Question: What condition is our group facing now in order to rise to the next level?

Answer: The main thing is to use the two forces correctly, the two ends. On the one hand it says: “And his heart shall rise in ways of the Lord.” Since if a person isn’t proud that he is following God’s way, he will not be able to resist the egoistic forces, the “shells” as he goes out against the world opinion.

But on the other hand, if he is not modest and humble, this pride will not be the right pride. This is why he has to be submissive before the Light that Reforms and understand that only the Light performs the changes and can give him the desire to bestow.

After every success a person has to say, it isn’t I and my own power that did this, but everything was done from Above and its success was predetermined. So instead of feeling proud in one’s achievements and accomplishments, he has to be proud that the Creator has chosen him and has raised him to this level, so that now he will be able to use it in order to bestow and thus get closer to the Creator.

He shouldn’t aim the success towards himself but rather from himself towards bestowal.

Thus we begin to learn and to use the success we have reached to advance correctly. After all, this state, like we are in now, when a person feels that he has attained something, can be a great obstacle for one’s advancement.

A person falls off track because of the imaginary failures or successes. These are two polar states. As a result of the failures he loses hope, despairs, escapes, and feels disappointed. But when he succeeds, it is even a greater problem, since it can draw him even further from the Creator, as it says: “He and I cannot dwell in the same abode.”

There are people who are more immune to that and there are those who are less immune. But if a person doesn’t forget the importance of the goal and he is clean with regards to it, it guards him. Otherwise he can be bribed by a good job, a respected name, a good reputation, or by being successful in the eyes of others. It will not be a clean calculation that is only aimed from him outward.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/26/12, Shamati #219

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Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar,” Item 46: Malchut is the coarsest cover, hiding the Light of Ein Sof. The Light it passes from Him to the receivers is only a small portion, related to the purification of the still body of man.

The Light is filtered, and it weakens on its way to the desire, and the level, the intensity, and the strength of the connection that it carries, depends on it. When it goes through Malchut, it can purify the desire only on the level of the still nature.

A person who receives the Light from Malchut totally annuls himself. He cannot perform independent actions and totally annuls himself, thus enabling the Light to operate on him. If the Light comes through Zeir Anpin, it purifies it on the level of the vegetative, and, in addition to annulling himself, it enables him to move for the first time.

Later, the Light that comes through Bina raises the desire to the animate level. Now, it can operate by itself, give birth to new levels, and resemble the Creator. Finally, when a person receives the Light of Hochma, there is no limit to what he can do with his desire and with his nature, with his inner potential.

So, it all depends on the level from which the Light that Reforms comes. We must be under that level and to resemble it somehow.

Question: In what way is the vegetative level different from the animate level?

Answer: First, measure the growth from the beginning or in other words, compare it to the level of the still nature. Inanimate nature cannot move on its own. It is totally annulled by the Light and is in absolute rest.

On the other hand, on the vegetative level, the desire that has grown can take on more advanced forms and to change, but this still has to be attained, and so the level of inanimate nature develops as it resists changes.

The desire to receive changes, but a person keeps himself, his structure, and attributes. Thus, he acquires a basis that is created of all the four phases on which he stands by not annulling his desire, but rather by leaving it under the Masach (screen) and the restriction.

Then, from his level of the still nature, a person can build the next three levels: the vegetative, the animate, and the speaking. Everything stems from the level of the still nature. Therefore, on the level of the still nature, a person goes through all the phases only in the form of the still nature. Then, on every level, there are the particular levels of the still nature, and they are all be the result of the Keter of the still nature that is stabilized from the start.

As for the level of the vegetative, it can generate independent movements under the influence of the Light. In other words, if at first I could only admire different delicacies, covering my mouth with my hand, which means covering the desire with a Masach, now I already can taste a bit in order to bestow.

Then, there is the level of the animate that already can give birth to new forms. It can move and extract waste materials and organize in groups, but only according to its nature. It doesn’t take an example from the Creator yet and acts like a baby in which the level of the animate is expressed for the time being.

This is the difference: The level of the vegetative cannot move independently, it doesn’t give birth to anything new, and only responds to the influence of the upper Light. At this point, a person gradually begins to work with his desire to receive, which means that he doesn’t just restrict it, but uses it to bestow in order to bestow. On the other hand, the animate level is ready to receive in order to bestow.

The level of the speaking already takes an example from the Creator, and this is different from all the rest. The whole point is to resemble the Creator.
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From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/25/12, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar”

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We attain the Creator, which means that we reach the attribute of bestowal, the revelation of the spiritual world, only if we acquire two discernments:

• A great desire that is aimed at that, which is clarified enough and which is one degree lower than the level of attainment. A person imagines what the revelation of the Shechina (Divinity), the Creator’s face is, what the Light and the attribute of bestowal are.
• A person must feel great pain since he doesn’t have the attribute of bestowal. A person suffers and he knows that the attribute of bestowal symbolizes the rising above his ego and a complete detachment from his previous life and from all his personal accounts.

It’s very hard to reach that, since we act against our nature. Therefore a person advances on two legs, step by step, between two lines: left right, left right…from his part a person should try to start from the right line and fall to the left. But from Above, he is always given the left line, darkness first. On every level, by the darkness and the Light the “letters of the work” are registered in a person, the relations that are drawn between the types of darkness and the Light, the attributes of receiving and bestowal in different manners.

The letters are different on every level. Each time the darkness and the Light are depicted to him in different attributes according to different criteria. Accordingly the letters also take on different forms. This is why each time a person has a new Torah, a new Creator, a new world, everything is new and he is also new.

Thus a person grows by his consistency that indicates how much patience he has, and thereby he advances and comes closer to the right forms of the great deficiency that are aimed at true bestowal. Here we see the principle of “I have labored and I found,” meaning a person is looking for the Creator’s face, the greatness of the attribute of bestowal. Connecting to the attribute of bestowal, the force of bestowal summons in him the feeling of belonging, warmth, up to the actual feeling of love. Since to love the Creator is to love bestowal, to love the attribute of love itself, it begins to fill a person and enables him to dwell in it.

We have to go through great changes in our nature by detaching ourselves from our old values, from the previous understanding of what exertion means and what the goal is, who the Creator is and what the Torah is. Each time we re-evaluate the great desire that is required of us and the suffering that we experience. The values naturally change in the transition from one state to another, and a person constantly changes and becomes another, a new person.

Therefore it says in the Torah, “Abraham is an old man.” “An old man” is someone who has acquired knowledge, who has been through and “plowed” the whole path. A person acquires the attribute of bestowal gradually, the mind and the understanding of how to work with it, the feeling, the loyalty, the self-sacrifice, and how to identify with the Creator. Thus he attains the level of “an old man” which means his point of adhesion with the Creator. Then the attribute of bestowal fills him, and he feels love and appreciation towards it.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/13/12, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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As it is written, “Confidence is the clothing for the Light.” The desire to receive is the basis for everything, but the desire itself is worthless if the Light doesn’t operate on it.

The greatest righteous one who attains many spiritual levels falls if the Light stops illuminating him, and he returns to his animal state. He even becomes worse than everyone else, although this is a good state since this is a great state but with a minus and the opposite from Holiness.

As long as the Light illuminates, there is confidence, and, if the Light stops shining, there is no confidence. Everything depends only on the Light that illuminates a person. To this extent he has the power to rise and to say something.

When the Light disappears, a person loses even his memory as happened to the Baal Shem Tov who couldn’t remember the letters of the alphabet. A person cannot understand in which world he is and whether there is an upper world or a Creator.

This means that everything depends on the intensity of the Light that comes to us and illuminates our matter, our desire. Therefore, as it is written, “There is none wiser than he who is experienced,” and “I labored and found.”

However, all this work, the exertion and the overcoming, all are aimed only at one action: to hasten the influence of the Light upon us. After all, it all depends on it while we are trying to prepare so that the Light will not disappear. Even if it should disappear, eventually all the difficult states will be in our favor, but we must do everything in our power to be close to it, to adhere to it, and to resemble it.

The way already has been paved in advance, and it is in our power to hasten the development and advancement along this way. The hastening depends on how much we all want to fulfill the new form, the next level, so that it will be fulfilled in us. This is actually where all the exertion is focused.

Confidence is an illumination from Above, and, if it stops, we have no confidence, no feeling, and no understanding. As it is written in the Book of Psalms by King David, “But when you hid your face, I was struck with terror.” We must achieve such a connection among us, which will oblige the Light to constantly be among us.

Together, by our collective efforts and with the help of the Light, we can create such an attribute of bestowal, of love and connection, among us that the Light will never cease to illuminate us. This is called confidence, mutual guarantee.

Thus, we attain the state in which the upper constantly illuminates us. Although each of us will rise and descend, and sway in different directions because of the multiplicity of mutual actions that take place in each one and in everyone together, we attain stability. Not only do we not fall, but on the contrary, we only keep on rising upward.

Our descents also become ascents since we are all connected in one collective fund. Thus, we achieve confidence, and there is no other way to achieve it.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/25/12, Shamati #72

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The Writings of Rabash, Volume II, Letter 8: And once I have acquired this above-mentioned clothing, sparks of love promptly begin to shine within me. The heart begins to long to unite with my friends, and it seems to me that my eyes see my friends, my ears hear their voices, my mouth speaks to them, the hands embrace, the feet dance in a circle, in love and joy together with them, and I transcend my corporeal boundaries. I forget the vast distance between my friends and me, and the outstretched land for many miles will not stand between us.

It is as though my friends are standing right within my heart and see all that is happening there, and I become ashamed of my petty acts against my friends. Then, I simply exit the corporeal vessels, and it seems to me that there is no reality in the world except my friends and I. After that, even the “I” is cancelled and is immersed, mingled in my friends, until I stand and declare that there is no reality in the world—only the friends.

Of course, it is impossible to achieve such a state by my own simple efforts. Only the upper Light can bring us to this state as it operates on us for a long time until it evokes in us the collective desire. Then, we all are incorporated in one network, and then each one feels the society.

Each one will see that this is the center of his life, and this is where he receives the force of vitality and its impression. In this mutual connection, he gradually discovers the Creator’s form since by mutual bestowal, the friends stabilize a field from which, like in matter that develops and discovers, the Creator’s from is depicted and revealed.

Thus, when we attain a collective desire, the corporeal conditions cease to exist. The desire is the only matter from which, by mutual bestowal, we begin to stabilize and to sculpt the Creator’s image by revealing it to everyone. A person sees that outside this general network there is nothing but the friends.

This is why we are in this state in such a world, and through the actions and through the corporeal states, we can attain the spiritual world. Otherwise, we couldn’t do anything.

It can only be this way, through corporeal actions and the Surrounding Light that raises us to spiritual actions, but the impression comes from the general connection between everyone. I believe that it is already among us to some extent.
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From the Preparation for the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/25/12

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Everything was created by the Light that operates within the desire to receive that was created as something from nothing. The desire grows thicker as the Light operates on it like yeast on dough.

The difference between the different phases of the desire—the root, the first, second, third and fourth phases—stems from the different levels of bestowal of the Light on the point of something from nothing that exists in the actual roots, until its attributes become totally opposite to the Light. This indicates that the Light has made it as thick as the last, fourth level.

Actually, all this thickness is created by the attributes of the Light that turn into their opposite form as it breaks inside by the point of something from nothing. The darkness is a replica of the Light. The darkness is actually the same Light, but its posterior.

This is why, in Aramaic, “night” is called “orta” (which resembles the word “ohr,” meaning light in Hebrew). At night, everything is the same as during the day. The only difference is that the basic point turns the Light, turning it into its opposite.

It is as if a magnifying glass breaks the rays and turns everything upside down. On one side, there is light, and, on the other side, there is darkness. This magnifying glass is the same point of something from nothing.

So, it turns out that there is nothing in Malchut that doesn’t exist in Keter, but only in the opposite form. This oppositeness is called something from nothing. The Creator has created a replica, an imprint of Himself, called “the created being,” Adam and Eve, a seal and its imprint, and so forth.

We must use everything there is in our desire to receive, but in an opposite manner, to turn it, to insert the “nothing” into it instead of the “something.” When we want to attain this oppositeness, we annul the natural ego in us and become similar to the Light once again.

All the forms of the desire come from the Light that has imprinted itself in the central point of the created being. However, these forms are opposite to it so that in this oppositeness, we will be able to attain the Creator
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From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/17/12, The Study of the Ten Sefirot

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In the workshop, everyone must constantly check himself, and the friends should support one another and remind one another of this point so that throughout the workshop everyone will feel the fear of leaving the connection. During all our life, we must hold onto the center of the group, not only during the lesson or the workshop.

However, a lesson or a workshop is the main time to work on our collective thought, which determines everything. Here, we need each other’s support without words, and, at the same time, we have to feel the inner burning. We have to discover some collective field that constantly spurs us on and keeps us “in the air.” It is all up to us.

It is as if you were signing a contract with the friends so that they would constantly care for you and make sure that you don’t leave this field with your thoughts. Pay them so that they will take care of you. This is called “buy yourself a friend.” You have to give the friend something so that he will be motivated to constantly spur you on.

However, how can he spur you on if we are all on the same level, and he himself needs someone to spur him on? Here, the upper providence operates, about which it is written, “the Creator is within His people.”

If we decide that we are committed to spur one another on, the Creator spurs us on. He gives us this power so that at least someone in the group constantly will be in contact with spirituality and will be conscious. This means that “the Creator dwells among His people.”

If there is a connection, it is called a house of assembly for prayer (Beit-Knesset) in which the Creator is present. As it is written, “I came to the house of prayer and did not find a single person?” However, if there is a connection among us, then the Creator will come and find a “human” in it!
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From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/17/12, The Study of the Ten Sefirot

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In order to grasp the right picture of reality, we have to be familiar with the two points of view that there are, one which is the Creator’s perspective and one which is the created being’s, and to understand the relationship between them. Based on these two states we can determine our attitude towards the desire, so that eventually all these points will determine the relationship between the Creator and the created being according to their oppositeness and similarity to one another and will provide us with a new perception of reality.

It will no longer be the same false picture we see now that is called “the imaginary world,” which is one-sided and limited to only what goes through us, through the egoistic filter, thus providing us with the feeling of this world. With the wide and infinite reality outside us, beyond the limits of our perception, when it goes through our ego and reaches our feelings, it’s restricted to the size of a corporal picture of this world that we eventually feel. But in order to reach an unlimited perception, we need the new points of view.

Our limited and egoistic reality is called “animal” since it is perceived by our animal body. In order to feel the true reality, we need the two points of view: one point that is opposite from the Creator and another point that is similar to the Creator. Between these two points, from the different types of connections between them such as for and against, similar and the opposite, we build the new picture of our world. All the opposite attributes and all the similar ones will be the components of our perception.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/13/12, Writings of Baal HaSulam 

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Question: How can I relate to the Creator if He is the property of bestowal?

Answer: Really, what is “the property” anyway? Is it a physical force? Can I really love or hate gravity? For example, I can like it on the condition that it does something good to me. But that doesn’t mean that I love or hate it. I realize that it’s something inanimate and therefore I relate to it according to my feeling, according to the benefits I get from it.

I enjoy the sun. But, do I really “love” it? How can we love the sun compared to loving a plant, an animal or a person?

So, how do I relate to the Creator? First of all, it is said about Him: “I HaVaYaH change not.” The upper Light is in absolute rest; it is “Good that does good to both the good and the bad”; the Creator treats us with absolute love.

On the other hand, the Creator is called the Great, the Terrible, and so on and so forth. All evil comes from Him; all the good originates from Him. Everything is so contradictory that I get confused.

If something is unchanging, it’s bad. Why do they tell us that the Creator doesn’t change?

Baal HaSulam explains in his letter number two, that if a father relates to his son with absolute love, it makes the son hate him instead of love. After all, if there is no reaction whatsoever on the father’s behalf, the son sees that it doesn’t matter how he treats his father; in any case, his father responds to him with absolute love. It prevents the son from developing love, and it does not allow him to change, see the connection and stay in contact. It’s as if he is facing an inanimate object. Plants have a certain level of reaction, animals respond even more strongly, not to mention the human being. Then, positive and negative reactions penetrate in each other and create a new liaison, a mutual inclusion.

But if the Creator doesn’t change, and at the same time He is so kind and loving, then what can I feel for Him? There is no way I can take Him into consideration. And yet, if I cannot consider Him, then I leave Him out of the picture, as if He doesn’t exist at all. Why would I consider someone who never changes?

It’s a very deep notion that was explored not only by Kabbalists. However, Kabbalists strove to demonstrate that at all times the Creator is “Come and See”; so I reveal Him. I cannot reveal Him Himself, His essence, but only His form that is dressed into matter. That’s why when we attain Him in His full entirety, we reveal His ultimate and perfect shape and really see Him as the Absolute, the Perfect, the Eternal, the Good that does good.

In all other states, we regard evil or good that come from Him depending on the level of our own corruptness, as it is said: “Everybody judges according to his own flaws,” and then, we have the opportunity to relate to Him to the degree of our own deficiencies and corrections, and thus see Him as good or bad.

And yet, we have to believe what the great Kabbalists who revealed Him in His true form, say, that He is absolutely good and bestowing.

So we have to relate it to our desires (Kelim): At this moment, we see the Creator to the extent of the correctness or corruptness of our desires, but when we attain Him at the end of the ladder we will reveal Him as the Good that does good.

Then all contradictions will be gone; we will get a “roadmap of advancement” which is scaled to our attitude to the Creator. It allows us to see how we change and accordingly how the Creator changes in our eyes.

We express gratitude to the Creator for giving us the ladder of concealment; with its help we can attain connection with Him. Otherwise, we won’t be able to connect with perfection.
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From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/9/12, “The Book of Zohar”

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Everything depends on the preparation and there is the issue of the group here, since the connection is the expression of the acquisition of the attribute of bestowal, the closeness, the adhesion between those who work together and follow one path; it is an expression of the attribute of love that they acquire.

The unity among them is similar to the uniqueness of the Creator, since if they want to be “as one man in one heart,” which means to be mutually incorporated in thought and desires, without any differences between them, as one integral system, they yearn to resemble the Creator who is One.

Thus they prepare themselves, all of them together and each one on his own, to feel the true taste of the meal that was prepared by the Creator.

This is why we were given freewill in our world, in order to enable us to reach the meal of the wicked or the meal of the righteous. You decide whether you prepare yourself seriously, or whether you play with toys!

We speak about those who have reached the wisdom of Kabbalah. We cannot demand anything from those who have not reached it yet. They simply continue to suffer from the general crisis that pushes them to correct themselves from below. These poor people don’t understand what is going on. They expect salvation, but salvation can only come from those who have prepared themselves correctly for the King’s meal. Then through them, the meal will reach all the others who have not started preparing yet.

So all our work is in the group, in mutuality, “as one man in one heart,” as it says: “Each man shall help his brother,” “Don’t do unto your friends what you hate,” “Love thy friend as thyself,” and “From the love of the created beings to the love of the Creator.”

All these principles can only be fulfilled through connection, since this is the preparation for the revelation of our relationship with the Creator, so that He will be revealed within our preparation, within the connection. This means that the attribute of bestowal and love is revealed in the vessels that we have prepared and corrected, in order to reveal this attribute according to the law of the equivalence of form.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/13/12, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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