Convention in Bulgaria

A convention will be held November 1-3, 2013 in Bulgaria at Hotel Samokov, an hour’s drive from Sofia. The convention is open to everyone. Please do not book hotel accommodations directly, but only through the convention registration.

Convention in Israel

The Bnei Baruch World Convention will be held February, 6-8, 2014. The Convention will be held in the new building of Bnei Baruch.

Integral Education Training in Israel

Prior to the opening of the World Convention in Israel, on February 4-5, 2014, there will be an intensive training in the method of integral education for our friends from abroad.

Please inform all the friends, as tickets booked in advance are much cheaper.
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On August 27, 2013, in the Rachmaninov Hall, the Moscow State Conservatory is hosting their annual International Festival “Gathering Friends.” Included in the festival is a concert of piano music titled “Armenia-Israel: Dialogue of Musical Cultures” from the musical project “Secrets of Armenia.”

The author of the project is my student Mikael Hayrapetyan, a famous pianist,. He will perform the music of Baal HaSulam from “The Music of the Spiritual Worlds.” Before the presentation, the guests will learn about the features of this music and the history of its creation. This will help to tune in to the musical perception.

The concert is part of the upcoming International Music Festival, which is a very significant event in the cultural life of the capital. It is presented by the Moscow Department of Culture and the Conservatory management and is held in one of the best venues for classical music in the world Rachmaninov Hall.
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Question: How is it possible to understand that I am found in the right line? How long can this feeling continue and at what moment does the rejection into the left side occur?

Answer: The expression of being found in the right line is a feeling of joy, happiness, security, spiritual elevation, and a mutual yearning for this. A feeling of good energy is the right line. It is impossible to cry and be thankful simultaneously.

Theoretically, we can advance in the right line only by constantly growing, extending, and expanding in connection with the friends, the group, bestowal, and love. But in practice, this is impossible. In spite of it all, we are not that strong.

In practice weakness, laziness, and so forth comes, we leave the right line and are thrown into the left. For the sake of the work, the ego enters, drawing us to the “left,” to comfort, relaxation, and letting go. We no longer want anything, we begin to criticize others and no longer want to work with the group, with the friends. It is apparently necessary to leave this state, but we don’t succeed in doing this.

What can one do? In a situation like this, the group needs to “shake and squeeze” us. It needs to declare: “You must leave this state!” It must agitate a friend in this manner to influence him with the power of persuasion and joy, with everything possible, just so he will not remain in a descent and will leave this critical state.

It is necessary to understand that if a person falls, his departure and descent from this fall depends on the group. The group must try to help him at least twice. If the group works on the friend for a particular time and there is no result, then it is necessary to let him rest; after a number of days the group can seriously begin to take care of him again. If they don’t succeed again, only then are they allowed to let him go, but he can also remain.

Question: Will there be a time when we become so strong that we can all advance together in the “right line”?

Answer: To advance together in the right line is our goal. It is necessary to work on this. For when we are found in the right line we attract the Light, the power of bestowal, maximally, we constantly thank the Creator and we are welcomed by Him. But this is only on the condition that there is serious cooperative work, because in general we become weaker in these states, we begin to enjoy our sensations, and this is liable to lead to a descent.

When we are found in the right line, we need to say to ourselves we are enjoying the friends and in this way, we are giving pleasure and delight to the Creator. If I hold on to my yearning for the Creator through the friends, then I will not fall.
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk Day One 6/14/13, Lesson 2

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Question: This comes up all the time that we need to work for the sake of some reward. How is it possible to correct this intention? Which actions must we pass through and how many? How can we really act opposite to this?

Answer: You will gradually change your assessment of the quality of the reward. Essentially you conceive the reward to be—either the state in which you feel yourself to be good, the state when others feel themselves to be good, or  the state where the Creator feels himself to be good due to your deeds.

That is, the reward must be constant. Everything depends on its quality:  What is my reward? If the friends become fulfilled as a result of what I do, this is the reward. Would it be impossible to enjoy this?

I only need to check myself, what is the cause and what is the result? Am I doing good for the friends for my own enjoyment, or do I behave like this because it will be good for them; and because of this I enjoy it? That is, my fulfillment is detachment of the feeling of joy from my Kelim (vessels) and its presence and feeling is in the Kelim of the friends.

Question: Is this a static process or is it possible to run it all the time?

Answer: This is a gradual developmental process of the person within a group. By blindly carrying out everything that the Kabbalists say and write, we can reach this rapidly.

After all, we can never see the next level of our development. Yet the Kabbalists give us advice, how we can make ourselves similar to the next level, become ready for it while being on the level where we are found. How can I be ready for it if I don’t see it and don’t know anything about it? Therefore, they give us advice and recommendations. And without these I would not be able to do anything.

So there is no reason to be alone in the desert to sit there and begin trying to get in touch with the Creator. The method for reaching the upper world was discovered once and we know exactly how this was done: ten generations, ten teachers, ten Kabbalists from Adam to Noah, ten generations from Noah to Abraham, and so on, and so on in a chain.

It cannot be that someone will suddenly discover it in some other form. A person can somehow feel the upper world but not consciously, only temporarily, and then it disappears. I have met people like this. And in order to be found in the spiritual world, clearly, realistically and correctly, and to work with all of our Kelim, which is to say with all the desires and thoughts, we require this method. This already came from Adam so he is considered to be the forefather of all people, all belonging to the level of Adam (Man).
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk 6/14/13, Lesson 3

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Question: You say that “it is impossible to thank the Creator when I am crying.” What does this mean?

Answer: I cannot cry from pain and simultaneously thank the one who causes me this pain. The sensation of pain suggests that you cannot thank Him, i.e., you might be doing this but superficially. You understand and are aware of this in your mind but not in the feelings.

You need to work on your feelings so that you can feel pleasure instead of pain while correcting the egoism. If the obstruction comes from the Creator, then it should be turned into happiness, joy, and pleasure. This is what we are engaged in. This is the correction of our Kelim (vessels).

But as long as you feel at least some flaw in your state, it is not called that you thank the Creator. In principle, He does not need to be thanked. When you feel good, this is your unconscious gratitude to Him. And if you also attribute this to Him, then it is complete gratitude. It’s very simple.
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk 6/14/13, Lesson 3

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Question: The time of transition from one level to another depends upon what?

Answer: The time of transition from one level to another depends only on you. Each one of us must have free choice. If I depend on others, I have no free choice.

That is, on the one hand we depend upon each other absolutely, but on the other hand, we don’t depend on anyone at all. I must tell myself that the entire group is found in an ideal state and that everything depends on me alone.

I need to consider this and clarify it in the following manner: “Everyone depends on me. But I also depend upon them. Will I be able to advance if I look at their faces? If they are friendly and inclined to be kind, then yes, and if they are not friendly, then no, so how should I behave?” Which is to say, their states and their influence on me also depends on me; I need to work on them. This is to say, I already depend on them but this depends on the degree that I can influence them myself. And here the opposite connection takes place, which also depends on you.

We can see and be convinced, that on one hand we are completely independent and free people, and on the other hand, are absolutely, mutually connected between us, and on the third hand, we can take from the others any form that we want. This means in fact, that we are always working in the presence of a group that is found in the infinite world, it’s only our ego that portrays them as we are describing them to ourselves now. Solely and only! And therefore, in order to advance, we need to “work” on them, to elevate them in our eyes. And in order to elevate them in our eyes, we must actually work.

During the process of spiritual work all questions will gradually become clearer because in order to clarify every one of them we need to create within us newer and newer sensations all the time, which we didn’t previously experience. Therefore think, clarify these questions, and in the end, they will mix together into one single whole, but this will already be a spiritual state. Then we will feel how much it is closed, complete.
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From the 2^nd Preparation for the Convention in Krasnoyarsk 6/13/13

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The topic of the lesson is “How do we reach the love of the Creator from the love of friends.” Our main goal and actually the only one is to reach the love of the Creator, which is the attribute of bestowal. All the other goals are only the basis for attaining the one goal and understanding it.

“Loving the attribute of bestowal” means being constantly in this attribute, wanting and yearning for this love. So how is it possible to yearn for the attribute of bestowal and to love it in the same way that we are currently subconsciously and instinctively attracted to receiving, to feel the filling inside us?

I constantly feel that something is missing. I choose the optimal, most comfortable position automatically; out of all the possible conditions, I choose to receive the maximum pleasure in life that minimizes effort. This is how we are programmed, and so our body and every cell in our body constantly work according to this principle. So how can we reach the same situation but in its opposite form, to receive pleasure from the attribute of bestowal and choose automatically how to do our best and bring Him contentment all the time?

This is possible only if I love someone very much. Then I am constantly focused only on giving him as much as possible. Just like a mother who holds her baby and thinks only about how she can give him more, constantly checking what he needs. We can observe how a mother constantly looks at her child, and all her thoughts are focused only on him. This is the attitude we should have with regard to the attribute of bestowal, to general love.

No matter how much I try to convince myself that the people around me are me, parts of my soul who are intentionally depicted to me as foreign “creatures,” I don’t perceive them as something that I need and that belongs to me. The attribute of bestowal is perceived as an unclear, abstract concept. The wisdom of Kabbalah tells us that the attribute of bestowal is formless and is not felt in itself but is revealed only with regard to someone else.

We are the carriers of this attribute! So how can we express it; how can we feel that we enjoy bestowing upon the other and that there is no other pleasure for us?

If I felt pleasure every time I bestowed upon the other, it would be much easier to bestow, then it would be to bestow in order to receive, which means that the ego is disguised, concealed receiving, and nothing would allow me to exit myself. People bestow a great deal in their life in order to receive pleasure. We constantly make a living in order to exchange the fruit of our efforts for pleasure and different fillings and comforts.

But how can I rise above that and bestow in order to bestow so that the actual action will also take place in the other and the pleasure will be felt in others and not in me, not in my ego, not in my desires, as if I have entered the other? Is that possible? No it is impossible! We cannot reach this by our nature, and in order to do so we need the intervention and the cooperation of the upper attribute of bestowal that is external to us and detached from our ego.

The upper force called Creator must help me detach from myself and start feeling the actions, the result and also the filling of the result, which is all external to me. I remain with only my Reshimot (spiritual genes), with the point in the heart. My ego will not be filled anymore and will remain empty. Only the law of the “first restriction” operates on it according to which egoistic desires cannot be filled.

This means that I have to totally give up the desire to feel pleasure inside me and to move on to the feeling of pleasure in others, to turn it to my own. I don’t want to weaken you, but a person is usually scared when he suddenly understands how far this is from our egoistic reality.
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk Day Three 6/16/13, Lesson 5

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We were given a group in order to resemble the Creator and to live only in the pure attribute of bestowal without any movement in my direction and without looking backward at myself. In it we need to do all that, to speak about it, to get to know it, and to feel it. We have to experience this, to try all the possible options, and to find out that we cannot do that and still try. We have to grab each one “by the teeth” and not let go. Although I am indifferent to these faces and I am even repulsed by them, I want to give to them and feel my gladness, my outcome, only in them.

To this is extent they will evoke even greater hatred in me. It’s because I will feel how opposite it is from my ego: Working for someone else so that he will constantly profit, I have to enjoy his successes, his pleasures, his gladness, as I increasingly detach from myself and increasingly feel that I have to feel my gladness and my pleasure in him. Everything is for him!

It’s impossible to attain this alone. I need the examples that the friends set for me which clearly show me that they operate in the same way. We are all in an attack against ourselves, and we see the other as the object and the result of our actions of bestowal!

All our work and our attention focus on one point, on clarifying where and in whom I feel my pleasure: Is it inside me or in someone else? Do I enter the other and try to evoke pleasure in him by my actions and feel how he enjoys this and am happy and pleased about it? I have to constantly guard myself and check whether I am trying to do so.

I constantly do this work, this full inner surveillance, under pressure, and I want to feel the gladness in my friends. My gladness stems from the feeling that they feel good and that I have made them feel so. I am proud that I awaken this pleasure in them and that they are glad as a result of my intentions and my work.

I have the right to be proud since this is the attribute of bestowal. I can be glad since I didn’t do it for myself. This is what I have to do, to live in them. If I focus my work this way and constantly exit myself, enter the friends, transfer myself into them, and feel glad as my egoistic desire remains empty and all the pleasure is passed to the other, it’s called creating an external vessel, Returning Light.

Then I begin to discover the attribute of bestowal in the friends, which I actually create by myself, thus creating the Creator. It says that we create the Creator, we make Him. This means that we discover this common attribute in the efforts we make for one another. Thus, I gradually transfer all my ego from me to others, and when I am totally empty of my ego, I complete a certain measure called Seah (an ancient measure of volume).

When I complete the transfer of all the things I thought of enjoying by giving to them, by bringing them pleasure, and feel my pleasure in them, I enjoy this, as it says: “in Him our heart shall rejoice.” At the end of this process I begin to feel the first spiritual level, in them, in my friends, inside them, adhesion with the attribute of bestowal that was finally created in the measure that I have given. I feel the integral attribute of bestowal that was collected by all my attempts.

There are ten major attempts, although we cannot differentiate them and count them. On the whole they are divided into tens and even hundreds of other efforts, as a result of which I begin to feel the collective attribute of bestowal that I have evoked, when it becomes a single attribute that begins to exist independently: It is called “Creator.”

Of course, this attribute also existed before, we receive the understanding from the Creator that this attribute created us with our ego, so that now you will collect it and work on it and transfer yourself into others, and thus discover your spiritual vessels and leave your ego empty, restricted under the “first restriction.”

The attribute is called “Creator,” and so it says: “from the love of the created being to the love of Creator.” The method is in this whole explanation.
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk 6/16/13, Lesson 5

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There is nothing but giving yourself to the friends and finding the general attribute of bestowal or the Creator in what you have given. But you discover a new dimension, a new world in this attribute, the upper world that is based on the attribute of bestowal and therefore it’s not temporary but eternal, constantly developing and infinite. You feel that you are in this eternal world.

If it all ended here, we would remain in this eternal state and in fact feel detached from our body. After all, the body, which means our desire, would remain totally empty. We don’t identify with anything else but the desire, so people who feel total emptiness in this world commit suicide, since they don’t feel that there is any reason to go on.

But the point is that this is only a very small part of our ego compared to that. The Creator, the force of bestowal, wants us to fully attain Him, and so He immediately adds a new ego of a totally different type. This isn’t the corporeal ego anymore, like on the first level from which we had to rise, but a spiritual ego called a “shell.” In it we already begin to receive serious spiritual interruptions.

In this ego we begin to feel the negative spiritual world. It’s the real egoistic world on which we will have to work again, like in the past, with the friends. But among them I already understand (forget and then remember again) how I should fulfill myself according to the exact principle of the first level. But now my desires are much more egoistic. I begin to see them more deeply and understand my negative and positive attributes more deeply.

This means that the struggle becomes essentially different, but I have to act according to the same principle: to transfer myself into the friends, to feel myself in them, to be glad in them, and to totally cover myself from the implications of my good deeds of any kind. I must constantly invest only in them.

The feeling that they are my soul, which I have attained on the first level, disappears and once again I think, “Why on earth do these people who are so distant from me, and who irritate me, have to be part of my soul?” On the first level I was simply indifferent to them and they even seemed pleasant, but now I begin to hate them. Their actions and their words seem repulsive; their words seem a total lie and their actions seem proud. Everything that they do is a kind of performance.

In other words, new gigantic, very serious, deep and real interruptions come along, which are absolutely justified by my rational thinking. It’s much more difficult for me than it was on the first level which now seems like child’s play. Then we simply played together and now it’s as if they are transparent: I see their dishonesty, their pride, their terrible ego. Despite all this I have to rise, which means to find certain opportunities to act for their sake, to feel joy that I do something for them, for their success and their pleasures.

I have to see my success only in seeing them fulfilled, by me or by others. It doesn’t even matter who fills them as long as they are fulfilled. If on the first level I was glad that I fulfilled them and that I somehow managed to connect this to me, now it isn’t so anymore! I can work through others and thus fill the friends in a concealed way, as long as they feel good. This means that I feel that I am more detached from the outcomes of my work and that it isn’t so important for me anymore. The main thing is that they will enjoy and be full.

They can look at me with disrespect, not want to be connected to me, or think that I am an egoist and not advance, but I don’t care, as long as they feel good. Imagine how many mutual interruptions there are here, with regard to me and to them. The Creator plays with a person in an amazing way. But if a person can close his eyes tightly and not look into his ego, into his heart and mind, and act like a blind man, despite everything, he wins.

This is called “faith above reason,” which means that I tell the Creator: “I accept your game! You are laughing at me, but I accept the rules of the game and am playing against you.” It turns out that my opponent is the Creator! Or it’s my ego, which is the same thing, since “there is none else besides Him.” He is the only one who plays with me and fixes all these dirty tricks.

I have to hold on to the main point that is determined by whom I enjoy in: in others or in myself. Thus, gradually, we discover the Creator by working with the friends in the group.
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk 6/16/13, Lesson 5

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If we continue with the explanation of how a person reaches the Creator through the friends, then in fact those words are repeated, because we don’t have that many words to express these actions. This is even though they differ greatly in quality and diversity. Such a wide range of emotions that don’t exist in our world are opened, so our dictionary is not prepared to convey them.

During our ascent, we pass through 125 levels, an infinite number of small states. All of the states are absolutely different emotions but are expressed by the same word: for example, “happiness,” “disappointment,” “anger,” “insult,” and “jealousy.” It’s possible to count several dozen words of this type, but they are all identical, beginning from the smallest step to the greatest step. Therefore the Kabbalists rank everything by number: The depth of the desire to receive (density), the height of levels of attainment, and in this manner they understand what is being said.

If I express a spiritual coordinate, then another Kabbalist knows what I am talking about, because he recreates this within himself. This is precisely the way one musician says some note to another musician, and this note plays within him. For a regular person who didn’t study music, this note doesn’t say anything; whereas, the musician hears it within himself and understands. That is also the way that Kabbalists understand the language of Kabbalah.

I hope that in the near future, instead of expressing emotions in words, we will express them together with you through Kabbalistic terms, and we will transmit them to each other in a form like this, feeling them simultaneously. We will be united by our sensations and discover the emotions within this unity.

In our world something like this doesn’t exist. It only seems to us as if we feel each other, but in fact we don’t enter into one another because we don’t have the characteristic of bestowal. We simply more or less react appropriately and feel a similar picture because we were created as similar animals. But we are not prepared to compare our comprehensions and certainly we are not prepared to connect with our sensations and emotions.

But when we connect with the characteristic of bestowal, then an amazing phenomenon takes place: We no longer feel within us but within our shared unity. There the same symphony is played for everyone! By being united within it, we feel the emotions of all the listeners, even though, at the same time, each one is feeling this within himself. We still cannot understand this “duality” of spiritual comprehension now, but it’s like this.

In conclusion, without the group it’s not possible to realize any spiritual movement. And a group doesn’t mean that we are just found physically in one location. A group is those people who share a realization of what I am now trying to explain to you. Therefore, Kabbalists dedicate so much time and attention to creating the group.
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk Day Three 6/16/13, Lesson 5

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