The transcript has been transcribed and edited from English simultaneous interpretation, thus there may be potential semantic inaccuracies within it.
Daily Lesson (Morning), April 11, 2024.
Part 1: Rabash. What Is, “For I Have Hardened His Heart,” in the Work?. 17 (1991)
Reader: (00:14) We are reading from the writings of Rabash, What Is, “For I Have Hardened His Heart,” in the Work? You can find the study material on kabbalahgroup.info and the Arvut system. You can also send your questions through the websites. Anyone asking questions here in the study hall should stand up, hold the mic close to his mouth and speak loud and clear.
Reading Article: What Is, “For I Have Hardened His Heart,” in the Work?
We should ask about the verse, “for I have hardened his heart,” why did the Creator not harden Pharaoh’s heart right in the beginning, but we see that only after Pharaoh admitted and said, “The Lord is the righteous one, and I and my people are the wicked,” then the verse says, “for I have hardened his heart”? Also, all the interpreters ask, Why did the Creator deny Pharaoh the choice?
It is known that the order of the work is that we begin the work in order to receive reward. To the extent that the body hears that it will be rewarded, and if it does not suffer, this leads a person to work in observing Torah and Mitzvot [commandments/good deeds]. That is, to the extent that he believes in reward and punishment, he receives motivation so as to be able to observe Torah and Mitzvot in all its details and precisions.
In this way, a person sees that he is advancing each day, and therefore enjoys his work, since he sees progress in the work. This follows the rule that one cannot do any work unless he sees progress in the work. It is like a person learning a profession and sees that he is not advancing in this profession, so he looks for something else to do, an easier job for him. But without progress, it is impossible to do anything. This stems from the matter, “which God has created to do.” For this reason, there must be progress in everything.
This is like the horse that circles the grindstones and walks in circles all day long. Because it constantly walks in the same place, its eyes must be covered so it does not see the truth, but will think that it is walking to a different place each time. That is, even animals must see progress in what they do, and any progress in the work is seen only when we work in order to receive reward.
But when we begin to work in order to bestow, when we want to achieve Dvekut [adhesion] with the Creator, which is equivalence of form, a person cannot look at the things he does. That is, although he sees that now he is doing more than he did while he was working in order to receive reward, but now he has a different measurement, which is to what extent he aims his actions to be in order to bestow and not for his own sake. At that time, he sees that he is far from it. Although he has many ascents, meaning he ascends in his degree, and now he wants to do everything for the sake of the Creator, it is only because he has received an awakening from above. Then he wants to annul before Him, as a “candle before a torch.”
But afterward, he descends from this state and falls once more into self-love. Then he sees that he has become worse; that is, he sees that each time he is farther from the work of bestowal, to the point that many times he comes to a state of “pondering the beginning.”
A person asks himself, “Why when I worked in order to receive reward, I had a good taste in the work, and I prayed and learned willingly, but now that I want to make more efforts than I did while I worked in order to receive reward, I see that I do not have the flavor that I had then?” The person asks, “Now that I want to work for the sake of the Creator, it stands to reason that I should have felt more closeness than while I was working for my own sake, but now I see the opposite! Not only am I not advancing in the work, but I am going backwards!”
The answer is as Baal HaSulam said, that one must believe that everything he feels now, that he is farther from the Creator, comes from above. That is, it is the hardening of the heart that the Creator gives in order for one to discover the real need, meaning to feel that without the help of the Creator, a person cannot emerge from the control of the will to receive for himself, but only the Creator Himself can help. That is, as the Creator gave him the nature of the desire to receive for himself, He should now give him a second nature called “desire to bestow,” since there is no light without a Kli [vessel], which is called “deficiency.” That is, the lack puts the taste in the filling.
Thus, if a person is given a filling but he has no need for it, he cannot taste the real taste in the filling. If he is given the filling before he has a need, he will not be able to use the filling, to elicit from the filling what is in it. It follows that the lack is part of the filling, since one without the other does not work. It follows that as one is given a filling from above, so one should be given a lack. It turns out that when a person sees that now he is farther from the work of bestowal, he is given this from above because the lack is part of the filling. Therefore, as the upper one gives the filling, so He gives the lack.
By this we can interpret the two questions we asked: 1) Why specifically after Pharaoh said, “The Lord is the righteous one, and I and my people are the wicked,” the Creator hardened his heart, and not before? 2) Why did He deny him the choice, as it is written, “for I have hardened his heart”?
The answer is that in the beginning, when starting the work, a person must see that everything depends on him. This is so as long as he is working in order to receive reward. At that time, a person can say, “The Lord is the righteous one, and I and my people are the wicked.” Hence, when one wants to work in order to bestow, meaning achieve Dvekut with the Creator, he must see the truth: It is not within man’s hands, since it contradicts the nature with which he was born. Only the Creator can give him a second nature, but without a lack, there is not real flavor in the filling. Hence, the Creator gives the hardening of the heart so that the person will feel the deficiency to the fullest.
This explains why only afterward did the Creator harden his heart, meaning after he began to work for the sake of the Creator and not before. Also, why did he need the hardening of the heart? It is for another reason, that if one does not feel the real lack, one cannot receive the real filling, since there is no light without a Kli. It follows that the hardening of the heart was not to his detriment, to remove him from the Creator. On the contrary, the hardening of the heart was in order to bring him to Dvekut with the Creator. We therefore see that the lack that a person feels when he is distant from the Creator, that, too comes from above and not by a person’s awakening.
By this we can interpret what our sages said (Avot 2:5), “In a place where there are no people, try to be a person.” We should interpret this in the work. When one begins the work, he begins in order to receive reward. Afterward, he sees that there are no people here, since in the work, we learn everything in one person. It follows that he saw that there was no quality of people in his heart, but only that of beasts—who do not know anything more than their own benefit. And he thinks about himself, how can it be said about the chosen people, as it is written, “You have chosen us from among all the nations; You have loved us,” that there is nothing more than a beast’s desire in the heart of the chosen people? Our sages said about this, “In a place where you see that there are no people in your heart, do not look at how the rest of the people behave. Rather, try to be a person.”
In other words, since you have come to see the truth, that one must be a person and not a beast, while the rest of the people have not achieved this awareness—that there are no people in their hearts—since they have not received this awareness, it is a sign that they still do not belong to the work of the individual, which is the work of bestowal. This is the meaning of the words, “In a place,” meaning in a place where the knowledge comes that “there are no people,” meaning that this person who received this awareness must try to be a person and not a beast.
Hence, for the most part, a person feels that he is complete. He prays, he learns Torah, and he observes Mitzvot. He thinks that he should only increase the quantity, but in terms of the quality of the work, he has nothing to examine because he thinks that he is doing everything for the sake of the Creator.
It therefore follows that when one feels deficient, that he is immersed in self-love, and that he is far from the matter of bestowal, this does not come from the person, but rather by an awakening from above. That is, from above, he was notified his real state, that he is removed from the Creator and does not want to annul before Him. That is, when one feels his own lowliness, he must believe that it came to him from the Kedusha [holiness]. This is similar to what is written about Moses (Exodus 2:11-12), “He went out to his brethren and saw their suffering, and he saw an Egyptian man striking a Hebrew man, one of his brethren, and he saw that there was no one.”
In the work, we should interpret that precisely when a person has the quality of Moses, called “Torah,” he can see how an Egyptian man, meaning the will to receive for himself, he says that it is called “a man,” and with this force, called “Torah,” he sees that it strikes the Hebrew man. That is, for the Hebrew, a “man” is one who does not do what a beast does, meaning that a man is one who does not use the desires of beasts, as it is written, “and he saw that there was no one,” meaning that “a man” will never emerge from him by itself. This is so because that person has the quality of Moses, who is the quality of “faithful shepherd” (who shepherds the faith for the whole of Israel), and that force awakens a person to see the truth, that he will never achieve the quality of “man” by himself. This is the meaning of the verse, “and he saw that there was no one.” This causes him to ask the Creator to give him faith in the Creator, by which he will achieve Dvekut with the Creator.
However, once a person has been rewarded with faith, it is still incomplete, for although now he is called “man,” and not “a beast,” he should also achieve the quality of Torah, for specifically through the Torah, a person achieves his wholeness, since he should achieve the state of “the Torah, the Creator, and Israel are one.” This is called “the quality of speaking,” as it is written about Moses, who said, “And Moses said to the Lord, ‘Please, Lord, I am not a man of words.’”
In the work, we should interpret that he asked that it was not enough that he was already in the quality of “man,” but he wanted to be a “man of words,” to be rewarded with the quality of “speaking,” called “Torah,” for specifically the quality of “speaking,” which is the Torah, is regarded as wholeness.
However, we must not forget that in the work, there is the matter of “right,” which is the opposite of “left.” That is, just as on the path of the “left,” the more deficiencies a person sees in him, the better, since a lack is called “a Kli [vessel],” so a greater lack means a bigger Kli. The same is true for the “right”: The more complete one feels, the bigger is his Kli. That is, the more a person sees that he is full of deficiencies, the bigger is the prayer that he can pray compared to one who is not so deficient, and whose prayer is therefore not as wholehearted. Thus, specifically the lack determines the measure of the prayer.
Also, the path of the right is considered that a person must feel that there is wholeness. Here, too, to the extent that he feels wholeness, to that extent he can thank the Creator. That is, the wholeness that one is in determines the measure of the gratitude to the Creator. Hence, a person must seek advice on how to see that he has wholeness. However, he must see that his wholeness is not built on falsehood. We should ask, If a person sees that he has no need for spirituality, and he is immersed in self-love, how can he tell himself that he has wholeness?
First, we must appreciate the connection we have with the Creator, meaning that one must believe that the state where one feels that he is empty and destitute, when he feels that in his heart, there is no need for spirituality, who gave him that feeling? Usually, a person worries about what he lacks, and he does not worry about what he does not need. Thus, we should ask, Who gave him the worry for that which he does not need?
The answer is that in truth, he does have an inner desire, he does need nearness with the Creator, but that lack is still not revealed within him to an extent that he will need to seek advice how to satisfy his lack. For this reason, a person must be glad that at least he has a need for spirituality, whereas the rest of the people have no interest in spirituality whatsoever.
When a person appreciates this, although it is not important to him, he does appreciate it and tries to thank the Creator for this. This causes him to acquire importance for spirituality, and from this a person can be happy. By this, a person can be rewarded with Dvekut, since as Baal HaSulam said, “The blessed clings to the Blessed.” In other words, when a person is happy and thanks the Creator, he feels that the Creator has blessed him by giving him a little something of Kedusha, then “The blessed clings to the Blessed.” Through this wholeness, one can achieve real Dvekut.
Baal HaSulam said that a person should depict to himself, even when he is in utter lowliness, when he thinks that if the Creator had illuminated for him a great awakening as he once felt during the ascent, he would certainly be willing to do the holy work. But now that he does not feel anything, how can he deceive himself that he has wholeness? At that time, he must believe in the sages, who said to us that one must depict to himself as though he has already been rewarded with feeling the existence of the Creator in all his organs, and how he would thank and praise the Creator. Likewise, now he should thank and praise the Creator as though he has already been rewarded with the real wholeness.
M. Laitman: (28:55) Are there any questions?
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (29:11) He writes that without a lack, there's no real taste in the feeling, that's why the Creator gives the hardening of the heart. What is the feeling of the hardening of the heart that gives that feeling that we're missing Dvekut in the Creator?
M. Laitman: We're not speaking of the feeling, we need to feel it.
Student: He writes, if they weren't to feel the real lack they wouldn't be able to feel the real filling because there's no light without a Kli.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: What's that hardening of the heart that causes a person to feel that it distances him from the work?
M. Laitman: Perhaps it's for a person who truly wants to attain something but still cannot attain it but he truly wants it, he desperately wants it, and if what he wants to attain depends on how much he wants it, in his heart, meaning in his innermost desire, then he needs to take care of it: Why doesn't he want it that much?
Student: How does that lead him to adhesion and not to run away from the work?
M. Laitman: If what he wants is very important for him, then he's looking for ways to increase the deficiency for it. And he sees that his heart disagrees, what can we do? Only turn to the Creator and complain that his heart is in disagreement and he has no control over his heart. So ask.
Student: (31:36) To continue that scrutiny, what does it mean that the Creator covers our eyes, that He's not showing us the truth along the way?
M. Laitman: That's how a person feels. How can you imagine it?
Student: I believe that in this way, He kind of gives us the increasing of our yearning to advance in the work, seemingly?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: But on the other hand, I understand here that seemingly we're not discovering the truth, we're kind of like standing in one place, not advancing, but He's giving us the feeling like we are advancing. So there's a certain clash here that I don't really understand?
M. Laitman: It's a certain state we wish to change, but we can't.
Question (Holland): (32:44) What makes us constantly accept the hardening of the heart?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: What causes us to feel that feeling of the hardening of the heart all the time?
M. Laitman: That depends on a person's sensitivity. In many instances we feel as if we are in the same state, as if nothing is changing and there are states in which we truly feel that the heart is becoming harder, then we can also discern that it's coming to us from Above. So, what are we doing?
Student: What gives us this sensitivity to want to feel this constant hardening of the heart?
M. Laitman: This is a good question. Let's imagine it this way: If our heart would be more sensitive than how it is today, we would be more sensitive to changes that we might be going through but we simply aren't feeling things like yesterday, like a month ago. If the heart would have been more sensitive, how much could it help us in changing our position, meaning what we're lacking is the sensitivity of the heart, then we could raise ourselves to the Creator and demand, demand the feeling of the current state. It's a problem. How to increase the sensitivity of the heart, to grow it.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (35:53) Buy If we had sensitivity, we wouldn't appeal to Him. We would see that we're advancing every day, we would feel every small change. It kind of like blurs every state, blurs the address?
M. Laitman: It depends on what you feel in your sensitivity, then. It's possible that you would not change on the one hand. On the other hand, you could feel that you're not changing. So, what to do?
Student: That's exactly the matter, how to hold on to those two states? The advancement is relative to what? He also wrote in the article that you can't measure in order to bestow, meaning we cannot measure it?
M. Laitman: Yes. It's a question. Maybe it's in order to receive, perhaps, but it's a question about sensitivity.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (37:27) What does the heart need to be sensitive to?
M. Laitman: To my current state, a more internal state, a more truthful state, one that I don't respond to.
Student: To what the Creator gives me, to the friends, where does the heart need to be aimed?
M. Laitman: The heart needs to be aimed at the goal. What does the Creator demand of me by changing the states for us.
Student: How do we soften the heart when it's heavy?
M. Laitman: He simply can't understand what is demanded of him, that’s what we can say of ourselves.
Student: How do we soften it so it'll be sensitive, so it'll be understanding of what the friends are giving me?
M. Laitman: The heart is in the hands of the Creator, only. That's why I need to turn to Him.
Student: If a person has no control over his heart and the heart is in the hands of the Creator, then what is the appeal, also the appeal to Him, to soften my heart I need to receive from Him?
M. Laitman: That's why, in addition to the Creator we also have the matter of the environment: where the more I am in contact with the environment, with my friends, the more I could feel what is that change that I have to go through, otherwise I will be completely blocked relative to those changes the Creator is demanding of me.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (40:00) How do we agree to wanting to aim more in order to bestow that we actually distance ourselves? How do we become whole with that?
M. Laitman: That's a totally different question.
Student: Because it seems like the heart is even heavier and it's hard to open it and be in sensitivity?
M. Laitman: That I agree with it?
Student: No, I don't agree.
Student: How to accept the fact that this is the process, that this is how it is? That now the heart will be even more blocked and now it's closing up even more, it's becoming heavier and an even bigger deficiency opens up. Meaning to understand that this is the process, and to agree that this is the process?
M. Laitman: What would happen if I agree with it?
Student: I need to, he says you need to beat it up, either Pharaoh or to the Egyptian, we have to come with blows?
M. Laitman: So, specifically to disagree, right?
Student: Right, but usually a person gets disappointed, he’s coming closer?
M. Laitman: And what can he do against it so this disappointment won't stop him?
Student: To ask for the forces from the Creator. But here he’s talking about the right line, that we need to be in wholeness, because if you're in a lack you can't. So how does the process close up, because when you're in the right, it stops you?
M. Laitman: What state do I need to get to?
Student: For all of my actions will be in order to bestow, to aim the heart.
M. Laitman: No, you're just giving me a...
Student: Here it's written that when a person starts for all his actions to be for the sake of bestowal, he becomes worse. So, a person needs to receive that force from the Creator, so that he will be able to overcome this desire. The question is how to agree that the deficiency is growing?
M. Laitman: How to agree that the deficiency is growing? That's not a problem. It comes from the Creator. What can a person do with it?
Student: It's like I'm moving backwards and it's okay. It’s hard to agree that it's like that.
M. Laitman: And then?
Student: He seemingly buries himself. He says go to the right, but it's not really clear how to close this circle?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (44:09) Can we be whole from deficiency?
M. Laitman: What does it mean to be whole from deficiency?
Student: I'm missing something, but I see that it's good, that it advances me eventually?
M. Laitman: You cannot advance purely from a deficiency. Deficiency means something is deficient in your feeling and this requires a reaction from a person.
Student: Very well, but a deficiency is kind of like our goal. For me to miss bestowal it's the Kli, it's actually something that advances us to the goal, it's excellent. Why is that not wholeness if the deficiency is correct?
M. Laitman: We can't live in a deficiency, it goes against nature. A deficiency means that fulfillment or filling is lacking. It's always like that.
Student: Okay, we can't live, we can't remain in that permanently. But why is it not wholeness? Why is it not in the direction of wholeness?
M. Laitman: Why is it in the direction of wholeness? Let's say that I feel hungry, and I feel hungrier and hungrier and hungrier, so I need to feel the attainment of the goal in that.
Student: That's like sufferings of love, I’m satiated soon, so I wouldn’t need anything but I have a deficiency for something?
M. Laitman: That's not considered a deficiency.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (46:09) To complete those questions that were just asked, we constantly, if we think about connection, bestowal, we immediately enter a deficiency. And the deeper we go it becomes even darker and more of a lack. What compensation needs to happen, and what immediate filling can we accompany this deficiency with so that we will really be able to work and advance to the Creator? We can't advance just from deficiency, we need something additional?
M. Laitman: What?
Student: He said it in the article that we need to think that from the moment we activate the deficiency on our behalf, we need to make a decision at every time that the Creator is sending us all these states, and we're entering into connection with Him?
M. Laitman: Oh, okay.
Student: That everything comes from the Creator. We have to activate such an awareness.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: This is how we can advance quickly because it fills us, it gives us the drive and yearning that enters now. Meaning to go deeper in None Else Besides Him, while we're activating the deficiency for love, connection, bestowal?
M. Laitman: Okay.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (47:50) Many times he talks about here and also in other articles, that when a person feels a lack, then to the extent of the lack against that is the extent of the wholeness. And then he says that we have to give consideration to the connection we have with the Creator, that He gives us the lack. So, many times when we have the work in the left, how to increase the right above it? Many times I don't see when in the right, when there's wholeness, how to grow the deficiency? I see that it's written less about that?
M. Laitman: He has to always tie himself to the goal. Is the deficiency that I have now, can I use it to reach the goal?
Student: Yes, but let's say he says here to increase the wholeness. So, a person receives a certain lack and he succeeds, the deficiency comes from the Creator and he's thankful and is grateful for it, and rejoices from it. Now, that's not just enough because we have to grow the deficiency and he'll remain in wholeness and be stuck there. Also, about that, it's barely being mentioned or that just needs to be revealed to him?
M. Laitman: It's revealed, in fact in the action itself: where the greater his deficiency, the happier he is.
Student: Because he could adhere this deficiency to the measure of wholeness already?
M. Laitman: Yes, yes.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (49:40) What exactly changes in the heart?
M. Laitman: You have to figure this one out, you have to scrutinize it. We are coming to states, such states where you have to interpret the article from beginning to end.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (50:11) What is the heart that's being spoken of here?
M. Laitman: It's a place in a person that's sensitive to his own path, a place where a person can feel his path.
Student: His spiritual path?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: And here when he talks about the heart being the hero, everything happens upon it, it's what's being given hardships and overcoming the hardening. The hardening of the heart, is that advancement?
M. Laitman: It's one state from advancement.
Student: The Creator is the one that hardens the heart?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: And the Creator hardens the heart, so the person will do what? What is he supposed to do against the hardening of the heart of the Creator?
M. Laitman: A person has to overcome the hardening of the heart with all of this burdening.
Student: How does a person overcome the hardening of the heart?
M. Laitman: If it's possible, in the Ten with the help of the environment and if not, with the Creator.
Student: So, the Creator hardens the heart of a person so that he will adhere to the environment?
M. Laitman: Turn to the environment and to the Creator.
Student: Through the environment to the Creator?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: What a person needs to learn from this is that he needs to address the environment, to get the importance of the environment and through it, turn to the Creator? That's the process the Creator expects of him?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: Is there another way for a person to acquire those discernments, or is this the only way?
M. Laitman: None. It's not from nature.
Student: Meaning the hardening of the heart is a necessary part in the process on the way?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: It's also something that constantly develops, it's not one time?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (52:52) If we see that the Creator is the Landlord of our heart, and let's say in 24 hours, it's worthwhile for us to be connected to that upper force for that dialogue to take place. What turns out, is that if there was more of this dialogue once, this dialogue actually seems to diminish, and is this part of the process, that it kind of moves backwards instead of more, or how does that go?
M. Laitman: That depends on the person. It depends on the person, there are many conditions there. I can't say more than that. Understand that we're discussing things here, we are discussing those points that you need to try and open up and discuss and advance through them. Do you hear that? Good.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (54:26) At the end of the article he gives advice that during the lowliness a person needs to depict to himself the state of wholeness, and from that to come to gratitude to the Creator. How do we do it in such a state, from the state of lowliness you manage to depict to yourself this state of wholeness, and give gratitude to Him?
M. Laitman: Yes, yes. We have a few questions, for which we have no answers. We don't know how to answer yet.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (55:30) We know there are states in the work of rotting, like a person, the desire rots completely. This complete rotting belongs to each state of a person or four times in the development of a person?
M. Laitman: No, I don't think that a person can notice four stages in that, no. Maybe he wants to, but he can't precisely feel that this time it's a transition from degree to degree.
Student: I'm asking in the context of, let's say a person feels he's moving backwards. Whenever he's advancing, he moves backwards because he feels that everything he had disappears. In what frequency of this state, this complete state comes to him?
M. Laitman: No, this complete state goes specifically also when he goes backwards. A person needs together with the complete state to feel that he is moving forward. If he works every day, well, not one-hundred percent, there is no such thing, there's no righteous in the land. So, he feels that nevertheless, usually he feels himself that he's advancing, in left and right, but he's advancing.
Student: We see it, we feel it, when a person feels he's moving backwards, as it's written in the books, a person feels he's moving backwards. What should he add to that state so it will be advancement? As you said, he's supposed to disagree with it. What should he add to it in his work?
M. Laitman: That's something you need to answer. I have nothing more to say. You have come to questions that we need to search ways to receive the answers. And it's actually good that you're all looking at me as if I'm supposed to solve your problems. No. You, together, try to connect between you and bring yourself to a state where you're demanding a solution from above. Please. Without looking at me. Again, I'm saying this. That's not the right direction. Well? Does someone have something to say about this? You start. Start scrutinizing between yourselves.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (59:04) That's what he writes. If a person comes to such a degree of suffering, he needs to turn in prayer. But what we hear now is individual prayers. There's no common prayer. There's no mutual deficiency.
M. Laitman: It could be that that's what we're missing.
Student: Because he is saying in that state of Abraham, how will I know that they'll have the deficiency? He says, don't worry, they'll reach such a level of suffering that they will turn to the Creator, and then He will help them out. So, here each one with his individual prayer increases the work, he suffers but what we're lacking here is to unite. How to unite in prayer, that's the question?
M. Laitman: No. Don’t replace one question with another question. You can cascade that way to such states that are maybe distant from the goal.
Reader: (01:00:35) We'll go to a workshop and we'll start scrutinizing in the Tens, the questions that are arising from the article. In the Tens, we are scrutinizing the questions that are arising from the article.
Student: (01:00:53) All right, there are really many questions. Maybe a question, maybe before the questions, a question that we need to remember all the time, which is, what's the goal of all this? In the end, the people of Israel need to come to, and the people of Israel sighed from the work that, at the end of the day, is the purpose of this whole process we're going through. And the question, the important question here is, how this whole process brings us closer to, and the people of Israel sighed from the work. There are many others, but we'll start with that.
Student: (01:01:34) I don't have questions from reading the article. I have questions from life. How to receive the forces from one another to do what's written here, even when you feel like someone who has no need for spirituality and is immersed in self-love? How, from here to appreciate, to value the connection he has with the Creator?
Student: (01:02:11) Maybe a question about the hardening of the heart. What desires really have a hardening? Egoistic desires, it's clear what's felt but the heart and what precisely are those desires? It's the beginning of the desires to bestow. It's connected to the point in the heart.
Student: (01:02:37) The question that comes up is, how do we reach the prayer, the correct plea together?
Student: (01:03:00) In the whole matter of the deficiency that we need to organize now to see every day, as a matter of moving to a state of descent or ascent, no matter what, we're seeing the changes in us that our heart will be sensitive. This is really from our spiritual life, how not to be sucked into all this nonsense and the engagements of this world, but to truly be in the spiritual air between us in this spiritual deficiency and see how the Creator is advancing us every step along the way. It's clear that it depends on the environment. We also heard that, but a person usually enjoys being in life.
Student: (01:03:49) Rabash depicts for us a complete course, track, how the Creator takes a person from the state of beast to man, to Moses, to shepherd. He paints this entire path and we all identify that pit in the middle, that hole, that specifically when a person is distanced from the Creator, he has to believe that this comes to him from the Creator. This is the hole that makes a person want to run away. He doesn't believe there's a Creator. On the one hand, on the other hand, he doesn't believe there is a Creator. Here, the environment has to give the reinforcement to a person in the critical moment. No matter how much connection they have with their friends. So, the changes in the heart, even belief in the sages. What do you want from a person who is unconscious? What can he do? He can't do anything. So, there's something about the environment that he tied himself to before. And these moments, he has to derive the forces from there and rise with and I think that's the turning point that has to come.
Student: (01:05:18) The truth is that the answer to what the friend said is actually the end of the article. And then he says, then he needs to believe in the faith in the sages, that they told us that a person needs to depict himself as if he's already been rewarded with feeling the existence of the Creator with all his organs. Meaning, the very end of this point is that in the feeling of distancing, inside the feeling of hardening, a person understands that the One that sent him the hardening, and the One that sent him the feeling of being distanced, is the Creator. Which means that the Creator is the One that's operating upon him. It means that the Creator, he's in connection with the Creator. Although through the posterior, the Creator is connected to you, but he's giving you a hardening. For that, a person needs to be grateful. To understand that there's the Creator here, who's giving him this hardening, and he has to work on that connection with the Creator. This is from the flip side of things. This is our goal, eventually, to come to adhesion to the Creator, where the blessed adheres to the Blessed.
Student: (01:06:34) Rav said, to turn to the Creator and complain that your heart disagrees and you have no control over it and you're asking the Creator for help. And there was a question, but his control is in control of that as well. Rav said, the environment. It turns out that all the twists and turns are ultimately to force us to come closer, to collect alms from the friends.
Student: (01:07:20) I also feel from all these circles that we should unite more, and look less inside me, what I want more, and for all the hardening to be an initiative for movement, and the questions about choice are..?
M. Laitman: (01:07:39) Well, what do we have from this consultation with our friends? What did we get from it? Does someone want to say?
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:08:00) Can I ask? Can I ask a question?
M. Laitman: No, first you need to talk about what you've reached.
Student: They're friends, you said, scrutinize the questions in the Ten. You tell us in the Ten to scrutinize the question. It's not clear, because some of the friends have no questions. Everything is clear to them. Some of the friends may have questions, they don't hear answers, or the answers are the same lines. You have to connect, you have to pray, and so on and so forth.
M. Laitman: That's not an answer.
Student: What is the correct scrutiny in the Ten? How to awaken the questions, the answers? What's the correct work between us? What do we need to come to?
M. Laitman: We need to come to us working before the question of the Creator. How we feel and what we feel, the question of the Creator.
Student: What is the question of the Creator?
M. Laitman: Why He has brought forth the hardening to our hearts. For several days now I'm in the study and in the scrutiny, and here for the first time maybe, we are stumbling upon the Creator being to blame. He caused the hardening to our hearts and demands for this, a response.
Student: What do we need to look at? Why did He harden? What is He doing?
M. Laitman: Feel what He does, what He does in the heart of each and every one.
Student: From that?
M. Laitman: And from that we'll see what we do onwards.
Student: What kind of reaction is the Creator waiting from us?
M. Laitman: For me to first of all, locate what's in my heart and that the Creator did it.
Student: And?
M. Laitman: After that, we’ll see. First of all this what is already clear to you?
Student: No.
M. Laitman: So, why do you want to jump ahead? It is written, I have hardened His heart. Yes? Meaning, our heart which is an egoistic heart, the Pharaoh, the Creator, is constantly growing it, truly inflating it. So, how do we respond? Is there an answer? Well, well.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:11:25) He replies at the end of the article, so what's needed is for a person to rely on the belief in the sages, and understand that the one who's hardening his heart is the Creator, and he has to be grateful for that, because it's an inverse connection in the posterior, meaning the Creator is in contact with me, and He cares for me. How? By growing my deficiency, seemingly of the feeling of being distanced from Him, but He did that. Then I have the first connection with the Creator and I understand He's twisting and turning this entire business.
M. Laitman: And? Well.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:12:12) I think that belief in the sages is something we need to receive from the friends, maybe it's a belief in the friends, maybe seeing the friends like that, because his whole life a person looks at his state and decides what to do. He's sick, he goes to the doctor, but here he's unconscious, so if this morning he was walking down the street and he fainted, he lost his consciousness, someone has to take care of him, someone else, someone that cares about him should come and care for him. In that state where a person loses the connection with the Creator, even though it's coming from the Creator, it's got nothing to do except for relying on what he invested, let's say, in the environment. They will pick him up and bring him back on course and open his eyes, and they'll be grateful for it and be joyful, but that critical moment, it's only the connection that he built with the environment earlier. And only that will ensure that they'll be able to lift him up.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:13:25) We spoke in the Ten about how He's growing our vessel, our deficiency in this process, and that He reaches the lowest point in a man's heart, and that's to bring him to the deepest depth of the deficiency. From that he will turn to the Creator, he will want to see the Creator's action in this deed.
M. Laitman: Well.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:14:07) This action we have to do is to recognize the evil, ask for it, and then again the more evil is revealed, because we go to Pharaoh. Each time it's, let my people go, I want to bestow, again I return to the state of recognition of evil, until all the evil?
M. Laitman: The recognition of evil in what? What are we discovering, in what are we knowing the evil?
Student: Recognizing the evil and that we can't bestow, that every action we wish to do in bestowal ultimately goes to the Pharaoh, to the will to receive. And every action in the society, in the Ten, with the friends, when we think that we are now bestowing, we're doing good, suddenly we reveal that in the end we took this work for ourselves, out of some pride. I did the action, I did it. It's not that the Creator gave us the opportunity to bestow. Everything goes for the sake of Pharaoh, He's like playing with us?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:15:40) It seems like the work we're doing, in connection, importance of the goal, all that, it eventually brings us to a wall. It doesn't bring us to attain, because the environment supports, constantly we get importance from society, world Kli, Rabash articles, everything. We're wrapped constantly, but a prayer doesn't come out of this. We don't get to the sons of Israel's sighed from the work, we don't reach a breaking, but we just keep working. When do you come to a prayer from all this, to a plea?
M. Laitman: It depends on how we decipher our situation.
Student: In every state, society has a solution. The Ten always has more forces to give you because they're always above you?
M. Laitman: So, in this way, we never get to anything.
Student: Right, so?
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:17:00) Maybe first he works because of a reward, and he tastes, he feels a taste in any action, in every action of bestowal. When he wants more, he starts aiming himself for the sake of the Above, and not for himself. He sees he has no forces. He sees that all his desires are only for himself. So, here a dialogue with the Creator starts, that the Creator is the only force that can help us?
M. Laitman: That's correct. That situation is correct.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:17:39) What our Ten talked about is to reach a state that a person agrees with everything the Creator takes them through. That the basis of our work is to reach an agreement, and that can only happen, there's no direct connection to the Creator, it's always through the Ten, it guides you in the right direction, as it was said before, the faith in our sages. And from that agreement all the answers arise in your internality, like we will learn from the soul. So, until you agree, the Creator won't ever take care of you like you'd want to?
M. Laitman: Well, that's one of the solutions.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:18:35) One of Rabash's articles of society, he writes that you have to be twenty-three and a half hours on the right, and only a half an hour on the left. And I think in the answer to our friend, he feels that in the many years we're here, we've perfected in becoming in the twenty-three and a half hours, but we never really engaged in that half hour. Even if a friend raises something as a deficiency, according to my feeling, and the response is right away, they tell you, you're anti. So, in my feeling, we never acquired the ability to scrutinize or create a deficiency. Like Rabash said, we're always being positive. Rabash almost never talks about how to formulate a deficiency that will eventually bring us to a recognition that we're in front of a wall, and only the Creator can take us out of this. Like you gave us an example that somebody put a stick next to the wall and told you to jump over it. So, I think maybe it's time to learn how we can create that half-hour in the Ten. I don't know if Rabash meant exactly a half an hour, but in the relation between to finally bring that half-hour into the Ten also.
M. Laitman: Okay, yes.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:20:14) Is there a difference between complaining and identifying the part of us the nature that the Creator has given, that we want to change? Can't we scrutinize the Hisaron without complaining about it? Is there a difference between complaining to the Creator, to recognize the part that the Creator gave us, that egoistic nature that we want to change? Can we discern between the two, or how to discern between the two? Between complaining to the Creator or recognizing the egoistic part He gave us and asking Him to change it? Especially inside our Ten, between us, to scrutinize what exactly is this inside of us, to identify the part that we could be grateful because it gives us an opportunity to address the Bo-re, but also this is what we want to be different. Then it could be a joyous exercise. Everyone gets to give an example of how terrible he is?
M. Laitman: It's okay, he's right. We don't hear the question from the Creator. Yes, that's clear.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:22:26) Can we say that man can suffer suffering? It's as if we're educating the desire. The burdening of the heart is, it's educating the desire that there's no other way to do it?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:23:08) I think there's a question up in the air here that, we're speaking between man and the Creator?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: Each one inside has that feeling in the heart and his calculations, and there's between man and the Ten and also here there's a constant dialogue. The question is: How do you connect them? For instance, I'm giving an example. When I feel that wholeness comes from the Ten, it's an opportunity to ask for deficiencies inside. Or when deficiencies come from the Ten, to ask for wholeness. Or when I am in wholeness, to search for the deficiencies in the Ten, is that like a ping-pong that completes each other? Or maybe some other way, I don't know?
M. Laitman: I hear you.
Student: To complete the inner work of a person together with the Ten?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:24:22) One of the friends in the Ten mentioned the fact that each one of us is a will to receive, and with due time it becomes more and more clear and a spiritual vessel is only when we work on the connection, or try to work on the connection. And it was right with the feeling that we're working together. There's like a sensation that that's the direction, and then you just fall into whatever you fall into. So, the question I'm adding now, if I may, how does this thing that from within the group we will reach, they sighed from the work? That not each one on his own?
M. Laitman: In general, this is what happens.
Student: We all reach that conclusion together?
M. Laitman: Yes. And it's not quite that each one feels exactly what the other one feels. It's impossible that there are still differences between them. But this is what happens.
Question (Haifa): (01:25:56) I'm speaking on my behalf, I'm trying to see it as my own responsibility. So, your question on how to develop that sensitivity in the heart for the changes, since I'm still a beast. So, I wrote a few rules before me that I won't forget, it's right here before me. The foundations are that the Creator is a Good That Does Good, and He's trying to bring us close to Him. So, the first rule is every day, everything will be new in your eyes. Meaning there's no such thing as, I know, I understand, another lesson, no. Second rule: is the Creator created one before the other. That develops sensitivity on what changed, there's two states, there's not a contradiction, it's a scrutiny. The Creator created one before the other. It's written in the Torah. The third rule is only a small one receives from the big one. The fourth rule is a person is not given a state that he can't deal with. The fifth rule is the end of an action starts with a thought. It's the last one, but there are a few parts in it. First of all, greatness of the Creator, meaning to praise and thank the Creator because everything is in His mercy. The path must be in happiness, because it's a testimony. And our destiny is love your friends as yourself. Not that the friends need to love me, but I need to love the friends. Thank you for the patience. Only together.
M. Laitman: Good, okay.
Question (Kyiv 1): (01:28:00) You were speaking about how the hearts are under the Creator's control and we need to reach a state that we're expecting His bestowal, His interference. What does it mean that He interferes in our state?
M. Laitman: We are always results, because created beings remain created beings. We are always results from what we feel, the general response. And we feel ourselves in relation to the previous response from the Creator. And this points to our state, to how we perceive, how we attain the state.
Question (Moscow1): (01:29:10) The lesson that the Creator is trying to give us so we clothe Him upon us, it seems that He doesn't change, but we're lacking the contradiction of our inner parts, that we can connect them and create a vessel according to the lesson.
M. Laitman: This is still not the final answer, no.
Question (French 1): (01:30:10) Is it the work in the heart that brings us to the correct prayer, to feel the vessel that brings us to wholeness, which is the Exodus from Egypt?
M Laitman: Good.
Question (Hadera 1): (01:30:40) The burdening of the heart comes against the intention. And a person needs to pray and ask for forces that the Creator gives him, forces beyond his nature to extend the intention. I think that the solution is in the article. We constantly feel a deficiency or wholeness, but in the example you usually give us, is that a person, before a meal, he takes a walk so he feels his appetite growing and then he feels the fulfillment that's about to come, and he gets excited from it. So, on one hand, a big desire is a burdening of the heart. On the other hand, if he thinks that he can use this desire to give contentment to the Creator, that's great. What we're lacking to close the circle is only to acquire a desire to bestow. And if he prays that, that desire is as big as possible and he has the desire to bestow, so that's it. You reach a realization of the deficiency that we can receive, fill that deficiency to give contentment to the Creator. Everything stands in place.
M. Laitman: Okay, let's drop it. Let’s move on to the next part.
Reader: Let's sing a song first.
Song: (01:32:30)