Evening Zohar Lesson – 04.04.10
Posted on April 4th, 2010
Preparation to the Lesson
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
Preparation to the Lesson: The Book of Zohar – Selection for Passover, Chapter “VaYakhel (And Moses Assembled),” Item 426
The Light of Hochma is sensed as darkness or night. Daytime only comes to a person when he clothes the Light of Hochma into the Light of Hassadim.
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
The Book of Zohar – Selection for Passover, Chapter “VaYikahel (And Moses Assembled),” Item 429
The extent of my readiness to help with the correction of the world determines the extent of what I’ll receive in order to pass it along.
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
Shaar HaKavanot, Concerning Passover Exodus, Lesson 5
I do not exit from Egypt; I surrender to the Light, which leads me out of Egypt, elevating me three spiritual degrees higher.
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
Writings of Rabash, Article 12, 1988, Shlavey HaSulam, “Shmot,” Vol. 2, Page 20
A state of “concealment” is not one of fogginess or confusion; rather, it’s a clear understanding, a desire, an aspiration towards that which I’m so desperately lacking.
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
The Zohar, Chapter “Bo (Come Unto Pharaoh),” Item 118: A firstborn is considered Hochma, and “All the firstborn” indicates that even the higher and lower degrees were broken from their dominion… ” Item 119: “From the first-born of Pharaoh that sits upon his throne…even unto the first-born of the maid-servant…."
A firstborn is GAR, the head of the Partzuf, and it needs to subside in Egypt. Everything that was perceived in the desire to receive pleasure as a stable basis of life, which supposedly could be achieved egoistically, is now being destroyed: "From the firstborn of Pharaoh unto the firstborn of the maid servant and the firstborn of the cattle."
Egoism grows, the Light cannot fill it, and Egyptian darkness comes about. It seems to us that the attitude of the Upper Governance with regard to us changes, but in reality the Light exists in absolute rest while the desire to receive pleasure in us increases constantly. If we don’t correct it in time, we feel greater and greater darkness and suffering within it.
At the end of the Egyptian slavery our desire increases through a leap, and it is revealed with a new force on the next level. It is there that a person feels Egyptian darkness, the ten plagues, which is egoism revealed in all of its ten Sefirot, meaning in a complete desire displaying darkness and evil. The desire has grown, and we have stopped feeling even that minor illumination within it which we had experienced before.
The ceasing of the former Light in the new, great desire to receive pleasure is called the execution of all the firstborns in the dark night, "from the firstborn of Pharaoh unto the firstborn of the maid servant and the firstborn of the cattle." This means that the Light has been concealed and is no longer revealed.
Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: Escaping From Yourself Into Another
Laitman.com Post: Spiritual Birth Is A Breakthrough Into A New World
Laitman.com Post: We Must Make The Demand Of Pharaoh To Let Us Unite
The Zohar, Chapter "Shemot (Exodus)," Item 250: For fear that they would mingle the tribes with the rest of the nations… He exiled them to Egypt, who were proud and despised and loathed Israel. And they were there until the iniquity of the Amorites was full and they came to their own land, for there was no longer fear of mingling with the rest of the nations.
How do we draw closer to the desired state when we build the middle line within ourselves? The middle line which is our similarity to the Light, to the One who bestows, or the Creator happens precisely due to the state called "the Egyptian Exile" that becomes revealed within us.
My egoistic desire becomes so big that I feel that I am locked in it and that it controls me. Then, I begin to discern between myself and my nature, between myself and my egoism, or between myself and my properties.
I would like to change my properties, but I’m incapable of doing that. I see that they harm me; I realize that I corrupt myself, my life, the lives of those who are close to me, and the entire world. I put myself and everyone else in danger because I exist in this endlessly growing egoism that I can’t temper. Yet I’m unable to do anything with it.
Then, there comes a state where a person begins to realize that the force acting in him is an alien force. He doesn’t identify himself with it any longer. He begins to perceive it as his bitter enemy. This is called, "Now a new king arose over Egypt” (Exodus, 1:8). A person begins to feel that a new dominion has been revealed, and that this is not him but someone else who sets up all this for him. It could be Nature or the Creator, but it’s not him. He doesn’t know how to free himself from it.
As if from the side, a person now sees his desire to receive pleasure as something alien to him. He begins to discern the Creator as the one Who organizes all of this for him. He already has the same attitude both to the Pharaoh and to the Creator.
He then experiences an internal split, the realization that there exists the Upper Force which determines everything that happens with him. However, this revelation doesn’t happen on its own, but only after multiple hours of study, uniting with friends in the group, and working in dissemination during which the person is practically engaged in the wisdom of Kabbalah.
Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: The Journey From Nothingness To Perfection
Laitman.com Post: Everything Depends On Us
The Way to Yourself [23:55]
Preparation to the Lesson
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
Writings of Rabash, Dargot HaSulam, Item 936
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
Talmud Eser Sefirot, Volume 6, Part 15, Item 30
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
The Book of Zohar – Selections for Passover, Chapter “Beshalach,” Item 298
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
Preparation to the Lesson
The Creator exists within the external Kelim, which seems foreign to me. A friend’s desire is the place where I can meet the Creator.
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
The Book of Zohar – Selections for Passover, Chapter “Bo (Come Unto Pharaoh),” Item 178
Initially I lower my head before the Upper so He can work on me; later I can act upon my desire independently.
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
Shaar HaKavanot, Concerning Passover Exodus, Lesson 4
The Kabbalists don’t describe the occurrences of the material world. What they do describe are the forms of interconnection between the Light and the desire that take place above space and time.
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
Shamati #59 “About The Rod And The Serpent”
“Serpent” is the force of opposition to the Creator. “Rod” is the leading force. It does not make any difference what is in my hands, the rod or the serpent, as long as I constantly countercheck them.
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
Preparation to the Lesson
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
Preparation to the Lesson, Shamati #159 “And It Came To Pass In The Course of Many Days“
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
The Book of Zohar – Selections for Passover, Chapter “Bo (Come Unto Pharaoh),” Item 166
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
Shaar HaKavanot, Concerning Passover Exodus, Lesson 3
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
Baal HaSulam, Letter 13, 1925, Page 55
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
The Zohar, Chapter “Bo (Come unto Pharaoh),”… And the Lord your God brought you out of there..Remember this day in which you went out from Egypt…And brought thee out with His presence, with His great power, out of Egypt…The Lord brought you out from this…Fifty times is the exodus from Egypt mentioned in the Torah….
Fifty is the full degree, the ten Sefirot of Malchut together with the forty Sefirot of Bina. Malchut in its entirety needs to rise above itself, to its full degree. These two forces need to be felt inside of a person – one against the other.
Therefore, salvation will not come until we end the exile, after reaching a horrible sensation that we have no strength to exit our egoism, and feeling at the same time, it is absolutely necessary for us to do this! When we will feel this opposition to the full extent, the waters of the Red Sea (in Hebrew called the Final Sea) will open up, and we will cross it.
A person doesn’t know how it is revealed. This is called a miracle. However, this miracle is caused by the person himself, when he comes to a dead end. On one hand, a person doesn’t understand how it is possible to exit – he has no power or strength for this. Furthermore, he doesn’t understand that there can be some force from Above, which can somehow change his nature. On the other hand, this force that exists above nature is revealed.
This occurs only like a miracle. It occurs above that state, that nature, which is called “Egypt” and comprises the whole inner sense of a person.
[11930]
The Zohar, Chapter “Shemot (Exodus),” Item 247: Sixty is Malchut, the mighty ones above, from the side of Gevura that cling to carvings, meaning to the externality of the holy Haya of Israel, which is Malchut. This is why they are named after her, sixty queens [Malchuts]. Those are angels appointed over the nations. Eighty maidservants are the angels appointed by the carvings of Malchut, beneath the sixty queens. This is why they are called maidservants and not queens. And there is no number to the maidens….
Everything that we read in The Zohar transpires within desire. There is nothing else but desire. We are reading about its inner phenomena, changes, and various relationships between its parts.
It is a great device, collectively called Malchut, which needs to change, each time bringing itself to greater equivalence to the Light. Therefore, all the names and terms written in The Zohar exist within Malchut, within our desires, in their various interrelationships.
Hence, we need only think of how to draw the Light to the desire described by The Zohar. Though we don’t understand specifically which qualities or changes are being depicted, or anything that’s going on there, still we await redemption: for the Light to influence this desire, for us to understand and sense the desire and the Light that fills it, and to feel them together. Indeed, it is impossible to feel one without the other, but only if there is contact between them, even to the very first, minimal measure.
That is what we are waiting for. And all the words and letters that we read in The Book exist only in this desire – in our soul.
Preparation to the Lesson, Shamati #41 “What is Greatness and Smallness in Faith?“
The first revelation of the Light of faith is the essence of Passover. Our intention should be aimed at this Light because it is the only thing that can lift us above egoism into bestowal.
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
The Book of Zohar – Selections for Passover, Chapter “Bo (Come Unto Pharaoh),” Item 119
Exodus from Egypt constitutes the exit from the end point of egoism, an escape to one’s friends, and a revelation of the spiritual world among friends.
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
Shaar HaKavanot, Concerning Passover Exodus, Lesson 2
The events of the Passover Haggadah take place within a person, regardless of what processes are taking place in the material world.
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
Writings of Rabash, Shlavey HaSulam, Vol. 1, Page 110
On the animal level, existence is measured by the degree of suffering, whereas on a human level it’s measured by the degree of truthfulness, which is a higher criterion.
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio
Daily Audio Version-MP3
Get the Weekly eNewsletter
Follow on Twitter
