Morning Lesson June 26, 2022 Transcription
Transcription is made from simultaneous translation which leaves a possibility for differences in the audio
Baal HaSulam. The Essence of Religion and Its Purpose (The Essence of Religion Is to Develop in Us the Sense of Recognition of Evil)
Reading (0:20) “The Essence of Religion Is to Develop in Us the Sense of Recognition of Evil”
1 R. (06:25) Well, he explains to us many things here.
2. S. (06:12) What does it mean a more developed person
R. Developed probably refers to emotionally developed meaning that he can better distinguish between good and bad, so for him the sense of good in the sense of bad are sharper.
S. Is it having a more complex ego?
R. That it's like sharpening the senses. That perhaps I feel a very subtle difference of how much salt is in something and you don't, because you're not that sensitive to it but you are sensitive to something else. Some people have very sensitive, that is what he writes, very sensitive to the ego, their ego or someone else's ego. That's the question right, when I look at others I immediately sense how they use their ego in various directions and how much their ego really governs them around and with myself I don't feel it. There are different levels of ego, yes.
S. More developed means more sensitive to the other?
R. That's not a correct definition, more sensitive to the others. Sensitive to the others in what sense?
S. That he manages to understand his motives, what he's doing, what he's doing.
R. More developed means that he better distinguishes in each and every action both inside him and around him that all the actions come from within the ego. His ego, others egos, in short all of nature is egoistic and it shows itself to us from within.
3. S. (08:58) He says that in order to be in bestowal he gives him two conditions, one that I have to be in equivalence of form to the maker and then the measure of the disparity of form, what is it mean disparity of form? Doesn't it depend on the other?
R. Disparity of form is disparity of form. What can I say here? There is a difference.
S. I can see there are two conditions but I feel like the disparity of form is according to how much I want to be in equivalence of form?
R. True, this is how you measure disparity of form from having the sensation of equivalence of form.
4. S. (09:54) It says now that the recognition of evil in him that working in the commandments we'll refine you, what does it mean through the commandments I can know the evil in me?
R. Mitzvot (commandments) means that you are trying to be good to others. Love thy friend as yourself. That is the primary commandment that includes all corrections inside of it. The more you increase love thy friend as thyself, by that you become pure, more refined, more sensitive to various forms of bestowal. You also begin to distinguish these things in other people or in general in the world and then you come to what is called the recognition of evil that you better and better understand, recognize your ego, your own evil.
S. What is the essence of the action in the ten?
R. Connection, connection.
S. Can I concede that this is recognition of evil?
R. Yes, if you connect with the friends then together you will begin to reveal the upper force and work with it practically until the final correction.
S. Let me get it. In the ten ,I try to see how the friend is nice and good and playing cutesie, and it is not that the friend is good, but the ten is nice. What is the work here?
R. Try to relate this way to each other.
S. How do I recognize the evil through that?
R. Don't worry, the evil will show itself. The bad will unfold. You don't need to worry about that, you just need to be drawn to the good, to the good complete whole connection between everyone so that they are like a circle.
S. Then will the evil be revealed between us?
R. The evil will appear as you connect stronger and stronger to the point of the Creator becomes revealed. You have to pressure yourselves so much so that you come to connect to each other so that you feel within how the Creator is concealed and gradually becomes revealed.
S. Meaning until I find the evil between us we cannot advance?
R. No, you're not advancing towards the revelation of the Creator which is our goal.
5. S. (12:55) If I see that the friends or the ten has something against me how to scrutinize if this is something corporeal or spiritual ? How to resolve it?
R. Tell everybody quietly, don't voice it out loud. Tell yourself do whatever is revealed towards you comes from the Creator and you were telling him thank you very much that in such a way he's showing you their friends relation towards you and by that you can come closer to Him. Nothing is revealed to a person but doesn't help him advance towards an encounter with a Creator.
6. S. (13:46) What's the difference between my ego and my friend's ego? Isn't it the same?
R. There are thousands of differences between you and him because as Baal HaSulam writes,there are no two hairs that come out of the same hole. What do you want? You're not similar, You are in your ego and he's and his ego, but you have to connect between you above that information or data that each one has and connect together towards the Creator.
S. I'm asking because it's hard for me to recognize my own ego but I always see the friends' ego all the time.
R. What do you mean the friends?
S. It is easier for me to recognize the egos of my friends but not of myself. I'm asking if I can take my ego absolute that belongs to everyone?
R. No, you have to see how you relate to your friends. Check it, scrutinize it, sort it out and then correct it. If not, pray to the Creator to help you see it.
S. How to correctly relate to the friend's ego? I recognize the ego in the friend.
R. That's nice, that's called that the Creator showing is showing you your ego.
S. So that's mine?
R. Correct even though you are calling it the friend's ego. He who flaws does it in his own flaws.
Reading ( 16:12 ) “Conscious development and unconscious development”
7. R. (17:56) Because we discover these things in our eyes and our hands.
Reader continues (18:00).. And to the extent that we recognize its damages,
8. S. (21:01) So again he says we benefit twice. We don't have to wait for life ordeals to push us from behind, whose measure of goading is measured only by the amount of agony and destruction. That's what is happening around the world. How do we expect that they will change? They want to reveal the Creator the world doesn't know.
R. Why can't you speak clearly and stop this disregard? Say sentences clearly.
S. He says Baal HaSulam,We do not have to wait for life’s ordeals to push us from behind, whose measure of goading is measured only by the amount of agony and destruction What I am saying is that the whole world feels it, the destruction other than Bnei Baruch, How can we expect them to learn Kabbalah and then advance without destruction?
R. We're not actually talking about the whole world. They also still have degrees of still vegetative,animate,and speaking and it's in each and everyone and what do you think that the Gmar Tikkun, end of correction you think, that everybody reaches the peak, highest point everybody together?
S. When is the end of correction?
R. That's when all of humanity will reach a state that they will all know me from small to the big and my house will be a house of prayer to all nations. That means they will all reach but each one according to his whole degree.
S. But he says that through the work for the Creator, that recognition develops in us without any prior suffering or ruin.
R. Yes, if we acknowledge that our problem is our ego and that we can correct it only only with the help of the upper light then we have only one issue how to invite. how to draw the upper light to work on us.
S. That's what I'm asking he says and they will know me from the little to the greatest. How will the whole world know they’re from the littlest to the greatest that's the end of correction?
R. So you are asking for the whole world.
S. That is what I asked in the beginning.
R. I don't know I don't know, I haven't gone through it yet I have no records about that I can't tell you.
S. What's the logic here?
R. Don't butt in, I don't know because there is no wise as the experienced and I have no experience it that but according what he writes the Creator will be revealed to all the world meaning all created beings each one to the extent of his placement in the system of Adam HaRishon he will gradually receive revelation of the Creator and then be drawn in connection to the others more and more in order to assemble the system of all the souls of Adam HaRishon that one soul and according to that the Creator will be revealed in that one soul these things are clear the way it all happens to each and every individual that I can't say because there is no wise as the experienced.
S. You see that it can happen around the world according to what is written here?
R. Why not who are humans they’re just little desires to receive that are eating away how do I say it crawling all over the earth and obviously the upper light will work on them they’ll start jumping and running and doing everything the upper light will obligate them to do to obligate a creature that is entirely made of the desire to enjoy that is very easy wherever you show it a bit of pleasure he runs and exists there and that’ everything you want.
S. So that’s what he writes only through destruction and the ruin we can advance?
R. Yes yes yes of course that's how it's going to be there is no problem in that you see how now the world is running from one place to the other in every direction each and every one just like little flies or ants.
S. Today there’s no food, the economy is down, the stock market.
R. Don’t cry, I don’t like that.
S. Where will salvation come from?
R. The salvation will come when we want it come, for dont we don't want it.
9. S. (26:19) I would love to read the last article here, the last sentence here, it says it all depends on us, I don't remember exactly.
R. Where did we read that?
S. It says, He operates according to “our own volition,” thus enabling us to increase our work and hasten time as we please.
R. What's the problem? Obviously either the Creator bestows on us influences us and we’ll run into what we need to or we ourselves gradually without His pressure but as much as we can come close to Him according to our efforts we’ll get an addition of the upper light every time and perform what we need to do either way you will reach Gmar Tikkun the end of corrections but you just have an opportunity to speed it up or walk the path of suffering that there is such a state in that path that God forbid to go in the path that’s not worth it that's why Kabbalists are writing what they do that the path of Torah the path of the light the good path the path of correction is good in the eyes of man and in the eyes of the Creator.
Reading (28:07) “Religion is not for the sake of people but for the sake of the worker. “
10. R. Meaning no bad for bad on you you don't do that that's the ethics.
Reader continues (28:44) “It is true that ethics and religion both aim at the same thing.."
11. R. (30:31) Meaning it's very different. Either we have an attitude towards society, people and so on or we have an attitude towards our source, the Creator, that's the difference.
Reader continues (30:47) "They are also completely removed from one another.."
12. R. Well that he didn't write but we can understand it from all kinds of parts of his other articles. Well let's start.
13. S. (36:08) About the last item the feeling is that a person constantly goes through states of choice in Torah and if a person finds himself as not fitting the goal what does it mean to taste?
R. You're right that's how we advance just every time new records awaken in us new deficiencies and we need upon them to scrutinize again and decide again and advance again. That's how it works. You’re right each and every day we have new scrutinies.
14. S. (36:59) A question about what we have read we typically learn also talked about it in the beginning of the lesson that every recognition of a flaw causes one suffering in the person wants to either escape it or correct but here Baal HaSulam writes that the recognition of evil with the help of the Torah awaken pleasure and gladness? Why specifically pleasure and gladness?
R. It is because he corrects his ego and by that he reveals the Creator coming closer to him from that he gets gladness.
S. I want to clarify further, such a structure that Baal HaSulam writes that the recognition of evil with the help of the Torah brings about pleasure and joy and then he continues this thought that in the feeling of pleasure and thought while working for the Creator with the goal of bestowing to Him contentment what is the complexity here?
R. That’s continuing a person's intention that he doesn't want anything of the state he attained and feels pleasures and horizons that he sees he doesn't want to take anything of that for himself but only for the benefit of the Creator we’ll reach it and then we will be able to learn about it how it happens and what to do with it but it has to be in order to bestow that is what he is emphasizing here.
S. Do I need to feel the pleasure from the Creator when I reveal the flaw or after correcting the flaw?
R. Both, also revelation of the flaws also happens by the upper light shining on those flaws that's why you have to be happy that the Creator is helping you and showing you your flaws that also by this you're already working together.
15. S. (39:51) How can we be aware of falling into ethics and doing actions to look nice in the eyes of others and receive a reward enough to be people of pretty actions?
R. Don't worry that won't happen the Creator's taking care of that and we are advancing correctly that won't happen to us we're learning only the writings of Baal HaSulam and Rabash and that is taking care of us that we won't deviate from the path and start bowing down before idols or work in some kind of philosophy or mysticism or psychology no that won’t happen we are only advancing towards the connection between us towards the Creator through a straight line path that is completely clear.
16. S. (41:12) Can you explain the third paragraph from the end, 'Now we can understand that the purpose of religion is collected while living in this world, and examine closely in “Matan Torah,”
R. Yes, we see that the purpose of relation is only for the person working in it and not for serving the creations although all his deeds are for the creation that is only to be a conduit for the purpose of equivalence of form with his Maker.
S. That is not clear, it sounds egoistic that in the end, on the one hand they tell us love your friend as yourself is the only way, but here it says that the purpose of religion with Kabbalah is not to serve the people and help them, so what does he mean?
R. Yes?
S. It is not clear, I remember that you said that it seems to us to me that the ten is only a means and that at some point I will get to the Creator and throw away the friends.
R. Who told you that?
S. I remember that you said that sometimes a person feels that he needs the friends, then tens, as something temporary to reach the Creator, and here it says that it’s using it as a conduit as a means to reach the goal.
R. The goal isn’t that I am throwing the means away. It is what is the goal that I'm not exchanging the goal. The goal is to reach a state that I am serving the Creator in an unconditional way that doesn't depend on me at all;, it's all above me.
S. From the perspective of feeling you say that you don't have the feeling of the Creator and that’s why you have to work towards the friends.
R. I do not understand you of course we need to work one towards the other in order through that because the Creator is hidden behind everyone so after that we discover that it’s all actual work with the Creator and we reach adhesion with Him and in the adhesion with Him we attain the final goal.
17. S. (43:51) How is this expressed to run a society that exists for the sake of the Creator, what’s the expression of it?
R. That each and every one makes sure that the friends are adhered between them as much as possible until the Creator is revealed between them and all the NRNHY.
S. To bring the Creator into an action in society that He will manage He will do, only to think about it that it’s all for his own sake, it’s this thought that activates him?
R. We’ll not only work in that way you’ll work in it practically with a screen coarseness direct light reflected light all of these things the records and so on you work with it in a practical way do you understand how many details you have there and this is all in order to scrutinize your relationships from the inner inner inner part of your nature which is the ego into the inner inner part of the Creator which is the upper light that is bestowing the NRNHY of NRNHY of NRNHY until you connect together and discover one another and connect together and then that final point will be called the end of correction.
S. Another point he emphasizes is for the sake of the Creator is not to receive a reward. What is a connection there?
R. In order to bestow is not getting a reward.
S. That becomes for the sake of the Creator?
R. Yes because who's working it’s your ego working in front of the Creator that’s why not getting a reward for your ego means to entirely bestow the Creator.