Morning Lesson November 30, 2023
Transcription is made from simultaneous translation, which leaves a possibility for differences in the audio
Part 1:
Rabash. Article No. 20, 1986. Should One Sin and Be Guilty
Reading Rabash. Article No 20. - Twice
1. R. (24:57) What do you think about this article?
2. S. (25:11) A very methodical article structured clear. Rabash here kind of leads us through a very clear path only a question, how he's talking about these very exalted states, repentance from fear, repentance from love, what can we take from this to our work?
R. Something that we can take nevertheless for our work that the Creator looks at the end of creation from the beginning to the very end and so all of these actions towards us are all directed to bring us to the end. Hence, therefore, we don't quite understand it when we're in the beginning of the path, but here he explains to us that it is all directed towards the complete correction.
S. When we discern some robber or thief, I don't know what else to call it in our degree, where he's not impressed by being looked at leaving the theft and being corrected and giving it back but rather continues on his own?
R. Yes, that is our situation for the meantime.
S. What's the advice?
R. The advice is to keep going and perform more and more connections between us until they bring us to a degree where we can immediately rise against the individual will to receive of each one and work collectively.
S. Meaning that the result we should expect from us asking for its correction needs to be after some time or immediate, what do we need to expect as a result of our request?
R. First of all, the request should be for connection, first of all, for the correction of the vessels, it's not that we want already to be in a state of receiving in order to bestow but rather, first of all, we should have a vessel that is fitting for that and then we can approach the matter of our connection with the Creator through receiving in order to bestow through equivalence of form.
3. S. (28:25) Even though it's very high up he writes that repentance from fear is that we have no choice and repentance from love is of course is a much higher state, can we somewhat ask do we intend because we have no choice?
R. Now we don't even expect yet out of no choice.
S. Understood. Do we need to aspire to advance from love or first from no choice and then to love?
R. Yes, according to the order.
S. Always this order?
R. Yes. We must have a corrected vessel. Then according to the correction of the vessel we will also be able to demand the filling and the conditions for receiving the filling.
4. S. (29:27) What is theft and robbery and spiritual work in the relation to friends?
R. Stealing versus robbing in the spiritual work means that I do not give, I do not allow my friends to reach a corrected vessel it depends on me. Meaning that each and every one of us as much as he depends on everyone, they depend on him, and therefore accordingly we can count the number of states, the number of degrees that we still have ahead of us, before the corrections so that we can receive in order to bestow. We can't yet reach a state of, first we have to reach bestowing in order, then receiving in order to bestow, we don't have a vessel for it.
5. S. (30:42) How to feel altogether that everything we received for ourselves we're stealing from the authority of the friend or the authority of the Creator?
R. We need to really try to be in a state where we're in a society where everybody depends on everybody, so it's impossible that someone who reaches the complete correction, unless everyone supports him. This is called our Arvut, Mutual Guarantee, and this is what we have to direct ourselves to first of all.
S. What will lead me to the place where I will steal from my friend?
R. As much as you attain that your correction depends on the friends, from this you will also conclude that the friends depend on you.
S. How do we locate the place of the authority?
R. The place of authority or permission, that already depends on the person. it depends on the person, when a person determines for himself the state that he is in.
S. A person defines for himself the place of authority?
R. Yes.
S. What exactly is that place of authority?
R. This place of authority or permission is that he can say now I’m before a Mitzvah or transgression or a place of permission of choice.
S. How do I give back what I stole from the friends? If I feel that I stole from them, is there such a calculation?
R. Yes, you need to come to a state with them where you give back to each other, each one to the other, what you discover that you stole.
S. How do you give up the theft, give back the theft?
R. This considered that with your heart and soul you want to help each other correct the vessels.
6. S. (33:27) Can there be a connection between thieves?
R. Between thieves there's a very good connection. They have such groups, such society's where they can all be devoted to each other, even more so than our group.
S. Is the Creator with them?
R. Yes, if they want to use the connection between them, the Creator helps them as well.
S. They don't want connection, they want the loot, what they can get?
R. Yes, but along the way they do care for their connection.
S. How do you come out of that?
R. This is already through true repentance where we need to see how we can rise above it, he writes about it.
S. Does our way move through the path of the connection between thieves?
R. I hope not. I hope that we bypass those possibilities in advance.
S. If there's a discernment of thief, that he's not worried that he's being seen, that he's not under the awareness of the Creator sees that he's taking, so that's a certain kind of connection between thieves, but between robbers can there be such a thing?
R. Between the robbers connection can be even stronger, they don't care that they're seen. This is the difference between the robber and the thief, that the robber can steal before everyone's eyes and it doesn't stop him, the fact that he's stealing and everyone sees him.
7. S. (35:55) The sin is actually that a person aspires for the pleasures for himself, or that he thinks that there is self altogether?
R. Both, it depends on the degree that he is in.
8. S. (36:18) If I hear correctly the person identifies the will to receive that is more developed and the answer to that is correction through the connection with the friends?
R. Yes.
S. To approach the connection with the friends becomes impossible the more the will to receive develops, so what is the action that proceeds with the connection with the friends, what do I do in order to approach the connection?
R. To realize that connection is the only correction.
S. Sometimes that's not enough because I understand but I need some kind of push, some force from above?
R. Then it's not considered that you understood it.
S. Then what is to understand to think about it?
R. Yes, the connection between us is the correction for all the crimes. It corresponds to the breaking of the vessel.
9. S. (37:33) Can I ask forgiveness from the thief?
R. Forgiveness for the thief?
S. Is sorry the thief or what is the forgiveness?
R. No, we don't ask forgiveness from the thief but rather we have to subdue him, make him put down his theft and ask for correction. The thief exists in every person, a person must perform such actions in connection with his Ten where he receives the forces to correct his attitude to the connection with each and every one in the group.
10. S. (38:28) How to discern when I'm a thief and when I'm a robber in the Ten?
R. The thief actually enjoys the fact that he is stealing. The robber also enjoys the action itself. If you will let's say, give him $1,000 he will happily take it as a thief, but the robber enjoys taking it from the domain of the other that he rises above the other, he lies to him. This is his pleasure, meaning it's more spiritual pleasure the robber compared to the thief. The thief only looks at the $1,000 let's say, the robber looks at how he does it cunningly. This is what he enjoys.
S. In my work in the Ten can I discern between them?
R. The work in the Ten we distinguish between one and the other how much after you have stolen. You enjoy telling the friends that I, yesterday stole $1,000 or you tell your friends how much you performed actions in order to reach a state where you still in a corrected way, meaning a special way, so that you are doing it in front of everyone and nobody can recognize you that you are working towards the Creator and towards the friends. That's a robber. If you only think about the money, the possession then it's a thief.
11. S. (41:23) Reality is a physical connection and a virtual connection. In a physical connection you can always feel more the emotions. What's the effort you have to add to the virtual connection so it will be as powerful as a physical connection?
R. We need to feel the friends more that they are somewhere, and in our vessels, in our feelings we don't have a common feeling and that is our difficulty, our hardship.
12. S. (42:28) The thief is like the intermediate state in the robbers that he has no feeling of None Else Besides Him?
R.Yes. The robber is one who nevertheless steals not taking anything into consideration.
S. It's not a point of question and you told you're a robber and that you have to bow your head before the Creator?
R. No one shows you some point, and this is the robber within you and you have to do something with it.
13. S. (43:26) Rabash writes several places in the article that a person takes the pleasure from the control of the Creator to himself. What does it mean to take the pleasure of the Creator into his own control?
R. That the Creator created feelings and pleasures only in order for them to be received in order to bestow so that they connect to Him in adhesion. When we do it for the sake of the Creator as it becomes revealed to us that the Creator is doing it for us.
S. Receiving pleasure for the sake of the Creator needs to be while we're in connection to Him meaning the promise of the connection to Him was destroyed?
R. I do it for the Creator that I'm an adhesion for Him, I'm connected to Him, I do it for Him and then our action is kosher, is correct, it's legal, permitted.
14. S. (44:53) These spiritual actions of robbery and being a thief, in our Ten we have this diary that we fill, some write, some don't fill it out, so is there a robber or a thief towards this action?
R. Yes, if you agree that you're going to write in this common diary, common notebook everyday so that there your inner goals will be reflected, and one who does not write there is not part of the group. It's very important by the way, we are already coming closer to being able to make such lists. We don't need to show them to anyone else but the group, the Ten. It's only for your internal usage, and there you actually need to write only those new things that you discover between you.
S. It’s news, it's anger, it's sorrow, some prayer, what needs to be there?
R. Try and then we will talk about it. It will help us to understand better ourselves. It will help us to be closer to the friends and to move further along faster. We can take a step forward only after we take a step towards each other.
S. How do you write to not insult the friend?
R. There shouldn't be there anything there about something that is insulting or not insulting, it should all be very direct. If you're not yet capable of doing that then don't do it. Each one can then write to himself, then after a few such weeks maybe you will want to start a common registry, a common diary but it should only be very clear and very short and to the point there.
15. S. (47:42) What does it mean to come to the sense of being guilty of becoming ashamed becoming responsible for the theft of the friend?
R. Yes, when a person starts to understand more deeply internally the content of the action that he invited.
S. Actually we are not responsible for being a thief because the Creator created us as a thief, so how can we be responsible for this action of being a thief, and being ashamed of it?
R. Don't agree with it, keep going forward and you will succeed that’s it. Every moment you must repent, see where did I perform a transgression and what should I do in order to correct it.
16. S. (49:15) It turns out that our work is first of all to discover that we are thieves and to pray for the Creator to help us?
R. Yes, maybe not only thieves but also robbers.
17. S. (49:51) According to the article that we just read, the robbers are more developed than the thieves as far as their will to receive, meaning potentially they are closer to being friends to us on the spiritual path. On the path there was a team managed by.... that took care of prisoners in prisons. You see in this error right now the importance of talking about dissemination of the Wisdom of Kabbalah specifically to do dissemination in prisons?
R. I don't think that in prisoners in prisons we will find people that want to steal or rob from the spiritual society their vessels and their forces. Rather you have people there who only want more money, so don't wait for a friend to bring you to the end of correction even though he is a good guy.
18. S. (51:35) How can we resist the robber and how can we resist the thief? What is the difference?
R. Against the thief we can only catch up with him and extract the fact from him, meaning to learn how to do that. Against the robber we have to catch up with him in order to extract the fact from him, we have to scare him, fight with him, because, well he's a robber. He wants everything, he already has a more clear attainment of what it is that he has stolen from us and we are trying to get back from him. Meaning that here there is already a higher attainment inside of what he has obtained.
19. S. (52:55) Can we say that if in my intention I am bothering my friends to come closer to the Creator I am robbing from them, and if I say something in the Ten that becomes a stumbling block for my friends then I'm attacking them?
R. Yes.
20. S. (53:28) What should we do to friends who do not observe the covenant in the Ten and prevent our advancement?
R. We have to work on them, pressure them, bend them, because this is a law that without keeping it we cannot advance. This is why the whole group must be against such things. Everyone should speak of the importance of incorporation and common work.
S. On the other hand we say that we shouldn't pressure friends, what exactly can an individual person do, what do I need to actually do?
R. Connect with the friends, scrutinize in the connection with them whether you are correct about your general path the general way, that the Ten is following, that's first of all. To the extent that you are in a single thought, a single action then you can move on.
21. S. (55:10) What's the difference between annulment to the control in spiritual work?
R. Annulment versus control, annulment is when a person annuls himself on the path and control meaning that he wants to control others in order to advance on the path the way it seems to him, these are two opposite states.
S. When a person sees the control of the friend as if the friends are overwhelmingly controlling, does he have to nullify?
R. Not always. I don't know, it depends on the situation.
22. S. (56:28) Can you explain how sins can become virtues?
R. Sins are the development of the will to receive of a person, if we combine them with our intention to bestow then we receive vessels in which we can receive in order to bestow. This is how we reach Hochma, the light of Hochma.
23. S. (57:15) To steal pleasure from the Creator is this talking about receiving pleasure without a Masach, a screen?
R. Without a screen, well that's what we want to develop.
S. It's impossible right because there is the first restriction?
R. Yes.
S. So how can you steal?
R. You can't, but the desire does exist and that's already called stealing.
24. S. (57:54) If there is a robber in the Ten that feels that she received not appropriate relations, should we continue our correction or do we need to resist just like a robber to her?
R. We need to enter a scrutiny together and then by that everyone will advance.
25. S. (58:41) What are the sins that are supposed to enter Kedusha, holiness after the correction?
R. They enter corrections and then Kedusha.
26. S. (59:13) What is the meaning that everyone needs to enter Kedusha, holiness and this is clear that the Holy Zohar said that the angel of death will become a holy angel?
R. That we will sanctify all of the demands of the angel of death which is our will to receive so that it becomes in order to bestow then it will bring us to the highest Kedusha, holiness.
S. In the Ten how is this expressed?
R. That is already in the end of correction.
27. S. (59:59) You give us the mission of writing in the Tens a diary and we have a problem. We write mostly the negative feelings that we feel and it's not clear to me how to work. I see friends writing about their negative emotions, what do I do in relation to that?
R. We have to scrutinize what to do about them, because we can use them in order to enter Kedusha in order to get closer to the purpose of creation, it doesn't matter if it's negative.
S. He's saying and that's what he's trying to understand, we try to do the right work with these feelings that are written, but we don't know exactly what to do with them?
R. First of all you need to connect above these emotions and then scrutinize when you are above these feelings, what to do with these feelings that now exist within you, how to use them.
28. S. (01:02:08) Is the feeling of distance from the Ten a sign that we are thieves?
R. No it's not yet a sign, we need to scrutinize that a feeling doesn't mean anything. A person feels things for all kinds of reasons, he needs to scrutinize where does it come from, why and what for and how does he advance with that relative to his previous day, etc. It requires further scrutiny.
29. S. (01:02:56) Who does the sin belong to?
R. The sin belongs or pertains to the Creator, he shows us that we exist in a sin.
S. What do we need to do?
R. For that, we need to do the other half of the path, we should try to correct ourselves by the same Creator.
30. S. (01:03:50) It appears as if the robber is a worse quality than a thief, but the robber is disclosed and the thief hides. The robber as far as revealing the truth is higher than the thief, so what state in me is closer to correction, the robber or the thief?
R. The robber.
31. S. (01:04:25) What helps in the war with yourself when you understand that you're a robber?
R. Only the connection with the friends, there is nothing besides that. There you receive an answer for each and every state.
32. S. (01:04:54) Where do we start the correction, is it the work of the heart of the mind? How do we approach it?
R. Both this and that, I can’t give you a single answer, both the mind and the heart we need to detect what state we are in with respect to the correction.
33. S. (01:05:42) I just see that there's another relevant point to us, a person that's in order to bestow, does he see thieves before him?
R. In order to bestow?
S. Yes if I wanted to be in order to bestow.
R. Possibly yes, maybe.
S. Does he see thieves relative to himself?
R. When he is in order to bestow he sees thieves that are hindering him so that he cannot perform an act of bestowal.
S. But on the friends, does he see that they are stealing from him or they're taking some kind of debt for example. According to what I understand, if a person is in order to bestow he just wants to give, he has no feeling that he has something of his own and then you can’t steal from him. A person who is in order to bestow and this happens in our Ten. When we start a meeting at first there are complaints then it kind of disappears. That feeling, it kind of is a little bit of the force of bestowal clothes us and then we don’t see the friends that they are causing bad, rather we want to give them so that we can help them. Can we say that in a state where a person is in more of bestowal, then sees less friends that are stealing from him? He doesn't see them as thieves because they're coming to help him and be in bestowal?
R. Well possibly, I don't yet want to talk about that. I don't think that a person who is in bestowal, it is as a result he doesn’t see in his friends actions that are against bestowal.
S. That's the second half of it. Maybe he doesn't see himself but does he see it between the friends these actions, that towards myself I don't have anything of my own authority, so they can't steal from me. But can you see that between the friends and relate to them that way because of that?
R. He nevertheless is in a state where he justifies everyone.
34. S. (01:08:05) Can it be in the Ten a common awareness that everyone is robbing or is it personal work?
R. A Ten is a common awareness of something negative, it can be. That's already a high degree, it already indicates a certain connection between them.
S. And what do you do in such a case where everyone?
R. Well you connect and realize that the Creator is giving them a sign that they were successful.
35. S. (01:09:09) About thieves in the Ten, if I have a financial situation in the Ten better than the friends, is that something I need to correct and am I considered a thief by that?
R. Why? Where does this question come from? The thief or robber corresponds to the action that a person performed, that wants to perform but it's not, it's only with respect to a state or something he intends to do or he has done.
36. S. (01:10:07) About the order of the correction because it seems like the thief is more problematic than the robber?
R. The thief it's not so obvious, it's not so clear, he is hidden, and the robber you catch him and bend him and correct him, meaning you don't demand a correction from him, from the thief we seemingly demand correction.
S. It appears like the thief is more problematic because he's sophisticated he's cunning, so why do they say that the robber is worse than the thief?
R. In terms of his will to receive, simply his will to receive is so great that he doesn't want to take what you have by stealing cunningly so you won't know about it, but he just comes and takes.
S. What's the order of correction that is revealed to us? How are the forces to correct appear in us, first what?
R. First we have to correct the thief.
S. Why first the thief?
R. Because he doesn't work by force, he operates not with an action but only with the intention.
S. But he's concealed, he's cunning how do you correct him first? The robber you see him, you say, oh here's the robber but with the thief, it's concealed?
R. What is the question?
S. What do we correct first?
R. What do we correct first? If I have before me a robber or a thief, well what can you do with a robber?
S. Scare him, to shame him, to cause him to at least to not be insolent.
R. And that's easier?
S. It would appear like it is easier because he's disclosed.
R. Yes that's something else.
S. Is there an order or is it revealed to us this or that?
R. You're right.
S. I'm asking, is there an order or is it revealed to us and we ask for help for everything?
R. We want to reveal both the thief and the robber and here there's a question, from where do we begin, so we begin with the thief.
S. And how do you help a friend let's say if I negate in my own flaws, but how can I help a friend that I see that has that quality?
R. Such a quality of robber and thief exists in each and every one of us. It depends only on the height that we discover it, that the control of the evil inclination is revealed, so according to that we come and correct it.
S. The correction of my attitude I understand, I ask I pray, but how do I help a friend?
R. We connect also the correction that we talked about before that's not a correction. The correction is only through connection, so as much as we connect on a certain degree, we correct the thief and on a certain degree we correct the robber. It all has to do with the measure, the size of the will to receive.
37. S. (01:14:32) It's still not clear the work with the diary in the Ten. We take part of our meeting after we read the Rabash article, then we ask ourselves, what are we writing there, and in the middle of the day there is like one or two friends that can respond to that and there's an understanding that when you read Rabash you're not in there so you write it in the diary. But as a common action that we are searching for a mutual area and to write out of there it is still. If we could elaborate on it a bit?
R. I didn't understand what you're saying.
S. What do we write in that diary? What common area are we writing about?
R. What do you think what should we do with the thief in us and what should we do with the robber in us?
S. This is this article so the next article is the same thing?
R. No in the next article is what each article awakens in us.
S. The writing is in relation to what we absorb from an article?
R. Yes of course. Isn't it obvious?
38. S. (01:16:09) How can I be sure that I'm not stealing from the friend in the spiritual work?
R. Ask him.
S. What?
R. Ask him if you stole from him or not, scrutinize it together
S. What should we scrutinize together?
R. If you stole or not.
S. It's not clear.
R. Ask him and you will see how much you have to talk about it, how he looks at it and how you look at it.
S. It's a sensitivity that we have to develop between us?
R. Yes and you will understand each other better.
39. S. (01:17:01) He writes that when you steal from it, but what is the repentance from Love and how do you reach that?
R. If you correct the robber.
S. But the robber is only potential and by force you can correct him but how does that bring you to love?
R. Scrutinize it and we will talk about it.