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

Daily Lesson (Afternoon), March 12, 2024

Part 1: Baal HaSulam. Shamati, 104. “And the Saboteur Was Sitting.”

Reader: Hello, we're learning the articles of Shamati of Baal HaSulam. Today we'll learn Shamati 104 “And the Saboteur was sitting.” Study materials can be found online in Sviva Tova and the Arvut systems. Shamati 104 “And the Saboteur Was Sitting.” Rav, please.

M. Laitman: It's a short article. And also, and also his basis is also short. That we, in us, inside the person, there is a Saboteur. That he is not letting the person to reach spiritual development. To come closer to the Creator. And he is constantly confusing the person and distances him from the spiritual goal. Let's see what Baal HaSulam says. 

Reading Article: (01:26) Shamati 104 “And the Saboteur Was Sitting.”

In The Zohar, Noah, “There was a flood, and the saboteur was sitting in the midst of it.” He asked, “A flood means a flood of water. This, in itself, is deadly and a saboteur. So what does it mean that the saboteur was sitting in the midst of it, in the midst of the flood? Also, what is the difference between the flood and the saboteur?”

He replied that the flood is corporeal torment, meaning torments of the body. Within it, meaning within the torments of the body, there is yet another saboteur, who sabotages spirituality. This means that the afflictions of the body bring him foreign thoughts until these foreign thoughts sabotage and kill his spirituality.

Re-reading Article: (02:51) Shamati 104. “And the Saboteur Was Sitting.”

In The Zohar, Noah, “There was a flood, and the saboteur was sitting in the midst of it.” He asked, “A flood means a flood of water. This, in itself, is deadly and a saboteur. So what does it mean that the saboteur was sitting in the midst of it, in the midst of the flood? Also, what is the difference between the flood and the saboteur?”

He replied that the flood is corporeal torment, meaning torments of the body. Within it, meaning within the torments of the body, there is yet another saboteur, who sabotages spirituality. This means that the afflictions of the body bring him foreign thoughts until these foreign thoughts sabotage and kill his spirituality.

Question (Women MAK 98): (04:21) The question, the saboteur, these are complaints? How do we run away from them so the saboteur doesn't see us, and we can be safe? 

M. Laitman: We only need to know how we put ourselves against it to put ourselves in such a way that his influence upon us would not be so strong, serious, and threatening.

Student: It turns out that we ourselves are our own Saboteur with our own complaints? 

M. Laitman: Yes, correct. 

Question (Women Moscow 5): (05:19) We discussed this article and came to this question. Are corporeal or sufferings of the soul corporeal? They are very different. Do all of our corporeal sufferings need to bring us to a state that we invert them to the spiritual? How do we do it?

M. Laitman: It all depends on your scrutiny of the problems. Your problems, to what extent do you understand that in essence corporeal problems do not exist? It's only our spiritual problems that are descending down towards us as corporeal problems. Such problems, that's it. 

Student: If we truly unite and work in that direction, our corporeal problems will be there, but we'll still go through them faster. How do we aim ourselves, so they don't disappear, but we'll work with them through the reforming light? How do we do this? 

M. Laitman: You need to depict to yourself that all your corporeal problems will lose their negative form, and then you will flourish, on the contrary, with your advancement to the Creator, and your corporeal problems will disappear.

Question (Turkiye 2): (07:37) Dear Rav, we must be in constant efforts in this preparation for this war. How can we do it constantly so that we will rise above the saboteurs and the floods? 

M. Laitman: We first need to understand that There Is None Else Besides Him, and only the Creator determines and does everything, and besides Him, there is nothing else in the world. And what seems to us as if there are other forces in our world, that is all in all the Creator who is confusing us, that we will not be able to reveal Him so easily, because through our efforts that we make, even though we want to come closer to Him, to reveal Him and to organize everything, in these efforts, by these efforts, we clean the entire ground, the whole world, from foreign forces that are, so to say, opposite to the Creator. And then we succeed in revealing the Creator in the correct and true manner. 

Question (Women Turkiye 7): (09:53) Sometimes I hear and realize what the saboteur is saying, but I feel that I don't have the strength to stand up to the saboteur. Is it possible to create a safe space for myself at this stage? 

M. Laitman: By you coming closer to the friends, you can be in some sort of distance from the saboteur. 

Question (Moscow 1): (10:41) We drown in all the states we get from the Creator automatically? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: Our job is to come out of that flood? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: If we see these states, if we follow them, it's the same status? 

M. Laitman: No, but what we need if it's to define where we are at and to determine where we are at in relation to those questions that the saboteur puts in front of us. 

Student: If we came out of the state and we're not drowning in it, but at the same time it's within us, that we're serving it, it stays within us but we're not drowning in it, how do we call that position correctly? 

M. Laitman: We do not understand that in such a way we do nothing.

Student: So how to make it clearer? 

M. Laitman: To make it clearer if you call this spiritual enemy to a battle and you are ready to be and to stand in front of him. 

Student: Then we're talking about correcting the state that we're in, this is coming out of that battle and it's a logical ending? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: And out of that we get the next degree and the next and in this way we go through everything that we're getting? 

M. Laitman: Yes, this is all correct. 

Question (Kyiv): (12:47) We discussed this article on a call in the Ten a few days ago, and the question from the Ten, how important is the deficiency of the lower ones in the Ten? How can we correct the corporeal states? And how through the spiritual we can correct the corporeal states of the friends? 

M. Laitman: When you turn to the Ten from one of the friends, it gives the Ten a lot of impression and it shakes everybody, and then everybody makes an effort somehow to answer it with the correct answer, to give some kind of correct answer that's why it's very important.

Student: To clarify how important is the outcry of the lower one in the Ten?

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: So, without the deficiency of the lower one it's impossible to correct any corporeal situation? 

M. Laitman: No, it's impossible. 

Question (Women MAK): (14:00) Dear teacher, what will help us to realize the corporeal and spiritual obstacles as help made against, to understand that nothing is stopping, but it's helping us to aspire further to the group and the Creator?

M. Laitman: If you find what is in your way to connect, what is standing on your path to connection in the group, and when you turn together to the Creator in order for Him to strengthen your connection, to give you more strength, more forces to be able to connect, then everything would work out for the better.

Student: How do you guard the interconnection through the Ten throughout the day? 

M. Laitman: I don't think that it's possible. Nevertheless, you will fall and rise, fall and ascend. To stay in one place, there is no such state in the whole world, at all.

Question (Women MAK 26): (15:27) Why is Baal HaSulam so clearly making this distinction that there is this flood and then there is this saboteur within it? Why is that important? 

M. Laitman: Because that's how it happens. There is a state which is called the flood, and there is also the source of this flood. We can call it the saboteur, or we can call it the Creator. Everything is from Him. This way we are the ones who need to determine it.

Student: That flood is like a temporary situation, and the saboteur is always there, is always around, or does it also come due to certain circumstances? 

M. Laitman: The flood and the saboteur are in essence the same thing, but when we talk about it, in general, it's the flood, and when we talk about something individual, it's the saboteur. That's it. 

Question (Tbilisi): (16:50) We are all the same, and I also am not different from others, I don't want to be different from others, and my materialistic problems are the same as everyone's, maybe a little bit more, maybe a little less, but the deficiency to please the Creator, in it I find such joy. I don't feel any materialistic problems. Maybe somebody will call me crazy, how can I not be paying attention to the materialistic problems, but somehow the wind is just scattering it. The main thing is to please the Creator. How do we bring all the friends in the whole world clear to this joy? I want to share this joy with everyone.

M. Laitman: That's something that you need to do gradually. Gradually, gradually everybody will come to it. 

Student: What actions can I do to bring everyone to it, Rav? 

M. Laitman: Continue doing what you're doing.

Question (Women Ukraine 2): (18:02) Question from a friend. We learned that in spirituality nothing is lost. What does it mean that the saboteur is killing the spirituality in me? What is his function from the Creator? 

M. Laitman: His role is in frightening you, showing you that there are higher states and that he can throw you away from these states. 

Student: How do we guard each other from the saboteur? 

M. Laitman: You need to connect between you more and more, and turn to the Creator, that He will help us to connect. 

Question (Women ITA): (18:55) If and how it helps us to share the impressions we receive from reading the articles before the midday lesson? 

M. Laitman: It's very good if you read the article before the lesson, then you already have an understanding of what we're talking about. 

Reader: The question is, she is also asking about whether it's good that they share impressions from the reading. If they're reading the article in preparation for the lesson, there's no question about that. But the question is, besides reading it, should they also share between them the impressions that they get from the article? Should I share it with the attendants? Is it worthwhile preparing for the lesson?

M. Laitman: I wouldn't rush to do so. Firstly, find out what exactly is written in the article, and all the rest of the things are in the discernment, and then we can see.

Question (Women Piter): (20:39) Dear Rav, if we don't correct something in spirituality, it immediately turns into something corporeal. How, from the corporeal problem, do we clarify what exactly we need to correct in spirituality? 

M. Laitman: There is no possible way that you can discern your state at the moment. But what you can do is what we study, meaning to invest the complete effort in order to connect all your businesses, and your thoughts together. That's what you need. 

Question (Women MAK 51): (21:34) The corporeal suffering is the flood. Can a saboteur exist without the flood? And what is the difference between the saboteur within the flood or without it? 

M. Laitman: The flood is so the person would feel that from all directions he's been pulled down, and he's been drowned, and he's simply suffocating and drowns and dies. A flood is a state, an action, which is very serious and powerful. Therefore, we are very frightened from a flood. 

Question (KabU 10): (21:22) The term flood specifically, does that imply that we are completely submerged in this illusion of the senses and our desires in our day-to-day life, which is this flood we're speaking of. We have to hold in our hearts the thin thread that connects the friends to the Creators.

M. Laitman: The flood comes to us and confuses us as if we are in a whirlpool that turns us around and drags us down. And that, in essence, is the flood that's not letting us come out of it. And we feel to what extent we are more and more without air. Without air meaning without intentions, without actions of bestowal. Only in order to receive, it constantly pulls us towards it more and more.

Question (Women Turkiye 8): (24:07) Does the feeling of lacking fear come from ignorance, or does it come from a spiritual strength? 

M. Laitman: Lack of fear, it's only for beginners that they don't completely understand where they are at, or where they are at.

Question (Women MAK 25): (24:43) Is there a difference when I see that the foreign thoughts start within me or if I see such thoughts start to take over in a friend? 

M. Laitman: There is no difference. There is no difference. In any case, you will drown each other.

Student: Is that from those thoughts we shouldn't, we shouldn't share these impressions so we wouldn't drown each other?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Women Moldova): What will save us from the flood? What thoughts when we feel that we are suffocating and nothing will save us? 

M. Laitman: You need to hold on to each other together. Hold on together. And together, all of you, to try and to rise, to come out of the water together, to pull one another.

Question (Women Turkiye 10): (26:27) How do we recognize the saboteur in us? What does he say to us when he confuses us? 

M. Laitman: We cannot, in advance, know about the saboteur only under the condition that the Creator arranges our advancement. Only out of that can we recognize the force that wants to nullify us, to cancel us, to confuse us. That wants us to drown in the flood.

Question (Women Spain): (27:37) The saboteur is working for the Creator in order to strengthen us in adhesion with the Creator? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: Can I ask another question?  Is the saboteur and the angel of death the same thing?

M. Laitman: No. The saboteur is, so to say, a part of the angel of death as if he wants to kill you. But eventually, he wants you to overcome and rise above. 

Question (Women Turkiye 9): (29:07) In the beginning there was only the Creator. Then he created man and gave him the soul. So man is a supreme being. Finally, the ego separates us. The ego is afraid of dying. But we can make the ego our partner and tell it that we will succeed with its help and that it will be very nice. Is it correct what I'm saying now? 

M. Laitman: Correct, correct. 

Question (Women PT 25): (29:50) The reason why the Creator gives us corporeal sufferings is for us to justify him above it? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: That's the correction? It's like a test that the Creator gives us? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: Why is he giving us such a test that seemingly I'm giving you something bad in corporeality so that above it you will justify me? 

M. Laitman: So we will know above it to justify him. 

Student: And this is something I need to hold in my head all the time, to hold the reason that the Creator gives it all the time? 

M. Laitman: Try, yes.

Question (Women Polish): (30:44) In the Saboteur these are incorrect perceptions of reality that doesn't let us see that the Creator is The Good That Does Good. Can we fight with them by ourselves, or do we need a group?

M. Laitman: A person alone cannot do it.

Student: Just the Ten?

M. Laitman: Yes.? 

Question (Women MAK 36): (31:10) Question from a friend. The Saboteur inside of a person, he influences the reality or just directly in the person in which he's operating? 

M. Laitman: I didn't understand.

Student: Again, the Saboteur within a person, he influences the surroundings or…? 

M. Laitman: The Saboteur within the person influences the person and through him the environment. 

Question (Women MAK 70): (31:51) I have a question for my friend in the Ten. If there is no state of birth, does it mean that I'm not working enough in the group and that I'm in this big ego?

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Question (Women Heb 2): (32:11) It's written at the end of the article that this means that the affliction of the body brings in foreign thoughts, and these foreign thoughts sabotage and kill in spirituality. When the person is in suffering, then he doesn't think about spirituality. And so, we overcome the suffering of the body, which is not for nothing. So, how do we overcome the suffering of the body that they will not sabotage our advancement in spirituality? How do we do it? 

M. Laitman: How do we do this? We are reading about this all the time. First of all, we pray. All the time we relate to the Creator, and we ask of Him. 

Student: How do we help the friends to overcome this suffering? 

M. Laitman: Through an example. With an example.

Student: It's hard to understand. Why would the Creator want to disconnect the person from Him? This is, in essence, what the saboteur does.

M. Laitman: Probably that it doesn't disconnect, but only for a certain time, He distances him. 

Student: Is it in order for the connection to strengthen because of this attempt? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Women Brasil): (33:57) Can you explain how does the connection in the Ten, which is focused on adhesion to the Creator, changes our perception in spirituality and protects us from foreign thoughts?  

M. Laitman: That's how the system is built. To the extent that we want to distance from the bad influence, from the bad connection, so then we can draw the good forces.

Question (Women French): (34:57) Does the bodily afflictions, something that is obligated to happen, and it repeats itself so we cannot come to overcoming? And the second question is, is the overcoming the quality of Hesed mercy? 

M. Laitman: Both this and that are correct. Meaning the corporeal sufferings, it's a part of the general sufferings. And we can understand that through the bodily sufferings, we also correct our intentions, our actions for them to be closer to the Creator.

Question (Women Kyiv 7): (36:04) The corporeal afflictions are the entire suffering, the corporeal suffering or just the physical suffering, the physical body suffering.

M. Laitman: The physical body, what other body is there? 

Student: We talk about spirituality, and corporeality is everything for the person, spirituality is everything for the Creator. 

M. Laitman: No, no, we still don't have all these distinctions. All that we feel is disturbances, this is still in the materialistic body, and it's all coming from above.

Student: What does the saboteur put to death in spirituality?

M. Laitman: He, with the help of such sickly feelings, he distracts us from the Creator. 

Student: So, he doesn't let us connect. 

M. Laitman: Yes, yes. 

Student: How to understand that I'm connecting correctly? 

M. Laitman: Sometimes when we prepare some sort of food, then we have a recipe, how to follow the recipe in order to make the food that will come out tasty.

Student: How do I know to add what's correct without destroying the flavor? 

M. Laitman: If it's for the sake of the group and the Creator, then you can add whatever, whatever is necessary. 

Student: You can never destroy the connection? 

M. Laitman: No. The connection never destroys.

Question (Women PT33): (37:53) You described that the flood is as if a person has been drowned from all directions, and he suffocates and dies. My question is, is that a state that each and every friend should go along the path, or can we avoid it? 

M. Laitman: Ultimately, we need, but because that you're connected with each other, then there are such things that don't have to pass through everyone. Parts do work on it, and a part doesn't.

Question (Women MAK 86): (38:39) When the flood comes, and the corporeal problems, we need to connect with the Ten and ask the Creator. I would like to know, what is the correct request? What are the correct words that we need to turn to the Creator with?

M. Laitman: He truly needs to say it out of his own feelings. We cannot act in such a way. Dig within yourself, find these words, and turn to the Creator. 

Question (Women MAK 26): (39:28) Dear Rav, do I understand correctly that the Creator gives the flood in order to disconnect this connection in this degree and to awaken it in a newer degree? 

M. Laitman: In order to raise us from this level to a higher one, He gives the feeling of a flood. 

Student: Does it turn out that if a person tries nevertheless, to hold on to whatever he has already attained or understood, then by that, he is drowning more? Meaning, here we need to specifically look for a new quality, a new degree, and that's what pulls you up?

M. Laitman: That's absolutely correct.

Question (Women MAK 97): (40:35) Someone can fall from the corporeal problems, someone can be elevated and look for the Creator? 

M. Laitman: That's not clear for us, but a person needs to always think that in front of him he has his correct choice, and in this way, he will move forward. 

Question (Women Moscow 4): (41:11) A question from a friend. When a person is in the flood, can he pray? And if so, what is this state that the person can't even pray?

M. Laitman: If he cannot pray, then it's very bad. Very bad. Probably the Creator already doesn't give him such a state of a prayer. I don't know. I don't think any of us have such a state. This is a purely theoretical state. Such cases, it depicts a few of such cases. But this is for the people that the Torah talks about.

Student: How to come out of this state and to see that there is an opportunity to pray? 

M. Laitman: To resist it. To the darkness and lacking the strength and all the time to move towards the Creator. 

Question (Women English 1): (42:50) Pardon me, dear Rav if I am asking a question that is too elemental. But I need to go back to some of your answers before here in this discussion. How should I understand that thoughts and feelings are coming to me in a flawed situation but originating from outside the Creator? I cannot wrap my mind around this. How can anything come from outside the Creator who is filling up the whole of reality? I don't understand how it works. 

M. Laitman: Well, let's accept it first of all, that this is how it works. And afterward, also not today or tomorrow, we'll see how it truly works with all of the internal qualities and the external ones of this flood. We'll see.

Student: Thank you very much.

M. Laitman: There are a lot of forces that are acting in it and we little by little are entering and talking about it. 

Question (Women French): (45:14) The question when we are in a flood and we suffer, when we pray, what should we be thinking about? The suffering or the corrected state that we want to reach? 

M. Laitman: We need to pray for the Creator to give us the strength to rise above our ego which now wants to drown us in the floodwaters. 

Student: When I ask for strength, at that time, I'm thinking about the suffering and the afflictions. Is the Creator going to give me the force, the powers of the suffering or to be released from the suffering?

M. Laitman: I don't know. The Creator is always doing what's to your benefit. Either he gives you the strength to overcome the state, the not good state that he puts you into, or he corrects that bad state in its foundation. Maybe he wants to give you more time to be in this bad force so that afterwards to bring you a bigger good force. 

Question (Women Latin): (47:35) How much does the extent that the saboteur influences us depend on the root of our soul? 

M. Laitman: Yes, and also on the saboteur itself. It's what the Creator determines. 

Question (Women Lithuania): (48:11) When the Creator gives the friend some sort of a corporeal problem for many years, and it is not solved in any way, it doesn't depend on our friends. So how should the friends relate to it, and is it in the strength of the Ten to solve that problem? 

M. Laitman: Pray to the Creator. Pray to the Creator, everyone all together. 

Student: What do we ask for? 

M. Laitman: For their problems, for health, etc. Ask.

Student: The friend. How to overcome it, because it drains the strength from her and the Ten who is constantly in it. So how are we meant to look at this problem? 

M. Laitman: Like I said, just to pray and ask. 

Question (Women Moscow 20): (29:25) Do we need to wait till the friend turns to us for help if we see that the flood covers her? Or we don't need to wait for her to turn to us?

M. Laitman: We don't need to wait. We need to pray for all of our friends and the Ten, for the Creator to advance them even further forward.

Question (Asia): (50:14) It is all for us to connect more, right? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: It doesn't have to be specifically that a friend receives hardening or burdening. It's not because of him, it's because of the entire state?

M. Laitman: Correct. 

Question (Siberia): (50:41) When there's a choice between the two commandments that you cannot choose between the two at the same time, this is important and that's important. It's as if stretching you in both ends, and it happens so fast and it's not clear to you what to do. How do you act in such an instance? 

M. Laitman: No, when you put it aside, you won't do anything. So take one, whichever one is closer to you on the right side, and then afterward the other one. 

Student: If it happens in the lesson, does that mean I don't have to listen to the friends but to scrutinize it? 

M. Laitman: No, because during the lesson then you need to be fully connected with the friends. Clear? 

Question (Women MAK 67): (51:45) Thank you for the opportunity to ask. If the friend is so much into the flood, into her corporeal problems, that she can't even see our example because you said to a friend that we need to give an example in order to draw someone out of the flood. And it seems as if we're sometimes working at the edge of our strength. And it seems like the friends are working so hard that the rope between us might tear away. What to do in such a state? 

M. Laitman: I understand you, but there's nothing you can do. Altogether you need to strengthen that connection between you and at the same time to turn to the Creator.

Question (Women Moscow 11): (52:45) Sorry about the camera. I have a problem. This article reminded me about a story about the Creator and the Rav that is very devoted to Him. And you said a while ago that the floodwater wants to drown us and destroy us in this allegory. 

M. Laitman: Okay, but what further? 

Student: He said that the Rav is not completely devoted to Him, and he sent messengers to check Him. So…[translator did not understand, sorry].

M. Laitman: You need to read the same article many times and then between you to discuss it and only then will you be able to hear what I said during the lesson.

Question (Women Spain): (54:32) The question is what powerful strength can make the saboteur leave us? Is it the prayer or the intention? 

M. Laitman: Prayer with the intention that you just want to be connected with the Creator until the saboteur leaves you. 

Question (Women Ukraine 2): (55:10) What is the difference between the flood and the final state of the sea that we need to die in? 

M. Laitman: It's not the same thing. These are different states. We are in the exodus from Egypt this is already a completely different state on the path. 

Student: Simply when the spirituality covers you it doesn't seem like salvation it seems like death.

M. Laitman: Well, how you determined it, let it be so in the meantime. 

Question (Latin 12): (55:54) We heard that there is no Torah without flour, and you gave us a recommendation to pray on that topic. Question? Is there a connection between what you said in regards to without flour there is no Torah to the corporeal afflictions of the body? Sometimes friends are influenced. The problem of the friend influences the entire Ten? Because we sometimes tell him that it's related to the root of his soul.

M. Laitman: I'm sorry but I need to stop the lesson. 

Reader: Let's finish with a song.

Song: (57:30)