Question: Instead of gaining superpowers, I feel weaker from one day to the next. How can I become a spiritual superman that ascends above his ego?

Answer: First of all you should base everything on the facts. There’s no reason to get scared of the facts because everything comes to us from the Creator, who presents a process to us as a way to learn something.

The Upper Light influences our inner Reshimot, creating inside them the pictures that appear before us. He takes informational data (Reshimot) from us, projects them on our inner screen, and thus we perceive ourselves as being in a specific state.

All of these states have to happen to us on the path. So what’s the problem? Is it the fact that sometimes I feel bad and sometimes I feel good, having completely no power over myself? After all, I am governed by the Light.

Now I am receiving an explanation of how the Light influences me. But who am I? I only observe this work. That is why it is called the Creator’s work. We are looking at it from aside and should use it to learn about what is happening.

Is it unpleasant to know He is operating me? What if I looked at my friend who suddenly cries or feels happy, sometimes he sleeps and sometimes he is rushing off to some place; that would be normal because I would see the Light’s actions operating someone else. But I am not glad to observe how all of this is happening to myself.

On one hand, this is correct. On the other hand, if you start to identify with these actions, with the Creator, and if you desire to justify Him, then you won’t care what passes over you. You identify with the One who operates you and perceive yourself as the material for Him to work on.

Can you detach from this material? Can you say, “This is not me at all. If I am moving, doing something, thinking or desiring something, none of it is me. I identify with the Creator who is doing anything He wishes to this material.” That’s when you can already see yourself from aside.

Now a question arises: Can I ask the Creator to carry out other goal-oriented actions? It’s possible that this will happen, so let’s try. What actions will they be? And for what? What will He hear? What will He want to carry out? I don’t want to ask Him for something vain. If I have already reached a state where I act together with Him against my body, as Moses did with the Creator against Pharaoh, then let me ask for something real. That’s when a person begins this entire process.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/25/10, The Zohar

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Question: On the second day of the Convention, I started to feel that all people, all “points,” as though, are within me, and feeling them as part of me, I could truly love them as myself. Is it correct to perceive the entire group within myself?

Answer: It is precisely how we start to form the place where later the property of bestowal called the Creator becomes revealed.

Question: I witnessed how during the Convention, people completely devoted themselves to work. Do we really need such external actions? Perhaps they actually distract us from the goal? After all, aren’t they just vaguely related to the truth?

Answer: Possibly, we need to distribute duties more evenly, but there is no doubt that we have to fully care for and perform all these duties ourselves.

Question: Suppose, we start hating the friends. How do we distinguish between this, let’s call it “divine” hatred that obstructs the connection of the broken vessels and simple hatred caused by nasty character or mental disability?

Answer: If, in order to reveal the Creator, a person exerted efforts in connecting with the friends, then a strong common effort exposes hatred toward the obligation to unite. The Zohar talks about it as well. But if a person did not exert effort in trying to unite, he will not feel true hatred.
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Question: How can we reach revelation so we would see the spiritual world as realistically as we now see our reality?

Answer: I don’t know whether the things I’m seeing now are reality or not. What if I am dreaming and cannot wake up?

It seems to me that I am now inside of a certain reality, but how do I really know whether or not this reality is just a dream compared to the next reality? Maybe there such a level of wakefulness is awaiting me that everything I felt in the past will seem like a dream?

Inside my current reality there are also periods when I tune out from it and go to sleep. So how do I know: Maybe I am sleeping now as well?

In other words, I have to discern how to go from one state to the next and acquire a new consciousness. And that is why Kabbalists have given us a means.

Until you acquire that new consciousness, you will remain inside a dream and you won’t even find out that it is possible to wake up and start living! We all understand what it means to dream. I was sleeping, I woke up, and now I am considered awake. And that is exactly how we exist in relation to the spiritual world, the world to come.

There are many states like this, one above the other. Kabbalah gives us the means to keep ascending from one state to the next. If you correctly use the means given to you in your current state, then you will be able to ascend to a state that is called “life” in relation to your current state, and what you feel today will be called a “dream.” It is written, “We were as dreamers.”
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/25/10, “Body and Soul”

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Question: How do we acquire the ability to advance “above reason”?

Answer: “Above reason” is above our “matter,” the will to enjoy; in other words, “above reason” is inside the quality of bestowal. We are unable to rise above our egoism ourselves. This is possible only with the help of the Upper Light, Ohr Makif.

“Reason” means my desire. Inside of my desire I am able to feel, see, and make calculations depending on the probable benefit or harm, or on whether it’s worthwhile for me to use a certain desire or not. As a result of these calculations I reach certain conclusions and then realize my desires. I do not have any problem in this regard. That is how I live in this world.

I am certain about part of these calculations and I have doubts about another part of them. In our earthly sciences we also use the theory of probability whenever we do not have reliable information. However, in any case we have something we can rely on.

On the other hand, “faith above reason” or “above knowledge” is when I don’t have any instruments or means of perceiving. In addition, I don’t even know what “higher” is. If it were simply opposite to reason, then I might be able to calculate how I should act according to my reason and then I would act exactly in the opposite manner. Yet, this would also be a rational calculation.

However, I don’t have the slightest idea of what “faith above reason” is; I don’t know what reason it follows, what sensation and calculation it entails, and in relation to what. It is a certain approach, tendency, or paradigm that does not exist inside me.

Therefore, only the Light can come and give us this approach because “above reason” means “for the sake of bestowal,” meaning not according to the calculation inside the Kli, the desire to enjoy. But if it’s not inside the desire, then I don’t know what it is. How can I find out? I don’t know. And inside what desire?

Kabbalists say: If you start to perceive the desire of your neighbor as your own, if you can make a calculation in relation to his desire, one that is for his good, then that will be above your current knowledge. However, to do that I have to receive super powers that I don’t have. If I receive them, I will be able to go “above reason.” However, for now you cannot jump higher than yourself.

Only the Light that created us can change us. Therefore we have to use the “miraculous means” (Segulot) and perform various actions that awaken the Light so it will influence us. That is how our success will be measured. The mind and the sensations that you accumulate inside your desire to enjoy for now are unable to help you. They can only help you in the opposite form. If you make a daily assessment of what you have attained in spirituality, you will see that in reality you haven’t attained anything even though you put in many efforts.

And the same thing will happen tomorrow. On the day after that, you will get confused in addition. Another day later you will suddenly feel confident that you have become smart. And so on. Every day you add more negative phenomena due to the fact that you reside inside the desire to enjoy for your own sake and you think that only the Light can help you, but it does not come and does not help you.

So what should you do? Start waging war against reason, as it is written about the Egyptian exile.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/25/10, The Zohar

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Question: I am a Muslim who has been studying Kabbalah for several months. Is it possible to observe the laws of my religion and correct my soul at the same time?

Answer: Kabbalah was born before Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The Torah speaks of Abraham “bestowing gifts” to the sons of his concubines and sending them East, thus laying the foundation for Eastern teachings. Everything stems from one source.

The collective desire is divided into many parts, and each part has its own individual path of correction. Certain parts can commence with correction immediately. They constitute the group that Abraham had taken out of Babylon. The other parts have scattered around the world, with each part developing individually in accordance with its unique set of qualities.

Their means of advancement are the various religions, faiths, and cultures. A person can easily remain in his faith and follow the spiritual path at the same time. Baal HaSulam writes about this in his Writings of The Last Generation:

“The religious formation of all the nations should first and foremost obligate its members to bestow upon their fellow man the concept of another person’s life coming before one’s own, a formation of ‘Love thy neighbour as thyself’… But otherwise, each nation may pursue its own religion and traditions, and one must not interfere with the other.”

That is, we must not meddle in the affairs of other nations and cultures. Let them have these things; people need them. This whole “territory” has nothing to do with the spiritual world. As a person advances, it turns into a cultural platform for him, a set of traditions, and does not get in the way.

If I want to rise above my nature so as to unite with everybody, even the relationships between religions appear to me in a new light. As a Muslim, I suddenly understand that I can advance toward the goal alongside a Christian, and, truly, what can stop us?

Everyone is used to their own home cooking, and nobody is taking that away from you. As Baal HaSulam writes, everyone can remain in their religion, and nobody has the right to meddle in your affairs precisely because this has nothing to do with the spiritual path. Ultimately, in our world, religions constitute culture, tradition that corresponds from the beginning to the nature of the various parts of Malchut and conforms to the root of the soul.

Recently, we read the weekly Bible chapter about the Creator bidding Abraham to sacrifice his only son Isaac, but at the very last moment commanding that a baby goat, not Isaac, be sacrificed. In Hebrew, the word “sacrifice” is Kurban, from the word Karov (to draw closer). Here, the right line (Abraham) sacrifices its ego, Kurban, the left line (Isaac), thus drawing closer to the Creator (Karov).

We hear that Muslims celebrate the holiday of Kurban to honor Ibrahim who had sacrificed a goat instead of Ishmael on Allah’s bidding. Allah is derived from the word Alla (Elyon or the Upper One).
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/21/10, “Hakdama, BeLaila De Kala (The Night of the Bride)”

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Question: When I served in the army, I saved money and waited for my service to end, so that I could start traveling. Now I can talk about what I have seen in various places, my adventures of pleasures received. What kind of impressions do we receive journeying through the Upper World?

Answer: From the place where we receive “the point in the heart” and begin to dream about ascending to Malchut of the World of Infinity, accordingly we descend lower and lower into a sensation of hatred, which separates the parts of Malchut.

The more hatred we reveal, the more we can correct and rise above it. This is what is meant by ascending from world to world: negative Assiya → Assiya → negative Yetzira → Yetzira → negative Beria → Beria → negative Atzilut → Atzilut → negative Adam Kadmon → Adam Kadmon (AK), until we reach the World of Infinity.
Your point in the heart receives the desire to journey through the “land,” that is within the desire (“land” in Hebrew is “Aretz,” from the word “Ratzon,” “desire”). And then you set out on the path.

You take the Light of Hassadim, that is the anti-egoistic screen (“money/cover”), penetrate the desire, and thanks to this cover/money you select the pleasure/Light of Hochma. You have the desire and the “cover,” meaning you can pay for it, and so you make the payment and receive the pleasure. This is your journey!

It is a journey within your desire! The entire world is your desire, and all the lands you’ve visited are parts of your inner desire as well. You have tested your desires and clarified which inner pleasure you can receive in Thailand, Europe or somewhere else.

The same applies to the spiritual world, except it is no longer an illusory picture, where it only seemed to you as if you’re traveling in this world. Now you really see that these are parts of your soul, and you discover that you exist together with them, in unity, revealing the light (pleasure) within this adhesion!

This pleasure is thousands of times greater than your past travels, where you might have seen or heard something, or eaten something that later gave you indigestion. The spiritual world is where you truly take pleasure! After all, this is a journey within your desire, only it seemed to you as it existed on the outside.
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From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/22/10, Baal HaSulam “The Gate of Intentions”

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Question: Spirituality requires completeness and joy, but in the group we sometimes deem it as gaiety. How does it fit in?

Answer: You drop into the group after your mundane, “civil” life. There, you would enjoy food, sex, family, wealth, respect, power, and knowledge. Here, however, you are placed before a goal that you don’t achieve and people you didn’t pick.

In the outside world, you would individually decide with whom to work and spend leisure time, but here you see the faces of the friends. Look, would you invite them into your circle? You have no choice. Moreover, there is no benefit. You find neither a reason, nor place, nor ways to feel the joy you used to experience in the outside world.

Now, you need to replace all your ideas. What am I here for? Why do I need all these people? How do I find fulfillment? What is the goal? How important is it? Having gathered and arranged these questions and their answers correctly, you must simply burst with joy, and soar to the seventh heaven because you are so happy.

After all, you are in the only correct place, in the company of the right people who yearn for the same exalted goal as you do, which cannot be reached on one’s own. Look, they all came together just for you. They exist solely for you to attain perfection.

Then, looking at the friends, you start loving them. They become important, close, dear to you, and the goal isn’t that distant any more. If we all unite, we will find it among us. It isn’t in some distant galaxy, but right here behind the partitions separating us, which we must crush.

The goal is to reveal the Light in us, but it cannot flow as long as there is a gap in the net. Because of the torn wires, the spiritual current doesn’t pass through any of us. So, let it shine; close the circuit. Everything is ready for us, and, if you see the events correctly, you will definitely get filled with joy.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/5/10, Rabash “The Matter of Schechina“

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Question: Is there anything eternal inside us?

Answer: In every aspect relating to the material body, we are mere animals, although more developed,  endowed with feelings and a mind. Nevertheless, every animate body is mortal.

There is a second nature, the desire to bestow, which is called the spiritual world, the soul, or the “part of divinity from Above.” Besides it, everything else belongs to egoism, the animate level, or the material world. Therefore, for now there is nothing connecting us to eternity besides one point that belongs to infinity, This point has to organize an environment for itself as a means to develop.

I am not talking about the animate soul that enlivens the body, which is the “vital force” present in all creatures still, vegetative, and animate. Besides it, man has one real point of the root which he has to develop. It is because of this point that he is called “human” – “Adam,” “similar” (Domeh) to the Creator, whose level he can attain.

A regular person contains nothing besides this point that is spiritual and eternal. Just as his animate body lives, so it dies – and nothing remains! And what about that point, do we get to keep it at least? Well, was it ever present inside the body? No, it does not belong to the body. We will never be able to transplant it to another person together with some other organ.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/24/10, “Body and Soul”

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Question: The material reality is described by Einstein’s famous formula in the theory of relativity: E=mc², which relates mass to speed. Is there an analogous formula in the spiritual world relating the will to receive to the will to bestow?

Answer: I don’t think Einstein’s formula can be applied to the spiritual reality because it talks about the limited nature of our material world, about what we can maximally extract from matter with all its manifestations (mass, speed, and energy).

Any formula indicates a limitation, but spirituality is not limited by anything. In spirituality we attain the maximum limit that is described by the formula: “He and His name are one.”

That is to say, we connect the entire will to enjoy with the entire force of the Light together with all the corrections, and we attain such unity among them that everything unites into one whole. The result is Infinity.

This is the maximum realization in spirituality. The material formula of the theory of relativity is about the boundaries of time, motion, space, energy, mass, and speed, but in the spiritual world these boundaries do not exist! That’s because you connect to the Upper Force, the Creator, and you become infinite like Him, without any boundaries!

In spirituality there is no formula because any formula compares conditions on one side to conditions on the other side, assessing how they can be in balance on account of one another. Energy cannot be greater than mass multiplied by the speed squared. But in spirituality that is not so! By completing opposites, we attain infinity. It’s as if we take the integral sum of all the forces of the universe, from zero until infinity.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/24/10, “Body and Soul”

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Question: Where may the prayer for our unity and correction come from? How do I start asking for it?

Answer: We cry and beg for correction, but it is a pretense and falsehood. We, ourselves, don’t even realize that it is just lip service.

However, if I am working in the group and allow it to influence me, thereby exercising my only free choice, then it passes to me its enthusiasm and motivates me toward spirituality. At that point, it isn’t a lie since I am inspired by the friends. Even though I tried to connect to the group artificially, when they worked on me, I started to take it seriously.

This is how I am made: I am a particle in the collective system which has been functioning this way since the beginning of creation. That is why I cannot escape being affected by the environment, try as I might.

However, in this case, it was my wish to be influenced by the friends, and I made an effort to achieve it. If I now turn to the Creator with the desire received from the group, I will immediately receive an answer to it, a response. After all, this desire has a unique nature: the will to unite.

When I try to unite with them on my own or cry to the Creator to get this wish granted, it is a false demand. It isn’t regarded as a true prayer (MAN or Mayin Nukvin, Female Waters), but a lie. Although it is also beneficial, I will eventually see that it doesn’t work.

However, when I turn to the group, exalting it and reducing my own importance, and receive from it a new desire, a request that I further raise to the Creator, this is called MAN. As a result, there will be an answer from Above called MAD (Mayin Duchrin, Male Waters), which will truly connect me with the group, and there, inside it, I will find the Creator.

Inasmuch as I contribute myself to the group upon my own request, to that measure, the Creator will be revealed to me. However, no altruistic desire or action can come directly from me.

The group stands between me and the Creator, and we meet inside it. I raise my prayer to the Creator through the group. In response, He channels the answer to me through the group, with the help of which I may now rise to the group and find the Creator in it.

Between the Creator and me, there has to be the group. That’s why it is called the “place” and so is the Creator because there, He and I meet.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/21/10, Beit Shaar HaKavanot

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