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

Daily Morning Lesson: June 24, 2025 

Part 1: Recorded lesson - Oct 9, 2021. Baal HaSulam, Shamati #16. What Is the Day of the Lord and the Night of the Lord, in the Work?

Reader: Hello friends, we will begin today's lesson studying Shamati 16, “What Is the Day of the Lord and the Night of the Lord, in the Work?” We will be watching a recorder lesson from the 9th of October, 2021. 

Reader: We are studying the article of Baal HaSulam, Shamati #16, “What Is the Day of the Lord and the Night of the Lord, in the Work?” You can find the study material in Sviva Tovah and the Arvut system.  Shamati 16.

M. Laitman: (00:58) We are continuing to study the Shamati articles according to order. The order doesn’t determine anything and we can see that also there is a date at the articles and a topic. Rather they are appearing so we study them. Let's get into it, let's open our hearts, let's try to pay more attention to what it says. Let’s try to be as close as possible to the text and to the understanding of the text. Let's get more excited from it and in this way, we will see this each and every day and of course every day we feel different. The day must always start from the night, and we must understand in our studies also as we start to get into what it says and we want to connect with what it says, then we discover ourselves as impervious, not understanding, not feeling or remembering, not being in the same excitement that we had yesterday. In spite of that, more effort and a bit more pressure, feeling together and through that we begin to come back to consciousness, understanding and feeling and in that way we will advance and it into the day. What is the day of the Lord and the night of the Lord in the work.

Reader: Shamati, Article #16. What Is the Day of the Lord and the Night of the Lord, in the Work?

Reading: (03:03) Shamati #16. What Is the Day of the Lord and the Night of the Lord, in the Work?

I heard in 1941, Jerusalem

Our sages said about the verse, “Woe unto you who desire the day of the Lord! Why do you need the day of the Lord? It is darkness, and not light” (Amos 5): “There is an allegory about a rooster and a bat that were awaiting the light. The rooster said to the bat, ‘I am waiting for the light since the light is mine. But you, why do you need its light?’” (Sanhedrin 98b). The interpretation is that since the bat has no eyes to see, what does it gain from the sunlight? On the contrary, to one who has no eyes, sunlight only makes it darker.  

M. Laitman: Because he knows that there is a matter of seeing here but he doesn't have eyes and so if there is light then one who does not have eyes is considered for him that he is losing his flaws, whereas if there is no light if there is darkness then one who has eyes or doesn’t have eyes there is no difference. It is the light of the lord and when it comes to the bat it comes in order to emphasize that the bat is missing his eyes.

Reading: (04:36) Shamati #16. What Is the Day of the Lord and the Night of the Lord, in the Work?

We must understand that allegory, meaning how the eyes are connected to looking in the light of the Creator, which the text names “the day of the Lord.” They gave an allegory in that regard about a bat, that one who has no eyes remains in the dark.

We must also understand what is the day of the Lord, what is the night of the Lord, and what is the difference between them. We discern the day of people by the sunrise, but with the day of the Lord, in what do we discern it?

The answer is, as the appearance of the sun. In other words, when the sun shines on the ground, we call it “day.” When the sun does not shine, it is called “darkness.” It is the same with the Creator. A day is called “revelation,” and darkness is called “concealment of the face.”

This means that when there is revelation of the face, when it is as clear as day for a person, this is called “a day.” It is as our sages said about the verse, “‘The murderer rises at daytime to kill the poor and indigent; and in the night, he is as a thief.’ Since he said, ‘and in the night, he is as a thief,’ it follows that light is day. He says there, that if the matter is as clear to you as light that comes over the souls, he is a murderer, and it is possible to save him in his soul” (Psachim 2). Thus, we see that in the matter of “day,” the Gemara says that it is a matter as clear as day.

It follows that the day of the Lord will mean that the guidance by which the Creator leads the world will be clearly in the form of good and doing good. For example, when one prays, his prayer is immediately answered and he receives what he has prayed for, and one succeeds wherever one turns. This is called “the day of the Lord.”

Conversely, darkness, which is night, will mean concealment of the face. This brings one doubts in the guidance of good and doing good, and foreign thoughts. In other words, the concealment of the guidance brings one all these foreign views and thoughts. This is called “night” and “darkness,” meaning that one experiences a state where he feels that the world has turned dark on him.

Now we can interpret what is written, “Woe unto you who desire the day of the Lord! Why do you need the day of the Lord? It is darkness, and not light.” The thing is that those who await the day of the Lord, it means that they are waiting to be imparted faith above reason, that faith will be so strong, as if they see with their eyes, with certainty, that it is so, that the Creator watches over the world in a manner of good and doing good.

In other words, they do not want to see how the Creator leads the world as The Good Who Does Good, since seeing is contradictory to faith. In other words, faith is precisely where it is against reason. And when one does what is against one’s reason, this is called “faith above reason.”

This means that they believe that the guidance of the Creator over the creatures is in a manner of good and doing good. While they do not see it with absolute certainty, they do not say to the Creator, “We want to see the quality of good and doing good as seeing within reason.” Rather, they want it to remain in them as faith above reason, but they ask of the Creator to give them such strength that this faith will be so strong, as if they see it within reason, that there will be no difference between faith and knowledge in the mind. This is what they, those who want to adhere to the Creator, refer to as “the day of the Lord.”

In other words, if they feel it as knowledge, the light of the Creator, called “the upper abundance,” will go to the vessels of reception, called “Kelim [vessels] of separation.” They do not want this since it will go to the will to receive, which is the opposite of Kedusha [holiness], which is against the will to receive for one’s own sake. Instead, they want to adhere to the Creator, and this can be only through equivalence of form.

However, to achieve this, meaning in order for one to have desire and craving to adhere to the Creator, since one is born with a nature of a will to receive only for one’s own benefit, how is it possible to achieve something that is completely against nature? For this reason, one must make great efforts until he acquires a second nature, which is the desire to bestow.

When one is imparted the desire to bestow, he is qualified to receive the upper abundance and not blemish, since all the flaws come only through the will to receive for oneself. That is, even when doing something in order to bestow, deep inside there is a thought that he will receive something for this act of bestowal that he is now performing.

In a word, man is unable to do anything if he does not receive something in return for the act. In other words, he must enjoy, and any pleasure that one receives for one’s own benefit, that pleasure must cause him separation from the Life of Lives, because of the separation.

This stops one from adhering to the Creator, since Dvekut [adhesion] is measured by the equivalence of form. It is thus impossible to have pure bestowal without a mixture of reception from one’s own powers. Therefore, for one to have the powers of bestowal, we need a second nature, so one will have the strength to achieve equivalence of form.

In other words, the Creator is the giver and does not receive anything, for He lacks nothing, meaning that what He gives is also not because of a lack, that if He has no one to give to, He feels it as a lack.

Rather, we must perceive this as a game. That is, it is not that when He wants to give, it is something that He needs. Instead, this is all like a game. It is as our sages said regarding the queen: She asked, “What does the Creator do after He has created the world?” The answer was, “He sits and plays with a whale,” as it is written, “This whale You have created to play with” (Avoda Zarah, p 3).

The matter of the whale refers to Dvekut and connection (as it is written, “according to the opening of man and the connections”). This means that the purpose, which is the connection of the Creator with the creatures, is only a game; it is not a matter of a desire and a need.

The difference between a game and a desire is that everything that comes in the desire is a necessity. If one does not obtain one’s desire, he is deficient. But with games, even if one does not obtain the thing, it is not considered a lack, as they say, “It is not so bad that I did not get what I planned because it is not so important.” This is so because the desire he had for it was only a game and not serious.

It follows, that the whole purpose is for one’s work to be entirely in bestowal, and he will not have any desire or craving to receive pleasure for his work.

This is a high degree, as it is what happens in the Creator. And this is called “the day of the Lord.” The day of the Lord is called “wholeness,” as it is written, “Let the stars of morning be dark; let it look for light, but have none,” for light is considered wholeness.

When one acquires the second nature, the desire to bestow that the Creator gives him after the first nature, the will to receive, now he receives the desire to bestow, and then one is qualified to serve the Creator in completeness. This is considered “the day of the Lord.”

Thus, one who has not been rewarded with the second nature, to be able to serve the Creator in the manner of bestowal, and waits to be rewarded with this, meaning with bestowal, meaning he has already exerted and did what he could to obtain that force, he is considered to be awaiting the day of the Lord—to have equivalence of form with the Creator.

When the day of the Lord comes, he is elated. He is happy that he has emerged from the control of the will to receive for himself which separated him from the Creator. Now he clings to the Creator and considers it as having risen to the top.

It is the opposite for one whose work is only in self-reception: He is happy as long as he thinks that he will receive some reward from his work. When he sees that the will to receive will not receive any reward for his work, he becomes sad and idle. Sometimes he comes to doubt the beginning and says, “I did not swear on this.”

Thus, moreover, the day of the Lord is attaining the power to bestow. If one were to be told, “This will be your profit from engaging in Torah and Mitzvot,” he would say, “I consider it darkness, and not light,” since this knowledge brings one to darkness.

M. Laitman: Let's awaken a few questions and then we will think, maybe we should make a workshop from this.

Question (Almaty 1): (18:34) Why when one has no eyes does the light create darkness for him?

M. Laitman: Because he sees the difference between him and the others. For them they have eyes and they attain and they feel a different world, and he does not.

Question (Kyiv 1): (19:02) He writes here that there will be no difference between faith and knowledge within reason. What does that mean, how can that be?

M. Laitman: We should reach a state where both the faith and the reason, the knowledge, will be as one, that they are not in contradiction. This is, well, when we reach that, we start to understand how one clothes in the other, that they are not in contradiction. In our world we can feel bad and nevertheless by the thought to rise above that bad feeling and to try to understand that it is to our benefit. Nevertheless, there is a difference between this and that. The purpose of creation is that it won't remain as doubts but also the darkness will shine as light. That we will understand that all of these bad things that we have been through, the will to receive felt them as bad because it is the opposite of the Creator. Therefore, we discover it as the opposite by feeling bad in it and then we have changed our view about it and we turn it into help made against us and good, and this is how we reach it.

Question (Moscow 4): (20:58) The comparison to the thief is not clear. At night he is a thief, and at the day he is a murderer?

M. Laitman: Because the will to receive, it depends on what kind of general state reaches the person - either an accent or a descent. A descent can pull a person even further down and disconnect him from the path of spiritual development, then it is considered that it truly kills him. At a different time when it awakens in a person and the person knows how to use it correctly, then it actually adds a livelihood to the person because then the person understands how much difference there is between his perception of the world and the perception of the world through the will to receive. We will talk more about it.

Question (French): (22:57) What I understood from the text, is that the Creator has no deficiency towards creation and that to Him it is like a game, so it feels like we are not important.

M. Laitman: Who says we're not important?

Student: We have to add importance to the Creator.

M. Laitman: No, we are very important for the Creator. We are very important for the Creator, however, the fact is that He relates to us, seemingly, as if to in a game. A game, means that the action itself doesn’t matter, but above the action itself we determine very important things. A game refers just to the action. That through this action we will want to achieve something more important and then the action is considered a game. That’s it.

Question (Moscow 3): (24:17) In the one before the last paragraph, it is written that when the will to receive receives no reward for its work he becomes sad and idle. In the last sentence it says that sometimes he comes to a state where he regrets it. He regrets what he did.

M. Laitman: It’s when a person is despaired and he regrets that he has invested a few years in coming closer to the Creator and did not succeed. Those few years that he invested he thinks that he just spent them for no reason. He truly is upset with us and I heard it a few times from several students who left us in the past, so they say “I invested in this, let’s say, five years or even ten years, and I didn’t get anything. Where is my reward for investing so much?” Out of the will to receive he is turning to us correctly, but he doesn’t understand that in order to reach the will to bestow and to start to discover that the will to bestow in him is growing and in it he is actually getting a reward, payment - that he doesn’t feel yet. Because he hasn’t yet crossed this boundary called from Lo Lishma to Lishma, from in order to receive to in order to bestow, and this is why he has complaints. The complaints are according to the situation that he is in are just complaints. What can you do, what can you tell him? Nothing. If he didn’t finish his quota of exertion that is what it is called, then he cannot demand anything. And even the fact that he is demanding, that is already an indication that he didn’t finish that quota and he is still in the form of the receiver, demanding. The form that we need to reach is the form of bestowal when I do not demand anything. Specifically, the fact that I do not demand anything is a reward for me. This for me is the reward, that I can go forward, and give more and more, and help more - and this is all of the reward for me. Just like with the Creator who is constantly giving and this is what He enjoys. So I need to reach a state where I am willing to give everyone, and pass on to everyone, arrange and help everyone, and at the time that I am working in such a way, I feel the reward, satisfaction, wholeness, like the Creator. To reach the nature of bestowal that’s our goal. Then we enter a world that is all good. This is called “the next world”, ”the higher world”, and if we don’t reach that then we are empty-handed on both sides. The spiritual world from bestowal I do not enjoy, and from being in reception and wanting to receive but I don’t receive anything and am not given anything, so I am not being harmed from both sides, I am empty on both sides. So, what can I do? This is that special state that actually helps me to advance. And this is how we should understand it and agree with it and actually advance.

Question (Turkiye 1): (29:20) How can I know when the day of the Lord has come?

M. Laitman: When the day of the Lord comes you begin to see that each and every act of bestowal that you’re performing, it brings you fulfillment, light. Coming closer to the Creator, understanding creation, getting to know the true reality - this is called the day of the Lord. When you open up your spiritual eyes and you see the world in its true form.

Question (ITA 3): (20:35) The day of the Lord is when he obtains the power to bestow. Is this the degree that brings us to bestowal? Can you explain what he writes about the day of the Lord?

M. Laitman: The day of the Lord, means that for me the quality of bestowal is considered true, it shines, it is full of forces, of values, when I am in the degree of Bina. If I bestow to others, I feel good in that. And if I see the actions of others, I look at them through the quality of Bina, that they actually want to bestow good to one another. You might put it this way, that the quality of Bina is when I look not according to the act itself but rather according to the intention. The act of bestowal, only the Creator can do it because He is the source, He is the supplier of power. We can only receive. But if I receive from others in order to bestow to them, in order to give them an opportunity to give to me, if we have such ties, such relations of love and connection and I give them an opportunity to bestow to me, I am doing it out of love. Because prior to that I made a restriction over myself and I don’t want to receive. So, out of this game between us, this is why the whole of creation is called a game, that the Creator is playing with the whale. So, if we do this, then we have such a connection between us in the group and we realize that each and every one in such a way is helping the other. Try to play. Try to play in that I am giving to the other, and by me taking from the other, try to look at his actions not according to the act itself but rather according to the intention. According to the intention. It's as if we are making the negative into a positive, it's as if we are replacing the screen, that’s it. And this is called, I saw an opposite world. When I see not the actions of people but rather their intentions. And this is how we will advance to the truth. We will need more and more to try it, question these things, to try to understand the answers, and this is how we will advance.

Question (New York 3): (35:05) We learn, you teach us that we should learn to live in two realities - the corporeal and the spiritual. In our corporeal reality daylight is something that is connected to hope, to opportunities. Day and light in the spiritual world, according to what we learn, creates in us pain and suffering. We see that our qualities and the qualities of the Creator are completely opposite. Why does the Creator make us constantly go into these sufferings, maybe there is a different way without suffering?

M. Laitman: A way which is without suffering - that’s our way. Because you are given opportunities to transition from suffering to joy and pleasure, but this is on the condition that you will understand what the Creator is doing with you. First of all, you need to recognize that what is happening with you comes only from the Creator and not to disconnect from the fact that there is none else besides Him. Second, you need to see in each and every action that it comes from the Good who does good, this is what the Creator is called. Good, Himself, and doing good to everyone and benefiting everyone. If you will try to see Him and His actions in such a way then you will discover the entire system of forces that exist between all of the created beings and the Creator, and this is called the upper world. And this is what we have to do.

Student: But this understanding still comes through suffering.

M. Laitman: No, why?

Student: Are you saying that it comes automatically, that we have to understand because we have a point in the heart?

M. Laitman: We need to sustain ourselves, precisely to know the Creator as the Good who does good, always and for everyone. And if you don’t discover Him in this way, it's a sign you don’t know how to discover Him. It's a sign that it’s not the Creator who is in your mind and heart but another force. That’s what I can say. Besides, I don’t know how often you are in our lessons but if you’re not present every day then you’re not going with us, you’re not getting a daily correction. You can complain for another thousand years, nothing will help.

Question (Turkiye 5): (39:00) What I understand from the article is that our reward is to work in concealment. The greatest gift of the Creator is that He conceals Himself. Is this correct?

M. Laitman: Yes, this is the answer.

Question (Zafon 2): (39:55) How do we reach the right understanding in our work of the Creator’s game?

M. Laitman: Play the way Kabbalists are telling you, play with Him. He’s giving you special conditions and He’s giving you certain activities within what He created, what He built within you, around you. And you should try to seemingly answer Him, just like in a game of chess. He does something to you and you answer Him with different things. In other words, how you relate, because our thoughts are our actions. Normally they are enough, if not do something physical as well. But what determines is your thoughts, your relation. So try to determine, to establish a correct relation to everything that the Creator does around you, to the family, society, work, to you personally, to the world, with everything there is. Try instead to build a network of your relation to reality, of how you want to relate to reality. Out of this, you will build your spiritual self. Try to build this relation correctly, spiritually. As much as possible, uphold it and sustain it. The important thing here is you will determine that the Creator is the good that does good to the bad and to the good. He is interested in promoting every single thing, every single person toward correction and final adhesion, this is His concern. He is in all of us in order to eventually, according to the network of Adam HaRishon, to bring us closer in relationships and ties between us, more and more correct, so we become as one man with one heart. To that extent, we are also incorporated in Him.