A question I received: The science of Kabbalah explains the law of roots and branches. Knowing the laws of this world helps us in our everyday lives. But how can knowledge of spiritual laws help us? I am referring specifically to the law of roots and branches.

My Answer: The law of roots and branches is the main and most important law in the entire science of Kabbalah. According to this law, everything that happens in our world comes down from above in a unilateral, absolute order.

It is written: “There is not a blade of grass that has not an angel above it that strikes it and tells it to grow.” Angels are forces, and any action, thought, desire, event or occurrence, from the most elemental particle to the biggest stars and entire galaxies, is managed by an Upper Force.

This force divides and within it, is included a number of forces on the various levels of the inanimate, vegetative, animate and human. These are physical and biological forces that influence all levels, with all of them coming from Above.

This is why the law of roots and branches is very important. With the science of Kabbalah, and learning the law of roots and branches, we can rise from the branches of our world toward the roots. We will begin to see our world as transparent and behind every object, we will see the force which manages it and brings it to action.

A person will begin to sense where his thoughts and desires come from and why things happen to him and to others. He will begin to see how a net of forces acts on this world and how it playfully and through various wavelike movements, organizes everything that occurs here for us. In this way, a person begins a dialogue with this Upper Force, with the root through which its own force operates everything in our world.

A person begins to understand where he can step in and have a dialogue with the Creator who is behind these forces, in order to respond, participate, change and consciously intervene. This is the only place in this entire net of forces that acts on him from the inside and out and where he can actively participate.

Although we are not conscious of it, we are inside of a picture prepared and formed for us by these forces. I have to come to understand how I can actively take part in this picture. In other words, how I can control my fate.

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A question I received: You said more than once that everything occurs within a person. The whole picture of reality is projected on a screen in the  brain. Who is it projected to? Who sits on a chair, watching this picture?

My Answer: The desire! The desire to enjoy, which has 613 (TARYAG) Reshimot,  are connected to each other in a special form, called 10 Sefirot or five Partzufim.

The world consists of five Partzufim, with five Sefirot in each Partzuf, and five sub-Sefirot in each Sefira. Consequently, this is a huge structure, with many parts, which are connected to each other like pixels on a TV screen.

There is a whole layer of desires in the desire to enjoy. The Light enters the desire, fills it, and builds it according to four stages:

• In stage Alef, the desire begins to feel fulfilled.
• In stage Bet, it wants to become similar to the Light.
• In stage Gimel it desires to become just like the Light, and
• In stage Dalet it desires to become independent and to absorb all of the Light.

In this last stage, it already understands what is happening to it, and the desire evolves due to the Light. These are two opposite forces, one of which influences the other. Therefore, the Light develops the desire until it begins to feel and understand itself, as well as to feel the root and understand it. This is how matter develops.

From where do we come to enter into this world? We come from matter, which consequently represents electrons, protons, neutrons, and positrons, which begin to connect with each other in an ever more complex manner.

This connection forms matter, which suddenly begins to move and to feel on its own–what is good or bad for it,  what to draw closer to and what to distance itself from.

It begins to think what is to its benefit and what isn’t and it therefore begins to make plans. It has already gained a sensation of the past, present, and future. It remembers the past and foresees the future.

All this is formed from parts of matter due to the fact that they unite with each other, forming more complex parts. However, what does it mean to “unite?” In this unification, matter receives a quality of the Light, since otherwise it is incapable of uniting.

It turns out that there is a desire to receive pleasure in the form of enormous or microscopic masses of matter, right down to elementary particles, which are studied by quantum physics.

However, unification between them is possible only with the force of bestowal in addition to the force of reception. Then a quality of the Light enters the matter, and this matter begins to consist of itself and its opposite.

From these two opposite qualities being joined together, a sensation of “I” and “the Creator,” emerges, which is a sensation of the receiver and the giver, the past and the future, the good and the bad. This is how matter begins to perfect itself and perceive the reality that surrounds it.

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A question I received: How can you aspire for the spiritual, something you’ve never experienced?

My Answer: The spiritual Reshimot (reminiscences) surface inside of us, and they are the only reason we aspire for anything at all. Let’s say that I tell you that I’ve eaten an exceptionally delicious dish in Mexico.

How can I stir your desire and entice you enough for you to spend a thousand dollars to fly to Mexico and then another thousand dollars for the meal? It must stir your desire enough for you to forget your work and your family and to do everything you can just to taste that same taste. I can fill your ears with that message and broadcast it through the radio and TV. Everyone you know would ask you, “Come on, haven’t you tasted it yet?” It would spark envy and pride in you that would force you to follow suit.

That’s the purpose of the group. If a person has only a small desire for spiritual development and revelation of the Creator, he plants himself in the right environment. The environment in turn inflates the desire he feels in his point in the heart, enough to evoke the Upper Light, the Ohr Makif that opens the Upper World to him.

Such is our nature. We can’t say “no” to the influence of the environment. Baal HaSulam writes: “I don’t dress the way I want to, I don’t eat what I want, the society decides everything for me.” Therefore, success in the spiritual path is determined by the environment, which is the books, the group and the teacher.

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A question I received: I simply don’t understand what the meaning of life is. I understand that maybe you can think up a meaning yourself. I can also do this but I won’t believe it. For now, I don’t understand what I should strive for. I don’t know what I can do or what direction to take.

Yes, it is possible to change, to develop, to realize oneself, to become like the Creator…but, what for? How can one strive to become similar to someone who you do not know?

My Answer: If you don’t have this need, you can relax. This means that you are not yet ready for Kabbalah. When the need arises, you can come back to it! The study of Kabbalah is for those who ask about the meaning of life, have not been able to find the answer and who cannot exist without finding it!

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A question I received: Would you be kind enough to explain the reason that the Creator created us in this form, with only the will to receive. Why do we have to go through this process at all? Why couldn’t we be created more like the Creator? Doesn’t the whole creation look like a game to you?

My Answer: You are perfectly right: the whole of creation is the Creator’s game with which he plays with His creation! The purpose of creating us in a quality that is opposite to the Creator is exactly for us to remain creatures that are different from Him, so that when we attain Him and become equal to Him, we will not vanish into Him.

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Revelation is an upshot of concealment, just as fire is born from the wick of a candle. A person experiences a great deal of concealment on his or her path. And this concealment is necessary, as an oil in which a wick is immersed, the very oil that feeds the wick and allows the lamp to light up. But the light and the wick don’t have fuel to burn, only the oil (desire) does.

The oil, however, can’t burn on its own – it needs the “means of revelation.” Darkness, evil and the burdening of the heart that a person feels on his spiritual path, all remain. But not a moment is wasted: all of our efforts throughout the period of the Upper World’s concealment accumulate and create a body, like the oil in a lamp or the wax of a candle. When enough oil, or enough desires for the revelation of the Creator are gathered, then the wick appears together with a spark of fire.

The greater the concealment, the tenser a person becomes when awaiting to reach revelation, and the hotter the flame of revelation that will arise. After all, from Above we receive only the spark with which to light the wick. But the burning of the wick does not come from Above; it’s the Reflected Light (Ohr Hozer) that rises from the burning oil.

The Creator just supplies one spark that Lights a person, provided that this person is ready for the Creator’s revelation. Then a person is lit like a candle, and the flame nurtures the oil of disappointments and searches – the states that he went through while in concealment.

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A question I received: According to Kabbalah, we can’t correct ourselves. We have to place ourselves under the influence of the Upper Light. Also, there is no way we could feel the Upper Light. So, in order to place ourselves under the influence of the Light, we have to believe that it exists! Does this mean that at the initial stage (before the Machsom), Kabbalah is a faith and later, after the Machsom, it turns into science?

My Answer: Not exactly, because what incites you to study Kabbalah is not faith or someone’s persuasion, but your desire, the point in the heart that you feel compelled to fulfill. Therefore, it is similar to how you advance in any other science before you have mastered it. You do not have to believe; you have to know. This is what the Creator demands: “All will know Me, from the least of them to the greatest.” The revelation of the Creator is necessary to both man and the Creator.

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A question I received: What is prayer (MAN)? Is it our desires that we raise to the Upper Level? How do our desires develop until they become ripe for the Upper Level to hear them?

My Answer: We develop our sensitivity and internal recognition of our desires. The spiritual world is not quantitative, but strictly qualitative. It only seems to us that in order to rise from one level to the next, we have to become stronger, but in reality, what has to become stronger is our scrutiny and sensitivity.

We have to become more perceptive and work on ourselves with “fine tweezers.” Real strength lies in being able to go ever deeper inside yourself in order to distinguish and classify more and more qualities within. This is how you grow: by developing your sensations and your analysis of them.

In our world, a baby grows in size according the number of pounds he gains. However, we do not evaluate his intellect according to the number of pounds he weighs, but according to the skills and qualities he has acquired. We evaluate how smart he is by what he is able to understand and do.

The spiritual world is built inside us by the Light. The Light descends upon us during the study of the Upper World and builds new qualities inside us. In the place where you felt nothing before, you now begin to perceive various new qualities and phenomena. When we read descriptions of the spiritual world, we don’t understand anything, similar to a cat that hears classical music and perceives it as mere noise. At times, we listen to the lesson while hardly being able to keep our eyes open.

But it is precisely in such semi-conscious states that the Surrounding Light (Ohr Makif) influences us.

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A question I received: From studying Kabbalah, I have come to understand that the external problems are there to pressure me and compel me to shift from analyzing things externally to internally, because all the original causes, roots and “orders” come from there. I have to find out what happens inside me in order to know why I am suffering. But is it the question: “What is the meaning of my life?” that compels me to look inside myself and find out what is hidden there?

My Answer: Yes, and this is exactly what is happening today to people all over the world. Gradually, the focus, concentration, attention, and views of the whole world are starting to shift in this direction. Meanwhile, people are not even aware of this. Over the recent decades, we have gradually turned away from this world and begun looking inside ourselves instead. This is the trend in our generation. It is also the reason why more and more people are becoming interested in Kabbalah, because only it enables one to reveal the inner roots and causes of everything in a scientific and methodical way.

To do this, we must make a realistic analysis of the situation and attain new qualities, inside of which we will be able to reveal a new reality. We have to change our view from external to internal, and then we will see and understand that a person contains all the roots and original causes of everything within. Only by having this scientific and practical approach will we gain the ability to control everything that happens to us.

We will then be able to change our situation and even the entire world, because by changing our qualities, we acquire a new perception and a new reality. It’s as if we transfer ourselves from one world to another.

If, however, we study the external world that surrounds us, we will only be able to make minor changes on the still, vegetative and animate levels of nature. But we will always find that these changes end up harming us. And this, too, happens with the purpose of directing us inward. When we begin to change ourselves internally, we will cause real, qualitative changes in our life.

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A question I received: You often mention that everyone has to attain the quality of bestowal. But when someone’s giving, it means that someone else is receiving, doesn’t it?

My Answer: Yes, but the person that receives does so in order to give, in order to please the giver with his reception. The balance you speak of remains, but on another level, free of reception.

I am taking from you because my action gives you the opportunity to show your love to me. In that case, my response is not called reception, since I am doing it for your sake.

The spiritual system works according to the principle where you don’t receive anything from anyone; all you can do is give. You give to everyone. You fulfill them and they are pleased to receive from you, because that way they can demonstrate their quality of bestowal to you. When a person receives in this case, he is actually giving. That is to say, he offers others an opportunity to give to him.

In our egoistic world, family members who love one another can establish a similar kind of relationship, where each one indulges the other by acting the way the other one wants.

But that’s still a small, animate level. In the spiritual world, however, such relationships make us similar to the Creator, because we bestow and are able to boundlessly receive from others in a reciprocal relationship.

Then each one of us and all of us together become “conductors” of endless information and energy through the entire creation.

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