We can see the Creator as good and benevolent only through the environment. Without a group you simply make yourself some kind of doll or idol that has nothing to do with reality. Actually the “good and benevolent” is the force that fills the network of mutual connections among us. It doesn’t exist anywhere else.

“Creator” (Boreh) means “come and see” (“Bo – Reh”). Where should I come to the corrected network among us? There we discover the Lights of NRNHY and their generalization called the Creator.

Thus, the force that fills our corrected mutual relationships is revealed as good and benevolent.

Question: In our conventions, under the strong influence of the environment, we seem to feel the good and the benevolent, but we don’t reach revelation?

Answer: In order to reach revelation we need a whole vessel. We try to discover the attribute of bestowal, so that it will be above us to some extent. This state doesn’t have to be perfect, but it must be stabilized. We really need to want this to happen. In the meantime we lack the pressure, the feeling of necessity.

It could also be that when we gather and connect, we enjoy it and that takes the flavor out of the quality. You eat, dance and hug the friends and you feel good and it could be that it doesn’t leave any room for a question, for a demand. But the joy and the demand must go hand in hand. It all depends on the preparation.

Question: So what actually is the “good and benevolent?”

Answer: It is when I discover in the vessels of receiving and in the vessels of bestowal that the Creator has created everything in His honor. Then I can receive all the goodness and enjoy it, and we aim everything at bestowing pleasure onto Him.
[67221]
From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/22/12, “The Study of the Ten Sefirot”

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Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot,” (50): However, before that, when the writing speaks only from the perspective of one concealment, the text ends, “they will say in that day: Are not these evils come upon us because our God is not among us?”

In other words, a person feels that he has no connection with the Creator because he lacks the equivalence of form with the Creator, and as a result he feels bad. It could be that he made a lot of money in the stock market and that everything is fine, but he feels bad because he has no contact with the Creator, meaning that he lacks the equivalence of form with the attribute of the general bestowal called the Creator.

“This means that they still believe in Providence of reward and punishment, and say that the troubles and suffering come to them because they do not cleave to the Creator…”

This means that I understand that I am bad, that I didn’t bring about the correction, and so I was “punished.” I have sunk into concealment. But on the other hand, we can also see it as a reward because I feel a negative response and thanks to that I can correct myself. This means that I have to “kiss” the stick that helps me be aware to how low I deteriorate. Otherwise I could deteriorate without even feeling it.

So the difference is in how I judge: according to how I feel my present state, or according to the state itself, as is. I have to determine the state as bad in relation to the required correction of the desires in which I am not adhered to the Creator. These vessels are broken, and the evil can be felt in them in a different way. I may feel bad because I am empty, and I may feel bad because I am detached from the Creator. I can also feel empty and feel good about it because I feel the shattering that way. Finally, I may feel bad because I feel the detachment. In any case, I feel that I am detached from the Creator.

So everything is determined according to the present state. It doesn’t depend on you and you can’t randomly jump from one state to another (like the arrows in the drawing). Rather, you have to examine what you have: “Do I feel good or bad? Suppose I feel good, what do I feel: detachment from the Creator or a connection with Him? Detachment: Does it bother me? No, I feel good. But can I still see the evil in this situation? Not at the moment.”

You should determine your accurate feeling and your attitude to the real state. This is the inner clarification of the state you were given. Then you feel the demand: “How can the group and the reforming Light and the other means help me correct my attitude?” It’s impossible to correct a good feeling or a bad one, or the state of detachment. The group can only correct my attitude to the situation.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/22/12, Shamati #1

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There is a concept called “opening the Book.” To open means to attain its depths, its essence, to come to know whose force is contained within it. After all, a book is the source of wisdom, the source of knowledge, and the revelation of what stands behind it. A book is a concept consisting of three components: the book, the storyteller, and the story.

So, who is the storyteller, what is the story about, and who is telling it? There is the one who wrote the book. He wrote based on his impressions of something. That which he was impressed by has the source, the source that created this image from which he was impressed and that he described in the book. And there is the one who opens the book, the so-called Book of Heaven, reads it, and explains and tells you about it. He can tell you something by describing it in the book. And you read what he wrote.

It can also be so that you do not read it, but already enter inside this author, this storyteller, and have to identify yourself with him. If you do not identify yourself with Rabbi Shimon, you will never know what is written in The Book of Zohar. After all, it comes dressed in him.

That is why there are two constituents here (although there are actually many more of them since it is the Creator who “wrote” it). Minimally, we must clothe into Rabbi Shimon. To the extent that we can identify ourselves with him, respect him, reach toward him, and try to merge with him, we begin to receive impressions, to feel and attain what he conveyed in The Book of Zohar through various hints that can be conveyed in a written form.

We must reach such a state where we won’t be able to listen to The Zohar without the concept called “Rabbi Shimon.” Also included in this concept are his students, as his students are included in him.

The spiritual vessel from which we receive the impact is called “Rabbi Shimon.” This is not a person, but a sort of cloud of qualities, forces, and spiritual definitions. This system, as a whole, is called Rabbi Shimon.

I am connected to this system. I receive nourishment from it, and so it is very important for me to adhere to it. The more I merge with it, feeling that I am in contact with Rabbi Shimon in particular, then, accordingly, the more I will perceive what is inside of him. Moreover, it won’t be the external impression of reading the text of The Zohar, but a more internal attainment.

The fact that we separate something that conveys spiritual impressions to me into several components: the book, the storyteller, and the story, helps me to unite with this impression; it does not distance me from it. This is one more way to use the concept called “opening the Book.”
[65069]
From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/2/12, The Zohar

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Question: How should we come out of the daily Kabbalah lesson in order to continue the internal work during the rest of the day?

Answer: I receive everything from Above and I should prepare myself for the maximal independent clarification. Every state should be divided into two parts. On the one hand, it comes from the Creator and I don’t want to spoil it with my desires, thoughts, and feelings. On the other hand, I understand that there is nothing to feel except my own vessels. So how do I do it?

The assessment can be done only in one way: comparing one feeling to another, comparing one intention to another. In order to not be biased, I should always calibrate myself according to a certain standard, according to the group. So I should make efforts to be incorporated with the general spirit of the group, and in relation to it, I should check: Do I feel good or do I feel bad, and how I do interpret whether it’s good or bad so that I will advance?

I constantly clarify things internally, demanding the reforming Light through the group, trying to clarify things with its help so that I will feel myself in the opposite state. In order to do that, I need to try and justify the Creator first, even if I feel bad. Then I try to rise together with the intention to the good state, not for pleasure, but because I resemble the Creator according to equivalence of form. After all, His goal is to do good to his created beings.

Thus I end my clarification. And this is how it happens each time.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/22/12, Shamati #1

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The Creator is pleased that the created beings advance, although their advancement is full of great problems and worries, just as parents of a mentally retarded child are happy that he begins to progress and grow wiser. He is the one who has prepared all these problems for us; He is the one who has hardened Pharaoh’s heart.

This is how we advance until a person begins to feel that he is in a world that is totally bad. First, as long as he was in a state of “total retardation,” he thought that the whole world was good. Now he feels that he is in a bad world and begins to search for the meaning of life and what we are living for.

He continues to develop through the environment, the group, and the right books and begins to discover why he feels bad. It turns out that this bad feeling is purposeful. After all, it says: “I have created the evil inclination.” There is an upper force that worries about him and takes care of him. It isn’t just the environment, but something more sublime.

He learns not only about himself and his dependence on the environment, but also about the upper force, a third factor. He understands that the upper force intentionally makes him feel bad so that he will want to exit this bad feeling and he tries to exit it.

He sees that there is a method that enables him to wake up from the dream everyone else is in. He is not “retarded” any more; he reaches the recognition of evil and wants to rise above it in order to understand why he feels bad.

He begins to search the reason for this bad feeling and discovers that there is probably an upper governance. Here he reaches correction and connects with the environment.

He discovers that all these problems were intentional. The upper force didn’t create evil in order to bring him pain and sufferings, but so that when he rises above the evil, he will attain the upper force itself, and will be able to control, to understand, to feel, and to determine everything.

It is all thanks to the fact that he used his evil nature purposefully. Then the good force is revealed in contrast to the evil force. A person begins to work with these two forces, when he is above them, and thus he becomes a partner of the upper force, the Creator. Just as the Creator manages all our life and this world by these two reins: good and evil, he also wants to manage the whole world by himself, by the good and the evil. He wants the Creator to teach him how to do that.

Thus from being totally detached from life, like a retarded child who grows thanks to the egoistic environment that develops him and supports him this way, he begins to rise above this environment to an upper dimension. Eventually, he learns to use all of the environment, all of his nature and the upper force itself, in order to become like the Creator. He does all this in order to attain the upper force, to discover It.

At first he does it unconsciously, like a mentally retarded child who is dominated by the upper force. Then he begins to gradually exit this state, thanks to the evil force, that discovers the egoism inside him. He developed this way to a certain level, until he asked himself: What is the reason for all this evil? If everything were good, he would have no questions.

He has no choice but to search for the good force in contrast to the evil force. Then he grows wiser until he learns to use the two in order to rise above them.

This whole process takes place under the motto: “There is none else besides Him.” There is one upper force in everything, which helps a person go through the whole way. By recognizing and feeling the whole process, he understands what the upper force has done for him, and that It suffered much more that the person did. Because when a person suffers, the Shechina suffers much more.

This is how a person reaches the love of the Creator.
[67253]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/22/12, Shamati #1

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Baal HaSulam, “The Inheritance of the Land”: Indeed it is said in the books that it is impossible for the souls to receive the good reward for which the Creator created them and the world, without the vessel prepared to receive, and a person cannot attain that vessel without exertion and the efforts to keep the Mitzvot; under pressure and war, a person fights with the evil inclination with many obstacles and concerns. The sorrow and exertion in the Torah provides a vessel for the soul so that it is ready to receive all the pleasure and goodness for which He created for the created beings.”

We can’t receive goodness and pleasure without hard work. Why? Because it is the hard work that stabilizes and builds the right desires in us for the fulfillment the Creator has prepared. It is impossible to manage without these desires, without the burden, without hard work and real sufferings. It is said: “You shall eat bread with salt, and drink water sparingly, sleep on the ground, live a life of sorrow, and in the Torah you shall work.” On the whole, all of humanity is going through a path of great sufferings, much worse than death.

Why does that happen? Why is it only in this way that we can clarify the deficiency that is aimed at the goal? Indeed, without acquiring this deficiency first, we will not feel the goal, and will not be incorporated in it. Perhaps we have already reached the goal but can’t feel it because we lack the experience.

So a lot of hard work is needed until we finally reach the leap, and it is revealed to us as the proper yearning. As we work, we make more and more efforts, and it becomes constantly harder to justify the way until we finally do not escape from Egypt. And the next step isn’t simple.

Kabbalists don’t hide this from us. On the contrary, they want to explain to us that our work is hard and that it is constantly growing harder. Don’t wait for everything to happen tomorrow, unless you are really able to add the wonderful tomorrow to the present. Here everything depends on you.

So we have to “keep the Torah and the Mitzvot,” which means to correct ourselves by drawing the reforming Light, whose influence connects us. The method of Kabbalah is meant to connect us. It is said: “I’ve created the evil inclination and I’ve created the Torah as a spice.” The Torah corrects the evil inclination, meaning the separation, and it corrects it by unity and love. So “Love thy neighbor as thyself” is the great rule of the Torah. We have to discover the hatred among us and the unity to correct it. We cannot escape it; we must unite as one.
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From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/20/12, Baal HaSulam, “The Inheritance of the Land”

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Baal HaSulam, "Inheritance of the Land": And so Abraham wondered, “How will I know that I will inherit it?” meaning how will I know that the Children of Israel will receive such a great reward, since where will they get such big vessels that will be worthy of this wonderful receiving, and to this the Lord answered him, “Know of a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them, and they shall afflict them four hundred years, and then they will have great exertion in the Torah and the Mitzvot….” This is the case for those who deal with the Torah, but those that deal with the fillings of this world and are not ready to deal with the Torah, how will they receive these vessels? Indeed the answer is that this is what is said in the Midrash, that Israel are not redeemed until they are united…."

So we see that we must connect with the world that provides us its deficiencies because we don’t have enough deficiencies of our own. In the same way we received the desires of the Egyptians in the time of the Exodus from Egypt.

Let’s see how things developed. After the exodus from Babel we went down to Egypt, we were there for 210 years and we went to Mt. Sinai. Then there was a series of ascents and descents until we arrived at the Land of Israel and built the first Temple. Then we fell from that degree and built the second Temple.

Thus we ended the work of the Egyptian exile. We corrected the whole legacy of 210 years in Egypt, all the evil inclination, with the help of the Torah, meaning the method of Kabbalah, which we received on Mt. Sinai.

After having fulfilled this level, we fell, we have been through two thousand years of exile, and now we have to ascend again. It is said about our state that: “The children of Israel were exiled only to add the souls of the gentiles to them," which is all the Babylonians. In the past, Abraham took a small vessel of Israel out of Babel, and now all of Babel have to reach correction. Here, in exile, we meet the Babylonians, we are mutually incorporated in them and together with them rise to correction, as one body that has a "head" and a "body." The head is the point in the heart (*), and the body is what we call "the nations of the world (NW in the drawing)."

Thus we reach mutual correction. The body cannot manage without the head, and the head cannot manage without the body.

[67055]
From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/20/12, Baal HaSulam, “The Inheritance of the Land”

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Question: Can I feel something towards the Creator without any fulfillment?

Answer: There cannot be a relationship between the “guest” and the “host” without fulfillment. If I totally restrict myself, I detach myself from receiving, but I cannot respond to the treatment of the Creator either. My relationship with Him is possible only through the fulfillment that I receive from Him.

If I receive from Him, from His huge table laden with delicacies, even “a tiny slice of cake,” in this cake I feel His attitude towards me. It is for this reason that I take it, after I restrict myself internally, in order to feel only His attitude towards me in that cake.

Otherwise I can’t perceive how He treats me. I feel love and concern in the Light that comes to me. Then I take a piece of that cake in order to feel all that, not to simply enjoy it since that would be a Klipa (shell), egoism, but rather in order to build my attitude towards the Creator from it, in order to reach equivalence of form with Him, in order to reach a state of balance. This state in nature is called homeostasis, harmony with nature.

If I am in such a state with respect to the Creator, a certain relationship is established between us. This means that I am already on some spiritual level: 1, 2, or 3….

But the question is: Where do we go from here? After all, this harmonious system relaxes me, and I cannot reveal more than I’ve already revealed. I received from the host, I gave back to him, we’ve established a relationship of equality between us, and through the refreshments we make each other feel good and bring each other pleasure. But what’s next?

If I don’t feel an additional deficiency, I won’t be able to move. What’s important is: What will I have a new deficiency for: the refreshments or for the host, for strengthening our relationship, for greater connection with Him?

Here, according to my preparation, a new deficiency is revealed in me. After all, I want to feel the deficiency for a stronger connection with the host. In order to discover the right deficiency for the host, I must have an appetite for the refreshments.

But it could be that the deficiency for the refreshments is revealed before the yearning for the host. Here it depends on if I approach the development from the side of sanctity or from the side of impurity.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/20/12, Shamati #174

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Question: Why don’t we appreciate the path we follow? Why don’t we receive pleasure at every moment? Even if it isn’t easy, we’re still in a group, we’re together, and this in itself is happiness.

Answer: Actually, there are two sides to the coin. If you come here for the meals and the friendly atmosphere, then things will end here. Your ego won’t let you be attracted to something else. On the other hand, if you feel bad here, your ego won’t let you come here and instead of coming to the lesson, you’ll stay in bed.

So we need both things, both the joy and the frustration. After all there are many people here who have the left line, meaning who are critical. They ask themselves: What can I really get out of life? I don’t want to be just a Hasid. I want to advance. Hasids on any level are happy with what they have and don’t want anything more. But if I don’t want anything, how will I advance? How will I acquire an additional deficiency?

This is exactly what Abraham asked the Creator: “How shall I know that I will inherit it?” In other words: How will I want spiritual ascent? Abraham’s attribute is Hassidim, the Sefira of Hesed, and so he worried about feeling the deficiency to ascend to heights that seem unattainable.

The Creator answered him: “Know of a surety that your seed will be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and they shall afflict them four hundred years….” But what sufferings are we talking about here? About the sufferings you go through by the “Torah and the Mitzvot,” by the Light. These aren’t just bad feelings that you have. “The Egyptian exile” isn’t a synonym for unemployment, lack of money, or health problems. The Egyptian exile is the feeling of deficiency that comes from the posterior of the Light, when you feel that you lack spirituality, love, and adhesion. These are the kind of sufferings we have to reach, and hard work is required here. [Read more →]

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Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot“: However, when troubles and torments accumulate to a great extent, it causes a double concealment, which the books name “concealment within concealment.” It means that even His posterior is unseen.

A person is a desire to receive. If he finds the power to ascend above his egoism, he becomes equivalent to the Creator and then according to the extent of the equivalence of form, the Creator is revealed to him as the good and the benevolent, as the one who bestows. This is because a person who ascends above his desire also becomes good and benevolent. First His Providence is revealed to him based on reward and punishment and later it is revealed to him as the eternal Providence.

But if a person cannot keep himself above the egoistic desire in equivalence to the Creator, if he doesn’t have a strong enough Masach (screen), he cannot cope with the pleasure that appears before him, and it immediately turns into darkness for him. This is how a person feels the concealment. It isn’t emptiness, and it isn’t lack of knowledge, but rather a feeling of something that is hidden: There is someone out there, and I can distinguish it from my own corrupted qualities. After all, they are opposite to Him, and this is why I feel that He is concealed.

So the concealment is a kind of revelation. It is divided into two parts: double concealment and single concealment, but in any case it isn’t total detachment, like in our case. Here everything depends on the Masach, on my persistence in trying to keep myself above my egoistic desire to resist pleasures from the bestowal, and to relate not to the pleasures of bestowal but to the attribute of bestowal. I have to relate to the source, to the Creator, not because I am fulfilled by Him but because of His quality.

But if there are states with which I cannot cope, I enter concealment and this brings me great suffering. Yet these are spiritual sufferings. After all, the concealment refers to spiritual perception. This doesn’t refer to our “unconscious” world with its “beastly” needs, but rather spiritual sufferings when I cannot please the Creator. Great voids appear in me which cause me great pain and suffering, but I know from what and and why I suffer.  [Read more →]

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