The Torah, “Exodus,” 33:4: [When] the people heard this bad news, they mourned, and no one put on his finery.

Advancing in spirituality means advancing in absolute darkness, but the moment a person abandons his ego, the darkness immediately turns into light, and if he sinks into his ego again he immediately finds himself in darkness.

The darkness is immediately felt in all our feelings, definitions and directions as helplessness, as lack of control and lack of a goal. But this is actually how we can reach the attribute of bestowal.

It is clear that we don’t feel the attribute of bestowal now; we cannot imagine where it comes from and how a person attains it. It seems that we simply change one attribute to another, although this isn’t the case at all. How can a person who is immersed in his ego want an attribute that is opposite from his original nature? This is the main problem, which no one understands.

How can I want the attribute of love and bestowal when I am in the opposite attributes? Even if I want them, it will still be with the intention of in order to receive. So advancing towards the goal without the Creator is in darkness, and this is actually what I need so that I will look for a way of turning the darkness into light.

This state already exists in me, but how can I feel everything that is opposite from my ego as Light? How can I change and transform myself? How can I reach the attribute of bestowal if we cannot demand it to begin with because everything we demand is for ourselves?

I am faced with an impossible mission, which is to find the point that is impossible to identify, feel, and understand in advance, because if I understand, it means that I am not in the egoistic attribute anymore!

Therefore, I yearn for it only thanks to my point in the heart, but even this yearning is egoistic because it is dominated by my egoistic desires.

This is the mystery of the cooperation between the Creator (the Light) and us. When it operates, we turn to Him through an obstacle that cannot be penetrated.

There is a very interesting passage between these two levels that we don’t know and cannot find. But if we keep advancing towards the goal by using the means we have, it is gradually revealed to us. The means to advance include working with the group, the desire to draw the Light that Reforms, and yearning to connect. These means gradually help us discern a certain direction, but it still remains secret.

We see that today very few think that it is possible to change our nature. Those who understand anything about human nature realize that it is impossible to change it.

Therefore this process is called the miracle of the exodus from Egypt, when a person understands that he cannot change himself and at the same time is already strongly connected to the Creator. By his actions he realizes that only the Creator can do it. The moment he reaches a point of detachment between the Creator and him, the Creator corrects everything.

We can turn our spiritual advancement to joy only if we acknowledge the importance of the goal that a person receives from the right environment. It is impossible to attain it without mutual support, without mutual guarantee.

Materialistic psychology tells us how we can calm a person down and how we can help him overcome depression, while our method teaches how to ascend to joy. If you are depressed, you cannot make even one step. A person has to turn all the dark states into Light, since otherwise he will not be able to overcome them.

The Torah tells us about clear states that we undergo and thus change our original nature by the help of the Light that Reforms.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 9/16/13

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Baal HaSulam, “A Speech for the Completion of The Zohar”: An exception is Rashbi and his generation, the authors of The Zohar, who were granted all 125 degrees in completeness, even though it was prior to the days of the Messiah.

Hence, we often find in The Zohar that there will be none like the generation of Rashbi until the generation of the Messiah King. This is why his composition made such a great impact in the world, since the secrets of the Torah in it occupy the level of all 125 degrees.

Hence, it is said in The Zohar that The Book of Zohar will be revealed only at the end of days, the days of the Messiah.

And since The Zohar appeared in our generation, it is a clear proof that we are already in the days of the Messiah, at the outset of that generation upon which it was said, “for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord.”

In the past we studied very little from The Book of Zohar. A person’s individual path of his spiritual development, that of the group, and the general path of the development of the world are connected to one another, because the individual and the general are equal. We couldn’t rush ahead and start studying The Book of Zohar until now because we were unable to hear it, so for many years we hardly touched The Book of Zohar in our study.

A special time had to come and our inner impulse had to ripen. About four years ago I suddenly felt that we have to do something with The Book because it is impossible to study from an authentic source in our times. There was a need to simplify The Book of Zohar so that an ordinary person would be able to understand it, and so we had to remove the many obstacles one encounters when studying this Book and also to translate it to other languages.

I felt a great elation in doing this work. I gradually went over all the writings of The Book of Zohar, day by day, volume after volume, and I greatly enjoyed it, feeling that I was drinking from the spring of life. Many other people took part in this project. We can actually say that it wasn’t work but a gift from above. Now we are glad to bring the outcome of our work to the whole world: the first complete edition in Hebrew and abridged editions in Russian and English. The Book of Zohar will gradually be published in other languages so that everyone will have a chance to study it with us.

No other book has ever been written by a group of Kabbalists as a result of ten connecting. Moreover, there has never been another book that was written in such a special time when people were both on the spiritual level that was before the destruction of the Temple and after the destruction. This means that they were exactly in the center of the shattering, between the two parts of the shattering, and managed to connect the shattering, to skip over it, and to connect its two parts.

There have never been Kabbalists who managed to attain all the 125 levels, which means to attain complete connection with the Creator. This is actually the reason that The Book of Zohar is on such a high level and belongs to the end of correction. It wasn’t written by one Kabbalist, but is the product of the connection between people who attained the Creator. This is very important. So when we study this book, it takes us back to that connection, to the correction.

All the other Kabbalistic books were written by people who attained spirituality but not as a result of the connection between people in a group. This is the reason that we wanted to make this book as close to everyone as possible. If a person reads it, the Light that comes through the high souls that connected begins to operate on him.

This Light operates among us and raises our sensitivity to connection. It operates whether we want it or not. Therefore , it was so important to simplify The Book of Zohar and translate it into different languages. This book includes everything we need for our correction!
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From the World Zohar Week “World Zohar Convention,” Day One 2/5/14, Lesson 1

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The Torah, “Exodus,” 33:1 – 33:3: The Lord spoke to Moses: “Go, ascend from here, you and the people you have brought up from the land of Egypt, to the land that I swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, saying: ‘I will give it to your descendants.’ I will send an angel before you, and I will drive out the Canaanites, the Amorites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Hivvites, and the Jebusites to a land flowing with milk and honey; because I will not go up in your midst since you are a stiff-necked people, lest I destroy you on the way.”

When He turns to Moses, the Creator calls him and the nation of Israel to begin their actual exodus from Egypt (from the egoistic desire to receive that they are in) and to fulfill the path of the ascent to the next level, to the level of Israel.

The angel that leads Moses is the force that manages and shows a person who yearns for the Creator which way to go, since otherwise he will find himself without a steering wheel or a sail along the spiritual path.If a person really wants to accept the attributes of love and bestowal by annulling his selfish attributes each time and obeying the angel that leads him, the managing force operates.

It is actually the same Light that descends upon us and leads us forward. Obeying the angel means focusing yourself on the attribute of love and bestowal of the Creator, Who is this one attribute, the only field towards which we should constantly advance.

Question: What does it mean to go to the “land flowing with milk and honey?”

Answer: Milk is the attribute of bestowal (Bina) and honey is a more sublime attribute (Hochma). The attributes are revealed in the land of Israel, in the desire that is clearly connected to the Creator, which means that it is full of the corrected attribute above the ego.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 9/16/13

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Question: If we were created as egoists from the start, why do we need to express regret, repent for our sins, and ask for forgiveness?

Answer: Prayer is making a judgment about our inner characteristics, obtained from the outside. The higher power of nature created our egoistic inclination, whereas we are only required to discover it and recognize its evil.

It is evil because it doesn’t allow us to connect with others and recreate the Kli of our common soul through which we feel the upper world.

A person is completely determined and defined by whatever characteristics he is born with, where he grew up, and what kind of education he received. So, we ourselves don’t sin that much, and even though it may seem to us that we have committed some sins in the past, we haven’t done anything bad. This is because nothing depends on us!

But if we clarify that the reason for all evil is our egoistic nature and we want to correct it, we have the possibility of doing this. So, let’s connect for that purpose because it is impossible to correct yourself on your own. So, I am appealing to everyone. Come, let’s correct ourselves, and we will feel ourselves in a completely different world!

All of our regret and repentance is awareness of how much we don’t want to connect with others. We begin to understand that it is possible to live well only through connection and unity, but our evil inclination is preventing us from attaining this. So, we ask the higher power of nature to connect and unite us, as it is written, “He who makes peace in His heavens, may He make peace for us and for all Israel.” (Kaddish).

Question: But what if I don’t want to relate well with others, and I am afraid they will exploit me?

Answer: We simply don’t understand how we benefit from connection and unity. It is as if we receive a sack with a million dollars as a gift. If the reward were revealed to us, everyone would want to connect. Everything depends only on the relationship between the results and the reward, and the wisdom of Kabbalah tells us how great the reward is.

Question: I am familiar with very many good people who are trying to relate well with everyone, but they haven’t gotten a million dollar prize.

Answer: The idea is that we don’t know what a good connection is. So, Kabbalah is called a science. It requires study and research. A person may invest much effort completely in vain. Many people in our world try to do good without results. They simply don’t recognize the laws of nature, so they make mistakes.

It is known that without knowing the physical laws of nature, it is impossible to do anything good. On the contrary, you only cause harm. If I don’t understand the law of gravity, I am liable to fall off a roof.

The same thing even happens with the soul. We must know the laws of our inner nature or of the soul, and then we will use them correctly and easily reach a wonderful, harmonious, peaceful life and benefit from much more than a million dollars.

In the month of Elul, we are entering a unique period. We have an opportunity to benefit greatly if we just will understand that the goal is to connect and unite among us, and the one thing that disturbs us is our ego, the evil inclination.

If we try to become freed from it with the help of the wisdom of Kabbalah, then it will provide us with all the necessary means required for correction. Then we will attain abundance and full prosperity. Between us, we will discover the upper world and begin to live a fabulous life as if we were on a cloud.
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From the Israeli Radio Program 103FM, 8/30/15

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The month of Elul is the time for self-examination. Did you fulfill the instruction that was given at Mount Sinai and, even before that, at the time of Abraham, which is to attain connection?

The Upper Light will be dressed on us and will reveal the upper world to us to the extent that we begin to unite, and we will feel that we are living in a corrected, round, upper and harmonious world.

Therefore, a sin or transgression is what stands in our way of achieving unity among us. Anyone can examine himself from this perspective and find out how full of sins, of egoistic attributes and desires, he is, which makes him resent others.

The month of Elul is called the time of repentance, which means the return of the created being to the Creator, to resembling and being equal in form to His attributes, to love and bestowal.

Discovering our sins and transgressions is already a correction. All we must do is to acknowledge our corruption. People try to conceal their evil and hide it, while the wisdom of Kabbalah tells us to bring out your evil because, you are a complete egoist. The moment these sins and transgressions are discovered, they immediately will be corrected.

We are divided and immersed in our ego, but we must connect like the parts of Adam’s one soul. Our role is to find the way to connection and unity. We look for the way, but each time, we discover that we really don’t want to unite, and we don’t yearn for connection. This is actually our only sin, and simply discovering that is the entire correction.

A prayer is judging yourself, the desire to discover and bring out all your sins and transgressions so that they can be corrected and will disappear. Regret and repentance is not tears but the recognition of the need to unite. We see that the world is beginning to realize that without connection and unity we simply will not be able to survive.

Every time we discover different sins against connection and unity inside us, they will be corrected thanks to our revelation. We cannot correct anything by ourselves and it is our duty only to discover the evil within us and to point out the egoistic attribute of our character. This is called a prayer, judging yourself.

Question: Why is it enough to simply discover and highlight our egoistic attributes, which already is the correction?

Answer: When we discover and highlight our evil, we realize to what extent we need correction. The correction itself is done by the Light that Reforms.

When we discover our ego and our sins, we draw the Light of correction. It is written, “’I have created the evil inclination, I have created the Torah as a spice’ …since the Light in it reforms it.”

The Torah is the general Light that is around us, but it operates on us only if we discover the attributes inside us that stand in the way of our connection and unity, which means our sins.

The main thing is to determine the diagnosis because the remedy already exists! The moment we discover the ego inside us that doesn’t allow us to connect, the Light that Reforms, called the Torah, immediately operates on it and corrects this desire.

The correction allows us to connect with others, but to the extent that we connect internally and begin to feel close to one another, the Upper Light can be revealed to us and let us feel the upper world.

Our work in the month of Elul comes down to revealing the evil that doesn’t let us unite with others. During this time, the evil only is revealed, but it is corrected when the new year begins on Rosh HaShana.
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From the Israeli Radio Program 103FM, 8/30/15

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The Torah, “Numbers,” 14:4 – 14:7: They said to each other, “Let us appoint a leader and return to Egypt!” Moses and Aaron fell on their faces before the entire congregation of the children of Israel. Joshua the son of Nun and Caleb the son of Jephunneh, who were among those who had scouted the land, tore their clothes. They spoke to the entire congregation of the children of Israel, saying, “The land we passed through to scout is an exceedingly good land.”

The spies who were sent to spy in the land of Israel crossed it to its length and breadth. They explored the land on all the levels, which means all the vessels, all the five levels of NRNHY, and discovered that it is good.

The Torah, “Numbers,” 14:8 – 14:9: “If the Lord desires us, He will bring us to this land and give it to us—a land flowing with milk and honey. But you shall not rebel against the Lord, and you will not fear the people of that land for they are [as] our bread. Their protection is removed from them, and the Lord is with us; do not fear them.”

The nations who lived in the land of Israel are our giant egoistic desires. When a person understands that he cannot overcome his impulses and sees his egoistic rival inside him, he simply surrenders and lets the ego do whatever it wants with him; or he may try to do something, but he cannot overcome the ego and has no powers to do so. Only if he connects to a group, to an environment, can he receive powers from them and then be able to overcome this obstacle, just like twenty small men can overcome one giant, for example.

Therefore, when Caleb and Joshua say that the time of the egoistic desires is over and if the nation of Israel goes along with the Creator, they mean that it is by His power that they will be able to enslave the ego, to smash it underneath them. Then all the egoistic obstacles that they see in the form of giants will function properly.

Question: What does it mean that they “rent their clothes?”

Answer: It means that all the previous external Masachim (Screens), the Returning Light, all the clothing they had, are not suitable for the new level. Now they need to be dressed in a totally different Returning Light. This means that they have to change their clothes. In our world there is a custom that when someone dies his relatives tear their clothes in his funeral. This means that they are just about to reach a new level. It is not the person who dies, but his ego, and therefore we bury it. This is the reason that we mourn the dead for seven days, gradually leaving him and once you are totally free of the previous level, you change your clothes and start a new life. The days of mourning, the seven days, thirty days, and the year symbolize reincarnations, when the same Reshimot (spiritual genes) return and you gradually raise them until the end of correction.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 4/15/15

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Question: If we still have not yet reached the spiritual revelation, but are only studying, are we doing spiritual work, or not?

Answer: You are doing spiritual work because you want to attain spirituality, although you are still not in it. It is similar to a person who builds a house. It is possible to build it over 20 years, but you are occupied by building a house. You have a goal to achieve spirituality and you progress and approach it until you enter in it. Even if it would take 20 years; so what is the problem?

Question: What is more important: to study and prepare for the ascent towards the spirituality or to be in spirituality itself? Once you said that the Creator loves us more when we are only preparing ourselves and not that we are in spirituality itself?

Answer: Indeed, as long as you are preparing yourself, you are making efforts like a baby, like a little child that you doesn’t know yet towards what you are going. Precisely at the place of concealment you have more opportunities to activate and reveal your attitude towards the Creator, “the force of faith.” Like in our world we are most touched by and enjoy more from a small child.

In spirituality it is not like that, and yet there is charm of this naivety, from this loyal yearning as compliance between the root and the branch. The biggest reward comes and is revealed to a person as a result of his effort in the time of his period of concealment, in these 20 years.

We think that this preparation period is lost time and we would like to avoid it in order to enter the spirituality as fast as possible and to really start working in full understanding. But we do not understand that it’s precisely these years that are so valuable. And here is the problem, because only the one that truly has a real desire to stay remains, and the others disappear.

Question: What is a true desire?

Answer: A true desire is called a Reshimo that is intended for correction, depending on the root of the soul.

Question: But we all want to cross the Machsom?

Answer: Of course everyone wants this. But one comes to study twice a week, like you, and others are coming every day. There are those that are watching football in the evening, and there are other people that go out to disseminate.

Question: How can I cause this real desire that you are talking about to appear inside me?

Answer: With the help of the environment.

Question: But I’m already in such a wonderful environment! What else can I do with it?

Answer: You need to integrate with it so that you will become one whole without any differences. This is called being as one man in one heart. And here is all the difficulty. You promise yourself each time to do it, but when the opportunity arrives, you suddenly sneak away from it. But with it, if you simply stay and study, then time will do its work.
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From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/5/14, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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Question: Why is it thought that Rosh HaShanah is the beginning of passing judgment on yourself?

Answer: Before Rosh HaShanah there is a period in which the person apparently checks his previous states and expresses regret, repents, cries, and then asks for help from above. That is how he apparently softens his heart, transforming it from a heart of stone to a heart of flesh. This is tradition, and the main thing is that the person will begin to understand that he must relate to life in a new way.

Question: Meaning that this is talking about good deeds, those he must begin in the New Year, on Rosh HaShanah?

Answer: Good deeds are corrections of the self, because when he corrects himself, he corrects the world. That is how he builds a system of mutual integration and unity in which the Creator is revealed and for which it is necessary to bring all the substance of the still, vegetative, and animate levels to correction and, in particular, the level of the speaking.
From KabTV’s “Holidays. Rosh HaShana” 8/6/12

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A time of confession and repentance is a time of discovering the characteristics that don’t allow me to connect with others. And so this happens before the beginning of correction, meaning before the beginning of the new Hebrew year. First of all, I need to clarify what is bothering me. It is reasonable that this is my ego and that I simply don’t want to connect and unite.

Question: I really don’t want to! A life in paradise is sitting alone on the beach where there are no people around me except for one or two who are close to me and whom I need. But you say it is paradise when we are united, won’t it be too crowded?

Answer: It won’t be too crowded for us. We will feel perfect harmony within this connection because nobody will bother us.

Comment: Every year I travel to the most remote place for a vacation where there is not a living soul. For me this is paradise.

Answer: This is opposite to the way of solving our problem of disunity, trying to escape the evil and hiding in a place where there are no people at all.

But you can remain among everyone and feel comfortable, as if you were alone, but feeling much better. Everything depends only on my relationships with the others and how much they pressure and force me to depend on them.

This refers to correcting our relationships with each other, when I will feel all people as parts of a single body. That is, they will no longer bother me; on the contrary, each one will be required because he will always be ready to help me with anything I want or need. This will be an ideal connection.

Anyway, we still cannot get along without people. We have no choice, we must be together. Today there are seven billion people on Earth and in another 50 to a 100 years there will be twice as many of us. So there is nowhere to hide from one another; we must understand that the general program of nature is to make us into one person with one heart. And then I will truly feel that nobody around me is superfluous in spite of there being millions of people around me. I will not feel like I am in a crowd, but on the contrary, I will feel how each one is necessary and completes my desire.

Regret and repentance are necessary to come to this in the month of Elul, which is the discovery of the desires in me that prevent connection. It is enough to discover and expose them, and in that same moment, they go through correction. If I consider them to be a sin, they are immediately corrected through the Light that Reforms. Nothing is required from us other than the discovery of our egoistic nature and the internal resistance to connection with others. And it is good that this evil is revealed, as the Light hates our egoistic society and is ready to correct it in a moment with our first request.

Question: Why is it bad to have the desire to be alone?

Answer: Because the goal of creation is to bring us to unity, and when you move away from that, you oppose the goal of creation and suffer from moving in the opposite direction. It would be possible to correct my connection with others and feel myself in a harmonious, ideal and wonderful state among millions of people, but instead of this, I escape for a week to be alone, at least for a little bit, and then I have to come back again. I could feel as if I am on vacation all year, as if there were nobody around me!

After all, it’s not like we have somewhere to escape to. We require the services of other people; we need doctors, chefs, grocers, and bankers. We are forced to work and serve others, earn money, and take care of a family. So we must establish relationships with other people.

Look at what is happening in the world because we aren’t doing this—the recent current events and the massive invasion of immigrants who are trying to break into Europe. Nature brings us extreme situations like these that require us to find a way for the right connection.
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From the Israeli Radio Program 103FM, 8/30/15

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In the News (vesti.ru): “Europe is paying for all the years that it conducted a colonial policy. To combat illegal immigration, France and England are establishing a special coordinating center.

“The experts in this center will be involved with monitoring the illegal immigration of refugees to Europe. In a word, this is called a deluge; rescue from which is not expected in the foreseeable future. Immigrants from the nations of Africa and the Middle East are reaching Europe in a massive stream. The quality and standard of living in Bulgaria or Romania is higher than in Libya, Iraq and Syria.

“Currently, there is a collapse organized by the Western nations, therefore the stream of immigrants to Europe has broken out. There is no solution to the immigration problem under current European conditions. The European Union cannot limit the flood of immigration, neither physically nor legally. What is left is only to build walls, but no wall will stop the immigrants who want and aspire to the good life in Europe. The European Union began its way specifically with the removal of fences and barriers. Has the opposite process now begun?”

My Comment: The reverse process cannot happen. The process of the mixing of the peoples has begun, as in the beginning of the development of our civilization in ancient Babylon. We are returning to the beginning. And we will be obliged to do what they did but did not complete, which was the ancient Jews under the leadership of our father Abraham, the founder all religions, connecting above all the oppositions and differences, as Abraham taught, according to the general rule, “And you shall love your friend as yourself.”

And the correction phase begins from the most egoistic part of humanity, from Europe. According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, continuation will come either through the way of suffering with the conquest of Europe by the Muslims, world war, the turning to Israel and the correction of humanity from hatred to love, or, through the way of Torah by accepting the method of the wisdom of Kabbalah in order to rapidly correct the universal ego from collective hatred to love.

Which will they choose?
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