The Kabbalistic Meal

Question: What is special about the Kabbalistic meal?

Answer: The meal is the most difficult action in Kabbalah because during it a person must feel himself as being together with the others in a common connection and loving them. He wants everyone to enjoy the good tastes that he now experiences.

There should be such a common connection between them that a person enjoys, not the taste of food, but the fact that they eat together and that this is what fills him. The main taste is not in the treats themselves but in the fact that now we are filling each other with our mutual relationship, love, connection, and unity.

It turns out that, during the meal, a person experiences great inner tension. After all, he must constantly control with what intention he is taking every bite, putting the spoon into his mouth, chewing, swallowing, as well as feeling the tastes while chewing, swallowing, and digesting the food.

Thus, he is in the process of receiving the Light into his spiritual Kli (vessel), in connection with all the others because the spiritual consumption of food is common to all and not only to each one individually.

Therefore, each one must feel that he eats the food together with everybody else as one man with the same mouth, with one tongue, one palate, and one throat. He chews with 32 teeth, which means he clarifies 32 streams of wisdom (the Light of Hochma).

When he swallows, he feels not the taste of the food but the taste of performing the action together with everyone. He transforms this material action into the reception of Light into the spiritual Partzuf for the sake of bestowal. If he does so with respect to everyone, then he can also be sure that he does it together with the Creator. Therefore, a meal is a very difficult spiritual action and requires much higher attainment than a workshop or a gathering of friends.

All in all, there are three actions performed by a Kabbalistic group that aims toward unification: a workshop, a gathering of friends, and a meal.

The goal of all of these actions is to connect the person with the rest of the group so that he ceases to feel himself as a separate element, dissolves in the group, and becomes included in everyone as a whole. Thus, he loses his egoistic individuality and receives the entire common Kli, the quality of bestowal, that all the others also have.

He exits his egoism and becomes included in the friends, feeling that there is nothing but them. As he loses himself, he enters the spiritual world, the sensation of the Creator, that is, the elevation to another nature based on bestowal and love.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 7/20/17

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Comment: In original sources it is written,“There is not a blade of grass below that does not have an angel above that strikes it and tells it, ‘Grow!’”

Answer: It is actually so. Everything that occurs in our world, materializes according to specific direction and influence of the upper world.

But we are not able to trace these influences. We cannot say which root, which force of the upper world, influences our world and what specific effect this force wants to realize. We don’t see the upper world; we don’t understand its program, its influence on us.

From the lower world, the upper world can be attained only if we will gradually come to resemble the nature of the upper world; there is no other way. Until we understand the entire, complex, system of influence on us from above downward and reveal it from below upward, we will not attain anything.

The law of root and branch points to the fact that there is a connection between the upper root and the lower branch: in each atom, in each action, on all levels of inanimate, vegetative, animal, and human matter, in thoughts, in forces—in everything.

But we do not observe this connection and cannot say which root is the cause of which effect in our world or how we can make some kind of changes in the root from the effect in order to improve the end result and its impact on us. This is actually the subject of study for Kabbalists.

The science of Kabbalah studies this interaction and offers practical advice and techniques for how to bring oneself to congruence with the upper root so as to be able to affect it and receive from it a desired response.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian, 7/9/2017

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Question: How does one react to an insolent and cynical lie to which you feel completely powerless? How do you behave in situations like this?

Answer: First of all, I try not to deal with a person from whom I have heard something false any more.

If we are in particular business relationships in our world, it is preferable to stay away from those people. Likewise, I don’t need to feel hatred or hostility toward that person or try to take revenge on him.

I deal with the Creator because He is the one who arranged this situation for me through that person. Therefore, all of my actions are directed only toward arranging a relationship with the Creator so that He will not send me “gifts” like this anymore.

Question: Why should I not continue my relationship with this person? After all, the Creator is telling me about these things through him and I work with them.

Answer: No. If this is done through a person like this, then it means that according to his nature, according to his role in the world, that is what he is like.

Question: Does this mean that it is not a Mitzva (commandment) to suffer?

Answer: You should not suffer! You should immediately try to clarify how the Creator is relating to you at every moment and attribute everything to Him only.

Question: So, does that mean that in our world we should act as is customary, according to the laws of our world? If someone lies to me and this is harmful to my business, for example, should I go to a lawyer, file a complaint in court, etc.?

Answer: Certainly. On the inner level, you understand that this is the Creator and that is where you work. But in the outside world you act according to what is customary here. What this means is that on the level of our world you are also trying to correct these mutual relationships. So, you go to a lawyer.

Question: By taking someone to court who insolently lied to me and caused me harm, am I correcting him?

Answer: In one of Baal HaSulam’s letter it is said that the Creator provided all the laws for our world so that with their help we would approach the higher characteristics. And what we cannot correct internally, we perfect in our world through external actions like these.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 5/1/16

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Question: What should be done if someone in the group deliberately works against unity?

Answer: Within each person, there is an egoistic force that repels him from others, tricks him, and lowers the importance of connection.

We can say as much as we like: ”Yes, I must, I have to, I will do something,” but in reality do nothing. After all, I can’t force myself to open up to friends and begin to connect with them.

This means that we should try to create such alternative states so that the friends would obligate me to take action.

Thus, we should not only understand those people who have strong intolerance for the group, but also to a fight against egoism. Uniting with the group is the main problem. Here, egoism stands firmly on its positions.

Some people have a different problem. They can easily connect externally. It is easy for them to hug and sing. But they cannot overcome an inner barrier. Moreover, they don’t even feel that this barrier exists in them.

So, at every stage everyone has their own obstacles. What can you do? Try to deceive yourself.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 10/30/16

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Torah, Deuteronomy 32:02: My lesson will drip like rain; my word will flow like dew; like storm winds on vegetation and like raindrops on grass.

The rain pours from above downward and the dew rises from below upward; in other words, the Direct Light (Ohr Yashar) and the Reflected Light (Ohr Hozer) act so that heaven and earth (the quality of reception and the quality of bestowal) unite and bear fruit.

Fruits are the next stage; the vegetative level begins to manifest after the inanimate matter.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 1/30/17

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Torah, Deuteronomy 32:05 – 32:06: Destruction is not His; it is His children’s defect you crooked and twisted generation. Is this how you repay the Lord, you disgraceful, unwise people?! Is He not your Father, your Master? He has made you and established you

Question: Why are there suddenly accusations against the people of Israel?

Answer: The Creator is perfect. And you, look at yourself. Look what you are doing under the influence of your egoism: to what extent you cannot correct it, how much it seems to you that everything that the Creator does is bad. Absolute disbelief and evil comes from you. You fall into your egoism and cannot justify the Creator, you cannot exalt Him, the quality of bestowal and love.

However, on the other hand, who created all this in a person? The same Creator! So why does He begin to demand everything from a person? This is in order for a person to realize that on one hand this is done by the Creator and now he must correct all of it. After all, only through the correction of evil will he reach the level of the Creator and understand why He did this.

Comment: But on the other hand, it is written that they are His sons and He is their Father and Master.

Answer: Aren’t we doing the same with our children when we want them to achieve something good? Don’t we place all kinds of tasks before them, give them exercises, and so on? A correct education places serious demands on children.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 1/30/17

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Question: How do we determine our place in the system of the universe and find our path to the Creator based on the knowledge that we receive in the Kabbalah classes?

Answer: When we study the material from the side, the systems or the worlds seem to align into a single picture. The system can be clearly seen. But where am I in this system? For that, I have to reveal it, see it, feel it, exist in it, and direct it in the full meaning of that word.

In order to reveal it, a person has to rise above his egoistic nature because the entire system is based on altruistic forces and principles. Therefore, an egoist cannot reveal, see, attain, direct, or exist in it. And this is the real system of the worlds.

In essence, it is unlike our world. This world is an illusory one that we perceive in our egoistic senses or qualities. That is just what it is called: Olam HaMedume or the imaginary world.

And the real world is the world in which the upper force, the kind force called the Creator, exists in the open. It is in that very same world that we have to realize ourselves and our freewill, our ability to rule the upper world.

Question: Will every person be able to find their place there?

Answer: Absolutely everyone! It is because the upper world exists that a person must find himself there, determine his place, his point, his root, and delve into it and realize himself fully.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 6/25/17

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Torah, Deuteronomy 32:01: Listen, O heavens, and I will speak! And let the earth hear the words of my mouth!

Moses brought the sons of Israel to the state in which two opposite parts, Bina and Malchut, two qualities within each of us and in the creation in general, merge together. The voice coming from Bina can reach Malchut, that is, from heaven to earth, and the voice of the people can rise from the earth (Malchut) to heaven (Bina).

The connection between Bina and Malchut is the most important thing that we have. From Bina we receive the quality of correction, the quality of bestowal that is added to the quality of Malchut (reception), and we perform reception for the sake of bestowal.

From this moment on, the people of Israel are already ready to cross the Jordan and enter the land of Israel. The land of Israel is those desires that need to be corrected to reception for the sake of bestowal. Moses prepares the people for this.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 1/30/17

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Gathering of Friends

Question: Sports training is conducted under the guidance of a coach on the football field or in the gym, the study consists of reading textbooks, listening to the lectures and making notes. What is the basis of the workshop in Kabbalah, is it based on people’s conversation with each other?

Answer: The workshop is built on a conversation between people, but it is conducted on the basis of special texts written by Kabbalists. Each time, a new selection of excerpts is chosen according to a particular topic on which the basis of a workshop is built.

The workshop is not a simple discussion because it is not very important what people say. The guide can even ask them to talk together at the same time. What matters is not what they say, but what happens to their heart, to what extent it wants to join the group in order to bestow to it, connect others, and reveal the Creator. That is, it is not the words that are important, but the inner aspiration of a person toward the ten.

There is a special kind of a workshop that is called the gathering of friends. It involves not only ten, but a large number of people, as if many tens are connected together. Let’s say that there are eight billion people in the world, which is eight hundred million tens. This is also kind of a workshop, but more like a meeting.

The gathering of friends is a more general action that obeys the same laws as the workshop. At a gathering of friends, we do not engage in clarifications, but speak about positive things, such as our progress and achievements, the greatness of the friends, the teacher, and the Creator, the greatness of our goal, and our ascent.

The gathering of friends is always conducted in the “right line,” that is, without any criticism in order to raise the spirit in the group. Usually the gathering of friends are held in a large group with many people and all the tens are connected together into one circle; they sit together and feel as one ten.

Question: What is the purpose of such a gathering?

Answer: According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, there is no more than HaVaYaH, that is, ten qualities. Therefore, any number of people in relation to the general assembly will always be like ten.

Question: What is the most important condition of a successful gathering?

Answer: The gathering will be successful if all of us want to feel ourselves connected. However, at such gatherings we do not discuss our deficiencies or any topic that can separate us or cause a rift between us. Everything is aimed at strengthening the greatness of the Creator and the group.

If we leave such a gathering filled with the sense of the greatness of the group, the wisdom of Kabbalah, the teacher, and the Creator and feel ourselves the happiest, it means that it was successful. This is not a psychotherapy, we really are telling the truth without being insincere.

We simply help each other to rise to the height of the group by this platform that the group creates for us, as if on an elevator. No matter at what level a person is, the group lifts him. The gathering of friends is an elevator, which upon entering, one can rise to the “second floor,” “third floor,” and even to the roof.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 7/20/17

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Question: To reveal the Creator’s absolute control, is that true freedom?

Answer: Yes. But when it is revealed, the individual receives it as his own corrected state. That is why it is experienced not as the Creator’s control, but as your own voluntary, freewill.

Question: True freedom is my right to determine what I will desire in the next moment?

Answer: Yes. But this is possible only if you rise above your egoism, if you have a connection with the upper light, and if through this connection you are able to clearly ascertain what you will actually be engaged in, what you will desire in the next moment.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian, 7/2/17

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