Question: What signs can help us tell whether a person is advancing in the study of The Book of Zohar?

Answer: Which books you study is irrelevant in this regard because besides studying The Book of Zohar we also study Talmud Eser Sefirot as well as articles and letters by Baal HaSulam and Rabash which explain how to advance toward unity among us and toward mutual study. They help us to get organized correctly. After we organize among ourselves into a study group, we begin studying actual Kabbalah.

The purpose of the study group in Kabbalah is not to study the material, but to aspire through reading it to realize the “Segula,” meaning to evoke the influence of the Light upon us from a higher level. If during the study we desire for the Light to become revealed inside our unity, then by this effort we build the higher level and then our effort brings about the emergence of that level.

However, if we study trying only to understand the material, then we do not study the Torah. That’s because the Torah refers precisely to our effort and the appearance of a new level in it.

Therefore, progress in studying the primary sources (The Zohar, the books of the Ari, and Talmud Eser Sefirot) is determined by the force of your aspiration to reveal the next level inside of you, instead of the desire just to know the material.

There is no advancement in understanding or accumulating knowledge because prior to the sensation of the upper world, all our notions of it are incorrect.
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/12/11, The Zohar

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Kabbalah Study, Kabbalistic Sources, Q&A, Torah, Unity, Zohar - 1 Comment →

Question: It is written in one of the books that there are spiritual objects. What are they?

Answer: In our world there is nothing that would connect us with spirituality besides special books. These books carry spiritual significance because they really speak of spirituality. Reading them, a person attracts spirituality to himself or herself.

It is most advantageous to read these books in the group when everyone gathers together with the intention and attracts the Surrounding Light. Besides the environment, meaning the group and the books, there is nothing in our world.

I highly recommend that you always be with a book wherever you are. If you have a few free minutes, short breaks at work, open a book and read a short excerpt. Little by little you will start noticing that you are drawn to it more, advance more, and that all your thoughts are changing. Start getting used to it.

I grew at Rabash’s very simply: There weren’t any computers back then, and I always had a book in my hands. Wherever I went, I had a book with me. This is how I re-read all the books many times. I even used to take The Study of the Ten Sefirot with me, a book that is hard to read in the middle of the street. But it contains a section with questions and answers, and I read them. I also read The Book of Zohar and different articles.

Today we have a wealth of books. I think that everyone should have them at home. Each month you can read a different book, not from cover to cover, but wherever you open it. This is what Rabash taught me to do.

During our walks, if he got tired, we used to sit for a few minutes on a bench. I always had a book with me. He would open it at random and start to read. After a few lines, he would close the book and continue the walk. And that’s how it was all the time!

Do it: Get a portion of the Surrounding Light for half an hour or an hour, and then do it again and again. A book has to be in your hands. This is why I’m for publishing them in a pocket-sized format.
[40172]
From Lesson 4, WE! Convention 4/2/2011

Filed under: Conventions, Inner Work, Kabbalah Study, Q&A - 1 Comment →

There are many stories in The Book of Zohar that are written in allegorical language (Midrash). They are seemingly describing people and angels (the forces of nature), animals, and plants, which is because the Book’s authors wished to explain all levels of creation to us: the still, vegetative, animate, and speaking.

Baal HaSulam prepared four introductions to The Book of Zohar:

1. “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah (Pticha)”: It is a scientific preface where he explains the structure of the worlds, Partzufim, Sefirot, and the interaction of the Lights and desires (vessels, Kelim).

2. “The Preamble to the Sulam Commentary”: It is connected to the above mentioned preface. Here, he also explains how to work in the three lines, with Lights and desires, if only in a more particular form, closer to each soul.

3. “Preface to The Book of Zohar”: In this introduction, Baal HaSulam explains the perception of reality. He describes how we transition from our ordinary, corporeal perception of reality to the spiritual one, when we start perceiving reality through this world, which becomes transparent, and see the forces working in it instead of the external picture of the world.

Similarly, when we look at the computer screen, we see a certain image. But it exists only pertaining to us since we created this screen and this method of projection on purpose. In reality though, it is merely an external manifestation of information stored inside the computer, on its hard drive. If we could read information directly from the disk, we wouldn’t need to retrieve it onto the screen and read it from it.

The wisdom of Kabbalah is the instrument that allows us to enter the internal, concealed part of reality and see not the external form presented to us at the moment, but rather the internal activity: the forces working behind the scenes of the familiar image of the world.

In this introduction, Baal HaSulam also explains that our perception of reality is divided into four components: the essence, the abstract form, the form clothed in matter, and the matter itself. Until the final correction (Gmar Tikkun), we attain only our matter (desire) and form that this desire assumes: either an egoistic or altruistic one. We cannot know the abstract form and less so the essence. Thus we advance to the final correction.

Hence, the wisdom of Kabbalah gives us a very serious warning not to indulge in fantasies, but rather to be realistic and use a scientific approach while striving to discover the spiritual world in a sound, tangible form.

4. “Introduction to The Book of Zohar”: Here, Baal HaSulam explains various problems a person faces in his or her questions about who we are, what our essence and role in this world is, why the Creator created us so flawed, low, and despicable, why we must walk this entire long path and become equivalent to Him, and so on. In the beginning of this introduction, Baal HaSulam asks these questions and answers them further on.

And in the end of the introduction, there is a very special, well-known, and widespread part where he writes about our correction in our days. There he explains that the world is divided into inner and outer parts. People who feel they belong in spiritual attainment are regarded as the inner part of the world. It is they who must unify among themselves and use The Book of Zohar to draw the Light that Reforms to themselves.

By doing so, they will become the spiritual source and the spiritual center of the world. Having the spiritual force, they will be spreading the wisdom of Kabbalah, and the whole world will get to feel that they have something exalted: knowledge, wisdom, the correct, common sense approach to what is happening in the world, and the answers to questions about it.

The world will begin to understand that these people reside at a much higher degree than all scientists and the so-called great leaders of this world since they possess the knowledge of the forces that act and transform our world in such an unpredictable way.

Then, after resistance and confrontations, the world will still begin to feel drawn to these people and recognize in them the upper force, the upper wisdom. And thus, in the end, the whole world will arrive at correction. After all, correction is basically performed between the individuals who are regarded as the inner part of the world, the ones with the point in the heart, while the rest of the world will only join in and cling to them, just like today in the world the masses live their daily lives while the world is ruled by a handful of others.

And thus, as Baal HaSulam explains in the end of the “Introduction to The Book of Zohar,” the entire humanity will keep developing until the world unifies together, all become as one whole, thanks to the same Book of Zohar, and reaches the same very ten primordial Sefirot that Rabbi Shimon and his nine disciples wrote about.
[39972]
From Lesson 4, WE! Convention 4/2/2011

Filed under: Conventions, Inner Work, Kabbalah Study, Perception, Zohar - No Comments →

It’s hard to even imagine to what extent the initial volume of The Book of Zohar superseded that which is left available to us today. It is about 20 times smaller. The majority of the Book is gone. But Kabbalists write that we don’t need more. The remainder of the Book is designated specifically for us, in order to provide us with the necessary assistance.

It is very difficult to discuss The Book of Zohar since it is supremely exalted. Besides, it is written in a very unique manner. Baal HaSulam explains that there are two types of souls: some root in the Inner Light and the others in the Surrounding one.

We reside in the integral system of souls, and the connection between us runs both in the internal stream between the souls and also in the surrounding field. Any electrical system is designed this way, having resistors (resistance circuits), capacitors, and inductor coils. All of this works together, both electromagnetic fields and the resistors between them. Some parts of this system accumulate energy within them, while the others turn the electrical current into a magnetic field and vice versa, the field into electrical current that runs inside it.

The system of souls works in a similar manner. The authors of The Book of Zohar also had to have these two types of souls. This is why they studied in a very specific fashion. They sat in a circle. Rabbi Shimon would talk about what he was attaining, while all his disciples were listening, discussing what he would reveal, asking him questions, and receiving answers. Rabbi Aba would hear what they were saying and write it down.

All of this was occurring during the conversation. Naturally, the conversation essentially lay in the transmission of the forces and Lights between these souls that originated in both Inner and Surrounding Lights. Rabbi Shimon had a soul coming from the Inner Light, and Rabbi Aba from the Surrounding one. Hence, Rabbi Aba was able to record everything Rabbi Shimon said in a concealed form so that today any person can buy The Book of Zohar, read it, and understand nothing.

To attain this Book, a person must undergo a certain preparation in connection with the friends. They have to form the same exact model of relationships between them as the authors of The Zohar did. Organizing such a group (it is not mandatory to have only ten people in it; there could even be 10,000) and striving to unify and wishing to discover what the Book is talking about in their mutual connection, they become similar to Rabbi Shimon’s group. And then they receive the influence of Light from it.

Since some of us belong in the Inner Light and some in the Surrounding one, we begin receiving the impact like a radio receiving waves. Then we start hearing what the Book is saying, at the rung of Bina (hearing is the level of Bina) and even seeing (at the level of Hochma), depending upon our spiritual degree. And if we haven’t reached mutual connection at the level of Bina, then we are still preparing for it.

Therefore, a sign of spiritual advancement is when we, as a group, while reading The Zohar, start sensing this text as the same forces and properties The Zohar is describing. This is the essence of the Book itself. This book is an instructor, a working manual. When penetrating it, a person feels how he rises with this book and discovers spiritual degrees, as if he is ascending a ladder indeed.

I very much hope that during our lessons when we start reading The Book of Zohar, you all together will keep the right intention in order to gain as much as possible from this source.
[39994]
From Lesson 4, WE! Convention 4/2/2011

Related Material:
The Book Of Books
The Intention Cannot Be Expressed In Words
The Key To Understanding

Filed under: Conventions, Group Work, Inner Work, Kabbalah Study, Zohar - No Comments →

There are books written by regular people about sensations in this world. And there are books written by Kabbalists, people who attain the upper world and write about their sensations in spirituality.

These books are called special, sacred books. Sacred (Kadosh) literally translates “separate.” The spiritual world is completely separated from our egoism; therefore, a person who is describing it from his sensations is writing a sacred book: special or separated.

There is one special book out of all the books written throughout history by people with spiritual attainment. In Kabalistic sources it is simply referred to as The Book, with no mention of its name “The Zohar.” This book is so unique that in relation to it other books aren’t even considered a book. This is because it was written by a special group of people who attained all ten of the highest Sefirot in Malchut of the world of Infinity.

The special meeting of these ten individuals occurred approximately 2000 years ago. Nine students along with their teacher Rabbi Shimon retired to a cave in the North of Israel. They stayed there and studied.

This cave is a very special place. When my teacher Rabash and I would go to Tiberias, we often visited this cave. Rabash really loved to be there. He would stand for a few minutes, and it looked like he was somewhere else, as if he left his body. That’s the extent to which he connected to the spiritual force of the ten Sefirot, the ten souls that sat in this cave while revealing the world of Infinity.

By connecting together they attained all 125 spiritual levels, from our world to the world of Infinity. Baal HaSulam writes in the “Introduction to The Book of Zohar” that such a high level of attainment by a group of people occurred only once in the entire history because they united and studied together.

Only in the final correction (Gmar Tikkun) will we be able to attain the same level that was attained by this group, and we’ll be able to do so thanks to their unification. They wrote in The Book of Zohar how they were able to unite, what happened as a result, and what was revealed in the connection between them. Therein lies the whole power of The Book of Zohar.

And clearly this Book can give us the greatest force of correction for our souls. That’s why this Book is so important.
[39874]
From Lesson 2, WE! Convention 4/2/2011

Filed under: Conventions, Group Work, Inner Work, Kabbalah Study, Zohar - No Comments →

Filed under: Kabbalah Study, Laitman Unplugged, Q&A - No Comments →

Filed under: Inner Work, Kabbalah Study, Laitman Unplugged - No Comments →

Question: Could you tell us about your intention while reading The Book of Zohar?

Answer: Kabbalists teach us what the intention should be. Every person has to actualize what he read to the extent he understands it.

It is impossible to tell you about the intention. This is something that cannot be explained to another person since the intention comes from a person’s inner state which he reveals.

I am in a state that’s unknown to me. I reveal it as it unfolds inside of me. From this state that becomes revealed to me, I create the intention.

In essence, it is impossible to clothe this intention into words. There are no words for it. That’s because it includes a person’s inner desire (Hissaron) and the degree of his connection with the upper reality through his attempts to find the means that will bring him to the highest possible closeness to the Host, the Creator – to adhesion (Zivug de Hakaa) with Him.

What are those means? They are the books, the teacher, and the group. A person includes everything that he understands and feels from their entire sum total, and through them attains unity with the Creator.

All of these means have to be present. If you miss even one of them, then you don’t have the right contact. And in addition, each of them must be properly balanced with the others.
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/28/11, The Zohar

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

Writings of Rabash, “Love of Friends”: A man found him while he was wandering in the field and asked him, “What are you looking for?” To which he replied, “I am looking for my brothers. Tell me, where are they?” … This is talking about a person who has veered off the path of the spiritual development, who does not know the true way there, who has already reached despair and thinks that he will never attain his goal. That is why he answers, “I want to be in the group where there is love of friends because then I will be able to ascend up the path leading to the Creator.”

That is how we wander around, not knowing how to reach the right state. We don’t understand how to establish the connection with spirituality and where to find it. However, in fact we are already in the spiritual world now, which is why we are wandering around this field. We already have the opportunity to establish a relationship with the group and to connect with the friends, but we are unable to do this. Thus, we walk by, like we are blind. We are already in the right place, but we cannot find this connection, as if we are wandering around in the dark.

This darkness is not outside, but inside of us, as a result of our blindness and lack of understanding. What’s missing here is some kind of epiphany in feeling and reason so I would understand in what form I have to connect with the friends. Then I will find how to make the breakthrough to the spiritual development, to the first contact with spirituality which is called “three days of absorption of the spiritual seed.”

For that I have to understand how to bind myself to the environment the right way, and that is the most difficult thing to do. In our world we know of cases when a woman is unable to get pregnant. And it is much more difficult yet to get into the spiritual world.

The Torah talks about the great problems of infertility that each of the fore-mothers had and how difficult it was for them to get pregnant. This is a symbol of how difficult it is to bind oneself to the environment.

How, then, is it possible to help a person who feels that he is lost and does not see any chance of advancing spiritually? He has put years into it and seems to know and understand everything, other than the direction. At first he thought that the knowledge he receives will help him, or some kind of actions, or maybe time will do the job.

But later he reveals that nothing helps him and then he becomes confused. That is when an angel comes to him and finally asks him, “What are you asking for? What are you looking for here?” Then the person checks himself and starts to understand that he lacks precisely the connection with the environment, “I am looking for my brothers!”

This is already a great attainment where you understand that you will be able to realize your spiritual development only on this path, inside of the connection with others. The group turns into a spiritual place. Instead of the material, physical group that he sees now, he will feel the inner connection between everyone and will turn this connection into mutual bestowal. He will reveal the net connecting them, which is called the system of the upper worlds, and all of the worlds will enter it.

This group will become the place where he will gradually reveal all of the spiritual levels, until he will come so close to the other 125 levels that he will unite with them into one whole. This will be called the end of his correction (Gmar Tikkun).

If a person begins to feel that he will be able to realize his spiritual development precisely in this way, through the relationships with the environment, this means that he is wandering around the Creator’s field and looking, while knowing what to look for and what to ask for. He still has to go through a difficult road up ahead, but this point where he decides that the spiritual world can only be reached through unity with the environment is extremely important. That’s because it is opposite to all of his previous, material, egoistic development.

This point marks the beginning of his development and his connection with others “from himself outwards, for the sake of bestowal.” Therefore, this point is the beginning for the new path.
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/23/11, Preparation to the WE! Convention

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Egoism, Group Work, Inner Work, Kabbalah Study, Torah, Unity - No Comments →

Question: Until we started studying the world of Atzilut in Part 9, Talmud Eser Sefirot (TES), it seemed to me that I understood the flow of the material. But in this part, I understand absolutely nothing. Can you tell in general terms what is happening there?

Answer: I can tell what is happening with you, why you don’t understand anything. It’s because you have no relation to it.

There are several levels of perceiving the study material: “I don’t know,” “I’m not familiar with,” “I don’t understand,” and “I’m unable to understand.” The latter is because your mind does not correspond to the mind of the book.

If this were written in Chinese and you didn’t understand the language, it would be one thing. If it depended on your education level and you didn’t comprehend certain formulas or basic definitions needed to master the material, you would still have something to study.

However, here you can study as much as you want, year after year, and you nevertheless won’t understand anything until your Kelim (vessels, desires)  become at least somewhat similar to the desires described in the book. When each word will echo with an inner change within you, you will start comprehending what is being described here.

You may ask: “But didn’t I understand something in the first three parts of TES?” No, you didn’t. The three parts in question describe the acts of absolute bestowal that are so distant from and opposite to you that this opposition gives you the illusion of understanding. In reality, you interpret them completely incorrectly.

It’s easy to draw a Kli (vessel), the Light, and the screen in the middle, the arrows pointing in different directions, the percentage of the Light received or given away. But it’s impossible to imagine this action for real. However, it is so inaccessible and opposite to us that it makes us think that we understand.

Meanwhile, the actions described in Part 9 of TES are very close to us. The moment you have at least one ounce of the desire to bestow, you will enter a similar act.

Hence you see that you don’t understand. Your mind has to become similar to the spiritual one—then the connection will appear and you will be able to comprehend. This is the only way!
[38890]
From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/23/2011, Talmud Eser Sefirot

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