Everything consists of just two components: desire and fulfillment. In Kabbalah, fulfillment is called Light. It is all around and inside us, unlimited in scope. We are in it like in an ocean. All the changes in how we perceive ourselves and our surroundings depend on the changing of our desire. Our desire, in turn, either changes under the influence of the Light or under the influence of our efforts. The desire is called a vessel and the fulfillment is called Light. The Light is constant, and the only thing that changes is the desire or vessel; its change alters the constant Light that it perceives.

Kabbalah teaches us how to change our desire so we feel an additional, spiritual world within it. This is the meaning of the verse, “You will see your world in this life.” This happens when a person creates one more inner desire. Inside it, he feels the Upper World, and then even when the desire in which he feels this world disappears, it does not influence his desire and sensation of the Upper World. It always remains in his sensation. Yet, even if one was unable to create a new desire, the Partzuf of our world eventually disappears and is replaced by a new one. Thus, a person is “born” into the sensation of this world.

Every sensation in the desire has its period of existence. When a certain level or Partzuf runs it course, it disappears and is replaced by the following one. However, on the level of this world, it remains as long as we don’t create an inner desire (Partzuf) of the Upper World, the desire of bestowal and love.

In essence, all the generations are Partzufim on the level of this world, existing within the quality of reception. They are limited by their inner perception because this kind of development takes place within a single plane: We return to the same level or the same world in various life cycles. We see our reality in different forms, but always on the same level – this world.

The Upper World, however, is the sensation within the quality of bestowal, the sensation beyond oneself and development upwards. That’s why we are summoned, “See your world in this life.”

From the preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/25/10, Shamati #69

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The science of Kabbalah defines life and death only with respect to merging with the Creator. A state similar to the Creator is called life, while one that is opposite to Him is death. Therefore, egoistic desires (Klipot) are considered dead, whereas the “poison of death” refers to the force that separates the creature from the Creator.

Death is not a loss of existence, as we observe the disappearance of one’s form in this world (at our degree). All that is created (desire) changes only with respect to drawing closer to or further away from the Creator in its intention to bestow; in everything else (in its desire), the creature remains the same. Hence distancing from the Creator, losing the state of adhesion with Him, is called “death,” whereas adhesion with Him, acquiring the quality of bestowal, is called “life.”

In his article, “The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah,” Baal HaSulam writes that the science of Kabbalah is a means for the creature to reveal the Creator in this world. To reveal the Creator means to assume His qualities.

Although we exist in a world of the still, vegetative, and animate matter, by acquiring the human level of similarity to the Creator, we come to feel ourselves and our existence as perfect and eternal, like the Creator. The science of Kabbalah changes us to facilitate our ascent to the next level (degree) where we begin to see that we do not disappear, but simply change the level of our existence.

From the Evening Zohar Lesson 4/21/10

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A question I received: In the Torah, a lot is written about death. Yet the Torah and the Creator are eternal and perfect; the reality that He created is also eternal and perfect. Therefore, it seems that “life and death” are states of the eternal process.

My Answer: We see how still objects lose their form; animals and plants lose their life. They are also born in a new form. We learn that nothing disappears; everything that exists only changes form. Since we do not perceive some of the forms, we imagine that they disappear or no longer exist.

A soul or a Partzuf loses the screen and the Light (Ohr Pnimi) leaves it. Its previous form remains, but it is hidden behind the new form that is born. However, at the End of Correction, all the previous forms unite and form a final corrected state.

Therefore, there is no death, just the disappearance of the previous form with respect to the observer since he is not on the level of his subsequent state. Yet if we were able to look at these states “from the side,” we would see the transformation.

From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/22/10, The Zohar

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A question I received: How can I become similar to the Creator if He has no form?

My Answer: The Creator has no form as we usually understand it in this world. The Light has no form, and neither does the upper degree. Rabash writes that all the worlds, when they’re not revealed in our desires (Kelim), are the Light of Infinity.

There are no worlds that exist outside of man. In relation to one’s inner system or the Soul, the “worlds” is an external system within him. Because of this, we give form to everything including the Creator.

The Creator (Bo-Re) means “come” (Bo) and “see” (Re). By changing and improving our qualities, we build an external form out of our uncorrected desire to receive pleasure. As we correct our attitude toward this external form (that is, correct our egoistic desire), this external form connects into us.

Each degree initially appears as external to us. Then, through our work with our environment, we have to raise its value in our eyes and see it as supreme and desirable. In so doing we attain love for a new degree from hating it. We desire this degree and change our selfish attitude toward it to aspiration to give to it. Thereby we attain this Upper degree. We as though absorb it or “turn a hating one into a loving one.”

We do this again and again until we incorporate the entire universe into ourselves and start perceiving it to be ours.

From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/19/01, Shamati #225

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Revelation is a result of efforts. When we read The Zohar, we only need to exert effort. By trying to discern the properties The Zohar is talking about within ourselves, we penetrate toward a more inner screen within us, toward a deeper picture of the world. This is where the revelation of the Creator occurs.

Personal interpretation and commentaries of the text do not bring revelation. To feel a new world within, to interpret The Zohar internally, in sensations, a person needs to direct himself toward an increasingly inner state when reading the text.

A more internal state means that a person connects the text with his internal properties to a greater degree. He sees them in himself; he discovers that every word points to a property or action within him such as the “twelve tribes,” “Jacob,” a “desert,” and a “well.” As a result of his efforts, he reveals their true meaning.

This is why Kabbalah is called “Torah Emet” or the true Torah. Such understanding of the text cannot be conveyed in words. Rather, it can be revealed only within a person, in his new properties which appear as a result of efforts.

From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/19/10, The Zohar

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I read The Zohar and wish to penetrate into its inner picture. What desires and qualities are these? I want to erase this material, dreamed-up world, this imaginary picture completely. I want to imagine the true picture instead. What would I see if there were this revelation right now? I want to aspire to it like a child that wants to be a grown-up. Then, I will see the connection of qualities and desires within me, rather than these corporeal images.

With this aspiration, I rouse the Light that Reforms that equalizes me to the Creator. I don’t need to think about this Light; the aspiration to see the true picture awakens it. Really, there is no "Light that Reforms;" there is only an advanced picture of the world in the next, higher degree, which in comparison to me right now, is called the Light. If I am impressed by a more inner picture, this is called the Light in relation to the present picture.

We perceive the Light as a special stimulation in the desire. We record the Light with letters in the same manner that we record desires. "I aspire to the Light," means that I aspire to a more advanced state of bestowal. This is what the Light is for me.

From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/19/10, The Zohar

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From the book Shamati, Article 197: Book, Author, Story. A book is considered [the state] prior to creation [the plan]. An author is the owner of the book. The unification of the author and the book assumes the form of a “story,” that is, the Torah along with the Giver of the Torah.

We perceive ourselves inside some sort of reality, and we have to do research to find out: What is the meaning of it? Is this an illusion or the truth? Or perhaps the two are the same thing? Some program is unraveling within me along a chain of causes and effects. But who is its author? Will I be able to recognize the author of the story that I read within me?

The book (this whole reality) already existed before I started reading and revealing it. However, all the revelations take place inside me because I am reading this story as I go through the book from beginning to end and receive an impression from its flow.

Inside this story, to the degree I become familiar and included in it, I reveal the author of the book. As I go inside the book, its story starts to build me and to push me to become its author (or scribe) as well.

The story is the Torah, which leads us to the full revelation of the entire book, in which we are together with the One who Gives the Torah. Each of us reveals it for himself anew, but we need a teacher to help us read this book, similar to how an adult in our world reads to a child until the child grows up and learns to read on his own.

In the science of Kabbalah, an adult (spiritually speaking) has to help the child. It’s impossible to reveal the book on your own, but only when it’s passed from teacher to student. That is how each of us must learn to read the book and go through this story in order to reveal the author within the book.

As long as I don’t learn to read on my own and go through this whole path, I won’t reveal the book and its author because that is possible only when I am similar to Him. Gradually I myself become the author, since I write the Torah on the matter of my desire, which continuously assumes new forms of letters.

Even though this book has already been written by its Author, I too, become its author. As I go through the story from beginning to end, I equalize and unite with the book, the author, and the story.

Note: In Hebrew the word Sofer means both the writer (author) and the scribe. The only author is the Creator, who wrote only one book, the Torah, which incorporates everything. We are only rewriting it (revealing it), each one of us within himself.

From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/18/10, Shamati #197

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While reading The Zohar we imagine, like on a screen, a picture of this world detailing various subjects and images, material words and actions. This is because our desire remains solely material.

We demand that The Zohar bring us the Light which illuminates a deeper screen similar to a computer screen where different windows are hidden behind each other. We have to try to see the spiritual property behind each word to the best of our abilities.

When we obtain spiritual sight, we naturally start to see a totally different picture behind the words we read: forces, connections, relations, properties, and qualities. This new picture is absolutely disconnected from what we used to see before. The prior form disappears and transitions to a more “inner” screen which is holding our sensations, sensibilities, and our whole life. We have to strive to attain this state.

In other words, I wait for the Light, the force that I attract while reading The Zohar, to get me more deeply involved in the screen that hides behind the others. By shifting from one display to another, I start to live through a new screen. That’s where my sensations and reason “reside;” it becomes my life.

When that happens, everything obtains a new essence. I previously thought that I grasped the meaning behind the words in The Zohar, and attached them to various subjects and actions of this world. Yet when I transition to a deeper screen, I see that the prior display barred a totally different meaning of a much more internal nature, for example, my inner properties. That’s the change that we have to expect from The Zohar.

From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/13/10, The Zohar

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Baal HaSulam’s article “The Freedom” starts with the words “’Harut (Carved) on stones; do not pronounce it Harut (Carved), but rather Herut (Freedom), to show that they are liberated from the angel of death.” What does a person need in this world while he is still unable to feel the Upper spiritual worlds and simply worries about his life like any other animal? At this time, a person’s primary concern is the issue of life and death. There is a reason that it is written that freedom means liberation from the angel of death. The science of Kabbalah is the method of achieving eternity, and it is fundamentally important for everyone.

Humanity subconsciously hides the issue of death from itself; this issue has no solution, but it reduces all of us to a level of worthless beings. Everything we do in this world (culture, education, work) is done in order to conceal the certainty of death. We try to push it further away and not think about it, as though it does not exist. However, if this question arises within a person, one feels completely powerless since nothing can be done to stop a person from dying. We can deal with anything and achieve anything except for one thing – eternal life.

The inevitability of death cancels out the human being in me. Therefore, everything that humanity engages in subconsciously comes from this one thought. We don’t understand to what extent we would view life differently if we were immortal. Our whole attitude to our existence, to reality, to other people, and to ourselves would be completely different.

From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/15/10, Article “The Freedom”

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A question I received: Is it possible to explain to children the spiritual meanings of the words and stories in the Torah?

My Answer: Children are more ready for this than adults. They’re developing their sensations and senses. They don’t have a problem perceiving the language in other terms, because they’re hearing the words for the first time.

You can show a glass to a child and say, “This is a glass.” You can also explain that a “glass” is a sensation of some desire in oneself. A child will perceive these notions because he doesn’t have any definitions of our world yet. Or you can say that a glass is a vessel made of glass that we fill and that it is also one’s inner vessel which he or she wants to fill. A child perceives this naturally and he won’t become confused by it.

This is because children’s perception is not dual like that of adults. Children develop in our world in the same way as we’re supposed to develop now in the spiritual world. This is the same path and the same route.

From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/12/10, “Exile and Redemption”

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