The transcript has been transcribed and edited from English simultaneous interpretation, thus there may be potential semantic inaccuracies within it.

Daily Lesson (Morning) December 7, 2024.

Part 1: Baal HaSulam. Introduction to the Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah, Item #8.

Reader: Hello, we're reading in the writings of Baal HaSulam. In Hebrew, it's page 155, the “Introduction to the Preface of the Wisdom of Kabbalah”, continuing with item 8. You can find the study materials in Sviva Tova and the Arvut system. You can also send us live questions through our websites. Anyone asking a question in the study hall is asked to stand up, hold the microphone close to his mouth, and speak loud and clear. Again, the writings of Baal HaSulam, the Introduction to the Preface of the Wisdom of Kabbalah, continuing with item 8. 

Introduction to the Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah.

Item 8

Reading: (0:37)The matter of the Segula [power/remedy] of Torah and Mitzvot to bring the soul to Dvekut with Him applies only when the engagement in it is not in order to receive any reward, and only to bestow contentment upon his Maker. This is so because then the soul gradually acquires equivalence of form with its Maker, as will be written below concerning Rabbi Hanina’s words in the beginning of the book [“Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah”].

In all, there are five degrees—Nefesh, Ruach, Neshama, Haya, Yechida [NRNHY]—that come from the five worlds called AK, Atzilut, Beria, Yetzira, and Assiya. Also, there are five particular degrees NRNHY, which come from the five particular Partzufim [plural for Partzuf] in each of the five worlds. Then there are sub-particular NRNHY, which come from the ten Sefirot in each Partzuf, as is written inside the book.

And through Torah and Mitzvot to bestow contentment upon the Maker, one is gradually rewarded with the Kelim in the form of desire to bestow, which come in these degrees, degree by degree, until they achieve complete equivalence of form with Him. In that state, the thought of creation—to receive all the pleasure, tenderness, and abundance that He had planned for them—is carried out. Additionally, they receive the greatest reward, since they are awarded the true Dvekut, since they have obtained the desire to bestow, like their Maker.

M. Laitman: Yes. Questions?

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (03:29) Baal HaSulam writes in the beginning, that to bring the soul to adhesion with Him, applies only when the engagement in it is not in order to receive any reward, and only to bestow contentment upon His Maker. 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: Is this the state of bestowing in order to bestow? Is that what Baal HaSulam is talking about here? 

M. Laitman: No, that's to not receive anything for oneself. That's what he means. 

Student: But if we do it according to the different states or discernments, which discernment is that? 

M. Laitman: This is before he commences a certain action.

Student: So it's to bestow in order to receive? 

M. Laitman: No. What did you read? 

Reader: Let's read item 8 again. 

Introduction to the Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah, Item 8

Re-Reading: (04:30) The matter of the Segula, the special power of Torah and Mitzvot, to bring the soul to adhesion with Him, applies only when the engagement in it is not in order to receive any reward, and only in order to bestow contentment upon His Maker. This is so because then the soul gradually acquires equivalence of form with its Maker, as will be written below, concerning Rav Hanania's words in the beginning of the book Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah.

In all, there are five degrees: Nefesh, Ruach, Neshama, Chaya, Yechida - NRNHYi, that come from the five worlds called AK, Atzilut, Bria, Yetzira, and Assiya. Also, there are five particular degrees of NRNHY, which come from the five particular partzufim in each of the five worlds. And then there are sub-particular NRNHY, which come from the Ten sefirot in each partzuf, as written inside the book.

And through Torah and Mitzvot, to bestow contentment upon the Maker, one is gradually rewarded with the vessels in the form of the desire to bestow, which come in these degrees, degree by degree, until they achieve complete equivalence of form with Him. In that state, the thought of creation, to receive all the pleasure, gentleness, and abundance that He had planned for them, is carried out. Additionally, they receive the greatest reward, since they are also awarded the true adhesion, since they have obtained the desire to bestow, like their Maker.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (07:05) He says that if we work correctly in Torah and Mitzvot, then through the degrees we are rewarded with receiving vessels of bestowal. My question is about a degree. Are others, my definition of others, that exist in this degree, it means that he’s in my degree, or one degree above me, like a Rav, a friend who is Rav, and maybe even more than that, in those definitions? 

M. Laitman: I don't know. 

Student: When I am in a degree, is the reality such that the others that I am facing is on my degree, or one degree adjacent to me, and that's it? 

M. Laitman: I don't know what you mean by adjacent to you.

Student: Adjacent means a friend who is a Rav, a teacher. He says that if we work correctly in Torah and Mitzvot, we are rewarded with vessels of bestowal, gradually the vessels of bestowal come to the one who is doing the work. My question is about these vessels of bestowal. Are these vessels of bestowal revealed to the one who is working always on the adjacent degree to him, as a teacher who is ushering him to the next degree, teaching him, demonstrating to him; how do we live on the next degree, and how do we attain it? 

M. Laitman: He attains what he is capable of according to his quality. 

Student: And the person is, in his definition of others facing him, the person defines who is the degree that comes to him. That's the degree? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (09:14) It speaks here about the soul, the special power, the Segula of the Torah and Mitzvot works on it, the light works on it. So I wanted to ask, who exactly does it work on? The special power, the Segula, who does it work on? Only on the degree of Neshama or what? 

M. Laitman: Soul is the general name.

Student: Of anyone who is engaging in it or…?

M. Laitman: Anyone who is engaged in internality, meaning who is already making actions in order to bestow. 

Student: If he begins, he doesn't yet bestow, and it takes him a few years, then this special power doesn't work on him? 

M. Laitman: It works, but you can't say that he attains something of the soul. 

Student: So, what does work on one that wants some power to work on him? What can help, what can work on him? 

M. Laitman: The general light.

Student: And how does he invite it, draw it, in general? 

M. Laitman: When he aims for it, when he has an initial desire, he was born that way, that he has a desire to attain godliness. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (10:30) Nefesh, Ruach, Neshama, Haya. These are degrees of giving contentment to the Creator?

M. Laitman: It's degrees that the created being attains in his ascent towards the Creator, and according to his degree, he can bring contentment. 

Student: And this exists in every state? All of these degrees, they exist in every state that a person is in? These are degrees, these measures of contentment. 

M. Laitman: You can say that, yes. 

Student: So, when can he say that he can truly measure it? After he goes through certain states? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (11:23) What does the soul acquire in every degree? 

M. Laitman: The soul acquires in each degree the light that is contained in that degree. 

Student: According to what he describes, in every degree, a specific form of bestowal in it clothes. 

M. Laitman: Yes, it's one and the same.

Student: So, what attaches to the soul in every degree? What possession does it come out in every degree? Because it clothes and leaves, and so, what is?

M. Laitman: The light that it has attained. 

Student: It's a light. This is the feeling that it achieves, or the form?

M. Laitman: It's the feeling. 

Student: So, what about the form? Does it need to acquire it each time anew, a form of bestowal? 

M. Laitman: The form of bestowal has to be developed on top of the will to receive in which it receives. 

Student: Now, this light that it attains, what is it, actually, the light, the feeling, with respect to the adhesion, to its adhesion towards the Creator? What is this light? 

M. Laitman: It's partial equivalence with the Creator. 

Student: Does it reinforce, reinform the adhesion with the Creator each time, its acquaintance with it, the connection? 

M. Laitman: Yes. The Creator is the light of Ein Sof, and the soul attains NRNHY. Meaning, in portions, the soul attains.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (13:09) What can help a student to own his intention all the time, so it will be more and more not in order to receive any reward? 

M. Laitman: That each time he knows what he is facing and what he is going to attain, what he still has to work on, and what he has to run away from. 

Student: From what you said now, what's most clear is what we should run away from, actually. What we should attain? These are just words for the time being. I want to resemble the Creator, I want to bestow. I can say it, but the feeling is still lacking a bit. 

M. Laitman: Okay, okay. But still, it's worthwhile knowing that this is ahead of us.

Student: What can help me to succeed in performing this action that you said, in a better way? Just to think about it, want it, even though I don't really have a perception of this next degree that you now described. 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: So what should I do? Just sit and think all the time that I want to resemble the Creator, that's it, that's enough, or maybe I need to do other things. 

M. Laitman: No, he says that if I have, if I want to grow, then I have to develop the vessel of the soul. Vessel of the soul is a greater desire with a greater intention in order to bestow.

Student: Is this the correct way for a person to measure, let's say, how much he wants to reach in order to bestow, versus all the other things he says is in corporeal life, and see that this versus that becomes more and more important, is this how we should look at it? 

M. Laitman: You can try that way. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (15:32) Each degree is in greater connection?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: Where in the Ten can we achieve a lack for connection for the next degree? 

M. Laitman: From all the friends.

Student: What does it mean, from all the friends? 

M. Laitman: If we talk about it, study it, we aim together to rise to these higher next degrees according to their order, that is the reason, that following it, we will go from one degree to the next. 

Student: With the upper one, we have no way of awakening Him so that He will give us a deficiency, we have no way of receiving a lack from the upper one. 

M. Laitman: We do.

Student: How? 

M. Laitman: By studying. When we study, so we have to be impressed by the degrees that are ahead of us, and we need to wish to attain them. 

Student: But that's for the next degree, but the link for connection, seemingly we need to depict to ourselves that on the next stage we're even more connected, and in that way create a lack?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: How can we always be in this direction? Because always, this matter that all of our work in the direction of greater and greater incorporation and connection with the friends is always forgotten from the heart. 

M. Laitman: We have to always be in that, not let it go. 

Student: Is there some advice, something we can do in order to lock on, on that? 

M. Laitman: No, just don't stop. Do not stop. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (17:55) We want the desire to bestow, we want to connect, we want many things, we want to connect, we want to reach the upper worlds, I don't even know what it is, but we want. How do I truly give contentment to the Creator before I even have a desire to bestow? Because only after I give contentment to the Creator, I can receive, gradually, a desire to bestow. What does it mean to give contentment to the Creator? 

M. Laitman: Ask. 

Student: Ask for what? 

M. Laitman: Ask to have a desire to bring contentment to the Creator.

Student: I ask to give contentment to the Creator. I want that indeed, later He will talk about true adhesion, but before I want to be in adhesion with the Creator, I want to be in adhesion with the friends. How do we reach adhesion with the friends? 

M. Laitman: That's easier now, that's right in front of you in this world. You have a Ten, and beyond the Ten, there are many thousands even, who, in order to get closer to the Creator, you have to get closer to them. Because getting closer to the Creator, you don't know how, you don't see the ladder. Getting closer to the friends is something you can feel and monitor. 

Student: This is what we talked about in the preparation. We had a workshop with the friends here, and also last night, we had a preparation for the lesson, and we told ourselves: what does it actually mean to be in adhesion with each other? How do we truly, every day, give this lack to each other, to be in adhesion? So I'm asking, how do we bring this lack every day? Yesterday, we asked in a common prayer that this table here will be full, and it is full, and there are more friends in the Arvut system. So how do we take this thing into the force of faith and continue it even higher? He's giving us something here that we need to take with both our hands. What do we do next with it? How do we take this adhesion, this true adhesion, as he says here, true adhesion? How do we do it? Not once a week, but every day this table will be full. 

M. Laitman: Not just about every morning, but rather throughout all our time of existence that we'll feel ourselves connected in a Ten and also across the Tens all around us, and we won't stop that.

Student: We talked about Arvut also, that indeed in these states that we're now in, we have to be guarantors for each other. How do we truly keep this thing? We make a prayer every day. Every day we make a common prayer. But how in each and every state do we remain together with each other here? We don't let go of each other. 

M. Laitman: That's only prayer. Only prayer. Turning to the Creator, who built us as separate and distinct, and we, in response, ask Him to get closer to each other and adhere to each other. 

Student: How from this adhesion will we achieve it? If the Creator himself will achieve it, how do we fulfill the thought of creation? He says that through the adhesion, and we will be together with each other every moment, we will attain the Creator's thought. How does that happen exactly? 

M. Laitman: From connection between us, we begin to feel the common force that unites us, and that, specifically by that, we come to the attainment of the next states on our path, and thus we advance.

Student: From lack to lack? This is how we advance and keep the Creator's thought. 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (23:28) He speaks here about the five Partzufim and five worlds. I wanted to ask, what is the connection of a person who hasn't yet reached attainment to the worlds and to the Partzufim, and what is it even? 

M. Laitman: Worlds and Partzufim? 

Student: Yes. 

M. Laitman: These are components of the upper world.

Student: What does that actually mean? 

M. Laitman: That's like me explaining to you that there is a car, and it has an engine, and the engine is composed of this and this and that part. If you don't know that, how will you understand that? You'll just hear some names. 

Student: Actually, the Partzufim and the worlds are a part of the upper world. This is what we have to attain, really. 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: And as a person who hasn't yet reached attainment, I have no connection with these things.

M. Laitman: But he has to try and get closer to these terms and expect, anticipate them to shine on him while he has written, while he mentions the names and discusses that, he summons a higher illumination from them. 

Student: And he'll be able to feel it when they shine on him? 

M. Laitman: That depends on where he is, what degree he's at. But ultimately, definitely yes.

Question (Women Latin 26): (25:30) What is the role of the Mitzvot, the commandments, in acquiring a vessel of a desire to bestow? 

M. Laitman: I assume that saying Mitzvot, he's referring only to the actions we do according to the Shulchan Aruch book, with your hands and with your mouth. But actually, Mitzvot are the actions through which we connect to the Creator and we bring Him, as much as we can extract from the Mitzva, we bring an illumination in order to bestow, to bring Him contentment. 

Question (Women PT 25): (26:20) Are we capable of feeling inner changes that bring us closer to attaining the desire to bestow? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Moscow 4): (26:36) In item 8, he writes that only keeping the Torah and Mitzvot not in order to receive a reward brings adhesion with the Creator? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: How does the Ten assist in making our intentions more precise? 

M. Laitman: By being in support.

Question (Latin 1): (26:57) If our nature is to only do things for myself, how will we be able to devote ourselves to the Torah and Mitzvot for the benefit of the Creator? 

M. Laitman: So, we will have to invert our will to receive to a desire in order to bestow. That’s it. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (27:38) To begin with, what is the soul drawn to? 

M. Laitman: The Creator. 

Student: He writes that gradually the soul acquires an equivalence of form, so does it mean that to begin with the soul is not in equivalence of form? It's not clear from the work. I thought that a person should realize equivalence of form, but here it speaks about the soul, that it performs this process. So here, what is the relation to a person versus the soul? 

M. Laitman: The soul means the part of God above. Meaning, the part which shines in the person. And to the extent that we wish to achieve bestowal, then we are awarded with this illumination so that it shines on us more and more. 

Student: So, actually, the person's relation changes in the process according to the measure that he attains bestowal with the friend, so with the Creator, to that same extent, he feels the soul shining in him?

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (29:43) The time when we come here to the lesson, following the preparation, we make preparation here, preparation even earlier. And when the reader reads the excerpts together with you, with all the friends, with good preparation, it's felt like today, for example, this is what I was created for. Everything is realized here. The prayer, the answer for the prayer, there is no more than this action. Now, I hear the friends asking, and the teacher is always directing us, and we need to live it, live in it all the time, always in this connection, in this common effort, in this prayer. I feel that it is possible to be in it only if we make a non-stop preparation towards this point. 

M. Laitman: Do that. Okay. It's not that there needs to be preparation with your hands and legs and some actions, but it's internal, with your inner desire, right? 

Student: So, I get an example from my friends in the Ten, who relate to their whole day as preparation for this time when we sit here together. 

M. Laitman: Yes, correct. 

Student: So, how can it be that the time of preparation, which is actually the whole day, becomes a place where we build this feeling, because it is preparation, I'm not there yet.

M. Laitman: No, in that preparation, we build the sensation and spiritual action and spiritual attainment. That's how it works. 

Student: And that intensity of the action that happens here, which by the way is not felt throughout the whole essence, sometimes there's a point where you can grasp it, feel it, and then you lose it. At least I do. At least that. So, is it possible in reality that a person truly feels this feeling in a prolonged way? This is how it needs to be? 

M. Laitman: Yes, all the time. 

Student: We learn that there is a role for entries and exits. 

M. Laitman: That's not up to us. What's up to us is to be in continuous adhesion. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (32:21) How is the degree of attainment measured? 

M. Laitman: According to the place where according to the place that the soul of the person who's in this study attains. 

Student: Can I say what degree I mean? Can a person say that? I mean, here he divides it into particular and sub-particular, etc.? 

M. Laitman: Yes, yes.

Student: According to what? 

M. Laitman: According to the degree, the height that he attains. 

Student: How can I not delude myself? I mean, you see people, sometimes somebody becomes, you know, says he's talking to the Creator. I mean, how does a person not delude himself? With respect to? I don't know, how do we do it?

M. Laitman: We'll get closer to that, and then we'll have more words and more to talk about.

Student: A person who truly has a grip on it, he can take advantage of it in the opposite form even. He is in a stature, even in our group, there are different roles, etc. People who have certain statures, they can seemingly use it, you know, seemingly, I'm doing it for bestowal, but you actually get honor because people look at him, you know.

M. Laitman: That's already man's work. How does he take the consequences of his actions, and what does he do with it? 

Student: I wanted to scrutinize how to truly perform the same actions that are depicted here, but that it will truly be clean, that I won't delude myself. You seemingly do something for others, but along with that, it raises your ego. It raises your... uh... 

M. Laitman: Yes, very true. Correct.

Student: So, how can I check myself to see that I’m truly doing it? 

M. Laitman: That is the whole entire study that we have to make sure that we will have, how to put it, a person who comes to doing a Mitzva, meaning to practically bring some contentment to the Creator, then he feels what he’s doing and to what extent he adheres to the Creator, to what extent he plays out his devotion to the Creator. He feels that.

Student: When a person bestows? 

M. Laitman: When he bestows. 

Student: Does he enjoy it? 

M. Laitman: He enjoys it. That is permitted to enjoy. 

Student: How? Well, I guess I need to scrutinize it.

M. Laitman: Okay, not everything at once.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (36:20) We talked about adhesion with the friends and that a person should always be in this thought, even if he’s not physically with them. There are states where a person doesn’t think about the friends. Are there such states? 

M. Laitman: There are all kinds of states, yes.

Student: So the goal is to constantly be in these thoughts, because it seems impossible. 

M. Laitman: Try more and more. After all sorts of successful and unsuccessful actions, you will see that, after all, you advance. 

Student: Towards the goal: that the friends will always be in my head, in my thoughts, in my desire?

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: What determines that a person can succeed in such an action? 

M. Laitman: Where his heart is. 

Student: Because it seems that by himself, he can’t succeed in holding on to it—it’s impossible. So maybe there’s also Arvut with the friends here to agree about it and to hold it together? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (37:43) A person can’t allow himself to say that it’s impossible to give contentment to the Creator? 

M. Laitman: No. 

Student: Because if He gave him the will to receive, then by the upper light He gives him a desire to bestow. 

M. Laitman: No, he’s generally born for that. 

Student: So, why would that not be a reward for him if he feels that he’s giving contentment to the Creator? Maybe he can be in it without feeling that he’s truly in it, because otherwise, it could be a different kind of reward for him. Maybe he’s in it, but he doesn’t feel it? 

M. Laitman: He receives a reward? 

Student: That is actually giving contentment to the Creator. 

M. Laitman: If he brings contentment to the Creator, it’s possible that he doesn’t feel much, like a baby. 

Student: But he should also feel it, and out of that, he reaches a point where he’ll actually feel if it’s correct or not.

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (38:49) What is the first degree in which a person acquires a soul? 

M. Laitman: It’s a very tiny feeling, a simple one, that cannot be divided into parts. It can’t be turned somehow in order to look at it, inspect it, taste it. Rather, he simply feels that he is in a state where he’s together with the Creator.

Student: And the work with restriction screen and reflected light means that a person already has a soul? 

M. Laitman: No. 

Student: Why not? 

M. Laitman: No, the work with restriction screen and reflected light, this is the work following which, what he feels, he can say that, I now feel my soul. 

Student: We can ask about the screen. Is there such a thing as partial screen? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: That part of the desire is already corrected and some of it he can bestow? 

M. Laitman: Yes, but we don't talk about a partial screen. A screen, that's it. 

Student: I'll give an example. Let's say a person overcomes a certain desire during the lesson by connecting with the friends and outside the framework he can't overcome it. So, what's the issue here? 

M. Laitman: He needs to be more attached to the friends, more connected with them.  

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (41:19) We say that as the magnitude of the deficiency, the size of the fulfillment. So, if we summarize what a human is, it's lack and fulfillment. Can we say that? Meaning that man is both lack and fulfillment? 

M. Laitman: A person is not a lack nor a feeling. A man, when we say Adam, it means a desire. And in the desire we can discover. Is there a feeling or there's no feeling? 

Student: So, if I'm a desire, a lack, just trying to understand the concept. The Creator wanted to bring out the wholeness of his actions to practice. He wanted to benefit the created beings. But I am a desire. I'm not sure how to express this, but it turns out that it's incomplete?

M. Laitman: Of course it's incomplete. 

Student: So, why did He even have this will to create and to do good? Because what a person, what the human feels is not just the doing good, it's also the lack. 

M. Laitman: That's how it's built. The Creator built Adam, a man who's full of deficiencies. And he can correct himself with these deficiencies and fill them in order to bestow, so that he will be as whole as the Creator. 

Student: Why couldn't the Creator shorten the whole process? 

M. Laitman: He has no problem with that.

Student: So, if He only wanted to do good already, why can't he create something already similar to Him, already like Him? 

M. Laitman: It's a nice question. It's because He wants you to earn what you will get in the end. 

Student: But if I have to earn it, then it turns out that He also created something that suffers.

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: Was that his idea, to create something that also suffers? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: So, why do we say that He only wanted to do good? 

M. Laitman: Because even the suffering that we feel, we later on relate it to pleasure.

Student: And in the meantime? 

M. Laitman: In the meantime, you're working in order to cover the suffering. 

Student: Okay, I'll think about it. 

M. Laitman: You should think about it and read a lot. There's a lot that you're missing. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (44:36) To be in this state of Lishma, in attainment, and to cross the barrier, is that the same thing? 

M. Laitman: We have to cross the barrier in order to be in attainment, yes. 

Student: That's already Lishma? 

M. Laitman: Yes, that is Lishma. 

Student: I have no doubt that I need to do everything not for my own sake. I believe that. But I also know that I'm in Lo Lishma. So what do I do? 

M. Laitman: Continue. Continue and understand better how to perform actions that are Lishma, and above your own pleasure. It will come. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (45:51) You described well before the first degree when a person acquires the soul. You said it's a subtle, small feeling that can't be broken down to pieces, that can't be manipulated. A person is in a state together with the Creator. When a person feels that attainment, what does he do with that feeling? He just experiences it. He needs to add something of himself. He needs to just absorb it. What?

M. Laitman: He continues, just like with any other state that he goes through. He is impressed by it, inspired by it, and then continues onward. 

Student: Why does a person receive this feeling? What for? 

M. Laitman: Which feeling? 

Student: This feeling of this attainment you've described of the soul. 

M. Laitman: Because he needs to discover his soul. This is his inner vessel. And afterwards to try to fill it, that soul, with the upper light, with the Creator. Give the Creator a place inside his soul.

Student: The soul is filled, or the soul itself is fulfillment? 

M. Laitman: No, the soul is filled. Nefesh Ruach, Neshama, Chaya, and Yechida are the empty vessels that we need to fill. 

Student: How does a person fill these vessels? 

M. Laitman: By making a meeting with the source of the light and performing a Zivug, a coupling with it.

Student: Another thing, you said that what depends on us is to be in continuous adhesion. How to do this continuously? 

M. Laitman: We don't yet know such things. 

Student: What does it mean for us to be in adhesion? 

M. Laitman: Adhesion means, how can I put it? Adhesion means that my vessel is matching the friend's vessel. Then we are in adhesion. 

Student: What is the friend's vessel? 

M. Laitman: Well, a vessel which is in order to receive, and I am in a vessel where I can also receive from above, and from my vessel I can give him. 

Student: But what does the friend want to receive? 

M. Laitman: I'll feel what he wants.

Student: So until I feel what the friend wants to receive, I can't be in adhesion with him? 

M. Laitman: Certainly not. 

Student: Not. So what depends on me in order to fill the friend's vessel? 

M. Laitman: To be together with him in all the possibilities, the opportunities that the Creator opens up to you. And out of these actions, you will feel each other, what each one wants, what is the nature of each one, and so on. 

Student: Now when I sit here in the lesson, the friends are sitting with me, how do I feel their vessels? 

M. Laitman: You can't feel it. 

Student: So what can I feel?

M. Laitman: What can you feel? You need to ask yourself, in what way do you feel the friends? Or do you feel the general deficiency that everyone together has? 

Student: What ability do I have to feel the friend's vessel? I understand I don't have that until I get that sense from above. 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: So I don't really have any ability to feel their vessels except to imagine something.

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: How then to feel the vessels of my friends? 

M. Laitman: When you elevate yourself to the Creator and you ask of Him to give you a feeling so that through you, you can feel the friends. And as a result, you have a connection with the Creator and with the friends, and with the feeling itself, the work itself.

Student: The Creator will also give me the feeling of the vessels of the friends, their deficiency? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: I should feel what they lack, or just to... And in the lesson, I'm focused on what you're saying. I'm focused on the sources. How do you add the layer of the friends here? 

M. Laitman: You need to think about how do you reach a state where it pains you that they don't have it, and you cannot bring it to them. They lack a feeling, and they seemingly are asking, and you cannot give it to them. 

Student: This is the feeling that such a pain is what I need to sit in the lesson with all the time? 

M. Laitman: Not all the time. It comes and goes, but that's the feeling. 

Student: So this is my aspiration, to have that pain towards the friends. And when I hear Rav, what do I do with that pain, with regards to the words and the spirit you deliver? 

M. Laitman: The spirit that I'm giving should fill the vessel from which you will be filled.

Student: For the friends? 

M. Laitman: For the friends. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (52:26) I want to continue the friend for a second. If I feel sorrow that I can't fill the friend, how can we be in joy? Where does the joy come on the path? 

M. Laitman: One doesn't hinder the other. 

Student: Doesn't bother? 

M. Laitman: No. If I feel sorrow that I can't help a friend and fill him, then I ask of the Creator that He will give me the power to receive and bestow from above downwards, and then I get it.

Student: So that's really where the joy comes from. 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (53:33) If I understand from the questions now, why you teach us that the connection between us is most important, and this is the spiritual inner connection that I feel, the desire of the friend, I can already place on my desire to bestow the restriction, that's where I need the Masach, then I raise the friend's desire to the Creator, so I connect with the Creator, I'm praying, and I'm the conduit, that's what it's about? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Women PT 6): (54:30) Is an action of bestowal only expressed towards the Ten? 

M. Laitman: Usually, yes. That is, even if it is towards the Creator, but it is through the Ten, out of the Ten. 

Question (Internet): (54:52) How do we get to caring for the friends like a mother cares for her children? How do we make that concern become natural? 

M. Laitman: It will become natural.

Question (Women PT 6): (55:12) The friend's corporeal desires are easy to identify. How do I identify the spiritual desires of the friends? 

M. Laitman: This can be revealed, but not in these degrees. Not in Nefesh and Ruach.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (55:48) When there is an action of the light, it brings up all kinds of feelings in us, from joy to crying. So besides relating it to the Creator, what else do you do with those feelings? 

M. Laitman: Connect with them and be in it completely. 

Student: Not to try to delve deeper and see why I'm in such a feeling? 

M. Laitman: No, no, that will come by itself.  

 Introduction to the Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah, Item 9

Reading: (56:52) Now it will not be difficult for you to understand the above words of The Zohar, that all the worlds, upper and lower and everything within them, were created only for man. This is so because all these degrees and worlds came only to complement the souls in the measure of Dvekut they lacked with respect to the thought of creation.

In the beginning, they were restricted and hung down degree by degree and world after world, down to our material world, to bring the soul into a body of this world, which is entirely to receive and not to bestow, like animals and beasts. It is written, “A wild ass’ colt is born a man.” This is considered the complete will to receive, which has nothing in terms of bestowal. In that state, one is regarded as the complete opposite of Him, and there is no greater remoteness than this.

Afterward, through the soul that clothes within one, he engages in Torah and Mitzvot. Gradually and slowly, from below upward, he obtains the same form of bestowal as his Maker, through all those qualities that hung down from above downward, which are but degrees and measures in the form of the desire to bestow.

Each higher degree means that it is farther from the will to receive and closer to being only to bestow. In the end, one is awarded being entirely to bestow and not to receive anything for himself. At that time, one is completed with true Dvekut with Him, for man was created only for this. Thus, all the worlds and everything in them were created only for man.

M. Laitman: Let's look at how it is written, so simply and beautifully. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (59:56) You always aim us to long for the highest degree possible, all the way to the end of the ladder. Is that correct? That's what I heard.

M. Laitman: Yes, but it's clear that this is where we need to reach. 

Student: Why do we need to aim ourselves that way? 

M. Laitman: Because that's the Creator's goal. That's the place that He has determined as our goal in our development. And so we aim ourselves to rise there. 

Student: We also learn that the whole path, we have Reshimot, which we simply realize. Every degree is already made for us. Everything's made for us in a form of Reshimot, and we only realize it. I wanted to ask, what does it mean that we realize a degree that already pre-exists for us, every time that we awaken the next degree, or that it awakens? From here until the final correction, there are Reshimot already pre-made for every degree. What does it mean that we realize these records correctly? 

M. Laitman: That we need to realize them, meaning to receive them, and according to these records to create couplings gradually from below upwards. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:01:55) A person that has achieved a certain degree already has it in permanence?

M. Laitman: Permanently, I don't know, but he has it let's say. 

Student: So what does it mean to see every day as new? 

M. Laitman: That each time that he receives a certain degree, he receives it as new, being new upon the previous states that seemingly were erased from him. 

Student: He essentially loses it and then goes back to the same? 

M. Laitman: He seemingly loses it in order to be impressed by the new state. 

Student: It's not so clear. He loses it in order for what?

M. Laitman: I achieved a certain degree and now I'm in a new state. And then new records come to me, new conditions. I accumulate them within me and I perform an action on them.

Student: For the new states? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: And what happens with the state I already attained? 

M. Laitman: It's not important to me anymore and I'll have more ahead of me. 

Student: So that's something we don't touch anymore, like as if we already have that?

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: And in every degree we have the same means to attain it, more or less? 

M. Laitman: Yes. Yes, we learn about all of the means we have.

Student: What basically changes qualitatively between the degrees? 

M. Laitman: What changes? 

Student: I understand it's more bestowing, but what else does it mean? 

M. Laitman: The coarseness, the screen, and direct light and reflected light. These things change all the time.

Student: With their power, intensity, quality? 

M. Laitman: Yes, in the magnitude

Student: And qualitatively? 

M. Laitman: Qualitatively? Well, of course there are changes, but I can't say what is the difference between the degree of NRNHY of Ruach and NRNHY of Nefesh. 

Student: So it's something emotional? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:05:14) We learned that the state in Ein Sof is Him and His name are One, which is a simple unity between the desire and the light. What's the difference between the desire that was in Ein Sof and the desire to receive? Because then the thought of creation emerges and we start talking about the will to receive. What's the difference between the desire of Ein Sof and the desire we call will to receive? 

M. Laitman: The desire that was in Ein Sof is the desire of the Creator. That includes within it his whole relation to the future created beings. That's it. 

Student: The desire is something that always existed? Kabbalists write that the desire always existed.

M. Laitman: Yes, following the four phases of direct light, we already have a will to receive. 

Student: Okay, when we say the purpose of creation, it came out of the state of Him and His name are one. So Him and His name one was always existing, eternally?

M. Laitman: Let's say so. 

Student: Okay, so also the concept of Dvekut, adhesion, is also something we acquire in the thought of creation. It didn't exist in him and his name are one, right? It's outside of that state?

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:06:55) Before a person reaches the ladder of spiritual degrees, does he have some way of measuring his state?

M. Laitman: Until he reaches the spiritual degree, does he have a way to measure his state? His state, I don't think he has a possibility to really explore his state. He doesn't. 

Student: There's a phenomenon across the years where you feel that the importance of our work in a person rises. Is there a way to look at it through the lens of importance, or it's not… 

M. Laitman: No, no, all these years, they're not going to bring us anything.

Student: No, not the years, I'm just talking about the importance. 

M. Laitman: The importance. The importance of the degree comes according to the lack.

Student: So before a person comes to all of the spiritual degrees we learn about, he basically has no anchor, besides maybe the friends who guard him, but he has no way to know, did I advance, did I not advance, he just keeps working. 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:09:10) He writes to us here, that a person merits a state where he is entirely to bestow and he doesn't receive anything for himself. Then he has true adhesion because that's the only reason he was born. I want to ask about this part of for himself. A person was born with this nature, a wild asses colt and so on,  he only thinks about himself. And if he is awarded with thinking of outside himself, then he receives the Torah, the worlds, the souls. And all of that, the goal of all of that is to get rid of the thinking for self? Basically, to understand that life is not for oneself? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: So, all of our work in the society, in the Tens, to begin to think about the Ten or society or the world, he basically has to kill the thoughts of self?

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: So, it seems like that's the problem that we have fundamentally, because a person thinks from himself. He wants to do good things, but mostly to himself. And all of a sudden, he needs to recognize that, that needs to be killed. What gives the person the power to put himself aside and begin to identify with something greater than himself? Where does he get this thought to stop engaging with himself? 

M. Laitman: From the upper light that the Creator shines on him.

Student: I understand that I don't understand it. I'm putting it aside. Let's say a person suddenly has a family. He grows and suddenly has kids and family and so on. His thoughts become a little less for himself. He wants health for everyone in his family. He wants everyone to develop well and so on. So, he loses his self-interest just a little bit. He relieves himself from it. He understands there's a greater benefit than just me. Now, this track of development needs to happen in his relation to others, to the society, or is it something totally different? 

M. Laitman: It's totally different. 

Student: What change does the light make to the desire, giving him a different perception of reality altogether here? What does the light do to the desire? 

M. Laitman: He indeed needs to see reality differently.

Student: I'm asking, what's the action the light does on the desire to cause that 180-degree shift? 

M. Laitman: It's not a 180-degree shift, but it is a turn. Because for the very first time he feels in his life that there is something outside of himself that is as important to him as himself, as he feels towards himself. 

Student: Can he grasp that? Make it an emotional vessel. Like, I feel when I'm hungry, when I'm tired, I have no doubt about that. How does a person suddenly start feeling a society, or even not something that big, a Ten? How do I begin to feel them that way? 

M. Laitman: That's the work of the upper light. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:13:07) You said that we can't examine ourselves. In the Ten, as a Ten, can we make actions of examination?

M. Laitman: We need to learn. Now you can't do it, but if you will learn, it will become possible. 

Student: When we can't make tests, can we examine the intentions, if I'm more accurate in my intention? 

M. Laitman: No, no.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:13:43) What does it mean not to receive anything for oneself? 

M. Laitman: Not to receive anything for oneself means that you have the light working on you, and it fills all of your desires, such that you don't want anything for yourself. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:14:35) In the wisdom of Kabbalah, there is light and there is illumination, and it's two different things completely. 

M. Laitman: Light and illumination? No, there's a light and there's a desire. 

Student: But there's two kinds of expressions of it I mean.

M. Laitman: There's an illumination that is part of the great light. 

Student: And this illumination is clashing with the vessel until it sufficiently purifies and the light is able to clothe into it. 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: So, meaning, there's some impression that happens through the clash. Something goes into the vessel. And even when it becomes inner light, it's not exactly inner light, a part of the Kli. Like, say, the shirt you wear, it's not a part of your body, but you always use it. 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: Okay, so let's say you have a vessel you acquired. What is its external expression, or towards the lower ones, or however we call that? 

M. Laitman: Whichever way I decide, that's how I can perform that expression, that plea. 

Student: Okay, how do you decide? If you are on a restriction, that it's not for yourself for sure, and then you have a screen that gives you the ability to come out of yourself, and then you work with reflected light, so how do you decide?

M. Laitman: I decide according to what I have in my hands. I have a restriction that I can go above in order to receive, and I have the desire to receive that I have to work above it if I want to bestow. So from that, I put together my vessel, my relation towards the others, and I start working. I want to resemble the Creator, please. The Creator gives everyone light, life, validity, forces. I can also do that in some measure, small measure. To that measure that I have light, and I reject it and don't want to receive it, I can also use that light in order to bestow with it, as if I am the source of light.

Student: So as long as there is no inner light, it's not regarded as truly bestowing.

M. Laitman: I will never have what the Creator has. He creates the light. I can only receive the light and send it onward, supposedly. 

Student: Is light direct light, or is it love? It's not the light itself. It only accompanies you, it disappears afterwards, you don't need it in the land itself afterwards. So why is he called the biggest prophet? 

M. Laitman: Because from all the prophets, he is really the greatest.

Student: He’s only the initial form, he only accompanies you in the beginning. 

M. Laitman: No, no, not only that. Between all of them, He is the greatest. 

Student: Because He makes you?

M. Laitman: He holds us.

Student: And the fact that He departs afterwards, do you still use it? 

M. Laitman: Yes. I use Him as if he’s living and existing. 

M. Laitman: But He was buried. It's written in the Torah that He was buried. 

M. Laitman: That was the external form.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:19:10) Can I ask about the letters? How to build letters? 

M. Laitman: To build letters?

Student: Yes. 

M. Laitman: You need a strong desire, a strong screen, reflected light, that you know how to use them, and then you will be able to build the letters.

Student: Is building a prayer, does it begin with building letters? Are there fundamental letters, and from what letter do we begin? 

M. Laitman: I don't know, it will be shown to you from above, the letters. You will be taught that.

Student: Something from above, there was a translation. There’s like a picture or a story in my mind about the arrangement of the letters. From above, downward, and there's also like a way to build several letters until they have the same form from below upwards. I don't know if it's okay to talk about something specific. 

M. Laitman: It's not okay. Don't even think about that. I'm telling you, don't think about that. 

Student: And if within the prayer the Creator puts... 

M. Laitman: I don't know, in the prayer, not in the prayer, don't think about it. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:21:53) We heard a little while, we'll have a discussion with Bnei Baruch management. We heard it was important for you to pick specifically these friends. I wanted to ask, why was it important for you to pick specifically them? And what, in your eyes, is the role of this group? 

M. Laitman: I don't know what to say. I don't count on the rest of the friends. I feel them, I accept them, I feel them close. But not that I can say about each one except for those that I count on them as a manager of society. 

Student: What is a manager of the society? 

M. Laitman: I can't say and I don't even want to. Those people, you should see in them that you will not have to do what they say, it's not a matter of, it's not like in the army  on one hand. But on the other hand, if you want to advance, you still should be under their authority. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:24:23) The situation where a person doesn't receive anything for himself, does what come before it must be hatred for the will to receive? When a person feels hatred and repulsion toward the will to receive. 

M. Laitman: I’d say so.

Student: Why am I asking? Because hatred for the will to receive helps you reject it, so is this something that can help us develop hatred for the will to receive? 

M. Laitman: Not more than what is written. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:25:18) You said before that we aim ourselves to Lishma, because that's the purpose of the Creator and that's a place that He determined as our goal in our development. And I want to ask, on our way to Lishma, what will help me develop sensitivity to the spiritual deficiency of the friend? 

M. Laitman: To adhere to him, and in this way, another one and another one and another one, till there'll be a group as one man with one heart. 

Student: From the text, each higher degree means it's further on the will to receive and closer to the will to bestow. What addition will we have when we attain the quality of bestowal? How will it influence Bnei Baruch, the world? 

M. Laitman: You’ll see, you’ll see.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:26:38) Toward the congress is an interesting feeling that's developing, that through our work in the Ten, there's a feeling we're creating something new in our society, some inner kind of renewal. And friends are beginning to talk not only about the Tens, but about our society, what we went through, maybe we're advancing this, something new. How do we deal with these questions? 

M. Laitman: Speak about it between you and see what you decide. And if you reach a certain decision, so bring it up here between us and we'll see what to do with it, if it's right or not. 

Student: To reach Lishma, the feeling of all of society, is that a good feeling, to feel all of society as a collective? 

M. Laitman: Of course. 

Student: It's not something we should suppress within us. No, no, no, only the Ten, because people feel it. 

M. Laitman: Okay, I told you already.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:28:07) We go through all kinds of changes, and I'd like to ask the managers, the friends who are managers. I once heard that we don't change what we have, the habits, we have the morning lesson that we have. These friends, if they can tell me, if they tell me to put on the kippah, I can do it. Can I trust them? And they tell me I have to put a mask because of COVID. Can I trust them if they decide unanimously that now we're changing the morning lesson? We're not going to study from 3 A.M., but from 2 A.M. Can I trust them if they decide together, unanimously, that now we have to do this meal or that Sukkah or Passover or use disposable dishes? Can I trust their unanimous decision like I can trust you? Because you too sometimes change orders in the society, in dissemination. Can I trust my friends, the management, if they decide this way? 

M. Laitman: You tell me, you should say.

Student: I'm saying, yes, if you decided, and they decide for spiritual reasons, together, unanimously, then I say yes. But who am I to determine? 

M. Laitman: You don't determine, I determined. 

Student: Oh, good. So, if I feel uncomfortable about it, if I'm certain that Rav said otherwise, if I heard, unequivocally, that Rav said not to do this? 

M. Laitman: So, stand up and explain yourself, and we'll all think about what you're thinking, maybe you were right. 

Student: Okay, but if the management still decides otherwise, for all kinds of reasons, and maybe they see better?

M. Laitman: If after that the management decides differently, so that's it, you have to lower your head. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:30:46) This point, our work is to what extent we justify. I wanted to learn from you, where you draw the line between justification and insisting on your opinion? How do you know when you have to annul yourself and when you have to insist on your opinion? How do you do that? 

M. Laitman: That's not the line that separates, it's society that obligates. 

Student: What does it mean? For example, you sit in the lesson, and you see something that bothers you, disturbs you, for example. How do you determine if it's the Creator who did this to you, and you justify it, and you annul before it, or you make a comment, you tell the friend strongly, for example.

M. Laitman: If I want to strongly show him something, and not that I'm just attacking him. 

Student: Let's say he's talking, or he fell asleep, or I don't know what. How do you justify or insist, that's the question.

M. Laitman: That's really a question, I can't say. 

Student: So where is the place of annulment, before what? 

M. Laitman: Annulment towards a society that can't withstand it, or towards a Creator that determined that. 

Student: Usually we say that those who are angry, they fall into the will to receive.

M. Laitman: They say that. 

Song: (01:33:48)