Baal Hasulam, “The Peace”: These are the words of Rabbi Akiva: “The book is open and the hand writes.” Any state that the generation is in is like a book, and all the evildoers are as writing hands because each evil is carved and written in the book until they accumulate to an amount that the public can no longer bear. At that time, they ruin that evil state and rearrange into a more desirable state. Thus, each and every act is calculated and written in the book, meaning in the state.

And he says, “All who wish to borrow may come and borrow.” This means that he believes that this world is not like an open store without an owner, but that there is an owner present, a shopkeeper who stands in his store and demands of each customer the right price for the merchandise he is taking from the store, meaning toil in His work while he is nourished by that store, in a manner that is certain to bring him to the purpose of creation, as He pleases.

His goal is to attain bestowal. However, a person requires powers to realize this, and he doesn’t have these powers. He takes them on loan, even though he intends it all for bestowal. What is more, this is even if he wants to repay, that is, not to use anything for himself. He uses the entire world for bestowal.

According to the standards of our world, it is impossible to declare that a person like this is taking something on loan. You see that we get a loan for personal benefit. Here, everything is otherwise. Incidentally, the Torah’s prohibition against giving a loan with interest is derived from this. In the spiritual world, no loan must be paid back with more than what had been received.

So, the forces that I don’t have from the start I take on loan, but I am not taking for myself. They are not mine, I only add to them a desire for the sake of bestowal. Instead of the Creator, I bestow to everyone, and my entire goal is only to convey this bestowal skillfully, as if it were from His hands. I have nothing of my own besides my altruistic self that contracts the egoistic desire within it and acts above it. Therefore, essentially, I don’t have anything to return.

Question: In spite of all this, it is not clear: How can a person ask for a loan for himself in spirituality?

Answer: So, I said that this is another kind of loan. You see, I don’t have my own powers of bestowal. Additionally, I (specifically, I) want to give just as the Creator does. I have to transmit and give that which He wishes for the world.

This state is described allegorically with a metaphor that says that the Creator wanted to give the nations of the world the method of correction. However, they could not accept it. So, He used a transitional group called Israel, which means “straight to the Creator.” The people of Israel are like coordinators that connect the upper Light with the AHP. Thanks to this, Malchut can rise to Bina and be “sweetened” there so as to pass the Light from above downward.

So, this is called a loan only because a person doesn’t have the power of bestowal, and he receives this from the Creator. However, he doesn’t use it for himself, as it is customary in our egoistic world. In this world, a person seeks benefit for himself first of all, and afterward, he thinks about benefit for others, whether this is financial matters, well-being, or net pleasure. In spirituality, I ask not for myself. I want to participate in the life of the Creator. This participation is intended entirely for bestowal. For the sake of this, I activate all of my desire to the maximum possible level. Everything else I temporarily keep “locked up” under the restriction.

Question: So, how is it necessary to ask for a loan like this for the goal of bestowal?

Answer: This is called ascent, a request for correction (MAN). From the Creator, I request power to be able to examine, to correct, the deed itself. I want Him to do this, as it is written: “Be clothed in me and perform the deed of bestowal.” It is like an infant asks for help from his mother or simply cries, and the mother comes and helps. The entire problem is to turn into a “crying infant” internally. And it takes time to learn this….
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/19/13, “The Peace”

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Question: Besides prayer, what helps a person “cut his ego to pieces” time after time?

Answer: The question itself is incorrect. There is no other means than prayer. Prayer is the conclusion of all the right stages of examination, when it has become clear that I have nothing more upon which to rely since I am this creature, I am the result of the higher forces. The one thing that is left to me is to turn to the origin from where everything evolves into me. This is to an origin that dominates me one hundred percent.

The rules of the system are not subject to change. So if I am their derivative, what can I do? My brain only helps me to understand that I am enabled. From here it can give me practical advice: “Turn to the Creator.”

That’s it. What other possibilities can there be? Disturbances and friction between us will not help; the opposite: They will shatter the entire system, and even this is just in our eyes. Because in fact, we don’t subtract or add anything, we simply don’t carry out the only action in this entire physical world that was given to us.

So let’s stop behaving like bulls held by the horns and think about what we can truly do. Everything else, one way or another, will produce nothing. Only prayer remains.

But what must the form of the prayer be? How is this request raised about the correction of Malchut which wants to acquire the characteristic of Bina? Regarding this we need to work. If there is already a force acting within the operating system, it must be activated. For me below, a possibility like this exists: To arouse, to call for this force, to the degree of the desire of the level of Adam within me.

And conversely, if I don’t awaken it, I am not connected with it and am left on the level of a beast. In this case it acts on me directly, from above to below, without my participation.

I was given the point in the heart, so I would be able to reach the right question and raise my request. But first I need to check and prepare everything that is required, to clarify what depends on me and what doesn’t, where I am found, and how to arrange my request so that it will reach the target and be influential.

You see what leads me is a system of laws that are not subject to change, devoid of intelligence and emotion. Even if you were to stand on your head before it, this would not help. This says that I need to build my structure in the right way, this being called “existence” from below to above, within the ten Sefirot of the Returning Light. And even if I were still to scream according to my understanding of all the mechanisms of what is happening, in spite of it all, within my scream everything must be arranged correctly.

So for this, the upper Light gives me an environment prepared in the right way to develop my scream. If I relate to a group as a Kli that is ready to convey my unclear scream, built from desire, yet still without form like an infant, then this scream will acquire the right form. This will make it possible to reach the source, the force that acts within creation.

In response, this force descends on me again through the environment. Otherwise, I would not be ready to receive the Light and it would simply burn me. Specifically, the upper Light influences my connection with the friends to the degree that I am loyal to them. It influences the place where we connect, coordinated with it, since only there am I accommodated to it.

So from my side there needs to be a request that passes through the environment, making it possible for them to hear it. And from the side of the Creator the Light also arrives through the environment, accommodates itself to me, so that I will be able to accept, feel and understand it.

It follows, that the environment is a two-way mutual adapter between me and the Creator. Everything takes place within this system called a “group,” a “people,” or more correctly, one soul.
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From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/22/13, Writings of Baal HaSulam “The Mutual Guarantee”

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Question: Whenever we speak about asking something from the Creator, it seems like an attempt to escape reality. After all, I don’t see the Creator and I don’t know who He is. If creation is managed by fixed laws, then how can I ask anything from them?

Answer: A request is not just words. When you ask for something, you discover a deficiency, a demand. This deficiency is a force, a “minus,” a negative that draws fulfillment. With this, you turn to the “plus,” to the positive, and draw it, activating the force.

Let go of the corporal picture of the bodies, trees, animals… Erase it, and, behind it, you will discover a void with two forces, a positive one and a negative one. Then, you will be able to activate the negative force intentionally as you choose selectively, and through that you necessarily will activate the positive force that is opposite to it.

You were given a chance to control your negative force. Other people wander in this void having no freewill and no understanding, just like particles that are influenced by different forces. Although you are a particle too, you were given the opportunity to focus your charge in a certain direction. This means that you operate a desire or a prayer, or, in other words, a deficiency or a request.

Although the words confuse us, we must remember that it is about forces. Therefore, it says that everything is attained by the force of prayer. We already know what a prayer is: It is the work in the heart that arranges the desires and directs them so that they can change the current map of forces.

I can change all the forces through my desire that is directed in a certain way. It is great work, real work in the field of forces. There is nothing but that. All the other “attires” are fictitious.

So, the wisdom of Kabbalah tells you that you are a force, a desire, and how you can focus yourself and be an active and even a beneficial force.

Thus, you understand that if you don’t do anything in the field of forces, you remain a zero. However, Kabbalists tell you that this isn’t so. If you were just an “animal,” you would remain a zero, but since you are given different opportunities that you don’t fulfill, then you are not just a “zero,” but a harmful force. Then, you must be “shaken” so that you will understand that.

I repeat, erase the picture of our fictitious world from your imagination, and feel that you are in a world of two forces: a negative one and a positive one, a desire to receive and a desire to bestow. We were given the opportunity to connect the two, and the connection between the “plus” and the “minus” is determined by resistance.

There are different types of resistance: a simple resistor, a cable, and so on. Certain factors create fields, and other factors create linear forces. The spiritual system also is varied and full. Some of the activities are fulfilled by the Surrounding Lights, as in a conduction coil; other Lights sustain the current state and don’t allow the force to burst, like a cable, and there are Lights that reduce the force or those that increase it. In addition, these forces connect in two lines that continue the three lines.

Generally speaking, it is about very complex systems that operate these two forces. To “pray” means to fulfill the opportunity you were given to increase your force. Thus, I change the whole system as if I have another supplier of power. Actually, there is no other supplier, but I use other suppliers like a solar panel that receives the sun’s energy and converts it, aiming at another function, for example, heating water or generating electricity.

So, a prayer or a request is the force that I operate in the system. I don’t simply ask the Creator to give me something. No, I know for sure what force I activate, how exactly I activate it, and what I can get in response. This is indeed an active spiritual act.
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From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/28/13, Writings of Baal HaSulam “A Speech for the Completion of The Zohar”

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Question: What should my prayer, MAN, in the group of ten be?

Answer: A prayer, MAN, depends upon the state that you are in. You may be asking something from them and they may be asking something from you, and you operate mutually in relation to one another. Or you may be already connected and together ask from the upper one who is in the group of ten.

You say: “The Creator is in the connection between us.” This connection between us is the mother’s womb, it’s ZAT (the lower seven) of Bina, our upper one. There is no other upper one but our connected group. But we are not connected yet, and so we turn to our future, connected, and corrected form that is our next, higher level. We turn to it and to the Creator who is concealed in it. This means that the prayer, MAN, can be aimed from each of you to others, or from all of you towards your future upper form.
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From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/6/13, TES

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Question: What does it mean that a person should only present his “half a shekel” in the work and the Creator adds the other half?

Answer: My “half a shekel” means that I have to bring a vessel, a deficiency, while the filling comes from Above. This deficiency is necessary in order to acquire the force of bestowal. If my deficiency is right, I will receive the other half.

But usually we prepare the desire to receive for our own sake and cry out: “Give me, Give me!” Then we say: “The Creator doesn’t give us anything! He must be wrong and this whole method doesn’t work.”

We are not aware of the fact that our vessel is actually aimed at what the Creator doesn’t give. He only gives us a vessel of bestowal, the Light that Reforms, which is the only thing for which you may ask. If you really ask for that, you receive it.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/3/13, Writings of Rabash

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After a very powerful Men’s Convention, we feel great heaviness. But I think that it should be the opposite since we have ascended to a new level, have received new desires, and now have to go out and fight the narrow-minded world we have returned to. We have to fight so all the confusions and the hardening of the heart that we will feel will not wane our feeling of awe and elation. If we won’t let things calm us down, then all the locks will become openings and the gates will open up.

If you feel heavy and indifferent, it is a sign that you are working with your primordial raw egoism. It is the way it operates in its pure form, as a feeling of a dark extinguished desire that doesn’t care about anything. Now you have been given another ten pounds or ten ounces of desire, it doesn’t really matter how much, and you have fallen under this load.

You mustn’t refuse to receive the new desire since doing so is considered disrespect of the chance to advance, of the gift you are given from Above. But you should ask for two things: From the group, you should ask for support, empowerment, mutual guarantee, and mutual responsibility; and from the Creator, you should ask for correction, awakening, elation, and the Light.

You have to ask. There is nothing you can do other than that! If you stop asking, then you immediately fall into a state of unconsciousness. So you must constantly ask and pray internally, focusing on the group and on the Creator, holding on to this prayer. Otherwise, you fall into a deep sleep.
[106251]
From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/28/13, Talmud Eser Sefirot

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Rabash, “We Shall Do and We Shall Hear (2)”: … And since a person must annul his reason and his thoughts before the Creator, he must accustom himself on the outside. This is called “doing,” which is called, “We shall do.” And all those annulments will enable him to annul his reason and thoughts before the Creator.

Thus, it turns out that one who has more knowledge has more work annulling himself before the Creator. But one who is a fool doesn’t need to annul his reason, since he has no reason. It follows that the only merit of reason is that one has something to annul, and this is the only reason why one should aspire for knowledge. And one who is not ready for that, it is better for him to have no knowledge.

This is called “His wisdom is more than his deeds.” This means that he has more knowledge than he can annul, since the annulment is considered doing and not hearing. “Hearing” means understanding, and doing is only by force, without reason. This is called, “We shall do and we shall hear.” Therefore, if he has the power of doing, he will be able to receive hearing because his basis is faith and not knowledge.

We should attain a state in which we can control at least some of our sensations and our mind. If my heart and mind will be under my authority, in my hands, I will be able to use only the part of my desires and intentions in which I can bestow and not receive for myself.

Of course, this is not easy, but we should try to achieve  this. This means that a man is riding on a donkey (Hamor), meaning that he controls and managers his material (Homer).  This means that he controls his matter and allows his thoughts and desires to work only on such a level of quality and quantity that builds the form of Adam (Man) from them, that is similar (Domeh) to the Creator. He does it so that they are all in bestowal and love of others, beyond his selfish interests.

He uses the thoughts and the desires that are aimed at his self-benefit only for basic needs and only if he intends to sanctify them eventually so they will be “in order to bestow” in the next state.

If a person doesn’t let go of this state, it is called “we shall do and we shall hear” and it means working by “faith above reason.” Of course, it is impossible to do this immediately after a person hears about it—if he hears about this type of work at all. It takes quite a while to be under the influence of the Light at the stage of preparation so that the Light will help a person sort out everything that happens in his mind and heart. Eventually, he begins to differentiate between the actions and the intentions, reception and bestowal.
[105867]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/22/13, Writings of Rabash

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Baal HaSulam, “The Peace”: He believes that this world is not like an open store without an owner, but that there is an owner present, a shopkeeper, who stands in his store and demands of each customer the right price for the merchandise he is taking from the store…

Such a person is regarded as one who wishes to borrow. Thus, even before he stretches his hand to take from this world, which is the store, he takes it as a loan, to pay its price. 

Question: What is this loan?

Answer: The loan is a collection of forces, thoughts, and actions, correctly arranged in order to bestow. This “individual order” is exactly what you have to do in your state. You are given all that is required, a complete package deal.

However, the trouble is that you already have left this state. You already want to “debit,” to steal part of this loan. Well, this happens in general. Some organization demands a budget for lofty purposes, and afterward they do business “on the side” instead.

I don’t accuse anyone; we only have to draw a conclusion from this. This is how a person is built. This is our nature, and this happens everywhere in the world, in every nation. It happens even when someone speaks enthusiastically, he’s sure that he is truly and simply handling the means at his disposal. However, a different desire comes along with a different usage. It is natural that when a person receives millions, his desires heat up.

Generally, theft and corruption are natural things; they always have existed. In the past, leaders didn’t need to take anyone into account and did what they wanted, but today some things emerge on the surface. This is even though we still don’t understand where to find the correction.

The problem is only a lack of an environment that will support and hold you in the right state. If the environment were strong enough, you would correctly use a loan, which comes in response to a request that has been approved. You are not guilty; you simply are not connected to the right environment, which would be the one thing that would maintain the right approach for you.

Therefore, it is first necessary to build the right environment. Without this, there is no chance. This is so even if a person submits a truly justified request and receives the means correctly. A number of years go by, and they discover that he has accounts abroad or secret real estate investments or something else. And we ourselves are to blame. We didn’t investigate all the conditions, not at the time the loan was approved, but at the time it was received.

On the other hand, in spirituality, there are no mistakes like these. If you don’t prepare the environment, then your request simply is not accepted. You can knock on the door all you want, but no one will open it for you.

Question: Which is to say, without friends who are guarantors for me, I cannot receive any loan?

Answer: Right, this is because you intend to realize it from the start with unsuitable conditions.

Question: Which is to say, my request for receiving a loan needs to pass through the group?

Answer: Yes. I want to help the friends so much, to unite them, to see them as one body that I must do something, and then, with this, I raise pain through the group. This is not talking merely about a “transition,” rather it is about absolute despair that rips me apart. I am like a mother who suffers because she cannot feed her children. I turn for help with this and then receive the loan.

However, this is not a loan on our terms. The Creator wants to help the friends himself. Therefore, this is speaking here about the Torah. I receive the Light that Reforms and the Light that fills the Kelim. I receive this on condition that I truly have a desire, an urge to bestow. I’m boiling up, but I don’t know what to do. And then everything will be arranged for me: I will be given the understanding, the Kelim, the means, and all that is required.

Question: So, how do I ask ? To whom do I turn?

Answer: This is my internal appeal. Not everyone is prepared to express the burning, inner love. Sometimes, it is the opposite. From the outside, it seems that it is contempt.

Love doesn’t burst out like lava from a volcano. It is the opposite. In accord with the spiritual source, it always comes with limitation, concealment, with covers and with modesty. Don’t expect hugs and kisses from the friends. The love burns within, and outside of us is a screen and the Reflected Light, which is to say, something completely opposite. After all, the screen with the Reflected Light are built above the egoistic desire, dark and gloomy to death. Therefore, love always is covered with modesty. The screen itself is concealment.

So, we return to the loan from the Creator. I receive the power to bestow to the group from Him. I help the friends, unite them so that they will join together wholeheartedly, and I feel that the Creator becomes revealed in the connection between them, with a laughing, happy face.

This is all the realization of the action. His powers act on me inside and out. By constructing the vessel, I see these forces when He is revealed. So, what did I do by myself? In sum, I prepared a place for this revelation.
[105545]
From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/19/13, “The Peace”

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Question: How do we build the right intention in us?

Answer: The intention is the result of the work of the person, the result of the Light that influences him, as a reaction to his right efforts to be included into the group, from his intention to acquire an intention for the sake of bestowal. Only the Light can give him this intention, its power.

When the Light illuminates the center of the group, everyone is connected to that center as to a well of living water, and then everyone and all together receive the Light that Reforms. In this way, thanks to the intention, we correct the desire so that it will be under the control of the intention. This is called the people of Israel conquering the land, meaning the power of intention.

This is the work in the group and during the study, where everyone intends to attract the Light that Reforms. This is continuous work to attract the Light to the center of the group, into the connection between us, our readiness to be one. Thanks to the illumination that comes, our vessels of reception are expanded “620” times. This is, by correcting each and every step, every small desire, with the intention in order to bestow, we build an immense desire that contains many distinctions. Every part swells 620 times.

The center of the group is the Shechina, our connection as one person with one heart. This is not our whim, but the condition of the spiritual statute, which demands this kind of connection from us in order to correspond to the Light. So, to the degree of the effort that we invest, the Light will act on us and help us to really connect.

The moment that we reach the first minimal degree of connection, we begin to discover the Light within us. This is called crossing the Machsom (the border to the upper world), birth into the spiritual world, meaning to a state of absolute bestowal to everyone and from all of us to the Creator.

The Light performs corrections, while our task is to exert effort.
[105171]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/15/13, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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MAN is translated as Mei Nukvin (female waters), which means that in a prayer there should be two elements: Malchut and Bina. Maim (water) is Bina, and the female attribute is Malchut. Only then is it called raising a prayer, MAN.

If I just feel sorry for feeling bad, it is only Malchut. The question is what should I feel sorry about, who should I turn to, what do I want to receive? There must be a clear picture of this request that ties Malchut to Bina: the desire and its direction. I have to understand to whom my sorrow and my pain are directed. Perhaps I simply feel sorry because I am in a bad mood, but that is not considered a prayer, raising MAN.

If I feel bad because the Creator is concealed, and I don’t feel the importance of the spiritual advancement, don’t want to come to the lesson but would rather sleep, it isn’t raising MAN, a prayer. It is simply a feeling of emptiness in my egoistic desires.

Everything depends on what I want, what I’m sorry about—Who I am sorry for. This means that the reason for my sorrow has to be external to me. Then I form my MAN by these two dissatisfactions, these two Malchut: the Malchut of Bina and Malchut of Malchut. A prayer has to be directed accurately.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/17/13, Writing of Rabash

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