Morning Lesson November 25, 2023

Transcription is made from simultaneous translation, which leaves a possibility for differences in the audio

Part 2:

Baal HaSulam. A Speech for the Completion of The Zohar (start with: Now you can understand the verse, “In the multitude of people is the king’s glory,”)

Reading (01:12) “Now you can understand the verse, "In the multitude of people is the king's glory,.."

1. S. (04:43) Question concerning item one: because it's an important person the student can bestow contentment upon him based on the sublimity of the Rav. Is this not a little egoistic from the perspective of the disciple?

R. It doesn't matter, we're speaking about the path, where we start from.

S. So that’s also a correct way?

R. Yes, yes.

Reading (05:17) “For this reason, the student can use his Rav’s attainment of the Creator’s greatness,..”

2. S. (07:34) How do you keep in a state where you seemingly perform an act of bestowal and it suddenly becomes reception since it’s a natural fuel and you can feel it. How are you careful not to eat it for yourself afterwards?

R. Because you receive it on a screen, in reflected light.

S. A different example: now you prepare a meal for the friends. The friends came, they enjoyed very much, you enjoy it, you see what you did for them and you enjoy it. How do you not fall, how are you not thrown out because of it but you continue with the intention that you want them to enjoy, that they will be happy?

R. That my pleasure is directed to them, that I want them to enjoy.

S. But I like the taste, I'm enjoying it.

R. Are you speaking about them?

S. I'm speaking about the person for whom bestowal became reception?

R. I don't understand you, tell me what you’re talking about, the one who prepared the meal or the one who’s eating the meal?

S. I'm talking about the one who is preparing the meal. When he prepares the meal he enjoys it so how does he not enjoy it in his vessels of reception and continues to bestow upon them and doesn’t fall from it?

R. He gives his gratitude to the Creator. That the Creator gave him an opportunity, an ability, forces and the mind to prepare a meal and his friends came to the meal because the Creator brought them. The Creator made it that they enjoyed the meal and it's all because he participated and prepared it in a corporeal way and the Creator made it all in a spiritual way.

S. So now after this point usually a person gets heaviness in life after he makes this action and he’s grateful, he gets this burning: now this feedback that the ten has to give them back?

R. What? He's not waiting for anything back.

S. I still don't understand how a person is kept, how does he guard himself from being thrown into his vessels of reception again?

R. He's in society, the next day he already has work in prayer and studies, the lesson and everything. That's how he keeps himself, only from the connection and daily work in the environment.

S. But there's a kind of feedback, a system of connection that should be with the ten, with the friends. It’s as if there's a kind of one directional act from the friend to ten. The ten receives the bestowal from the friend but the friend has to draw their influence on him.

R. He's not demanding it, he doesn't want it. His action is to bestow to them and from them to the Creator. He’s not demanding anything in return and also what can they return? Nothing. He did it not for them but for the Creator.

3. S. (11:40) It says here that through contentment to his Rav he gets the thoughts and knowledge of the Creator mouth to mouth and afterwards attains devotion until he is rewarded with adhesion with the Creator. Until today I thought that it was until the Creator testifies about him and then he gets the knowledge from the Rav.

R. That doesn't matter, this way, that way. We, on these degrees, still can’t scrutinize this.

S. Can we know which comes first?

R. No, when it comes you’ll know.

4. S. (12:27) Can we use dissemination in order to adhere to the Rav more?

R. Well, actually, yes.

S. How?

R. Every action of dissemination to the general public invites the light that reforms and that connects us together.

5. S. (12:55) What does it mean a temporary equivalence of form with the Creator doesn’t help and a temporary equivalence of form with the teacher does help?

R. Because the Creator is in a permanent state and the Rav as man is in a changing state. That’s why towards him it’s beneficial and towards the Creator it isn't.

S. So towards the Creator only when it's absolute, when it's final?

R. Yes.

6. S. (13:30) From the virtual work how can a disciple connect to the internality of the Rav? What is the incorporation with the Rav and how do we realize it, how does it happen?

R. That they are directed to the same goal, that's it.

7. S. (14:09) It says here serving the Rav, how can a virtual disciple serve the Rav?

R. With the same intention, with the same deeds as whoever is sitting here. There's no one who’s actually serving me. You’re serving me now by reading. You’re serving an organization, you’re serving the people that are there. You are my worker.

8. S. (15:03) Equivalence of form with the Rav, being adhered to the Rav, how important is it to take the article a day before, an evening before and go over with the friends, scrutinize, bring questions and come with a deficiency for the lesson? How important is it?

R. It’s very important to come to the lesson with a certain deficiency and to really try and implement it.

S. And if certain friends in the ten say let's read a different article, we have a certain situation, we want to read a different article.

R. Instead of reading everybody together?

S. To read everyone together but a different article that’s not related to the lesson.

R. It doesn't matter, if they decide so it’s possible. If everybody decides that now we’re reading a new article, a different one, so that's okay.

9. S. (16:21) The first time I heard the Rav I felt a truth, I didn't know where it was coming from. Why am I not feeling this truth in the ten, why don’t I feel it?

R. I guess that’s your problem, I don't know.

S. The first time I heard you I didn't even make an effort and here I come to the ten and I don't feel the same.

R. You don't have the same deficiency.

S. But again that deficiency didn't come from me the first time I heard you.

R. I'm telling you what I need to tell you, that’s it. I have nothing to add.

S. So I need to search for a deficiency in the ten?

R. Yes, search.

Reading (17:21) “This is not so concerning learning Torah with his Rav, as this must be for his own benefit and does not yield Dvekut.”

10. S. (21:56) You always tell us that it’s impossible to attain the greatest of the Creator more than the greatness of the ten. Can the same be said regarding the greatness of the Rav?

R. Yes, yes.

S. What is the difference between building the greatness of the ten and building the greatness of the Rav?

R. I think it's the same thing because they are connected to one another.

11. S. (22:42) In the beginning of the excerpt we read about mouth to mouth or mouth to ear, it was very complicated. Can we maybe read it and you’ll explain it to us?

R. I can read it but the reader will read it better.

Reading (23:09) “Learning Torah with his Rav must be for his own sake and does not yield adhesion…”

12. S. (23:58) What does it mean, I don't understand it?

R. If you serve the Rav it’s more important than studying with the Rav because if you study you just fill up your brain and by serving him you fill your vessels, your spiritual vessels. So what’s not clear?

S. There is from mouth to mouth and there is from mouth to ear. What does that mean?

R. That's a big difference, that's already a spiritual perception. Mouth to ear is corporeal perception, regular you could say even though it's also not regular because you’re studying, you’re studying wisdom but mouth to mouth is already spirituality, it’s according to a common screen.

13. S. (25:10) How do you test if you are a student, a disciple as he writes here? How do you put yourself in that position?

R. How to go into that position of being a student? A person who wants to study needs to come to every lesson, to try to absorb it as much as possible. Not everyone is equal in that. Also outside of the lesson to help the friends and the Rav in a way that everyone absorbs the material as much as possible and uses it in the best way possible, that's it.

14. S. (26:45) He writes here that there are two conditions for attaining greatness. One: each student has to feel that he is the smallest among the friends and the second one is that each student must extol the importance of the friends as though they were the greatest in the generation, so he must feel. How can I force myself?

R. First in force, then in practice.

S. What does it mean to feel by force? Maybe I have to pray for it all the time?

R. To pray, also to depict it to yourself. In any possibility to feel that all the friends in the ten are greater than him and only thanks to them he can exist and come closer to spirituality.

S. So we can say that in everything we do we add an intention. It has to be part of the intention?

R. Yes.

15. S. (28:15) What is it exactly to serve the Rav?

R. Scrutinize what’s important in his eyes and try to do it.

S. So what's more important than learning?

R. Could be no, that you don't need anything beyond that.

S. Concerning habits, he was talking about habit becoming a second nature. Is it a little different from what we learned before about being new everyday?

R. Yes, it’s different because habit becoming a second nature, you’ll need an extra effort for it.

S. So is this good or not?

R. It’s not good but what can you do, that’s our nature.

S. So it's best not to get used to it.

R. You can’t. If for a few years you wake up at 3:00 so you’ll keep waking up at 3:00.

S. So to the same extent I can’t see each day as new.

R. Well, the Creator knows this, He knows your nature.

S. So only when we draw the light then we see everything is new?

R. Yes. Okay, let's end here.