The Zohar, Chapter “VaYikra (The Lord Called),” Item 20: And one appointee was established on the gate from the outside, and his name is Gazriel. With him, there are twelve appointees surrounding him—three, three to each side, on four sides. The [lower] general Merkava is twelve—Michael, Gabriel, Uriel, Raphael—in each of which are three lines, HGT, which are twelve. Individually, each contains twelve.

In spirituality, every creation consists of twelve parts. Every element including the smallest and the entire spiritual reality, has the same structure and the same properties. If we carved out even a tiny portion, it would contain all the properties of the whole structure. Therefore, there is no difference between the general and the particular in spirituality, contrary to our world where parts are added together to form the whole.

In the spiritual world, quality rather than quantity is important; the whole is not created as a sum of its parts. Rather, every part is already the general; however, it is revealed at the qualitatively new degree. The spiritual reality is revealed only in a person’s attainment, within one’s desire. This means that we attain the forms of desire, which are called the soul and the Light, acting inside the desire and giving such forms to it.

It turns out that the entire reality is one soul Adam HaRishon. All of the worlds, spiritual objects (Partzufim), angels, and forms are the four levels of the desire (still, vegetative, animate, and speaking). The entire creation has the same structure. Besides it there is only Atzmuto, the essence of the Creator, which is unattainable. We can only guess that it is the root of everything that we reveal, but we cannot attain Him.

From the Evening Zohar Lesson 5/13/10

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As a person rises from one level to the next and goes through various states, he mustn’t forget that there is just one force in reality. It’s not him or the environment, but only the Upper Force, the all-inclusive Nature, the Creator, who organizes all these states for him, and he exists in connection with Him.

It’s true that I have to lower myself before the environment and that I have to study the Kabbalah books that were written by wise people, Kabbalists, and that I must continuously build myself anew. But through all of these means, this wrapper, this entire theater, I am connected with the only Director who arranges everything by the rule, “Thou Hast Hemmed Me In Behind and Before.”

Then I don’t just go through levels and states or build a relationship with the group, but I am always connected to Him through all the means He has placed between us. They are like adapters that help me to reveal Him. Gradually, as I study them, I see that all these obstacles and degrees of concealment between me and Him are intended to help me change so I will become more and more similar to Him, to the Director who organizes everything for me.

Then I begin to perceive the surroundings, the atmosphere, the friends, studies, and teacher, as His representatives. I stop attributing any significance or existence to them in and of themselves, and they gradually disappear in my eyes. I no longer see them as having their own forces, power, and influence.

I relate them to the Creator more and more, and to this degree I justify them and the Creator, who acts this way with me. That is how I acquire a connection with Him. Then I love everyone, since they helped me attain adhesion with Him. And the whole world is then called “the holy Shechina” – one desire, inside of which the Light fills everything. And this desire is mine.

From the 8th lesson at the World Zohar Convention 5/9/10

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Our entire problem in spiritual advancement is that we approach Kabbalah, the revelation of the Upper World, as if it were a scientific theory that we must attain with our mind and actualize with our own forces. However, Kabbalah offers us something completely atypical – the chance to acquire new qualities. And as long as a person does not acquire them, he will not find out what Kabbalah talks about.

All of Kabbalah is the method of developing a new quality in a person, the quality of “love for one’s neighbor.” It is also called “the Creator.” Thus, Kabbalah is the method of going from a total negation of Him to His full revelation. Our initial “earthly” feelings and mind do not bear any relation to the revelation of the Creator. The revelation of the Creator is the creation of His quality inside a person. Kabbalah is the method to form the quality of bestowal within us, the state of the Creator.

Our entire reality consists of two components: feelings and mind. When a person creates the image of the Creator within himself, he acquires a new mind and a new feeling instead of the previous ones. That is how he goes from the perception (or sensation) of this world to the perception (or sensation) of the Upper World.

The new sensation inside a person is called the Creator, “Boreh,” which means “come and see.” It is also called the soul.

The main challenge for a person who begins to study Kabbalah is the inability to connect all of his development with the Light that has to change him, with the force that has to bring him a new mind and feelings. We cling to external forms and aspire to perceive the text that was written by Kabbalists with our earthly feelings and mind. We try to adapt spirituality to our earthly existence. However, in all the books of Kabbalah, not a word speaks about our world. Our state is necessary only in order to attract the Light that Reforms through studying in a group. Our task is to expect for the birth of new feelings and a new mind within us, which will give us the perception of the new reality.

Our entire battle with our nature amounts to finding new instruments of perceiving the world, and then perceiving and attaining through them.

From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/4/10, “Matan Torah”

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It’s essential for a person who wants to reveal spirituality to try to achieve that “everything would be in your eyes as new,” as if I was just born and I’m starting from scratch. I don’t know what world I‘m in, or who I am. While reading an article, I have no idea what it speaks about, as if I know nothing about these things. I erase all previous views, like I landed here from another planet without understanding a thing about the order of the universe. I want to perceive it anew.

Why? In their teachings, Kabbalists wish to show us that there are spiritual phenomena in our world. However, they are concealed from us, for if there was nothing of spirituality in our world, spirituality would not be called concealed. This is why we have to try to discern spirituality in our reality. But how can we do it? What kind of a special light, what illumination can help me see the spiritual reality? I don’t know; I have to master this.

Kabbalists tell us the following: If you want to recognize spirituality that is concealed here in this world, you can perceive it in a new relationship between you and the environment. Herein lies the entrance into the spiritual world, and you can penetrate it. Through your discovery of this opening, you will begin to see a new world. Its entrance is in your relationship with the environment, but it is a new relationship that you’ll unexpectedly reveal.

Suddenly you’ll see that an entrance into another world is from the world that surrounds you. No one recognizes it. It’s as if you’re walking down the street and right around the corner you are in the spiritual reality. This entrance opens when you look at our world in a different way, as if totally unfamiliar with it, with a fresh approach you perceive the reality of “I and the environment” anew.

From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/30/10, Rabash, Article 17, 1986

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A question I received: How do I recognize the form I’m being taught from Above?

My Answer: The science of Kabbalah speaks of very logical things and reveals a great deal of new knowledge about man in this world and the force that governs us all. By doing so, Kabbalah supplements our knowledge of human psychology and our general outlook on the world.

Yet the science of Kabbalah is meant for those who already sense spirituality and have five spiritual “organs of perception”: Keter, Hochma, Bina, Zeir Anpin and Malchut. Until a person acquires these higher organs of perception, Kabbalah is not a science for him, but rather an encoded message, a book of mysteries.

What can I do if I am unable to understand a single word that I read? I don’t exist in the reality that converts every word I read into a concrete sensation. If I lack such a connection with the world under investigation, it’s not considered a science. Only when I have all research data and can experiment with it, does it become a science.

Thus initially, we study Kabbalah not to learn this wisdom, but to obtain the tools (Kelim) to attain it so that we can  begin to sense the object of our research. If my vision is bad, then to be able to see, I first need to get myself a pair of glasses. I earn money to buy the glasses, put them on, only then do I begin to see clearly. Only then do I begin to hear the explanations and understand what I am being told about.

That is why there is “preparation time” during which we work on ourselves in order to enter the spiritual world.We begin to sense it to the extent we acquire its properties. Later on, as they appear and develop within us, we proceed with investigation of the new world, much like a child who grows because of new properties that surface in him.

At the initial stage of developing new properties within us, we have nothing to ask about, because we have no ability to understand. Only one question is appropriate during this time: Are we aligning ourselves correctly in order to attract the Upper Light which forms new properties within us? Our success and future depend on the Light’s actions.

From the Evening Zohar Lesson 4/29/10

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The Zohar, Chapter “VaEra (And I Appeared),” Item 6: …each degree comprises GAR and ZAT, which is ZA, and there is attainment only in ZA of each degree, even in ZA de [of] GAR, called Daat. However, no one can attain in the GAR of each degree, even in the GAR of the degree of Assiya.

We perceive everything inside of Malchut. Malchut is called “the Creator’s image.” Presently we do not see the true picture of the world, but only what enters our five senses (sight, sound, taste, smell, and touch) and is presented in our brain. We receive an impression from the information delivered to us by our senses, and sense reality that seemingly exists before us within, in the back of our brain.

The same happens to Malchut. Baal HaSulam explains in “Preface to the Book of Zohar” that along with Malchut, there exist the first nine Sefirot; however, Malchut does not know what those nine Sefirot are. She attains these Sefirot after including them within herself, sensing them as something that appears before her.

Thus, Malchut discovers the first nine Sefirot to the extent that she is able to act like them, from below upward. When Malchut becomes like Keter by repelling the Direct Light and forming the Reflected Light, from within the Reflected Light, she attains the fact that before her are the first nine Sefirot, that is, the lower one begins to act outside of itself, outward, and sees what is happening in the Reflected Light.

The same applies to us in this world. We see something that exists before us in accordance with our ego, depending on what is beneficial to us and what isn’t. Whatever doesn’t affect our ego, cannot bring us benefit or cause harm – we do not detect.

This stems from the spiritual roots: Malchut senses the first nine Sefirot only to the measure of the Reflected Light, which the Direct Light imprints within itself. This is the picture that appears to Malchut as though existing before her. Nothing else exists as far as she’s concerned, for she doesn’t sense anything above that.

If Malchut were to have the desire to enjoy of the Root (0) phase, she would not detect before her anything other than the Root phase. If Malchut were to have a greater desire to enjoy, she would see before her a wider picture of reality. Everything is determined by the thickness of our desire (Aviut) and the Light it reflects. That is why nothing in Kabbalah speaks of what truly exists in reality, for everything depends on the measure of one’s attainment.

From the Evening Zohar Lesson 4/28/10

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A question I received: What does it mean that the Creator gets angry? If we’re talking about invariable spiritual laws, why does The Zohar portray the Creator as one who possesses human qualities, such as anger, envy, etc?

My Answer: The Torah uses the language of man to tell us what we feel and attribute to the Creator. I often use a computer as an example of this. Why do we get angry at a computer when it is nothing but pieces of metal and plastic? It has no intelligence, but merely executes its programmed commands perfectly. All its actions are correct.

If you press the wrong key, or if you lack the knowledge of how the program functions, you can smash the keyboard in frustration all you want, but the computer will still respond with the same error every single time. A computer isn’t a person who can change its behavior. A computer is inanimate, and cannot change. Yet, again and again, you relate to it as you would to a person, questioning it in rage: “Why aren’t you doing what I want you to do?”

We attribute to a computer our own qualities, our personalities, wishing for it to change as we do. In truth, we are uncorrected and we change, while a computer is not uncorrected; hence, its behavior is unvarying and always correct.

The same rule applies to the Creator. We’re not talking about the Creator Himself, but about “Bo-Re” (“Come and See”), that is, our perception of the Creator. We discern and conceive the Creator in our desires (vessels of reception, Kelim). And that is why we ascribe to the Creator the same qualities and reactions characteristic of us.

It is therefore written that the Torah speaks the language of man. In order to explain to us our correct behavior and to help us change, we need to imagine that the Creator undergoes changes though in truth He does not. Perfection cannot change, otherwise it would not be perfection.

By ascribing to the Creator our qualities and regarding Him as though He changes His attitude toward us, we can see ourselves in two manifestations: One, the way I am as is, the way I appear from the side and two, in the changes I undergo either in a constant or transient world.

This perceptual duality which allows us to imagine as though something changes outside of us is a great gift from the Creator. Because of it we come to perceive a different dimension, to understand the spiritual world, to enter into its perception freely and independently.

Therefore, our perception that reality exists and changes outside of ourselves is a true salvation from the prison cell of our world (the sensation of spiritual claustrophobia). It is a fundamental point which grants the creature the opportunity to rise above its creation, to become human: Adam, similar to the Creator.

From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/27/10, The Zohar

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A question I received: Do we attain the properties that we read about in The Zohar during the preparation period or after crossing the Machsom?

My Answer: We begin to discern within ourselves various reactions to all these names and terms even before crossing the Machsom. To the extent that we want to rise above our desire to receive pleasure, we begin to differentiate between the giving and receiving desires. Ultimately, there is nothing more to scrutinize.

It is said, “In the future the angel of death will become an angel of sanctity.” This means that there are no bad or good desires, only the desires for the sake of bestowal or for the sake of receiving. Everything depends on the way we use them. “Haman,” “Terah,” “Abraham,” “Elazar,” “Rachel,” and “Laban” differ only in their intention  and in strength.

Therefore, by trying to keep one’s intention for the sake of bestowal – to learn, understand, and discern it through the group – a person will also react differently to every name and definition, so much so that that he will reveal their “tastes” or sensations: pleasant and not so much, shining and irritating. He will start discerning various shades in them.

However, after the Machsom, a person attains them in a clear and precise manner. Then they are clothed in him and he discovers them in practice.

From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/26/10, The Zohar

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Egoism, which is rooted in our nature, is the reason for our suffering. Since nature is inescapable, people attempt to limit the use of egoism by reaching all sorts of  agreements, realizing that otherwise egoism will lead to confrontation and war. Countries make all possible efforts to sign treaties while at the same time they realize such treaties won’t radically change the situation, yet they understand that it is necessary to counter-oppose the power and the egoism, to curb it by force.

If only people knew that it is possible to correct our nature, that evil reveals itself through us specifically so that it could be corrected and bring us to something great and supreme! If only we knew that we can escape hardship, rise above death, and attain eternal and perfect life!

This is the knowledge that we try to bring to others, since merely understanding it will bring humanity tremendous relief. No one knows how much time it will take since nowadays time accelerates exponentially. This is why we have to keep working and not despair; we will see the fruit of our work in the nearest future.

We have to explain to the people why everything happens (for our correction), what the goal is (eternal and perfect life), and the good path to it (how to realize the goal with the Light’s help). Then people will understand what real life is, that it’s not just something we perceive at a given moment in our limited egoistic desires.

We sense transition from one Partzuf to another as death and the loss of everything there is. But if we perceived the world through the desire to bestow, this transition wouldn’t be felt as a loss since we would sense a larger, general system. Upon losing one’s Partzuf, a person still stays within the system and enters a new Partzuf. If one connects other people to his desire, he feels the eternal flow in everything that he undergoes.

Today, we don’t perceive eternity and it seems a disaster for us to lose our Partzuf and the ten Sefirot that we envision as “this life.” We don’t know anything except it.

It’s not so hard to explain this. Any person gains so much from listening to this information that he would want to know more. Ultimately, everybody dreams of eternity and perfection.

From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/25/10, Article “The Peace”

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A question I received: What is a real spiritual vessel (Kli)?

My Answer: A real Kli is a desire that is ready for correction. My task is to fully discern which part of my desire I can correct for the sake of bestowal, and which part I can’t correct and must simply restrict.

Suppose I am given a desire and I discern that I can correct 20% of it for bestowal, and that I have to restrict the other 80% of it, making Sof out of it, meaning the end of the Partzuf. This means that I corrected that entire desire. Both kinds of desires are always present, and I have to understand what to do with them.

However, there may be desires awakening in me that are unclear. This is because the Light that reaches me is insufficient to illuminate all the desires and all their details. This is why I am left with desires that aren’t discerned, called Hash, Mal, and Noga.

It’s as if I am in a fog and I cannot touch part of these desires. I only have to revive them as Klipot in order to support life in them. I have to make these compromises due to my own weakness and inability to perform the correction.

The desires that I have discerned are called “root, soul, and body.” They differ from these other desires, called “garments and castles,” which appear as if they’re not my own, real desires.

Later, at the very end of correction, these desires will turn into my own, real desire. It will join that which is called “brain, bones, and veins,” and will become my unified spiritual vessel. I will then see that all of reality is inside me, as opposed to the way I see things today, when it seems that there is me and a world outside of me.

From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/25/10, Beit Shaar HaKavanot

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