Preparation to the Lesson

Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot, (Starting with: “However there is no doubt”), Item 12, Lesson 5

The Book of Zohar – Selected Excerpt, Parashat “Emor,” Item 88, Lesson 7

Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol 3, Part 8, “Ohr Pnimi,” Item 52, Lesson 34

“The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah“

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Preparation to the Lesson

Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot, Item 11, Lesson 4

The Book of Zohar – Selected Excerpt, Parashat “Emor,” Item 71, Lesson 6

Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol 3, Part 8, Item 48, Lesson 33

“The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah“

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Preparation to the Lesson

Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot, Item 8, Lesson 3

The Book of Zohar – Selected Excerpt, Parashat “Emor,” Item 61, Lesson 5

Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol 3, Part 8, “Ohr Pnimi,” (Starting with: “Now you can understand”),  Lesson 32

Acting Workshop “Build a Home”

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The Book of Zohar, Weekly Torah Portion, “Ha-Shavua” Selected Excerpts

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Preparation to the Lesson

Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot, Lesson 2

The Book of Zohar – Selected Excerpts, Lesson 4

Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol 3, Part 8, Item 47, Lesson 31

“The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah”

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Preparation to the Lesson

Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot, Item 1

The Book of Zohar – Selected Excerpt, Parashat “Emor,” Item 5, Lesson 3

Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol 3, Part 8, “Ohr Pnimi,” (Starting with: “It is written, ‘These two bottom'”), Item 45, Lesson 30

Writings of Baal HaSulam “Pri Chacham al-a-Torah”

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Preparation to the Lesson

Shamati #40 “Faith in the Rav, What Is the Measure“

The Book of Zohar – Selected Excerpt, Parashat “Emor,” Item 5, Lesson 2

Preface to The Book of Zohar, Item 40, Lesson 30 

Shamati #115 “Still, Vegetative, Animate, and Speaking“

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Question: How do we turn the vessels of receiving into vessels of bestowal?

Answer: We create a variety of different forms from metals. We make gears, grilles, bars, etc. We also work with the desire to receive according to the same principle, although it will never bestow itself. In Kabbalistic terms “vessels of bestowal” are vessels of receiving that can bestow when they operate in a special way. In other words, they take on a special form. After all, they cannot do anything but receive.

So receiving is improved to such an extent that it will become like bestowal.

Today, whether I like it or not, my intention remains egoistic. In order to correct it I need a special external force. To do this, we study in order to evoke it.

I cannot change anything by myself, and so I don’t worry about my desires; they will develop according to the plan. I don’t have to worry about whether my vessels are full and if they are what there is in them and how much. Here everything is fine, and I am only concerned about the intention, about aiming my thoughts. I differentiate between the action and the intention and only in my intention am I constantly adhered to the goal. As long as I keep the same focus, no matter what I do—I am corrected and everything is fine with me. This is why it says that a person is where his thoughts are.

100% of an intention to bestow ensures me 100% of correction. It is the intention that counts and not the action. So even if I steal and destroy, I steal and destroy parts of my egoistic desire in order to perform acts of bestowal. A person is not responsible for his actions; it is the intention that determines everything.

The problem is that when we look at one another, we see actions and not intentions. But this problem brings us to correction. I have to rise to the height of mutual connection in order to judge others according to their intentions and not their actions. This obligates us to be Kabbalists. There is no other choice; otherwise we cannot connect correctly. The disasters are increasing, so where is my influence on the upper?

Question: If the intention is the same form that is dressed on the matter of the desire, how do we correct it?

Answer: With the help of the Light that Reforms. We try to act in bestowal, we try to connect and our failures reveal the need for the Light.

After all, there is a part of Galgalta ve Eynaim (GE) in every person. As a result, some people are drawn to the Light, and this attraction is revealed in them when the question “What is the meaning of life?” arises. They want to know, to discover the secret of life. Such people are especially egoistic. They are very far from being nice and they are even quite disgusting and don’t care about this world at all. They disrespect it and are not satisfied with its “nonsense.” In short, people who are not nice at all reach the wisdom of Kabbalah. After all, a great desire suppresses small desires. Eventually, a person burns because of one thing only; he wants to know why he should go on living.

Other than that he can be worried about high philosophical questions like: “What is the universe? Why does all this exist?” in other words, he feels that it is crowded here and he cannot stand it.

All this is caused by the part of GE that has awakened and is in AHP in the meantime, increasing it and pushing a person to search, forcing him to open himself to everything, trying to “swallow” all of reality, including the Creator.

Then, thanks to his actions in the group and the study, a person begins to appreciate and to sort out all these phenomena correctly and then he comes closer to correction.

In addition, it depends on the root of his soul, on the quality of his GE. Someone may yearn for general, global knowledge according to his Reshimot (informational genes). After all, certain Reshimot were very high once, and fell so deep that they require much work. Such people don’t succeed immediately, but after decades, they ascend accordingly while others don’t.

In any case, “He who is greater than his friend, his desire is even greater.” This is what the number of actions of correction he has to perform depends on.

But in any case, parts of GE and AHP are initially in everyone, including the nations of the world. After all, we have all been through the shattering including in ancient Babel. Then too the crisis was revealed as it is today, and as a result, only a small group came out of the crowd—the nation of Israel. Now when all the other “Babylonians” are suffering, having no choice, they will have to correct themselves together with this small group in order to finally leave Babel. Then everyone will be called “Israel,” which means “straight to the Creator” (Yashar—El).

It isn’t about a nation but about resembling the Creator. The difference is the order of things: Someone begins the process and someone continues. Each one does his share, and eventually everyone corrects the shattering of Babel.
[92001]
From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/02/12, The Zohar

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During these days, I am constantly asked questions about the hurricane Sandy that hit the east coast of America. Everyone wants to hear the answer as to why it happened and how we should look at it.

Baal HaSulam writes about this clearly and openly: We are in a single system of Nature and have come to the state in our development when it can no longer tolerate us. As soon as this system begins to show itself as integral, “round,” as soon as overall interdependence is manifested, we must behave accordingly. Otherwise disasters become much more qualitative because they originate not from the animate, but from the human degree.

In the course of history, we were evolving on the still, vegetative, and animate levels. Our egoism was growing, sometimes stronger, sometimes weaker, but more recently at an exponential rate until it has become satiated and “round.” So far, everything went as usual: The more egoistic a person was, the more he could earn and succeed. We thought that this trend would last forever. We were so obsessed with this idea that it obscured the limits of natural resources from us.

However today, when Nature shows itself as “round,” requiring us to become “round” as well, we have found ourselves in a completely different situation. Now it’s not enough to simply reduce our ego and be polite with each other. Today, we have to unite.

We are talking about a very different quality of relationships. If in the past, humanity could bend its ego slightly during wars and disasters, today it won’t help. We need an entirely new unity, and it can come only with the help of the Returning Light because this unity is against our egoistic nature and thus does not arise by itself. So, if our actions don’t help at least indirectly to bring the Reforming Light, then they bring only harm and misery.

Here we see the task of the people of Israel. It possesses the method of Kabbalah—the only means of attracting the Light that allows all of humanity to unite. This is a truly fateful, decisive situation. Today, humanity needs only the Reforming Light. If it doesn’t begin to integrate, it will cause disasters much worse than Sandy.

And the people of Israel are responsible for this. It determines the way forward. If it doesn’t have time to form itself into a connecting link between humanity and the Reforming Light, if it doesn’t carry out the task of Galgalta ve Eynaim, if it doesn’t become a “mediator,” then all evil can turn against it.

Therefore, from a selfish point of view and from the standpoint of the purpose of creation, we must please the Creator. From His side, this means to do good to His creatures, and from our side, to do good to Him. Let’s hope that our studies will help bring the Reforming Light that will correct us and flow through us to all of humanity.
[92046]
From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson, The Zohar

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It says that the temple was destroyed because the children of Israel didn’t bless the Torah first. They studied the Torah without a blessing. What does that mean?

There are blessings in the Siddur, for example: “Blessed are You Lord, the giver of the Torah.” But what is the Torah? It is a means for correcting the evil inclination. It says: “I have created the evil inclination; I have created the Torah as a spice.”

How is it possible to bless the Torah? Only if there is such a deficiency when my initial inclination is revealed as evil. I feel that my desires are evil; I have to correct them, I can’t bear them. This is called the revelation of the true evil, when I cannot agree to it, when I have to get rid of it, to get it out of me as something that is very harmful.

Then I discover the means that can get these evil desires out of me, a special instrument that is called the Torah. It turns out that there is a special method for studying, a special book, special conditions, and all this is called the Torah. It isn’t the title of the book that says “Torah,” not the number of people, and not the place of study, but simply the fact that in answer to all my actions there comes a special force that changes the force that is inside me. It is because the desire to receive is actually the force by which I identify the evil and I want it to become good, as it says: “Since the Light in it reforms.”

So I determine that my desire to receive is the evil inclination and decide that I must make it good. What is “good?” It can only be the opposite of my current desire; there are no other options. Thus the concept of the Torah symbolizes my efforts, the group I work in, the books I study from, the teacher who teaches me this method. On the whole they are the ones who summon that force from Above that corrects me. “From Above,” since the force of correction is higher than me and stronger than the current force. Thus I acquire it and heal myself from the evil, which becomes good.

But if I study without this preparation, the Torah becomes the “potion of death” for me. In this case, I reach self-fulfillment by a long and difficult path. Along this path the Light also operates on me, but from its posterior and not in the desire that dresses and not in the desire that is dressed. I reach the recognition that I don’t discover evil the way I should, I don’t recognize the poison in it. This, of course, also leads me in the right direction, but along a long indirect path of sufferings.

So if a person is not in the direction of recognizing the evil, he is in “exile.” And when he recognizes the need to correct the evil in him, which means the desire to receive, he feels that he is under the domination of Pharaoh. The deeper this feeling is, the more he wants to get rid of the evil, which means to get out of “exile.” Then he uses the Torah correctly in order to draw the Light that changes the desire in him, which enables him to use the desire not for his own good but for the good of others. Thus the Light reforms him and changes him to the good.

As long as we don’t want to exit our desire to receive and enter the desire to bestow, from evil to the good, it isn’t considered exile. We don’t even feel that it is exile. Only the need for a means to turn the desire to receive into a desire to bestow indicates that we are ready to leave the exile. The exodus itself is that we begin to use the Torah correctly.

This is what we have to aim at while reading The Book of Zohar: Do we open it with the right deficiency? If not, then we don’t bless this action, but simply follow a timetable. This is a wrong and undesirable approach. We have to think about it the whole day before the lesson, to add the discernments that stem from different states, from the desire to receive that dominates us, into one picture. We want to ascend above it towards the friends, towards the Creator.

Then we will have something to bless in the morning lesson since we want to receive “the water of life” from the study, the healing force, and this means that we are truly studying the Torah.
[91966]
From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/01/12, The Zohar

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