We are separated from the Creator only by a tiny black point within the infinite Light, which is regarded as “existence from absence” (Yesh Mi Ain). This is, in fact, the very basis of the entire creation, the new reality “from absence.” The rest of it is “from existence,” from the Creator.

This point is created by the Creator, while all “existence” (Yesh), which is added to this point, must come from us, our own effort. Hence, in the end, we attain similarity to the Creator, adhesion, the level equal to His.

First of all, this point of creation evolves in four stages of the expansion of the Direct Light, whereby these four degrees of bestowal instill into the point “from absence” all the basics. On the part of the Light, no more actions are necessary; it’s enough. The rest emerges as the reaction of this point that received an impression from the Light, absorbed its properties, and is able to act on its own thereby.

Thus, from the world of Infinity, from the state where it merged with the Light, it begins to withdraw into our world through the ten “Sefirot of concealment” (Sefirot Blima) that absorb (Bolim) the Light inward, inside the creature. Due to this, the creature grows from the point opposite to the Creator, reaching the utmost possible distance from Him, which is regarded as “this world.”

This withdrawal (both qualitative and quantitative) encompasses all properties and locations. As a result, the created being has no quality that would match the Creator’s to the smallest degree. We think that this means a downfall, a descent, withdrawal, darkness, but it is quite the opposite. It is the unfolding of our nature, the very black point created by the Creator!

This development is necessary to reveal how much this point from “absence” is opposite to existence, to that which “exists.” It is what we attain from this entire descent, albeit not all at once, but with time, descending deeper and deeper, after we reach “this world” and experience the development of our egoism, meaning realize our being opposite to the Creator. Thereby, we pass through the still, vegetative, and animate levels of nature, until we reach the lowest one, “human.”

A human becomes aware of being far from and opposite to the Creator and concludes that it is evil. From the awareness of evil, he continues to study himself and the Creator even more, as the “advantage of Light coming from darkness,” and understands that it is necessary to become corrected. Thereby, he reaches true opposition to the Creator.

When he begins his correction, on one hand, he starts ascending back to the world of Infinity by equalizing himself with the Creator. On the other, even while doing so, he attains how opposite he is to the Creator ever more.

Only in the very end of correction (Gmar Tikkun), when he returns to the initial point, Malchut of Infinity, he gains complete understanding, awareness, and experience of what existence (Yesh), the property of the Creator, means.
[42526]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/8/2011, “All Who Suffer for the Public”

Related Material:
Connecting The Creator And The Created Being
The Multi-Dimensional Creation
We Are Existence From Absence

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Inner Work, Perception - No Comments →

Question: You say that The Zohar is the system of ties between us. How are these connections expressed in The Zohar: in the shape of the letters or the meanings behind the words?

Answer: You won’t find the symbols of these connections in letters or words, and not even without them. We should view The Zohar as a connecting device and nothing more. I don’t know how it works. All I know is that if my desires are correct and I am reading The Zohar with the hope that these desires will be fulfilled, it will occur.

I have a certain device that I adjust and plug into electricity, but the one last drop is missing: a little bit more of my thought and desire for it to occur, for the device to start channeling electricity and begin to work.

I should be anticipating it, nothing more. It is regarded as “awaiting salvation.” But we must, to the best of our ability, prepare our desires and needs so that they are fit for correction as much as possible. After all, an unripe desire doesn’t merit correction. Desire the time which has passed and a new desire needs to be used or the same desire but at a higher degree won’t merit correction either.

Everything has to occur with the utmost precision, and then the Light that Reforms comes and performs our merging with the Creator. This is what our work entails.
[42476]
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/8/2011, The Zohar

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Inner Work, Q&A, Zohar - No Comments →

In commemoration of National Remembrance Day for Fallen Soldiers and Victims of Terrorism

We received this land when we came out of Babylon. Our spiritual root in relation to the material world lies only here. Baal HaSulam says that here, we have to give an example to the entire humanity of what it means to be a nation corrected in accordance with the upper force, with nature. All the nations and the entire world have to abide by this natural law in order to continue to exist. Otherwise, a mass destruction will begin.

We must endeavor so that all the wars of the state of Israel were not in vain. We have to be faithful custodians of what we have obtained thanks to those who fell in wars. A succession of endless wars is not the way to advance the country. On the contrary, in honor of those who have given everything for us, we must understand how to live on, how to put an end to wars and killing.

It depends on us. So, instead of talking, let’s do what we have been entrusted with. Our duty is not only to prepare for a possible war, but to advance toward a true reconciliation, to peace. Only united with each other will we pass on the peace between us to everybody else.
[42503]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/8/2011, “The Nation”

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Inner Work, Israel - 1 Comment →

Until we reach the force of unity in which we reside in the center of the sphere of all the worlds, in the world of Infinity, and from where we withdrew from each other and descended into our external world, the same very source, the Creator, affects us with good and evil and entangles us from every direction, as it is written: “Thou hast hemmed me in behind and before.”

What does “behind and before” mean? Baal HaSulam explains that “You hem me in behind and before” means that it’s both when the Creator is revealed and concealed. After all, He is the only one who rules, and everybody will attain it. And then the notion of time and the feeling of past, present, and future will disappear. If there is only one force at work, nothing changes and everything is at absolute rest.

The attainment comes gradually, in correspondence with how we unify with this single force, the Creator. Besides, we don’t lose control of reality and turn into nothingness, but rather become like Him. We, together with Him, become the same exact magnificent, governing, singular force. And neither of us cancels the other: The Creator doesn’t nullify the created being, nor does the latter nullify the Creator. Moving forward and closer to Him, I don’t nullify myself. Instead, it is my ego that gets cancelled, while I rise like the Creator and come to adhesion with Him in all His perfection.

Then, I discover that I have been governed by this one force all the time, but it was simply hiding from me on purpose so that I would acquire it on my own and become as autonomous and magnificent as this singular force, the Creator. As I keep building myself in equivalence to Him, the Creator appears before me as an equal, magnificent partner and thereby we merge.

Every time when I gain autonomy, by transcending my ego in uniting with the group, I find the Creator within us, and thereby we unify together.
[42419]
From Lesson 8, WE! Convention 4/3/2011

Filed under: Conventions, Inner Work, Spirituality - No Comments →

The degrees of our connection, of how much tighter we bond with each other, are the spiritual ladder of rungs, the ladder of the worlds. We bond in the minimal degree, overcome the minimal thickness of our desire (Aviut Shoresh), and thereby attain the Creator only at the level of the Light of Nefesh.

When we unify in a greater degree, we attain Him as the Light of Ruach, followed by the Light of Neshama, Haya, and Yechida. Thus we pass forth from the world of Assiya to the world of Yetzira, followed by the worlds of Beria, Atzilut, Adam Kadmon, and finally reach the world of Infinity where our unity has no borders and everything is linked as one whole.

Until then, this unique force keeps working among us, confusing us, and nurturing us in all possible ways so that we would develop a need to unify among ourselves and merge with it. However, this force acts from “behind the scenes.” That’s how we play with children since we want them to “brainstorm” and use all their skill to do something independently. We know that only when a child exerts personal effort does he gain wisdom and understanding of life. In this, we are the same.

On the other hand, children have a tremendous natural yearning and desire to grow; they are always ready to act and learn about the world, while we are lazy and unable to make ourselves exert the necessary effort. And this is where the external force, the force of the group (and never the force of the Creator!) can do it, as it is written: “They helped everyone his friend.”
[42422]
From Lesson 8, WE! Convention 4/3/2011

Related Material:
The Most Serious Spoof
Joy Gives Us Strength On The Path
Grow Playfully

Filed under: Conventions, Inner Work, Spirituality - No Comments →

In our spiritual work we cannot do anything ourselves because we don’t know how to identify the unified force and relate it to many situations in our life. What should we attune ourselves to? Simply saying that the Creator is everywhere doesn’t help.

This is why we are given the group, and if we unite together, we discover this unified force called “there is none else besides Him” between us. The Creator deliberately split the creature He had made into a multitude of parts so that they would reassemble once more into a single thought, a single desire. Then, in this common desire, they will reveal the unified force that exists only in the connection they have formed, in unity and adhesion with them.

By uniting together into one desire, we don’t attain this force outside of us, but reveal ourselves and this force together as one whole. Indeed, there is no Light without a vessel (Kli), there is no Creator without the creature. The closer we bond together, the more we reveal the Creator within our unity.

In other words, our unification is the Creator. That is what it was at the start of creation, after which we dispersed and descended to this world in the form of small egoistic creatures.

Therefore, by uniting together we are building the Creator. We are creating Him independently, which is why He is called the Creator (in Hebrew Bo-Reh or “come and see”). There is no other place where we can build Him, discern Him, unite and achieve adhesion with Him, but only within our unification in the group. And all of humanity will need to connect together in the same way.
[42427]
From Lesson 8, WE! Convention 4/3/2011

Filed under: Conventions, Group Work, Inner Work, Spirituality - 1 Comment →

Question: We are looking at the words that are written by Kabbalists and signify a spiritual root. But how can we create an association in our corporeal sensory organs between the words we are accustomed to and the upper reality?

Answer: According to your desire to attain spirituality and your intention, you somewhat correspond to the Light. And in the degree of this correspondence, it starts affecting you, your desire and intention, from afar. It is what we call the “Surrounding Light,” the Light that Reforms.

It illuminates you from a distance since it still cannot come in contact with your desire and intentions, which are not as pure as the Light just yet. But there is still some connection between them since you are striving upward even from your low state.

And the intention emerges if you are connected in a smallest degree with the environment and receive from it the same desire and aspiration to unify together. Only in the degree of mutual inclusion of such intentions, which we are working toward while reading Kabbalistic texts, will you merit an illumination that will begin to affect you.

If you connect your desires and intentions with the others, who aspire to the same unity during the lessons, you draw the Surrounding Light. Now ask yourself: How often do you think about and desire it while you are studying? Otherwise, years will pass by, and you won’t see any results.
[42491]
From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/8/2011, Talmud Eser Sefirot

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Inner Work, Kabbalah Study, Q&A - No Comments →

Question: When I see my despicable egoism yet again, how can I not despair and simply succumb to it, thinking that it will never end?

Answer: A person must go through such states. Every time we reach a new spiritual degree, we undergo all of these states yet again, and it is absolutely necessary to come to total despair. But it’s only needed so that we clarify all of the states and pass through them. Every state builds the one that will follow it.

A person must lose faith in his or her personal power! And also, he must lose hope to receive help from Above. One has to go through all this: At each new degree, one relives the entire life anew, meaning that he undergoes all states.

The key is to prepare all the necessary tools for work, studies, and participation in dissemination and the life of the group. If a person adjusts this whole mechanism so that it works like a wind up clock, he won’t fall. I need to build a framework that will hold me as best it can.

I have to feel shameful about breaking this framework. The most powerful tool is the shame: at home, before the wife and children. How can it be that I won’t go to the lesson and won’t participate in a certain project? Let my pride prevent me from acting so.

When we experience a descent, we fall to the lowest, animate level of our “donkey” (Hamor or donkey comes from the word Homer or matter, desire). And I must prepare the kind of defense for myself that would make me feel ashamed even at the lowest degree, where I probably shouldn’t be feeling any shame or care about anything whatsoever. But I should still feel ashamed even at this degree.

The most powerful feeling a person may have is shame before his or her children. They know that parents will always forgive them and accept them just the way they are, and even the wife. But where the children are concerned, they are the ones who make us feel ashamed most—after all, they are our upper degree.

Hence, we should strive to prepare for ourselves conditions that prevent us from abandoning this path no matter what, that do not allow me to justify one claim of my egoism, try as I might…
[42328]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/5/2011, Shamati No. 56

Related Material:
Spiritual Endurance
How To Build A Passageway Into The Upper World
Let The Donkey Work For The Human

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Inner Work, Q&A - No Comments →

To reveal the first spiritual degree, we must reveal our unity, “one, unique, and unified,” at least in the smallest degree. The degree of our unity defines the level of our first spiritual degree.

The Lights of Nefesh, Ruach, Neshama, Haya, and Yechida (the five spiritual degrees) are characterized by a sum of particular details and the power of their unity, despite the fact that they are all in contradiction with one another. It is the only factor that determines the revelation of the upper Light. If we can find unity in the smallest degree, the weakest Light of Nefesh will become revealed as well.

However, why does the Light suddenly become more powerful and is called Ruach? It is because despite the changes and the movement of all interconnected parts, they can still remain balanced and tied. It is as if we keep the boat afloat, while it’s being tossed by waves in a storming sea, and make sure that it keeps stable.

At the first degree of unity, mutual transformations are not yet revealed. Everyone stays in some kind of stationary condition, just as one is, and we seek how to connect with each other. At the second degree, the same unity remains, but every part begins to transform; the cogwheels of the common mechanism as if start spinning relative to each other. And if we stick together despite all these changes and are able to unite, we reveal the Light of Ruach.

These are very limited changes nonetheless: While “staying grounded,” just like a plant, each of us, in our own place, sees the transformation of our individual properties. It is still the same Light of unification but at a higher (“vegetative”) degree. It is followed by a third degree, Neshama (“the animate” degree), where we start moving freely relative to each other, but still reveal unity, “one, unique, and unified,” among ourselves.

This means that the Light we experience in spirituality always depends on the power of our unity, despite any transformation that may be occurring within each of us individually and all of us together. It keeps growing, until we finally reach the end of correction (Gmar Tikkun), while we are experiencing all sorts of changes preventing us from unification in relation to one, single Light, but regardless of this, we are still able to unite.

This is what we call the one, unified spiritual vessel (Echad, Yachid) that receives one Light: Yechida.
[42331]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/5/2011, Shamati No. 56

Related Material:
The Game “Behind The Scenes”
The Force That Reveals The Spiritual World
Come And See What I Have!

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Group Work, Inner Work - 1 Comment →

Question: How does attainment differ in the worlds of Assiya, Yetzira, and Beria?

Answer: There is a tremendous difference, which is truly impossible to explain. It is the same as to live in Israel or some other countries, in the Temple or outside of it, or to be a great priest or a regular person.

The tiniest changes, a small ascent in the worlds, evoke tremendous transformations within our souls. The worlds of Beria, Yetzira, and Assiya are internal desires of our souls. We are always present in the three worlds of BYA and cannot disappear from them.

They serve as the “wrappers” around our souls. Just like now, I reside in this world and cannot escape anywhere from it since my body belongs to this world. I live, grow, mature, and die, while still remaining in this world. My body’s entire matter is part of the material world, whether I am alive or dead and disintegrate and return to the earth.

Similarly, a soul, regardless of the state it is in, always remains in the worlds of BYA. In the meantime, we reside only there, where we ask for correction and draw the Surrounding Light. It can pass down to us and illuminate downward, beneath the Parsa, from the world of Atzilut, although the Parsa doesn’t let the Light through. But this is the “surrounding” Light, and it illuminates from afar, awakening and calling us as if from a distance: “Come and see what I’ve got!”

Then I wake up and ascend along with the worlds of BYA above the Parsa. But I can’t rise without them since I am tightly connected with them: They are the closest “to my skin,” clothing me like a dress. I live in the world, but I am wearing “clothes”—they are the very worlds of BYA. And in them, I ascend to the world of Atzilut, which is regarded as “the ascension of the worlds.”

But as soon as I ascend to Atzilut and force the worlds of BYA to rise to it with me, I thereby receive a volume, an enormous empty vessel that I fill with the Inner Light of Atzilut. This signifies that my soul has been filled with the Light.

Desire has let the Light, the Creator, in and is experiencing Him now! Hence, the Creator and I are together, merging one with the other in the degree of our equivalence of form. This is all; there is nothing else in all of creation.

And all of a sudden, I discover where all the friends, other people, the still, vegetative, and animate nature, and this entire universe are. Everything is contained within this very desire; nothing vanished, but rather acquired a different form.

All that I used to see as rocks, plants, beasts, and humans turns out to be my desires that previously seemed material objects to me, which I could touch with my hands. But in truth, they are desires from which the universe is made. And beyond it, there is nothing else.

So it goes that a person ascending to the world of Atzilut with the worlds of BYA starts revealing the true image of reality. He as if gets to see what was hidden inside the computer, behind all those images he was shown on the screen. That’s what is called revelation!
[42443]
From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/6/2011, “Explanation of the Article, ‘Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah’”

Related Material:
Don’t Be A Donkey At The King’s Feast
The General And The Particular Attainment
Come And See Your Creator

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Inner Work, Perception, Q&A - No Comments →