We are initially adhered to our vessels of receiving, and only in them can we feel the world. We judge everything only according to how good or bad we feel in our vessels of receiving called “a donkey (hamor),” which is also our “matter (homer)” (which has the same root in Hebrew). And the man in us is also adhered to the same “donkey.”

Thanks to our exertion, we can detach the man in us who is immersed in his matter. Then this man begins to think differently.

How can we detach the man from his matter, from his “donkey?” Only by the Light that Reforms that gives a person the attribute of bestowal, Hesed, the Light of Hassadim. This Light fills the part called “man” and gives him new attributes by which a person can detach himself from the donkey, from the matter of the desire to receive. This detachment from the desire to receive is called the exodus from Egypt.
[104130]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/3/13

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We examine love relative to the hatred that awakens in a person toward the source of evil: whether he can love the source of his suffering despite his feeling bad. By that, he has to isolate himself from the evil, from the place in which he feels the suffering, as if it isn’t his nature.

This is a very delicate point. In the ordinary egoistic nature I hate the one who brings me sufferings, the source of evil. It’s just as we often soothe a child who hurt himself by hitting his head on a table, by telling the child to hit the table back. It’s a natural, instinctive animal response.

But the spiritual work was meant for the correction of man, and all the corrections are possible only if I feel that someone makes me feel bad and I realize what comes to me is only love and goodness. So all the painful signs should focus me not on the source of this bad feeling but on the source of evil inside me, on the place where I feel this evil, on my evil inclination. It’s there that I feel sufferings, bad relations, and that is what I have to detach myself from, to put a Masach (screen) on, a restriction, so that eventually it will turn the evil to its opposite form.

It’s as if there is a table before me with a five-course meal and every dish tastes horrible, smells bad, and looks rotten. It isn’t just that the food is a bit salty or too spicy, but that it’s actually poisonous. I, on the other hand, have to correct my vessels of perception so that I can love this food, which at first seems impossible. In the same manner we also reach love on top of the correction of our vessels in which we feel hate.
[104123]
From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/3/13

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Question: What is the meaning of adhering to the group?

Answer: To adhere to the group is to be with the friends in the entire process through which they are passing, to perform the tasks, to participate in all the events: in studies, dissemination, duties, gatherings of friends, workshops, and paying maaser. I need to try to be a useful and active participant in all this. These are mechanical actions of joining a group, which are visible.

Besides this, within myself, I wholeheartedly try to be included in this image called a “group,” to disappear, to melt there. I want to be absorbed within this concept of the “group,” the “society,” so that nothing of me remains.

If I try to do this according to my egoistic motives, to the extent of my efforts, I become closer to the Light, and It brings me thoughts about this and shows how appropriate I am to it or not. So, I begin to demand that the Light correct me more. I begin to relate to my inclusion in a group in a more practical way, connecting this inclusion with the Light that influences me and helps me to enter a group.

It follows that the more I am included in it, the more states I begin to discern: greater or smaller inclusion, how much I forget about myself, how much more I belong to the friends, how much more or less I love them. Only according to this do I evaluate my ascents and descents, since no other ascents and descents exist.

And so together with everyone, I turn to the upper Light that makes of us one whole. And here the work begins. All measurements and evaluations take place only in regard to the group because without this there is no correct measuring scale, there is no correction with which I would be able to examine myself.

I have no indication and evaluation of my emotions, not in relation to the Creator and not in relation to myself, if we don’t do this within the group. The group is the place where I feel, measure, and carry out all spiritual actions.

There is no other place outside of it! There, in the group, I need to discover hatred and my ego, all of my characteristics. All that is discovered outside the group doesn’t require any correction. Only what is discovered in the relationships between the friends, this is the only thing that we need to correct. Pharaoh, the ego is the force of mutual rejection and of hatred that is discovered in a group. And outside the group, this is all the physical life of the animal body.
[103976]
From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/31/13

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Question: There are periods when everything progresses in an excellent manner: at work, in life, in the group. But nonetheless, one must constantly yearn for the next level. What can be done with this feeling of satiation, with our feeling of being satisfied all the time?

Answer: That’s a problem. The feeling of satiation from this world closes the upper world for you. The “Bourgeois life” is killing you so much that you don’t feel any need for it. Only the group can develop the feeling of the lack of value from this existence in you. You need to get this from the group.

You need to discuss the upper world: What it is, the attainment of it, the feeling of the upper reality, how much broader and richer it is compared to our world, as it opens the meaning of life for you. You also need to discuss your corporeal existence, which will one day end, since all of us exist in a body that has a life of its own.

Generally, a person needs to think about this and stimulate himself in every way possible, to pull himself out of the static state. The group exists for this reason. Thus you need external influence. Come and visit us.
[104037]
From the European Convention in Germany 3/23/13, Lesson 5

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Question: Can the system of relationships that currently exists among the people of Israel prevent the entire world from liberating from egoism?

Answer: By all means it is so. If we are not connected to each other, we cause malevolence not only to ourselves, but to the entire world.

The general process impacts us the same way as it does the rest of the world, but our task is to react to it differently. There is no sense in waiting for the entire world’s reaction since all they have is a desire to receive, whereas we also have a spark of bestowal. This explains why our reactions have to be correct and thoughtful. Our mission is to unite and become “the Light for the nations,” a “Kingdom of Priests.”

The lack of unity among Jews in the land of Israel influences not only the Jewish Diaspora, but the entire world that hates us and despises the State of Israel. Today we see that it’s not anti-Semitism that is popular, but “anti-Israel.”  It’s not an accident, since Israel is a very special place where we have to unite, but we don’t do that. If we start taking care of the relationships among us, we will eliminate all hindrances and will see that the rest of the world happily follows us. The nations of the world don’t have such a level of egoism as we do. So, if we apply enough efforts, they will join us on our path.

Moreover, Jews who live abroad will also relate to us appropriately. Today, they hate Israel. A majority of them vote against Israel. They would be happy if this state never existed. That’s what official surveys reflect. We can do nothing about it. It’s triggered by our non-performance in pursuing our mission. Nobody wants us the way we are now. We are egoists, protectionists, literally a “splinter” in the body of the world. All world problems are connected with Israel. Nobody notices our achievements; on the contrary, our accomplishments only irritate them. We have to bring a methodology of correction to the world rather than teach them how to use egoism in a better and more successful way.

Question: The nations of the world don’t realize what the Israeli mission is, do they?

Answer: Subconsciously they do. Why do they say that we are the reason for the overall evil? It’s because they feel that they depend on us. This sensation is not accidental. When Arab leaders claim that Jews are the cause of the world’s wickedness, they really feel it. It’s not just politics, but rather the voice of their hearts, their internal sensation. Jews in various countries realize that contemporary Israel doesn’t contribute much to this world. That’s why today there is a tendency to abolish Israel.

Unfortunately, nobody in Israel listens to the world’s predispositions. We behave as if we don’t care; we continue doing business, making money, raising our wellbeing, arguing in the Parliament…

We live as if nothing is going on. That’s why we can’t exclude a chance that very soon we will be overwhelmed with new immense troubles. External forces that come both from Jews and from the nations of the world might seed a disagreement among the people of Israel which will cause riots and protests, a new round of an “Israeli spring.”

It means that the experiment to create a State of Israel was not a success; how long can the world tolerate it? Why currently are all Jews in the world against Israel? If at this time, on the eve of Passover we won’t unite, then in 2-3 months we will end up in a very dangerous situation. Let’s hope that we will find correct words to address the people of Israel and that they will understand us.

Our salvation is in unity and in spreading unity to the entire world. We have to tell the world openly what our mission is and that unity is exactly what the nations of the world are entitled to receive from us. Then, they will understand how much they need us. Our previous internal relationships only caused them troubles; at this time, let our unity bring everybody benevolence. People will understand and feel it. If we change, then our internal state will change too; otherwise, we won’t live up to a good future.

Question: What can we do on the eve of Passover to halt this negative development?

Answer: Aspire to exit from Egypt, meaning to rise above the hatred, disagreement, and separation among us for the sake of unity. The entire nation, which is now split into multiple groups and parties, as well as each particular individual have to realize that it’s our unity that will define our future, nothing but that!
[103816]
From KabTV’s “Kabbalists write: Exodus from Egypt.” 3/4/13

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Question: There are two forces in creation: the plus and minus, the desire to receive and desire to bestow, the male force and the female force. Perhaps the connection between the male and the female forces is missing in order to discover the one force that is called “One?” If that is true, then how can we connect?

Answer: Only by including the Creator, there is no other way! Only He can create harmony between the plus and the minus. It says “a man and a woman, Shechina (Divinity) is between them.” A man and a woman, plus and minus, these two opposite forces will never be able to connect without the revelation of the Creator.

In nature there must always be a resistance between the plus and the minus in which the mutual energy between them becomes prominent, and it’s the Creator who plays that role. First He reveals Himself in the form of the ego, the resistance between the plus and the minus, then He connects everything into one system, and then on top of this resistance, His revelation becomes disclosed and we begin to feel Him.

We can’t actually feel Him. He is felt in our desires, in our vessels, in the resistance that we create between the plus and the minus.

Suppose that this is our resistor, plus or minus, our ego (Ego). If there is a “current” flowing through it, which means that we are connecting despite the ego, then on top of the resistor (R) we begin to reveal the Creator.

The Creator is opposite from our ego, since He created the darkness from the Light. So it’s on top of this “instrument” that we discover the Creator. This “instrument” is our Masach (screen).
[103808]
From the European Convention in Germany 3/23/13, Lesson 3

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Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar,” p. 29: For if we didn’t have this damaged will to receive within us, we could not correct it at all, for nobody can correct something that isn’t in him. And therefore that amount of will to receive that is embedded in the body from its birth into the air of the world is not enough. Rather, it is further compelled to be a vehicle for unclean Klipot for no less than 13 years.

It follows that even if I possess a great will to receive, this is still not enough. From the start the Creator says to us, “Come to Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart.” He will inundate you with blows, so you will want to flee from him. It’s impossible to take me out of the evil inclination until it has reached a level where I can no longer endure it. But first it’s necessary to become completely aware of this evil.

In our world, we educate children to be careful, “Don’t go there, don’t do this…” But in the spiritual world, there is nothing like this. There it’s the opposite; they send me to “criminals” and “thieves,” “alcoholics” and “drug addicts,” into the arms of Haman, Balaam, Balak, Esau, and so forth. Otherwise, how can I correct these characteristics? In fact, these are uncorrected parts of my soul. Therefore, I must own them, feel them as mine, recognize the evil hidden within them, and be released from them, to rise above them.

Question: Does it follow that I must be evil in order to advance spiritually?

Answer: How should I answer you? Yes. It’s possible to correct only what is within you. And in spite of it all, this doesn’t say that I must just become evil. It’s one thing if, like a terrorist, I want to kill someone. It’s another thing if I want to love, and at the same time I discover within me a readiness to kill. These are two absolutely different approaches. And the difference here is that I discover the evil in opposition to it, I see that in myself I am evil, but I don’t kill someone who seems evil to me.

“13 years” among the unclean Klipot is not time according to the calendar, rather this is a level, and the stage is very high. I aspire to love, to bestow, so I discover my evil inclination. This is the condition; otherwise, I wouldn’t advance at all on my spiritual way towards correction, towards the Creator.

I want to be close to Him, to embrace Him, to kiss Him, to give Him pleasure according to the principle: “Don’t do to your friend what is hateful to you,” and love the other as thyself. And likewise, for 13 years, I discover the opposite of bestowal within me. In other words, I discover within myself characteristics, desires, and inclinations, which I didn’t even know existed because they are spiritual and come from the four impure worlds of ABYA. They dwell above the “beastly” comprehension of our world, and therefore, this is already an ascent.

Here the principle: “One against the other” acts. Aspiring to the good, I discover the evil, again and again. And so it goes for some time!

If I don’t maintain the position and stop, everything disappears. And if I don’t want to stop, then I turn to a group, to studies, to the Creator, resorting to all the means that will help me to hold on to the way, to tilt it favorably.

And only then are the “malicious” and “erroneous” things discovered in me, defects that seemed not to exist before then. I never felt what the 613 broken desires were and now they are apparent. If I hadn’t advanced, I would have remained on a level that in a spiritual sense is neither good nor bad. Conversely, if a person advances properly, he becomes worse.

But he works on himself; he understands what is happening with him; he is found in an inner struggle; he helps others, and they help him. It’s as if he “crushes” his ego with millstones, chews and grinds it, so that it will be possible to “swallow,” to “digest” it. During these difficult times we must help and support each other.

Imagine a car show, where the new car sparkles and glimmers, all shiny, clean, and beautiful—a real pleasure. And now look at a car repair shop: the stench, the garbage, the mess….It all depends on where and what they sell to you.

So at this stage, we do most of the “dirty work.” To correct the Human in me: What can be worse? And on the other hand, what can be higher?
[103435]
From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/20/13, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar”

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Question: What does “revelation of the Creator” mean?

Answer: The Creator (Bore) means: “Come and see” (Bo-re) which means revelation.

How can we approach Him? We can do it solely through convergence. Let’s say, we have ten different people. If we gradually build one man out of all of them (as one man with one heart), we come to a point when we become one whole. Then, we reveal the Creator; “Re” stands for “revelation.”

In other words, the Creator discloses Himself in one general Kli (vessel), in His new property. We are the ones who “create” the Creator. We are the ones who “build” Him out of ten, twenty, a thousand different points. It doesn’t really matter how many points are involved in one joint whole.

Let’s say, there is a structure that consists of forty people; this structure is called “as one.” It is the Creator. In other words, by uniting a multiplicity into “one,” it gives us a sensation of the Creator. We feel the Creator only in this form, that’s why He is called “Bo-Re.”

We can feel it only inside our properties. Currently, we sense the world within our egoistic qualities. However, if we manage to change our isolated, shattered, and destroyed qualities and make them integral and united, we’d be able to sense “the Integral,” the unity, which is called “the Creator.”

Question: Do we disclose the Creator to the 99%?

Answer: We reveal the Creator in order to please everybody who is outside us. The Creator can be discovered only in the property of bestowal, that’s why we work to enhance connections among us and boost the importance of our unity by making it higher than our egoism.

When we rise above and exit outside ourselves, we unite into one common spiritual body that is named a “Partzuf.”

This is the exact place where we reveal the unity that is called “the Creator.”
[103502]
From the European Convention 3/22/13, Lesson 2

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Question: There is a resemblance between Moses and the state of the Israeli nation today. Moses doesn’t feel secure with regard to the Israeli nation or to Pharaoh, although he is in contact with the Creator. The current state of the Israeli nation is also quite insecure.

Answer: It doesn’t matter. If there is a specific direction, if we understand that we have no choice, then despite the conditions that force us to escape from Egypt and to jump into the Red Sea, we do what we have to do.

Question: But you say that the modern Israeli nation doesn’t feel that it’s in Egypt. Perhaps a certain force should appear or someone who can explain things and start this process?

Answer: This is exactly what we are trying to do. Our group, our organization, wants to show the whole nation of Israel that there is a way to be saved. Let’s change our life! After all, things are constantly getting worse; the world is becoming more and more hostile, and the Israeli society is disintegrated and divided. Our security is in an increasingly growing danger.

But the blows that we feel don’t come upon the “nation of Israel,” but upon “Egypt,” upon our ego, since we don’t want to exit it. Israel in us, the desire to bestow that wants to come out of exile and to ascend, doesn’t feel the blows. When we are in the ego, it feels the pain, but the moment we leave it, we become disconnected from the “plagues.”

Question: What should we do in order to stop falling into the ego?

Answer: The only thing we should do is to unite. We have the method of connecting for the whole nation of Israel, and it’s the means to be free of all our troubles.
[103732]
From KabTV’s “Kabbalists Write: The Night of Passover Seder” 3/4/13

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Question: Is there an exodus from Egypt by force?

Answer: Of course, everything happens forcefully. Without the Creator’s “plagues” and without the pressure from Pharaoh we wouldn’t come out of Egypt. As it says, it’s actually Pharaoh who brought the children of Israel closer to the Creator, when He provided the unbearable conditions for them. Did He think that they wouldn’t run from Him, but that they would actually love Him?

If Pharaoh operated on the Creator’s side, as the Creator’s force, if the Creator didn’t force the ego to be the source of all our troubles, we wouldn’t try to break free from it. The Creator creates the difficulties for us so that we, while wanting to exit our ego, will become like Him. Therefore it says that Pharaoh brought the children of Israel closer to our Father in Heaven. The Creator always operates in concealment.

When the people of Israel escape from Egypt, Pharaoh follows them and surrounds them sending them into the sea. The chase helps the people of Israel advance in the right direction. Even when you escape the ego, you are not totally free from it unless you jump into the Red Sea. Then all of Pharaoh’s army that has been chasing you drowns in it.

Jumping into the Red Sea is the final phase in the process of the exit from exile. The name the Red Sea, Yam Suf (Suf-Sof – meaning end in Hebrew) actually indicates that that you have reached the end of Egypt. Then Pharaoh returns but in another form; it isn’t Pharaoh anymore, but Amalek and other foes.
[103730]
From KabTV’s “Kabbalists Write: The Night of Passover Seder” 3/4/13

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