Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 244

Should This Practice Become a Habit?

It will not become a habit, but rather something like a habit, with a habitual foundation. The habit is formed on a previous degree, and each time an opportunity is given to establish the point of connection with the Creator on a higher degree, where habit does not exist.

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Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 243

What Does It Mean to Build an Inner and Outer System?

An inner system and an outer system need to be built so that our highest thought will be that we are connected with the Creator in every action, thought, and desire within us. How is this done? Through a thought, a desire, an action, or an activity on any level whatsoever.

How can we maintain this all the time? It is very difficult but possible only after the Creator illuminates it for us. However, we can aspire to remain in it constantly, and this is called giving the measure of exertion required by the Creator in order to open our eyes so that we may see Him. How can these exercises be practiced as frequently as possible? How can we return to the connection the very moment it disappears, without wasting time? For this purpose, both inner and outer preparation are necessary.

Inner preparation is constant reflection on this, to the extent that we are capable. Inner preparation is a kind of internal exercise. Outer preparation is to ensure that there are various signs around us that remind us whenever the connection has been severed. Every few minutes, there should be some kind of “gong,” something that awakens and shakes us, reminding us of this. The problem is that we are built in such a way that if we hear a gong every few minutes, we begin to ignore it and eventually no longer hear it. We forget what that gong was supposed to remind us of.

It is exactly like reading an article impatiently, wanting to move on. The reason for reading the article is forgotten. We need to constantly create signs for ourselves, seek supports (which is called giving the measure of exertion), that will return us to the point of connection with the Creator through some external sign.

Inner and outer practice enable us to reach the required measure of exertion. Through these repeated entries into the connection with the Creator, through returning again and again to that point, in all kinds of thoughts, actions, and desires, in all kinds of ways, we continually press on that point. On page 70 of the book Pri Hacham—Letters, this is called desiring the same woman, in the same place, at the same time, until time itself brings the person Kedusha (holiness). That is, until it is opened to him and he enters spirituality.

The message that Baal HaSulam conveys there is that we should revolve around this point all day and all night. He writes there that a person desires connection with the Creator the way a lustful man desires only that love, and is blind to everything else. All of Baal HaSulam’s examples are taken from physical, animalistic life because they teach us from the plane on which we currently exist.

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Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 242

What Can We Do to Prefer the Connection with the Creator at All Times?

We need to constantly understand that, apart from the connection with the Creator, everything else—good and bad feelings, good and bad events, everything that happens—is intended to strengthen our connection with Him. At the higher degree, we need to remain constantly aware and at the very heart of the search for a connection with the Creator, holding on to that point. We must know that everything happening is intended to add more to that connection with Him. In order to maintain this, we must build both an inner and an outer system.

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Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 241

Can the Connection with the Creator Be Strengthened Without Suffering? How Can We Be Connected with Him Only Through Goodness?

It seems that through suffering, we at least remember the Creator. It is worth understanding that our suffering is sent to us by the Creator, and through it we feel the Creator. The suffering is intended for this purpose, but it is not the goal. The goal is not to feel the Creator through suffering, but to feel the Creator through adhesion, through closeness.

The Creator reminds us of Himself through what is called the “path of suffering.” Through suffering, He reminds us how much we need Him. However, what happens after we realize we need Him? If we tell ourselves that it is worthwhile to suffer so as not to forget the Creator, it is the Klipot that are telling us this, leaving us in suffering. The situation can be described as the Creator reminding us of Himself through suffering. This is His tool, i.e., the Creator has placed a thorn in us, and we remember Him. But what do we think? Do we think that the Creator does us harm, and we remain with that thought? Is that the kind of connection we should remain in?

We are now in the system of the Klipa, which, through this connection and through our agreement to remain in suffering, draws nourishment from us and grows stronger. For what is a Klipa? It is the evil that we feel as coming from the Creator, and this is precisely the opposite of what we should feel. So how can we convince ourselves, while we are under the domain of the Klipot, to feel goodness and delight from the Creator? How can we reject the connection with the Creator through evil and instead be with Him in equivalence, in adhesion and connection, through a common joy?

Pain cannot be shared. Even the Klipa states, “Just as the Shechina is in sorrow, so am I in sorrow,” as though it aspires to elevate us even higher along the left line. Therefore, we must seek a connection that corresponds to the Creator’s qualities, because according to such qualities, it is impossible for us to remain in evil.

Then we seek how to bring pleasure to the Creator. Our suffering gives no pleasure to the Creator, and we try to rid ourselves of that feeling of sorrow. However, in the next moment, the Klipa once again throws us into sorrow, and we forget the joy. From one moment to the next, everything is erased, and this is called a “slingshot,” when we are tossed from side to side.

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Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 240

Does Suffering Return Our Thoughts to the Creator?

Indeed it does, and that is why the Creator gives suffering. Otherwise, we would simply drift about in our own worlds and forget everything and everyone. The Creator uses suffering as a tool to awaken us.

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Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 239

Why Will the Body’s Resistance Be Removed If It Is Actually a Necessary Part of the Process?

The body’s resistance does not disappear simply by saying that everything is for the best. By saying this, we are, as it were, making a restriction. We do not want to receive only the body. Instead, we want to receive it together with the Creator’s qualities that are positioned opposite it, so that we, the Creator, and His entire method exist together. Then we derive benefit from that state.

We attain nothing by sinking solely into resistance and negative qualities when nothing stands opposite them. Sometimes it seems that great suffering brings results, but this is untrue. There is no commandment to suffer even for a single second. Suffering is a problem of the body, of the Klipot (shells/peels), which constantly confuse and mislead us into thinking that through suffering we manage to attain something.

The statement, “It is a great Mitzva to be in joy,” is absolutely true. The moment we can move into joy, we should not think that we have not yet felt enough suffering, that we must still sink deeper into suffering, into the depths of the evil inclination, into the depths of creation. Nothing is attained from the evil inclination or from suffering.

One should rejoice and not judge joy as frivolity. If, in the face of suffering, we immediately move into joy, that is not frivolity. In any case, suffering will soon return, and we will emerge from it once again, and so it goes, over and over. “And from Zion…,” i.e., from coming out of suffering, “shall come forth Torah.” Otherwise, we bring about destruction.

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Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 238

How Should We Relate to the Various States?

First, we accept the state that comes, observe it, and want to examine it within ourselves, without judging whether it has done us good or bad. We examine it from within the recognition that everything the Creator does, He does for good. We give it a place from the knowledge that it has come to correct us, even if it is so difficult that “a sharp sword rests upon my neck.” We must not despair or drown in self-pity. Everything is a correction.

Naturally, it is not always easy to accept states in such a way. But after we have related to them in this manner once, there will be moments when we feel incapable, filled with resistance and a desire for destruction, and then, upon second thought, we will begin to relate to the state correctly. The resistance will disappear the moment we remember that the state is intended to correct us, and from there we must move on to the third state, “There is none else besides Him.” From within that state, through the sorrow and pain, we will begin to discover “There is none else besides Him,” and will immediately arrive at sweetness, i.e., at the sweetening of the judgments.

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Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 237

Why Do New Discernments Give Us a Familiar Feeling?

New discernments are seemingly new, but when we examine the way they are expressed, we see that the words are the same familiar words. In the wisdom of Kabbalah, we learn that all of reality consists of only the original ten Sefirot. There is nothing beyond that. The worlds and the souls are within them. Everything exists in the ten Sefirot. The difference lies in the way these new discernments cause us to feel those ten Sefirot, which is different and deeper. The depth of their perception consists of 125 degrees.

We are still before degree zero of attainment. Also, even before we begin to attain the ten Sefirot, before the barrier, there are steps and discernments. However, in principle, the picture is the same, as we learn in Kabbalah, that all the worlds are built according to the same pattern: five Partzufim and ten Sefirot. That is, everything is the same, and we repeat the same thing. A three- or four-year-old child learning to read the Torah and a Kabbalist such as Rabbi Shimon read the same Torah, but each understands different layers of it.

What does a child reading the Torah say to his or her mother? “Mom, look, Abraham wanted to kill Isaac.” That is how he understood the Torah. A Kabbalist, however, knows the correction that the Torah describes in the case of Abraham and Isaac, a correction entirely above this world, and attains it, sees it through spiritual forces, through an eternal vision. Yet the expression is in the same letters and words.

When we begin to study, we discover that we see new things in the study material each time. Suppose students are sitting in a lesson and reading an article with their Kabbalist teacher. Afterward, one of the students asks the teacher about the meaning of the text. How does the Kabbalist know something beyond what they know? It is because the Kabbalist sees additional depths in the article that are hidden from the students’ eyes. The Kabbalist cannot convey to the student what the Kabbalist feels, but explains what he sees in different words.

For the students, the article is revealed only to a certain depth. For the Kabbalist, it reveals deeper layers, and there are those to whom nothing will be revealed. They will read the article and there will be no response in their hearts because they still have no spiritual vessel. Among the students, such a vessel is already beginning to form. So what is the difference between the student and the Kabbalist? The difference is that when the Kabbalist explains something to the student, he gives him a little illumination from the depth in which he himself resides, bringing it up to the level where the student is. In other words, the Kabbalist adds additional light of his own to the surrounding light that the student awakens during the study.

A group can also add light. In a group, each person understands according to a certain depth, greater than that of a person who does not study the wisdom of Kabbalah. Therefore, when they study together with the intention of sharing everything with each other, all of their surrounding lights unite and act upon everyone. From this, we can understand what a powerful amplifier of spiritual force the group is.

It does not matter that there are differences in knowledge among the people in the group, nor does it matter if there is a Kabbalist among them and everyone else knows less than the Kabbalist. The differences stem from the fact that each person has a unique character and a unique root of the soul. Yet even the Kabbalist benefits from this integration and receives an addition from it. There are things that the Kabbalist will be unable to understand without certain friends in the group, each of whom brings something uniquely their own.

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Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 236

How Can We Understand the States We Undergo?

We do not know why or in what sequence various states are imposed upon us. In fact, we have no idea how we exist at all. We are like babies who are unaware of the purpose of our lives. We want various things, and certain things are given to us. That is, we are given all kinds of desires and impulses from within, changing qualities, environmental conditions that change from time to time, and we thus continue to exist, flowing onward.

This is how each of us rolls along, carried by the current of life, and it only seems to us that we determine or control something. It is simply untrue, an absolute falsehood.

So why were we given intellect and thought? It was in order to seek the one thing worth holding on to, to learn what is happening to us, and this learning should bring us to conclusions that are called “recognition of evil.” There is no need for us to oppose anything. We should not force anything because that would be in vain. We only need to pay a little attention to what the Creator is doing with us, and from this we begin to understand who we are, who the Creator is, what the Creator wants, why He arranges things for us in such a way, and with what subtle cunning He does so.

Through this, we gradually come to know nature. The wisdom of Kabbalah is the study of nature in its broadest form, including the world of causes, where everything that happens here is prepared and made ready. This world of causes subsequently includes our nature, ourselves, and our environment. We learn the overall reality through ourselves, through self-study: “From Your actions we know You”; “From my flesh I shall behold God.”

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Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 235

How Can We Remember the Correct Thought During the Study?

This requires preparation. During the study itself, we certainly cannot suddenly remember the correct thought unless we had already intended it beforehand. This is because we already know, from trying and failing several times, that during the study we are unable to direct ourselves properly.

Then we begin to worry: “Today as well as tomorrow I will sit here without benefit, so what will come of it?” Before the study, we already begin thinking about what will happen to us during the study. This concern before the study prepares us to think correctly during the study.

This is possible if we simply train ourselves to do so. It does not happen quickly. We need to do many things in a very unsophisticated way, simply, like “an ox to the load and a donkey to the burden.”

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