Preparation to the Lesson
My reward is the ability to bestow, to love.
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Part 1, on Baal HaSulam’s Letter #26
When man reaches the secret door, he starts to understand what it means to part with egoism. He then retreats, until he fully strengthens himself.
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Part 2, on Item 9 of “Preface to the Sulam Commentary“
We are lacking the desire of all humanity in order to reveal the Upper System that connects us all.
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Part 3, on Item 156 of “Introduction to Talmud Eser Sefirot“
For the modern generation, the only means to make spiritual progress are the books of Baal HaSulam.
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Baal HaSulam writes that everyone has to study the wisdom of Kabbalah, because this is the reason a person is born: to correct himself.

Our world emerged due to the breaking of souls, when the single, unified soul partitioned into billions of pieces – individual souls. Today we are in the state of separation, which we perceive in the form of “this world.” In reality, however, there are no lower or upper worlds; they are just products of the human perception of the degree of connection between the souls.

“The world” is a degree of connection among the souls. The current degree is “this world.” If the souls begin coming closer to one another, then the increased interconnection among them will be called, “the World of Yetzira.” An even greater connection is, “the World of Beria,” and so on.

As we strengthen the connection between the souls, we will consecutively feel all the worlds. We will ascend up the levels of the worlds all the way until the World of Infinity, where everything is one.

Kabbalah is the method that helps all the souls to unite into the corrected state. This is why it is so vital to us.

(From Part 3 of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson)

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People don’t understand what The Book of Zohar actually is. When I just started studying Kabbalah, I was told that The Zohar is Musar (ethics) according to Kabbalah. Musar is a system of moral values, telling people what they should be doing and what they are forbidden from doing because they will be punished for it. These people believe that The Book of Zohar is a book of morals on a higher level, like a decree from Above.

Baal HaSulam writes that many horrible things took place in the world because The Book of Zohar was revealed before the time was right. The Zohar was only supposed to be revealed during the time of the Ari. Why is that? When a person who hasn’t been properly prepared for reading The Zohar reads it, he will not understand it correctly. He will not arrive at the same thoughts and intentions that Rabbi Shimon had when he wrote this text.

This is why Baal HaSulam added his own commentary, titled “Sulam” (Ladder), which includes a “technical” supplement to the text of The Book of Zohar. There he provides a Kabbalistic definition of every word of the Torah and explains where each word or quality is located in the structure of the soul.

This enables the person reading the text to connect both definitions, and thus to experience an inner response to what he is reading. Both worlds become revealed to him – this world and the Upper World, and he senses the Creator’s governance inside the text and inside himself.
(From Part 2 of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson, on the “Preface to the Sulam Commentary”)

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Preparation
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Part 1, on Baal HaSulam’s Letter 24
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Part 2, on Preface to the Sulam Commentary
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Part 3, on “Introduction to Talmud Eser Sefirot,” Item 146
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The spiritual world consists of the same parts and connections between them as the material world. However, we can only feel the spiritual world to the degree our sensations enter it.

Forces descend from Above into our world, and they have inanimate, vegetative, animate and human qualities. This is what we observe: the expression of the Upper Forces in our world as objects and actions.

Our encounter with the details of perception gives rise to the forms. For example, say I see an object before me now. It appears to me in a specific form, but if I had different qualities, then I would see a different form. Baal HaSulam gives the example of a table: I see it one way, but an angel sees it through its qualities.

Reality or perception is produced when my qualities unify with the Light’s, due to our having common or similar qualities. Beyond my perception, there is only Infinity, out of which I perceive just the part that I have shared qualities with. So how can I attune myself to having shared qualities with the Upper World? I can do it because inside me, I have the same coordinate system (world–year–soul and a ready-made reality) as it has inside. And when I ask for it, the Upper Light makes my system similar to the Upper Level. This is called the correction of the soul. It’s when I make my inner system similar to Infinity, in a specific measure. I thereby determine my spiritual level and the degree to which I perceive Infinity.

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A question I received from my student: Is it good or bad to use one’s fantasy in the inner work?

My Answer: If you are studying only Baal HaSulam’s books and are trying to leave behind all your previous prejudices and stereotypes, then you will gradually be “cured” of all your fantasies. Our task in Kabbalah is to start feeling a new reality, which is not a fantasy! You should come to feel an additional  world that is similar to how you now feel this world, but you shouldn’t make it up!

Right now, you don’t feel the spiritual world. Even though people tell you about it, you don’t discern it. Nevertheless, you wait to feel it and you aspire toward it by performing different actions and exercises in order to feel it. In virtue of the efforts you make and your practice, you will eventually begin to sense spirituality, even though initially you didn’t have any abilities to do so.

The same thing always happens with everything we do in this world, as well. If we seriously engage in something, then we begin to feel and understand it. Where does this sensation and understanding come from? It comes from the general system that we are all part of, where each of us is connected with everyone. We simply forget that we are inside this system. For example, if I don’t feel or understand anything about plants, but begin to study gardening and start taking care of flowers, then I will gradually begin to feel them, receive impressions from them, and will establish a connection with them.

Where does this connection come from? From our connection with all parts of reality, which already exists. Now, when we perform various exercises, we merely awaken the connection that is already there, but we are not creating anything new. We only discern this system in virtue of our efforts and desires.

The same thing also happens with the spiritual world! We are already in the World of Infinity, but we reveal this system in virtue of the efforts we make, by studying the Upper World and trying to reveal it together with others. We reveal something that is already there! So there is nothing in the world to which we can point and ask, “Where did this come from? Is it a fantasy?” Nothing is a fantasy! All we have to do is practice in order to awaken our sensitivity to something that already exists.

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Baal HaSulam says that when we start looking at the world through the point of the soul, we develop a different perception of reality. This is a new sense, in addition to our five corporeal senses (sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste).

Within this new sense, I perceive an image that I call “the Upper World,” or another dimension. I then perceive both myself and this world inside this new, different sensation.

When you start perceiving the true, Upper Reality, you start seeing that your former perception is relative, that it is just one possible reality, and not the only existing reality, the way it seemed to you before. You start looking at the former reality in a detached way, and you see that this it is relative: it may exist, or, if your body dies, it may not.

However, when we switch from one perception of reality to the other, the new perception of reality does not annul the former. You begin perceiving them together and you see one of them as originating from the other.

But then you embark on yet another journey to an ever-expanding, true, eternal and absolute reality of the Creator.

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A question I received: I’m studying the videos and texts on the site and I’ve been learning a lot! I’m a teacher of philosophy in Brazil and my focus of study is the thinker Baruch Spinoza, a cherem Jew of the seventeenth century. Spinoza spoke about a God like Nature, a God not external, but internal and equal to Nature (where Nature is not seen only as trees, clouds, and so on, but the superior Nature that includes all of thing and energies). How does Kabbalah see God? And what does Kabbalah think about Spinoza’s philosophy?

My Answer: There is a huge difference between the definition of “God as Nature” in Kabbalah and in Spinoza’s philosophy. For example, there are differences in how they see the Upper Force as having a mind and a will, to make decisions, its goal and program, its separate, superior position over Nature, its causality and primacy, and so on. It would be best for you to sort all of this out for yourself.

To do so, it will suffice to browse through several articles by Baal HaSulam: “The Wisdom of Kabbalah and Philosophy,” “The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah,” Part 1 of “Talmud Eser Sefirot” – Histaklut Pnimit (Inner Reflection).” Once you read them, I will be happy to speak with you on the subject. I will be in Argentina from August 26 until September 2.

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In the News (from Japan Today): “Jewish human rights group protests ‘anti-Semitic’ ad in Nihon Keizai Shimbun” In a press release also posted on its website, the Wiesenthal Center’s associate dean Abraham Cooper blasted the Nihon Keizai Shimbun for having “broken a longstanding commitment to desist from running advertisements that promote anti-Jewish stereotypes, by running an advertisement for two books that promote the canard of Jewish control over the global economy.”

The advertisement for “Why did the Jewish financial system collapse?” (author: Kotaro Nada) asks rhetorically, “Is it true that the Rothschild family controls the global economy?” and purports to explain what was behind the failures of Lehman Brothers, AIG, Citibank and Bear Stearns. The ad also touts a second work by Nada titled “Jewish Money: Why are they able to continue to move the global economy?” The Nihon Keizai Shimbun boasts a claimed daily circulation of over 3 million copies. It is often compared to The Wall Street Journal and Financial Times.

My Answer: Of course the Jews are to blame for it all, because they don’t disseminate the method of the world’s correction to the world. This is how they cause all the miseries in the world, and not only the global financial crisis. See Items 70-71 of Baal HaSulam’s “Preface to the Book of Zohar.”

Even though the nations of the world don’t know this, they subconsciously feel that “it’s all the Jews’ fault.” After all, the “light” in their lives depends on the nation of Israel, which holds the wisdom of Kabbalah. Moreover, from now on, if the nations of the world won’t receive the method of correction in time, they will “join together against Jerusalem,” as stated in The Book of Zohar and in the books of the prophets.

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A question I received: I have a question. The movie Nights of Kabbalah showed how Kabbalists could predict the future. But this was in reference to the Kabbalists of the past. You also mentioned that now there are no teachers equal to Baal HaSulam.

However, I’ve heard someone say that there are people living today who have special powers and can change the physical world around them. For example, they can turn stones into sand, and they can be in several places at the same time. But these magic tricks are not their objective; their goal is to know the Creator.

They are able to do these things completely naturally, without any spells, esoteric practices or mysticism. So, with all due respect, I would like to know: how is it possible that Kabbalah is the only truth? How can it be that only Kabbalists know the whole truth?

My Answer: There are no miracles in this world. See Baal HaSulam’s article, “The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah,” where he explains that Kabbalah is a science, which means that it is based on data that was attained and revealed through the method of experiment. You should also read “The Introduction to the Book of Zohar,” where it talks about the limits of attainment – that one can only attain matter and its form, but not the abstract form and the essence.

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