Question: What do I do if while reading The Book of Zohar I keep thinking about various things including my new business?

Answer: This is wonderful! Let your egoism pray together with the group about the revelation of evil and its correction and also about the prosperity of your business. But it has to be everything together!

There is nothing outside of the system of correction. It is said that all “sinners” (egoistic desires) will be corrected and join the “righteous” (desires of bestowal and love). Why can’t your business be inside them? Don’t neglect anything; include everything into correction.

When the words “escape from the Pharaoh” are said, they do not mean running away from the Pharaoh, but rather ascending above him. It is said, “We left Egypt with great belongings.” We take everything there is, our entire ego, and exit. Thus, our ego becomes corrected.
[22826]
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/7/10, The Zohar

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: All The Wicked And The Righteous Are Within Me
Laitman.com Post: When Pharaoh’s Questions Overcome Us
Laitman.com Post: The Zohar: The Illumination Of The Upper Worlds

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Inner Work, Q&A, Zohar - 1 Comment →

Question: When reading The Zohar, is “to receive the force of bestowal” the correct intention?

Answer: We do not need anything but the force of bestowal. There are only two forces in the entire reality: reception and bestowal. We do not lack the force of receiving. When we correctly prepare ourselves by working in the group and studying Kabbalah, the force of reception, our evil inclination, becomes revealed to us.

However, if I have not yet begun to arrange myself with the group or the study, I do not reveal the egoism against the Creator in me as something that hurts me, as evil. At first I need to reveal my evil. If I do not see the evil in me, I have nothing to begin correction with.

But when I reveal the evil in me, I reveal it in the group, and for this reason I already have the Light to correct it. After all, it is where I reveal my rejection of friends that I find the strength to overcome this rejection.

Question: If I do not feel the need to read The Zohar, do I still need to do it?

Answer: A person beginning to study Kabbalah needs to know that it is specifically the reading of The Zohar that helps him go through the stages of the revelation of his evil and its correction. The evil will keep being revealed, while he will keep rising above it until he reveals the entire altitude of evil, the entire 125 degrees between our world and the World of Infinity.

He will rise high, above the evil being revealed, to the top of the mountain as if he were on a funicular. This is why he needs both: the mountain, the evil that is being revealed, and the funicular, the force of the Light that lifts him to the top.

This is the reason we need to study Kabbalah, which reveals the evil to us. This is called “I created the evil inclination,” and then we need the force of correction, which is called “and I gave the Torah for its correction because the Light in it Reforms,” that brings me to the top of the mountain.

This is why in the beginning the Creator told Abraham: “Your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own,” meaning that they will be under the influence of the egoism, but they will leave with great wealth (egoism), and they will need its correction: the reception of the Torah, the method of correction with the force of the Creator, the Light. Having stopped using egoism (Egypt) and having turned it into a “desert,” they will then use it for the sake of bestowal and turn it into the “Land of Israel.”

There is only one desire, but the gradual changes of the intention over this desire turns the desire into “Egypt” (in Hebrew “Mits-Raim,” “the concentration of evil”), then into the Sinai desert (in Hebrew “Sinai,” hatred), until it turns it into good, the “Land of Israel” (in Hebrew “Eretz Yisrael,” desire towards the Creator). That is, one goes through the stages of the evil inclination – “Egypt,” then “bestowal for the sake of bestowal” – “the Sinai desert,” and then “reception for the sake of bestowal” – “the land of Israel.”

The desire to receive pleasure remains the same, you only determine your attitude toward it, which becomes increasingly corrected every time.
[22830]
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/7/10, The Zohar

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: Everything Is Revealed Between Us
Laitman.com Post: The Central Point Of Connection
Laitman.com Post: The Zohar Is The Link To The Upper Force

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Group Work, Inner Work, Q&A, Zohar - No Comments →

Rabash, Shlavei HaSulam, “And Jacob Sat at the Land Where His Father Dwelled”
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio

The Book of Zohar – Selections, Chapter “VaYechi (And Jacob Lived in the Land of Egypt),” Item 770
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio

Rav Yehuda Ashlag, Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol. 6, Part 15, Item 145
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio

Rav Yehuda Ashlag, “The Teaching of the Kabbalah and Its Essence,” Lesson 2
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Zohar - 2 Comments →

When reading The Zohar, every person can ask for whatever he wants. The most important thing is to get used to asking. Even if I want a bicycle like a small child, I can ask for it while reading The Zohar. May we wish to reveal the spiritual world in the same way!

Question: How should we use the period of preparation for the Convention to desire to attain bestowal as much as a child wants a bicycle?

Answer: You have to participate in the preparations for the Convention together with everyone. A person is a result of society’s influence. Spirituality is something we don’t desire naturally, and if we want to attain it, then the way to expand the only spark of spiritual desire we have is through external stimuli. That’s because we are impressed by whatever the society is impressed with.

We have a spark of spirituality inside us, and society outside. Our work and free choice lie only in our ability to unite our spark with the society. This is called choosing the environment.

Everything depends on how much a person desires to be connected with the environment. Does he turn on our Kabbalah TV channel or Internet, does he desire to be together with us while trying not to criticize, to see only the good in order to be impressed as much as possible? His future depends on this, and by doing these things he awakens himself and becomes more sensitive.

Obviously, some things seem stupid to him, but he has to understand that they contain a very strange and special awakening which comes from spiritual qualities of bestowal. When a person discerns this state well, he understands that he has to ascend above his knowledge and acquire the society’s opinion. He has to merge with that opinion, with the importance of bestowal and the Upper Force even though it seems strange due to being opposite to our qualities. That is also why it is concealed. In order to attain that Force, we have to acquire the same qualities and the way to do so is by advancing step by step.

Therefore, one’s only freedom of choice lies in the environment. A person must check himself more and more to see how he perceives the society: Why does he perceive it precisely the way he does and why is he made to perceive it in this form? In addition, he must thank the Creator for giving him this ability to criticize and to see himself from aside so he can tell that he has now delved into criticism.

That is how he can reach faith above reason, the right perception, and the realization that he has no choice, enabling him to agree to all this “nonsense.” He has to make this decision by faith above reason, yet it has to be a sound decision and he has to know why he is making it. He has to be sure that he has taken everything into account.

We think that faith above knowledge does not entail knowledge. However, it in fact entails knowledge and contemplation.
[23493]
From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/13/10, The Zohar

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: How To Ascend By Stepping Over Yourself
Laitman.com Post: Sailing On The Waves Of Congresses
Laitman.com Post: Where Is Our Freedom?

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Prayer and Intention, Zohar - No Comments →

Question: Looking at our world I see that there are seven billion people who are still uncorrected. So what are we doing wrong in the process of studying The Zohar? If we are talking about correction, then can’t it happen at any moment?

Answer: Imagine a moving herd. It has strong leaders that understand where to go, how to avoid falling into pits, how to climb hills and squeeze through narrow gorges, and how to guard oneself against robbers on the road or predatory beasts. On the other hand, the weaker ones have to be on the inside.

The main mass is always weak, but you cannot get rid of it because you have to achieve the general correction. You have to protect them, therefore you place them inside as the most important part.

That’s because the thing you depend on becomes the most important thing to you. For example, you hide a baby inside. The weak are not killed off like in Sparta. A society that does this is doomed to perish.

Therefore, those who are strongest always walk at the outer edge. The others walk on the inside, surrounded by the strong from all sides. There is a group surrounding all humanity and all humanity may be doing nothing besides advancing inside the group even without realizing it, like children.

That is why the seven billion people do not have any spiritual force despite their quantity. The science of Kabbalah informs us that all of the inanimate nature is equal to one plant, and all the plants are equal to one animal, and all the animals to one person. The same thing is true of the human species.

Therefore, the majority of the people will receive everything only from those who really change the world.
[23487]
From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/13/10, The Zohar

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: Kabbalists On Kabbalists, Part 8
Laitman.com Post: The Spiritual Center Of Humanity’s Common Organism
Laitman.com Post: Spiritual Democracy

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Zohar - No Comments →

The Zohar, Chapter “VeYechi (And Jacob Lived),” Item 696: “Dan shall judge his people, as one of the tribes of Israel.” Dan, as it is written, is the last of all the camps, the left thigh, Hod. He walks last because Judah and Reuben journey, the Levites and the ark set up banners, and the banner of Ephraim journeys to the west. The right thigh journeys according to the order that the right thigh comes before the left thigh, Dan. Thus, Dan journeys last.

In this form The Zohar tells us of the formation of the “camp of Israel in the desert,” meaning the formation of the soul in its development at the 0-1-2 levels of desire (Galgalta Eynaim), attainment of the qualities of Bina, and how all 12 parts that make up the system of the collective soul (called the “12 tribes of Israel”) need to advance along the degrees in “three lines.”

In the soul there are such notions as “banners,” separate groups or “camps,” “women,” “elderly,” and “children,” which go in the front or in the back. These are all various desires within a person, thus organized and interconnected and thus actualizing their correction: moving from one “camp” to another, from one spiritual degree to the next. And every time there is a particular order which every moving “camp” must follow (“hands,” feet,” “head,” torso,” “extremities,” or lines and Sefirot), and how they have to connect between themselves so as to advance.

This is why the Torah talks about what’s happening in the camps, all the various problems and events there, that is, about the revelation of new lows in the ego of the common soul and how they correct the ego and advance thereby. That is what the story is all about.
[23260]
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/11/10, The Zohar

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: The System Of The Twelve Tribes
Laitman.com Post: A Lever For Transformation
Laitman.com Post: Understanding The Boundaries Of Desires

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Inner Work, Zohar - No Comments →

The Zohar, Chapter “VeYechi (And Jacob Lived),” Item 675: Zebulun was rewarded with preceding Issachar in the blessings because he took bread out of his mouth and gave it to Issachar’s mouth. Thus, one who provides for one with Torah receives blessings from above and from below. Moreover, he is rewarded with two tables, with which no other person is rewarded. He is rewarded with wealth—blessed in this world—and with having a share in the next world.

The Zohar speaks of the types of connections existing between the souls for only this is concealed from us, and this is what we need to reveal. In the connection between the souls, which we reveal, we clarify the picture of forces (desires) of bestowal, the web of connections between them that manifest the degree of their bestowal to one another above the egoistic forces of each particular soul. The connections between the souls are the forces of bestowal, the desires to bestow, while every soul is an egoistic desire to enjoy.

It follows that if we work, everyone in his desire, so as to actualize it in bestowal to others, this means we are working with the right desire (Kli) equipped with a screen so as to be connected in mutual bestowal with everybody. This is the way the system of desires (Partzufim) of every soul works with respect to other souls (Partzufim). Mutual bestowal and its general force, the Creator, become revealed in the connection between them, while within every soul there remains its inherent desire to enjoy.

The Zohar speaks not of the desire to enjoy embedded in each of us, but of what happens between us, where we reveal the web that connects us. Initially, this web is called the world of Assiya, then Yetzira, Beria, Atzilut, Adam Kadmon, and the World of Infinity, where the connection between us has no end or limits. As we strengthen our connection, we reveal the Creator, the Light, inside it.

Therefore, when we read The Book of Zohar we must think of what The Zohar speaks of: the connection between us wherein the Creator is revealed.
[23083]
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/10/10, The Zohar

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: The Central Point Of Connection
Laitman.com Post: Unification With The Group Leads Us To The Creator
Laitman.com Post: The Detector Of Bestowal

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Group Work, Inner Work, Zohar - No Comments →

Rabash, Shlavei HaSulam, “Hezekiah Turned His Face to the Wall”
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio

The Book of Zohar – Selections, Chapter “VaYechi (And Jacob Lived in the Land of Egypt),” Item 751
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio

Rav Yehuda Ashlag, Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol. 6, Part 15, Item 141
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio

Rav Yehuda Ashlag, “The Teaching of the Kabbalah and Its Essence,” Lesson 1
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Zohar - No Comments →

Question: Why are there 12 tribes and only 10 Sefirot?

Answer: Sometimes, when we refer to Sefirot, we count ten of them, at other times, when we refer to the phases of the Light’s expansion from Above downward, we say that there are five of them, and when we speak about Zeir Anpin, we count six Sefirot. In truth, there are nothing but five phases. If we are adding something else, it is because we wish to emphasize that in Zeir Anpin there aren’t more than six Sefirot and, in that case, instead of the five, general Sefirot, we count 10.

Sometimes, we wish to underscore that these 10 Sefirot are aligned with the three lines. In that case, we say that each property, phase, or Sefira also has its own individual relationship with the other Sefirot according to the left, right, and middle lines. Then, instead of 10 Sefirot, we speak of 12: The 4-letter name of the Creator HaVaYaH (Hochma, Bina, Zeir Anpin, and Malchut) is multiplied by the three lines in each of them, totaling 12. This is merely a method to emphasize a specific characteristic.

Sometimes, we speak of 13, at other times of seven (Zeir Anpin and Malchut), at other times of eight Sefirot (Zeir Anpin with its Malchut and a separate Malchut) and so forth. One should never think that by doing so we may cut off some Sefirot, some part of the Partzuf. We use various calculations solely to express the current state being undergone by our souls: the right line, the left line, the three lines, the small state (Katnut), or the big state (Gadlut).

For instance, we say that in the small state there is only Galgalta ve Eynaim (GE) and no AHP (Awzen, Hotem, Peh), but it is simply not being used since there is no force of the screen over it. All of the titles or names indicate to us only the force by way of which a 10-Sefirot desire is being engaged.
[22524]
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/4/10, The Zohar

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: How To Build Your Ten Sefirot And Fill Them With The Creator’s Light
Laitman.com Post: The Perturbing Language Of Partzufim And Sefirot
Laitman.com Post: The Method Of Climbing Up The Spiritual Ladder

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Q&A, Zohar - 1 Comment →

Rabash, Shlavei HaSulam, “The Matter of Mercy”
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio

The Book of Zohar – Selections, Chapter “VaYechi (And Jacob Lived in the Land of Egypt),” Item 726
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio

Rav Yehuda Ashlag, Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol. 6, Part 15, Item 137
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio

Rav Yehuda Ashlag, “The Love for the Creator and Love for the Created Beings,” Lesson 10
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Zohar - No Comments →