Question: What is special about The Book of Zohar?

Answer: First, it is special since Kabbalists wrote it.

Humanity climbed down from the trees and began to evolve until the first eruption of the ego during the time of ancient Babylon. Then the method of correction was revealed in this first egoistic wave. Because people couldn’t overcome the great ego by themselves, they began to look for means to do so and found the wisdom of Kabbalah that enables a person to overcome the evil inclination through connection.

Those who began to use this method in order to correct themselves are called “Israel” which means Yashar—El, “straight to the upper” (ISRA-EL).

In the meantime, the ego continued to grow even more and all the other nations went on as usual.

Then the ego grew in the Israeli nation and as a result they went down to Egypt. Some went a bit further down, and others received the Torah in order to overcome the separation. It is about the same Kabbalistic method, and the difference is that now it is adapted to the great ego that was revealed in Egypt, which is already specified and divided into different strange desires that have to be corrected under different conditions, in different events, connections, etc. In order to go through this process we need a method called “Torah.”

Abraham’s work in Babylon was easier if we may say: to rise above the ego to the Creator (Boreh) in love and connection and to do what is good for others, for strangers, since the ego wasn’t specified then.

Abraham gave the rest of the world religions (Dat).

By that he paved two paths, but the difference between them wasn’t so big yet. Yes, these are two opposite attributes, in order to receive and in order to bestow, but in a rather minor “thickness” of the desire.

On one hand, a great ego called “Pharaoh” was indeed revealed in Egypt, and on top of it everything that is in a person, everything he is made of internally: attributes, discernments, thoughts, and desires. This means that in the time of Moses (Moshe) the crisis of the shattered soul was revealed (Neshama), which was unknown before. This is already a totally different level and so accordingly the Torah was revealed.

Later as the ego grew, the children of Israel built the first Temple with the help of the Torah and by that attained their end of correction. After the destruction of the Temple they built the second Temple and then the long descent began.

Here, before the end of the descent, The Book of Zohar was written. On one hand, great discernments of the previous level were still kept here, but on the other hand, the last level of the ego began to appear. Therefore the authors of The Zohar relied on all the 125 degrees with regard to the destruction and with regard to the attainment.

This is why The Book of Zohar is very special: It includes all the Light that will be revealed in our times on the background of the biggest ego that will bring us to the complete end of correction. The Book of Zohar symbolizes this state and tells us about all the states of the end of correction. These are the states Rabbi Shimon’s son Rabbi Elazar especially speaks about.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/16/13, Writings of Rabash

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The Book of Zohar, Weekly Torah Portion, “HaShavuah” Selected Excerpts

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When we move toward correcting ourselves, all our intentions must be oriented to unity, and none of them can be of a personal nature. Our points in the heart are the only personal thing we have. What can this point in the heart worry about except reaching unity with the rest of our collective body from which it will eventually receive spirituality?

That’s why our attempts to join our collective body reveal to us its various forms and characteristics that we read about in the Torah: Pharaoh, an angel, Moshe, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and many others. Who are they? They are the images that all of humankind, the group, and the world acquire to the degree of their attainment.

The picture described in the Torah is a form of the general soul that constantly changes and reveals itself in a new shape. However, it discloses only on condition that we continually aspire to unity. The Book of Zohar speaks about it. Each word and every line of The Book of Zohar represent an in-depth, gradual revelation that goes on until it fully discloses itself to “the eyes of all of Israel.” It’s not an accident that these words are the final phrase of the Torah.

We only reveal spiritual forms when we are connected.
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From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/1/13, The Zohar

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The Book of Zohar, Weekly Torah Portion, “HaShavuah” Selected Excerpts

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Baal HaSulam, Shamati, Article 38, “The Fear of God is His Treasure”: Our sages said, “Everything is in the hands of God except the fear of God,” because He can give everything except fear. This is because what the Creator gives is more love not fear.

Our goal is to reach adhesion with the Creator. Adhesion is attained by equivalence of form. Equivalence of form is attained by reaching the love of God, to the same extent the Creator does.

This means that we must attain love. The Creator constantly adds to this love on His part and as a result we feel that we are advancing by the path of suffering because we don’t add anything on our part.

In order to reach love a person has to build his spiritual vessel called “fear“, fear that he may not feel love towards the Creator.

In order to attain this fear, a person needs the Torah, the Light that Reforms, Mitzvot (commandments), and the right intention to fulfill them. Otherwise he will remain on the level of the still nature. He needs the environment to remind him of the right intention during the study of the Torah and Mitzvot, so that others will hold him in the right intention and won’t let him forget the Creator’s good. So the Torah and Mitzvot were not given to an individual but to many, and everywhere it says “You” in the plural sense and not in the singular meaning.

It’s impossible to advance without the intention to attain the Creator, the love for Him. This must be the reason with which everything begins and which obligates all the actions.
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From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/27/12

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Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot,” Item 102: This is why it is written that all who learn Torah Lo Lishma, their Torah becomes a potion of death for them. Not only do they not emerge from concealment of the face to disclosure of the face, since they did not set their minds to labor and attain it, the Torah that they accumulate greatly increases their concealment of the face. Finally, they fall into concealment within concealment, which is considered death, being completely detached from one’s root.

This is what happens if a person doesn’t make an effort through the environment, through the study and all the means he has, in order to reach the revelation of the Creator, which means to discover the attribute of bestowal and love of others inside him, in order to arrive through the love of the created beings to the love of the Creator. He has to focus on that so that the result of his study will be the revelation of the attribute of bestowal upon others, no matter how artificial and meaningless it may seem to him at first and contrary to his own nature.

At first he refuses to hear about it and to agree to it. But if he returns to it time after time, despite all the obstacles, and performs all the requirements as required and determined by nature, by the Creator, as a result of the crisis, and all the other conditions that are revealed to him, he gradually agrees that the goal of the study is to reach self-negation.

It is a very special action, not the kind we imagine at the beginning of the way. But to the extent that the changes occur in us along the way, we discover new definitions each time, what—restriction, the other, connection, mutual guarantee, Creator, the attribute of bestowal and love, etc.—mean. We already begin to understand what “the potion of death” and the “potion of life” mean and why the Torah brings such opposite phenomena. Thus we gradually begin to clarify the right way and direction.

A person often falls into situations in which he does not see how wrong he is. But “what one’s mind doesn’t do, time does.” The only way out is to advance as “an ox to the burden and a donkey to the load,” to go on studying day after day as it says: “Do anything but leave!” He doesn’t understand what is happening: The ego is given to him from above and so are all the conditions he is in; everything is done by the upper force.

He exerts himself, does something, but so far he doesn’t understand what is going on. The main thing is not to leave, but to at least perform the simplest actions mechanically. If he can somehow carry on this way, then he should be happy that he manages to do at least this.

So we should respect anyone who makes efforts to go through each day and to participate as much as he can, as much as he is allowed from above. It is an essential condition to come to this place, to this state. Afterward there is already the work of clarification: Why, what for, what will I get from it, why am I participating in this, what is the desired outcome that I expect?

I have to learn from the example of Rabbi Shimon and his students since we want to connect and to be like them, to sit among them. They felt hatred or love toward one another. We have to reach these contrasting discernments.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/24/12, “The Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot”

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Question: Why can studying the Torah incorrectly be harmful, and even “the potion of death?”

Answer: The incorrect study of the Torah is the wrong use of the system that was designed to perform a gradual correction of the desire to receive. Instead, it draws the part that is meant to be corrected away from correction. Thus, it prolongs the way and fills it with sufferings, which brings the Creator, who loves us, a great deal of sorrow. Thus, this path is undesirable.

From the point of view of a person’s ego, this path is also undesirable since it brings about sufferings. But if we speak about the form of bestowal and value it with regard to the Creator, we have to see how much He suffers.

If we didn’t participate in the system of correction, but were corrected by it unconsciously, instinctively, like the still, vegetative, and animate nature, then there would not be reward and punishment for us. The system wouldn’t change with regard to us, but would push us in one direction by its rigid, absolute laws, like a train moving on a track.

But because a person is on a level that he himself participates in this process, he has to become more sensitive to the influence of the system on him. So he learns to understand this system and grows feelings towards it, which means towards the Creator who is on the other side of the system. “From Your actions we shall know You” and we connect to Him.

It is impossible to attain any discernment this way, not even the smallest one, if you don’t go incorrectly at first. The point is only that a person should constantly try incorrectly only in potential but not in practice.

It is said: “There isn’t a righteous in the land who did good and didn’t sin.” So the mistakes have already been prepared for me every step of the way, and I must sin. But I prepare myself, try, and am careful and afraid to sin, which means that I am afraid to break away from the feeling of “there is none else besides Him” who is “the good and the benevolent.” I am afraid that I will stop yearning for love and bestowal, that I won’t be able to rise above my desires, above my instinctive thoughts, which means above my animate level.

I need self-clarification, self-recognition; I constantly ride my donkey (hamor), my egoistic desire (homer) (which has the same root in Hebrew), and I compare what I feel and what the donkey thinks to what I would like to feel and how I would like to think. Thus I discover my donkey together with the human in me.

“God shall save man and beast,” and thus I advance. My mistakes bring me to my successes and help me advance. My mistakes and successes are revealed in me as the left and right lines. In this case, they are both legitimate and they complement one another correctly, since without mistakes, I wouldn’t discover new discernments and wouldn’t understand where I am.

I have to sin and to do Mitzvot (commandments), since there cannot be one without the other; everything begins from the recognition of evil. But it could be better if I discovered this evil in the Light. The Light comes and helps me see the dark, and not the darkness revealed first when I don’t understand that it is darkness and by a long path of suffering advance towards the Light.

This is why Kabbalists and the Torah give us advice as to how we should prepare ourselves for the right revelation of the sins, for the revelation of evil.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/24/12, “The Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot”

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The Book of Zohar, Weekly Torah Portion, “HaShavuah” Selected Excerpts

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Question: What does it mean that “by exerting yourself in the Torah, you are rewarded with the revelation of the Creator’s face?”

Answer: The Torah is the method for the correction of the evil inclination, as it says: “I have created the evil inclination, I have created the Torah as a spice,” I have also created the Torah as a means for its correction. I study in order to draw the Light that is concealed in the higher levels, the Light that Reforms that is in the Torah. After all, I hope that this Light will change me, that it will give me a new mind and a new heart, that everything will be so new that I won’t even recognize myself.

But the main thing about this new “me” is that the Creator will be revealed to me. This means that the force of love and bestowal will begin to control me. So in order to achieve this, I “exert myself in the Torah.” It isn’t in order to receive abstract knowledge but because I want to connect to the material that I study. To “know” means to arrange the connection.

Then the power of bestowal and love is revealed in me, meaning the Creator’s attribute through which I know Him, as it says, “from Your actions we shall know you.” We don’t know His actual essence, as we don’t know the essence of electricity, our own essence, or the essence of the air. We only know our impressions from these phenomena, which we call “electricity,” “air,” “the world around us.”

So the upper force is called the “Creator” (Boreh), which means “come and see,” a certain attribute that is revealed in me. I call this form that is revealed in my desire to enjoy “Creator,” since I “came and saw” it. My goal was to bring Him contentment by this revelation.

“To exert in the Torah” means to do everything in your power when you fulfill the Kabbalists’ advice: to study and to work in the group. The action itself is to gather the group and to organize the study in it. Everything else belongs to the intention. All this is called “exerting in the Torah,” according to the rules: “Don’t do unto your friend what is hateful to you,” and then “Love thy friend as thyself,” in order to reach the love of the Creator.

These principles not only describe the study of the Torah, but also the direction the whole creation is moving toward, all of the upper worlds and our world including everything in it: humanity, the still, vegetative, and the animate nature. It isn’t just the Torah that someone studies, but the trend in which all of creation is developing.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/19/12, “The Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot”

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The Book of Zohar, Weekly Torah Portion, “Miketz” Selected Excerpts

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