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

Daily Lesson (Afternoon) October 14, 2024

Part 1 Rabash. Record 121. Two Forces within Man

Hello friends, we're reading the writings of Rabash, volume number 3, page 1652, article 121, “Two Forces within Man”. You can find the study materials on Sviva Tova and Arvut and ask questions on these websites. 

Reading Article: (00:26) Two Forces within Man

Man detects two forces in the world: 1) The rejecting force, so one will move from the state he is in. 2) The attracting force, which draws a person, for which reason he must move from the state he is in

The rejecting force is called “suffering.” The fact that he suffers in the state he is in makes him leave that place and go look for a place where he can enjoy life.

The pulling force is called “pleasure.” If a person sees that there is a place that if he went there he would receive more pleasure than he has in this place, although he has pleasures here, if he sees that he can enjoy life more in another place, he leaves his place and goes there.

However, one force is not enough, since there is a possibility where he will be dissatisfied with the situation he is in, but will not see where he will be better off. Our sages bring an allegory about a pigeon that had a snake under the rock and a hawk up in the sky, so where could it go? While Israel came out of Egypt, the sea was before them and Pharaoh and the Egyptians were behind them.

Sometimes we can receive more pleasure, but we must make an effort. Hence, a person is afraid to leave his place so he will not be left empty handed on either side.

But when there are the rejecting force and the pulling force, a person can move from his place. That is, when one feels suffering where he is, and believes that there is a place to go and receive pleasure, he goes forward. This is called “Turn away from evil and do good.”

Question (W MAK): (04:02) What does it mean to run away from oneself, from one's Egypt? 

M. Laitman: That the person feels that he is in thoughts, desires that don't bring him satisfaction, and at the same time, this feeling of evil that's awakened in him is called the state of Egypt. Then he looks at himself, at everything he's been through, and he sees that there is nothing shining for him from anywhere. Then he depicts his life in this way. This is the status called when he is in all his qualities, he sees problems.

Question (W MAK 36): (05:13) Is there a taste in faith? 

M. Laitman: Of course, there is a taste in faith, but we have to find it, reveal it, try it, what this taste is so we would be able to determine constantly whether we are in faith or we're close to it or on the way to it. Then everything will become clearer to us. 

Student: Does this speak of something else? To force is the taste of bitterness, rejection, the taste of sweetness and attraction is pleasure, and the taste of faith is something else. Does this have to do with this? 

M. Laitman: This is a sweet taste of attraction. 

Question (W Kavkaz 1): (06:21) I try to clarify this question for myself periodically. Where is my effort? When the Creator puts pressure on me I am forced not to think about my gain, but only to get out of suffering. I accept the Creator's pressure on me, but when this goes away, can I put pressure on myself in this way? 

M. Laitman: It depends on you. Perhaps you're imagining your current state as perfect or some kind of a future state. But basically, all your states depend only on you, how you rate them, and then what you do about them. 

Student: I'm not only self-annulment? My work is not just in acceptance, but I also have some kind of independence? 

M. Laitman: Of course. 

Question (W MAK 53): (07:47) Here it says, how to see the place where it's better. You feel that everything is seemingly good, but there is some dissatisfaction, and you don't see the place where you should go. Even if you see it, you don't have this ability. How to work with this? 

M. Laitman: What possibilities are you lacking? 

Student: For example, you see something in front of you, something better, and you want to achieve this. But how do we do this? 

M. Laitman: I don't know. You have only one opportunity to reach that. Only through one action can you achieve that, when you will always be thinking about accumulating strength towards the Creator. Then, at the end of the day, eventually you will start feeling Him more, and more, and more. You start understanding how you can strengthen the connection with Him. That's it, and then it's His work. You have to give your desires to Him, and He will be correcting them on His side.

Question (Kyiv): (09:35) This talks about a situation with two forces, that on the one hand it pushes, and on the other hand it attracts, rejects and attracts. It is also written about the situation when he can't move, and there's a snake under the stone, and a hawk in the sky. How to move forward in the Ten? What kind of force should it use? The force of rejection, the force of attraction, because sometimes in the routine actions the Ten doesn't stop, but it's not accelerating. It's moving at constant speed. 

M. Laitman: You have to be seeking forces of attraction, so that they would be pulling you, and then it will be easier for you to drift out of your descent and advance forward.

Student: What is this force of attraction for the Ten? Where should we look for it? 

M. Laitman: In the Creator. Where else can we look for it? Only in the Creator. 

Student: How does the Ten feel this force of attraction? How is this revealed? 

M. Laitman: When you speak about the Creator inside the Ten. You have to feel that in the Ten there is such a force that is pulling you forward, and this force eventually will manifest itself between you. This is how you need to act. 

Question (W Italy): (11:36) We see two forces in ourselves. Should we pay equal attention to them, or which one should we favor? 

M. Laitman: We can advance only through the force of attraction, and through the force of rejection, pushing forward, and the difference between them is basically absent. I need also to use the force of attraction and the force of rejection. 

Student: And where shall I use which force more? 

M. Laitman: It's a specific case, specific state.

Question (W Moscow 8): (13:00) I have this every year, especially on Yom Kippur. It shows me a distance, remoteness from Him. I see that He created my ego, it beat me again. And then we continue to pray in the Ten. Is this the correct dynamic, the feeling of growing abyss between myself and the Creator? 

M. Laitman: Yourself and the Creator? Every year more and more? 

Student: Yes, I feel this abyss, this huge ego that is just beating me. 

M. Laitman: It's good. The Creator is showing you more and more real distance between yourself and the Creator. Obviously, you have an opportunity to plea for Him, for Him to make you closer. 

Question (Asia): (14:17) You said to a friend that we need the forces of attraction and rejection in order to rise above the state you're in. There is a state where you can move from your place, physically move your state, and there is the ability to rise. So, the question is, when? It's difficult to know how to change the place.

M. Laitman: No, no, it's not hard. Every person has to check, research how can he exit from the state, under what natural forces does he have to put himself? And see, from this, how he can advance further. 

Student: Can we decide to stay on the path, overcome everything, when you can connect with friends and our framework, when the material things won't change anything?

M. Laitman: Correct. 

Question (Moscow 7): (15:48) First of all, I wanted to say how unique this article is. It so precisely depicts the state of reality, but this causes many questions. These two states, the suffering is caused by the evil inclination, the force of rejection, and the force of attraction should be from the good inclination. How important is it to clarify the form of this future state and this evil inclination, to ask precisely what to correct, so that the heart is connected to the state we should be attracted to. Should we clarify these forms? 

M. Laitman: No, I think that the most correct way is to identify all the states with our work, egoistical or altruistic, and this way we will exit them fast. 

Student: And this evil inclination, when I recognize it, I am kind of strengthening it. On the other hand how do I make the Creator correct it? 

M. Laitman: No. We have to identify the evil inclination inside of ourselves, precisely realize it, and then perceive it only when we need it. If you have the forces to take this evil inclination, and start rising above it, then do it. Do this action, perform this action, and you will see how much the evil inclination is actually helping you, more so than the good one.

Student: And if a person can't rise above the evil inclination, then we need to increase the upper part? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Question (W Turkiye 7): (18:46) There are states when I suffer in spiritual work. What can protect me from running away from this, and what do I have to hold on to?

M. Laitman: You exist in spiritual work, always under the rule of the Creator, under the reign of the Creator, and you cannot simply run away from this work. All of the time check if you have the desire, the lack for the bestowal, to feel your desire to receive. Don't be afraid. It's not going to get anywhere from you, and you also won’t run away anywhere. 

Question (W Australia): (19:59) The state that Baal HaSulam writes about, as Israel during the exodus from Egypt. While Israel came out of Egypt, the sea was before them, and Pharaoh and the Egyptians were behind them. So, this state, when you don't know what's better, where to go, how to come out of this state? 

M. Laitman: The best thing is if you will ask for good forces from the Creator, so that He would supply you with a good energy, with a good force. Then you will exit this state, as if you find yourself in a swamp, or in the depth of the sea, and you are trying with your own forces to exit this state, this encounter, this situation, then you will succeed. 

Question (Novosibirsk): (21:10) After suffering, you come to the conclusion that He does everything to increase faith, that it's all for the good. So, what's this conclusion? Is this conclusion from vessels of bestowal? 

M. Laitman: No. In Kabbalah it is said, more than once, that the state beneficial to us is when we try to find the truth, and then we start working on it. Otherwise, there is no other beneficial state.

Student: May I clarify this individual need, the force of attraction in the Ten when we need this faith to continue. So, I am under the load of all these obstacles, disturbances. I can't see that it's for the good, and only in the Ten can I receive this faith, so to continue and reveal it as something that the Creator attracts through these obstacles. Can we reveal that each one brings this individual need for faith, and this is the force of attraction that we gather for? 

M. Laitman: Yes, yes, absolutely right. 

Question (Turkiye 2): (23:05) How can a person make a shield when he is under the influence of the force that rejects him in his soul? 

M. Laitman: It's a good practical question. Enter the desires, the intentions, the thoughts, and the actions, such that they all influence his desire to receive, and reject the desire to receive as much as possible. Then you will see that there truly is a desire, strength in the desire to receive, and in the desire to bestow way more than in the desire to receive. Then he will pull the desire to bestow, and he will work on it. It is said that there is none wiser than the experienced one, and the more and more he tries to work with the desire to bestow, he understands more and more that he can work only with this desire.

Question (W MAK 19): (24:55) You said that the evil inclination can help. The evil inclination tries to get in the way of seeing the good in the Creator's action, but it makes us ask and pray? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: Can it be that it can happen that in the corporeal there are things that reject us, but there is also a force of attraction in this? 

M. Laitman: Absolutely. There is always a positive force.

Student: Can we perform some calculation whether what I see is the force of rejection or attraction, even if I see that I'm being pushed away? Should I see the force of attraction in this? 

M. Laitman: Yes, yes. 

Question (Nikolaev-Sochi): (25:58) We are talking about the spiritual being pushed away from the spiritual. For years we have friends that are attracted by corporeal things. What is this force that attracts him to corporeal things even though he felt tastes here as well? 

M. Laitman: It's not important. It is said, do not trust yourself until the day you die. Do not hope that you will be able to handle ego. 

Student: Therefore, with what can we cover this?

M. Laitman: Only with the connection between yourselves. Nothing else. Connection and examples from the friends. 

Student: So, we have to be included in one another like a family that no one can leave for corporeal things?

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Question (German): (27:30) How do these two forces of rejection and attraction, how do they bring us to the spiritual? 

M. Laitman: The Creator gives us possibilities, opportunities, and we want to correct our desires in order to raise ourselves towards the force of bestowal. More and more we receive this force of bestowal until it clothes on us and it becomes the reigning force over us. 

Question (W Ukraine 2): (28:20) So all the desires come from the Creator, and it's not bad to have many desires. But we have to see the spiritual part in each desire, right? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: But sometimes I can find justification and know why I need this desire. But this is also ego, right? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Question (MAK 24): (29:06) Can we say that we initialize the force of attraction by our prayer and the Creator initiates the force of rejection if we don't ask? 

M. Laitman: In both cases we have to look for the Creator and orient towards Him. 

Question (Hadera 1): (29:36) Each friend in the Ten can assess his state whether he's advancing by the force of attraction or rejection, and then have to perform a true measurement? 

M. Laitman: In the meantime, it's not possible. The time will come when you will be able to rise over your desire to receive, and then truly be bestowing for the sake of bestowal. Then you will have the opportunity to affect your desire to receive in order to elevate it in the direction of bestowal. 

Question (W Heb 2): (30:35) Can we consider this awakening from below and awakening from above that will help me clarify what else I need to strengthen the connection with the Creator so I don't lose it? 

M Laitman: Basically, you can do this, but still understand that you cannot have constant connection with the Creator until you correct all your ego for the sake of bestowal.

Question (W Kyiv 7): (31:25) How can we correctly work with the state of inner balance. 

M. Laitman: The state of inner balance is when you take all your desires, all your thoughts, and you turn them to the Creator, and don't turn anywhere else from this path. 

Student: How do we do it? At the end of the day, how do we keep this balance between the force of rejection and the force of attraction? 

M. Laitman: Keep this balance. 

Question (W MAK 56): (32:11) What is this force that affects man in feeling suffering, but the other says that it's not so. What is this influence of the forces and how to work with this? 

M. Laitman: I don't know. Ask the Creator to help you make this clear. It's a good question, very good question. If you're not able to figure out your desires, your intentions, ask the Creator and you will actually get it. On one hand, you will become closer to Him, on the other you will attract His attention towards yourselves.

Question (MAK 39): (33:18) Is there a force in the group that holds each friend on a short loop, because it's easy to enter but it's hard to leave. So, there is a force that holds each one of us. 

M. Laitman: Yes, it manifests itself in a certain manner, but still, to enter spirituality is way harder than to exit it.

Question (KabU 14): (34:00) I'm reading the last paragraph. “That is, when one feels suffering where he is, and believes that there is a place to go.” When one feels the suffering of the desire to receive for myself or for himself, is it the shield and how do we believe more that there is a place to go?

M. Laitman: You have to ask the Creator and receive the answer.

Question (Tbilisi): (35:45) This speaks of two forces. I understand this in the following way: one force that makes me feel bad in this world, and the second one is I want to please the Creator. I want to cancel that bad feeling. I want to please Rav, the friends, to unite with the Creator. Are these the two forces we speak of and is it correct to see it this way? 

M. Laitman: Yes, this is correct. 

Question (W MAK 104): (36:26) What does the spiritual force that is pushing us in the group mean? 

M. Laitman: The spiritual force that pushes us is the force that pushes you so that you clarify the Creator's attitude to you. 

Question (W United Kingdom): (37:03) In our Ten, every day we are feeling more and more a sense of urgency, and we are trying to do more things towards this? How can we hasten this force of bestowal? We feel we really want to do this. 

M. Laitman: Only through a prayer.

Question (W MAK 43): (37:46) What should I do when I have to bring in the effort in the switch to the new state, but there is a fear to lose what is there already and expectation of the future? 

M. Laitman: You shouldn't have such fear. 

Student: So, I'm losing faith, right? 

M. Laitman: You need to have some connection with the Creator, and apart from this, you have to constantly feel you and the friends as rising towards Him closer and closer. 

Student: If everything is there, but fear is still not going away, maybe I don't understand this fear and I have to scrutinize it. 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (W Eng 1): (38:54) Does annulling oneself count as making an effort? 

M. Laitman: Yes, of course. Annulling oneself is very hard for a person.

Question (Hadera 1): (39:25) There is also the force of our nature to be in a still state. When is it easier for a person to be in spirituality, when his nature is in the still state, more or less? 

M. Laitman: Of course.

Student: When this doesn't need his effort, then the work is easier? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: So, the force of stillness is smaller? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

 

Question (W Russia 3): (41:06) What is the scale of merit, and what right does a person have to judge the world at this scale? And why is the building, if he's included, aren't those his thoughts, the thoughts of the whole world? It was written about it there, that the person includes thoughts of the whole world. 

M. Laitman: Yes, and he has to ask for the whole world, and then everything will happen.

Question (Petah Tikva 29): (41:48) When a person is going above reason, it depends on the person, or it's the Creator pushing him? 

M. Laitman: Why is this important? 

Student: There's such a feeling that it's important, because on one hand, it's just the efforts of a person, but on the other hand, it's the work of the Upper One, or is it both? 

M. Laitman: Our work in the spiritual, you know what it's called? 

Student: Work of the Creator.

M. Laitman: Well, you see, so what else do you want to ask after this? If we call our work, work of the Creator, it's the work of the Creator, then where are we? We're not in it, we are just doing what He sends us. 

Question (W Tbilisi): (43:09) In order to annul oneself, there needs to be trust inside of the Ten. What is the basis for this trust? How is it supposed to be born in the Ten? 

M. Laitman: It's born gradually from you praying together, turning to the Creator. That's why you get such a group, and this group is felt by the Creator, and you receive, as a result, a response from Him. So that's how it works. That's the way it works. 

Question (English 1): (43:59) Can we use brute force and determination and will to break into spirituality, to use that as the pushing force? 

M. Laitman: Maybe yes.  We have to try. We learn and we try to do this. The question is to what extent we focus on this. This is a question. 

Question (German): (45:01) I have a feeling that there is a force in the upper world that is attracting us.  What kind of force is that? 

M. Laitman: The force that attracts us is the same force of the Creator. The same way that it rejects us, it also attracts us. What do you mean by this question? 

Student: How does it clothe itself, this pulling into our life and our experiences? 

M. Laitman: We'll study this. This is enough for now. 

Question (W MAK 36): (46:05) Do we need to interconnect with our egoistical desires of our friends? 

M. Laitman: No.

Student: But sometimes there is a feeling, maybe I'm wrong, but a friend has a desire, and I can feel how this desire becomes mine in time. I didn't have it before. And it's one-hundred percent egoistical. So how do I not enter it? 

M. Laitman: Not enter? You don't have to enter your friend's every desire. 

Student: How do I stop myself? 

M. Laitman: You have to control the desires you feel are going from her to you and are influencing you. 

Question (W Moscow 6): (47:08) I heard that we perform whatever the Creator has sent in us. How do we perform it correctly? 

M. Laitman: Ask Him. But even if you don't ask Him, but you just perform, He will correct you and you'll learn how to react correctly next time. 

Question (W MAK 25): (47:53) What do I need to do in order to avoid the state of being stuck for the whole Ten, when in the current state it's uncomfortable to be, but the new perspective where to put in the effort is not visible yet too? 

M. Laitman: We have to work more between us, to digest, to grind everything you feel as coming from the Creator. 

Student: So, the more we do workshops, the more Creator will give us these forces? 

M. Laitman: Yes, yes. 

Question (W UK): (48:32) In our Ten, as well as writing our own prayer daily, we have started reading the Siddur a lot, and we feel that it's really helping us. Is this correct? We really enjoy reading it and love it.

M. Laitman: Yes, yes. It will help you a lot. 

Question (W Italy): (49:11) When suffering becomes a habit, how can we break this cycle and find a way out? 

M. Laitman: Only through unity with the friends. 

Question (W MAK): (49:43) It turns out that we have to look for, in our friends, only desires to bestow and basically approaching, coming closer only to these desires? 

M. Laitman: Generally, yes. It's desirable to see only good actions in them.

Student: When we have connected, let's say, and we all have the desire to bestow in the Ten, so what's the work from that moment on in the feeling of “we” in the bestowal to the Creator? 

M. Laitman: We'll study this in the future. 

Question (W Kavkaz 1): (50:36) Let's say, I have a striving toward the friend, to the Creator, and it's so strong that it basically holds me by the sleeves, and I can nullify it or I can sacrifice it to satisfy the Creator. But the striving is not going anywhere; it's just reviving all the time. So, is this the engine for advancement or am I not using this gift correctly? Because I'm striving to annul the understanding. 

M. Laitman: Work on this more. It's better in this state. It's better to stay for longer. 

Question (W Turkiye 10): (51:31) All of us in the Ten strive to stay in the studies, but sometimes the force pulls us out, bringing us to all kinds of worldly states, like a person in the middle of the sea with a stone tied to his feet. In these states, how can we activate the force that will pull us up to save us from drowning? 

M. Laitman: Turn to the Creator all together and ask Him. This is the best possible state to turn to the Creator and ask Him in this state of salvation. 

Question (Kyiv): (52:24) What force do we as your students can bestow upon you and pass on to you so that the Creator would fill you and push you forward together with us so that you would have strength for a long time to come? What force can we pass on to you? 

M. Laitman: I don't know. It's best if you ask the Creator for the force that will raise you all. 

Student: Do you mean for all of us together with you? 

M. Laitman: Together with me. 

Student: What forces do we have to ask for, so that you would have the strength for the Creator to reveal certain degrees in front of us or that He would push us from behind? 

M. Laitman: Just ask like this.

Question (MAK 39): (53:42) In our work in the Ten, we come closer in our hearts, but how do we understand how the Creator evaluates our work? Each one separately or the Ten as a unit? 

M. Laitman: This way and the other. Each one and all together. 

Student: But how do we orient? 

M. Laitman: That He helps you all the time. 

Student: So, coming closer, is in steps, coming closer and then distancing.

M. Laitman: Yes, yes, of course. 

Question (Novosibirsk): (54:25) Rabash is writing about a person, about two forces around the person, and he brings examples, bodily examples. So, do these forces differentiate for pulling and rejecting force? Are they different forces? 

M. Laitman: Of course they are different forces. In each moment, each action, there are different forces. 

Student: Meaning the principle of their action? 

M. Laitman: Yes. Bodily and spiritually. Even if they are very close, we don't understand how different they are. 

Student: If I have a bodily desire, a corporeal desire, where you don't feel the pulling force, but you understand that it's lower than what is required, but the Creator does not give you this pulling force for the material desire, so what does it tell us? 

M. Laitman: It means that you don't ask Him enough. At the end of the day, you get the ability to ask Him, not turn away, not disconnect from Him, but insist that He explains to you. 

Question (Women MAK 19): (56:15) Can we scrutinize in the Ten the states that we receive in our thoughts and our desires?

M. Laitman: Of course you can. Try and find the boundary after which you shouldn't cross with friends.

Student: And doubts will always be with us on the path?

M. Laitman: Generally, yes. 

Question (Haifa 1): (57:50) To continue with the words of a friend - we need to respect Rav, the fact that he represents the Creator in this world, and to thank him, and to connect to him via questions for the sake of bestowal. You said yesterday that we need to rise to the new step, called mutual connection through our love towards Rav. Everyone can love Rav and thru it plug to the connection with the Creator. 

M. Laitman: Thank you, and I hope everyone will have good health and elevated spirit and lots of understanding of everything we study. Let’s unite in one heart and reveal everything.