Entries in the 'Spiritual Work' Category

Why Are So Many Worlds Needed?

630.2Question: Why are so many worlds needed?

Answer: The spiritual worlds are needed in order to rise to the level of the Creator. The fact is that the light of the Creator began to influence the desire that He created, and this desire developed continuously under its influence until it reached the 125th degree called our world. At that point, the general desire shattered and broke.

Now, by gradually gathering and reassembling it, we must ascend from our world back through 125 degrees to the level of the Creator.

Question: In our corporeal world, everything is divided into many small objects, like a honeycomb. We see the world divided into inanimate, vegetative, animate, and human nature. But in spirituality, all phenomena take place within one body. How should we understand this?

Answer: In spirituality, everything takes place within a single common desire. There, many opposite inclinations, directions, and qualities are united by one common screen. I collect all the pluses and minuses as if into one bag, tie it up, and want to use it to bring contentment to the Creator. As a result, in bringing contentment to Him, I receive contentment for myself.
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From Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 2/25/18

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What Is Faith?

962.3Question: Why do you constantly speak about faith when Kabbalah is a science and attainment, and faith is a philosophical, religious concept?

Answer: Faith is the property of bestowal. In our world, this quality does not exist, because even if I give something, I do it with the aim of subsequent receiving. I cannot give simply for the sake of giving.

The property of the spiritual world, however, is the quality of bestowal. It is called faith. Do not confuse it with what we understand by faith in our world.

In our world, a believing person closes his eyes and does something completely thoughtlessly. This is a completely unrealistic, illogical, and baseless action.

In Kabbalah, faith is the force of bestowal that we receive from the upper light.
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From Kabbalah Lesson in Russian, 5/15/16

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When Words and Gestures Become Unnecessary

942Question: You said that inspiration and transmission of information should be brief, clear, and to the point, not rambling statements that go on for five to ten minutes where one person speaks and everyone else is silent as if forcing themselves: “Yes, we must listen.” What should a truly inspiring speech be like?

Answer: That is a big problem, because our guys start quoting excerpts, using official jargon, and bringing in all sorts of explanations. Here, you just need to express your inner expression as simply as possible, from heart to heart, to convey the maximum feeling with the minimum number of words, and that is all.

Therefore, I am in favor of everything being very brief, without unnecessary intellectualization. A person should prepare in advance so that it would burst out from their heart, as they say, “without thinking.” But this is not easy; it comes gradually.

In addition, the listeners themselves are not yet attuned to understanding. We don’t yet communicate with each other internally, through feelings. Just as a mother feels her baby without words, and the baby feels the mother through subconscious sensations, so too should we feel one another. Much more so!

Then our external communication, words, gestures, facial expressions will become superfluous. Over time, all this will cease, and you will be able to transmit your sensations to others and receive them completely outside of physical contact, even if the person is no longer in our world but on some other levels.

That is, you no longer associate him with his body. Whether he is somewhere, a couple of thousand kilometers away from you in his body, or outside the body, in another dimension, what is the difference?
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From KabTV’s “I Got A Call. Transfer of information” 1/23/11

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The Path of Light Instead of the Path of Suffering

254.01Question: If everything in the world depends on people engaged in spiritual development, does it mean we are responsible for all the suffering in the world?

Answer: We do not cause suffering in the world; on the contrary, by attracting the light, we move suffering from the material level to the level of spiritual suffering. Meaning, instead of suffering from wars, diseases, and all other problems, we suffer from a lack of spirituality. This is what the science of Kabbalah gives a person.

It brings him “suffering,” but it cannot even be called that; it is the suffering of love, as if I were invited to a meal in a couple of hours, so I do not eat right now to keep my appetite strong. This is called the suffering of love; it is when I realize that I should prepare spiritual Kelim.

And even now, in the empty Kelim, I feel the glow of the upcoming meeting with the people I love, and from the meal. This is what humanity needs to be brought to, to show them that there is a solution and to develop not as a result of the blows of nature.

Now we are entering a period of ecological problems that can cause the suffering and death of thousands of people. We see natural disasters occurring all over the world, in China, Europe, Russia, and America.

The only way to escape it is to transition to preparing spiritual Kelim, not in an earthly form, not waiting decades for suffering to pass until we finally realize that there is a reason and a goal and two paths to the goal: the path of light and the path of suffering.

Why should we suffer in vain? Let us draw the light now that will show us the difference between its state and ours, so we would suffer from the fact that we want a better state, rather than from feeling bad now.
This is what the science of Kabbalah offers man—the path of light instead of the path of suffering.
[20487]
From Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/1/10, Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to the Book Panim Meirot uMasbirot“

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Go Above Reason

232.09I have nothing besides my desire, so how can I give it up? All my life, I have been following my rational logic; should I suddenly go against it, as if I have lost my mind and reason?

The science of Kabbalah does not call for working without mind or reason, but teaches us to rise above them. Knowledge and reason remain, we do not cross them out, but always rise above them and do the opposite.

Therefore, one who goes above knowledge stimulates his knowledge to grow ever more. The more his mind and knowledge grow, the higher a person rises to act above them, and therefore one becomes more and more intelligent in the material world, and further advances in the spiritual.

This is how he grows all the time, within knowledge and then above knowledge, and again within knowledge and above knowledge…

Therefore, we never annul our knowledge or go below it, as happens in religions, but always go by faith above reason. Faith gained above reason becomes knowledge, and again we must go above it. This is how we ascend the spiritual degrees.
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From Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/22/20, “Work with Faith Above Reason”

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See Your World in Your Life!

737.01If we place our “seed” into a good environment, it develops; but if we place even the very best seed into “bad soil” (environment), it will wither. Everything depends solely on the environment. That is, we need people around us who reveal the evil of egoism within themselves and want to correct it.

I must place myself in such an environment and strive to absorb everything possible from it to the maximum extent: moisture, minerals, warmth, everything that the soil can give to the seed.

For, as Baal HaSulam writes in the article “Freedom of Will,” at the hour of death a person will not be able to take anything from this world with him except the attained quality of bestowal, which can be acquired only in this world, and through which one feels oneself living in the upper world. It is said: “See your world in your life.”

And if nothing has been attained, then one remains only like a seed, which will later be placed again into the earth and given a new chance.
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From Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/18/10, Baal HaSulam, “The Freedom”

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The Spiritual World, The Material World

942There are two opposite worlds in the creation: the material world, created by the desire to receive, and the spiritual world, created by the desire to bestow. The desire to receive pleasure is a central quality of the material world. Our world is given to us in the sensations of the five senses, consisting of this desire, and the human mind helps us to interchange it.

There is also another state that we can create while being in this lowest of the worlds by beginning to change its nature, its matter from the quality of reception to the quality of bestowal. And then we will see matter in a completely different form, a different appearance, a different plane, matter that works outside of itself, for bestowal.

There is no such quality in our world, because everything that I feel here, I feel because it enters my sensory organs. And the spiritual world is arranged inversely, in a state where I exit myself and feel everything outside of myself.

But it is not clear to us how it is possible to feel something outside of yourself. If I see something, it exists in the space that my sensory organ attains, includes, and feels. But how can I feel what it does not feel? In other words, a person has a threshold of limitations in attaining the world in his sensory organs.

And the spiritual world is attained and takes shape in our feelings that work according to the principle of “outside of ourselves.” For this, a new sensory organ is created that senses the other: I feel what is in him, what he feels. This can be done only when a person acquires the quality of love.

In our world, love is self–gratification from food, sex, family, children, no matter what. We love these sources of pleasure because they evoke a special arousal in us that we feel as something pleasant.

But true love implies loving not myself and in myself, but an object outside of me. And then it turns out that I can feel what he feels. If I acquire the ability to feel something outside of myself, then this is called acquiring a spiritual quality, the quality of bestowal, true love, when I can love what another loves and not what I like. This is the difference between one world and another.

It is difficult to speak about this because it constantly eludes beginners. But gradually, by overcoming all kinds of obstacles and difficulties and by carrying out our exercises, we can reach a state in which we truly begin to feel what the other person loves or does not love without any regard for ourselves at all!

But how can this be done without regard for myself? And here the science of Kabbalah says that it is necessary to make some corrections, additions, and preparation. This means that I make a restriction on myself, what is called Tzimtzum, and do not include in my feelings, in the heart, mind, and thoughts, anything that is in me.

I rise above myself and become absolutely neutral, as if I personally do not exist, and only someone else exists. I enter into him and feel him in himself the way he feels himself. It is exactly here that I have the opportunity to rise to the level of a spiritual sensor, a spiritual vessel (Kli).

This is achieved through training, which is very simple: I sit together with my friends, and engage in each trying to annul himself before the others, to get out of himself and try to enter into them.

This is a special practice that is carried out with the help of a force called the upper light. If we strive to connect with one another above our egoism, then a special upper light truly descends upon us, an altruistic force that allows us to exit ourselves. And then we create, outside of ourselves, a common field in which we exist as one unified whole.

This practice is called a workshop. With the help of such workshops, we draw the surrounding light (Ohr Makif) upon ourselves, which lifts us above our nature and gives us the opportunity to integrate into each other. It is then that we begin, through others, to feel the upper world, a new space, the quality of bestowal and love, the quality of being outside of oneself, above oneself.
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From Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 2/21/16

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Proper Prayer

947A proper prayer must consist of two parts:

1. Gratitude—praising the Creator for bringing us into the group, uniting us, forming us into a single whole, for responding to our intermediate silly and not-silly requests and whims. Otherwise, to whom are we addressing ourselves?

2. An urgent request for one another, not for oneself. After all, if we all unite correctly, then this request for one another no longer even makes sense, because it immediately turns into a request for the Creator, i.e., we desire to turn to Him.

A mandatory condition must be the understanding that only the Creator can answer our request. He is the only One who exists, the only One who responds and acts in the entire system of creation.

Moreover, we must suffer from the fact that we have a great desire, yet we have not yet received an answer to it. And later, when I receive an answer to my request, I feel joy, delight, and fulfillment. The difference between the magnitude of suffering during the prayer (not animal suffering, not for oneself, but for the benefit of the created beings and the Creator) and my delight upon receiving the answer constitutes the amount and quality of the joy that fills me, that is, the group.

Therefore, the more effort we invest in properly shaping the desire for the light, the closer we will come to it and the faster we will pass the path of forming the correct desire to which the light will respond by entering it. Thus, we will be granted the revelation of the Creator.

And it does not matter how beautifully this desire is formulated or whether it is clothed in lofty words. Only one thing matters—the sincerity of the heart in the request for the friends, for the group, for the world, for the Creator. Then my desire will truly become a desire to bestow, to which the light will instantly respond according to the law of equivalence of form.
[187817]
From the International Kabbalah Congress, Moscow, 5/2/16, Lesson 3

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Please Put It down to the Creator

598We are all puppets, deprived of free choice. People circulate in this world, in material, “animal” life.

Meanwhile, their egoistic desire grows until it reaches special states of despair that are directed toward the revelation of the embryo of the soul, the point in the heart.

And perhaps not a point in the heart, simply suffering sends a person into search, and then he joins those in whom the soul has already “broken through.”

Within the common cauldron, desire continues to simmer, and at a certain stage a part of humanity acquires the possibility of free choice. This means that people act, so to speak, independently of the Creator. They are freed from their egoistic desire, and it is entirely and completely in His hands.

I acquire freedom from my egoism and become independent of it, that is, independent of the Creator who governs it. Together with others, we turn into independent acting beings; we want to understand and realize what is happening ourselves and to take part in the process ourselves.

I do not want the Creator to govern me—I want to act exactly as He does, but of my own freewill. Through this, I come to know His work, His actions, His goals. My “profit” lies in the fact that I become similar to Him, become a human (Adam), and perform exactly the same work that He performed over me.

In the end, all the benefit here is that I give pleasure to the Creator. There is nothing else besides this.
But there are also people who do not possess a soul of this type. Their souls can only join the development to one degree or another. As they become what is called “dust under the feet of the righteous,” they receive illumination and spiritualization through this, they understand the importance of the process, and they also acquire their soul.

Likewise, in our world there are leaders, “those who lead,” and “those who are led,” those who simply live their lives without questioning them. They constitute 99.9% of the population who earn their bread and do not feel a lack of anything more. However, in unity with everyone, each will reach his or her root in the common Malchut.

Through interconnection we all feel ourselves living in one world. Of course, great scientists, philosophers, and thinkers understand it far better than a street sweeper or a market trader who knows only how to sell watermelons and watch football on television. There is no need at all to despise him, he is not guilty of anything; it is simply that his desire has such a structure and acts in such a way. Another person, however, needs to attain the world from the height of Malchut of infinity, otherwise he feels unrealized.

All the difference between them lies in the desire that the Creator created and awakens to life. Everything comes from the Creator. And therefore the thinker must understand that in his realization he is in no way higher than the trader. For the circumstances do not depend on him at all. Thus it turns out that in this sense they are completely equal, because all their accounts are signed by the Creator.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson, 4/28/11, Baal HaSulam, “The Acting Mind”

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Can’t You See Infinity? Put on Your Glasses!

294.1Our world is a copy of infinity, only at the smallest level of sensation. We perceive and feel reality only to an insignificant degree; we are as far as possible from complete perception.

It is like a person with poor eyesight who sees almost nothing without glasses. He barely distinguishes those around him, even though they stand right next to him.

Drowsy, blurred sensations, a tiny fraction of clear awareness of infinity—this is what our world is. Yet we always reveal a complete picture, just as each fragment of a hologram contains the entire image.

Even at the lowest degree, I observe the full spectrum of reality to the extent that I can see it without “glasses.” The better these glasses are, the clearer the picture becomes.

We exist in an unchanging state; we simply feel it according to the clarity of our perception. The clearest, most unclouded perception is the world of infinity.

To approach it, we must first correct our tools of perception (Kelim), to reveal a bit more light within them. And in order for that to happen, they must become similar to the light.

The advice of Kabbalists helps us in this correction, and when the light is revealed, we discover a “treasure” or rather, a deposit, a new layer of reality that was originally “placed” into our account.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson, 10/2/09, Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to the Book From the Mouth of a Sage“

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