Question: You have repeatedly said that men who study Kabbalah must be married. Does a homosexual male have to marry a female or rather, have a partner of the same gender? Do you recommend for homosexuals, males and females, to conceive or adopt children?

Answer: I think that everyone, within the parameters of the corporeal world, can do as their inclination dictates. And all their inner forces should be directed toward reaching an exalted, eternal, perfect goal.
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Question: In one of your lectures you said that a person must add the Creator to his list of friends. What does that mean in our spiritual work?

Answer: If you ask psychologists, they can tell you about what happens to a young couple who has recently gotten married. When they start living together, after the honeymoon period is over, there comes a period of mutual complaints, dissatisfaction, tension, and conflicts, and now they have to work really hard in order to continue living together.

These periods can be long or short, and this depends entirely on the example they saw in their parent’s home. At this time, a young couple needs advice from psychologists or parents to help them connect on the basis of mutual respect and compromise, instead of love.

They have to learn how to avoid pressing each other’s buttons, which cause the conflicts between them while they remain inside theirs egos and are egoistically attached to their partner. This is what happens in our daily life. However, this approach doesn’t work in our spiritual development.

While advancing in spirituality, a person does have to look for these points of tension and make them visible instead of concealing them because “the Torah will come out” precisely from these points. If a person views them correctly, wishing to discern and utilize them in order to reform himself, then instead of demanding something else, he strives to attain his own inner evil.

This is possible only when a person walks along with the Creator, as if holding onto His hand, as it is written, “Come unto Pharaoh with me!” One has to discern this Pharaoh, this evil within, and then tame and reform it, unify with it, and flee from it. But while working with the evil, a person must always be bound to the goal and use the Creator’s force.

All conflicts, arguments, and tensions can be revealed between the friends in the group only on the condition that they strive for unity, if they make efforts to come together. Only then will they see that they hate one another and don’t have any desire to be one. Therefore, they must bring the Creator into it so He may reform this hate. After all, it is the Creator who shows man where his evil resides. This is the place where He doesn’t dwell, the place without Light.
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From the lesson on 2/25/11, Writings of Rabash

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Question: How should women support the unification among the men?

Answer: This is a very powerful and important action from the women’s end. They can motivate the men to advance spiritually, to unite, to study, and to disseminate.

In the same way, in the spiritual world, Zeir Anpin starts moving and acting only when Malchut, the female part, motivates him to do so by raising MAN to him and demanding correction.

A man will not awaken without a woman and her desire—both at home and in the group. Therefore, the female part has to wake up and awaken the male part because otherwise the men won’t attain the goal.

We turn to all the women of the world Kli, asking them to unite together and put pressure on the men in different ways. Then the men will feel that they have to advance and that they cannot calm down.
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From the talk on women on 3/8/11

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Question: You say that a married couple has to “play” at being a corrected family. But what should they do if the evil is revealed between the spouses constantly, if they fight often, don’t respect one another, and don’t understand one another?

Answer: Unfortunately, none of us received the necessary upbringing and we weren’t prepared for family life. We have to raise a man and a woman in a way that teaches them to establish the right interconnection with one another and with their children.

This is the problem of egoistic development: Each person thinks that he knows what to do. No one prepares a person for life. Instead of educating a person, we barely teach him some kind of profession. That is why the modern crisis is so deep.

The crisis of families has become unbearable. The whole world is being immersed in universal, total despair from the attempts of families to live together. And while this is happening we do not admit that the family unit is the foundation of all of life. Without it, life will not go on.

Man will have to search for the answer, and the answer is: “Husband and wife, and the Shechina between them.” We have to understand that egoistic development has brought us to a dead-end: We cannot stand each other anymore. Only the importance of the goal can help us, and we can attain that goal only if we have the corrected family which gives their children the right upbringing. Only on this condition do we acquire similarity to nature or the Creator. Then we reveal Him, unite with Him, and attain eternal life on the spiritual level.

Only the spiritual goal will obligate a person to create the right family, to have children and the right relationships between the spouses.
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/8/11 on Women

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Question: What does the correct family look like in the spiritual sense?

Answer: It is written, “Husband and wife, and the Shechina between them.” If we live for the sake of spiritual attainment, if we initially place this at the foundation of our connection, if this is our goal at every stage, if we both understand that this is exactly why we exist in the world, that this is the “pinnacle” of the family, that this is the reason why we give birth to children and work, if we feel that the thread connecting us with one another and with our children passes through the Creator, if we want Him to reign between us so the whole family would feel His presence, then this approach corrects all of our relationships. Then we have a successful family.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/7/11 on Women

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Question: Why do energetic women copy the male forceful approach? Where does this come from?

Answer: Out of having no other way to go, women are forced to solve the problems of life in order to provide themselves with what men do not give them. That is why they are forced to go through the education system and work hard while at the same time taking care of the home and raising children without a husband. As a result, today they are rising higher and higher on the career ladder, occupying newer and newer positions.

All of it is happening because men are running away from responsibility, from the part they have to take upon themselves. Women are accepting modernity’s challenge, but men are not.

Overall, the modern environment conditions us to be free, telling us, “Live however you want, no one can say anything to you.” People do not feel responsibility toward society, their country, their people, or the world. Do anything that comes into your head as long as you don’t kill, steal, or other such things.

However, this is opposite to what Baal HaSulam explains to us: According to the spiritual root, each of us is indebted to society. The calculation is not only with what a person takes, but also how much he fails to give. Each person has to work and contribute his share to society. Each person has to take on the burden of a family, raise children, and so on.

However, in our society it is not considered a transgression if a person does not contribute his share. A transgression is if he took more than what is accepted. In this situation we will continue to suffer until humanity finds itself “at the brink of death,” so to say. And maybe that will help.
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/7/11 on Women

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Writings of Rabash, Article 535 “On Partnership”: The husband works and brings home money, while the wife takes the money and her work lies in going to buy the food and preparing it, making sure that the meal will be tasty. Then they are both happy and satisfied. If the wife cooks tasty food, then the husband has an appetite and then he has the strength to go to work and bring home money.

Analogously, if the feet go out into the street and the hands buy food and give nutritional substances to the brain, then the brain has the energy to think.

This is how nature itself has arranged things, although in our times many things happen differently. In the end we have to become similar to nature. No matter how much we try to run away from it, we will have to come back. Obviously, we won’t be returning to primitive life in the caves, and besides, today there wouldn’t be enough caves to go around.

The essence of the matter is that every gender has to be provided with the appropriate field of activity for which it is intended, both in the spiritual sense and in its material projection. Everything comes from the spiritual world, and therefore, we have to study its laws in order to then turn to the material world according to them. In spirituality there are two Partzufim: male and female. The female part is the carrier of the desire, the “home,” and the “vessel” that has to be ordered the right way. But doing that requires the force that the male part brings.

Where should this force reside? What does it have to incarnate into? How should it be expressed? The answer is: in the female quality. The revelation of the male quality in the female one is the home, the children, and everything connected to the family.
Therefore, if we divide the male and female functions even in every individual, and if we skillfully arrange all the things in their right places, then we gain time and speed of development, reducing troubles and aspiring to the goal by the good path.

It’s worthwhile for us to learn from nature. After all, we can’t escape it. We are just small parts of the great whole. If we will know this and keep it in mind without trying to jump over our heads, if we act precisely according to nature, then we will reach the perfect state.

In this regard we have to understand that our incorrect functioning is a result of egoism. We are deliberately confused in order to have the opportunity to search for the right form of our activity in life without putting on airs as if we have risen above nature. Otherwise we are in nature’s power and in addition are also proud of being slaves to egoism.

Our work is, first and foremost, to make an analysis: Who are we and what are we, where are we located, where are we going, what controls and motivates us, and what do we have to reach? Once we discern all of these foundations, we can then establish the right order of controlling ourselves, both from above and from our own end. Then we will reach similarity to the upper image. We have to use precisely that image to learn how to build our lives here, below.

The matter here is not the fashion or the customs of the times. Nature has its own laws and it really is worthwhile for us to follow them.
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/7/11 on Women

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Today we are in a transitional period. And when we begin the correction, the women will be exactly equal with the men.

On the spiritual path a woman has to set the desire, exert pressure on the man, and obligate him to advance. Similarly, in our world a wife pressures a husband to work and bring home earnings. And when there is a home and the means to exist, then we can give birth to children and raise them.

That’s how it works in spirituality as well: If we work on the correction of the soul together, then we give birth to new souls, new corrections. It is written about this, “Husband and wife, and the Shechina between them.” The revelation of the Creator occurs precisely between us, when we are together.

Both men and women have to contribute their share to these actions. No one is greater or smaller here. It is impossible to give birth without a woman. A new soul, a new spiritual Partzuf can only be raised by the force of the female desire.

In the process of correction no one acquires greater significance. No one is smaller or greater. Wherever something weighs less, something else counterbalances it according to the reverse order of the Lights and Kelim. Without a female desire a man is powerless, and a female desire without a male screen is also powerless.

Nevertheless, who is primary? It is the woman. That’s because the desire to ask for correction always comes from the woman. It’s the same in our world: Even though men think they succeed by their own abilities, in reality all of their activities happen only for the sake of women, only in order to acquire significance in the eyes of women. That is how we are built.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/6/11 on Women

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Question: Can Kabbalah help a person find mutual understanding between a man and woman or fix relationships in the family or at work?

Answer: No, you will not be able to create a good life for yourself in this world with the help of the science of Kabbalah. A good life will come as a result of your using all of the evil that becomes revealed in order to attain love for the neighbor and love for the Creator. Then the desires in which you feel bad will no longer emerge in you. The science of Kabbalah does not lie to a person! This is not psychology or charlatanism; it is not mysticism or a magical means to improve our lives!

Kabbalah says that the evil which becomes revealed to you is goal-oriented. It is intended to push you toward correction. You do not have to nullify the desire in which you feel bad, but rather, you have to admit that the desire is bad because of your hatred to the neighbor, and when you correct your hatred to love, you will be able to enjoy love for the neighbor and then the bad desires will no longer become revealed in you.

If you want to create a family or you are already married and a disagreement, animosity, or a misunderstanding comes up between you, that misunderstanding is impossible to correct without correcting your attitude to creation and the Creator. The Creator is between you: “Husband and wife—and the Shechina between them.”

For now the Shechina is still in exile. It becomes revealed as an evil, harmful force, the force of mutual hatred which sets you one against the other. The Creator does this deliberately so you wouldn’t connect on the previous, animate level, the way a female animal unites with a male animal in order to produce offspring, but in order for you to merge with one another as two souls into one soul and reveal the common force of bestowal that will connect you together.

If you are able to correct the relationship between you in this way, you will really become a family. Otherwise you won’t be able to do it. Kabbalah does not give you hints, solutions, or medicine for your current state, but elevates you to a new state where you will be able to be happy, successful, and perfect.

All of the suffering, problems, and blows become revealed in our world not in order to bring peace and perfection into the world, but in order to elevate us above our world. Otherwise it is similar to building communism in Russia. If you do something not for the sake of the Creator, meaning not in order to reach absolute bestowal, then you won’t achieve anything.

I feel bad, I have problems with my family, at work, with my children, and with my health, and I want to succeed in all of these areas. Kabbalah says I will feel good? Then fine, I agree to study Kabbalah! To do that I have to bestow to others? Then I’m even willing to bestow to others—anything to feel good myself.

This is called Lo Lishma (not for the Creator’s sake). This means that you know the method and you want to bring it to life for the sake of everyone so that you would also feel good. Now everything depends on what proportion you are willing to bestow to others in order to improve your state.

At first it is 1% for others and 99% for yourself. Then it’s the opposite: 99% for others and 1% for yourself until you acquire the force enabling you not to want anything for yourself. “I don’t care about what happens to me, I want to bestow to others.” This is called “bestowal for the sake of bestowal.”

However, we will never be able to return to a successful and corrected material life. All the methods that say that they can achieve this are lying, and Kabbalah tells you from the onset that this is impossible because all the evil in this life exists in order to elevate you to a new level.

Therefore, if you apply the science of Kabbalah to improve this life and you begin selling holy water or red strings, then it becomes a deadly poison. We have to understand that the reason for the general state of the world is the need to elevate us, but not to improve our situation. This is the difference between Kabbalah and other methods.

Therefore, if someone promises you a good life in this world, or health and happiness in your personal life, don’t believe it—it’s a lie and goes against nature! Nature wishes to elevate us to the “human” level. And when you aspire to this state, everything falls into place in the most wondrous way!
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/24/11, “The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah”

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Question: Is it necessary for every one of us to concede in order to achieve peace in the world?

Answer: The question is: What are we willing to sacrifice? We must sacrifice our egoism, hate, and resentment. Concession is like overcoming an obstacle. Only in this case, I overcome my inner qualities, my nature, and yield to my connection with someone else.

Rabash repeatedly said that love is not an animate sensation that arises in us naturally, under the pressure of hormones. Spiritual love is something that we create ourselves since it is doesn’t exist a priori. It is built on the basis of concessions.

A person overcomes himself, receives the attributes of the Creator, and while doing so, he starts realizing who he is going to connect with. This is how love for someone is born within him.

In the degree that a person loves the Creator, he loves the friend since only with the friend’s help can he realize his love for the Creator. It is similar to how love is built on mutual compromise in the family. One shouldn’t get married because he or she “fell in love,” which is not love but deception that will not last.

Yet if two people understand that they should form a union for the sake of an exalted goal, they will concede to each other. This will be part of their spiritual work since they will be tied by the goal, and then they will build love between them.

This will be authentic love that will lead them to love for the Creator. After all, it is the Creator who will obligate them to yield to each other and establish mutual connection of love.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/20/10, “Peace in the World”

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