Part 3: Baal HaSulam. Shamati 18. My Soul Shall Weep in Secret – 1

Reader: Let me just say that the recorded lesson that we see the next day appears in the mail for the study material in the link also the study material itself that's in this the recorded lesson for example in our Ten we read the day before the text of the recorded lesson and that helps to prepare ourselves as well like Rav mentioned.

We are in the articles of Shamati, Article 18: What is My Soul Shall Weep in Secret – 1. 

Reading: (00:21) Baal HaSulam. Shamati 18. My Soul Shall Weep in Secret – 1

I heard in 1940, Jerusalem.

When concealment overpowers a person and he comes to a state where the work becomes tasteless, and he cannot picture or feel any love and fear, and he cannot do anything in Kedusha [holiness], his only counsel is to cry to the Creator to have mercy on him and remove the screen from his eyes and heart.

Crying is a very important matter. It is as our sages write: “All the gates were locked except for the gates of tears.” The world asks about this: If the gates of tears are not locked, what is the need for the gates at all? He said that it is like a person who asks his friend for some necessary object. This object touches his heart, and he asks and begs him in every manner of prayer and plea. Yet, his friend pays no attention to all this. And when he sees that there is no longer reason for prayers and pleas then he raises his voice in weeping.

It is said about this: “All the gates were locked except for the gates of tears.” That is, when were the gates of tears not locked? Precisely when all the gates were locked. It is then that there is room for the gates of tears, and then we see that they were not locked.

However, when the gates of prayer are open, the gates of tears and weeping are irrelevant. This is the meaning of the gates of tears being locked. Thus, when are the gates of tears not locked? Precisely when all the gates are locked, the gates of tears are open since one still has the choice of prayer and plea.

This is the meaning of “My soul shall weep in secret,” meaning when one comes to a state of concealment, then “My soul shall weep,” because one has no other option. This is the meaning of “All that your hand and strength can do, do.”

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (04:07) What are the gates? Spiritually, what does it mean that there are gates?

M. Laitman: The gates, externally it seems closed, but if a person, according to his degree, according to the matter that he wants to learn, to solve what he has before him, if he has the forces to do it, a tendency towards it. So, he is able and willing to invest his, maybe final forces, in order to organize before him that last stage of the realization of salvation. That's all. 

Student: If I understand correctly, a person wants to break free from spirituality, he sees that there is a wall, he feels a wall. And he feels that there are gates that are closed in front of him.

M. Laitman: Yes?

Student: And then he bursts into tears, and then what does he feel? It's written here: That there is a place for the gates of tears, and then he sees that they are not locked. When a person breaks through the gates of tears, does he feel that all the gates are opening? Or just the gates of tears and that's it? Does he feel something, what does he feel? Everything he's been through so far, all the walls, all the gates that were closed in front of him, do they open? 

M. Laitman: Not all of them, but they’re partially open, a few of them..

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (06:53) It's written, to weep to the Creator, for Him to have mercy on him, and to pass over him the screen over his eyes and his heart. 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: What is this screen? 

M. Laitman: It's the screen that conceals. It conceals his connection with the Creator. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (07:30) What is crying? We learned that the strongest thing there is, and all the connection with the Creator is prayer. Is crying something even more powerful, even higher?

M. Laitman: It's not even more powerful, it’s an outburst that comes out of a person. That he just bursts out and cries and asks from every plea he has. 

Student: Can we say that crying is a high degree of prayer, it’s peak? 

M. Laitman: Let's say so, let's say so. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (08:18) It appears that this state is a critical state, a final state, a request that is total, until the end. So, what is the rest of the gates? How do you say there are more gates and the rest of the tears? There are probably only the gate of the tears.

M. Laitman: The problem is that before that, there may be other gates.

Student: Gates to where?

M. Laitman: To the Creator, to turning to Him.

Student: To the Creator enters the broken-hearted people. Before that it appeals to what? To you yourself, it’s not really the Creator. How can it be to the Creator?

M. Laitman: That’s what’s written, that is what is written: That when a person reaches a true desire, so before him, there is a feeling that everything is open. 

Student: Before that, it is just to discover that all the gates are closed. That it’s not really real, yes? 

M. Laitman: Before that, he has all kinds of things on the path but it's all in order to reach the gate of the tears. And to feel the height of that gate, its intensity and which inner point he can solve it.

Question (Rehovot 1): (10:34) Why is crying a great and important thing on our way of development? 

M. Laitman: A person reached crying after he used all his wisdoms, understandings and didn't attain what he wanted. Then, he reaches a state that he doesn't know what else to do. And that question, what else can I do in order to burst out, in order to enter the state where only the Creator is in control? 

Question (W PT 6): (11:39) The gate of tears is a state of the Ten? What is that state in the Ten? 

M. Laitman: It doesn't really belong to the Ten that much, it's a way a person scrutinizes, the way a person feels where he is. In that already, he scrutinizes the state to himself. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (12:24) He says in the beginning that the concealment overcame a person and he cannot feel fear in any way and he has no other advice but to cry to the Creator. How from a state of inability to do anything where it's in concealment, how from here to crying? It seems like there's an abyss in between. It seems like a person is some fogginess and crying is something that is a great necessity, it's very emotional.

M. Laitman: Correct. We still need to be in these states that are borderline, there. Then it will be more clear what we need to prepare. 

Student: He also says there's no other advice but to cry. It sounds like planning it isn't crying something that you just burst out, is it a result of a feeling. Or is there like an advice that you have to go and cry? What is it like? 

M. Laitman: Part of the state comes from crying and part of the state comes to the broken heart, from a broken heart.

Student: He says that this happens when there's no room to give a prayer and request, then a person raises his voice in weeping. So, is that the condition that the weeping takes place? Where he sees that there's no reason for prayers and pleas? Is that the preceding stage for crying? 

M. Laitman: Yes. It's something we have to see from practical forms that we have.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (14:52) Weeping from a person not being able to bestow to the Creator? Or weeping from feeling that he's opposite to him and he's feeling shame? What is he weeping from? 

M. Laitman: Crying from being opposite of the Creator and can't bring himself to a state that the gate of tears opens, and that's how he advances. 

Student: You say that he's crying because he can't bestow to the Creator? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: And is there a difference between crying from not being able to bestow to the Society? To the Ten? Are those two stages or is it the same? 

M. Laitman: No, it's not one and the same, it's simply that he needs to reach states. And from them to choose what is suitable for his current state, that's it. 

Student: And what does Baal Sulam explain that to bestow to a friend or to society is the same as to the Creator? From what I understand from what you said, it sounds like it's a little different. To bestow to the friend and to the Creator, is it the same thing or not? 

M. Laitman: Of course not, of course not. Bestowing to the Creator has to be complete bestowal. And bestowing to a friend is partial, that we only feel that we want to bestow.

Student: Nevertheless, bestowal to a friend is a means. 

M. Laitman: Yes, that's correct. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (17:30) What does a person cry for the gates of tears to open before him? 

M. Laitman: The gates of tears open, or whether they're locked, that works on a person. So, what are you asking? 

Student: What does a person cry upon so that the gates of tears will open before him? The tears are the key, right? His crying, his prayer, his request is what opens the gate? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: But what is he actually crying about? What's inside there, what hurts him? 

M. Laitman: That they aren't opening.

Student: I understand that if I'm opposite to the Creator, there's a room for this. But what about all the cries that I have along the way? 

M. Laitman: That's only in order to open that complete degree, that complete state. 

Student: How does a person continue? What pushes a person so that the gate of tears or that all the gates are locked before him and he continues more and more and doesn't despair from turning around? What pushes him to continue? 

M. Laitman: What pushes him to continue is that he isn't at the gate of tears, yet.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (19:28) The nature of this state where a person reaches the gate of tears is for a very specific reason, as I understand – it's well defined. He comes to this gate when he asks for adhesion to spirituality. But this gate is one that we come to also for other reasons: Health, livelihood, etc. So, how to arrange these things? Meaning, when I'm in our work, for what reason should we come to this gate?

M. Laitman: Only from not having any more forces – he's just drenched. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (20:25) The increasing concealment is because a person now feels more concealment 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: And that's what leads him to cry?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: And that's all a person can do anything on his behalf?

M. Laitman: For now, yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (21:06) To reach the gate of tears is a Godly gift, it's a gift from above that a person reaches it. What's the most important point in order to focus on it as fast as possible to reach that state? To fill the quotient necessary, where to put our forces?

M. Laitman: I think in connection, in attaining the connection. 

Student: Let's say the difficulty in connection, let's say I see that my attitude to the friends is not good. And we continue to work on this and maybe later it becomes better. Meaning, actually, there is the wheel that advances a person?

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (22:27) In what stage in the Torah does the gate of tears appear? In what part of the story?

M. Laitman: According to what he writes: Concealment got deeper upon a person, overpowers a person and he comes to a state where the work becomes tasteless. And he cannot picture or feel any love and fear and he cannot do anything in holiness. His only counsel – he has no counsel – it's only to cry to the Creator to have mercy on him and remove the screen from his eyes and heart. 

Student: Is that I understand from our work in the Ten, our spiritual work? I understand that I'm trying to connect it to the biblical story where the people of Israel went to the gate of tears or somewhere else maybe. Where does it appear in the story? 

M. Laitman: I don't think we can learn that from the Torah.

Reader: So, thank you to Rav. We're going to continue to a summary of our lesson now let's summarize what we received from Rav also in the live lesson also in the recorded lesson a workshop in our and we will continue. Summary.

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