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

Daily Lesson (Morning) August 20, 2024.

Part 1: Baal HaSulam. Letter No. 27.

Reader: Hello, we are reading in the Writings of Baal HaSulam, Letter 27. Anyone asking a question in the study hall is asked to hold the microphone close to his mouth, speak loud and clear. Again, reading Baal HaSulam's Letter 27. 

Reading: (00:37) Letter No. 27

16 Tevet, Tav-Reish-Peh-Zayin, December 21, 1926, London

To the honorable student ... may his candle burn:

... I do indeed want to unite with you in body and soul, in this and in the next. However, I can only work in the spirit and the soul because I know your souls and can unite with them, but you can only work in the body, since you do not know my spirituality, so as to unite with it. If you understand this, you will also understand that I do not feel any distance from you, but you certainly need the physical closeness. And yet, this is for you and for your own work, not for me or for my work. With this I answer in advance many questions with regard to me.

But I do pray to the Creator to lead you on the path of truth, that you will be saved from all the obstacles along the way, and that the Creator will succeed for you all that you do.

As for you, you should meticulously follow the ways that I have set out for you regarding mind and heart, longing and prayers, and then the Creator will certainly make us succeed and we will soon unite in body and soul, in this and in the next.

To reply to your letter from the 26 of Kislev, the second day of Hanukkah [December 2, 1926], you wrote that the world was created for work, and that He has created the darkness for the purpose of work—to have substance on which to work in it—since in the light, there is pleasure and not work. Accordingly, you asked, “What is the Klipa [shell/peel] of the right [side] for, for it feels the darkness as light, and the creature feels the darkness as separated from him, as though it is not his, so how can it continue throughout his seventy years? Such a person, why was he born?” You demand a complete answer for it, and it is not the great lights that you need, but only to remove the disgrace of hypocrisy from yourself, which reaches as deep as the soul. And you conclude that you can say about it ... “truth will show its way,” and “it is already the fifth year,” and so forth.

In truth, your words are confused, and therefore I do not know that truth. You said news: The world was created for work. If so, should work remain forever? But it is known that eternity is rest! Also, your question about the creature replacing darkness with light without knowing the darkness in it, we need to know how to discern right from left, and you still have not been rewarded with seeing the darkness, since darkness and light are as the wick and the light. Therefore, we must see the candle and enjoy its light, and then you will know right from left.

However, why are you asking about the Creator, Who gave great powers to the Klipot [pl. of Klipa]? I have already given you elaborate explanations about it, and primarily that the Creator protects Himself that one who adheres to Him will not doubt Him, and this will never happen because He is Almighty, and I have no wish to elaborate here.

But I consider your words as “a prayer for the poor,” which is a prayer in complaint. It is closer to being answered than all other prayers. See in The Zohar about the verse, “A prayer for the poor,” etc., “And David was poor, but a poor one’s prayer is in complaint,” etc.

Also, your concern about a good sign, it seems that you need wholeness as merely a sign. This is a good sign because five years ago you were not complaining about this. I have already told you that from “And they journeyed from Rephidim” to the reception of Torah is only one journey. But know that my words must not calm your worry or comfort you, since at the end of the first year you were at a higher level than you are now. And yet, do not give up on mercy.

You bring evidence from the writing to the purpose of creation, that it is for work: “What does the Lord your God ask of you but to fear the Lord your God ... and to serve the Lord your God.” Indeed, there are two purposes: One should be before man’s eyes, and one is for the Creator Himself. But the writing speaks of what should be before the eyes of the creature.

The matter is as it is written in Pirkei Avot [Chapters of the Fathers]: “It is not for you to finish the work, nor are you free to idle away from it.” That is, since wholeness is the purpose of the work and its conclusion, there is an open side to the Sitra Achra [other side] to come near and make one understand that he is incapable of it, and bring one to despair, since we should know that the end of the work is not at all our work, but the Creator’s work. Therefore, how can you know the Creator and gauge if He can or, God forbid, cannot finish His work? This is insolence and heresy!

“And you are not free to idle away from it,” even in that manner, if the Creator wishes you to work without finishing the work. This is the meaning of what is written, “What does the Lord your God ask of you?” That is, the creature must know only this: The Creator ... work, and will therefore do His will wholeheartedly, as in “Open for Me one opening of repentance, like the tip of a needle.” By this he will be saved from the Sitra Achra ever approaching him. If a person is completed in this, he can be certain that the Creator will finish His work on His end, “And I open for you gates through which carts and carriages enter.”

But if he is not ready to serve Him, even in a manner that he is not rewarded with the completion of the work and the opening of the hall, no fawning or lies will help him. I have already explained what is written in The Zohar, “On the evidence of two witnesses ... he who is to die shall be put to death,” that it is SAM and he is dead to begin with, and it is not hard to kill the dead, though the dead has the Klipa of the right, since the harder Klipa is canceled by proliferation of thanksgiving before the Creator, and proliferation of work.

I do not know if my words satisfy you, so do let me know and I will reply in a timely manner since the question, “What is the proof?” is a wise man’s question, if he is one who works.

Yehuda

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (12:18) Why did the Creator make it so that He is the one who finishes the work and not man? 

M. Laitman: Again? 

Student: Why did the Creator make it so that He is the one who finishes the work and not man? 

M. Laitman: He? I don't…

Student: That the Creator Himself finishes the work and it's not man who finishes the work. 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: Why did the Creator make it so?

M. Laitman: Why did He make it so? For several reasons. Firstly, what does it mean to finish the work? When a person says, that's it, I'm done, I finished everything? Is there such a thing? Does such a thing even exist? Rather, a person should always see more and more room for work ahead of him, always. And so, that's the order of things, as the Creator says, whether a person likes it or not.

Student: What is the tip of the needle that we need to open so that the Creator will open openings such that carts and carriages can enter?

M. Laitman: The tip of the needle, it's when a person establishes a connection with the Creator and connects everyone to that. That's what it is.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (14:54) What is the Creator's work? If we look at the example of a mother towards a baby, the kind of work that she has, maybe we can take that as a comparison.

M. Laitman: What kind of work do you have to do? 

Student: No, not me, the Creator. It says that the work is not for you to finish. What is the Creator's work? Where does He work? It's like a mother who relates to the baby. She bestows, and so she enjoys. So what kind of work does she have? 

M. Laitman: You're right in saying that in order to bestow in Lishma, there is no work. There it's all pleasure. But to come to that, for your work to be Lishma, for her sake, that is the work. 

Student: This work is called work with respect to us. But it says the work is not for you to finish. Seemingly, this is the work that we have to reach. But it's not work, it's for bestowal. 

M. Laitman: No, I don't understand. 

Student: How? It's not clear how the Creator gives us work, which is not bestowal. It's not work, really. 

M. Laitman: Because it's in order to bestow. How can bestowing have an end? 

Student: I just don't understand it from His side. What does He exert? 

M. Laitman: He makes an effort. He wants to be in order to bestow in every possible way. Thoughts, actions, intentions, everything in order to bestow. And He doesn't see an end to that. There's no end, and no end is necessary. One just needs to be prepared for that. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (17:14) What does it mean to make His will wholeheartedly? 

M. Laitman: Truth be told, I do not know. It seems to me that it's when a person doesn't ask what for, why, how, when, but rather does the work through adhesion. He executes these actions in a complete way, automatically, let's say. 

Student: But what moves him in such a state? 

M. Laitman: What moves him? He's attached to the Creator, adhered to Him to that point.

Student: He writes elsewhere in the letter, if one is not ready on his side to serve Him even in a way where he's not rewarded with the completion of the work and the opening of the hall, necessarily all the fawning and lies will not help him. So, what does it mean to be ready on his part to serve Him, to work for Him? 

M. Laitman: To be adhered to the Creator to such an extent that one uses the upper mind, the upper force in everything that one must do, annulling himself to the point where he's seemingly not even in existence. 

Student: What is this preparation? What exactly does this preparation demand or require? 

M. Laitman: To annul oneself in theory and in practice to the point where he is integrated in the Creator, incorporated.

Student: He writes, you do not need the great light but only to remove from you the disgrace of hypocrisy that touches the souls. What is this work of removing this shell?

M. Laitman: There is a certain shell which still separates between man and the Creator. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (20:00) He says here that a student complains. He says that I see that there are people in the darkness. They don't even know that they were in the darkness. Why was all of that created? And he tells him, you don't know the right or the left until you see the candle burning. And then you'll see that the weak and the candle are one. The weak and the light. But he says your prayer is a prayer of the poor who's complaining. That prayer is the closest to be answered, to be received before all other prayers. So, what is a prayer in complaint, the prayer of the poor? And why is it the closest?

M. Laitman: Because the poor feels that he has nothing. One who is poor, almost. Right? And so with every breath, for every time he swallows something, he thanks the Creator for having that. That with these things he can do the work and act in order to bestow. 

Student: Seemingly it should have been the opposite of complaint. 

M. Laitman: Why?

Student: Because complaining means anger, frustration. And the poor, if I understand correctly, it means he doesn't have... So he doesn't have how to... I mean, how can it be that he doesn't have anything, but he's angry? 

M. Laitman: He's angry about not being able to advance in this work. As he has no means by which to advance. That's how I understand it.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (22:17) This means that the poor... What I was thinking is that the poor are someone who is kind of miserable. He doesn't have matter. So, it's not that at all. The poor is one who feels that what he lacks is a little bit of holiness with the Creator. It's unrelated to corporeality. 

M. Laitman: We're studying spirituality, yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (22:57) He writes here about a good sign. What is a good sign in our work? 

M. Laitman: A good sign for a person is where he sees very clearly what separates him and the Creator. That every time he's capable of scrutinizing that properly and clearly, and according to that either take a step forward or see that he cannot take a step forward, and then he begins to pray. 

Student: So, it depends on the work we do between us.

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (24:08) We don't know how to appreciate the darkness. He says that we can't appreciate the darkness, and because we don't appreciate the darkness, we can't appreciate the Creator, the light. So, what does that mean? 

M. Laitman: Yes, because the light is opposite the dark. Only through that you can see the extent of the light, the power of the light. In darkness you cannot see that, because it's dark. You cannot measure, you cannot orient yourself. 

Student: [no translation]

M. Laitman: The vessels of darkness are yours, and so you need to be better prepared to evaluate and appreciate the darkness as you measure all of the discernments in it, before you reach the actual darkness. 

Student: Appreciate the darkness even before I reach the darkness?

M. Laitman: Well, more or less so, yes. Darkness is not when you don't see anything. Darkness is the heaviness a person feels in his work. And accordingly, he begins to see what's ahead of him, and he turns the darkness into light.

Student: He says here that specifically thanks to that I can distinguish between the right and the left. 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: What does it mean that I should constantly appreciate the right opposite the left, or the left opposite the right? And constantly between the right and the left, the left and the right, it gives us this understanding, the distinction between this and that. 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: So, how exactly in the work between us, between the friends in the Ten do we have this significance to always be between the right and the left, the left and the right?

M. Laitman: If we want to take a step forward, then we search, we look to find what we can cancel, what separates between us and the Creator. And so we need to make an effort to feel which discernments we can view as separating us, distancing us from the Creator. And over those discernments we should make an effort to cancel them.

Student: To cancel, meaning whatever separates between me and the friends, and by that, ask the Creator about that? 

M. Laitman: Yes, I begin to see that the group in which I need to be incorporated, that I need to be connected to and work with, it's what's connecting me to the Creator. And so what else is missing here? 

Student: So it actually constantly elevates your sensitivity towards the friends? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student:  Truly so, because only towards the friends, when you raise this sensitivity, this is what I feel, you can truly know what the Creator wants you to do, to get closer.

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (28:39) When he writes that the creature feels darkness as separated from him, as though it's not his, and if so, he will be able to spend all his 70 years. In such a person, why was he created? Indeed, the question comes up. Why were people created who have no contact with spirituality? What's the purpose of it?

M. Laitman: We shall see. We shall see.

Student: A question about those people, a question that I wanted to scrutinize.

M. Laitman: You take care of yourself. 

Student: Myself and my Ten? 

M. Laitman: Yes. It is said that the power a person has who engages in the wisdom of truth, taking steps towards it, is many, many times greater than all the actions performed by people who have no connection to that truth. And so, groups of Kabbalists are generally small, and they also feel that way, but in truth their power is great. Truly great. But where is the balance, the scale by which to measure a person who's engaged in the wisdom of Kabbalah? Maybe not exactly, but he's touching upon it. And in comparison with people who don't, who aren't part of this work, the ratio between them is one to many millions.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (31:01) In this work that you now talked about of annulling and making efforts to detect what are the barriers, the partitions, and to work there, to work on that point. On the one hand, it's towards the friends, to try to get closer, to try to go according to the desire of the friend. But it's also work where seemingly you need to force yourself that this is the form of your connection with the Creator. Can we ascribe this to mind versus heart, or… 

M. Laitman: No, no, it's not worthwhile to get confused with that.

Student: These are two different directions, though. 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (32:11) I'm going to read the entire excerpt. Also, your concern about a good sign, it seems that you need wholeness as merely a sign. This is a good sign because five years ago you were not complaining about this. I have already told you that from And they journeyed from Rephidim to the reception of Torah is only one journey. But know that my words must not calm your worry or comfort you, since at the end of the first year you were at a higher level than you are now. And yet, do not give up on mercy.

M. Laitman: Yes. So, what's the question about that? 

Student: Are you willing to explain it? Or should I tell you what I understand, and then you'll tell me if it's correct? 

M. Laitman: Quickly.

Student: What I understand is that opening your heart is what counts for a person, not how many years or how many potatoes he ate, but opening the heart causes him connection. What does it mean not to give up on mercy? 

M. Laitman: It means that the Creator will help you either way.

Student: And it's true, this part, that opening the heart causes connection, not just the number of years or experience? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (33:52) However, your question about the Creator who gave great powers to the shells, I've already explained this to you in elaboration, that the Creator protects Himself so that one who adheres to Him will not doubt Him. What does it mean that the Creator is concerned that no one will doubt Him? 

M. Laitman: We're speaking about the person here, not about the Creator. A person shouldn't enter states where he wants to criticize the Creator.

Student: But He gave him great shells, which do cause him to? 

M. Laitman: You need to go above reason. 

Student: This means that, I mean, from where does the person take the power to go above reason when the shells come and

M. Laitman: From the prayer. From the prayer.

Student: What should be his prayer? That He will cancel the shells? 

M. Laitman: No.

Student: So what should it be?

M. Laitman: A prayer to the Creator, to be more connected to the Creator, above the power of the shells. 

Student: Can I ask another question about the prayer? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: It says, I heard that you will answer. Before you pray, I answer already. How does this reconcile with the fact that I need to pray if He answers me before I even pray? 

M. Laitman: You'll see. Check. I can't answer questions about things that you have to discover already. It's good that you're asking, but you also need to know that it's upon you to solve. 

Student: Of course, I engage in this a lot. Most of the day, I engage in the matter of prayer. What should I ask for? How to ask? Whom to ask from? Of course, also here, he speaks here about his hypocrisy. When a person feels the hypocrisy within him and the request is not always clear, he hears what he hears, he asks for what he hears from the environment. You don't know if you're asking for truth.

M. Laitman: Are you asking something?

Student: I'm scrutinizing it with myself, out loud. 

M. Laitman: And scrutinize it not when you have a microphone in your hand.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (36:38) He speaks about the shell of the right, what does it mean?

M. Laitman: You have the shell on the left, the shell on the right, even opposite the middle line there's a shell. 

Student: He says we can defeat it with gratitude, giving thanks. I didn't quite understand what it's about, and also about the fact that the other side, the Sitra Achra, will not approach him if he repents as the tip of the needle. 

Student: Those are subtle things. We will discover them.

Question (Women Heb 1): (37:24) What is the work that a person should do that saves him from the Sitra Achra, the other side? 

M. Laitman: Through the society, he wants to adhere to the Creator. That's his work. Over all the conditions that the Creator sets for him, opens up for him. 

Question (Women Moscow): (37:49) What does it mean to be at an important level? How is the importance of the level measured? 

M. Laitman: The importance of the degree, of the level, is measured according to the extent to which a person can be directed towards the Creator above all the disruptions. 

Question (Women PT 33): (38:24) How to reach such adhesion when we stop asking why, what for, where, and we simply do the work? 

M. Laitman: Again? 

Student: How to reach such adhesion when we stop asking why, when, where, and we simply do the work?

M. Laitman: Actually, to put it simply, it's when a person has corrected everything. But there is no such thing, there is no such thing. Because the sins always exist in every matter. Only the Creator covers for it. Only the Creator.

Question (Women Moscow): (39:44) What does it mean that the prayer of the poor is in complaint? 

M. Laitman: The poor is one who lacks everything. And he feels himself to be poor. And he never achieves gratitude, never reaches gratitude to the Creator. That's one who is poor. But a person who has nothing but is nevertheless aiming towards the Creator and grateful, he's not considered poor. He's not poor. He has the Creator. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (40:42) What does it mean that a person has a lack? Because the Creator created the will to receive, but what is a lack? What is the difference between those two?

M. Laitman: The will to receive is a technical given, the will to receive. But to the extent that a person feels in the will to receive how much he lacks, this is already a lack, a deficiency, a feeling of a deficiency. 

Student: So, how does one with a lack, a deficient one, turn to one who is whole, perfect? What kind of relations should exist between them? Because throughout this article, Baal HaSulam is reproaching the student about him being angry, not knowing how to turn to the Creator correctly. So what's the relation between a person who is lacking and one who is whole? 

M. Laitman: The correct relation between them? The relation is to what extent the person is capable of turning to the Creator in the state that he is in. This is actually all of the options, possibility that he has, and all of this importance that he is able to show everyone, to show himself, to turn to the Creator, to work with it. 

Student: And when does his lack hide the Creator? And when does he discover Him, reveal Him? 

M. Laitman: If his lack is so much that he cannot turn to the Creator, that is not a good lack. The lack should be above the degree of a man but such that a person is able to turn to the Creator. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (43:45) What is the work of the Lord? 

M. Laitman: The work of the Creator, it's when a person receives a desire to attain the Creator, and he tries to perform actions in order to do that.

Student: So why is it called the work of the Creator? Does the Creator work or the person work?

M. Laitman: The person, but this is how it is called.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (44:35) Baal HaSulam quotes from Pirkei Avot, I think it's worthwhile to read the whole part of the text. He would say that it's not upon you to finish the work, but you're also not free to resign from it. If you've studied much Torah, you're given much reward, and your employer is loyal and will pay you for your work, and know the salary of the righteous in the world to come. So my question is, our range of work on our way to spirituality, is it between one who is angry and one who can justify the Creator? 

M. Laitman: Yes, so what is the question? 

Student: So, our direction, do we need to reach a state where we justify the Creator without anger, complaint? There's No One Besides Him, Good Who Does Good? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Turkiye 2): (46:12) How does one work with one's entire heart? How can one work with one's whole heart?

M. Laitman: I do not want to attain the Creator, but rather I want to correct myself so that the Creator will be pleased with me. So, what should I do? That is the question. So, what do I need to do? According to that, I see a field of work before me. That is what is required.

Question (Kyiv 1): (47:16) You said that every act, every act in the work should bring adhesion with the Creator. How do we do that, each adhesion with the Creator? 

M. Laitman: First, there is the deed. Before the deed, we want to reach the Creator. And following the deed, we need to check, to criticize to what extent did we achieve what we wanted to achieve. Meaning, to what extent we performed an action in order to bestow. 

Question (Moscow 7): (48:05) Tell me, please, what is the order? First, a person discovers that the Creator is the first and the last. And after that, that He is the Good Who Does Good?

M. Laitman: I can’t say. 

Student: So, another question. When one receives everything a person wants to tell the person through the Ten, we discover not what the Creator fills but that last part of the puzzle, when it's corrected, the very last quality, we complete the vessel, and then the feeling is revealed within the complete vessel. Is it so?

M. Laitman: Let's say it is so.

Question (Women Moscow 18): (49:18) What does it mean to put the dead to rest? What does it mean that one is born dead?

M. Laitman: That he doesn't have the feeling of connection with the Creator.

Student: How can you put to death one who is dead? 

M. Laitman: When a person is not yet feeling connected to the Creator. 

Student: What does it mean to put to death one who is already dead? 

M. Laitman: Where do you see that? 

Reader: It's written in the Zohar, that by two witnesses the dead will be put to death. This is SAM and he is dead to begin with, and it is not hard to kill the dead, though the dead has the Klipa of the right, since the harder Klipa is canceled by proliferation of gratitude before the Creator, and proliferation of work.

M. Laitman: Yes. Well, read the article properly and try to scrutinize what it says there towards you. 

Question (Moscow 1): (51:07) Within which act is the lack not too small or too great, but… 

M. Laitman: Inside every act.

Student: So, what's closer to us? What is revealed? 

M. Laitman: Whatever they give us. Whatever they give us from above.

Student: Sometimes in the articles he writes that we must work in some moment or situation that we're in. So what about that situation is better adapted to this connection? 

M. Laitman: Yes. Okay. What do we have next? 

Reader: We have the Preface to the Sulam Commentary. 

Song: (52:04)