The Midrash Says, Chapter “Acharei Mot,” Preparation for this most holy day of the year (Day of Atonement) always started a week prior to the holiday. During this time, the High Priest lived in the Temple, in a special chamber. During all seven days, he had to purify and prepare himself for the festive services.

Question: Why did the High Priest begin his preparation for the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur) a whole week before the holiday? Did he have to purify himself and get ready to conduct the service?

Answer: The seven days symbolize seven levels during which one ascends to the upper part of the system: to GAR. Hesed, Gevurah, Tifferet, Netzach, Hod, Yesod, and Malchut descend to us from Above. We have to rise from the bottom, from Malchut to the upper level of Hesed.

The Midrash Says, Chapter “Acharei Mot,” On the third and seventh days of the preparation, the High Priest was sprinkled with water in which the ashes of the red heifer (red cow) was dissolved in case he, unwittingly, turned to become unclean by touching a corpse (something impure).

The third day stands for Hesed, Gevurah, and Tifferet or the middle line. The seventh day means the same: Netzach, Hod, and Yesod—the middle line that transitions to Malchut.

Question: What is the “red cow” and its ashes?

Answer: In the material world, the cow is an herbivore, peaceful, kind animal that gives milk and meat. People do not realize that due to this animal humankind was able to free itself from a huge number of problems – concerns about food. Indeed, each cow is a “factory” for the production of food.

From a spiritual point of view, the cow represents the properties of the left and right lines (red and white) and their correct combination, when you can use them to correct the parts of your soul.

The cow means the property of Bina – the red property of judgment ​​(Dinim), which, rising up, becomes whiter and turns into the property of mercy (Rachamim).

Ash (Ofar) is the lowest property. When the former higher properties fall on the lowest, then they can be corrected. Therefore, the high priest was anointed with the water, in which the ashes of the red cow (Red Heifer) was dissolved.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 3/12/14

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The Midrash Says, Chapter “Acharei Mot,” On the eve of Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement) all sacrificial animals were presented to the High Priest and he remembered them to be able to recognize them when conducting the service.

All our animate desires are displayed to us; we analyze, identify, and recognize that we have to raise them to the level of the Holy of Holies, i.e,. to the level of complete bestowal.

The Midrash Says, Chapter “Acharei Moth,” In the morning, sages who instructed him departed and were substituted by experienced Cohanim [priests] who exercised the art of shifting incense from a spoon into the palm, which was one of the most complicated actions that the High Priest had to perform during the service in the Holy of Holies at Yom Kippur.

“Spoon” is the Kli (vessel) of an inanimate level. “Palm” is the Kli of a speaking level.

“Incense” symbolizes the Reflected Light (Ohr Hozer), something that we raise to the Creator. It is very difficult to raise incense (the Reflected Light) to the speaking level. We have to “turn on” a different pool of desires , the ones that we never experienced previously, and re-direct them towards bestowal, that is, to cut one’s egoism to the extent that previously seemed impossible. It is hard work.

In this world, minor internal actions often are the most complicated ones. Imagine that I give you a half-glass of water. How does this action happen in spirituality? I have to impose a restriction, a complete correction of all desires that I feel towards a glass of water, rise above it to Hafetz Hesed, to the first level of sanctity, and then correct them to the degree of the second step, the Holy of Holies, and only then I can give it to you.

This is the problem! In materiality, all these things are adjacent, whereas in spirituality, it involves dozens of years of hard work and hundreds of steps.

That’s why in this world we are in the state that “kind of” allows us to fulfill spiritual actions. If we were not able to perform them, we wouldn’t be alive at all. Only due to observing them can we exist.

As to the spiritual realm, unless our most internal desires become ready for bestowal, we won’t attain It.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 3/12/14

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Question: Can we really discover the Creator among us now?

Answer: We understand the concept “Creator” as a sensation of fellowship, connection and love. This is not something limited in space and volume. Rather, this is the general force of nature by which we live. We develop it; that’s what we do.

If we can be organized so that we discover this force, then it will exist. Likewise, it also will influence us, and we also will be connected to it. This means that the person develops the Creator.

We must constantly try to find this current through which all of us advance and exist. We must avoid extraneous thoughts and activities. This means that everything will be directed only toward connection. It will live in us, and we automatically will feel it.

As is understood, from each one of us, there will be a particular effort in this regard. Yet, this effort will become desirable. It will be like a person who plays basketball and invests effort in this, but enjoys it. After all, in this world, we get pleasure from many activities in which we seem to invest great efforts.

So, we must understand that our efforts will create pleasurable sensation in us. Specifically, it will create an urge to come closer, intending to satisfy the Creator. This will make us happy and give us vitality.

MAN is what nourished us in the wilderness. MAN is the ascent of desire. In the physical world, we work and then get paid, whereas spiritual work itself becomes the payoff. The efforts become our nourishment. A sensation of lack, hunger, and yearning fulfills us.

So, we suddenly will begin to understand that we were even in this perfected state before. We just didn’t feel it, and, now that we have cleansed all of our intentions, have prepared the sensory Kli, we see that we exist within this. Nothing changes except the fact that we have begun to understand correctly the state we are in. It appears before us as a universe that has changed, as a humanity that has changed, as another world. However, all of this is in relation to us because we are the ones who have changed.

MAN (prayer) is mutual yearning, mutual help, being concerned that my friends will discover the higher force! This becomes the only goal of my efforts, and, if I ask myself, “What am I thinking about?” this means that I am concerned that all of the friends throughout the world, our entire immense group, will receive the discovery of the characteristic of bestowal and love between us. If all of us will think this way, as having responsibility for everyone else, then this will succeed.

It is up to us to reach this. Don’t expect any external changes, only internal changes that must be such that we feel the higher world within our regular state.

So, we must have only one singular request as the goal. The yearning must be shared. The intentions and the thoughts of each must be not about himself, about his attainments, but only about our attainments. In the first stage, it is “we,” instead of “me.” In the next stage, it is a single whole, instead of “we.” All of us merge with the Creator. That is how the sole higher force of nature begins to be discovered within the connection between us.
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From the Convention In St. Petersburg 9/18/14, Preparatory Lesson 1

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Midrash Sefer, “Acharei Mot”: Moses who was on a very high spiritual level was given a special state. The Creator told him: “You can enter the Holy of Holies any time you wish to speak to Me. Any time you enter and wish to hear My word, My voice will be heard between the cherubs and reach your ears.”

Moses was allowed to enter the Holy of Holies any time because he was on the middle line between the two cherubs, between the right and the left lines. The level of Moses is the level on which a person is continuously in the state of the Holy of Holies, in the state of Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement).

You can disagree: “Yom Kippur is a state of sorrow when a person cries about what he discovers inside him.” But did Moses constantly cry and ask for something? On the contrary, he was happy, since, in fact, Yom Kippur is actually a day of joy and not of weeping. People simply don’t understand the truth and so they cry and torment themselves the whole day.

In fact, if I advance and yearn to discover the negative attributes inside me which were initially created by the Creator, and ask Him: “Correct me so that I will be closer to You. This is how I want to delight You: by bestowal and comprehensive love…” then it is an ascent for me and an inspiration.

In this case, Yom Kippur becomes a day of joy instead of a day for tears, a state of continuous awe! This is a day of double holiness, of double bestowal, when not only my desires of bestowal, but also my desires of receiving, work in order to bestow. This is the level of Moses.

On the level of Aaron this state is attained only once a year, whereas on the level of Moses, it is continuous. Therefore, every person must reach the level of Moses.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 3/12/14 

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The Torah, Book of Leviticus, “Acharei Mot” 16:21-16:22: He (Aaron) is to lay both hands on the head of the live goat and confess over it all the wickedness and rebellion of the Israelites—all their sins—and put them on the goat’s head. He shall send the goat away into the wilderness in the care of someone appointed for the task. The goat will carry on itself all their sins to a remote place; and the man shall release it in the wilderness.

Letting a goat into the wilderness stands for releasing the desires that are as yet impossible to correct nor suitable for working with for the sake of bestowal. It’s the basis of the notion of a scapegoat.

The other goat, the one that is killed, symbolizes the egoistic desires of a person who is still at an animate level and who is in the process of rising to the speaking level. People use this animal as food, i.e., they implement their desires for the sake of bestowal

Laying both hands on the head of the live goat means controlling our thoughts that we as yet cannot refine nor use for the sake of others.

Question: What does send the goat away into the wilderness mean?

Answer: From the material point of view, the wilderness is the place where wild goats live and die naturally.

From the spiritual point of view, they signify the desires that we reject and that are considered dead. Killing them is beyond our power, only a desert can cope with this task because we ban ourselves from using these desires, i.e., we fill them with emptiness that eventually kills them. And then there is the resurrection of the dead i.e., the desires that are subject to correction are revived.

The Torah, Book of Leviticus, “Acharei Mot” 16:26: The man who releases the goat as a scapegoat must… This is speaking about a messenger who takes the goat far away into the desert and leaves him there. In other words, the one who has to let his most powerful and huge internal desires go. Only a priest (Kohen) can do it. If not a Kohen, then only a special envoy can cope with this task. The person who does it experiences huge internal tension.

The envoy then returns and washes himself, since he was connected with impure forces, with the desert. He has to internally purify himself. After he rejects all desires and thoughts that cannot be used correctly, that is, when he sends them to the desert, he has to clean himself. It happens under the influence of the Light of Hassadim that is represented by water.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 3/06/14

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Question: How do you understand what the Creator is?

Answer: It is impossible to understand the Creator.

We are a desire to receive, so whatever we feel, we can understand to the extent that we feel and understand our desires. Our desire comes first. Then the mind perceives, thinks, and assesses what it feels. Thus, it is impossible to know and attain the Creator without feeling Him. Feeling the Creator is nothing but feeling the connection between us. We perceive Him as the right connection between us since He is “come and see,” Bore (in Hebrew).

The Creator doesn’t exist inside me. The connection that is properly established among us allows me to understand that the Creator is inside me and this is what He is called. I don’t feel, don’t understand, and don’t know this. This is something, in and of itself, and is my first and basic source. I can feel Him inside me to the extent that I resemble Him. I don’t feel Him, but rather the corrected attributes that resemble Him and that I call the Creator.

Baal HaSulam gives us the example of an electric current. We don’t know what it is, but we can only see and feel its manifestation: a needle moving in a measuring device, a light shining, it heats, cools, etc. But, what is this actually?  It is some kind of energy that is not understood, because everything we wish to feel, see, or measure is its revelation in matter and not the actual source. This means that it is already matter that has been transformed.

Therefore the Creator is called come and see, and it is what’s inside us.

Question: So how can we personalize His control?

Answer: We shouldn’t personalize Him personally and must not give it any form! That is a terrible mistake. If you do that, you descend to paganism and don’t work on correcting yourself, but rather, depict a kind of figure whom you ask for mercy.
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From the Convention In Toronto “Day One” 8/04/14, Meal 1

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A group in itself is one single whole, and everyone gets only what exists in the whole group, nobody feels himself as a unique unit.

In a group there don’t need to be any differences between men and women, veterans and newcomers, any differences of opinion, misunderstandings, or distortions.

The concept of an “individual” torn off from the others doesn’t exist in it because one is the hand, a second is the foot, a third is the body, and so forth. Everyone constitutes a single whole, one body that is found in absolute mutual cooperation, in absolute agreement among all of its limbs.

This must be the main thing for everyone and we shouldn’t have any complaints from anyone about this. The opportunity was given to me to participate in a group, to dissolve in it, and nobody takes that from me because the Creator is the one who granted it to me. He brought me here, gave me friends as His representatives through whom I must work on my unification with Him. I am found in this.

The main thing is that in every moment I can dissolve in the group further and further, “losing myself” among them such that they manage all of my thoughts, feelings, and desires, they determine all of my behavior, my attitude. The moment that I attain this state, I immediately begin to feel the next spiritual level, because it is felt in our unity. If I attain it, become dissolved in all of them, then I move to the next level.
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From the Convention In Sochi “Day Two” 7/14/14, Lesson 4

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How can we discover the Creator? Essentially, this is the purpose of the creation of the worlds and all of humanity, and all of our long history in which we don’t understand where we have come from and where we are going and what is happening to us every minute.

That is how we develop: without understanding and knowing the reason for any event. However, at some time, we will reach a point of development when we can begin to discover the reason and the essence of everything that is happening with us. Through the reality that is revealed before us, we can discover who activates it.

In other words, I exist in a world. This means that I feel myself as existing in a body. I have feelings and intelligence, and, with them, I feel my existence. Likewise with them I perceive the reality in which I am found. This reality exists and changes. It follows that I and the environment exist. The environment includes within it only everything that I can perceive with my senses.

The Kabbalists say that there is a comprehensive general force that stands behind all of this reality inside and out, a force that penetrates everywhere and carries out activities both outside of me and within me.

If so, then, first of all, I must detect some kind of basic point from which I will determine what changes on the outside and what changes on the inside, and, from this point, I will begin to identify these changes. This inner point is my “self,” and within it there is only one characteristic of perception: “I am the one who is feeling.”

Now, I have been given a permanent, endless exercise for the duration of my entire life: how through all that changes within me—in my sensations and in my intellect, how within my internal changes—I perceive external changes, how through all that happens within me and outside of me do I discover the hidden force, the hidden and imperceptible desire that carries out all of these actions, all of these changes.

This force constantly holds me in some kind of state, changes these states, and constantly replaces the surrounding conditions. If I am sensitive and aware—trying to maintain my ability to examine and scrutinize, discern and locate this force—then, gradually, I will be able to identify it through everything that happens inside and outside of me. From this, I will begin to understand and feel Him so much that I will not relate to my inner and outer changes, but will see the cause, the force that carries out, and realizes these actions.

I will know why He does this, the purpose, what He wants from this, how He teaches me all the time to feel, to understand, and to discover more, to such a degree that I will discard all of the externals, meaning myself and the environment, and I will see that I (this inner point from which I constantly have tried to discover this force) and this force adhere together.

There is no external reality, not my body, my emotions, nor intellect. There is no environment with its whole mess. There is no world filled with human beings. All of this disappears, and only the link between me and this force remains. All that happened between us was only to develop a direct connection between us, such a connection that is called “adhesion.”

This is our work, and to carry it out we must go out to the wider public, connect with the group, study, and participate in all kinds of events. All of this is ultimately to bring myself to such spiritual work in which we constantly try to discover this inner force that surrounds and determines everything.
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From the Convention In New Jersey “Day Two” 8/9/14, Lesson 4

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Question: Why does it always seem to me that there is still time and that it is possible to wait until tomorrow? Why don’t I dive into the study and dissemination, but find new excuses with which I deceive myself and others?

Answer: This is because you need to correct yourself, specifically thanks to these “whys.” The Creator gives us such questions and exercises like we give a little child in school. We must understand that they are required for our development, and we must try to respond to them correctly.

Generally, at the end of every exercise book, there are answers for the questions. However, for us, every question is given one general answer that includes within it an endless number of terms: “There is none else beside Him.”

In a group, there must be a sensation that we always are in a cloud managed by the Creator, and we must live in one basket mutually within this cloud, moving toward full awareness and management, and, simultaneously, nullify not ourselves, but our ego.

This means that I must manage, influence, understand, and work, but not within my ego, but rather within a state that I now must acquire, own, and master. This is an absolutely new state, and I must enter it.

A cloud into which it is necessary to dissolve my ego and in which I must begin to feel myself as active, as understanding, must envelop all of us. This is called “work in a group.”

This shared feeling must hold us within it, and we need to nurture, develop, and take care of it. This, at least partially, amounts to support by the friends. The group exists on this platform.
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From the Convention In Toronto “Day One” 8/4/14, Meal

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Question: How can we understand, know, and feel the effort that we must make in order to connect?

Answer: We see what is happening in the world, and to some extent, we begin to feel that everything leads us forward and that there is one force leading us to one, unique goal.

How can we make an effort in order to ascend above all the strange thoughts that confuse us? We must understand that it all comes to us on purpose from the Creator. On one hand, He draws us to Him, and, on the other hand, He confuses us and keeps us away from Him so that we will be able to develop the right attitude towards Him and towards our nature so that we will connect to Him.

It is actually by our opposite nature from the Creator and by the confusion and lowliness of our level that we can clarify, discover, and reach adhesion with Him.

It isn’t easy, but we must clarify this process because this is how we grow. At the same time, we must be ready for even greater external problems that the Creator will present to us as we advance so that it will be increasingly more difficult to clarify our inner problems. As it is written, “He who is greater than his friend, his desire is greater.”

The Creator created such inner conditions for us in which we fall into our ego because of the most trivial things that a beginner wouldn’t fall into, but a great person does fall into them since, for him, it is a great problem.

For example, it makes no great difference if a manual worker who works with a heavy hammer digresses one millimeter in the wrong direction, but, for a brain surgeon, any slight digression may cost the patient’s life. Therefore, if we don’t go through the descents ourselves, we will not know all the subtleties since it is only by our progress that we become aware of them.

The Creator wants us to get close to Him, so we need support. We mustn’t forget that our progress is not in studying the material more deeply, but in the internal connection between us. If the connection between us is right, we will feel the filling of the inner force called Light, or the Creator, the Bore inside us, which means come and see. How do we do that?

I see that it is different on every continent. Israel is characterized by special problems, and, here, the Creator leads us in a cruel and serious manner, but, still, the Bnei Baruch group lacks the power to connect. If we speak about Israelis in general, they still think that missiles falling on their heads is normal and that it will all go away.

Along with the afflictions, people become numb and don’t understand what is going on. This is like a child who is beaten and becomes increasingly more stubborn as a result. The more he is beaten, the more stubborn he becomes, and nothing can be done.

Therefore, working with Israelis is not at all easy. Thousands of people go out to disseminate every evening, organizing discussion circles, giving out brochures, and doing their best to influence the public. These are the conditions that the Creator has arranged for us.

In South America, the groups are very successful, sensitive, and knowledgeable. There are groups who find it hard to go out to disseminate, but they get along well with one another. There are groups, on the contrary, that go out and disseminate our materials. I was in Columbia, Chile, and Mexico, and every group is unique. I believe that the goal should be that all of South America should connect because of their common language.The Creator has given them a very serious condition, and they must ascend above the different regions and not play the game of separation anymore, “We are here and you are there,” but rather establish one serious Latin American department, which means to direct all their efforts to establishing one whole.

The Mexico group had a very powerful convention of connection and understanding. People already have grown and they are well trained and organized. The problem is that spirituality is above the ego, and only if we connect above the ego, restrict it and build a Masach (screen) will we be able to feel the upper world, the feeling of the soul.

This is very serious work. During my trip, I was convinced that the preparation period is totally over. There are no people in Israel, Canada, and South America who know more or less than others, or people who don’t know the material as others do. We really have reached a certain common basis, and now we must work only on our connection, which is the most important thing. The preparation period is over. Now, we must work.

In Israel, the work on our connection is in a worse state since it must go through all 125 levels until we reach complete connection.

The question is how we can actually do that. I believe that we will not be able to control this from inside the Bnei Baruch Center since, despite the mentality that has very little effect on the fulfillment in spirituality and all the practical recommendations which are identical for everyone, the conditions do matter, and we must work together in any case. It is because it is the same rule for everyone, and the way you fulfill it is up to you.
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From Meal 1 of the Convention In Toronto “Day One” 8/4/14

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