Part 3:
Morning Lesson September 29, 2021, Transcription
Baal HaSulam, Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah, #56
1. R. Until now, we learned how the will to receive was created, how it developed and how it builds of itself some sort of system to connect to the upper light so it could be in its will to receive by restricting the desire, and with a screen, to invert the will to receive to work in order to bestow. This way, the will to receive builds Partzufim of Galgata, AB and SAG. Now we are going to learn onward how this will to receive, that was created from Ein Sof (infinity), cascaded and developed. How can it develop further after having ended the power of the screen from the light Ein Sof (infinity) that was in it, and it’s got no more power to develop according to that same formula of the will to receive, be in the restriction, screen and the reflected light. So what happens with it next.
Item 56 (01:32) “We have thoroughly explained Tzimtzum Aleph….” Twice
2. R. (04:02) (Rav drawing) In other words, we had the will to receive and that will to receive worked in such a way it received, and four phases evolved in it through the influence of the light. Four phases evolved in it, 1, 2, 3 and 4. Four phases, four discernments, four levels of coarseness or 0, 1, 2, 3 ,4, 5 degrees, it doesn't matter, however we say it, and that’s the will to receive - desire. Afterwards, we learned that this will to receive made a restriction, in other words, it expelled the light that came to it and then it remained empty, this is called the restriction. Then, it decided to receive according to the level of bestowal upon the Creator, the host. Now, it needs to be receiving under a different condition, to the extent that it can bestow, and as a result of it receives. Then, the light that fills it is called Neshama (soul). This is the light that comes from the Creator, and this is the light that it repelled, don’t want to receive it, so this is 1, first light, 2 is expelling it, and 3 it calculates how much to receive in order to bestow so all the reception will be as bestowal. It does it only for the Creator, just like the host who presses the guest and the guest doesn't want but eventually agrees and receives. What it receives is connected to the host. This is what connects it to the host and this is called the soul, Neshama. Are there questions about this, please.
3. S. (7:29) What does it mean that reflected light becomes the vessel of reception?
R. My intention to give to the host, and in order to give to the host, I have to receive from Him. So that intention to give to the host is called reflected light.
4. S. (08:12) What does the vessel enjoy before the restriction, and what does it enjoy after the restriction?
R. Before the restriction, the vessel enjoys satisfying its own desire. After the restriction, it enjoys satisfying the desire of the host, the Creator.
S. The light that enters the vessel is entirely different?
R. Of course. In other words, if previously you enjoyed having a piece of meat that the Creator gave you, the host gave you, so you enjoy the meat. After, you performed the restriction and you received only for the sake of the host. Then, you enjoyed to the extent that you are pleasing the host. It's not about the piece of meat that you received. The point is to what extent you delight the host, meaning you already feel the host, the host is in you with His desire, with His relation to you, and you feel that you are relating to Him in the same way, and you become connected together within your desire. In other words, your desire is filled with the host Himself, the Creator feels the created being.
5. S. (09:57) What is in the desire that decides to make the restriction?
R. The upper light that it receives from the host. Except it doesn't feel in this light the mere pleasure within its desire, which are the degrees of still, vegetative and animal. It feels in this light from where the light comes, that it’s coming from the upper one, from the love of the upper one to him. In other words, it has to activate its own love for the upper one and then, it will feel how much the upper one loves him. In other words, what we develop in us is basically the feeling of love of others and then, how can we come to it? By being in a group and trying to be connected among ourselves and then, we develop in us senses, where through these senses, we come to similarity with the Creator or sympathy with the Creator. We don't begin to see the upper light that fills us as some sort of satisfaction but rather, we feel in it the higher degree, love of the Creator to us which is received in our love for the Creator. This is what we see happening after the restriction, and the screen, and reflected light, when we want to be connected to the Creator in this way.
S. This exists in every part of reality, this part to connect to the Creator?
R. Yes, of course. But not in everyone does it work. The fact that a person wants to connect to the Creator is regarded as having a point in the heart and then, his whole disposition is to connect to the Creator and not to perform other activities in this world, customs and all kinds of things. But it is specifically the Creator that he wants to attain, attain how? Develop in himself such vessels that will make him do such things that will make him be similar to the Creator. Then he will feel, within him, this ‘’come and see,’’ the Creator. This is our work.
6. S. (13:15) How will we be able to raise the importance of the giver more than what He is giving?
R. That’s a good question. This is what the screen does in the Peh of the Rosh of the Partzuf, when pleasure comes to it, it stops the pleasure, it doesn't receive it. Then, it throws it back, it says, I don't want to receive into my will to receive. First, I will calculate how much I can give in order to give to You, above the restriction, that is still above the rejection. Then, it calculates and whatever it decides, this it receives in order to bestow.
7. S. (14:24) How can he do more above the restriction? What does he have to do more above the restriction that’s an additional calculation to the host?
R. (Rav drawing) When the light comes, it stops it. It doesn't want to receive anything before it weighs why it’s doing and what for. It checks, it wants to fill the host. To the extent that the host relates to it, he wants to relate to the host in the same way. Meaning, I perform the restriction, I'm not receiving for myself, now, however, I receive. This whole reception should be only in order to give back to the host and that’s the calculation it makes. That calculation happens in the Rosh (head). This is what we depict afterwards, that it has Rosh (head), Toch (interior), and Sof (end), and here you have the Masach (screen), the light enters, the screen repels it and then calculates. It calculates how much it can receive in order to bestow. This part it receives, and this why this part is called, ‘’Toch’’ (interior) of the vessel. You have the Rosh (head) here, and you have the Toch (interior), and the Sof (end). Here, it doesn't receive anything at the Sof (end). That’s how the vessel is built.
S. If the reflected light, it makes, is precisely in the extent of the repulsion of the coarseness that it yearns to receive or the reflected light has some other addition?
R. No. If there is more to receive, it won't receive because the calculation won’t be for the sake of the host. It has to receive as much as it can.
S.
That’s
clear.
The
question
is,
if
he
can
bestow
more
than
what
he
wants
to
receive?
Is
such
a
thing
possible?
R.
I'm
telling
you,
no.
Because
it’s
egoistic
if
he
doesn't
want
to
receive
in
order
to
bestow
more
then.
Let's
say,
I
can
receive
in
order
to
bestow
twenty
kilos
of
pleasure
and
I
receive
only
fifteen.
Why
aren’t
you
receiving
more?
Are
you
trying
to
show
that
you
are
more
than
the
host,
that
you
want
to
establish,
to
assert
your
own
calculation
and
not
the
calculation
of
the
host?
You
have
to
annul
yourself
as
much
as
you
can
and
receive
from
the
host
as
much
as
you
can
in
order
to
bestow.
Otherwise,
it
will
not
be
equivalence
of
form.
S. There cannot be a state where I am yearning twenty-five, despite that I want twenty? Yearning to bestow to Him twenty-five, despite that I only want to receive twenty?
R. How can you yearn for more than you can?
S. Meaning to bestow to Him more than what I’m able.
R. This can’t be. You have nothing to work with, with this yearning.
S. So, what it means it can’t be possible?
R. I want the end of correction, just like that. It’s a question that’s in the air, I can't fulfil, I can’t realize it.
8. S. (19:01) According to the drawing, everything that I receive is within the friends. The friends are the Neshama (soul) and all the rest is my ego?
R. Your ego, too, when you correct it, it will be also...of the soul. The whole of the will to receive, that the Creator created, if we can correct it to work in order to bestow, the part that we correct with the aim to bestow, this is called the Neshama (soul). In this way, we increase, we augment the soul more and more, and more.
9. S. (19:45) It seems to me that I heard from you, at the time of learning Preface we should invest all of our learning in the internal work. How do we do this, what’s this direction, that it just won't be some mechanical, geometric stuff? How do we connect ourselves to the internal process?
R. You're right. This can, indeed, be. That’s why we have to implement it in the ten. As much as we can, we should speak about it practically, where are the states where we want to connect in one desire, present it to the Creator, ask for corrections on it, ask for the understanding, how we position this desire so we can work with it in order to bestow. This is what we need to ask from the Creator. If we turn to Him and ask together, all of us, it is certain that He will give us the corrections and we will see how it works.
10. S. (21:22) What types of pleasure are we talking about here?
R. We still can’t understand them, but it is a pleasure that we can enjoy the Creator or delight the Creator. But we still don't have such pleasures with which we can understand what it’s about.
11. S. (22:01) What role does gratitude have in the calculations that take place in the Peh de Rosh?
R. We will learn it. You are right, it is a process and we will learn it maybe tomorrow or the day after tomorrow. Today we are still not talking about operations, but in the Rosh (head) you have everything. Everything that happens afterwards in the Guf (body) comes after the decision in the Rosh (head).
12. S. (22:46) Why is the sensation of love of the Creator towards the created being so much stronger than all the pleasures in this world?
R. Because it is the highest and greatest in quantity and quality. Because it comes as upper light from the Creator, and everything we have in this world is a tiny spark that sustains this entire world. When we come to receive the upper light in order to bestow, by which we become similar to the Creator, and there is no end to our vessel, to our fillings that we discover.
13. S. (23:48) According to the drawing, the first vessel you drew is that Behina Shoresh (root phase) or Behina Aleph (first phase), the light that enters the vessel from above?
R. (Rav shows drawing) Here is the vessel with all four phases, all the desires, and the light comes to the vessel and wants to enter it so the vessel can begin to receive it. Those are the two things that we have, here is the Creator, and here is the created being. The Creator begins to fill up the created being and the created, being under the influence of the feeling that it receives from the Creator, begins to change accordingly, to grow. Here we see the restriction. After the vessel is filled, it feels that it is receiving and is opposite to the Creator, so it expels, it pushes back all the light that it received. Here we already have the calculation. After it restricted itself here, in state 2, state 3 is that the light comes again, the vessel repels it but it doesn't just repel it by restricting. It repels from receiving it in order to receive and checks how much it can receive of it in order to bestow. To the extent it can, meaning that it brings itself into balance with the host, so that part that receives in order to bestow upon the host, that part is called Neshama (soul). This we will learn and all the Partzufim that we will have. What needs to happen is that the upper light, that wants to permeate the vessel, eventually will enter the vessel and will be accepted in the vessel but to the extent that the vessel becomes similar to the source of the light, the Creator. It turns out that we have a created being that has become truly as the Creator and this is called the final or the end of correction of the created being.
14. S. (26:29) As much as we feel the love of the Creator to us and the extent we love him, we know that the first degree to reach, this is to develop the love of my friends. What can we do in the 10 to raise the love that we feel to our friends?
R. To the extent that our connection in the society is strong, we will be able to arrange our common desire to receive more and to bestow on the Creator and then we will be able to receive the revelation of the Creator in us, more light will enter our common desire to receive.
S. How is the step to the Creator taken, are we supposed to love the friends?
R. Of course that is the correction of the desire and to that extent from the level of the created things to the love of the Creator we can relate to the Creator likewise. But you can't incorporate all of it in one sentence.
15. S. (28:18) There is a sentence that we read that we scrutinize the refinement of the screen in the body of each Partzuf from the beating of the inner light and the surrounding light. Why is there a beating and it's not just the pressure of all of the lights?
R. The truth is, let's say the host presses you to receive from him something more of what he gave you, that he gave you what he gave you but you want to receive more of the portion, so it turns out that you have flavors from what you receive and what you did not receive you can still assume what it's like according to the flavors that you did receive. You have a relation between what you received and what you have not. You have the Reshimot, records from both and this is why it is like the beating of the inner light with the surrounding light and both pressure the screen that separates them.
S. Ultimately the surrounding light, an inner-light both press on the screen?
R. Yes.
S. It turns out both the lights are the Creator and there's something between them a scrutiny?
R. Depict it however you want but of course the light does everything.
16. S. (30:22) Regarding restriction, the example with the meat is understood, but what nourishes the ten before the restriction?
R. The 10 should be impressed by the connection in them, in relation to the Creator and this should fill and satisfy them. If we can direct ourselves in the connection between us and in the connection with the Creator, this should fill us with the light of Mercy, of Bina. For now, we don't want to receive anything but only to have the feeling, this relation to the Creator. Afterwards more will come.
17. S. (31:21) The first restriction was made because of what?
R. The first restriction is done as a result of the shame when that desire to receive in Malchut feels how opposite it is from the Creator’s desire to bestow.
S. It is not records, right, that it wasn't present before so where does the restriction and shame come from?
R. Now you're asking after we already finished the four phases of direct light and I tell you again what's happening, phase four receives from the upper light itself is a development of all the previous phases. It has a desire to receive and it feels that it is receiving for itself and this is why it feels shame that the feeling of shame distinguishes and separates it from the Emanator completely. Therefore, it has to restrict itself otherwise it can't exist in disconnection from the Emanator this is why it performs the restriction.
18. S. (33:00) How to turn a small spark into a large light in the work between us?
R. By receiving this light, the small light in order to bestow more and more, your vessel magnifies this light from a spark to the light of Ein Sof. There are no measures in the vessel, it all depends on the light so if you increase your importance to the light then the light comes from a tiny spark to the light of infinity that has no measure or boundary or number.
S. The vessel to grasp the light of infinity?
R. This is perceived in the vessel Ein Sof this is the end of correction.
19. S. (34:10) The end of this part we learned about the order of the clothing of Partzufim, what is the clothing?
R. It is when each one emerges from the other to continue the same work as the upper one and this is called emerging from the lower one as AB from Galgata to continue its path.
20. S. (34:52) The addition of AB to Galgata as the strongest screen?
R. Yes.
S. Why do you need AB, it is weaker, what can it add?
R. No but that is a good question as it always awakens but what AB does Galgata cannot do because the same light that was Galgata was abstract light. This is why it's called the light Nefesh in AB, there is already light of Nefesh Ruach until it comes to the final vessel where we receive all the light NRNHY, Galgata receives all of these lights. Think and we will talk about it a lot more. You all received the feedback questionnaire for the Congress so you need to answer it according to the management's request simply want to be more organized and so please try to connect to the management of the Congress and our management in general to all of the work to participate with them and their participation is material and ours is with what they're asking is a spiritual participation.