group, through love for the friends, then it means that I am correcting this desire.

How do I know what kind of desire it is? What does it consist of? Opposite what exactly does it stand? Why is it one of the 613? What is the difference between them? I do not know this because the answers are found on such a degree that it is impossible to know them. On a higher degree, the same desires will come to me more clarified. But now it is only a concealed desire.

It is like a baby who does not know what to do with his hands and legs, nor how he grows. Later he gradually begins to understand. And then he comes to know better and better how to use his hands and legs as an adult person.

So it is with us. We receive these desires on the zero level (Aviut Shoresh); we do not know how to use them, and we can only perform the same work against their background. Then there will be the first level (Aviut Aleph) of the 613 desires, the second (Aviut Bet), the third (Aviut Gimel), and the fourth (Aviut Dalet). This means that we rise from world to world. The desires are the same, only more clarified, the 613 “organs” are the same, but grow ever larger. However, initially these 613 organs, these 613 desires, emerge as disturbances.

How is one disturbance connected with another, like the organs of the body? I do not know. Why precisely in such a situation, and with what it is connected, I do not understand any of it. I must simply perform the same work against the background of each one of them.
[353305]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/18/26, Rabash, “According to What Is Explained Concerning ‘Love Thy Friend as Thyself’”

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In the work, a “place” is a place of deficiency.

That is, if a person has some lack, we should say that he has a place in which to receive a filling for the lack. But if he has no lack, it cannot be said that it can be filled, since there is no one to fill (Rabash, “What Is, ‘There Is Nothing that Has No Place,’ in the Work?”).

“Place” is, as Rabash says, that which was created from absence, the will to receive, the creature. That is, the creature is the place in which the Creator is revealed.

When is a person called a creature? When he creates, produces, and gives birth to this place. It does not appear by itself; it must be built from many factors. Initially we are given all the data, all the causes, and all the conditions for building the desire. But the work of its creation is placed upon us.

If we want to build something in the corporeal world, we lay a foundation and begin construction from it. The same is true in spirituality. We must take as a foundation the will to receive, created from absence, which is at our disposal.

As in our world, we learn from great people who pass their experience to us. As in this world, we must exert with great efforts against our desire in order to build something. Our mind loves to rest, and the body prefers to remain at ease, to do only what is convenient and pleasant for it. And in order to do something, we must compel ourselves to make efforts against our desire.

Effort is what we do against the desire. I can jump from morning to night, but this will not be considered effort if it corresponds to my desire. And I can sit still without moving, yet this may be a great effort because it is against my desire. The test here is the dependence on a person’s desire.

Spiritual construction is similar to corporeal construction. We receive desires that are opposite to becoming a place for the revelation of the Creator, and we must correct them so that they become suitable for being filled by the Creator. Our work lies in preparing and organizing the place.

This place is called the soul. While we build it, we pass through 125 degrees, and according to the degree at which the creature stands, the Creator is revealed to it. Then a person becomes a dwelling, a place of residence for the Shechina, a temple for the revelation of the Creator.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/7/26, Rabash, “What Is, ‘There Is Nothing that Has No Place,’ in the Work?”

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What kind of mechanism can be built that would force me to remain constantly focused on changing my inner states? Certainly, it is the group. How can I wake up? How can I build a mechanism within me that will constantly awaken me? I cannot. It is impossible for me to do this.

In essence my body is a desire to receive, a desire to enjoy. If it is in a state of relative satisfaction and it appears that remaining in that state is advantageous to it, then it will simply sit or lie there. This is its nature.

In order to change it I have to build some outer states that I do not sense yet, they do not exist in the body, but they would force it to change.

Now I am nothing but a desire to receive. However, I have to cultivate a specific attitude within myself toward the goal, one that exerts sufficient pressure on the desire to receive that will make it feel uncomfortable and restless unless it is actively moving in the direction of the goal.

Only then will it begin to stir: “I feel bad, what should I do, where can I find something good?” What constitutes “good”? It is going to a bar, a soccer game, a nightclub, or watching a movie. But what is truly good? In every state that my desire encounters, it does not find sufficient fulfillment. Everything is shrouded in darkness until suddenly a light begins to shine somewhere in the distance!

A person has to go through these internal discernments so the desire to receive becomes awakened only toward the search for true pleasure. For that it has to receive sufficient fuel, meaning pressure and the sensation of suffering that will force it to break free from its current state. This pressure forces it to seek the truth, a truth that, once found, becomes a source of profound sweetness.

Furthermore, it requires a supportive environment, a group, to encourage it, to make the path easier, and to carry him along. All of this is not easy. When you begin to build this mechanism and see what you depend on, when you begin to analyze all these states, you reach the realization that Baal HaSulam wrote about in the article “The Freedom of Will.” In summary, it is that there is me and my properties that constantly change; there is the environment whose properties are also changing, and there is nothing else.

I have no power over my “I” and my properties. However, I can potentially change my environment and its properties. I will exert influence on the group and in turn it will influence me. The only force that can influence me is the group. It can bring about my transformation by evoking a sense of shame when it delivers me blows with the realization of how much I need it. I agree to receive blows and the fine-tuning from them, what it takes, provided they steer me in the correct direction.

If a person agrees to it, he is entitled to be placed in the correct group. He chooses a group that will transform him and will apply pressure on him, and he is ready to pay for it with his efforts by serving them in every possible way. Everything comes from the recognition that his only free choice is to choose a group that will put pressure on him and force him to move in the correct direction.

There is no alarm inside of you that will suddenly wake you up so you would change a state. The sensation of deficiency (Hisaron) will not arise from within. It will eventually come, but at such a slow natural pace that your progress will be driven only by means of suffering. Only the group, your immediate environment, can pull you forward. If you have already begun to grasp it, then you can speed up the change of your states.
[354004]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/11/26, Rabash, “What Are Day and Night in the Work?”

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Preparation to the Lesson

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1st part of the Lesson — Writings of Rabash, Article 5 “What Is, ‘When Israel Are in Exile, the Shechina Is with Them,’ in the Work?” (1988) (2.10.2003)

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2nd part of the Lesson — Writings of the Baal HaSulam, “Study of the Ten Sefirot,” Vol. 6, Part 15, Item 5 (4.11.2016)

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3rd part of the Lesson — Pharoah

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Question: How can I know that my intention or the intention of a friend is correct?

Answer: First of all, we do not speak about someone else’s intention. Intention is my attitude to the purpose of creation, to the Creator. I cannot enter another person and begin to examine how he relates to this, nor is it important to me. What matters is myself.

How can I examine my own intention? What I feel is, in essence, what I must relate to. A person never truly knows what is in one’s heart; it is concealed from us.

Even now, you may see that you think about yourself as being relatively fine, almost righteous. But if you were to look a little deeper into your heart, you might think somewhat differently.

We must advance according to our sensations. It is said: “A judge has only what his eyes see.” And only after such an examination should one build one’s attitude toward what needs to be done.
[354125]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/14/26, Rabash, “Why the Speech of Shabbat Must Not Be as the Speech of a Weekday, in the Work”

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As there cannot be a day without a night, there cannot be light without darkness. Darkness is the Kli [vessel] and the light is the filling of the Kli, following the rule, “there is no light without a Kli.”

…if a person says that both light and darkness come from God, this is “And God called.” At that time, both the light and the darkness make one day. That is, as there cannot be a complete day without evening and morning, so the light and darkness serve one role—both together are called “day” (Rabash, “What Are Day and Night in the Work?”).

“Day” and “night” in spiritual work are actions of the light; these are the same steps that lead to the goal of creation: adhesion with the Creator. Therefore, it is said that our goal is to reach a state in which there is no day or night, and everything is revealed as one light, when night is revealed as part of day.

Regarding what do I feel darkness? In relation to the goal of creation, as a lack of adhesion.

If a person has already reached a state where he checks himself and sees that he is in darkness because there is a desire to receive in him that separates him from the goal, he checks it in the dark, with only the light of a small illumination, light that he attracted from above through great efforts. Thus, he reaches a state where he is truly ready to come out of Egypt, out of his desire to receive, and into the spiritual world.

Therefore, first of all, we must remember that the feeling of night and darkness is necessary. This is a feeling of the real Kli, of our true nature. It is achieved in relation to the goal of creation, to the fact that we are in properties opposite to the Creator.

We must see why we are opposite to Him, why we cannot integrate into the Creator, that is, into the property of bestowal, and determine that precisely this is darkness.

But the reason for this should not be the desire for spirituality in order to feel good, avoid trouble, and experience various pleasures.

If a person realizes that his spirituality is a property of bestowal, while he is the opposite of this property, and he is unable to integrate into it, to adhere to it, then he decides this is a true night. And by regretting, he reaches a state where he turns this fall, this darkness, into day.

Then the darkness begins to bring him light, the Kli begins to change; it receives an intention for the sake of bestowal, and becomes like the light. This means that the state of final correction is neither day nor night.
[353954]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/11/26, Rabash, “What Are Day and Night in the Work?”

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The Creator is only one quality—bestowal, absolute goodness. But the creation was made by the Creator as opposite to Him, as the desire to receive (pleasure).

Therefore, in order to come to similarity with the Creator, the creation must go through many opposite states.

In order not just to change the desire to receive into the desire to give and adhere to the Creator, but to remain independent yet similar to the Creator, the creation includes two components: the desire to enjoy and the sensation of the giver.

Our entire sense of the world and our existence is built from these two opposites: Yesh mi Ain (existence out of nothing), only then does the creation feel that it exists.

We cannot exist only in Yesh (in the reality of the Creator) or only in Ain (in the reality of creation); therefore, we undergo consecutive changes in ourselves so the light (Yesh), which created me from nothing (Mi Ain), brings the desire (Ain) to the form of Yesh, the form of the Creator.

This is how it leads me along this chain: from cause to effect, from cause to effect, where each previous
result becomes the cause of the next state.

So far I am starting to feel His attitude toward me as someone external, an outsider, the force that created and controls me.

In addition to the fulfillment that I feel within reason, there is also the force of the Creator that develops me, shows me an example and a goal, and here I must act by faith.

I am in my current state like an animal acting only on what it has, but I also take into account the next state, the next degree; although I do not yet have it, I accept its existence by faith because it is the opposite my present state.

The nature of spiritual degrees is such that the next degree is the opposite of the previous one because it is a greater bestowal than the previous one.

Therefore, in order to ascend to it, I must accept its conditions of “bestowal contrary to egoism,” faith above reason.

Otherwise, I will forever remain on the current, animate degree and will receive everything in the same desire to enjoy rather than climbing the spiritual degrees, the degrees of bestowal.

Therefore, we must prepare ourselves to accept the next degree as desirable and not push it away.
[18435]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/2/10, Rabash, “The Meaning of Truth and Faith”

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