Question: What does the mourner’s prayer (Kaddish) symbolize?

Answer: When someone dies, we thank the Creator. Seemingly, for what, for the death of a loved one?

However, we send gratitude at the spiritual level. We look from the height of the spirit, down to the desire to receive which shed its egoistic form by virtue of the Light, the Creator. Finally, He has made it happen. That part has died, and now I can realize the “revival of the dead” with it, meaning to take the desire that remains without an egoistic intention and begin to work with it for the sake of bestowal.

After the death of egoism, meaning the intention to receive, only the “body” of desire remains. It is decomposing, and I can start working with it. Thus, I received a great deal of help from Above and thank the Creator for that. These are not simply words, but the feeling that bursts out of a person when his egoistic desire dies at last.

The Kaddish appears contradictory in our present egoistic understanding. In fact, all our prayers, precepts, and rituals don’t correspond to the laws of our life. All of them are absolutely illogical, irrational in our eyes because they are the projection of spiritual laws.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/9/2011, About the Israeli Nation

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Question: We know that “Isra-El” is a calling and not just a stamp on an identity card. Yet, is there a special task for those who live in the geographic state of Israel?

Answer: In the future, this land, this country, should become a symbol of the state that will be built completely on the forces of bestowal, reciprocal love, mutual guarantee, on the principals of “love thy neighbor as thyself” and “don’t do to others that which is hateful to you,” on unifying into “one man with with one heart.”

Here is the place with the most suitable conditions. Thus, if a person is drawn to spirituality, in a sense he is drawn here. It is impossible to establish the state of Israel on Madagascar or in Uganda. The law of the spiritual root and branch acts here, and this has to be taken into account.

Thus, we don’t have a choice. We are here and have to build a state of love and bestowal here, setting an example for the entire world. Only in this way can we defeat enemies, achieve independence, and avoid any new victims.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/9/2011, About the Israeli Nation

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Baal HaSulam, “The Nation”: The only hope is to establish a thoroughly new national education for ourselves, to discover and ignite once more the natural, national love that has been dimmed within us, to revive once more the national muscles, which have been inactive in us for two millennia, in every suitable means to this end. Then we will know that we have a natural, reliable foundation to be rebuilt and to continue our existence as a nation.…

Question: What is “national love?”

Answer: It is brotherly love. Every nation has its inherent love because the nations take their origins from the 70 roots of Zeir Anpin. These roots have a place for every nation. That is why people feel a connection to the mutual root.

Despite egoism and individualism conspicuous today in everyone, people have a sense of belonging to a particular nation. This feeling is common to all nations except the Jews. After all, Israel is not a nation; it has no root in those 70 roots. Of all the nations that inhabited Ancient Babylon, Israel was made of people with the point in the heart. They separated from the others and joined together because of this spark.

When the spark blazes and connects them, they live at the spiritual level, welded by their points in the heart into a single soul. But when this soul breaks, their vessel disappears, and they fall into regular desires, the desires of other nations.

Then, Israel stops being a nation because nothing connects them besides the hate of others toward them. Only external pressure keeps them together. If the pressure decreases, they become dispersed as far as possible from each other. They exist in comfort namely when their connection is weakened. We can see this in the Jews living among other nations.

When will Israel become a nation again? It will only be when they assemble around the message that Abraham laid in the nation’s foundation: “Love thy neighbor as thyself.” It must be done not for themselves, but for the sake of the world.

We are at the last stage of redemption, the final correction, which has to embrace the entire world. Baal HaSulam writes about this in his articles “The Revelation of Godliness (Matan Torah)” and “The Mutual Guarantee.” Israel has to be united for the Creator to correct everybody through them.

Desiring to correct themselves, Israel raises MAN, a plea for the entire world. Then, it receives the upper Light, the Light that Reforms. This Light moves through the “template” called Israel and obtains the right form of unity. The Light is abstract and formless, but here it acquires the form called Mashiach (Messiah). Then, the great desire of the nations of the world becomes corrected.

If we act in this manner, we are Israel. If we don’t, we receive blows and troubles, both from the upper Light and the nations of the world. We are in the middle between them. Either we perform the coordinator’s task, or we are worse than everyone else and have to suffer the consequences directly from the Creator and indirectly through others.

The Light must find its vessel, and until then, it will not calm down.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/8/2011, “The Nation”

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Question: You liken the Jewish nation to a special forces unit that is sent on a special mission. Where to?

Answer: It is sent to conquer the evil inclination. “Israel” is a spark, the point in the heart, the foreign force in the “hostile country,” in egoism. We must strive to defeat this egoism and correct it. We have to strengthen ourselves first, and then, having been reformed, we must give egoists the Light and correct the entire world.

After all, it is true that we are not from here, not from the land of egoism. Our root lies outside of it; we infiltrated it by way of the breaking of the vessels, of the integral soul. Here, inside it, we were broken in the beginning, but in the end, we must become corrected. To the degree of our correction, we reform the collective ego.

Question: Who is the commander-in-chief that sent the special forces unit on the mission?

Answer: The Creator did. Israel is a part of Him, the vessels of bestowal sitting in egoism, in the vessels of reception. The commander-in-chief sent the soldiers out, having supplied them with all the necessary gear and ammunition. To cast them onto the hostile ground, He intentionally “broke” them up so that they may look like everyone else and not stand out in the crowd.

Thus, we can be likened to secret agents. Each of us looks exactly as all the natives of this egoistic country. Imagine being dropped into Africa, and you look exactly like them: You have the same character, mentality, tastes, and likes. Everything is identical to theirs, inside and out.

For a while, the planted agent doesn’t receive instructions. He has to settle in at the new site, find a job, and make a family. Years go by before he embarks on his mission. However, one day, he receives a reminder. By now, he has forgotten all about it when the phone starts to ring: “So and so is speaking….” It’s just like in a movie.

We have received our wake-up call: It’s time to remember that we have a special mission here, that this is not, in fact, our home, that we came from a totally different world. In truth, we are from another “planet,” from another dimension. We received an impulse and came out of dormancy. All of the aliens on this planet have woken up, are gathering in the groups, and starting to prepare themselves to conquer the planet Earth. That’s our mission.

Question: How do we win it then?

Answer: We are being sent instructions, gradually explaining all that we need to know and put into action. Then, we gain a new mind and a new sensation. Our mother planet is sending us the power of our initial nature, with the help of which we will conquer every citizen of the Earth.

We came here for one reason: to establish the same order here as exists in our own world. There, everything is opposite. It is governed by love and bestowal.

Now, we must end all the horrors that are viewed as the norm here. People are destroying themselves and the life on the planet, while we have come to help, to save them and provide a totally different life for them. We were woken up by a special signal from home, on a special wave, which means that it’s time to act.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/9/2011, About the Israeli Nation

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Question from Moscow: What does it mean to desire to unite? And what does unity feel like?

Answer: Apparently these questions are coming from our Moscow group in anticipation of the upcoming convention in Moscow. What does it mean to unite? Why? Why are we holding this convention? The question is correct.

Why should we unite? To be frank, this is impossible to explain. If a person has a Reshimo (informational gene) that remained in him from the unity he once experienced while being in the common desire, where he once revealed the Creator and then lost this sensation, and now this Reshimo is awakening again, then he desires to return to this state. “I want it!”

For example, some people like eating frogs. Well, what can you do…. I don’t have this desire, but to them it is a heavenly delight. That is exactly how the desire for spirituality emerges. It awakens—and that’s all. What can you do?… One person starts feeling a desire for frogs, and another—for spirituality. This desire awakens from the inside and it does not depend on us.

Why would someone start feeling a desire to eat frogs? It’s because he once tasted it and felt a pleasant taste, got used it, received the corresponding upbringing—and now he desires this.

But another person was in spirituality at some point and a Reshimo has remained in him, and now it awakens. That is why it is impossible to explain what unity feels like to people who don’t have a Reshimo from the spiritual state. But it is possible to show them that it’s worth it to unite with one another because that way we will come out of the general crisis, and therefore, it’s worth it for them to join those who are setting out to correct the world’s current state. After all, they will also benefit from this.

This is what we have to tell people. They don’t understand what spirituality means, or the Creator, adhesion, unity, the feeling of perfection, eternity, harmony with nature, the upper spheres…. This is meaningless to them so they will tell you, “Leave me alone! Just give me something in this life—peace, safety, good health. I don’t need anything else!” Every person speaks based on his desire.

When you are speaking to that kind of person, you have to show him that he also won’t be able to fulfill his desire unless he goes together with everyone toward unification because this is what the global, integral nature demands. We have evidence to rely on and ways to explain this to him. Therefore, you tell him that the world requires unity because this is what nature demands. You have to speak to a person on his level instead of telling him about the Creator and spirituality. Due to having no other way, he will also join in. But every person has to be addressed according to his or her desire.
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/11/11, The Zohar

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Question: Why is it much easier to read those parts of The Zohar where Baal HaSulam explains it using Kabbalistic terms?

Answer: It’s because then it’s clear to us that these are technical definitions and not earthly images. However, everything depends on one’s level of qualification.

If I invite a specialist to fix my computer, I show him the images on my screen and tell him that I don’t like the color shades or display quality, but he doesn’t look at the actual picture. A computer specialist looks at the electric signals, the forces that create this picture inside, at the quantity of the colors installed in the system. He doesn’t care about the picture itself because for him it’s nothing but an external reflection, a symbol for what’s happening inside, which indicates the computer’s proper or improper functioning.

On the other hand, when I show him this picture and ask how to fix it, he explains it to me in technical terms: “Here you need to replace HGT, NHY, reconcile the forces of the right and left lines…” and I don’t understand what he’s talking about either.

We are confused not by The Zohar speaking this way or that, whether it’s the language of legends or the language of Kabbalah, but by our inability to correctly discern the actual picture and realize what it’s talking about. Every word of The Zohar indicates a desire which must be corrected. There is nothing else to it besides that.

The Creator gave rise to desire. This desire must be brought to correction and fulfillment. Until it achieves its correction followed by fulfillment, we’re only talking about this desire. As soon as it becomes corrected and fulfilled, we stop talking about it and begin to discuss the next degree, a deeper desire which follows right after.

This is how we correct desire after desire, layer after layer. This phased approach to the whole power of the desires within us, which we correct step-by-step, one after another, is called Mishpatim—judgments or reincarnations of souls. “Reincarnations of souls” means that I am always undergoing these inner transformations.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/6/2011, The Book of Zohar

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Question: Why was it necessary to withdraw from the Creator to the utmost point in order to get corrected and come to adhesion with Him?

Answer: It is not sufficient to descend through all of the worlds to this one. We have to descend even deeper. Only when we enter the group do we start attaining what a “broken man” is. Then, we fall lower and lower, much deeper than when we just started to study.

After all, previously, we were not familiar with our evil inclination and didn’t feel bad about it. At that point, we still thought that the desires we had were good, and the more our ego evolved, the more energy it provided for us to advance.

Then, we begin to want to unite with the others and reveal the internal essence of the group. We do this while constantly thinking about it in order to find the internal connection between us, which does exist, but is concealed from us. It’s only then that we discover that we always forget about, reject, and hate it. Thus, a person gradually starts attaining his nature.

This is still a descent since he hasn’t revealed all his evil, and all ascents and descents are defined solely by how the creature feels about it. A person doesn’t see himself as more distant from the Creator just yet. All of his understanding and experience is based on the degree of his being distant from Him, as if he is moving further and further away.

Hence, he feels an even greater void, bitterness, and frustration. He doesn’t understand how it can be that he works and studies so much, only to feel worse as the world is becoming still darker for him. Yet, he finally realizes that this is how the created being is revealed, and it is necessary to go through it.

In the end, he agrees with it, which is regarded as “unconditional acceptance.” He is prepared for whatever may come and thinks that it’s all right if he feels lower than low; most important is not to give up!

In that case, he receives an even greater burdening by the ego while, simultaneously, he gets an opportunity to correct it. Here the advancement is based on two opposites since when he starts correcting, equalizing himself with the Creator and coming closer to Him with every new step, he must reveal his opposite nature in the “left line.” Then, in accordance with that, he will plead for the Light “in the right line” and correct himself in the “middle” one.

That means that over the course of this entire ascent to Malchut of the world of Infinity, to the very last moment, the adhesion regarded as “Rav Paalim UMekabtziel (He Who Blesses and Adorns Her),” he will keep revealing increasingly greater evil. It cannot be avoided.

Otherwise, we won’t find in ourselves the need for the Light. We need room where we can make the Creator within ourselves. This space is supposed to be opposite to the innate properties of the Creator, and then it will be up to me what to do in it.

That is why we find this void, all the places that comprise it, and all of its parts as separate, opposite, and distanced from one another, like the broken parts of a construction set. We, however, begin to assemble it, looking for matching pieces and placing them in the correct sequence, in the correct order of cause and effect, so as to align all the details that were taken apart.

Thereby, I reveal how the Creator feels about me, that He is good that does good which created the point of “existence from absence” that I need to correct in myself. This awareness that I am created “from absence” helps me understand the “existence from existence” (Yesh Mi Yesh) which created me.

The entire process that this point created by Him passes through is necessary solely so that I may attain the infinite Light. All these stages were pre-set long before, during the plan of creation, preceding the creation of this point “from absence,” as it is said: “The end of an action is in its initial thought.” Thus, it arrives at the attainment of the force that created it and to the understanding of what the essence of this entire correction process was.
[42523]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/8/2011, ”All Who Suffer for the Public”

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Question: Why does the greatest advancement happen precisely while reading The Book of Zohar, without understanding anything, just by keeping intention?

Answer: The study of Kabbalah does not require any special mental abilities because it is not learned with the mind. On the contrary, people who consider themselves smart, who are good at studying, who grasp things quickly and have a keen mind, usually do not advance very well in Kabbalah. That’s because the mind and the sensation of their mental abilities stops them, carrying them away to the path of the rational study of this science instead of attaining it by being loyal to the group. This is a problem.

I would say that it’s precisely the regular, “average” people who are more successful in spiritual advancement. The brilliant smart-alecs who come to study the science of Kabbalah usually stumble right away. I see that its as if they jump head-first into the deep sea, and “resurface” from there many years later, once the water washes off all of their pride, feeling of superiority, and power.

Let us hope that we belong to those who are successful in attainment rather than those who have a brilliant mind.
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/11/11, The Zohar

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Question: Does suffering point to the area of the necessary correction directly or only indirectly?

Answer: We need to try to accurately discern what is causing the pain, meaning what the Creator expects from us. When a thought, desire, or intention visits us and it’s not connected to love of others, I should immediately feel the red light turn on in me!

There are thoughts, desires, and intentions where this alert signal is, at first, yellow, then orange, and finally, red as a real sign of disaster. It depends on the case.

But I should view it so as to desire looking at everything with love, and if it’s less than that, I want a red light to turn on. Then, I will see a field of red lights in front of me. This makes me understand and become aware of my real condition so that I can get a hold of myself and want to switch all these lights to green. I search for how it’s done, and thereby, I start working with the Creator.

He turns on the red light within me, and I switch it to green. While I am attempting to do so, I search for why it turned red and how to switch it. This is what our work is all about, the process we are supposed to undergo.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/9/11, Shamati #113

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Question: I recently read an article that talks about how things that became successful throughout the world did not catch on in Israel, such as fantasy films and complicated media gadgets. Why is that?

Answer: We, the people of Israel, are “primitive animals,” the most backward nation if we do not live in a framework that’s appropriate for us. This is evident from the culture, the upbringing, and everything else happening here. We can’t do anything right, and we’re also proud of that.

We don’t understand that we don’t and won’t have any achievements until we place ourselves beneath the upper force. Compared to the achievements of the Jews abroad, we have practically nothing to be proud of here. Of course, we do manage to do some things well, but considering our potential, it’s a miserable fraction of what we can do.

We have always compared ourselves to other nations, but that is incorrect because our entire potential comes from Bina, not Malchut. So why do we always retreat? In essence, our “achievements” are failures compared to what we are able to do.

Nothing will help us. If we don’t connect to our Source, then we simply won’t survive.

This is why we celebrate Independence Day, when we are happy about the opportunity to do spiritual work and to ascend spiritually. This day is not about “being chased into the pound,” which is what happened to our bodies. We can’t look at life that way.

Independence Day for us is a reminder of the chance that has been given to us. By realizing this opportunity correctly, we will be able to bring the whole world to a spiritual ascent, to eternity and perfection. The issue here is not the state of Israel or the nation of Israel, but the spiritual essence of what is happening. We have been brought to the place of spiritual realization, the place where the spiritual redemption of the whole world begins.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/10/11, ‘Inheritance of the Land”

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