The Book of Zohar, just like the whole Torah, is only about the connection between us, as we unite, our connection reveals a new force. Each time we exert ourselves in order to connect to one another, as if trying to penetrate the center of our mutual connection with a force of several “kilograms.” Once we have created the sufficient force to connect, a special type of connection is revealed called “the world of Assiya.” When we create greater tension, the connection called “the world of Yetzira” is revealed. And so we ascend the spiritual levels. There is nothing more than that.

So while reading The Zohar we constantly try to find out how to connect more strongly to one another and to find out what our connection is. By the connection that you discover, you attain the level of mutual bestowal, and according to the level of the mutual bestowal, you begin to discover a special force, the Creator. This is called “from the love of the created beings to the love of the Creator.”

This is the only state we should think about, because there is nothing but this state. On every level there is only the concealment of this state, and the revelation. To the extent that you have to be connected, but are not connected yet, you feel sufferings: missiles, financial problems, in everything, without exception. All for one reason only: You are not connected strongly enough to others.
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From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/22/12, The Zohar

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The conscious aspiration towards the Creator means that we organize a group, its spiritual center, assemble together, all our aspirations are aimed forward, everyone is equal, everyone connects, and we expect to find the Creator and cling to Him as to our only place of rescue specifically in the group.

A small child holds on to his mother (he doesn’t know anything else in the world), grasping her, feeling her, and recognizing her scent, and that’s it: He doesn’t need anything else. So do we need to reach such a state in order to hold on to the Creator, but only through the group and from within it. This is our salvation! It is specifically in this state that we cross the Machsom (the barrier that separates us from spirituality), the first point of connection, adhesion, contact with the Creator.

It is well described in the stories of the exit from Egypt, when one no longer knows what is happening. People flee from there at night, run without knowing where to, jump through the Red Sea. They jump into the abyss, it doesn’t matter where—what matters is to move forward, towards the Creator, and to hold on to Him! It is not known what will be there, and there’s no need to know. One finds himself in this state, and in this state he passes the Machsom. This is, to our present states, when we, so to speak, are slightly rocked from side to side, we need to add these big shake-ups.

And after one passed the Machsom, he is being shaken more strongly. There, on one hand, one finds the Klipot (the shells) and on the other, the divinity, meaning forces of impurity and holiness. There serious problems begin, which don’t stop until Gmar Tikkun (the end of correction). They travel from the bottom to the top by a cone, and minus and plus become greater and greater. And that gives us greater and greater need to hold on to the Creator. And this is what His help is. This is why it is called “help against him.”

But is there another possibility to come to Him if we are egoists and were created opposite to Him? There is no other way.

So what is our participation in this? When we are being shaken, we grasp onto the Creator, like a baby to his mother, crying, longing, clinging to Him. What is our work in order that we will grasp this process and transform it into good, conscious, worthy?

Question: How can we make this process in order to participate in it and not just to be rocked from side to side and thus have us long to hold on to Him? How is it possible to transform this path into something more normal? How is it possible to speed up our progress forward?

Answer: We can participate ourselves in this process only in the event that we approach it more strongly and attain the point of connection in the group. Through this point, we will hold on to the Creator more strongly.

We need to do this consciously so that the shake-ups from the side of the Creator don’t influence us, so that we ourselves, regardless of the shake-ups, exalt connection with Him, so that drawing closer to the Creator, to a state when we are in reciprocity, unity, love, and mutual assistance, when we are one complete whole will be important for us. This shouldn’t be in order to escape problems, but because it is important in itself.
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From the Georgia Convention 11/05/12, Workshop 1

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Question: According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, everything is revealed in a person. So, where are the spiritual worlds about which we study in the lessons?

Answer: It is in our attitude to the friends. Once, we were one whole and not slices of a whole “cake.” Then, there was one desire, and the Light resided in it. Later, the desire to receive came between us, the intention of “in order to receive,” and we crumbled.

Today, each cake crumb wants only to enjoy, to compare itself to others at the expense of others, by others. This is what we feel, and it determines everything. Accordingly, if we get rid of it, if we change the intention of “in order to receive” to the intention of “in order to bestow” that is aimed at bestowal, we will collect the pieces of the crumbled cake by ourselves. The upper Light will serve as the glue for that by filling all the voids between us.

Now, we are so contrary to one another that there is a void in everyone’s feelings, a vacuum between a person and the others. What is more, everyone wants to expand this void so as not to have any connection with those around him.

So, when I exit myself and call others, wanting to feel them despite the distance between us, I cannot annul this void. So, I want to ascend in order to build the necessary network above it, the network of the worlds of ABYA.

Then this void is filled by the upper Light. First, it was very small and just held us like cake crumbs, but, now, when we must fill the voids between us with the force of love and bestowal on top of the repulsion that remains, we discover between us a connection that is 620 times stronger. It is as if our cake has been filled with chocolate cream, and there is enough room to fill it with everything that is good.
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From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/20/12, “The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah”

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When you are thinking about the other, a special action happens within you. A special state emerges when suddenly a very warm point appears in the heart, so red, crimson, and incredibly warm! It lights up when you are thinking about the other. You connect with him, and it lives; you stop thinking, and the point is extinguished.

I have not spoken about this before, but this indication appears in the human heart, and it tunes him correctly, similarly to when you tune into a radio frequency. You can determine by this point, like in a precision instrument, whether you are connected with others or not.

We have to work on this and wait until this point appears. If you suddenly catch contact with others, it comes alive in you, and you guard it, afraid so it is not lost. And then, there are more and more with others. And gradually these points come together, and the Creator is manifested in them.

You need to feel this point once. It’s so warm, hot, bright, not even red, but crimson, and it simply paralyzes a person by its love, connection with others. He can do nothing, and for it, he is ready for anything. We need to reach this state quickly!
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From a Meal at the Georgia Convention 11/8/12

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Nature is a circle; it’s perfect. At this time, nature impacts us integrally. This conclusion derives from laws of nature and is supported by sociology, physics, and other sciences. Therefore, our society must reach the same condition and become global, closed, rounded, and integral. Everybody must depend on each other.

Look at what is happening in the world now. Today, it is enough to isolate any particular country, and it will perish. It will not endure on its own. Look at Iran or some other countries. They completely depend on everyone and everything. We are unable to break these liaisons.

Afflictions push our society from behind toward integrity. It should become as rounded as nature itself. Integrality means that we must reach balance and equality with each other.

Practically, everyone must live at the same financial level and work hard on making equality and mutual interdependence stable. Nature will push us toward it quite strongly. So far, we haven’t realized it. Therefore, we will be getting more impediments until we come to understand this fact.

How do we achieve this? If we continue using only the remedies that currently are available to us, this process will be very complicated. However, if we approach the problem from the point of view of Kabbalah, then it will be relatively smooth since the Kabbalah methodology allows us to achieve it without too much trouble and makes it almost effortless. Kabbalah explains and vividly demonstrates that the current state of affairs in the world obligates us to live according to standards of reasonable consumption.

By all means, a person must have a house, a family, a job, a car—everything that a normal human being needs at this time—but anything that is beyond this level is extra. We should not allow lavishness any more.

Nature will force us toughly by setting up catastrophes. It is obvious, and we have almost exhausted nature. Soon, all natural resources will be drained away, and we won’t be able to satisfy our needs any longer, not to mention those of our children and grandchildren. For them, there will be nothing left at all. The integral laws of nature tell us about it.

Nowadays, integral upbringing should replace our current paradigm, our current perception, of the world through integral education. We must begin to educate people to understand in order to see the world differently. Since we all are at the mercy of one another, we should naturally change our nature to the fullest interaction with each other.

Here, the Biblical appeal, “Love thy neighbor as thyself,” comes to mind. It is obvious that we simply cannot abide without this verse. It is inevitable that we eventually will achieve this state, but it is important whether we will get there forcefully or voluntarily, consciously and smoothly.

The wisdom of Kabbalah is meant to help us realize these things and, thus, avoid severe blows of destiny. It helps us move ahead in a kind and mild way, which eventually will allow us to win.

What, in fact, shall we win? We will transition to a new level of existence, to another dimension. At this time, we all are at the animate level. Animals take care of each other and of their bodies. We also take care of our relatives, friends, and of our bodies as well.

In other words, we do not rise above the animate level, whereas the “speaking” (human) level—called Adam, from the word “Domeh” (similar to the Creator)—is analogous to the force of bestowal and love. This level is quite different from the one where we are currently, and we still must ascend to it.
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From the Georgia Convention 11/5/12, Lesson 1

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All the exiles the people of Israel have been through were all exiles from mutual guarantee. And each time, the sufferings increased to such an extent that the group of Abraham reconnected again. But eventually the desire to receive grew so much that the brotherly love turned to unfounded hatred. The Temple was destroyed, the mutual guarantee was broken, and the people found themselves in the last exile that continues until the present day.

Today, as Baal HaSulam tells us, the people of Israel are like a sack of nuts, who are together only because of external circumstances. The hatred of other nations compels them to connect to a certain extent, but this connection doesn’t exist in the inner connection or in natural connections that are typical of other nations. Among the people of Israel, there was only the connection of mutual guarantee when their recognition and understanding, and their efforts were aimed at being together.

Any other nation is united by a natural “instinctive” force, while the Israeli nation has to work on its connections, since otherwise this work is done by the hatred of those around it, leaving it no other choice. In such a case, the nation of Israel is connected only on the level of the still nature; it doesn’t develop and remains in exile since it doesn’t advance towards connection by itself, of its own initiative; it doesn’t yearn to discover the quality of bestowal and love, that is, “the Champion of the World” (אלוף); the Hebrew letter Aleph (א) makes the difference between exile (גלות – Galut) and redemption (גאולה – Geula).

The children of Israel leave the exile, when they yearn to discover bestowal and love in the connection among them. So today they are still in exile and are not a nation yet. Only a series of troubles keeps them together, so that they will not disperse, so that they will be able to fulfill their role and to pass on this message to the whole world, and eventually bring contentment to the Creator.

This is the current situation. This means that the children of Israel should invest all their power in that, in order to move from the external pressure to the internal pressure. If the internal pressure obligates them to connect more strongly than the missiles and other revelations of general hatred, the external pressure will stop. The people of Israel must constantly obligate themselves to connect by overcoming the pressure of external factors.

But today the people are ready to speak about connection and it is simply a shame. It is the wrong situation when the Creator evokes it to connect by enemies from the nations of the world. This isn’t the real work of the Israeli nation and there is nothing to be proud of. People don’t establish good and desirable relations between them and external forces do this work. In the meantime, we must develop our inner powers by turning them into connection and then all the external pressure will stop. It will simply disappear.

It is very easy to test this since the internal mutual connection doesn’t cost anything, it doesn’t require anything except for a desire and a decision. So let’s try and see what benefit it will bring. There is no doubt it will heal society, be helpful to the country, and beneficial for everyone. The number of car accidents and crime will be reduced. At the same time, we will follow and see if it helps increase our sense of security and whether it affects our enemies. I am for testing.
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From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/16/12, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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Rabash, Letter 34: As it is said, “And the Lord shall be unto you an everlasting light.” When? When you are all one society, as it is written, “live every one of you this day.”

Usually, if someone takes a pile of branches, can he break them all at once? But if taken one at a time, even a baby can break them. Similarly, you find that Israel will not be redeemed until they are all one society, as it is said, “In those days and at that time, says the Lord, the children of Israel shall come, they and the sons of Judah together.” Thus, when they are united, they receive the face of Divinity.

I presented the words of the Midrash so that you don’t think that the issue of a group, which is love of friends, relates to Hassidism. Rather, it is the teaching of our sages, who saw how necessary was the uniting of hearts into a single group for the reception of the face of Divinity.

We can only feel the connection with the Light from a whole and perfect vessel; a vessel in which all the desires in order to receive are covered by a Masach (screen), which turns them to in order to bestow. This is possible only when there is connection, since to whom can I express my intention to bestow? Only towards others! So by connection in our desires and intentions in the heart and mind, we reconstruct the shattered vessel and by that get closer to the Light, until eventually it can illuminate for us.

If in the meantime, we only try to get closer to one another, we summon upon ourselves an illumination from a distance, which is called the Surrounding Light. This is the law we know from the wisdom of Kabbalah, which is the law of all of reality, the law of nature.

So the condition for receiving help from Above for the revelation of the Light is our connection. If we want to improve our condition, there are no other methods but that. There is no point in looking for anything else and just wasting our efforts. We must only yearn for connection by which we will evoke and draw the Light that Reforms us.

If we don’t act towards connection, then nothing good will come out of our efforts. So in the very difficult and tense situation the people of Israel find themselves in today, we should try to connect as hard as we can and to attain unity. It’s through this that we bring the Light closer to us, and bring it closer to everyone. Thus we advance to a better state in a better way, through the Light.

We should do that before the sufferings reach us and force us to connect by putting pressure on us. We should always have the inclination to connect out of our goodwill and not because we are forced to do it. This is the difference between the “path of the Light” (hastening time) and the “path of suffering,” the natural process of developing (in its time).

Let’s try to understand that the connection summons the influence of the good force upon us and explain this to everyone. The more people will join this connection and unity, by feeling this condition and understanding that the more we disseminate and publicize it by every available channel, by Internet and TV, the more people hear about it and incorporate in it, the closer we will be to the good Light. The Light is the only thing that operates. It’s a waste of energy to think that there are other actions that can improve our situation except for connection and unity.
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From the Preparation the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/16/12

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Rabash, “Three Lines:” Before a person is granted to exit self love and to do everything in order to bestow, which is called Lishma (for Her name), even though a person studies different things the way they are, they are only names with no commentary, since he has no attainment of the matters that he studies, since he knows nothing about the upper roots that are called by the Holy names or Sefirot or Partzufim.

And we can learn the upper matters, called the wisdom of Kabbalah, only by way of merit, since they can bring a person a desire and passion to adhere to the Creator, since these are Holy matters referring to the Holy names…and when a person studies the upper matters in order to get closer to Holiness, it brings the closeness of the Lights, which he wants this study to bring him, so that he will be granted to aim all his actions in order to bestow, and this is called working in preparation, as a person prepares himself to be ready to enter the King’s palace and to adhere to Him.

There are several phases in the preparation work. In the first phase of the study a person listens, but he doesn’t hear, since he doesn’t know what it’s about. All the terms Kabbalah books speak about are hidden from a person—he doesn’t feel them and doesn’t see; he doesn’t discern himself or his environment. So he imagines what he hears as he desires.

He doesn’t work with these concepts and cannot discern them or respond to them, he thinks that Pharaoh is a person who rules Egypt, which is a distant country, that the Creator is very far, and that Israel is someone who is born to a Jewish family. He lacks the right spiritual concepts, so that he can immediately feel an inner reaction if he hears them.

If he hears about a pain in the heart, the head, the arm or the leg, he can immediately imagine it. He would feel a reaction to the word he hears, but the Kabbalistic terms don’t evoke any reaction in him, and so in the meantime he studies without attributing all this to himself. But the Surrounding Light operates on him and reforms him, and to the extent that a person does everything in his power, it brings him closer to the upper world.

The main thing is that at first a person doesn’t know that the only way to advance is by subduing himself to the group, the teacher and the books. After all, he is like a baby who has to adhere to the grown ups, to an upper level. By that he shortens or prolongs time. The preparation may take several years, until he comes close enough to the Light and begins to feel how the Light operates in him and begins to discern every attribute in him. This can take 20-30 years.

Everything depends on the extent to which a person can subdue himself before the teacher, the group, and the study with all the means that he has. It’s the study period of Yenika (infancy) when one must adhere and devote himself to the upper level, when you annul your mind and everything that you know as much as possible. Then there is the stage of greater awareness, when a person already begins to discern these attributes in him and to experience ascents and descents.

In the third phase he already understands that it’s the Creator who evokes these ascents and descents in him, as He calls him, “Come to Pharaoh!” The Creator is always on the right side, and Pharaoh is on the left side, and a person is left in the middle between these two forces. But until this is actually revealed within him, he can only guess that that’s the way it is according to his own reactions. Eventually he cries out since he cannot exit himself and break free of Pharaoh’s domination, and then is granted redemption.

Afterwards the road doesn’t get any easier. A person simply sees everything that happens along this road differently. Redemption becomes an opportunity to bestow for him, to ascend above himself and to work disregarding the unpleasant inner feelings.

Thus he advances and his advancement is determined by the re-evaluation of his values.
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From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/15/12

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Question: What kind of changes should take place in me in order to draw the Light that Reforms? What can I do in order to draw this Light?

Answer: This is exactly what I have to find out, that’s the whole point. From now until the end of correction I only need the Light that Reforms. This is the Light that fills my soul, that is incorporated in all the other souls, as all the differences between the souls disappear and the Light of Ein Sof (Infinity) fills everyone 620 times more than in the initial state. This is where the Light that Reforms comes from, exactly like every MAN (prayer) rises to Ein Sof, and in response MAD (a response) comes down from there.

So all along the way, from now until the end of correction, I have to worry about one thing only, the maximum Light that Reforms that I can draw. It is as if I am sunbathing and calculating: Which way should I turn, how long should I lie in a certain position, at what time, etc.? This is how I should clarify my internal movements: How should I operate in my desires in working with the group, with individual friends, with the teacher, with the study, at home, everywhere.

In everything that I am, I have to clarify how I can make the most of my different actions 24 hours a day, so that each time the Light will operate on me most efficiently. There are no other worries except for this worry. What else is there in life? After all, everything depends on the Light, including my corporeal life.
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From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/14/12, The Zohar

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A letter from the south of Israel: “The situation is such that we could not get together today for a lesson, and we had to stay at home with the kids because at any moment the siren could sound. But our desire to be in the classroom with the rest of the world group is huge! How can we make it so that we have this desire constantly and not only under the threat of missiles?”

Answer: We are all together in the same union. We know from the wisdom of Kabbalah that thus we awaken the upper forces hidden in nature. We hope that in this way we will be able to resolve this confrontation. Our unity should have an impact on the overall connection, first of all in Israel, at the epicenter of the opposing forces, and then in the entire world, where there is a collision of these two forces that cause crises, hurricanes, natural disasters, and riots in Europe.

And that is why all our friends around the world should feel a great responsibility. Those who have the point in the heart must unite and lead the world to correction. No one but us understands what is happening in the world and sees the true inner reasons behind all the decisions, the acting forces and intentions.

It is known that the “hearts of the rulers and kings are in the hands of the Creator,” and that is why only us, who belong to Yashar – Kel, that is, “striving straight to the Creator,” are able to make correction. It does not matter how many thousands of kilometers separate one friend from another, a group from a group. If we unite for one goal, one force through the Internet, we are definitely together.

Some are now sitting in bomb shelters in southern Israel, others are at the center, in different parts of the country, or around the world, but we all have to feel huge connection between us at the spiritual level that draws towards us the Light that Reforms. We will strive so that the upper Light realizes our unity.

And after the Light is revealed within this connection and helps us to make clarifications and correction, we will reach an absolutely good state. We hope to bring the world to this.
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From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/16/12, “Peace in the World”

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