A question I received: What is the connection between The Book of Zohar and global nature?

My Answer: The Book of Zohar explains how to connect to universal and perfect nature, how to request, demand, and extract this special, unifying force in order for it to affect me. The Book of Zohar is a binding link between me and all of nature; without this link a person in this world has no connection to it.

Now that I discover that nature is global, that the whole world is a global village in which everyone is connected, I further realize that I am dependent on everyone. As I depend on everyone, I then wish to be the same as them, to be among them as a friend treating everyone with goodness and for them to do the same with me. So, how do I obtain this?

In order to achieve this, I need to know how to connect with them. I need guidance, some instruction manual of connection. The guide needs to show me how to establish a connection with a group of people, how to approach and talk to them; the instructions need to expose what they need from me and what I need from them.

This manual of connection, The Book of Zohar, reveals this whole system of connection between a person and nature, so that nature, the Creator, will influence a person and turn him into an integral part of nature.

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We need to perform very specialized work under a very specific set of conditions to reveal the influence of the Upper Light upon us. Thus, the absence of any feelings, flavors, or understanding while we study The Zohar doesn’t mean a thing.

You don’t need to feel or understand; you simply need to stay open for the influence of the Light, and let it work on you. The environment has to attune us to the correct desire so that we become eager to be influenced by the Light even if we lack the connection to what we read, taste, or understand.

This is what we call the “miraculous force” (Segula) that is implanted into The Book of Zohar. This hidden mechanism (rather than the stories or words) somehow works on us and moves us forward.

When studying The Zohar we need to “trust the sages,” meaning we need to believe the advice of the Kabbalists. We have to constantly take care of how to align ourselves with the perception of the force that is yet concealed from us.

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The Zohar, Chapter “BeHukotai (In My Statutes),” Item 45: “I will never again curse the ground on account of man.” “I will never again,” meaning I will not give addition to the litigants to destroy the world, but only add as much as the world can bear. It is written about that, “then I will [chastise you] more,” meaning add what the world can bear.

This describes how we advance. The whole process consists of Malchut rising to Bina and then descending back from Bina. Then it rises to Bina again, and descends back again. All these movements, these oscillations, are meant to give us sensations.

After all, we cannot feel our reality in Malchut or in Bina; we can only feel it in the connection between them. We feel reality in the coefficient of their connection; that is, in the changes of Malchut’s inclusion into Bina and Bina’s inclusion into Malchut.

More simply, we feel ourselves only under the condition that we move between Malchut and Bina. When the relationships between them change in us, then the variable correlation between Malchut and Bina also changes in us, and it is these changes that we perceive as life.

Conversely, if this correlation ceases to change or becomes still, we would feel this as death. In this state, all the sensations and gradations of qualities vanish. Therefore, on one hand, we feel life in the process of change of Malchut’s inclusion into Bina, and Bina’s inclusion into Malchut, and the unifications between them. On the other hand, this gives us heavy and unpleasant sensations, and the lack of patience. However, this is precisely where we feel life. Therefore, in order to live, we are forced to survive. We are unable to part with life and so we prefer movement.

In spirituality this movement reaches a state within which we reveal the Creator. It is the state, from which life comes to us and provides movement, strength, and the changes in the connections between Malchut and Bina and in the ascents of Malchut into Bina.

When we reveal Who does this, Who creates these changes, and for what purpose all these changes occur in us, we rise above these movements, above the changes in us, and we merge with the Giver of life. Thereby we begin to feel at rest. After all, we then feel that this movement is necessary for creation, and without it creation is unable to feel the Creator.

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Kabbalists who lived before the author of The Book of Zohar Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai (Rashbi) performed corrections in the common system of souls on a higher level. Rashbi’s system is connected to us directly, and for this reason we treat The Book of Zohar as our primary source. By carrying out corrections in the system of broken souls, Kabbalists created special connections in it, preparations for a general correction. They revive this system, bringing Light to it through the channels of connection that they have established within.

Therefore, we can now rise and correct ourselves within this system. By correcting itself, a soul not only changes itself; it also brings about its corrections into all the other souls. Yet, there are certain souls, like the soul of Rashbi, which play a principal role in correction: They complete a specific stage and prepare the foundation for all the corrections that follow.

It seems to us that a corrected soul is some isolated part of the system. However, this is incorrect. The whole system of souls is integral, like a holographic picture, each part contains the whole picture. On the other hand, every part is present in the whole picture as well as in each of its parts. I am part of the system of souls, the whole system is within me, and I am also included in each part of the system.

The soul is not a unit of the whole – it is “dispersed” into the whole system of creation. It penetrates the entire Malchut of the World of Infinity, with its qualities. This holds true for every one of us. When each person supplements everyone else, we get one large sphere of souls, where the system of Rashbi acts in providing correction for it. It is through this system that we receive the Light that corrects and fulfills us.

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It is a known fact that the more we research ancient Biblical literature, the more we realize that its traditional dating is correct. The philosophers that made groundless claims that The Book of Zohar was written in the 11^th century in Spain or even later in the Middle Ages, recently have had to budge and grudgingly concede to what is written in The Zohar itself, which is that it was authored by Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai in the 2^nd century.

One common argument supporting the more recent writing of The Zohar was that the vocabulary used in The Zohar did not appear in the lexicon until much later than the 2^nd century. However, recent research of ancient texts enabled by new technologies sheds light on a wealth of documents written in the ancient language of Aramaic.

In a report of these findings in the University of Chicago News, one of the researchers in this Perepolis Fortification Archive Project at the Oriental Institute, Aramaic scholar Annalisa Azzoni, assistant professor at the Divinity School of Vanderbilt University, states, “We don’t have many archives of this size. A lot of what’s in these texts is entirely fresh, but this also changes what we already knew. There are words I know were used in later dialects, for example, but I didn’t know they were used at this time or this place, Persia in 500 B.C. For an Aramaicist, this is quite an important discovery.”

I want to believe that in the recent future all misconceptions about Kabbalah will vanish and we will be able to use it to better the world.

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The Zohar, Chapter “Pekudei (Accounts),” Item 15: When the Creator said unto Moses, “Make the Tabernacle,” Moses was bewildered; he did not know what to do until the Creator vividly showed him, as it is written, “And see and make them after their pattern, which is being shown to you in the mountain.” “In their pattern” means that the Creator showed Moses everything in its higher, spiritual shape, and each of the spiritual shapes above was making its shape similar to the fictitious shape that was made below, on earth. This is how Moses knew.

This is what our work consists of because the spiritual world doesn’t have a form and we don’t know what Upper Light is by itself. This notion doesn’t exist at all separately from the creation. We can attain and define it only in relation to ourselves and through our sensations. However, our sensations are imaginary because we always feel reactions to an outside influence. We will never find out what actually is happening outside of us because we can’t extract ourselves from our perceiving senses.

It turns out that one can perceive properly only to the extent of the similarity of his properties to the spiritual properties. When the properties of man and the Creator coincide, man reveals the Creator to the extent of that similarity. Initially, we only perceive the imaginary form of this world. Our work consists of rising above it and asking for the Upper spiritual form to clothe in it. Once we have these two forms where one is confined within the other, we will acquire the proper perception of the world.

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The Book of Zohar — Selections, Chapter “BeHukotai (In My Statutes),” Item 20
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The study of The Zohar consists of several stages. In order for the Light to affect us, we need to continually return to the text. The Light performs its work time after time, and we begin to feel the text with a better understanding.

Our first inner reactions mark the beginning of attainment and this will initiate the enabling of our understanding the text. After all, when we read The Zohar for the first time, it is in order to create the ability to perceive the vessel (Kli) within us.

The Light doesn’t enter when it comes for the first time, but only creates the desire for Light. This desire is not considered to be selfish (evil) because it cannot yet be comprehended since there is no Kli for it. Only the repetition of it is considered evil; and the repetition creates an impression. This is why for now we simply need to keep reading, and later on we will have something to speak about. Suddenly impressions will appear within us, and the Upper Light will appear through the fog.

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A question I received: Naturally, every book influences people even if it’s a health-food book. When we read Rabash’s articles about the group or Baal HaSulam’s articles like “Matan Torah” (The Giving of the Torah)” and “The Arvut” (The Mutual Guarantee), it’s clear to us that these articles speak about unity. When we read The Zohar, we believe that Kabbalists wrote about unification, but this isn’t obvious to us from the text. How does this text influence people?

My Answer: There are books that affect understanding. For example, when we read an organic cookbook, we understand what this book is about and this affects our mind. However, The Zohar is written in a way that doesn’t speak to our physical mind, which is why we’re unable to understand this book. The Zohar speaks to our spiritual mind; yet, at present, we don’t have a spiritual mind. We weren’t created with it; rather, we must attain it. We can’t yet understand what the authors of The Zohar wrote about; to do so, we must rise to the level of their mind and sensations.

Sometimes we can feel these changes inside ourselves such as when we suddenly perceive things that previously we were unable to grasp. All at once, we can see that there’s an absolutely different perspective from which we can view things. This is an inner perspective that doesn’t exist in this world. In this world, so far, our vantage point is with the intention of Lo Lishma (for the sake of receiving). Consequently, once we understand the meaning of Lishma (for the sake of bestowal) and acquire the spiritual mind and senses, we will feel as if we are from another planet, not from this world.

The Zohar is written in two layers in order to bring us to this. The first layer is tales that are seemingly about this world, but are written in a very strange form such as about the Tabernacle, animals, the Sinai desert, and so on. The second layer is a more inner level written with Kabbalistic terminology such as Zeir Anpin, Malchut, the three lines, ascents and descents, Aba ve Ima, and so forth.

We have no connection with either of these planes. Essentially, however, these are not two planes, but two languages that speak about the same phenomena. I can still visualize the plane that is closer to me, the one that seemingly speaks about this world such as a tent, the Tabernacle, and people that do things. I can also visualize the second plane, somehow, of the right and the left lines, up and down, the passing of the Light, and ascents and descents of Partzufim.

A lot of effort is needed to visualize both planes as one whole and see that all of this is within me. This is about my connection with the forces of bestowal; all of this is only about the forces of bestowal. Where are the Tabernacle, the tent of gathering, Zeir Anpin, and Malchut? Everything is within me. I must treat both of these planes like they are my inner spiritual qualities. I want to bring them out from within me and feel them, which is called “Opening The Book of Zohar” or revealing it. This is why Segula (Remedy) operates here.

Cookbooks or weight-loss books brainwash us. We acquire the author’s mind, he influences us, and his opinion begins to interest us. The Zohar doesn’t “brainwash” or coerce; it doesn’t contain anything like that. The remedy in it only operates according to our desire. We need to have a very strong desire so The Zohar will really influence us so that spirituality will become revealed to us.

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When we read The Book of Zohar, we understand that it talks about qualities, forms, and images that we don’t perceive yet. It is precisely this sensation of not understanding that pushes us forward and makes us form the right perception.

If we read other Kabbalistic books, then we might perceive everything in a purely mechanical manner, with our mind, or in the form of material pictures. Then we will be satisfied with the perception that lowers all the concepts to the level of our world, without understanding that they are all imaginary. Alternatively, we might consider them spiritual, yet merely theoretical.

In contrast, The Book of Zohar with Baal HaSulam’s Commentary forces us to search for a new perception and to unite these two images. This results in the emergence of the true perception of reality. A person doesn’t understand how it happens, but the book works on him and he gradually acquires a new perception.

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