Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 4

Why Is an Attitude to the Creator Called Prayer?

All feelings that we feel in our heart originate from the Creator, and thus the feeling in the heart is not called “prayer.” Prayer is our appeal to the Creator. The Hebrew word for “prayer” (“Lehitpalel“) comes from the word, “to judge” (“Lehaflil“), i.e., it is self-judgment, an evaluation of the connection that we have with the source of our feelings—the Creator.

Since the source of our feelings is good and benevolent, our prayer expresses the difference between our feelings and such goodness and benevolence. We discover the extent of the flaw in our heart. Prayer is the feeling of the difference between a person and the Creator.

In other words, if we were to measure the difference between what the Creator fills our heart with and what our heart feels and how we respond, we would see the extent of our flaw. Likewise, if we were fully corrected, we would feel fully good and benevolent. The more opposite our sensation, the greater the indication of our flaw.

Not only does it indicate the level of our flaw, but also our spiritual location. Since the Creator gives a force of goodness and benevolence through all 620 channels, we can know the channels we feel more or less, where we feel good or bad.

If we have a complete picture of the soul, we perceive and sense everything, we know where we are at every level, and we possess a clear picture of our corrected state compared to our current state. All aspects by which we evaluate our attitude to the Creator are collectively called “prayer.”

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Question: Why should I feel awe before the Creator rather than affection and gratitude toward Him?

Answer: We feel awe from the awareness of the Creator’s revelation when we attain Him. But in general, this is not mandatory; it comes by itself.

So let’s keep striving step by step to come closer to the Creator, to reveal Him, and will see what it evokes within us.

Question: How can we perceive this sense of awe to foster unity and love within the group?

Answer: Together as a ten turn to the Creator and implore, request, and plead with Him to lift you closer to Him. Use the simplest words, He will understand everything.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/3/24, for Graduates of MAK – the International Academy of Kabbalah in Russian, “We have gathered here”

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Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 3

What Is Prayer?

Prayer is an attitude to the Creator. It is what we feel in our present moment toward the upper force that governs us. Whether we want to or not, we relate to the Creator out of our innermost point in our heart. Even if we do not feel it, the heart of every created being receives its feelings from the source, which means that we always feel the Creator.

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Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 2

What in Prayer Is Under a Person’s Control?

It is written: “I have labored and found.” The effort is under a person’s control, but the outcome is not. Why? It is because we are working on our soul without knowing its structure or its paths of development. We only need to try, to apply effort, both in quantity and quality; we do not need to worry about the results, the path, or the events that we might encounter. We should not worry about the pace of our progress or our ultimate form. This is because we not only do not know our final form, but in every new state, we have no idea where we will arrive. Even a great Kabbalist like Rabbi Shimon Bar-Yochai knew that he was ascending to the level of the final correction (Gmar Tikkun) only because he recognized its posterior side. If he had not seen its posterior, he would not have known what level he was about to reach. A new state awakens at every moment. It is born out of an internal memory called a “Reshimo” (record).

People think that a Kabbalist knows and sees everything from the beginning until the end of the world. A Kabbalist, however, only knows what they have traversed on their spiritual path. They know what they have attained up to their current level, and not what they have not yet experienced. Therefore, spiritual levels are referred to as “ascents” and “discoveries,” discoveries of what was previously unknown.

In a spiritual ascent, the effort should thus be aimed above our current understanding, against the understanding and thoughts in our present state. This is always the relationship of the lower level to the higher level because the posterior side of a higher level is darker and less corrected than the lower level.

Effort itself holds no indication of the result. It has no direct correlation to the greatness of the goal. A person labors on a certain matter and receives a result that they never expected because each time a new part of their soul becomes revealed that was previously hidden from them.

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Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 1

Chapter 1. Prayer from the Depth of the Heart

Since it is written “half,” we understand that more than half is not demanded of us; our half is called “prayer.” Prayer bursts forth from our heart as a result of our emotions. It must break through from the depth of the heart before we start critiquing the feeling in our heart with our intellect, before we start thinking about it or understanding it. The feeling hidden in the heart before we try to control it is called “prayer.”

If prayer precedes our control over it, why are we told that we must pray and reach a prayer, as if prayer depends on our efforts or free choice?

The answer is that we must reach the desire called “prayer” through various actions and means that help bring us to the correct desire. Prayer is a summary; it is the result of our preparations. Accordingly, each time we pray, we feel a certain kind of connection to the Creator in our heart and our prayer to the Creator is always new.

A person can open an ordinary prayer book, written two thousand years ago by the Men of the Great Assembly, and by saying the same words every day, feel something new each day. The interpretation changes so much that the words spoken yesterday no longer fit today. In such a prayer, we feel that we had never said the words that we spoke today.

What words should we aim for in our prayer? Primarily they should be words that speak of the Creator’s glory. Why? It is because in the Creator’s glory, we do not speak of His essence—who He is, or what He is—but we discuss His qualities of bestowal and how we appreciate such qualities. The extent to which we value the Creator’s qualities of bestowal is the extent to which we measure the strength of our connection, closeness, and alignment with the Creator.

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Question: Rabash writes that a person does not know where he will be better off, like Israel during the Exodus from Egypt, with the sea ahead and Pharaoh behind.

How does one get out of such a state when he does not know what to do?

Answer: The best course is to ask the Creator to provide you with good energy, a good force. Then, you can emerge from this state as if trying to pull yourself up from a swamp or out of deep waters by your own efforts. That is how it will happen.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/14/24, Writings of Rabash “Two Forces within Man”

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Question: Can our choice be that we leave the decision to the Creator?

Answer: We must constantly pray to the Creator so that He shows us what action is really required.

Question: Should this prayer be about choosing a good path or specific situations in the ten to find the best solution?

Answer: Maybe so, but usually about the best path.

Question: Everything that comes from the Creator is good. What determines whether it becomes the potion of death or the elixir of life?

Answer: It depends on how we perceive what comes to the ten.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/28/24, Writings of Rabash “For Man Is the Tree of the Field – 1”

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Question: Is the correct prayer made up of thoughts, actions, feelings, or all of these together?

Answer: When a person asks from the heart, he does not make a calculation: 20% of thoughts, 30% of feelings, 20 to 30% of experiences. He simply asks from the heart.

Question: How can a ten come to one united prayer? We are all different. We all came to Kabbalah at different times, and each one has his own opinion. One wants to study, another wants to pray, a third wants to answer, one hisses at the other: “Be quiet, I can’t hear the teacher,” and so on.

Answer: It is precisely this discrepancy between people in the ten—when one is in one state, the other is in another, and the third is in a third—that gives the correct result. This one wants to pray and that one wants to study; this one wants to disseminate and that one believes that the most important thing today is to make a film for dissemination.

Each one has his own states, so everyone should understand that merging them into a single direction toward the Creator will bring the correct result. Each one from his own point.

So there is no need to worry that all people are different. They will always vary more and more in the ten. But if they strive toward the Creator, then He unites them together.

That is why it is said: “In Him our hearts will rejoice,” meaning in Him we unite. This is very important. We will not be united until we are incorporated into the Creator.

Comment: But when I look at others, I see that they are not in the Creator.

My Response: We do not check who is in the Creator and who is not. We all strive toward the Creator, each one as much as he can and in his own way.

If we try to unite outside of Him, it means a unification of egoists, and nothing will come of it. The Creator will make us even greater haters of each other. But if we try to unite in Him into a single whole, then we will succeed. Simultaneously with the feeling of unification, we will begin to feel the Creator and reveal Him in the connection between us.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/28/19, Questions and Answers

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Comment: I decided that I only have Kabbalah in my life, and I don’t get distracted by other methods. But my “donkey” desires something different. For example, I want to go out and have a beer, I feel that urge. But I understand that if I go, I will not be able to get up for the morning lesson, and I will have a headache. I feel powerless in this situation because it feels like it is the Creator directing me this way.

My Response: Let us clarify: the Creator sends you to the lesson and the Creator sends you to have a beer. The Creator is everywhere, in both places. So which direction do you choose? Which Creator will you listen to?

Question: I understand that all of this is from the Creator, but can I pray for myself to follow the Creator who sends me to the lesson?

Answer: I do not think that is the best path because you will end up fooling yourself. It is better to use your ten to overcome the “beer” Creator. Then you will truly feel like you are in a fight, will connect more with the group, and will strengthen your connection with the Creator and the connection of the Creator with the group. In this way, you will really advance.

I believe that if a person finds themselves at a crossroads with two apparent paths, they should recognize that both are given by the Creator so they must decide which choice the Creator would prefer.

Question: Can I pray for myself and ask the Creator to help me choose the right path?

Answer: That is a weak prayer. It is much better to pray through the ten. A genuine prayer is always done with what is called a minyan, a group of ten people.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/28/19, “Questions and Answers”

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Question: What does it mean to come to the lesson with the intention to purify myself? How can I check if I truly have that intention?

Answer: Analyze what you were thinking about before the lesson.

Question: Is it possible that someone gets up for the lesson every day simply out of habit?

Answer: That is why you do not see serious results from your studies. Sit for a moment before the lesson and think about yourself, your state, and what lies ahead.

Gradually, you will see what thoughts, feelings, and requests you can bring to the Creator.

Question: But how can I check my focus on the request for purification? After all, a million different thoughts and requests can come up.

Answer: That is exactly why you should ask, in your own words.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/15/24, Writings of Rabash “According to the Sorrow Is the Reward”

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