Talmud Eser Sefirot, Part 1, “Histaklut Pnimit,” Item 7: … They said that there is a great flaw in free gifts, namely the shame that encounters every receiver of a free gift. To mend this, the Creator has prepared this world, where there is work and labor, so as to be rewarded in the next world for their labor and work.

Usually the religious stop with this saying and do not advance further. They claim that in this world one needs to work in order to receive the reward in the next world, meaning, after death. As if we work today and tomorrow receive the reward.

But that excuse is very strange. It is like a person who says to his friend, “Work with me for just a minute, and in return I will give you every pleasure and treasure in the world for the rest of your life. There is indeed no greater free gift than that, because the reward is incomparable with the work. The work is in this transient, worthless world compared to the reward and the pleasure in the eternal world.

What value is there to the passing world compared to the eternal world? It is even more so with regards to the quality of the labor, which is worthless compared to the quality of the reward.

Our sages have said: “The Creator is destined to inherit each and every righteous person 310 worlds etc.” We cannot say that some of the reward is given in return for their work, and the rest is a free gift, for then what good would that do? The blemish of shame would still remain! Indeed, their words are not to be taken literally, for there is a profound meaning in their words.

Shame is a creation by itself. It is a feeling in the souls of the difference between them and the Creator, a feeling of disconnection from Him that was created by the Creator Himself. Therefore, as much as man rises higher in the level of the degrees, the feeling of shame grows in him and becomes more refined and clarified. Therefore, it is said that shame is intended only for higher souls.

If I feel disconnected from the Creator, then the feeling of the “I” is awakened, the feeling of a separated existence. I understand that I must annul this separation, close it, do something with it. And therefore I work. This feeling of the gap between me and the Creator, between the guest and the host, the feeling shame, forced me to work. To the degree I feel this shame, I am willing to work until I remove the separation between us and I reach an equivalence of form with the Creator, meaning adhesion.

It is clear that it does not talk about the 70 years of man’s life in this world and in the next world after this life. When I work for myself, it is called Olam Haze (this world) and I must work in it and correct myself. When sometimes I succeed in correcting myself compared to each amount of shame, the difference that I reveal between me and the Creator, by that I perform my work in this world, and as a result I reach equivalence of form and adhesion, which is called reward in the next world.

Therefore, in my life in this world I must feel this world and also the next world. The difference between them is that state in which a person feels shame and works in order to remove it, to correct his lack of equivalence with the landlord, called this world. This is the world and these are the efforts in this world. And the attainment of equivalence and adhesion is called the next world. According to this principle, the two worlds are separated.
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“Midrash Rabba,” Parshat Balak: In the answer that Balak received from the sages of Midian they said, “This snake, Moses, suckled from our breast. A Midianite invited him into his home, gave his daughter to him for a wife and provided him with money. And after leaving the house of his father-in-law, Moses destroyed the Egyptian people. Do you want to know where the power of Moses and his disciples is? It is in their mouths. When they cry out to God, He fulfills all of their requests. Therefore defeat the Jews with their weapon, we advise you to call to Balaam, whose power of speech is not less than that of Moses.”

In the Torah it is said that there was no prophet among the Jews who attained a level higher than Moses, and among the nations of the world, more than Balaam.

Between them, meaning between the positive and negative forces, there must be a balance. Otherwise, if you don’t begin to balance between one and the other, you cannot develop.

When you ascend the ladder of spiritual worlds, you constantly move from level to level, and in each of them the powers of right and left must be equal.

Question: Are you saying that the management of Israel must necessarily be compatible with the management of the nations of the world?

Answer: I am not talking about history and I don’t want to stand one physical or spiritual war against another or the management of one or the other because in the physical world, everyone is an egoist.

A person who ascends the spiritual levels walks on “two legs,” the right and left lines; his heart and mind rise higher and higher in the correct integration between them. This is because the system of higher management, the revelation and creation system of the Creator, consists of two opposing forces.

You will not discover, recognize, see, understand, or describe the Creator in any other way! You need to portray Him in front of you on your screen.

On our internal screen, we now apparently see the world that surrounds us. Actually we are looking inside of ourselves and the illusion appears to us as if we are seeing something in front of us. But in fact, the two opposing forces must draw the same image, the same system of management on our screen, the same thought of creation that is called the Creator.

All this is found in each one of us. And what is outside of us? We don’t know and don’t understand this.

That is, in normal spiritual advancement my left leg is Balaam, Balak, and the rest of the negative forces, and my right leg is the people of Israel, Moses, etc. And they are all opposed to each other and equal on every level. Precisely between them, when you completely lose the difference between the two systems, you can ascend.

The ascent is only made upward, according to whatever criterion is called “upward.” When there is no preference for one force or another, right and left must be equal! So what is the force? It is an invisible component called the middle third of Tifferet. That is where everything is concealed. It is above you!

When you reach the right opposition between the two systems, the two opposing forces, darkness and Light, then you begin to understand the thought of creation of the Creator, that which existed before the creation of the world is found above this. In other words, you need to rise to that point from which these two systems of forces were created, the thought of creation.

There are also two parts in the thought of creation even though the system is much greater. One part is the program that descends downward, creating the two systems of forces and the spiritual worlds. First there is the system of management, after that our world, and then on the level of our world, nature: the still, vegetative, animate, and human.

The second part is the higher thought of creation that is found above the program and system of management, through which everything is realized in our world.

And beyond this, everything is concealed. In the meantime we have no possibility of discovering what is found above the thought of creation. We feel something, but cannot perceive it. We have not yet developed the appropriate Kelim for this.

So the Kabbalists say that everything is hidden, absolutely obscure there. These states are called GAR de Atzilut. GAR is the upper three Sefirot of the world of Atzilut, where the entire connection with our world is concealed.

There are completely different characteristics there that we cannot attain until after the complete end of correction, in the unification of all the systems, where there is no difference between the right and left lines, between good and evil.

When we rise above this, the foundation for understanding this secret level begins to be created within us. It is a secret to us because we are not able to ascertain it today; we lack the resolution for perceiving it. But in any case, everything that exists beyond time and space, beyond our world, is found within the person.

So these two opposing forces are not revealed in our world in any form. That is, true egoism and altruism are not at all what we see on the physical level.

They are discovered only in the internal resistance of people who ascend above them. For example, when a group of friends who want to rise spiritually gathers among the people of Israel, precisely then these characteristics appear in them.

The Torah, meaning the Light that works on those people who want to ascend, was written precisely for them. And therefore the only condition for ascent is to be “as one person with one heart,” meaning using egoism correctly.

And then we discover within us all the characters that are described in the Torah and everything that is written in it as forces on the path toward the best development.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 7/8/15

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The Torah, “Numbers,” 22:4: And Moab said unto the elders of Midian: “Now will this multitude lick up all that is round about us, as the ox licketh up the grass of the field.” And Balak the son of Zippor was king of Moab at that time.

The people of Moab fear that their ego will have nothing to feed on and that they will not be able to live according to the old laws, which means for a better corporeal life.

A person feels good in the world today: he fills his world with culture, science, builds a successful family, and tries to behave nicely. Everything blossoms and it is possible to reach such a life by communism and equality. So what is the difference if we establish communism and equality here, now, in this world, or whether we yearn to ascend to spirituality? The difference is simple: such ideas will lead to nothing in this world.

This is an ideological difference and therefore it is very difficult to reveal. Because eventually the outcome that both Kabbalists and altruists wish to reach seems the same and quite normal on the level of our world.

Although Kabbalists have yet to convince people that it is impossible to prosper in this way on the level of our world and that we have to reach it by studying the upper world; they also have to explain that it isn’t for the sake of our world, since it is merely an intermediate level on which a person stands on one leg in order to ascend to the next level.

Comment: What if you come to people who live in order to build a home, plant a tree, and raise children and tell them that this isn’t the purpose of life?

Answer: People today don’t see that as a special goal anymore, we have reached the end. Does anyone want to have a normal family and think about how to keep it? A person loses these desires, impulses, urges, and options at a young age these days.

As an adult, a person still tries to find a soul mate and perhaps even have a child, since after all he must do something until old age. But in the end it doesn’t work out. People today start a family when they are about 40, and then they break it up when they reach 50 although there is nowhere they can run to but the graveyard, to which the way is more or less a straight line.

It is clear that the concept of a family is gradually disappearing and people don’t want children in whom they have to invest 25-30 years either. A person has nothing left in life. So now it isn’t so difficult for people to understand, because we actually turn to their general feeling of disappointment. The media repeatedly presents ruined countries on TV, and this is the future of the whole world! We will soon see Europe just as we see Syria today. Can you imagine wild wolves roaming the ruins from Western to Eastern Europe?

Question: Do you mean that the Barbarians will come out of the woods and invade the cities?

Answer: They are the same Europeans who have turned into complete barbarians. They have no power or reason to conceal it and everything that was concealed internally is coming out. Their whole cultural structure will evaporate over time. It is the same in every person.

If you dig a bit more deeply you will see that the external wrapping immediately falls off and you don’t even need to scratch it off.

Question: Do you believe that they have no protection because of the Islamic invasion to other countries?

Answer: No, but the Islamists are stronger ideologically and there is nothing to be done about that. No religion can confront them since all the religions are already dying these days.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 7/8/15

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Question: If the Kabbalists are so great, why do they come again into the world and suffer some more?

Answer: Kabbalists have their mission. They come into this world to serve humanity.

Question: Do you want to say that they have no life of their own?

Answer: No. Suppose that even though I am not a great Kabbalist, I sit like a monk, go out only for photographs and television programs, to a lesson or sit in front of my computer working on material and that’s it.

In what way am I different from a hermit? In nothing. What do I have besides? In principle, nothing. So what am I in this world for?

The life of a Kabbalist is to transfer knowledge to others, and that is how the chain continues until all of us reach the goal of creation, perfection and eternity.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 10/25/15

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Midrash Rabbah, “Parashat Balak”: Balaam relates to Moses with unique hostility because he realizes that Moses is not inferior to him in wisdom.

Balaam is Moses’ cousin, which means that they are on the same level, they have the same power, the same opportunities, but the difference is that Balaam doesn’t have the attribute of bestowal (Bina), which Moses brings the world.

The question is what Jacob actually stole and how Moses uses this theft. What Balaam would like to get back and give the nations that are behind him and live in the land of Israel at the time, and the answer is the blessing.

But it is impossible to take that now. The blessing shows what will be revealed in the end since what is important is not what happens now but what will happen in the end: who will remain.

Moses will remain and the nation of Israel that has the force of connecting to the Creator will remain. It can change egoism into the attribute of love and bestowal, and whatever does fit the correction disappears. Balaam disappears into nowhere.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 8/5/15

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Midrash Rabba, Parshat Balak: The bird in Parshat Balak revealed secrets to Balak that were not known to anyone. Among other things, the bird told Balak that he would overcome the children of Israel, yet would ultimately fall into their hands.

In a previous attempt, Balak did everything that was required so that the bird would speak. He bowed to it, burned incense to it, but the bird flew away from him.

Much later, the bird returned when a flame singed its tail. This showed Balak directly that the control of the Creator would ultimately prevail over his impure power.

Balak could not win because the highest point is general bestowal and love. Only on such a level is it possible to be like the Creator.

Question: What do the miracles of the left line indicate?

Answer: These are not miracles, but egoism that is created by the Creator because a spiritual structure, the spiritual world, is created only from the discovery of the ego and its correction. In fact, the spiritual world does not exist. We create it from the ego that is found in us and from the Light that we attract from above.

The influence of the Light on the ego is what builds states or images of mutual cooperation, thereby connecting them together. These are forms of mutual cooperation between two opposing forces.

To the extent that we attract the Light and want to resemble the Creator, the ego is born and developed in us. About this, it is also written, “The greater the man, the greater his Evil Inclination” (Sukkah 52a). So, to the degree that there is spiritual growth, problems increase.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 7/9/15

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Midrash Rabba, Parshat Balak: Balak could have been better than others by creating a magical bird. His name, Balak ben Tsipor (bird), indicates that he could predict the future with the help of a magical bird.

Midrash Rabba is a book that was written at the time that the Torah was written, and it could even have been before then. Sometimes, we even associate it with the times of our father Abraham who preceded the appearance of the Torah. This is because everything that is written there is written after that in the Torah, separated by 600 to 700 years.

So historically, Midrash Rabba is no less important than the Torah. The explanations in it are very broad and deep, delving into all kinds of different niches of the way to the spiritual development of a person.

When a person develops spiritually, he passes through those niches, understands them, but does not linger in them. Indeed, everyone can delve into them as a result of his development.

But there are souls who are so broad that they enter into all of these states and can describe them.

It must be understood that this is talking only about forces of nature, about the forces of man, those through which he passes by way of the systems of right and left, one system nourishing the other.

Egoism cannot exist without altruism and altruism without egoism. So, in a person there is only egoism, and solely and only above it he builds altruism as he transforms the ego and immerses it into altruism.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 7/8/15

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The Torah, “Numbers,” 22:5 – 22:6: He sent messengers to Balaam the son of Beor, to Pethor, which is by the river of the land of his people, to call for him, saying, “A people has come out of Egypt, and behold, they have covered the ‘eye’ of the land, and they are stationed opposite me. So now, please come and curse this people for me, for they are too powerful for me. Perhaps I will be able to wage war against them and drive them out of the land, for I know that whomever you bless is blessed and whomever you curse is cursed.”

A person always will be mistaken before he attains the state of accurately yearning for the Creator. To be mistaken means to be under the curse of Balaam.

Only when a person reaches the point of accurately yearning for the Creator, which he can reach only after internal wars and the revelation that all of the problems are inside him, does he receive a blessing instead of a curse. This is what we see.

Question: Balak’s call to Balaam is like to the Creator and sounds exaggerated: “… whomever you bless is blessed and whomever you curse is cursed.”

Answer: Balaam is higher than Moses in that. Moses cannot turn to the Creator like Balaam because he turns to Him from an egoistic perspective.

His “she-ass” [donkey], his animal level, is connected to the Creator. Interestingly, his ego is on a level of a prophet. If you are on the left part, in a shell, you have enormous powers, animal powers called Balaam’s she-ass.

Here the she-ass prophesizes, which means that his lowest desires are connected with the upper forces, and all of this is revealed to a person as the left line.

What is poor Moses worth? He must ascend above this state in his connection with the Creator because, with regard to the Creator, he is like a baby. Balaam commands the Creator here. In other words, you face a king who has a loyal companion, a loyal force that gives commands: to stop this little Moses. What is he running around for?

Moses can do only one thing, which is to surrender, but this is how he wins. What is more, their forces are absolutely unequal.
This attribute in us that leads us to the Creator is the peak of our continuous yearning for unity.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 7/8/15

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Question: In your spiritual development was there a time when everything seemed meaningless to you? If so, what brought you back to the path?

Answer: A Kabbalist passes through states like these every day! This is on every level! In The Book of Zohar, they describe the difficult states that Rabbi Shimon and his great companions went through when they wrote this book.

Likewise, I saw states like these that my teacher went through. When he was in a state like this, he could not move or open his eyes. He didn’t have any strength; it had left him!

There is no Kabbalist, not even the greatest, who hasn’t experienced daily opposing states on the way, from the greatest minus to the greatest plus. Specifically with their help, he advances in the right and left lines, like walking with the right and left legs.

People going in the path of truth go through states like these because it is impossible to achieve a new, higher level unless we first feel its emptiness.

All knowledge is built on a comparison between darkness and light, so the feeling of disappointment in life—in emotions, in work, in tasks and in everything that a person does, and for which he exists—is natural and necessary. Otherwise, he cannot push himself and rise higher.

However, there is no need to fear these states! It is simply necessary to strengthen the connection with the right environment, and then all of these states will seem like blessings. So, I suggest that you will have disappointments and, together with this, great fulfillments, and then you will feel life!
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 10/25/15

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The Torah, “Numbers,” 22:2 – 22:3: Balak the son of Zippor saw all that Israel had done to the Amorites. Moab became terrified of the people, for they were numerous, and Moab became disgusted because of the children of Israel.

The Torah doesn’t tell us about historical events, although we also can understand the content of the book from the historical level of this world. It is actually about states in which people who yearn for the Creator can unite and become one nation and thus be very strong.

The concept of many refers to the intensity of the connection between them, as one man in one heart, and not to the number of people. They are divided internally, but when they make an effort and develop internally, they can attain the force of unity that connects them, which is called many and of which Moab is afraid.

“… and Moab became disgusted because of the children of Israel” means that Moab sees the connection and unity between the children of Israel that is approaching and threatening it, and cannot do anything about it which, on its part, is unbearable.

The hatred that is mentioned here isn’t the hatred we see in our world. It manifests as the contrast between the spiritual forces of nature, whereas the rejection and hostility we see between people in our world is subconscious. The Jews don’t understand why they are oppressed, and the nations of the world don’t understand why they hate the Jews.

Question: What is the force of nature called Moab?

Answer: The egoistic force is divided into seven major opposite forces that are embodied by the seven nations living in the land of Israel until the conquest of the land by the Jews who came from the desert. These are seven Klipot (Shells), forces of impurity, that can exist only in this land, which means on this spiritual level.

A person who wants to discover the Creator must be on the spiritual level and accordingly on the level of this world because the two worlds are parallel.

All of the objects and phenomena in this world are the outcome of what happens in the upper world, as root and branch. Therefore, if you wish to conquer the land, for example, you can conquer it. However, in order to do so, you first must conquer the spiritual root, which means to be on the spiritual level. This is how the Torah tells us about the conquest on the spiritual level, and the outcome already is fulfilled in our world.

When the people of Israel began to take the idea of love of others lightly, for example, and fell into mutual hate, into the ego, they lost all of that in the corporeal world too and were expelled from this land. In other words, everything that happens in our world is an imprint of what we actually summon on the higher level.

The egoistic force, Moab—about which it is written, “…and Moab became disgusted because of the children of Israel”—wants to corrupt the children of Israel by sending them women who symbolize the ego so that their ego will grow. Moab can change Israel’s intention so that when they serve altruism and love, they will receive a little for themselves, which is enough to corrupt the spiritual level. Consequently, all of the changes that occur are fulfilled in this world in a negative way.

This is exactly what we see in Israel today, but there may be a different state, and we must start from above in order to change it.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 7/8/15

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