Part 2:
Baal HaSulam. The Freedom (Taking after the Collective)
Reading Baal HaSulam. The Freedom “Taking after the Collective”
1. S. (05:21) Yesterday we said in the one law for all the worlds, that we have to come to the realization of the desire to receive, and now we say that in the first line that we have to follow the will of the collective, so how do I realize my desire and still follow the will of the collective?
R. This happens gradually, we have four spiritual worlds, and we need try to gradually, through Assiya, Yetzira, Beria, Atzilut, the world of Adam Kadmon, the world of Ein Sof, in this way to ascend in the observance the all the spiritual laws to the extent in which we climb higher, then we will need more and more to observe the laws of connection between all the parts of creation, until in the highest possible degree, we close all of creation together to one system, under one force, under one law, and this law is the law of love where each and every part completes everyone without any calculation for oneself, but only for the benefit of everyone, that's how it be corrected.
S. So he continues later and he says that there's the developed, and the under-developed, how can we know who's developed and who’s underdeveloped?
R. Those parts that participate in this whole system, they themselves need to see the extent to which they are close to the others or distant from others. Accordingly, we examine whether each is developed or not.
2. S. (07:25) What counts a collective versus the individual?
R. The minority of the collective is two, and an individual is one.
S. Is it possible that the individual has an opinion or desire?
R. There's no such thing, if he's not connected to another then he's an individual.
S. And if he's connected to others?
R. If he’s connected to others, that means that he has to somewhat annul himself towards others and accepts upon himself what they need to do, and is with them in a mutual way and then it's already a connection between the many, the collective and the individual. He needs to incorporate in them. There's no greatness in a person standing out, there is greatness in, as it's written, “I dwell amongst my people”.
S. Why does he say that the collective is allowed to overrule the individuality of the individual?
R. What to offer, there’s nothing to offer. The individual must incorporate in the collective.
S. There's an opinion or a desire of the individual that he's not included with others?
R. Until the point where it's corrected, to the extent that he's corrected, he's incorporated in everyone. But this doesn't cause the descent of the general level, do you understand, on the contrary, this is talking about an ascent, a spiritual ascent, of all the connection between them.
3. S. (09:45) There is something that is not clear and I will continue the question of the friend, I was trying to find the words written, “most of humanity is underdeveloped and the developed are always a small minority, if you always determine according to the will of the majority, which are the undeveloped, the reckless, the whole world goes backwards”.
R. Right, that is why there's a law about following the collective when it comes to connection, and after the individuals when it comes to attaining the goal, and this is how they connect with one another.
S. So who to listen to?
R. Continue with the collective in connection, and where should we aim the connection, to where the individuals say to. Meaning the small group of Kabbalists that stands at the head of the whole world is what gives the direction of the development of the whole world, and the whole world has to connect between them and to follow those Kabbalists. That is the difference between the Rosh and the Guf.
4. S. (11:25) It is very difficult to understand what he is writing here, according to the law of taking off to the collective[…] so unfortunately I do not see this happening today.
R. What do you always want to move everything to today, don't draw us to today, we are learning the laws of nature, so let's learn it, not like it seems to you today in the human society.
S. How do you realize it, he's didn't just write it, he wants us to get to it?
R. Right, well let's say so.
S. So how do you realize it, we are the last generation?
R. We are in the last generation in potential, not in practicality. According to the conditions that come to us to the above, we can be in the last generation, if we take upon ourselves the laws of the last generation and begin to implement them.
S. What are these laws of the last generation that you mentioned?
R. First of all, love your neighbor as yourself.
S. Okay and the second?
R. After that we will talk.
S. Thank you.
R. You see you already received an answer and it satisfies you.
S. He wrote it a hundred years ago already and nothing’s happening.
R. The fact it was written a hundred years ago doesn’t mean it was right or wrong, it was written but the fact that it talks about the laws of nature that already is not having to do with a hundred years, back or forth, or behind. It means it’s a law of nature.
S. So what you are telling me is this is a law of nature, that we all have to be in bestowal, and suddenly it will happen, all of these laws?
R. Yes.
S. We need to get to become in attainment?
R. To observe this, yes. We correct ourselves in order to start to understand these laws that are demanded of us.
S. And then it will happen?
R. Yes.
S. In our work, in short, what we do every day?
R. Our work and every day we intend to implement that.
S. How did you get to the decision that we suddenly have to read the book of Zohar, many times you didn't want to, so what happened?
R. I was in a special connection with one upper angel, and he told me that this is the will of the Creator.
S. How did you choose the book of Zohar more than any book?
R. Because prior to that I did not get a command from the angel.
S. Are you serious?
R. Of course I'm serious, angel is a called a force that manages a person, so there is a force that manages me, and that is how it’s guiding me.
S. Meaning this is your feeling?
R. Also feeling.
S. Okay I received it thank you very much.
5. S. (15:54) I really don't understand what it means to follow the collective because also in the collective there will be a few individuals that lead and influence the collective, is there such a thing, a force of the collective?
R. There is the thought and the opinion of the collective, and we have to follow it, to take after that opinion that mind.
S. How's this expressed in the spiritual work, because it seems like just following the flow, which distances us from the work?
R. No, no, no, the collective means not collective, just the mass that you see in the street, rather the collective and the individual are those who are attracted or pulled toward spirituality, those are the individual and the collective, we will continue to read and we will see what he means.
6. S. () You answered now how of the collective, meaning the ten, the group, which has the power upon the individual, therefore we really need to play, to act, the higher degree of bestowal?
R. Yes.
7. S. (17:41) When we stand before the Creator, do we appear before Him as an individual, or as the collective?
R. As an individual.
8. S. (17:59) I didn't quite understand the proof that he says here in what he writes, he goes through and then makes some jump which I did not manage to understand as far as the proof here, according to what he writes.
R. I do not understand what you are asking.
S. He actually explains this law, and the starts to say this law of following the collective solves every problem for us in the society, and then he kind of makes some kind of a connection from it to the article The Peace, and from here he kind of makes a leap, which is kind of like a connection to all the Mitzvot in the Torah, to the laws of nature in which they come to us from above down, this connection is not clear to me, can you explain
R. I did not understand you exactly but we will take care of it but not now.
Continue reading (19:28) from heading “A path of Torah and a path of suffering”
9. R. (20:42) Okay this just is the preface to what it’s going to.
Continue reading (20:53) from heading “The collectives’ right to expropriate the freedom of the individual”
10. R. (22:21) The question is clear how, does the large collective that is completely undeveloped, receive the opinion of a few developed individuals about the goal, and who will hear them.
Continue reading (22:45)
11. R. (25:52) Meaning that in spirituality, each observes what is within his heart, and in corporeality, each has to to take after the collective.
Continue reading (26:13) from heading “For Social Life, the Law, Take after the Collective”
12. R. (28:52) Here it clarifies what he wanted to share earlier.
Continue reading (29:03) from heading “In Spiritual Life, Take after the Individual”
13. R. (32:56) There are a lot of, as if, laws, suggestions, advice, that he's giving us on the path. We will try to understand them from the generality of our attitude towards nature, and accordingly we are given to guard the views of all individuals, because of the weakness of the ruling collective. The ruling collective does not take into account every individual, and if we want to keep, observe these laws we have to be sensitive to the request of every individual. These are already things that we will check later.
14. S. (34:01) The collective advises to follow the more developed personality in spirituality but we see that a person that is less developed is less ready to study and annul before the more developed, why does nature make it this way and make an opposite law?
R. That we understand that there are no to the selected individual the selected minority chosen by nature is our privilege.
15. S. (34:55) How does society know where the boundary goes between the corporeal life of a person and his spiritual life?
R. According to the response of the individual as much as he is able to draw himself closer to the society and be included in society and there we see is his border. His limit.
16. S. (35:27) Is something to lose here it looks like all this success of the society, the spiritual success is bundled in the minority and you should know this well, and from this the many meticulously need to be protected with their eyes open all the individuals so that they will not perish from the world. What caution do we have to need to know about, to be careful about all the time?
R. That we will give all the developed individuals to express their opinion.
S. We have to be cautious of those who are in their external environment about what?
R. Not to receive their thoughts, their opinions
S. Not to mix them with us?
R. Yes.
S. This is something very harsh, because you never know who is with you and who's not with you actually.
R. Of course you know who, it is according to people who work on themselves.
S. Also those that are a side of a society or those that are inside of our society?
R. Are you talking about Bnei Baruch or in general?
S. Yes about us, of course.
R. We need to discern and scrutinize it.
17. S. (37:03) Also the force of the individual is not always together, its split just like the force of the collective is split, its bifurcated, how to always go in the right way?
R. This is only according to the inner inclinations of the heart for it to be clear according to the behavior about what the person is being drawn to.
S. Meaning we need to follow the upper province, if we do not have the desire to bestow then we will always be bifurcated or we always be split?
R. Yes.
18. S. (37:53) How can a developed individual stay in an undeveloped environment and adhere to the goal nevertheless?
R. In order to draw them after him.
19. S. (38:26) If I understand correctly the law of following the collective means that a person needs to place the society above him.
R. Yes, let's say.
S. That is in a corrected society but in a corrupted society, like we have now, what does it mean?
R. In a corrected environment everyone is already in a unified opinion and then there is no one to follow. It's clear that there is a clear goal and a clear defined path towards it. There are no two ways. Rather what is in a society that is not yet corrected then it is after the collective corporally planning toward society today.
S. I don't understand. Let's say I'm an individual. I have to incline toward society today. Which one should I be following?
R. You have no one to follow.
S. You said that the collective is underdeveloped, so what does it mean to follow the collective?
R. The fact that they are underdeveloped does not mean that they are wrong, whether they have a certain way towards correction or a special way. They are not going after the individuals rather after then the collective.
S. I did not understand who are these many, the collective?
R. The collective that are drawn after the connection between them and the purpose of creation.
S. But that's not the situation, the collective in the world are not drawn towards the purpose of creation?
R. Are you asking me, of course they're not drawn, we're not talking about our world, we are talking what needs to be, what has to be.
S. So I understand, in our world there's no meaning in the current state of the social society of the world, there's nothing to grasp here?
R. You do not have in this world after who to follow.
S. The connection between the individual and the collective, you said it's like the relation between the Guf and the Rosh, so it’s like us and our attitude towards you and the Kabbalists, it’s the attitude of the body towards the head, what about our attitude towards humanity that is in dissemination?
R. Disseminate to them because they haven’t received any form that is aimed towards anything so we cannot say anything about them that they are organized as a society.
S. Is it right for us to see us as a head towards the body of the society?
R. No, because there is no connection between the head and the body, there is no connection. Just because they are belonging to the same external form, that they have Rosh, Toch, Sof, hands, feet, it does not mean that they belong to the same species.
S. From where is the willingness of humanity to listen to us happen if they don't observe the relation between head and body?
R. From the relation from above.
S. So it’s simply being a pipeline, we’re transparent and the light flows through us?
R. Correct.
20. S. (42:15) If there's a minority in the people that artificially creates an opinion in the society and then we follow that opinion, does this breach the laws of nature?
R. Of course, of course, naturally. The general goal of development of the society, of the collective, has to be clear to all parts of the society and in accordance with its development they have to accept it, and each portion of the society follows this goal in accordance with its readiness of development, but still this single unified goal, ties and connects everyone to it, just differently.
S. If it breaches the laws of nature, are we going to some end by this, to lost, to being lost. Does this breach the laws of nature, does such an action is meant to fail?
R. Yes this is how we see it in our world, many years can go by and still it will fail.
21. S. (44:09) When we think about the next degree in the work of connection between us, now if the collective defines the degree, I understand that the individual needs to annul before the collective. But if it is the other way around, meaning the many do not have the next degree, and the individual does, what is the decision here? Meaning what is the meaning of this law altogether.
R. Listen, I'm giving you an example: Let's say that we have to advance in the human society. So there are factories, workers, managers, heads of state, heads of departments, scientists all in each and everyone has to be deep within his work in the goal of humanity to reach the next level of development and so each and every one is in it. There is no difference between them, rather each according to his development in his place and this is how we have to see the correct development of society. I have nothing else to add.
S. What does this mean, is it concession or not? It's not clear to me these words. If you can lower it even more.
R. We have to annul ourselves only when we are all aimed to the same goal each from his degree and from his qualities.
22. S. (46:30) Does the collective choose which individual to follow or is it always chosen by the Creator from above?
R. We see according to what is written that not below do we choose the above, but according to the connection between us we find how do we connect to the upper force. This is how it has to happen, then we will not fail. We will not go wrong.
23. S. (47:32) What is the difference between a corrected society and the society of the last generation?
R. If this is a corrected society then it is the society of the last generation.
S. How can we implement, you said that we cannot yet enter this society of the last generation. What’s bothering us as Bnei Barch to become that society.
R. Lack of connection between us. Lack of connection between us where everyone wants to replace the other and to help everyone.
S. When we study the writings of the last generation of Baal HaSulam we are just left with implementing them?
R. Yes.
S. Even if we're not corrected, just to realize all those laws.
R. This is a different question. Are we able to, yes. Are we able to, maybe not. Should we try, yes.
S. Ok we will try.
24. S (49:02) It is written that the whole Torah and Mitzvot were not given but to purify the people of Israel which means to develop in us the sense of recognition of evil which is impressed in as from birth. What is the sense of recognition of evil and what does it mean that it has been imprinted on us from birth?
R. The sense of recognition of evil is the ego that is in us and the recognition of evil is the same thing.
25. S (49:52) It seems like the there is two laws that are in parallel here. That if we are in some work in the society we have to follow the collective and when we are suddenly before the system we have to go by the law of the individual. So how do we connect between these two works?
R. Following the collective following the individual you have to be divided as such.
S. Yes.
R. Each divides himself accordingly to this and that.
S. How exactly do I divide myself?
R. According to laws that related to society you are following the collective and according to laws that relate to Creator you are following the individual.
S. The laws of the Society is our laws here in the group.
R. Yes. Good luck to you and all the best.