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

Daily Lesson (Morning) December 8, 2024.

Part 1: Baal HaSulam. Introduction to the Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah. Item #10.

Reader: Hello, we shall be reading from the writings of Baal HaSulam, “The Introduction to the Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah”, item 10. You can find all of our texts on kabbalahmedia.info as well as through the Arvut platform, where you can send us questions live. Anyone asking a question here in the study hall is requested to stand up, hold the microphone close to his mouth, and speak loudly and clearly.

Introduction to the Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah

Item 10

Reading: (00:44) 10) Now that you have come to know all this, you are permitted to learn this wisdom without any fear of materialization. This is because the students are very confused: On one hand, it is said that the ten Sefirot and the Partzufim, from the beginning of the ten Sefirot of Atzilut to the end of the ten Sefirot of Assiya, are complete Godliness and unity (The Tree of Life, Gate 44, Gate “Names,” Chapter 1).

On the other hand, it is said that all these worlds are generated and appear after the Tzimtzum [restriction], but how can this even be conceived in Godliness? And there are also the numbers and above and below and other such changes and ascents and descents and Zivugim [couplings]. But it is written, “I the Lord do not change”.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (02:24) What is this prohibition against materializing things? What does it mean to materialize these things?

M. Laitman: It is certain that it is not as we can depict to ourselves with all of our most disconnected from the matter of this world imaginations. So by this, it is clear that we move away from the Creator, from spirituality. If we want to depict to ourselves the reality, which on the one hand we read that it is sublime, superior, higher; on the other hand, we want to reveal it as it is in this world, in matter.

Student: When we seek this reality in the relations between us, is that not called bringing the soul, or is it?

M. Laitman: In the relationships between us, we don't look for spirituality. No. In the relationships between us, we want to establish such relationships, discernments, phases of bestowal, and not that we draw from some place, let's say from the upper world, forces to us. That's impossible.

Student: What does it mean that we want through the study for the relationships between us to construct a place for the Creator, is that not called a soul? Materialization, rather.

M. Laitman: Through this study, we want to try to depict to ourselves what might be the approach, the connection between us and the spiritual world.

Student: So, we do aspire through the study, to find the spiritual place?

M. Laitman: Well, we can put it this way. It's not quite so, but yes.

Student: I'll ask differently. We have a desire, that's clear. And there are many operations taking place on that desire.

M. Laitman: Correct.

Student: Through the environment we create, we want the operations that happen upon this desire to bring us to a place of spirituality, a desire for spirituality, and that's not called materialization.

M. Laitman: Materialization means that you want something that you don't feel, and don't understand, and cannot grasp and work with forces. So you want, with your own force, your own strength, to insert these forces and operations to the material that you control, to the will to receive.

Student: We shouldn't do that?

M. Laitman: We shouldn't.

Student: What should we do with that desire which is revealed to us?

M. Laitman: So, which desire is revealed to us?

Student: All sorts of desires in the connections between us.

M. Laitman: So, for the time being, we learn what to do with them, with these desires, but not that we can do whatever we want.

Student: It's clear that we're not imagining things, thinking that we're in spirituality already, so as not to materialize it.

M. Laitman: Right.

Student: What to do with those desires, the relationships we have that are revealed to us in the Ten?

M. Laitman: That it's not spiritual, it's still corporeal.

Student: Yes, but we're now studying, we're learning from a place which is spirituality, the place he writes about.

M. Laitman: That he writes? Okay.

Student: He comes from a spiritual place to us who are not in a spiritual place.

M. Laitman: Right.

Student: How to relate to what he writes and also be careful about not to materialize things.

M. Laitman: This is really a very difficult question. To be careful from materialization, I can do this on condition that I have no contact with spiritual actions, operations, that I cannot twist them however I want according to my will to receive. That all in all, that I want to attain them, to feel them, to reveal them, but it's clear to me that it's still not in my nature. That's it.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (08:40) If I heard you correctly, you said that we relate to each other with bestowal, or at least we try to, but we shouldn't get confused thinking this is all spiritual, spiritual relationships. So, we simulate it, so to speak?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: What is, if it can’t turn spiritual, what is the ambition?

M. Laitman: We learn that if we try to depict spirituality among us, then we will advance and come closer to revealing it between us.

Student: What does it mean? At some point these relations do turn spiritual?

M. Laitman: Could be.

Student: We say there's a method. A method, well, it sounds like it's not something that may happen, but it should.

M. Laitman: If we can depict spiritual relationships between us, then we will gradually come closer, approach and reveal them.

Student: Clearly these relationships turn spiritual under the influence of the upper light. The upper light comes as we sit and study, or also by conducting the simulation?

M. Laitman: Both.

Student: Where in the simulation does the upper light come?

M. Laitman: When each one relates to his friend, as Baal HaSulam writes here, that everyone feels that they are connected to each other, and dependent on each other, and can help one another reach the world of bestowal.

Student: So the very thought of the relations between us being meant to raise us towards the Creator, is that what ultimately makes the difference?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (11:00) You see that he divides this into two states: one is study, and the other is understanding. So, in the Ten between us, what does it mean to learn, to study, and what does it mean to understand?

M. Laitman: Learning is what we learn from the books of Kabbalah, what we should do, and then to which new states we can reach, we can come to, and what is revealed to us. We will be able to understand, feel, as something that is happening in our corrected vessels.

Student: You told the friend that we need to picture for ourselves. What do we need to picture to ourselves in our work?

M. Laitman: We should depict to ourselves that we are bestowing upon each other, and all of us together upon the Creator.

Student: And from that, we're meant to acquire vessels?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: From our work in the Ten, vessels by which to reach equivalence of form with the Creator, as He bestows upon us, we acquire vessels, and these vessels, when we acquire them, what do we do with them?

M. Laitman: With these vessels, we discover the Creator and feel in them the operations of the Creator.

Student: By asking Him to feel…

M. Laitman: We ask in our desires, in the connections between us, to feel the Creator's relation toward us.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (13:35) Is it possible to elevate, to raise a desire for holiness, for divinity? Many desires awaken in us, how do we raise the desire for holiness?

M. Laitman: A desire for holiness is a desire for bestowal, for love of others, for what is outside of our will to receive. That we must, gradually, take out from ourselves, and through it connect to others, to the friends.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (14:34) A person who begins to study the wisdom of Kabbalah feels all sorts of changes. What's happening to him on the spiritual level?

M. Laitman: I don't know. What happens to him, he knows. If nothing happens to him, he doesn't know.

Student: These changes, transformations a person undergoes, those aren't the spiritual work, the changes you feel to begin with, the way your relation to reality changes, and so on.

M. Laitman: No, it's still related to his ascent.

Student: When does spiritual work truly begin? When does it start?

M. Laitman: When a person can connect to his group and make that connection eternal.

Student: Without working in the Ten, a person has no chance of ever…

M. Laitman: Of course not.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (16:01) Understanding means to reveal. Is that correct?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: We are now learning, studying in this class, so there's no revelation here? This is a different kind of work?

M. Laitman: If there is or isn't revelation, it's something for each person to say.

Student: So, within the study, as part of the study, there's also revelation, understanding?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: So, it's okay, while we study, to also ask for revelation, to understand what we're learning?

M. Laitman: That too.

Student: And how do we reveal this? How do we come to understand?

M. Laitman: We reveal it only in vessels of bestowal. We need to connect between us, only in desires to bestow.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (17:06) What does it mean to depict spirituality between the friends in order to advance together?

M. Laitman: When each one can connect with all his might, with all his strength to his friends and feel that they are connected and incorporated in Him, and then the mutual relation between them will be called spirituality.

Question (PT 31): (17:58) Which actions we perform together advance us quicker towards spirituality?

M. Laitman: Bestowal, love, help - acts of bestowal.

Student: Which actions between us draw the strongest light?

M. Laitman: As we learn that our actions, when they are aimed toward the benefit of the friends for the benefit of the world, want to connect to the upper force with the quality of bestowal. That is revealed through our connection.

Question (PT 33): (19:08) How to check if we are acting in order to raise our world to the spiritual degree, rather than trying to draw spiritual forces into our worlds?

M. Laitman: That's through connection between us and by turning to the Creator together, all of us, from within the connection between us, and we ask Him for help.

Student: What should we be careful about so as not to be confused, not to materialize things?

M. Laitman: We should be careful to see that our connection, the connection between us, is aimed toward emitting from within it the force of bestowal.

Question (MAK 16): (20:31) You talked about the eternal connection. What does it mean to create an eternal connection in the Ten?

M. Laitman: We don't know what eternal is, and it's hard for us to imagine it. But the eternal connection in the Ten is that we begin to see our friends, that all of us together are reaching a structure where it does not need to change, that it needs to be constant and as living as now. The inner connection between us will grow all the time, but all the other forms may change.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (21:43) I heard that we need to picture a reality which is disconnected from this world.

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: What was this world created for? What is the purpose of its creation?

M. Laitman: In order for us to reach the upper world from this world.

Student: What should my attitude towards this world be, such that it advances me towards the upper world?

M. Laitman: That I use what I was given, meaning this world, in order to rise from it to higher states. And there, I discover already in a different way: my friends, the big group that I'm in, and certainly the Creator fills them, holds them, develops them.

Student: In order to use this world in different situations, which advance a person spiritually, when a person comes upon some situation in this world, when can you say that he's used this situation in order to advance spiritually?

M. Laitman: When he sees that precisely by being in this special relation with those who are in this world, he demands of the Creator additional forces, additional strength in order to rise to a higher level of bestowal?

Student: Meaning that it's always through how one relates to others?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Reader: Item 11.

Reading: (24:11) 11) From what is clarified before us, it is clear that all these ascents, descents, restrictions, and the numbers are only regarded as Kelim [vessels] of the receivers, namely the souls. However, we should distinguish in them a potential and an actual fact in them, like a person who builds a house—the end of the act is in his preliminary thought.

But the quality of the house in his mind does not resemble the house that should actually be built, since the conceived house is spirituality, a conceptual substance, and is considered the substance of the thinking person. At that time, the house is only a potential. But when the building of the house begins in practice, it acquires an entirely different substance—that of wood and bricks.

Similarly, we should discern potential and actual in the souls. The beginning of their emergence from the Emanator into “actual” souls begins only in the world of Beria. And their Hitkalelut [inclusion] in Ein Sof, prior to the Tzimtzum, in relation to the thought of creation, as written in Item 2, concerns only the “potential,” without any practical manifestation.

In that sense, it is said that all the souls were included in Malchut de Ein Sof, called “the middle point,” since this point is included in potential in all the Kelim of the souls that are destined to emerge in practice from the world of Beria downward. And the first restriction occurred only in this middle point, meaning precisely in that discernment and measure considered the “potential” of the future souls, and not at all in itself.

Know that all the Kelim of the Sefirot and the worlds, through the world of Beria, which hang down and emerge from this point, or due to its Zivug de Hakaa, called Ohr Hozer, are also considered mere potential, without any essence of the souls. But these changes are destined to act on the souls later, when their essence begins to emerge from the world of Beria down, since there they have not yet departed from the essence of the Emanator.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (28:58) I wanted to ask about the transition from potential to force, in force. When we study and we want to connect, is this called in force?

M. Laitman: Yes, it's in potential.

Student: And what turns the potential into something that is in force?

M. Laitman: When we add some qualities, join some qualities in each one, to the formula that we already have in potential in order to actualize it.

Student: When prayer emerges from the person, is that something in potential or in force?

M. Laitman: It's still in potential.

Student: When it's in force, what happens? Does it materialize things? What happens in actualities that doesn't exist in potential? What is the addition?

M. Laitman: What happens? Into this formula enters the matter of the created being, the will to receive.

Student: Why is this, why is it not enough to just have it in potential?

M. Laitman: This is what he writes, that it also has to be in practice, in actuality.

Student: What happens in potential? Isn't that an operation, an action that comes from the person?

M. Laitman: It is an action that comes, or an operation that comes from the Creator.

Student: What comes from the side of the person?

M. Laitman: From the side of the person comes the search.

Student: Searching for what? Because ultimately, if the potential is called your desire to connect, that's how you express your prayer, that's in potential.

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: The Creator does that. So where is the person there? Where does the person take these steps towards the will, towards the prayer?

M. Laitman: A person should awaken it.

Student: Then this seal of actuality, the Creator does that for him?

M. Laitman: So to speak, yes.

Student: So if you could, in essence, what does the actuality here add to the awakening that happens in potential?

M. Laitman: That a person wants to perform operations that are in his attainment, in his attainment, that they will persist.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (32:34) He gives an example here about a person who thinks of a house, which is in potential, and then when he has this house, this is already actualized. So here, the worlds are in place for Adam HaRishon to be born there, right? The future created being. So, those worlds are the places where he can move through, and be made there. Is that a good way of understanding potential and force?

M. Laitman: Again.

Student: He writes an example about a person thinking about a house, this being in potential, and when he has the house, this is already the house in force, in actuality. And then he talks about the worlds, BYA, and he calls these worlds potential, in potential. So Adam, the person was not created there yet, right? It's only a place in which he can be born. Isn't that right?

M. Laitman: Let's say so.

Student: And then the soul of Adam HaRishon can be there. It says his feet stand here, and he's divided into the Sefirot, and so on. So that's only as the worlds are formed in potential. And in actuality, when Adam HaRishon is already there, he can be there, right? Is that correct?

M. Laitman: No.

Student: So how?

M. Laitman: We'll see. We'll see.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (34:01) I understood it a bit differently, that he says, that in potential is in Atzilut, and BYA is in practice.

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: He needs the will to receive in order to bring into action his desires, his actions. As he says here, the trees and stones, and so on. And the matter of potential in Atzilut, as he describes the shape of the building, he fantasizes about it, he thinks about how he'll build it and assemble it. It's all in thought yet, right? So what image should we picture before having attained this connection with the friends? Meaning, we need to picture some higher image, something higher than us?

M. Laitman: Why?

Student: Because right now we're not connected, in my perception, let's say, for now.

M. Laitman: So, how can you depict to yourself that you're already connected?

Student: That's exactly the point. How to bring into action, so to speak, the description of the building, how it'll look like, where everything will be placed, the stones, the trees, the wood?

M. Laitman: So what do you recommend to do?

Student: I recommend, I don't recommend anything. I'm just trying to understand what the Kabbalists write. They recommend very clearly that, first of all, you need to reach gratitude, greatness, considering every friend highly, seeing him as great, and then there'll be some power to perform some action in the desires.

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: This first matter of regarding every friend as great, and seeing myself as lowly, and between me and the Creator, is all that called in potential?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: And the second stage is to bring into action this construction, let's say. We need the second stage. We need wills, desires from the friends. Coarseness, needs, wood, and stones.

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (36:41) When the souls acquire these states of wholeness, perfection, as they rise back towards Malchut of Ein Sof, this wholeness is measured with respect to what?

M. Laitman: The wholeness of the soul is measured with respect to the light that operates, that elevates it, turns it, corrects it.

Student: We say that everything already exists in Malchut of Ein Sof, but everything exists only in potential, not in force.

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: The question is, the states of perfection, wholeness, or actually, yes, the states of wholeness on the path of correction, what are they measured against if in actuality it doesn't exist yet? Malchut of Ein Sof doesn't exist in actuality, only in potential.

M. Laitman: Is there any operation in spirituality that is actual even though in corporeality it doesn't exist? Is that the question?

Student: No, that's not exactly what I asked.

M. Laitman: Ask again.

Student: The states of wholeness of the souls, they attain that in practice, right? As they correct themselves.

M. Laitman: What they correct, they attain.

Student: They attain it.

Student: So what is that measured against if in Malchut everything exists only in potential?

M. Laitman: It exists with respect to their initial state when they still were not connected.

Student: Right, and so the question is, what does actuality add to potential? What does it add?

M. Laitman: That it really exists. It happens that the one who determines, works. He does it. He does it, and he sustains it, and he's satisfied by it.

Student: All right, and why do we say that everything exists in Malchut of Ein Sof if everything there is only in potential?

M. Laitman: Because everything exists in the form of records.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (39:31) In potential, in force and the word “attack”, the word “attack”. When we relate to the word “attack”, does it have two meanings? On the one hand, bringing what is in potential to force and also in attack to receive that?

M. Laitman: No. Now you're saying what we're going to do in the action itself. In it's beginning, at its end, what, how. But the act of the attack depicts to us a force that bursts out and operates against what stands against it.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (40:34) He tells us that the essence of the souls begins in the world of Beria. What does he want to say?

M. Laitman: That up to the world of Beria, in the world of Ein Sof, Atzilut, there is no division into worlds and souls. From the world of Beria downward, we do have such a division.

Student: What is special about the world of Beria that allows us to begin to sense the essence of the souls?

M. Laitman: That there is a certain disconnection between the created beings in the world of Beria and the Creator.

Student: Once you begin to feel the separation between us and between us and the upper force, can you already begin to think about that?

M. Laitman: You can.

Student: I'm trying to ask to the point here, because all this is a bit lofty for me. As far as we're concerned, when we can together mutually engage in something, us the friends, and from that rise a bit towards bestowal, to be a bit closer, think about the Creator a bit more. And also when a person is by himself, when he comes out of this place and lives his daily life, is that something close to something we can do in practice?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (42:33) It says here that in potential, well, everything is pre-planned, everything exists already, and the Creator does everything. And it's only in creation, Beria, that the souls are revealed, and from there there's some operation that the souls have to perform. What do they need to do in the world? Because if everything already exists, and the Creator does everything, what is the role of the souls once they're revealed as souls?

M. Laitman: The souls should carry out the will of the Creator. That's it.

Student: They don't have many choices other than to carry out the Creator's will. Because it was all pre-planned.

M. Laitman: Here, we also hear that everything is pre-planned, but so what? Does that mean anything to us?

Student: All the more so.

Question (Women Petah Tikva 33): (43:52) What is the soul, the aspect of the soul? Is the soul the Ten?

M. Laitman: Well, let's say it is.

Student: And it's not possible to attribute a soul to a single person but only to the connection between the friends?

M. Laitman: Yes, because in a single person, there is no room for the soul.

Question (Women Turkey 5): (44:23) Do I have any influence over the actualization of the potential soul?

M. Laitman: Yes, it depends on the person. On how close he is to bestowal and far from reception.

Question (Woman Turkey 8): (44:41) How can a person discover his potential? Is every person different?

M. Laitman: Every person is different.

Student: How does he discover his potential?

M. Laitman: I don't think he discovers it. But rather through his work, through his connection with the group, with the Ten, and with the Creator, through them, he begins to attain himself.

Question (Woman Hebrew 2): (45:28) I heard that we join together the qualities of each and every one with that formula we have in potential to bring it to actualization. What does it mean to add, to join together each other's qualities to the same formula?

M. Laitman: Let's say there's a Ten, and ten people, ten desires to receive come. And they want to connect between them in order to become similar to the Creator. So, they perform actions that connect them together. And then they direct themselves toward the Creator.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (46:53) I'm a bit confused with this example of things being in potential and in force with respect to the building. When there's a building and a person plans it out, then you have the person planning the building. And later the building is built in practice?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: Who is the one who plans in the spiritual world? In potential and then in force? It's not the person. Is it the Creator? Who's the one planning?

M. Laitman: The Creator.

Student: The Creator plans in potential the actions of the will to receive. And then the will to receive in action carries out what the Creator planned. And what are we within this game, this play?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: Who are we in this whole business?

M. Laitman: To the extent that you're incorporated in the desire that performs the will of the Creator, to that extent you exist.

Student: How does a person, I'm talking about a person here, a member of the Ten. How does a member of the Ten even know what's happening in potential? In action, we perform all sorts of actions together trying to connect, everything that we do. But in order to understand the action you need to understand the potential. And potential, you said that's the world of Atzilut, right? So I don't understand the process.

M. Laitman: I didn't talk about Atzilut. I don't know where you…

Student: Someone asked if potential is called the world of Atzilut and enforces the world of Beria, and you said yes. That's what I heard. Maybe it's not right.

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: I'm asking when we talk about bringing things from potential to actuality, there's an action that happens from the top down. And we said that the Creator plans the potential and then makes it actual. So, what do the friends do? I mean the connection between them, what are we within this whole process of potential and actuality?

M. Laitman: We live our lives, and at the same time we carry out the operations of the Creator who thinks about us.

Student: And when is it called that we're performing a spiritual action? Do we need to understand the potential, what the Creator plans, or are we simply being operated?

M. Laitman: No, we don't want to be operated upon. We need, we want to rise to the level of the decision-makers.

Student: Is it correct to say that in the stages before a person reaches spirituality, spiritual attainment, he's actually being operated in this world? He tries to connect, he tries to do what the Kabbalists tell him to do, and then when the friends truly reach spirituality, then they'll discover the potential, they'll discover what the thought was that manipulated this whole thing? Because right now we're performing actions without understanding why. We're told, as He bestows, so you try to bestow, He loves the created beings, you try to do the same, and so on and so forth. But is it right to say that at this stage we don't have any perception of this potential, we don't know what the potential is?

M. Laitman: No. So what?

Student: I'm just trying to understand this item, this text, I'm trying to understand what Baal HaSulam is trying to explain. Because we're talking about, this is the Introduction to the Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah. He needs to give me the instructions, right? So he talks about the Creator who has this potential and in force, okay, fine, if He created everything then I guess He has a plan, He knows what He's doing. Where am I in this plan? Where are we in this plan?

M. Laitman: The person in this plan is a person who wants to understand the thought of creation and relate himself to it. So, what happens with us? Are we in this or not?

Student: What we understand from the thought of creation, at least at this point, is that there's a stage at which we need to connect, we have a congress coming up in two months in which we said we’ll reach on some degree of a higher connection, a higher degree of connection than we have today, and that's where we are.

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: But we don't completely understand the plan, we don't understand what He wants us to attain in the end. But for the time being, we're performing all sorts of actions together. Is that the right way to look at it?

M. Laitman: Yes, we perform actions between us in order to discover what?

Student: The thought of creation, what He wanted, the Creator, we say a lot of words, but they're words for the time being, it's not discovering what bestowal is, to try to come close to that.

M. Laitman: Okay, who else wants to add?

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (53:08) I'd like to continue the friend. We say that when we study the wisdom of Kabbalah and we perform these actions, we try to perform acts of connection in the Ten, then we're drawing the reforming light. Now, if we draw the reforming light, I heard you once say that all light comes from Ein Sof, and it moves everything in the worlds, the lights, it forms operations on the soul. So the question is, how to connect what happens between us in this world, where we maybe don't feel the upper world, the souls, when we perform actions together between us, even corporeal kind of connection. The friends connect, the intention is not yet whole, but we simply want to reach connection, the way we understand. So what happens, are we bestowing in some way?

M. Laitman: I don't know, you should say from what you learned.

Student: Theoretically I can answer, but the essence of the question is how does corporeal connection turn into spiritual connection? What's the connection between these two things?

M. Laitman: For the time being, there is no connection.

Student: But if we invoke the reforming light, is there some influence on this process? Something happens?

M. Laitman: I want to see in me these two forces. One that belongs to Malchut, and one that belongs to Bina, or to Keter. For the time being, I don't detect it.

Student: So, until you attain it, it's impossible to talk about, is what you're saying?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (55:13) He describes the process of things cascading down from potential to action. Do we return back from actuality to potential?

M. Laitman: No.

Student: So with what do we return?

M. Laitman: Return where?

Student: Return to the root, to the potential, to the beginning. There's a cascade here, a process.

M. Laitman: Yes, I understand. You could say that we attain the root, our root, but not that we actually return.

Student: So, what do we attain? The whole process from potential to actuality?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: And our process of attainment begins from actuality to potential?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: So, our attainment was also there in the potential?

M. Laitman: Our attainment is in potential and afterwards, it truly brings us to see it in practice.

Student: What is the addition for the person?

M. Laitman: That a person exerts.

Student: What does he exert?

M. Laitman: He exerts strength, energy, his prayer, whatever he is.

Student: And all this was in potential? Is there any addition in the person here, or is he only carrying out a pre-planned plan?

M. Laitman: No, there is an addition to a person where he activates these forces in creation, and then he discovers how he is incorporated in them, in their network.

Student: And all this too was in the potential, in the plan?

M. Laitman: You can say whatever you want. You can say that even before the world was created, there was He is one and His name one. And then what? We are talking about what we attain.

Student: Right. Now, the Ten here. We return to eternity with the Ten, right? So the Ten, is it at our spiritual root?

M. Laitman: The Ten is in the spiritual root.

Student: And we return, right, but we don't just want to be in the Ten, we want to expand, to feel everything.

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: Maybe if you can put things in order, it's not so clear to me.

M. Laitman: If everything is clear, then what will you do? I actually have to make it as blurry as possible.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (58:20) Why do we invest so much in learning about the world's in potential and much less in the study of the worlds of Yetzira, Assiya, and Beria? The Kabbalists invested so much energy in teaching us about Ein Sof, Adam Kadmon, all these worlds and laws that are so far from us?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: Why is that so, first of all?

M. Laitman: Well, that it is probably more important.

Student: How does it affect us if we study the worlds of Assiya and Yetzira versus if we study the worlds of Ein Sof? Is it more important to study that?

M. Laitman: No. The world of Beria is more important.

Student: How does it influence us if we study the world of Beria?

M. Laitman: Because we learn about the will to receive that was formed, and already demands some, or requires some operations on itself. It's impossible to come down from Ein Sof, from above downward without MAN on our part. This is why we learn.

Student: The effect on us is different if we learn about the world of Beria instead of higher worlds?

M. Laitman: Yes, of course.

Student: My knowledge, at least, what we learn, is usually more focused around the first restriction and the world of Nekudim, less so the world of Atzilut and the world of Beria. What would you recommend?

M. Laitman: I would recommend to continue, first of all, and to invest more in bringing the spiritual worlds closer to the mind and to the heart.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:00:44) A person in this world, exerting himself correctly, ultimately comes to discover the spiritual world?

M. Laitman: If the Creator wills it.

Student: So the corporeal and the spiritual worlds connect, ultimately, within that person.

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: And we need to yearn to feel the spiritual world, right? It's part of our correct exertion, drawing the lights.

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: Now, I heard previously that in the relationships between the friends, or if I imagine the spiritual world in the connection between the friends, then I'm materializing it. It's not quite true. That's not clear to me, because, so what should I work with? All my work is in the relations between the friends. The intention is, maybe it's not right yet, but ultimately, I'm waiting for my intention to be correct.

M. Laitman: You want to discover that the Ten is on the spiritual level, where everyone is connected to each other, and we are bestowing from within us, from the center of our connection, to the Creator. This is what we want to discover in the Ten.

Student: And that's not related to the relations between the friends?

M. Laitman: Of course it's related.

Student: So is it spiritual? It's not materializing? It's not materialization?

M. Laitman: What I just said?

Student: Yes, because previously I heard that the relations between the friends, that's materialization. And now I hear that you can picture them, describe them correctly, and that it is spiritual?

M. Laitman: I don't know what else to add. Help me.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:03:02) I think that it was said previously that if we think that by our own power within the Ten we'll find spirituality, that's materializing things. But if in the work between us, we ask for the force to reach the place, that place from Him, then it's not materializing, and it's the correct way.

M. Laitman: Yes. That is also true. In anything that we utter from our mouth, there's already a flaw.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:03:48) When a person enters a house, uses it, the rooms and so on, right, everything there, he enjoys what he has, but it's not necessarily that he thinks about the intention of the architect who planned out the house, who built the house. Maybe he does, maybe he doesn't. Us, now, the souls in Beria, Yetzira, Assiya, do they attain the Creator's thought, His intention in what they receive?

M. Laitman: To some extent. When the worlds Beria, Yetzira, Assiya rise up, ascend.

Student: And this happens every time a correction takes place?

M. Laitman: It happens on Shabbat, holidays, and also through an awakening from below.

Student: Yes, but I remember us having learned that for a correction to happen, the world rises to Atzilut, and there the correction is made, performed. So this ascent, first of all, this ascent, we say the attainment of the soul of the person in Yetzira, Beria, Assiya, he still rises to Atzilut, he still tastes to some extent the world of Atzilut.

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: And with that, he also receives the Creator's thought.

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:05:43) It would seem that we have no attainment of this description?

M. Laitman: It is clear that we have no perception.

Student: Yes, so now we're trying to understand?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: It's developing in us this desire, the desire and the yearning, which is written about in item 135. Does it invoke the lights that correct us?

M. Laitman: We are constantly invoking the lights. But their influence is still insufficient for us to rise to the spiritual world, to the necessary spiritual degree in order for the spiritual force to be revealed to us.

Student: What's lacking?

M. Laitman: A lack. The lack. An open heart.

Student: And these lights, they come from these worlds he describes here, that source of strength?

M. Laitman: Yes. Yes.

Student: And he says that we have no perception of these changes, but these changes, transformations will ultimately affect us when we reach that lack?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: How to accelerate this pace of the lack?

M. Laitman: Only through a common prayer.

Student: Thank you.

M. Laitman: Let's say that until tomorrow, homework. Through this homework, you become closer to each other and awaken one another, and you want that from the common force, in the end, you will reach the Creator, who will be impressed by you and will be willing to help, to assist. Okay?

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:08:56) You just answered the friend saying that it happens on holidays and the Sabbaths.

M. Laitman: No, no, no, no, it has nothing to do with the day or the date of a holiday. No.

Student: All right. Thank you.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:09:21) The action in potential, does it have any shape, form?

M. Laitman: Where? It has to clothe itself in something in order to take shape.

Student: My question is if this shape, the form of the force, if it's similar to the shape of what is in action.

M. Laitman: No.

Student: No? So, how can you differentiate between the potential and the implementation in form?

M. Laitman: This we need to discover. This we need to discover. That there is an operation in potential, and then from the potential it becomes actual. Yes.

Student: And there's no indication by which you can differentiate?

M. Laitman: There is, but we need to reach it and see it. And see.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:10:51) Is there any similarity between potential and force in the spiritual world? Is it similar in any way to an embryo and its mother, the way we experience it in this world?

M. Laitman: I didn't understand.

Student: There's the stage of conception, impregnation, before the embryo comes out to live, right? Can we call it potential?

M. Laitman: No. No. No.

Item 12.

Reading: (01:11:54) 12) Let me give you an allegory from the conducts of this world. For example, if a person who covers and hides himself behind clothes and garments so his friend would not see him or notice him, can it even be conceived that he himself would be affected by the concealment made by all the garments with which he is covered?

Similarly, take the ten Sefirot we call Keter, Hochma, Bina, Hesed, Gevura, Tifferet, Netzah, Hod, Yesod, Malchut as an example. These are only ten covers by which Ein Sof is covered and concealed. The souls that are destined to receive from it will be compelled to receive by those measures that the ten Sefirot allot them. Thus, the receivers are affected by this number of ten Sefirot, and not at all by His light, which is one, unique, and unchanging.

Conversely, the receivers divide into ten degrees precisely according to the qualities of these names. Moreover, even these covers we spoke of pertain only to the world of Beria and below, since this is where the souls that receive from these ten Sefirot are found. But in the worlds AK and Atzilut, there is no existence even to the souls, since there they are only a potential.

Hence, the ten above covers in the ten Sefirot govern only in the three lower worlds, called Beria, Yetzira, and Assiya. But in the worlds BYA, the ten Sefirot are considered Godliness through the end of Assiya, just as in AK and ABYA, and as prior to the Tzimtzum.

The only difference is in the Kelim of the ten Sefirot: In AK and Atzilut, they do not even disclose their dominance, since they are only in “potential” there, and only in BYA do the Kelim of the ten Sefirot begin to manifest their concealing and covering power. But in the light in the ten Sefirot, there is no change whatsoever due to these covers, as was written in the allegory. This is the meaning of “I the Lord do not change.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:16:13) Can we say that it's also a screen, reflected light, inner light, or only ten Sefirot are a vessel? Or is each Sefira a vessel?

M. Laitman: The ten Sefirot, it's not a vessel. The Ten Sefirot that are connected with a specific coarseness, when there is light that holds them, you see…

Student: It's not just when they're connected, it's a vessel?

M. Laitman: No, the vessel, it's when they're all connected, and as a result of their connection, the Malchut within them feels the will to receive, and then it operates on the nine Sefirot before it in order to imprint within them, to capture within them the light that reaches it.

Student: So, one Sefira isn't a vessel?

M. Laitman: No.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:17:40) What do we gain from having so much coverings on the light?

M. Laitman: By that, specifically, we can discover the light, understand it, feel it, work with it.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:18:11) I didn't understand what happened with the friend. If there's only lights and vessels, so what does it mean that a Sefira isn't a vessel? Because we say the vessel of Bina, the vessel of Malchut. So what's a Sefira if not a vessel?

M. Laitman: A Sefira is a vessel…

Student: So now I'm confused again. So, is a Sefira a vessel, and a few Sefirot that connect together are also a vessel? So, it's all different kinds of vessels?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: The difference is only their deficiency?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:19:02) What do the Ten Sefirot measure in the soul?

M. Laitman: The Ten Sefirot, they measure the light that influences the soul, and then, accordingly, the soul is discerned.

Student: What do the souls measure in the Ten Sefirot?

M. Laitman: The souls measure in the Ten Sefirot in what state the Creator created them.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:19:54) In the end of item 11, he wrote that these are the changes that will work on the souls that are destined, when their essence begins from the world of Beria, since they have been departed from the essence of the emanator. You said we have to reveal the light. That comes through these changes that we discover here between us? What are we speaking about here? Because then in 12 he says that we are actually like the man that is covered. So every time we are taking off the coverings between us, and the concealments between us?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: So, from these changes that we discover, from the connections between us and the Ten?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:20:51) He writes that in AK and Atzilut, there is still no revelation of the control, but only in potential. And only in BYA the vessels of the Ten Sefirot reveal the forces of concealment in them. So, does that mean the vessels have the force to conceal, or they discover that inside them there is a force of concealment? Who puts the covering in BYA?

M. Laitman: All the Sefirot, each and every Sefira, each and every Partzuf, makes a cover.

Student: Conceals the Creator?

M. Laitman: Conceals the Creator. So that the light from Ein Sof, when it reaches through all the Partzufim and Sefirot downwards, it will no longer be in potential to meet the upper light in a revealed manner.

Student: And all of this is so the vessels will be filled, right?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: And then what's the difference from below upward in our work?

M. Laitman: That we gradually add coarseness to the force of bestowal. By this, we enlarge the vessels, and the upper light shines in them more and more.

Student: But also we work in order to be filled?

M. Laitman: Yes, that is specifically our work.

Student: So, what's the difference between the expansion of the lights from above downward to what we're doing from below upward?

M. Laitman: This is the difference, either it comes from the Creator down to this world, or from this world by the lower ones up to Ein Sof.

Student: But also in our work, when we say that it's the lower ones, our work is still to pass the weight of who is conducting reality to the Creator?

M. Laitman: Let's say so.

Student: Because we say to discover None Else Besides Him and the Good Who Does Good?

M. Laitman: Well, that's not everything. The most important is what He wants from us.

Student: So what is really the main part of the concealment on our behalf from above downward? What is the essence of it?

M. Laitman: What comes out of it is that we, on our own, want to conceal the Creator, because His revelation demands our concealment.

Student: So, it's only in order to reveal Him, or is there something else we're trying to attain by this? Because the revelation was there before?

M. Laitman: Whatever comes to us from above downwards is the revelation of the Creator, who is gradually covered until it reaches a specific, special degree, where there is no longer any difference between the one who is revealed or not revealed, and that's in our world, right?

Student: From below upward?

M. Laitman: From below upwards, we constantly attain it through screens, and screens that are greater and greater. According to the magnitude of the screen, the measure of the screen, we become incorporated in the Creator, and then we build in the Creator, we give the Creator a deficiency, a lack from our vessel. And by that, we add to the Creator light. And we elevate ourselves to the upper light in order to determine, to establish our place.

Student: But in the end, we determine, we decide where we worked, or where does it come in that the Creator operated in everything here?

M. Laitman: After we discover, or the more we discover ourselves, accordingly, we discover the Creator.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:26:22) He writes here that the receivers are divided into Ten Sefirot, according to the names of the Sefirot. When I sit in the Ten, in a meeting, I need to look at every friend coming with his desire but also comes with a special quality that I don't have?

M. Laitman: You can't do that, you don't need to do it, but we just say so, that each one is according to his desire only.

Student: What do I gain in a good meeting of the Ten let’s say, which I won't be able to attain in my individual work, which I won't be able to attain in my personal work?

M. Laitman: You cannot attain in your individual work, on your own, anything that is spiritual. To whom you are bestowing, from whom you are receiving, on your own? There is none.

Student: This state of prayer can be created only in the Ten?

M. Laitman: Only in a Ten. This is why the Creator, first of all, broke the will to receive and scattered it among everyone.

Student: It turns out that in the core of the Ten, a person feels like he's lacking something, but all his work is to go to a place where the Ten is, where what is revealed is that what's lacking is connection that creates a Kli to stand before the Creator?

M. Laitman: Only connection.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:28:35) Also, about the Sefirot, and the souls, and vessels. When we talk about the root of the soul, are we talking about a unique personal Sefira that a person is born with, that characterizes him, an individual Sefira?

M. Laitman: No. I don't think so.

Student: So what? Is it an expression of the incorporation of the Sefirot? What is the root of the soul?

M. Laitman: The root of the soul is after the incorporation already. It's an expression of the incorporation.

Student: When we try to depict our connection in the Ten as spiritual as possible, in order to be drawn to that state. Rav after all is teaching that we have to depict depictions of bestowal. He also gave us these exercises now. So, how to depict it correctly in such a way that we will be able to be drawn to this corrected state of connection between the Sefirot that create a spiritual Partzuf?

M. Laitman: Simply depict it to ourselves.

Student: What should we depict?

M. Laitman: We should depict to ourselves these desires and the operations that take place between them and how do we connect in order to adapt ourselves to the Creator more and more. That's it. This is our work.

Student: Is every friend an expression of a certain force, a certain quality, a certain Sefira in spirituality?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: Do we need to try and depict this or not?

M. Laitman: No.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:30:53) Earlier, you recommended to do homework that will bring us closer, make an impression on the upper force that would want to assist us. Do we need to invent these measures ourselves, or can you recommend something specific?

M. Laitman: No. You have an organization, people that are responsible for each and every thing, so…

Student: We should turn to the organizers, or in the Ten we should search for this homework?

M. Laitman: No, it's better if it's the organizers.

Student: So, they need to publish it for everyone so that everyone can do it?

M. Laitman: Yes. Yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:31:48) I wanted to ask about the Ten Sefirot in the Ten. Does each have his own Malchut, or is there something common?

M. Laitman: Of course, each one has his own Malchut and what is common is the general, the common Malchut.

Student: So, the work of a friend in the Ten, he needs to work on his Malchut as restricted as possible to go to the friends and then it's built together, or does each do it himself?

M. Laitman: No. Why restrict? No. They need to work on going through all the actions so that they will form between them…

Student: A common structure?

M. Laitman: A common structure, yes.

Student: But it's mutual work nevertheless. Without that, nothing will happen?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: About our friend's question about the organization and the Tens. The organization needs to aim all the friends, guide them all to work according to certain orders, principles for everyone, or does each Ten act the way it is?

M. Laitman: The way it hears, and feels, and the way that it's ready.

Student: But you said we should turn to the organizers to give us the homework and stuff like that?

Student: No, I didn't say, homework.

Student: Then what did you actually say so we can understand this? That until tomorrow we need to do something and how do we interpret this?

M. Laitman: Let's think about it until tomorrow.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:33:47) Is the concept of Ten a spiritual vessel?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: And how or at what stage does a collection of friends become…

M. Laitman: At what stage ten people become a spiritual vessel? When they feel that they are connected between them, and they have a common will to receive, and they are willing to perform actions in order to realize the general will to receive.

Student: What actions?

M. Laitman: Actions, by connecting between them and forming all kinds of, well, it's enough to say connecting. I'm afraid to say more because it will confuse you.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:35:03) In the Ten friends behave differently. Can someone cause another friend not to develop himself because the form in which he behaves towards him and the way that he, I don't know, his general behavior towards him, can that cause someone to close up so he won't be able to develop in that Ten?

M. Laitman: Yes, it could be.

Student: And if the Ten identifies such a thing, what is it supposed to do?

M. Laitman: It should relate to these things with seriousness.

Student: They're usually very delicate matters, how a friend behaves and how one responds to that.

M. Laitman: So, in the meantime, just investigate it, but without showing any response to it.

Student: If it happens and it's no longer a delicate matter in that Ten already?

M. Laitman: Then bit by bit start talking between you about how much you can talk about it openly between you.

Student: If there's just bad blood between these two, do they have to be stubborn about remaining in the same Ten, or is it correct for one of them to just move to another Ten?

M. Laitman: Maybe it is worthwhile for him to move.

Student: Is that a Ten's decision, or can there be an external team?

M. Laitman: If you see that it's impossible that this will ever reach balance, then divide them.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:37:04) I hear a lot, all the guidance about depicting states, depicting Sefirot. I don't know what to do with all those things. I know what happens when you work with a Ten. There are interactions, there's room for work, there's room for requests from the Creator. There are things that you experience on your flesh. But all those things that come from depicting and imagining things, it's for me like trying to solve a physics formula. I don't know.

M. Laitman: What do you prefer?

Student: I prefer nothing. Where's my work in this? I just don't have where to grip on to anything in this whatsoever?

M. Laitman: So, what should he hold on to?

Student: I don't know, to ask to hold on to something?

M. Laitman: To ask, to request, that's for sure.

Student: I hear that there's friends that it talks to them, and they're living, they're blossoming in it. They can talk for hours about it. I get obtuse from it, I get blocked.

M. Laitman: There's nothing you can do about it. You have to open your heart.

Student: It has to do with opening the heart, such depictions?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:38:41) He says here, someone asked about this earlier, that only in BYA the vessels that the Ten Sefirot discover the force of concealment in the covering upon them. You're expecting to discover their reality. Why are discovering actually the force of concealment and covering? That's what they reveal?

M. Laitman: This is what they discover, well, because that's what's in them.

Student: You talked about advancement being in covering and concealment. It's something that's really not clear. We recognize that you advance by discovering more and more. And you're saying the opposite. Can you maybe explain that, or am I just getting confused for no reason?

M. Laitman: By us covering ourselves, we discover our vessels. It's a revelation through concealment. Because it is the opposite of what we have here, in this world, with direct light.

Student: If possible, another word on this. Before that, where did the force of concealment and covering come from? If only in BYA, the vessels of the Ten Sefirot started to discover the force of concealment and covering in them. So, where was that force of concealment and covering before? That process was, after all, there?

M. Laitman: There was no need for concealment and covering. There was no such need.

Song: (01:41:06)

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Conversations With Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on studying with the friends

Conversations With Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on studying with the friends

Conversations With Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on studying with the friends

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Copyright © 2003-2026 Bnei Baruch - Kabbala La Am Association, Alle Rechte vorbehalten