Question: Why did you leave us before the convention and go on vacation for three days?

Answer:  1. Because I have lost my voice, and I’m unable to speak.

2.  Because I felt that this was necessary, and you do not argue with the Teacher, but accept what he says as the truth.

3. Because everywhere before an exam, a student is given time for his own homework and preparation.

4. Because the entire success depends not on me, but only on you, your preparation and solidarity.
[111830]

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The topic of the first lesson of the convention in St. Petersburg is “There is None Else Besides Him.” This is the main topic that we always study.

In principle, we are in a special reality called the “Creator” and have to reveal Him. The “Creator” (Boreh) means to “come and see” (Bo-reh in Hebrew). If we already dwell in Him, in the upper white Light, then only He acts and there is none else besides Him. Only He “outlines,” forms us; He is the first and He is the last. All our thoughts and deeds stem from the actions of this upper Light. Nothing exists but Him.

We observe still, vegetative, and animate forms in which the Creator acts wholly, obliging them to make any movement. They have no freedom of will at all; they are entirely under His direct influence.

On the other hand, we ourselves have a certain point, created by Him, existing seemingly outside of Him. This point gives us the opportunity to know the Creator—the only one who affects us. In fact, in this way we do not go somewhere outside, do not become distant from Him, and do not violate any of His actions. The reality remains the same: There is no one else besides the Creator. However, due to this point that seems to be abstracted from Him, I can analyze myself and Him, I can deliberately and consciously lead myself to the only existing state in which there is none else besides Him.

I attain the Creator due to this work. I attribute every fragment of reality to His oneness, and thus I attain all His deeds, all the steps, direct and opposite Him, that He undertakes. So, returning to the state of unity and oneness of the Creator, I stand in all the power that He has given me and realize that really there is none else besides Him.

Thus, I bring Him pleasure, and this is the greatest pleasure that I can bring Him, and this means myself. After all, there is none else besides Him.

So now we need, against our desire, to reasonably and deliberately become included in the concept: “There is none else besides Him.”
[111373]
From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/3/13, Preparation the St. Petersburg Convention, Lesson 1

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Question: What does it mean to use the teacher in order to connect with the upper level?

Answer: To use the teacher means to follow the teacher’s recommendations and commandments. The teacher recommends that the student should work on his connection with the friends and engage in the dissemination of this method, of integral education—this includes working on preparing the material and disseminating it—and a person’s incorporation in the group. But he should do all that thinking that by this he brings his teacher contentment.

It’s a very simple system. There is my group of ten and we have to be impressed by one another in order to connect together to a higher level, which is called a teacher, Rav (Rav stands for one who is greater, which means an upper level). We want to overcome and to fulfill the gap between our level and his, which means to ascend.

But how can I ascend if I am repulsed by the upper level? I have to see it as grace, as extremely attractive, and so I have to be impressed by the friends as for the greatness of the upper level. If I can imagine by myself that this level is great and that it contains everything that is good, then I probably don’t think about it correctly, but quite the opposite.

This is called using the teacher’s body, which provides external help which you are sure is his desire. The teacher says what and how we should do it: how to study, how to connect, how to disseminate the method, and according to which criteria we should exist.

Question: How can we check that we are already in contact with the teacher?

Answer: You can only check this when you have the recognition on the level of the teacher.
[109270]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/05/13,  Writings of  Baal HaSulam, “A Speech for the Completion of The  Zohar”

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Baal HaSulam, “A Speech for the Completion of The Zohar”: Our sages said, “Make for yourself a rav and buy yourself a friend.” This means that one can make a new environment for oneself. This environment will help him obtain the greatness of his rav through love of friends who appreciate the rav. Through the friends’ discussing the greatness of the rav, each of them receives the sensation of his greatness. Thus, bestowal upon one’s rav will become reception and sufficient motivation to an extent that will bring one to engage in Torah and Mitzvot Lishma.

They said that, “The Torah is acquired by forty-eight virtues, by serving friends and by meticulousness of sages.” This is so because besides serving the rav, one needs the meticulousness of friends, as well as the friends’ influence, meaning that they will affect him by elevating the greatness of his rav. This is so because obtaining the greatness depends entirely on the environment, and a single person cannot do a thing about it whatsoever.

Without the pressure of the group, without feeling that the environment highly values the spiritual mentor, a person cannot esteem him. Egoism does not allow him to do so. It’s clear that here we need the help of society; only it can oblige us to have the correct attitude towards the teacher, through which we will get help from Above.

A teacher is a higher degree, and the group must instill the importance of this higher degree in a person. The difference between the material and spiritual world is that it is enough for the student to follow the teacher’s instructions, performing some material work together with him, and this will already connect him to the teacher even though he has not attained the same spiritual properties. Simple help is sufficient to make a connection with the higher degree and to begin to receive the Light that Reforms.

However, all of this is possible only under the condition that the person venerates the teacher. And this is at odds with human nature, and that is why this can be achieved only due to the influence of the environment. The more the environment venerates the teacher, the easier it is for the person to bow his head before him and thus get help from above according to the order of spiritual degrees.

The ten Sefirot of the person’s spiritual vessel are his friends, and the upper source from which they get the Light, is the Teacher. Thus, the person ascends the rungs of the ladder.

Being in this imaginary world gives us a unique opportunity, through the use of our egoistic desire, to come into contact with the upper spiritual degree and also to build our spiritual union by means of the material connection with friends. Otherwise, there would be no chance to connect to the desire of bestowal from the depth of our egoism.

It’s this material, imaginary form that allows us to use our egoistic desire to rise to spiritual degrees with the help of physical actions. So it happens up to the very top of the spiritual ladder: the same attitude towards the group and the teacher remains. The higher a person ascends, the higher or lower he feels himself, depending on his state. He appreciates the group more and loves the friends or vice versa, hates them more. Also, the teacher seems to him more insignificant, or more exalted.

This connection is never lost. It’s not important in what worlds the friends and teacher exist, in this world or if part of them have already entered the other world, that is, have lost their material form. In general, their connection with each other is forever preserved in the structure of the soul as if they belong to the same spiritual organ.
[109185]
From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/5/13

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We receive all the spiritual information from Above through a chain of Kabbalists’ souls. The order of these levels does not change. It begins from Adam HaRishon (the First Man), who was the first to discover the upper force. This chain begins from him and descends from the top down like a cone until all of humanity joins it and reveals the Creator.

This is the way the upper Light, the upper wisdom, the Light that Reforms, the raising of prayer, MAN, and the response for them, MAD, come from. Everything is transmitted and descends only through this chain since we are connected to one system.

So, we must cleave to the spiritual legacy that the great Kabbalists have left us and to respect them as we respect the Creator—to the same extent and even more. Most important is to reach adhesion with the writers and the books (the writers are the sources of the Light of Hochma, and the books are the means of communication that they have left us).

If a person tries to develop in himself a sensation of the importance and the value of these sources then, naturally, he will become attracted to them and will get closer to them. He will begin to respect these great Kabbalists and will connect to their writings and, with their help he will reach adhesion with the Creator.
[106176]
From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/28/13, Shamati #25

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Question: In one of the lessons, you said that a student, according to his spiritual progress, starts to disregard the teacher more and more. You also gave an example of your relationship with your teacher. To what spiritual level do we have to rise so that this disregard for the teacher will disappear?

Answer: As in our world, when do we begin to appreciate our parents and understand them?  When we become parents ourselves! But this does not justify disregard. One who wants to grow up must understand his nature and grow in spite of it.
[102941]

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In every spiritual state on the spiritual levels, there is the Inner Light and the Surrounding Light. But in our state, as long as we do not attain restriction and a Masach (screen), we can be assisted only by the Surrounding Light.

The force of the Surrounding Light depends on how much we value it, on our appreciation of the upper, of the next level, which means the Creator. But we cannot value Him. We were only given a couple of means by which we can develop an inner feeling of the greatness of the upper. The upper for us is the group, the teacher, and the books, meaning the study that tells us about the spiritual world and the Creator hidden behind all these means.

We begin to value the upper who is external to us by using all these means: the group, the teacher, the books, and the intention of attaining equivalence of form with the Creator in order to bring Him contentment. Although we don’t feel it for the time being, even if we just talk about it trying to feel it from time to time, we raise the greatness of the upper in us by that. Then at a certain point He becomes so important that He allows us to feel His presence next to us.

It’s because everything that is external to a person is the Holy Shechina, the Godly presence. But everything depends on how much we value Him. All the other rules of behavior in the group as to how we should speak, what to demand of it, and how to treat it, stem from this condition, from the need to value the upper.

Accordingly, the Surrounding Light shines upon a person. It is the real upper Light, but in the meantime it operates on the lower as the Light that Reforms, which means that it brings about changes in us by gradually bringing us closer to bestowal. Then finally it will give us the “restriction” and the Masach, which means the ability to work spiritually.

Then we will begin to understand where we are and what is happening to us, but at the same time, we have to work in faith above reason and value the upper despite all the problems the upper sends us and all the reasons for an opposite attitude. This is our work that is based on our great appreciation of the upper until we adhere to the posterior of the upper as if it were His face. Then we will see that it was never His posterior, but that He has always turned His face full of light to us. Thus we leave exile and reach redemption.

At first it was as if you were unconscious, but then you begin to feel that you are in exile, so, step by step, you begin to get closer to redemption and finally you leave exile and come into the Light. These are the levels of ascent according to your appreciation of the upper, and later your adhesion to Him.

We have all the means, all the roads are open, and everything depends on us. There is nothing else that we need. The Creator has given us every possible opportunity and everything else is up to the person. We will not be forgiven and there are no concessions from Above if we don’t do our work, since otherwise we will not build our spiritual vessels.
[102235]
From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/8/13

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The problem is that we need an inner connection between the friends and the teacher so that the external forms of the interruptions that are purposefully sent to us will not weaken, but rather, will strengthen this connection. It is indeed very difficult, since our ego depicts everything in an ugly external way and forces us to blame one another.

We cannot rise above the obstacles and external conditions that the Creator places us in so that we would overcome them by ourselves. The external corporeal picture strongly influences us and we cannot leap over it and rise in different states of conflicts, disrespect, feeling distant from others or when it comes to different corporeal accounts.

All this draws a person further from the goal, and it doesn’t just repulse him, but also causes him such harm that he will need to work for a long time in order to repair his past mistakes.

Baal HaSulam tells us in his letter that as long as a student yearns to get closer to his teacher and climbs the hill, the desire burns in him. But the moment he gets physically close to the teacher, his yearning diminishes gradually, until it is totally lost. Therefore, it is much easier to be distant than to be near. We all know that important people try to keep the crowds distant in order to increase the people’s interest in them.

A person creates a kind of image of a friend, the teacher, and the Creator, and doesn’t want to know the truth. He feels good living in the fantasy that he has created for himself and it is hard for him to get away from it, to erase it, in order to accept something new. If this picture is closer to the real picture, then, on the whole, it is less pleasant and more obligating.

So a person who sometimes hears the voice of the Creator and receives an invitation to stroll in His garden for a while, eventually doesn’t attain anything. It is because he doesn’t try to rise above his nature, above the inclination to reject his friends and his teacher and to imagine them as he sees fit instead of seeing the real picture so that the physical closeness or distance will not make a difference and also so that the spiritual closeness or distance will not lead to any changes in his relations with the friends, the teacher, and the Creator.

We have to try to rise as much as we can above our corporeal attributes and to be more objective. This means to judge above reason and to enter the collective vessel, outside one’s self.
[102132]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/3/13, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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