Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, and so on are stages of the soul’s development. A new force arises inside the soul each time and begins to drive the development and all that accompanies it.

The new force is always a will to receive and a will to bestow. The development is phased, however, with one period following another. Until I have completed one stage of development, I don’t know what the next one will be, and so on.

After the seven years of plenty, I don’t know what the seven years of famine are. It seems to me that I am advancing, and I will enter the spiritual world the same way. Suddenly, instead of the spiritual world – boom! – the Egyptian darkness descends. Similarly, I don’t know that all of a sudden I exit the Egyptian darkness, the terrible, pitch-black darkness when my desire has no fulfillment, neither the Surrounding nor Inner Light, and I come to the Light.

Development occurs in stages. We just need to know how to advance, but every revelation is a surprise, a complete surprise.
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From the Lesson on Weekly Torah Portion, 12/2/10

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At present, you are moving ahead, inquiring, wishing for something. Who instills these desires and actions in you? That is what you must find out.

Gradually, as you get to know the unifying force working in the whole of creation, you thereby replace the instruments of your perception: the heart and the mind. You become more responsive and begin to better comprehend what is going on and understand the Creator’s actions.

You suddenly see an enormous world, which is much broader, deeper, and more complex in all its angles and aspects. All of this becomes different in relation to you. But later you will understand that it is you who is changing, and outside of you, everything remains the same.

Later, you will find out that all you are seeing is only the Creator. It is so because there is none else beside Him. And what you see as the world is just your shadow over Him, and it is so until you will have reached the condition when this shadow disappears.

In other words, to reach adhesion with the Creator, we must undergo multiple changes. In your perception, these alterations are called the worlds of Assya, Yetzira, Beriah, Atzilut, Adam Kadmon, and the World of Infinity. These are degrees of your perception of reality that are shown to you in its much more authentic form.

So, what did change? Only your perception. You alter your sensory organs and witness how gradually the Creator is being revealed to you, how the image of the world acquires much sharper characteristics, becomes real, constant, and eternal. It all depends on the place you are observing it from in relation to the Light of Infinity.

Then, you begin to understand that the shadow you saw on the Creator, all of these concealments, the worlds, all of this was for your own good. At least, you saw some silhouettes, a certain drawing that you needed to erase, saw that you needed to become similar to the Creator within this shadow, to make it disappear.
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From a Lesson 11/26/10, Baal HaSulam’s Letter #151

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Our whole work consists of justifying the states that we go through, and then they will seem more comfortable to us. And this depends only on us! After all, all these states are inevitable; all the Reshimot (spiritual genes) must come out, in order, one after another, and be realized until the end of correction.

They are gradually revealed in you in order for you to justify them. And what does it mean to justify them? It means to realize, feel, and understand for what purpose they come, who brings them, why, and in what order.

Thereby you develop yourself, and so much that you begin to include in you the whole creation. This is precisely what the Creator wants from you! This is why He does not give you the final form; you wouldn’t feel or understand anything in it. Instead, He leads you through the whole sequence of actions.

But does this process truly exist? It doesn’t! There is no beginning, no end, and nothing at all! There is one perfect state. The Creator stretches it out from beginning to end, like a rubber band, implanting the ego, the evil inclination, or the desire for pleasure, into His own action. And then you can go through all these states in order, from beginning to end, all the while perfecting your sensations and mind.

This helps you understand the whole process of creation, from two opposites: from darkness – to Light. And if this were one state, you would not be able to differentiate between anything, since you are a created being. You need two states in order to feel and elucidate one against the other.
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From a lesson on Baal HaSulam’s Letters 11/26/10

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Question: What are “round” vessels (Kelim de Igulim), and how do they participate in our work?

Answer: “Round” vessels are the storage, archive of all desires, which we need to extract from there and correct. They are desires of the World of Infinity, still before the restriction. Through them the Upper Light can influence those who still don’t have a screen.

Souls that have a screen work with “straight” vessels (Kelim de Yosher). They are situated in “straight” unification with the Upper Light. However, if I don’t have a screen, I cannot influence the Creator.

And how can the Creator influence me? He influences me through “round” vessels since He exists everywhere, in all desires. Through them He can influence me since I, too, have “round” vessels which I still haven’t “straightened out,” directed them to the Creator.

Therefore, there are two types of Upper Governance: individual and general. I exist under the individual, private Governance if I am able to be connected to the Creator in mutual bestowal. In that case, He gives to me, I give to Him, and we work together completely “straight”: “the measure of suffering (effort) determines the measure of reward,” meaning the screen determines the whole profit, and this is how I advance.

Meanwhile, the “round” desires indicate that I am unable to overcome anything. I don’t even know or understand that I am receiving since the whole world does it. Until a person acquires a screen and starts working “in the line,” he is controlled through the “round” desires, meaning he receives without thinking, like everyone else.

The Light reaches us through the “round” Kelim and rouses a “straight” reaction in us because we have no other opportunity to respond to the Creator. If we react properly and in a “straight” manner to the way He influences us through the “circles,” we enter into contact with Him. We reveal the Creator as a Giver and receive the whole fulfillment in a “straight” manner, with the help of the screen.

And if not, then we are sent various disasters and misfortunes through the “round” desires. The “circles” control and turn us in all directions, but if we establish a “straight” connection, we take the control into our own hands.
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From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/3/10, Explanation of the Article, “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah”

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A person cannot avoid being influenced by the environment, which elevates or belittles him. It is impossible to resist if I am important in my eyes.

If I don’t wish to conform to this opinion, I have to construct another image around myself, one that will become meaningful to me. In that case, I will measure everything in relation to it: If I am being reprimanded or praised, foremost, I will check whether it is beneficial or harmful to this image. And then, let me be scolded, but if the image benefits from it, helps me to achieve it, and come closer to it, I feel good.

If I am being scolded by the people whom I hold in authority, I value their opinion. But if I regard them as foes, then the more they scold me, the more it convinces me that I am correct. I am glad they are criticizing my path. In this case, the most horrible condemnations may sound as blessings to me.

Let’s say you are being cursed by the Pharaoh, it’s great, because he is opposite to the Creator; it all depends on whose influence you choose. Hence, I must remain only under the influence of my environment that I chose for spiritual growth. I should be very responsive to it since with its help, I can aim myself in the right direction.

Upon entering such an environment, its opinion must become sacred for me. I copy all its values and live in accordance with them instead of with what used to fill me before.

If I wish to receive the mind of the Upper One, the Creator, instead of my own, then I unfold my entire future world in the head (Rosh) of the group, in their desires. I don’t have anything else: They are that very Kli which I receive the future world into. Therefore, the collective opinion of the group and its values, start prevailing over everything else.

In fact, I will never be able to uncover the tiniest particle of the spiritual world unless I step out of myself and exchange my head for the common head and heart of the group. Therein lay my sole choice and chance to reach spirituality.

You need to be responsive to their mind and heart and keep trying to find within what the true environment is. As a result, you will suddenly get to realize that they have it all although they themselves are unaware of it. It is this particular group in relation to which you have to nullify yourself, and that is where you will find the entire World of Infinity.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/2/10, The Writings of Rabash

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Question: Do I have free will to ask my own questions, or it is also done by the Upper Governance?

Answer: Free will doesn’t lie in your asking one or the other question. Free will means not sitting inside your ego getting blows. After all, submerged in your ego, you are unable to understand anything because you lack one more factor existing on the outside.

Identifying yourself with someone or something outside of you, you will be able to see yourself from aside. It will teach you to recognize two conditions: the Light and the dark. And then you will be able to advance faster.

But if you don’t enter the group, live in bestowing to it, and being affected by it, you do not advance. It is so because spiritual advancement lies in understanding the process of creation. In order to gain it, you need two initial points: one is within, the other-outside yourself. Hence, the group is given to you so that you may find this second point.
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From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/1/10, Baal HaSulam, “Beit Shaar HaKavanot”

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Question: In the article dedicated to the Hanukkah celebration, we read about choosing the environment. How does one relate to the other?

Answer: What is another way to come to the celebration of Hanukkah in the soul? Only with the help of environment that wakes a person up to demand the property of bestowal. And then we start asking it, by raising MAN (female waters, a prayer): It is our revolt against the “Greeks” above whom we must rise with our collective desire.

This is a war against inner doubts; waged until we defeat them all and climb to the top of the mountain made of these doubts (mountain in Hebrew is “har,” from the word “Irurim,” doubts) to the holiday of Hanukkah. And when we are in the final stage of the climb, when Hanukkah ends, all of its 8 days (the 7 Sefirot of Zeir Anpin plus Malchut), then we start approaching Purim. Now we collect the desires we rose above and attach them to Bina, thereby reaching the big, mature state of adulthood (Gadlut).
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/2/10, The Writings of Rabash

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Question: How should I work with faith above reason if the heart doesn’t open?

Answer: You need to be patient. It is hard work we do while in Egyptian bondage when we keep building new “pyramids” by exerting the greatest effort until the heart suddenly starts feeling. And in this work, the circulation of Kabbalah helps tremendously; it is beneficial to the person himself. The more he invests in the others, even if the motives are diversely egoistic, the faster he starts feeling how his heart unfolds.

I see this in the example of people who put much effort in studying but don’t get involved in the dissemination of Kabbalah. It is not enough to simply study and stay in the group: the heart doesn’t open! Everybody has to find himself a unique job, no matter how small, in order to make it his constant concern, so that he knows: This is what I bestow to people; through me, this wisdom gets spread.

This is a magical instrument as I have seen from my experience: A person who is involved in dissemination advances much more rapidly. Therefore, I recommend it to all.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/2/10, The Writings of Rabash

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Question: What should we do this Hanukkah so that the spiritual world becomes reality?

Answer: All of us around the world have reached the point of breakthrough. We are approaching the exodus from Egypt, from the sensation of just our world inside our ego.

On the one hand, we feel that the Pharaoh, egoism is holding us by the toes and stubbornly refuses to let us go. On the other, we understand that we must break out of our ego. These forces are fighting one another.

Every day brings us greater understanding that the spiritual world and its perception are above the ego, which is called faith above reason. However, when we attempt to reach the spiritual world, we feel that we still lack the forces to make the breakthrough and escape from Egypt.

Therefore, we need more events such as the recent Unity Day, which was held by all the world groups with great success. Our world group is already big and diverse enough, giving great power of unity to our Kli. Therefore, we have come to a state where we are fighting against the “Greeks” in us, wishing to be free of them.

The difference between the Pharaoh and the “Greeks” is the level of the struggle: The Pharaoh represents the passions of the material world such as the desires for food, sex, family, wealth, fame, and so on, while the Greeks represent the struggle between materialism and Kabbalah. A person who stops being tempted by these things despite having all of them, and who realizes that other things are more important in life, wages the war for ascension above this world since his life lacks meaning. He doesn’t know what to live for.

Thus, the Maccabean War is a spiritual war. The ancient Greek philosophers argued that our world is real and that we have to live in it and develop it. This approach is opposite to the wisdom of Kabbalah, which says that we must rise above this world because it can no longer fill us; we have to realize the thought of creation.

We have reached a very advanced level, although we always want to achieve more. I think that all of us, including those who are advancing together with us in groups, as well as individual students all over the world, will quickly prevail in this war.
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From the lecture on 11/30/2010

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Question: It is said in The Study of the Ten Sefirot (Part 8, Item 4, “Inner Reflection”) that the lower one raises MAN, a plea for correction, only to its upper one (Elyon), and from there, to the degree higher than the upper one (Ali Elyon). So it follows that there is a leap of two degrees?

Answer: No, you can never rise to the degree higher than the upper one. The text discusses three degrees to prevent you from thinking that the action is completed in your upper one. The upper one raises your MAN to the degree higher than the upper one.

And although the action does not end even at the degree higher than the upper one, we only consider three degrees in the World of Atzilut. However, it does not mean that everything ends at them.

Not a single degree can correct anything for the lower degree without taking part of the Light of Infinity. It must raise the desire, the need of the lower one into the World of Infinity since such a desire is completely new: It is a desire to unite Malchut with Bina that has never existed, does not exist, and it’s not to be found even in Infinity.

This desire has to ascend to the World of Infinity where Malchut of the World of Infinity enters a union (Zivug De Hakaa) with the Light of Infinity and passes the special Light intended specifically to that MAN of the lower one.

However, in order to discuss this entire chain we consider only three degrees: the lower one, the upper one, and higher than the upper one.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/5/10, Talmud Eser Sefirot

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