The transcript has been transcribed and edited from English simultaneous interpretation, thus there may be potential semantic inaccuracies within it.
Daily Lesson (Morning) January 19, 2025.
Part 1: Baal HaSulam. Matan Torah [The Giving of the Torah]. #16.
Reader: Hello, we are reading in the writings of Baal HaSulam, article “Matan Torah” [The Giving of the Torah], item 16. You can find the study material on kabbalahgroup.info and in the Arvut system. You can also send questions live through these websites. Matan Torah [The Giving of the Torah] in the writings of Baal HaSulam, item 16.
Matan Torah [The Giving of the Torah] 16
Reading: (00:36) In the above words, we find a way to understand our concept from above (Items 3 and 4) about the contents of that Mitzva, “Love your friend as yourself,” how the Torah compels us to do something that cannot be done.
Indeed, know that for this reason, the Torah was not given to our holy fathers—Abraham, Isaac and Jacob—but was held until the exodus from Egypt, when they came out and became a complete nation of six hundred thousand men of twenty years of age or more. For then, each member of the nation was asked if he agreed to that exalted work. And once each and every one in the nation agreed to it with heart and soul, and said “We will do and we will hear,” it became possible to observe the whole of the Torah, and that which was previously impossible became possible.
This is because it is certain that if six hundred thousand men abandon their work for the satisfaction of their own needs and worry about nothing but standing guard so their friends will not lack a thing, and moreover, they will engage in this with great love, with their very heart and soul, in the full meaning of the Mitzva, “Love your friend as yourself,” it is then beyond doubt that no one in the nation will need to worry about his own well-being.
Because of this, one becomes completely free of securing his own survival and can easily observe the Mitzva, “Love your friend as yourself,” obeying all the conditions given in Items 3 and 4. After all, why would he worry about his own survival when six hundred thousand loyal lovers stand by, ready with great care to make sure he lacks nothing of his needs?
Therefore, once all the members of the nation agreed, they were immediately given the Torah, for now they were capable of observing it. But before they grew into a complete nation, and certainly during the time of the fathers, who were unique in the land, they were not truly qualified to observe the Torah in its desirable form, since with a small number of people it is impossible to even begin with engagement in Mitzvot between man and man to the extent of “Love your friend as yourself,” as explained in Items 3 and 4. This is why they were not given the Torah.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (05:49) What does it mean - a state, where a person feels or sees that he is given the Torah?
M. Laitman: He feels the forces that operate in the world. He knows and sees how they are divided into those that come from below or come from above, and how a person participates in them. And therefore, what we are reading, he sees, he feels that such is the world.
Student: And the work on his part is to build the Arvut [the mutual guarantee], or demand it?
M. Laitman: Yes. To demand the mutual guarantee, mutual responsibility.
Student: What does he have now that he didn't have before? Because you could say that he will always work on the Arvut.
M. Laitman: First, previously he didn't see the forces operating in creation in a way that they are all closing the group called Israel, but they close it and want to lift it higher and higher on the ladder. And therefore, he still doesn't have anything to demand. He doesn't feel that he is in a system of forces.
Student: Then he has an aspiration to change, or what to aspire to?
M. Laitman: Yes, of course. He has a feeling and understanding that he is under the control of such forces, that he can demand from them his own ascent to higher degrees.
Student: So, from this point of view, you can say that the giving of the Torah is a personal state the person is going through?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (09:07) So, what does it mean to stand guard, as far as I'm concerned? We have to be constantly with the feeling of these forces, what does it mean for me “to stand guard?”
M. Laitman: You need to connect to these forces and to try to carry out in them the act of connection.
Student: What does it mean, to carry out the action of connection? I can't do anything by myself. So, what does it mean to carry out the action of connection?
M. Laitman: You feel that the forces in nature are all arranged in such a way that they operate on every element in nature in order to bring it closer to the Creator. This is the purpose of the forces. And then a person asks, demands, to reveal - he wants to also maintain these forces, also, for the same goal.
Student: Meaning, I have to keep my finger on the pulse, to be alert to our mutual deficiency and ask for it from the Creator?
M. Laitman: Yes. And every time you'll see that here you can add something and here a little bit, and there a little bit, etc.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (11:19) “We shall do and we shall hear,” what does a person agree to before hearing?
M. Laitman: Before he hears, I cannot say. You want to say that a person comes to something, to some degree, some operation. This is called agreeing to we will do and we will hear, right?
Student: Yes, it's saying we should do and we should hear. If I understand and I remember how we learned about this, there's an agreement even before they attain the thing. After they agreed, and then they received the Torah.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: So, what do they agree to before they received the Torah? What should I commit to agree to before I attain the light, the Torah?
M. Laitman: To that, through an operation in the Torah, in the forces of the Torah, we approach a state where we can control, where we can begin to work with these forces in practice.
Student: Which is before I feel those forces?
M. Laitman: No, to some extent you already feel them, you are already in some system. Except now you come to a state where you observe, you do your work in the system in a purposeful manner.
Question (Latin 1): (13:36) Why do you need an entire nation to receive the Torah?
M. Laitman: The Torah contains, incorporates all the forces in nature, all the results in nature, and all the souls. Therefore, it is impossible to receive it, to open it, to use it in such a way that we don't realize the Torah, implement it. This is why the Torah was not given to one person or to several people, but to a whole nation. When is it a whole nation? This is what we see from the text - that 600,000 people are dependent on each other, they want to reach such a connection between them, that they will be connected between them as one man with one heart.
Question (Women MAK 43): (15:37) It says that before they grew to the size of the entire nation, not to mention the holy fathers, they were not able to observe the Torah to the right measure. What does it mean?
M. Laitman: I understand it simply. Until we come to the intensity of the general common desire, we can't observe the Torah. Only afterwards, once we feel the common force, we can observe the Torah, and then we actually reveal it, and then we can exist in order to carry out the common force.
Student: Regarding the 600,000 men, they ask, is the measure of 600,000 men the force of incorporation of an entire Ten, in the individual or in the collective?
M. Laitman: The 600,000 men are a complete measure that is called a nation. When do we feel the 600,000 people? I think, only after we feel the connection between them, and we are drawn to the connection, and want to reach the connection. And then this common effort brings them to feel the common root, which is, and then they connect. And they are willing to work together, all of them, together.
Student: We have to reach such a quantity of 600,000 men?
M. Laitman: No. They, too, it wasn't about a number, it was a figure of speech. It's how they spoke. 600,000 are - six is HGT NHY, the Sefirot of Zeir Anpin, and when each of them rises to the degree of 1,000, they can operate in such a way, that there is, in each of them, a control or a governance over everyone.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (19:14) He writes here, that he becomes worried about nothing, and …, sorry. When 600,000 men stand guard, he is not worried about his own existence. What does it mean?
M. Laitman: You don't know what his own existence is?
Student: So, it turns out that if right now my heart and my head are worried about myself, God forbid, I will have no work, no sustenance, I have a fear, a psychological fear - I don't trust anyone, I trust my own forces, that I can't even start. Is that correct or not?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: I mean, there has to be a system that cares about each and every one, otherwise we cannot begin.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: So, ultimately it's a psychological matter, if I'm confident. And I read somewhere that if a person relies on the Creator, trusts Him, then he is relieved of this fear.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: But for that he has to feel, is that a psychological matter or is it something true and tangible?
M. Laitman: It helps him, and then he can let go of his perception, the present one, and move to the next other kind of perception.
Student: If a person comes to a state where he feels and understands that the Creator cares about, everything about him, he just needs to trust what's happening, is he relieved of this fear?
M. Laitman: What does it mean to trust what is happening?
Student: He's not concerned, they will arrange it from above, if he will behave correctly and relate correctly to reality, all of his needs will be taken care of from above. Is this correct, this perception?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: So, why does he need the 600,000?
M. Laitman: No, that's a condition. That if you, as a result of your work, of your labor, feel that you've become connected to 600,000 such desires, right? Then you unite together into a force, you connect together to a force that is called “Creator”.
Student: Now, about the fathers, I heard that the fathers kept the entire Torah even before it was given, so what does it mean that the Torah was not given to them, what is the difference here?
M. Laitman: This I don't know, they were different conditions, a different state.
Student: Do they speak about coarseness perhaps, or it's not related to that?
M. Laitman: I don't know, I didn't read anything clear about it anywhere, so everything we say is just in the air.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (23:07) It's hard to understand, what does the condition of Arvut [mutual guarantee], what does it add to the commandment of “Love your friend as yourself?”
M. Laitman: Why?
Student: He writes that, in the beginning of item 16, how the Torah compels us to do something that cannot be done. That's the beginning of the article, you cannot observe “Love your friend as yourself.” And then he says, the solution is in the Arvut [mutual guarantee]. He explains, it removes himself from his own… abandon the work for the satisfaction of their own needs, and worry about nothing but standing guard so their friends will not lack a thing. And moreover, they will engage in this with great love, with their very heart and soul, in the full meaning of the commandment “Love your friend as yourself.” It is then beyond doubt that no one in the nation will need to worry about his own well-being. Nevertheless, each one of the 600,000, needs to observe the commandment of “Love your friend as yourself” toward the friends.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: But we said that it's impossible to keep it. So, where's the addition? Where's that leap? From each individual who tries to observe “Love your friend as yourself” and cannot, versus when everyone is trying to observe “Love your friend as yourself,” and they can do it.
M. Laitman: In connection.
Student: Connection, if I understand, is the outcome of their efforts. But when they're already observing the Arvut…
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: The question is how to make the leap, how to get to this degree from each one individually, feels that it's impossible to keep that commandment.
M. Laitman: But when they connect, they feel that in the connection, they find the solution.
Student: That I understand. He also says it, that each one acquires confidence and stops worrying about the satisfaction of their own needs, and they worry about the others. But before that, there's a gap, a seemingly unbreachable gap, where each one, even here, feels himself as an individual on the path and is working, is trying to work with the friends, in love of friends, but the connection…
M. Laitman: The ascent to the degree of connection.
Student: Yes, how does that happen?
M. Laitman: It happens from above. The Creator connects them. They don't have the strength to connect all the individual souls together.
Student: On what condition?
M. Laitman: On condition that everyone wants to be together, not to let go of each other, because the condition of Arvut [mutual responsibility] depends on the connection of everyone.
Student: Many times, we give this example, when a friend feels that he can't do something, and you say to us often, you lack the feeling of dependence, of feeling of together, support, the mutual action, the mutual prayer.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: So, how do we generate that precondition in order to enter the Arvut?
M. Laitman: The precondition? What precondition?
Student: For everyone to be in efforts toward “Love your friend as yourself.” I don't know, that's what I'm asking. What is that condition? I heard from you, that everyone has to be making efforts to make “Love your friend as yourself,” and then the Creator raises everyone to connection, and then he can keep it.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: What does it mean that everyone is trying to engage in “Love your friend as yourself?”
M. Laitman: That's even before everyone tries. How do we come to a state where everyone tries, and everyone sees that this is a necessary action that is in front of them?
Student: Seemingly, this is the only thing we're discussing.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: So, I understand that we lack the feeling that everyone is trying to reach it.
M. Laitman: It depends on the person, on his ability to raise himself, to elevate himself, and see all his friends in a group together.
Student: So, sometimes we hear, as you said now, it's up to a person to see that his friends are exerting and working in love of friends.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: And sometimes, we hear that we have to work together on love of friends.
M. Laitman: Of course. So, and?
Student: So, it's both? How does that work?
M. Laitman: How does it work, we have to discover and practice. This is what we need to discover in practice, that this is what will happen with us.
Student: Just on what you said, we lack the matter of everyone feeling the need to work in love of friends. That's what I heard, that's what I understood, but we lack the condition of “together.”
M. Laitman: The need to work in love of friends, we get it from increasing the desire in each one sufficiently to want to connect to everyone. And now, we need to break the partitions between everyone.
Student: It is something that has to happen in the society at large?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: And how does each individual contribute?
M. Laitman: Each individual contributes to it as much as he wants, in a uniform manner, to break the partition.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (31:18) How do we break down the partitions?
M. Laitman: Through prayer. There is nothing but that, only a prayer. A prayer that is connected to the confidence that we are indeed about to receive the force that will break all the partitions and connect all of us together.
Student: I understood from the beginning of your words that the forces of nature are working on us in each and every detail in order to bring us closer to the Creator.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: And they invite us to work together with them toward the same goal.
M. Laitman: Yes. But these forces are, seemingly, not connected between them in the meantime. They don't lead us to connection. They operate on each and every one, and then along with discovering that all the friends are actually, they actually agree, and yet each one doesn't feel the others. They're not connected together, like, say, in one room where they're all standing tight together.
Student: But from the point of view of the forces of nature, their direction is to bring us to this adhesion, closeness.
M. Laitman: No. Through the prayer, we need to bring ourselves into this tightness.
Student: What is the direction of the forces of nature without man?
M. Laitman: Nature's forces are only in order to bring a person to a state where everyone is together. Everyone is together in one Kli, one vessel.
Student: So, with or without man's intention, they will bring him to be as one man in one heart, and so on?
M. Laitman: No.
Student: Why not?
M. Laitman: They will bring him to a state where, on the one hand, he will have a feeling of nature as a collection of forces that operate on him for a purpose, for the purpose of realizing the connection. But from this, he himself cannot move.
Student: What brings us to this adhesion, the feeling that we're all in one flow?
M. Laitman: If we want to. If we want to, meaning, if we find between us maybe a few servants of the Creator, then we won't be able to implement it.
Student: What is this small minority? What brings it to be so tight? Where does such a desire grow in it to adhere like that? It's against the laws of nature.
M. Laitman: Why?
Student: Because each one is going in his own direction, his own line, his own flow.
M. Laitman: Each one in his own line, and in his own line he discovers his nothingness. And then he comes to a resolution that he must connect with everyone in order to find that common principle, that will tie them together and will be able to lead them to the common goal.
Student: What brings a person to that decision to connect to others, to be so tight like in one room?
M. Laitman: Because from within, we are as one man with one heart. We come from one root, and therefore, we can think about it, approach it. And only patience, basically, the quality of patience, helps them, as it's written, and then we will reach it.
Student: I still understand there are some terms. What's the difference between the forces of nature and the forces of Torah?
M. Laitman: It's the same, no difference.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (37:01) What is the action of agreement, agreeing that we have to undertake?
M. Laitman: The act of agreeing?
Student: Yes.
M. Laitman: Between whom?
Student: As he writes, that only after the entire nation agreed with their very heart and soul, the full meaning, then they're able to get into “shall do and shall hear.”
M. Laitman: Yes, because that's already a different level of connection, that they have to choose connection.
Student: So, what are they agreeing about, on?
M. Laitman: Agreement that they have to be connected between them, the souls of Israel, right? They have to be connected among themselves as one man with one heart.
Student: How, as he writes here, each one of the members of the nation, how can each member of the nation carry out the act of agreement inside of him?
M. Laitman: From wanting to be connected to all the souls in the nation, and in this way achieve connection.
Student: Is it an action of the desire, just want it to happen?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: Clear. So, only after they agreed, they received the Torah. So, what happens up until the point of agreement?
M. Laitman: They agreed to take upon themselves this condition of being in mutual responsibility, where each one cares for the others, and all of them are rewarded with the reception of the Torah.
Student: What's the greatest obstacle, the greatest hindrance before a person to receive such, to reach such agreement?
M. Laitman: The biggest obstacle to a person is, that in order to connect with the other, he must, seemingly, disconnect from the Creator for this.
Student: Why?
M. Laitman: For the time being, this is how it turns out for him. But this, I can't explain. In order to connect with the other, he must disconnect from the previous Creator that he had, and be involved in a new system in which he comes to a new reality, a new connection, and he can connect in every possible way to the rest of the parts of the soul.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (41:59) Is it correct that Mount Sinai is a result of us wanting connection but being unable to attain it? As a result, we discover our real nature, which is the will to receive, hatred.
M. Laitman: The hate, you say, comes to us when we cannot connect in order to reveal the Creator. There's one force, and when we can't reveal Him, there's a separating force between us, yes? That's the hate.
Student: How can we come to a state where we can demand connection, a result that we cannot achieve with our own human force? How do we come to that?
M. Laitman: How do we come to want connection? Nevertheless, try more and more, and pray, and a penny by a penny adds up to a great sum. That's how it is.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (43:38) Some more clarification about revelation. Anything we reveal is out of oppositeness of form, light out of darkness, as Baal HaSulam explains. And we also come into contact, into connection also, out of being pushed into the center, more and more. What's the desirable way of discovering equivalence of form, so we don't come to connection out of duress, out of coercion, because it's also not desirable in the eyes of the Creator. We have to come to a sensation of oppositeness, because we really want to have the right deficiency, you understand? Because a person comes and feels dependency, he feels that he has to connect. Why? In order to overcome his suffering. So, he'll look for it, out of the will to receive, he wants it. But that's undesirable in the eyes of the Creator. We see also in this country, we united in order to face the enemy, who came to kill us. So, we have the strength to overcome, to fight. But that's undesirable.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: It's completely not the place. And we have to come to the revelation, also from every time we come to a state of oppositeness, to add more and more. So, what's the desirable way? A friend asked about it, you tried to explain, but still…
M. Laitman: I tried to explain, and the more I spoke, as much as I spoke, the situation did not become any clearer.
Student: Not only that, we're coming to a state where there is incorporation of more and more and more people. He writes, it's a whole nation, a whole nation.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: So, how can there be a whole nation? How do you bring everyone into that? It's only torments, like Baal HaSulam writes. Like a bag of nuts that we are inside.
M. Laitman: No, no, no, no. We also need to, on our path, the path of correction, when we connect broken pieces, day in - day out, together more and more. We need to rejoice about that and to see this special work that the Creator gave us. A way to go, to put together a complete form from this puzzle.
Student: What's lacking here is joy, that feeling of...
M. Laitman: The joy, the gladness has to be from the revelation. The gladness has to be in revelation.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (47:30) Well, I heard you say before that in order to connect with the other, a person must disconnect from the previous Creator he had and be involved in a new system. A new system in which he comes to a new reality and into reconnection, and then he can reconnect to the rest of the parts, of the pieces of the soul.
M. Laitman: Did I say that today?
Student: Well, this is what I heard, and this is what I wrote down. So, the first thing a person needs to do is to disconnect from the previous Creator he had? What does it mean to disconnect from the previous Creator I had? I want to connect more to the soul, to the part of the soul. So, the first thing I need to do is to disconnect from the previous Creator. What does that mean? What do I need to do? What should we need? What should we do?
M. Laitman: Disconnect from what we thought of as the Creator in the previous state, previous degree.
Student: I understand the meaning of the words in Hebrew, but what does that mean? What should a person, or a group, or a Ten do in order to decide to disconnect from the previous Creator it had, in order to rise to a new level of connection? What does that mean?
M. Laitman: Unless you grab hold to the new Creator, you cannot disconnect from the previous Creator.
Student: And what is this new Creator? There's an old Creator here, new Creator. What does that mean? I don't understand the term, “previous Creator,” “new Creator.”
M. Laitman: That's how Kabbalists also write about it.
Student: Right, every day I have a new Creator, etc. I understand it. I'm just, well, we can finally hear what you're saying and what Kabbalists are saying. So, I'm saying, okay, once I heard it, let's try to see what to do with it.
M. Laitman: What to do with it? Simply to try and reach the new Creator. The new Creator is the one who arranged us together, the one who puts us together, who's holding us together at a time where we're unable to hold on one next to the other. And the one who advances us daily. He advances us, and we see that we're about to make it, and we'll see.
Student: Okay, maybe one last question about that. When we disconnect from the previous Creator, from what connects us today, if I understand correctly, this is the previous Creator that we have here. What keeps us from dispersing into, I don't know, everywhere?
M. Laitman: That's also the Creator.
Student: Is there an operation we can do or something we can decide among us? We want to get rid of the previous Creator and move to the new Creator. What should we do?
M. Laitman: Just go to the new Creator each time. Advance toward a more correct, more truthful Creator that you can reveal.
Student: And how do we find out what is this new Creator?
M. Laitman: That in the connection with the friends. And of course, there are additional actions for us to observe, to keep, and then we will attain the upper force, this common force.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (52:48) Let's say, we have an opportunity to ask the whole nation this evening: “Are you ready to have Arvut, to have mutual responsibility or not?” What does it mean that a nation is ready for this question? What amount of knowledge should there be in the nation in order for them to be willing to answer the question, ready?
M. Laitman: It's never a matter of quantity. You never count the heads or fingers. Rather, it's always the intensity, the power of connection. It's a quantity that becomes a quality.
Question (Holland): (53:46) To continue this discussion of the collection of the forces working on us - in our Ten, we’d like to collect all these forces. We're talking about 600,000. It isn't a number, but what does it mean, let's say, that we collect all these forces working on us? And what are these forces?
M. Laitman: It's power, an intensity, the level of connection. This, too, should become clearer, that level, the intensity of connection.
Question (CzechSlovak 4): (54:48) How can we come to a state of “we will do and we will hear,” and be rewarded?
M. Laitman: Through connection, when we all connect more and more and more, it stems from our connection.
Question (Kyiv1): (55:23) You talked about this force of the 600,000 souls, that it's the seventh Sefirot of Zeir Anpin. How do we discover in the Ten this power of 600,000 souls?
M. Laitman: I didn't get the question.
Student: How in the Ten do we discover the power of the 600,000 souls?
M. Laitman: It's simply revealed as filling, fulfillment.
Student: But you also said we have to feel that we are in one room, all of us together. And often, our meetings and the work we do have this feeling, as if we are in one room. But what is the addition here, so that this force will appear?
M. Laitman: The mutual force of the mass of souls, or heaviness.
Question (Women Turkiye 7): (57:01) To what feeling should one come in order not to worry about his own needs? To what inner feeling should he come in order not to worry about his own needs?
M. Laitman: Adhesion with the Creator. I need to be in adhesion with the Creator. Let's say that it's like a little child with his dad, like a loyal butler to his master, a loyal servant to his master. That I receive commandments, orders, directives, and I carry them out happily.
Student: When a person obtains a Creator through the Ten, does that person obtain, reveal a new me? Does that person become a new person?
M. Laitman: When I discover a new Creator, in each and every degree, I relate to Him in a new way. And that's how I climb higher and higher.
Question (Women Spa): (59:36) What to do so that the bad envy, that's revealed in the Ten among the friends, becomes a good envy, and we can come to “Love your friend as yourself?”
M. Laitman: I didn’t get it.
Student: She's asking how to turn the bad envy that's revealed in the Ten among the friends, into a good envy that can lead them to loving one another?
M. Laitman: Using the speech, talking about it, break down the partitions and make a connection through speaking. It's very important. They can advance in the wisdom, but between the parts of the soul there will be no added connection, you have to break it.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:01:17) What internal or external relation should be expressed among the friends?
M. Laitman: I didn't get it.
Student: When we approach our root, mutual responsibility, what is the inner or outer relation toward the friends?
M. Laitman: The inner attitude, when I wish to be connected with them with all my feelings, with all the intentions, with all the actions, spiritual actions, corporeal actions, whatever’s possible to do with them together, and I want to completely annul myself before them. That's how I relate to the friends.
Student: Sometimes I relate to myself in a way that I demand from myself, but I can't have the same relation, same attitude toward the friends.
M. Laitman: Right.
Student: I need to relate to them differently, not as I do toward myself.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: So what kind of relation is it?
M. Laitman: Love. Toward the friends, it's a relation of love. That's the sign of connection.
Student: Why is it so hidden?
M. Laitman: It's not hidden, it's simply not yet in the air between us, but if you would think about it, each one just a little bit, throughout the day, you'll feel that you're in an ocean of love.
Student: I understand.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:03:23) I heard you say, a new Creator. It is written, and a new king arose over Egypt, that pharaoh. Is this what you meant?
M. Laitman: No. I meant that day in and day out, as Kabbalists say, and it's written about it in a few places, we have a new Creator.
Student: That new Creator, is that a feeling of a person on our path erasing everything, everything that happened yesterday? He erases everything he wrote, and discovers it anew?
M. Laitman: Maybe. It's possible, except I don't recommend you build on these thoughts.
Student: Because the way I feel it, every day there's something new here, or we take something new with us in the connection. How is the feeling of a new Creator expressed in the connection between us?
M. Laitman: It's expressed in the new connection.
Student: What is it?
M. Laitman: The connection between us.
Student: What does this new connection between us look like?
M. Laitman: When we approach the new connection with the friends, we feel with each passing day that today I want to relate to them differently than yesterday, or the day before yesterday. And so we renew the connection.
Student: Can I say that the friend opened up to me in a new way, I see in him qualities I didn't see?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: I want to bring him closer to me because it happens between us.
M. Laitman: You're thinking about yourself and not of him.
Student: Right. So, how do I think about him?
M. Laitman: You need to discover in him a greater inclination toward connection.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:05:47) The question of agreeing, should it constantly be before our eyes?
M. Laitman: Agree with what?
Student: If I agree to enter this great work. They were all asked as one nation if they agreed.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: So, is there a point in scrutinizing it in the Ten? Because this question is a matter of development. Each one comes to it in some different way, right?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: How do we come to it? Because he writes that each of the members of the nation was asked if he agreed. How do we come to this question together?
M. Laitman: Together. It doesn't have to be like this where everyone is asking through the microphone or something, no. Rather the question awakens in the heart.
Student: Personally, individually?
M. Laitman: Individually.
Student: And there's no point bringing it up in the Ten?
M. Laitman: You can.
Student: Even if each one, because we said it's a matter of development and each one has to come to it at his own pace.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: Should we nevertheless awaken it, and talk about it, and try to understand?
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: And until each member of the nation agrees?
M. Laitman: The more we grow, the more the gaps between us will grow, and the questions and misunderstanding could also be much greater.
Student: But the work is still to rise above it, as we learned. Shouldn't there be a basic agreement of each one in order to advance?
M. Laitman: Yes, but together with that we have to work on our disagreements also. Why do we have such opinions and other opinions? So on and so forth. We need to answer ourselves that it comes from the lack of equivalence, and from a lack of feeling the Creator equally among everyone.
Student: And then what is the work? The minute we identify that it came from inequivalence in the Ten, meaning we identify the situation?
M. Laitman: We have to check where does it come from? Does it stem from variations in the senses? Or from the intensity of the work that I invest, which is different? Here, this is the work, these are the scrutinies. We have to always ask, when can we reach a common ground? In this common ground, meaning in such states, so that we can feel ourselves, that we are together, and then we can determine for ourselves, for all of us, a single feeling in there in the time being, to make certain actions of equivalence. We'll talk about it.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:09:59) A person naturally wants to bring order into his life. He wants to understand the truth, to kind of fixate things. And relations of mutual responsibility require constant changes to destroy what you thought was right before, the old Creator, and aspire to see the change as the aspiration for the next thing. How do we reconcile these two forces? On the one hand, we want order and understanding and organize things correctly. on the other hand, the relations between us constantly require changes.
M. Laitman: This is our entire work. We need to go from the state I'm in right now, and I understand, and I know all of the environment, and all the forms that exist in us, and together with that, I need to change. I need to change the environment. I need to climb it.
Student: So, why is there this constant desire to put order in things?
M. Laitman: Because I'm afraid I'm losing myself.
Student: So, it's good that we want to put order.
M. Laitman: It's from lack of understanding, lack of identification with the system.
Student: So, a state of a Kabbalist at the end of correction, he doesn't want to put order anymore, he's willing to… anything that comes from the Creator, and that's it?
M. Laitman: You say he's in the end of correction?
Student: Yes.
M. Laitman: So what does he have to change?
Student: Not to change, but the desire to understand, the desire to understand, the desire to organize templates, make things clear.
M. Laitman: That's way before that. He's gone through it a long time ago.
Student: So, he's totally dedicated to any change the Creator wants to kind of put on him, and he's a...
M. Laitman: Yes.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:12:42) So it is written that each time, each day we discover a new Creator. With that, you once said I remember, that if there's contact with the Creator, it should... You should grab hold of that point, and press down, and it creates an area out of it. And also, we remember, I, HaVaYah, do not change, meaning, I, the Lord, do not change. So how to relate to that?
M. Laitman: On our path, we always want to short two ends of the world. If I'm not for myself, who is, and there's None Else Besides Him, and all similar opposites. We are constantly... we find ourselves in making these relative scrutinies between the two. So what are we doing now? We’ll move on. It’s not correct when you stand at a certain point. Try to advance, and then you can circle back, but try to advance.
Reader: The last item of the article, item 17.
Matan Torah [The Giving of the Torah] 17
Reading: (01:15:03) From all the above, we can understand one of the most perplexing phrases of our sages: “All of Israel are responsible for one another.” This seems to be completely unjust, for is it possible that if someone sins or commits a sin that upsets his Maker, and I have no acquaintance with him, the Creator will collect his debt from me? It is written, “Fathers will not be put to death for children,” etc., and “Each man will be put to death for his own sin,” so how can they say that I am responsible for the sins of even a complete stranger, of whom I know neither him nor his whereabouts?
And if that is not enough for you, see Masechet Kidushin, 40b: “Rabbi Elazar, the son of Rabbi Shimon, says: ‘Since the world is judged by its majority and the individual is judged by its majority, if he performed one Mitzva, happy is he, for he has sentenced the world to the side of merit. And if he commits one sin, woe unto him, for he has sentenced himself and the world to the side of sin, as it is said, ‘one sinner destroys much good.’’”
Thus, Rabbi Elazar, son of Rabbi Shimon, has made me responsible for the whole world, since he thinks all the people in the world are responsible for one another, and each person brings merit or sin to the whole world by his deeds. This is twice as perplexing.
But according to the above said, we can understand their words very simply; we have shown that each of the 613 Mitzvot in the Torah revolves around that single Mitzva: “Love your friend as yourself.” And we find that such a state can only exist in a complete nation whose every member agrees to it.
M. Laitman: And this, it's clear to us what we need to go to, what we need to reach. Okay? Questions?
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:18:53) What is the impact of a Ten, of a few friends, on the entire system, on the souls?
M. Laitman: There is an influence, but it's pretty weak.
Student: Weak? So what is the role of each Ten with respect to the entirety of the system?
M. Laitman: The role of each Ten is to constantly stand on the discernment, the diagnosis that's in it, of where it is in its wholeness is moving, where it's… in which way it's moving, and in what purpose of scrutiny between them is happening, and how they can through these changes awaken the whole big group to the correct scrutinies.
Student: Out of the whole of humanity, there's the group, and within it the Ten. Now, the Ten elevates itself alongside the entire group, and at what point do the rest of the souls join in?
M. Laitman: What does it have to do with it?
Student: We always say that our role, our duty is to draw the light, to influence the whole system, and to draw the whole of humanity alongside us to the same action for connection. When do we influence everyone like that?
M. Laitman: That is completely, completely not yet our goal before us.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:21:04) The way I understand it, the system of nature will pressure the person, and pressure, and pressure him. It's not of his own choice, but when will he get the free desire to connect?
M. Laitman: Again, what was the end of the question?
Student: What I want to say is, there are forces in nature whose purpose is to bring a person to connection, and they'll pressure the person, pressure, and pressure, so long as the person won't have his own desire to connect.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: The desire to connect, is that one's free will?
M. Laitman: No, there are no free desires. The Creator chose these desires and those souls, and all of that is spread out before us.
Student: And if a person never becomes free, so what is all this about?
M. Laitman: To be a free nation in our land is after we come to a free desire. And we can use it, to live in it. Let's hope that it will happen at some point.
Student: So, this free will, where does it come from? Because the system of nature, there's no freedom in it.
M. Laitman: There's none, there's none. You see there's no free action in the land.
Student: So, where will that will come from?
M. Laitman: Where did it come from, what?
Student: The free will.
M. Laitman: The free desire doesn't arrive yet. We need to come to a state in which we are asking for a free desire, we're choosing a free desire. And then, we might receive it.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:23:31) We heard that this is not about quantity but rather quality. And that turns into connection. I want to ask about the concept of a nation. Baal HaSulaam discusses the entire nation. Who is the nation? Is it a group? Is it a Ten? Is it a group of Kabbalists? Who is the nation that goes through the entire process Baal HaSulaam describes here?
M. Laitman: I think it's the collection of all the special parts from all the souls. And the way they connect, join, and relate to the upper force, that's called a nation.
Student: So, is it a qualitative state?
M. Laitman: It's certainly a qualitative state.
Student: So, it's a certain intensity of connection which occurs in what? A Ten, two people, many people?
M. Laitman: It's the power of connection that is something that comes out of each and every Ten. And this is how they connect, the Tens.
Student: So, if we try to apply this to our world, Bnei Baruch, is it our global Ten, the global group, is it each Ten individually, is it a few of them?
M. Laitman: The closest thing to this is the world Ten.
Student: So, there is a certain power of connection here, which is derived from a group of people who want that connection, right? It cannot be individuals.
M. Laitman: No, it has to be quantity and quality.
Student: So, there is a degree of connection here that we need to achieve together.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: Now, within the global group, we're very diverse, very different. We come from different degrees, different levels. So, how do you settle all that, or is it not important?
M. Laitman: It's completely not important, completely not important.
Student: Is there any relative kind of relation here, where each one needs to get their…
M. Laitman: That's on the way. It's still early to talk about that, but there is between us in this little, several essential changes. I think that towards the summer, we will change, we will change a lot.
Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:27:21) I return to the end of the article. How can we understand the idea that the whole of Israel are guarantors for each other if it also says here that each one will be put to death for his own sin, never for another's? How does that work together?
M. Laitman: Because each in his individual life observes the commandments of himself, or the commands of himself. And with that, everyone together observes the will of the Creator.
Student: I'm responsible for my own actions.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: And if I sin or do something good, then I get the results.
M. Laitman: Yes.
Student: So, that part I understand. But what about the part where it says that all of Israel are responsible for each other? I'm responsible. My sins cause my death, or do they also harm others? I don't understand where it connects.
M. Laitman: Your sins come to the whole of the nations, all of the souls. And these souls take on a change, that you did this for them.
Student: And do I harm only those who are in Arvut with me, or do I harm everyone? Even those who don't enter into that rule of Arvut?
M. Laitman: Also in everyone.
Student: So, what does it mean that each person is put to death for his own sins?
M. Laitman: I don't yet have words to explain that. We will understand, we will truly understand soon. We'll enter the convention, and our minds will change.
Reader: We can continue to the next part of the lesson, selected excerpts about obtaining contact with the Creator.
M. Laitman: Well, that's always relevant.
Reader: So, a song, and then the next part, please.
(Song) : (01:30:16)