Question: What do we have to do so The Zohar will find its way into the deepest recesses of the heart, into our desires and thoughts?

Answer: Open your heart. Nothing else is needed. The most important thing is not to despair and not to relax, and to make efforts precisely when the going gets rough. The article “Donkey Driver” in the Introduction of The Zohar is exactly the place where it explains that when you are walking along and your “donkey” (in Hebrew “donkey” is “Hamor,” originating from the word “Homer,” matter, the will to enjoy) can no longer carry its burden, you are sent a “donkey driver” that helps your “donkey” to ascend.

This driver stings the “donkey” with a sharp stick and it’s unpleasant. However, it makes you move forward. Therefore, if you agree to have a driver like that, you will receive him. But you have to ask for these “stings.”

Question: I know how to ask for good things, but how can I ask for the “stings” of the donkey driver?

Answer: If I don’t identify myself with my ego and want to be liberated from it, then I think the opposite: The more “stings” it receives, the more able I am to distance myself from it, to run away from it and ascend above it.

These “stings” do not wound me, but my ego. If I separate and detach from it, then we are separated by a distance and I therefore do not feel the “sting” that passes over it. The sting comes only in order for me to part with my ego. Then I don’t perceive these blows as happening to me, but to my “Pharaoh,” and in the meantime I ascend.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/9/11, The Zohar

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Writings of Rabash, Shlavei HaSulam, “What Are the Powers Which Are Needed for the Work”
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The Book of Zohar — Introduction: “Yitro (Jethro),” “You Will Behold the Secret of the Lines in the Palms,” Item 154, Lesson 7
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The Book of Zohar — Introduction: “The Donkey Driver,” Lesson 1
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Talmud Eser Sefirot 3, Part 8, Item 52, Lesson 29
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Writings of Baal HaSulam “The Wisdom of Kabbalah and Philosophy,” Lesson 10
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The key to reading The Book of Zohar is intention since while reading it we draw the greatest Light, if we know how to do it. Of all Kabbalistic writings, none contains a greater Light than The Book of Zohar. That is why this book gained such great fame and popularity over the course of history, and why it was hidden and underwent many fateful events.

It is becoming revealed only today because it is the source of the Light that Reforms. Therefore, it doesn’t matter what exactly we read in The Book of Zohar at the moment because we do not understand a word of it correctly anyway. Yet, we aspire to penetrate through the image that is being described, to feel it rather than to understand it since we cannot comprehend it in our corporeal mind.

We strive to step into it, to unveil it. It is written by Kabbalists who attained the spiritual world and are sharing with us what they found there, just like an adventure novel that tells a story about travelers exploring new islands and continents. In a similar manner, Kabbalists tell us about the spiritual world. They describe what internal instruments they use to reveal spirituality, while also letting us know what they see and feel. In other words, they tell us about the actions they perform and what they find as a result.

On our part, we look, read, and listen to it although we do not understand any of it. Nevertheless, we are motivated to experience these states and live in them. As children, when we felt excited while reading adventure books, we experienced what the protagonists did in our imagination. On the other hand, in our case we actually enter the spiritual world and are able to feel it even more than how we perceive ourselves in this world. As a matter of fact, our present perception of this world is extremely distorted and blurred compared to what else is out there.

In spirituality, there is incredible clarity and transparency, which is impossible to imagine now, along with the deepest understanding of all the events and forces that stand behind us, including the causes, effects, and the source of all that occurs. This is what we should aspire to while reading The Book of Zohar. We should stop feeling like “old men” and instead feel like children who are absorbed in a book of exciting adventures.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/7/11, The Zohar

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Question: Is it possible to find one’s bearings in the upper world without knowing all these terms that The Zohar is using? Does knowing the upper world depend on understanding the terms?

Answer: It doesn’t matter in which language a person is reading The Zohar at the moment: a totally unfamiliar one, the language of branches, or any other. All these languages are not for us just yet. I don’t know what is being described.

If I am not familiar with some phenomenon, object, type of fulfillment, forces, spiritual states, or outcomes, and if I haven’t attained the spiritual state itself, you can describe it to me in thousands of words—it will not help me. What do these names and words matter to me then if I haven’t attained them?

Why then do Kabbalists write all these texts for us? They do so in order for us to not focus on the words themselves, but rather to strive to attain these spiritual states. Without attainment, none of these words has value. You may play with them as you please: It’s as if you toss them into a box, mix them up, and put them together however you wish.

If we don’t attain, all these texts are merely a Segula (a miraculous remedy) provided that you employ them as such. If not, you only entangle yourself. Therefore, we look at The Zohar’s text only inasmuch as we are able to think about its “miraculous property” during the reading. That is the key.

The Zohar does have chapters which are very difficult to focus on. I read about various faces and facial features, or palm lines, all of which really confuse me. But this is also good since I exert more effort in order to recognize spiritual properties behind these words.

Therefore, we must see in the text of The Zohar only its “miraculous force.” And the more entangled we get with it, the stronger it should encourage us to cleave to this “miraculous force” and demand the Light that Reforms so it will bring us attainment. After all, “Anything we do not attain, we do not define by a name and a word.” We won’t understand a word, and no name will ring a bell.
[31967]
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/6/2011, “Introduction of The Book of Zohar,” Article “Yitro (Jethro)”

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The Book of Zohar describes spiritual states experienced by those attaining the spiritual world. Yet, it describes spiritual objects in the words of our world. These words bring corporeal images to our mind. They arrange earthly pictures on our “will to receive,” our egoistic screen, through our corporeal properties.

In spirituality there are no words but only sensations. For this reason, Kabbalists borrowed the words of this world to describe the spiritual one and labeled with them the spiritual properties that they reached in their attainment.

Therefore, while reading The Book of Zohar, we should try to identify the upper forces, spiritual states, and relationships, which exist beyond material objects that we are accustomed to feeling behind these corporeal words. It is a very good and useful exercise.

Suppose we read the words “forehead,” “eyes,” “ears,” and “hair” in the text. We have to try to immediately start thinking at least about the Sefirot (Keter, Hochma, Bina, Zeir Anpin, and Malchut), which relate to the corresponding parts of the Partzuf (“forehead,” “ears,” “nose,” “mouth,” GE and AHP).

“Hair” (Searot) is an excess of the Reflected Light that the Direct Light cannot clothe into, which results in the Reflected Light’s spilling over and out thereby forming the “hair” in a Partzuf. These are the Lights that expand in this manner from Above downward in the upper system, in Rosh of Arich Anpin and then in Zeir Anpin, and through all these multiple Partzufim, we receive the forces that awaken, transform, and fulfill us.

Therefore, in The Book of Zohar, we are studying this integral system of transformation of souls.
[31971]
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/6/2011, “Introduction of The Book of Zohar,” Article “Yitro (Jethro)”

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Question: Could you please explain all of these forms of connection that The Zohar is describing, or can you give an example? What is the easiest way to visualize them?

Answer: The Zohar describes the forms of connection between the souls: types (lion, ox, eagle, man), Sefirot (Gevurah, Hesed, Tifferet, Yesod), letters (Chaf, Zain, Tav), colors (white, black, red, green), and so forth. When all of a sudden you experience a certain spiritual sensation, this gives you a clear understanding that it is called “the right eye brow,” that another sensation is called “the left eyebrow,” and so on; you feel it.

Suppose I look at person’s face. It evokes various impressions in me: “What a forehead! What eyes!” But they are not a forehead and eyes, but rather, my inner impressions, feelings, a phenomenon in my will to receive pleasure. I am affected in a certain way and it creates an image inside of me. Its name corresponds to the feelings that it evokes in me, but not what it really is.

The same is true in spirituality, only without the image I usually see in this world. Spiritual images exist without my participation. I unveil these forms, forces, impressions, and label them with all kinds of words: “red,” “white,” black,” “bitter,” “sweet,” “sour,” “tall,” “short,” and so on. But all of this exists without a corporeal picture.

In truth, we don’t see the images of our world outside our will to enjoy; we see them inside, just like seeing various combinations of electrical signals on the computer screen which are assembled into a movie. We have to gather all of our desires in similar combinations in order to see that this world, this form of reality that we perceive right now, is, in fact, only imagined. It doesn’t exist on its own; it only exists relative to us because we perceive it that way.

Each of us is a product of the Light’s projection, similar to the forms made by laser projectors. We are all forms, images, depicted by the Light; we just feel as if we exist in some reality, some space. But in truth, there isn’t anything real in these images. It is merely a projection of the forms that appear before me since I am still unable to perceive them in a more internal form.
[31868]
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/5/10,  “Introduction of The Book of Zohar,” Article “Yitro (Jethro)”

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Writings of Rabash, Dargot HaSulam “Come”
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The Book of Zohar – Selections, Chapter “Tzav (Command),” “All Came From the Dust,” Item 173
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Explanation of the Article, “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah,” Lesson 10
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Rav Yehuda Ashlag “The Freedom,” “Two Forces in the Will to Receive: Attracting Force and Rejecting Force,” Lesson 11
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We haven’t yet reached a sensation that the entire problem lies in the connection between us. For the time being, each of us wants to "pick the fruit from the tree" by himself.

We have to reach a state of standing at the foot of Mount Sinai in order to understand the hatred which the authors of The Zohar describe. Then, you will uncover that mountain of hatred and begin to correct it.

Until then, it’s only the individual ego of each one without his or her relation to others. It’s not yet the reverse imprint of the Creator. Each person isn’t yet aimed at the connection with the others.

That’s the way babies grow. Up until the age of two or three, a child has no need for the company of other children. He plays with his own toys. It’s only after he is two or three years old that he begins to realize that he can play with someone else, that someone else exists.

We are at exactly the same degree in our development. So far, we don’t want to unite with others; we don’t want to "play" with them yet. No matter how much we talk about it, the result is only words and not a change in our desire.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/4/2011,  “Introduction of The Book of Zohar,” Article “Yitro (Jethro)”

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Question: Without the environment, it is impossible to advance. How do we build the environment when we read The Book of Zohar?

Answer: We build the environment when all of us, together, wish to attain everything we read about in The Zohar in our mutual connection. The Zohar draws various forms for us. What are they? If we become unified, we will obtain a certain form of connection between us. Let’s name it “a rabbit,” for instance. The next form of connection will be labeled as “a cow,” and the next after that will be “a donkey.”

Later, we may come to such a connection that will be called “human” at various stages of development: Ibur, Yenika, Mochin (fetus, breastfeeding, and adulthood), until we reach the level of human. Then the form of connection between us will have a human shape. In other words, it isn’t I, you, or he, but rather a form of our mutual connection, some unifying formula, that will make our image human.

“Human” in spirituality is bestowal. But what is bestowal? What is its form? It is a certain field between us that we will title as human. This field undergoes various states that The Zohar describes as individuals with different hair and eye color, and so forth. All of it speaks about the forms of connection between us. The wisdom of Kabbalah doesn’t discuss anything else; there is nothing else to talk about.

There is nothing to say about the will to receive pleasure (desire) since it simply strives to enjoy. But as individual desires rise above themselves and mutually connect in bestowal in this place of unification, they create the common form that The Zohar is describing. It is that very form of the Creator which you are getting to know.

Therefore, The Zohar explains what specific form of the Creator you are discovering. It is what is named “human” within you, your inner equivalent to the Creator. Do you find him a bit unattractive in his uncorrected state? True, but that is what you are for now. Hence, The Zohar explains what steps you take as you advance.

It always speaks of the connection between the souls: to what degree it is equivalent to bestowal which awakens hatred, caring, and other feelings between them. However, all of it still lies in their mutual connection.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/4/2011,  “Introduction of The Book of Zohar,” Article “Yitro (Jethro)”

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