Morning Lesson February 12, 2022 Transcription
Transcription is made from simultaneous translation which leaves a possibility for differences in the audio
Part 1:
Baal HaSulam. Introduction to The Book of Zohar. #26
1.Rav’s Introduction: We need to continue reading and understand what he has to tell us.
Reading Item 26 (00:26)
2. R. (02:36) That is the first state necessitates the third state and therefore the third state exists already in eternity and we reach a state that is already fixed, that exists already, that we are already incorporated in it we exist in the final wholeness. It is only with respect to us for us to provide vessels for it, our labor, our desire to reach that to the extent that we open up with the right desire to receive the third state in some part, some style, then we discover that third state and here we reach all of it.
3. S. (03:33) It's understood that we need a big will to receive and put an intention on it but what is the process by which this desire has to be killed first and then revived?
R. The will to receive like you also said is a will to receive, to begin with the intentions to receive and we have to open it up in order to receive and turn it to be in order to bestow. We cannot do it with a single action because it is very, very great and therefore it opens up in many parts one up to the other both according to their quantity and according to their quality and this is how we correct it. We do not know what needs to open up in what form, how this will influence us, we simply need to be ready to receive the entire will to receive that is separating between us making us fight each other, everything that it does against the connection between us and our connection with the Creator. We have to check, see, correct and change it and this is how we will advance through equivalence of form of the Creator.
S. He says that one is open, this is called being extinguished and lost in the second state?
R. Yes, but gradually we are in the shattering of the vessels so the broken vessels open up to us gradually according to the light that works on them from above through these broken vessels. When it comes to us we discover that will to receive in us and then along with that through all kinds of actions we can draw the reforming light. Not the light that broke the vessel but the light that stands ready to correct the vessel. Then we seemingly have these two elements, one element one input is the broken vessel with a will to receive, on the other hand we have the light which is in order to bestow and when we between us, we exist in a way that we want to meet these two vessels and correct one through the other and this is how it happens in this process and this process is called Tikkun, correction. This is what we have ahead of us.
Reading item 27 (06:37) twice
4. R. (10:25) This means that all in all, it is clear to us what it is it that we have to do we have to bring upon ourselves the reforming light and it has to do this work and it does this work in a way that it removes from us entirely all of the limitations and bit by bit we can come closer to the state of an order to bestow. As he says here, that one, we must completely remove it, remove the will to receive in order to receive with the intention to receive, up to its last end, until nothing is left of it. Two, later on we can receive in it once again the will to receive but once we put on top of it the intention to bestow. Meaning everything follows the intention to entirely remove all the intentions that are entirely to receive and then accordingly how much we can work in order to bestow then below it we can place the will to receive then we work with the will to receive to have the will to bestow.
5. S. (11:43) What is the difference between rotting of the body and the Excerpt 26 and the fact that we have to remove it, it implies likely in the second part that we do something ourselves that we have to remove it, is there a difference?
R. We only need to want to emerge from an order to receive and enter in order to bestow. That is it. This is what we need and to do it with all kinds of actions of connection between us so that they will show all of us that we truly are in such actions of bestowal and connection, this is what we need. Therefore first of all we have to reach a state where we understand that we do not have between us, we cannot have between us a place for any individual will to receive for anyone. Later on, that we assemble between us bonds of connection, mutual connection that is that each one wants to do good to the other towards the advancement of the other and we are friends in that. This is how we advance. So first we want to cleanse ourselves of the will to receive as much as we can detect it, that it exists between us and later on instead of it, we want to reach mutual bestowal, mutual support, each one shall help his friend and in that way we will advance. So all of these things have to be accompanied by a prayer to the Creator so that all in all both to get rid of in order to receive, of the intention to receive and also to become equipped with the intention to bestow. We can do it only by receiving by him support the reforming light and it comes according to how much we need it.
6. S. (14:41) Where does a person feel himself at the time when the intention to receive, you've gotten rid of it and the intention to bestow has not come?
R. This is called between Heaven and Earth. Each time we exist in the states, some of our desires, some of our desires are in that and we do not know and we have to scrutinize it. This is called between Heaven and Earth, a state of scrutiny and here we greatly need the connection between us in order to put together our inclinations, our intentions, our desires in order to receive to in order to bestow, where are we. Then in a prayer to the Creator we will start to get the reforming light. We have to understand the reforming light does not work on an individual because there is no such thing as being in the quality of bestowal as an individual but rather whom do you want to bestow, whom do you want to connect to, through their friends to the Creator. Here we still need to understand that without actualizing ourselves in the group we do not reach the Creator. Those sentences that we hear or read from the words of the Kabbalists they are very clear and closed.
We cannot reach love of the Creator except through love of people. Connection with the Creator only out of us establishing a connection between us and in it the Creator is revealed and therefore the most important is to depict to ourself those corrected states and then to try to ask for them. Here each one should help his friend both in detecting how far we are, how much we need that state and how much we realize that this is not within our power to do it, but we can ask, we can demand from the Creator that he will help us. To the extent that our request is established pretty much correctly and of course there will be many problems still there, this is why we have 125 degrees to correct our intentions each and every time until the intention will truly be truly in order to bestow, a hundred percent but more that we try to go in that we get corrections from above each time. The reforming the light works each time and corrects all types of things within us, thoughts, desires, actions, towards people, towards society and this is how we advance.
S. Who helps me more to do this is it the Creator or the group? From where do I get the energy?
R. Who helps you more, the Creator or the group? It is not that someone helps you, it is the Creator. However he helps to the extent that you show him the place area that you want the correction to come and therefore if you bring him the ten, that you have to be connected with them, that you want to discover the connection between you, a connection where you disappear and we all actually disappear and become one so that we are in one boat. Then by that you invite it as much as you are drawn to it as much as you truly or as if you want it, you don't want it but you as if want it. Accordingly the Creator shines, you are drawing and inviting his reforming light and truly from your deficiency even if it is night not quite a deficiency, nevertheless from that becomes the deficiency to be together in order to receive the single force and that is the Creator.
7. S. (19:39) It feels like in the work we have in the ten there are many blows, how does it connect to what we are saying now?
R. We don't understand that these blows, they come along with all of our corrections and all of these blows are also corrections. It is not that we need to love them but ultimately we have to reach a state where we will bless over the bad as over the good.
S. We pray a lot, we ask a lot because of these blows and this understanding does not come.
R. Bit by bit, just wait. The understanding cannot come but only in a vessel that is corrected and we do not have the required corrections and therefore you cannot see inside of these blows a remedy. But for that we have to reach a degree which is a little bit higher, on the next degree you will realize that what you received was not a blow but rather it was a revelation of the disease that existed within you already. Therefore you simply felt that you are sick and therefore you asked for a remedy, you received a remedy and you reached healing. This is the way it is.
S. So what do we do in the meantime, continue?
R. Continue and pray continue to pray. We all wish for complete healing among us, for you to be healthy and complete and successful.
8. S. (22:02) What is that state of the death of the will to receive, is it a death that happens while we are still here alive and what do we feel in that state of death in which there is no will to receive before we are resurrected with a desire to bestow?
R. The Creator created only a desire and that is the created being. In order to give the created being a certain attitude, relation to the Creator he gives it in the will to receive some guidance and direction. What does it mean to receive, what does it mean to want to receive because the desire itself is neutral, I want. But what it wants to receive then what it wants to receive, from whom does it want to receive, from what, later on is also the intention from what I want to receive as the will to receive develops. So it's not like it wants to receive like a baby where you give something and it takes it and it doesn't care who may take it. But rather the thing itself that it wants, later on as it develops it already has this thought of what I am receiving, from whom, and what for. This is already the development, that is about that desire, this is how we develop. So we therefore need to learn our desires because that is the substance of creation and through the changing of desire and the way we use it we reach up to the degree of the Creator. This is enough for us, the will to receive.
As we learned in the beginning of the introduction that the whole of creation from its beginning to its end is only the will to receive. There is nothing more besides that. This is what the Creator created and he did not need anything else besides that. Now when he enters into this will to receive and the will to receive develops accordingly and it wants him because he created it. The Creator with respect to the will to receive is like the father or the mother that begets it and so the world to receive your yearns for the Creator and in this way as it yearns for him, why does he yearn for him, for what purpose, these are already degrees of development. That in the initial degrees like a baby, we say that it does not care about anything, it just wants to receive, later on what does it want, from whom does it want, etc. It already has discernments, later on we reach a state where we have no choice, I cannot receive so if I give, like we say to children. If he will give you that I will give you this and in this way you will be able to play together but first they do not understand it and do not agree, do not even play together. Let's say up to the age of two children do not know how to play with each other, they do not yet have a sufficiently developed will to receive.
Later on they already start to play together out of the fact that they start to understand what does the other one have, he looks at the other one and he wants what he has, he grabs what he has and he holds two, of his, of mine and later they start to understand that they can make exchanges between them and each one can gain more. Then they start to understand that there is the matter of relations between them, that it is not him or me but between us there is something born and then we develop in this way. So it turns out if there is me and there is the friend and we play with such things “I to my beloved and my beloved to me” then it turns out that by that we develop our will to receive and then we start to understand that in that way we can get to know all together what is outside of us. When I start to get to know the friend that he exists and I can give him and he can give me then I already have an interaction and interconnection with creation. Later on by coming to a connection with creation we start to understand what is happening to the other one, he also wants to receive and he can also give, so we can work with him and giving and receiving.
This is already the development of the society and this is what we see how we develop like that for thousands of years, we as humanity and more and more and now in the human evolution we are reaching a state where we have already realized this entire will to receive like children, that he can give to you and you to him. We also had many wars were we forcefully take things like little children, we have already had this in our development and now through commerce being aware in that and that's soon will come to an end, we see already that these things are coming to an end and then we will have to shift to a new stage. We're actually it will not be my will to receive and your will to receive but rather ours and ours means that we have to feel ourselves that we believe belong to a single body. This is already the group, the ten and then though that we will come together like this, we will feel that the force that is allowing us that, that is filling us, managing us, is also one. This is called one receives one. This is the process that the whole of humanity is going through and we are the first ones.
9. S. (28:59) Yesterday I heard that you said that we only register the Creator's actions on us. How can we ask the Creator to exert ourselves to get rid of some harmful desire?
R. That is not correct that we need to get rid of our bad desires or good desires or ignore them. It is not a matter of desire, it is the matter of intention. We have to examine more according to the intentions. What is it that I would like to happen? Not that desire itself. Maybe I come to a state where the desire itself seems good, sweet but the purpose or result of it is bad and then I need to search for forces, for support, for an environment that will help me to rise above that sweet desire towards a purpose which is above it. So as to get out of it this is what we have to do. All of these days we have to try to emerge from them through the environment, then I will emerge not from a bad state to a worse state, from an evil inclination to another evil inclination but rather from the evil inclination meaning in order to receive for myself to the good inclination which will be a group-desire. We need to try to do that. Even in simple cases when I am outside of the lesson and I do not want to connect to the lesson and I overcome myself and I nevertheless connect because by that I am implementing my correct choice to reach the right correct state. Things like that, simple things and in all kinds of states where I have the group and some life outside of the group that I always choose as much as possible to be with the group. That is it. Not to think about it but to simply do it and I'm telling you that already.
10. S. (32:10) Previously I thought that we correct the intention piece-by-piece, now it sounds like I cannot acquire any intention to bestow until I put to death all my intention for myself?
R. No I did not say that. That is incorrect. We have to fight over what we have before us not to wait for my entire will to receive to awaken or something like that, know whatever I have before me that is what I do.
11. S. (32:59) Concerning the fact that in the beginning we get rid of the intention for ourselves and then we inquire the attention to bestow. Many times in the work I see that initially I demand the Creator to give me the desire to love the friends but during the work such big ego is revealed that not even lovingly I just want to cancel this evil so I do not harm them?
R. This is why it seems to us that we are getting worse and it is true that the will to receive that opens up to us opens up in a more conspicuous manner which is worse. It's like the students of Rabbi Shimon where they come to want to kill one another, it wasn't like that for them before. And this is a sign of progress. That we are always working against a greater and greater desire.
S. Is this what Baal HaSulam says that first we get rid of the intention for ourselves and then we come to love of friends? To real love of friends?
R. One goes through stages of ascents and descents. The deeper we fall later on we rise and then we understand both the descent and the ascent and out of them we already become wise we have experience.
12. S. (34:40) You said that the desire is neutral so it all depends on your communion intention how we want to use the desire, correct?
R. The desire itself is neutral however to begin with there is an intention on top of it and a bad intention in order to receive. This is why we have to bring this desire to a state where indeed we understand that it is with the intention to receive and we want to get rid of it and make it in order to bestow, the desire itself remains. It is… of creation but he is not going to do anything with it. Rather the intention is really the subject that we have to close on and turn it to be in order to bestow. And only the Creator can do that and therefore we connect between us in the end of… the Creator that he will invert it for us, he will invert the intention to receive to the intention to bestow. This is called to rise from Malchut to Bina. To reach from reason to faith above reason.
13. S. (36:21) What does it mean that a person needs the reforming light? What should we ask so that the reforming light will work?
R. In order to be rewarded with a reforming light a person should want that light. To want the help of the light, to truly want it not just to cry in vain or to just talk about it. He can do it only by making an effort so one has to make an effort over a long time with many forces in order to be the bestower and reach a state where he cannot be the bestower. And all the time even if it seems to him that he does want it he is thrown back like that many times like a person who is climbing something and he falls and again he climbs and then again he falls. It is like that many times and together with the group he can shorten the time and his efforts because we all want to do it like that and therefore each one learns from the other and also he helps the other and sees that it didn't help him and it didn't help the friend etc., until we reach all in all all of us reach a state where we are not capable of climbing the mountain above our ego by ourselves. Even if we help one another we will not be able to do that. But then we discover that inside of us there is another friend who is the creator and then we latch onto him and demand of him to do it and he does it. That is the work.
14. S. (38:40) You said that in the time that in the world of Nekudim, the shattering of the vessels, the shattering of the bodies and in Adam HaRishon there was the shattering of the souls. What is the difference between these two kinds of shattering?
R. The desires in the body are external desires in the souls they are more internal desires.
15. S. (39:21) You explained earlier that when I and the friend connect between us this is how we increase the desire and over this, above this connection I would like to ask what is outside of me, this creation, this is how we get to know creation. Can you explain a bit more about this process?
R. When you want to help each other you begin to feel that you can help each other and you help and you succeed to some extent but afterwards you discover that you need a third force that between you there needs to be an upper force, the Creator and then you find the need for him and you turn to him and he helps you and then you really succeed.
S. So this is how we increase our connection with creation and everything?
R. Yes. First we have to make an effort between us, this is called from the love of people to the love of the Creator, where in the connection between us where we try to reach the goal we see that we cannot but there is another element which is superior to us and it will help us.
16. S. (41:11) It says that in the beginning of item 23, the first state necessitates the third state. What does it mean to necessitate, what is this connection between the two states?
R. Necessitate means according to the law of creation one stems from the other, very simple just like in our world, all the laws. This process brings us this result.
17. S. (41:42) In item 27 it says so is the conduct with each individual corrupted that we wish to remove from us. When we first remove it until it's very end until nothing is left of it?
R. Let us say that I am forbidden to eat something sweet. I got diabetes and I cannot eat sweet things so I have to completely abstain sweet foods and when I know how to do it and I do it then they say now you can add half a teaspoon of sugar to something because they already know that I've gotten used to being without sweets but you cannot without any sweetness, without any sugars so now you can add a little bit you need this as well for your health and then I do it. This is what we normally have to do with everything in creation. There is nothing that the Creator created which is truly genuinely bad. It all depends on how we use it. So both for the will to receive is also a necessary part of creation and actually by using it when we first completely refrain from it, avoid it then when we acquire the power of bestowal we add the force of reception to the force of bestowal it is called raising Malchut to Bina to faith above reason and in this way we advance. We first go with faith and then as much as we can we add with the force of reception. This is called raise AHP. And in this way each and every time we raise up to the force of Bina, the force of bestowal and the force of Malchut, the force of reception until the two of them rise to Keter. And this is the end of correction.
18. S. (44:15) How do we practically do that? How do we remove this quality entirely so it doesn't remain?
R. This is also through the upper light. We cannot perform any spiritual actions ever. We can only demand that the Creator will do it. This is called the Creator will finish for me.
19. S. (44:43) Can we also say that this means that we have to be in complete annulment towards the Friends?
R. We have to be in complete annulment before the friends. If I have to annul before the Creator I could not do it unless I first do it to the friends.
20. S. (45:07) How can the ten help the person to know if the evil quality within him has been completely eradicated?
R. First of all If he receives what he receives from the ten and he wants to be connected to them, to be together with them heart and soul without any thought of himself. If his ten is closer to him and more precious, dearest to him then the Creator. More important and closer the ten is more important and closer to him than the Creator. He needs to come to such relationships with them that there is nothing but that besides the friends and in them he therefore wants to Simply dissolve himself, to be as the adhesive substance that glues them all together and he has nothing besides this and in this way he begins to feel that by this he becomes adhered to the Creator because the Creator is there between them to begin with and then a person through this action achieves adhesion with the Creator.
21. S. (46:47) What does it mean that the ten is more precious and closer to the person than the Creator? The Creator is the goal.
R. But I do not know what the goal is or how to reach it. I do not know anything. All I know is that the group can lead me to it. Meaning I know only one thing: it is like a baby for him to be attached to the mother is everything. He knows that this body that it smells and feels this is life for him and he doesn't understand anything else so are we only by beginning to depict what the essence is of the ten. Not their faces or characters or something but the spiritual essence of the ten by this I reach its internality and there I discovered the Creator.
22. S. (47:52) If we have to remove the evil qualities entirely in what form does the desire remains at the end of the second state?
R. When I truly come to a state where..this is what he says here and item number 27. How can there be a revival of the dead but only any of the end of correction, meaning at the end of the second reality. Meaning we correct all the desires to receive that have ascended through ascension and afterwards we have the lowed AHP where we work with the will to receive itself the way it is.
23. S. (48:59) What does it mean in the medium way?
R. The medium, desirable way?
S. It says in the last line of 27 that as long as we have not fully removed it it is impossible to conduct it in the desired medium way? What is the desired medium way?
R. It is where he says in one and two that initially I must completely remove this intention to receive until there is nothing left of it. Meaning stop receiving all together and two, next we can receive it again and conduct it in a middle way. Meaning as much as I can use the will to receive in order to bestow.
24. S. (49:54) What does it mean to control the desire in the middle of line of the 10 in our work?
R. In the ten where we scrutinize our goal and check ourselves each time to what extent we are aimed towards the goal, and determining this when we direct ourselves this way determines all of our relationships. This is how we advance. You do not know how close you are to it. You just need to pressure yourselves a little bit and come to it and practice. Decide. And at every step the Creator will still finish the work for us and therefore we need to do whatever we can. And the end of our work is that it ends with a prayer for the Creator to help, as it is written that the Creator will finish for me.
25. S. (51:11) So according to what Baal HaSulam writes here we come together to the third state or do we come into the first state?
R. We come to the 3rd state which contains within it the first and the second. Where all the will to receive is kind of resurrected in its excessive way, we will learn this. We meet the will to receive in a very special degree, the degree of the end of correction and then we come to correct it, the Creator corrects it. We do not do the end of correction. We only need to do all the scrutiny until the end of correction and then we can see the act of the Creator, the work of the Creator that corrects the real intention to receive.
26. S. (52:26) Baal HaSulam writes that the revival of the dead happens at the end of the second state. What is the revival of the dead?
R. When we have corrected everything we could and then it comes all of a sudden, this third state. Because we cannot detect it in advance, we don’t have the vessels for the third state. The third state happens on the real Malchut and we are always working and correcting to raise AHP, the added Malchut to the first nine. It is written about it that salvation of the Creator is as a blink-of-an-eye, what comes all of a sudden.
27. S. (53:14) It says that the body has to rot, on the other hand we learn that we do not kill the desires, we rise above them. So what does it mean to rot?
R. Rotting means that the intention to receive on the will to receive rots. It acquires a form where it is not suitable, worthy of being used and this is called rotting. I was very happy with the women's questions. They are beautiful questions. Prepare more and we will answer them again.
Reading Item 28 Twice (54:00)
28. S. (57:47) Where does a desire that starts for me turns into bestowal? The beginning of the desire always starts from myself. The desire always starts with the intention to receive. When does it invert to the intention to bestow?
R. When the reforming light influences it and this depends on you, on how much you draw reforming light on yourself. You can draw it on you to the extent that you are connected with the friends because you want a light to come and elevate you from the degree of reception to the degree of bestowal. So for this you need to draw the light to vessels that you can work with in bestowal. And therefore you need to first of all begin to connect with the friends even in corporeal states and afterwards ask the Creator to give you, all of you the force of bestowal. The force of bestowal, where would the Creator give it? He would give it to you so you could connect among yourselves. What are you going to do with the force of bestowal if you receive it? There is nothing that you can give to the Creator. If you’re right, what will He give you? You can’t give Him anything, he doesn’t need these things. All of His pleasure, all of His delight in creation is when the created beings connect among themselves into one single body of Adam HaRishon.
This is what he wants. This is why he created the system of Adam HaRishon and broke it and gave it to us. And if we want to please Him, to give Him contentment by all means we should want to connect between us up to the last degree. Just imagine until the whole world, all of humanity unites just like one beautiful warm family. This is what He wants and this is where he is leading us, on a path that..He has no problem with time. It is until we understand that this is the right and best way and the only way that can exist. This is what the whole wisdom of Kabbalah is intended for. To explain to us that only in this way should we exist and you will see how the world takes a few steps even today because we are in the last generation, at a stage where the world is beginning to recognize how necessary it is for it to connect among everyone. You see how it is happening. It happened already in all kinds of struggles between blacks and whites, between all kinds of people, between men and women. Everything is gradually, gradually becoming stabilized in one area, in one level, one plain. Where gradually our laws, our intellect are coming to a state where there is no difference in terms of how people are born, there is no difference in how they are born. But rather each and everyone in the end will be weighed by how much he works towards connecting everyone. This we have yet to determine.
29. S. (01:02:17) This process that leads us to death, does the same process apply to men and women and to the same extent?
R. It is not to the same extent, it is not quite in the same way but it is the same process. Just as in our world there are men and women. There is a difference in how a man goes through life and how a woman goes through life and how they relate to life. In spirituality there is also a difference but the difference is not as big as it is in this world. In spirituality the Creator connects, the Creator balances the relationships between us. This is why in spirituality we take into account a person's inclination, a propensity to unity in his soul.
30. S. (01:03:39) What does it mean what you said just now that we will be considered according to the degree of connection we have in the ten and by how much we act for the benefit of others. What does that mean?
R. Why are you connecting in the ten? Maybe you want to rob a bank? You know there is no tighter bond then among gang members. They are willing to and agree to die, just to get what they want. So the question is what is the goal?
S. You asked this question as though you said it comes after our life. You said we are measured and valued accordingly, so what does that mean?
R. I do not understand your question.
S. You said that we will be measured and graded according to the work that we have invested for the benefit of others. So who will appreciate us, measure us?
R. The upper system. We are under the upper system which in its perfect state was called Adam HaRishon when he was created. Afterwards it broke on purpose, it was broken on purpose as a preparation for our current state and it is broken. So now in this system you have two states, the complete state and the broken state and we have to come to it in such a way that we want to shift the broken state into the complete state. This is our work. This is this called correcting the world, Tikkun Olam. What are you asking?
S. This is exactly what you said and I wasn't able to understand what you referred to when you said that we will be measured in light of the work we do.
R. Okay, very good.
31. S. (01:06:36) You answered it in one way so I'll ask it in another. How exactly do we insert all that excessive will to receive in the form of bestowal?
R. For now we need to cling to the desire to bestow, to the degree of Bina, to bestow in order to bestow. So all of our desires will only be for the benefit of others and use only those desires and then it turns out that we don’t want to receive anything from others, we only want to give to them. This is how we work, the Tzimtzum, the restriction, the screen, the reflected light and the qualities of bestowal, why we come to it. We will also talk about the will to receive in order to bestow. These will be even more advanced stages.
32. S. (01:07:49) What do we do when there is no patience for this whole process, to wait for it and there is no more patience?
R. You do not need to be patient. If you have a desire to advance by all means take your ten and advance with it. The problem is that you're probably not working in the ten and you want to run ahead on your own. Then you don’t have patience. When you begin to work with your ten you will see that you have more friends and then you will advance. You will have a feeling that you are doing a lot of work every moment. In other words the impatience means that there is a lack of correct orientation in the work, in the spiritual work.
S. So what do we do if we do not have patience for the corporeal world also, that the body is tired of it?
R. It is because you are not incorporated in the ten and you feel everything and want to work only on your own without connecting to the friends and then you have no patience because you are not feeling that you are doing something, realizing something, that you are doing something in the world. The world is a projection of what you are doing, and if you feel like nothing is happening start speaking to their friends, start working with them and then you will see what practical actions you can do.
33. S. (01:09:36) How do we help the ten attain for the very first time the will to receive?
R. By connecting together in the same decision, determined resolution, and you turn to the Creator with an outcry, even if it is not a strong outcry. But you turn to the Creator with an outcry to cancel your intention to receive, to elevate you to the level of faith, Bina, faith above reason.
S. Why is it that the ten is the best means we have to manage the will to receive in the right way?
R. Because getting rid of your will to receive is possible only on the condition that you are connected to the nine friends and that together you want to be this way. This is the right expression of what you are trying to say.
34. S. (01:10:58) Every day we hear that we have to connect in order to reach the goal. Can we set a goal for ourselves that we should do it to make Rav happy because somehow it disappears. We hear it and then we forget about it.
R. Look, let’s put it this way, you are a child and you are going to school in order to acquire knowledge there and get good grades. So there are two things. Either you go to school in order to be smart, successful, to succeed in life or you go to school only in order to please your mother so when you come home she will be happy that you got a good grade. So we need to come to reach the goal nevertheless to reach good grades, in order to later be great people, successful people. The fact that we are getting the mother’s support is only a sign for us that we are advancing correctly. That’s the way it is. In spirituality it is even more so because the Creator is attained as a result of connecting the environment. The Creator means come and see. When we assemble ourselves, the relationship between us in a more connected manor, more uniform, united way, by this we establish the image of the Creator who is built out of the sum total of our images, characters, efforts, forces, thoughts of the friends. This is called you have made me. From what do we make Him? Each of us as much as he can yearns for connection in order to build the Creator, this common image that has been established between us. And this is our goal.
35. S. (01:13:40) It says here that in the meantime it was given to the Klipot for purification. The question is how could it be that the Klipot, shells, purify it?
R. We are going through the shells until we come to a state where we can start depicting Him through the shells. We go through restrictions, a cleaning, a sorting and then what we have left after we filtered it through the net.
S. We filter?
R. So after we filter all the desires and our intentions what we have afterwards we elevate for a request to the Creator to purify us and place on it the intention to bestow. This is what we do.
36. S. (01:14:55) Why are the morning lessons so important and how can it help us in this transformation of the will to receive, from receiving to giving?
R. The lesson is important because it methodically, systemically, gradually promotes us toward practical implementation. But for this you have to be at the lesson every day and then during the day think about how you implement it. So think about how to implement, how to realize the morning lesson. Each and every day I give you another portion and another portion so that you will gradually receive it, realize it, and advance. But without those who are not in the morning lesson, it’s a big problem. From where will they take it? Because there is a connection here, there’s a light that lives between us, and we need to realize this state in practice. I recommend hearing the morning lesson at least the part that we are going through now, the Introduction to the Book of Zohar, to listen to it at least once, ideally twice during the day.
37. S. (01:17:00) The dead will have to be revived with all their flaws later on to be corrected. Can you explain, what does it mean that later on they will be corrected?
R. Those desires that we cannot correct and they don’t participate in the final correction at the first stage because it's the Malchut of Malchut. These heavy desires approach correction after the lighter desires are corrected, the first 9 Sefirot of Malchut, and only then the Malchut of Malchut.
S. The joining of all the vessels happens on the way?
R. What are you saying? You’ve studied with us for so many years. There is a system that scrutinizes what desires are closer and farther from correction. These desires rise, they turn to the light that reforms, and the light that reforms corrects them. And this is how they go through filtering and connection stage after stage.
38. S. (01:19:05) How can I open up the whole world through myself?
R. Start connecting to the world and you will see that you can correct the whole world. Because in your personal vessel you need to be able to correct your integration, your incorporation with the whole world.
39. S. (01:19:36) When a friend has a feeling of darkness, if we all join his feeling is that called unity?
R. Better to join him and take him out of there, then you attain unity. Not that you go down to him and be with him in a descent.
40. S. (01:20:08) How can we dissolve into the time?
R. By not wanting to determine anything on our own but only to be together with the friends. When I raise the friends higher above my head and thus I incorporate with them.
41. S. (01:20:35) What is the desert without an intention, is there such a thing?
R. It means without a scrutinized intention but just the natural intention in order to receive.
42. S. (01:20:55) You said “you don't know how close you are to it, all you need is to put pressure on yourselves”. Should I put pressure on myself?
R. Of course, what else to do just to keep things as they are? Then you just fall into the hands of society and they need to carry you? What kind of question is this?
43. S. (01:21:25) Our group requires your advice we're meeting with a Costco's group for a while we gather together every week now we decided that we're going to meet with the Kavkaz group for a while, we gather together every week; now we decided that we’re going to meet the Kavkaz group once a month. Every day we're meeting different groups, but when we announce it to them, we meet such pain and misunderstanding that we're not sure we got the right decision. Maybe it's better to meet the same group every week?
R. I cannot tell you what to do but based on what we study, you can consult with all the groups, with those who are responsible for the connection of the groups, and then they will tell you. I don't want to determine anything here. Also, whether you stop connecting once a week and suddenly want to do something else, I do not want to get into that. You need to look into all these things and clarify based on what rules, based on what guidelines are you changing things. All of that has to be based on getting closer to spirituality and not to what's closer to your will to receive.
44. S. (01:23:25) You said that during the day we should realize the lesson. For quite a while, we have been discussing in the ten how to do it in the right way. What does it mean ‘during the day’ the way you see the ten realizing the lesson and doing it?
R. I don't know, this is something you all need to think about, but you need to at least one more time, hear the lesson and it's an hour and a half, it is not simple so how are you going to find time for it, I don't know? But if you have to you have to absorb those Q&A, the ideas, the spirit of the lesson.
S. So, people in the ten hear the lesson and some people do it a few times, some find quotes and post it on WhatsApp. But what does it mean to do it after we have absorbed it, that is the question: how can the lesson leave us during the day?
R. Okay, maybe that each one writes two or three special sentences that he read from the lesson and you can read that.
S. We do that too.
R. So what do you want from me? Just keep going.
S. We want to do.it with a better quality. What does it mean to absorb the material from the lesson and what is to realize?
R. My answer is one: ask, ask for an answer from above. Because all of this has to do with the deficiency that you need to establish the Creator.
45. S. (01:25:20) Baal HaSulam writes about the general state called the ‘Revival of the Dead’. Do we have such a private state in our work?
R. Yes of course, there are individual states, and these are the unique souls. Today this opens up to many, many, other souls to achieve this state of the personal final correction. But again, that does not replace their collective, final correction, it does not replace that.
46. S. (01:30:23) Why can't we correct the big will to receive only when it's under the control of the shells?
R. Then what do you correct if it is not under the Klipot. To clean it from the shells, that is the correction. The will to receive itself is neutral, it just wants to receive but what for, whom for? That is essentially determined by the shape, the form of the will to receive to itself or to the others, for itself or to resemble the Creator.
47. S. (01:31:05) How can you draw different lights by their qualities? How exactly when we’re separated, can we draw the light that connects and corrects us?
R. We asked for the light to correct us and shine in the general way but then, later we will learn how to do it when we have all kinds of desires and we know how to work with them, how to sort them out and how to realize them correctly. Then we will know how we can connect these desires with those intentions and what combination and so on. This whole weaving process that we need to do between us, that with it, by it, we establish a single will to receive which is called Adam. All of that is done by the Creator, we let Him I run these threads between us in this weaving process and these threads altogether other garments that we want to have over the body of Adam that is similar to the Creator and this garment is similar to the Creator that makes the human, Adam, similar to the Creator, externally similar.
48. S. (01:32:53) You talked about this additional friend that is revealed in the then, Creator. So how will it happen? Will it be equal to us, what will be the relations between us and Him, how do we beget this friend?
R. What is it about, I don't remember what it is about.
S. You said that we, out of our relations we will discover a new friend in the ten, the Creator. So how will that be when He will be revealed between us, how will the relations with Him be, how will we beget this new friend?
R. We will learn that, this is what it says. “You should have no foreign god”, or “God shall not be foreign to you”, we will learn that the Creator can also be your friend. Because whoever you connect with is called your friend, ‘Haver’, from the word ‘Hibur’, connection. So, I need to reach a state that each and every person in the world is my friend in that I see the Creator in him.
49. S. (01:33:55) How can we pass on from the will to receive for myself to a common desire in the ten, to hasten the reaching the third state. I feel that nothing helps, and I cannot disconnect from my ego?
R. To pray, what can you do? To request, make requests to detach from my ego, meaning in order to receive, and try to connect with the friends, together, all of us reach a prayer to the Creator. It is impossible that a person prays on his own and reaches the Creator, what is he praying for? He needs to bring with himself at least one more, and then when he asks to make a connection then the Creator has room to be between them.
50. S. (01:34:59) In practice, our will to receive continuously grows so we can’t be against it, can’t oppose it. How can I reach a state that I hate my nature, through acting?
R. We can hate our nature but not the will to receive rather the intention to receive. And the will to receive, itself, is neutral, it's just the matter of creation, it's just the will to receive and there's nothing you can do about it, it's not good, it's not bad so why will I suffer about it? It is not good and it is not bad, nothing. So, it's only my intentions that I can bear on not bear.
51. S. (01:35:54) How in the work can we work for the Creator rather than working from being afraid to receive blows from Him?
R. It all depends on how connected to the friends I am, and together with turn to the Creator and we talk about Him being Good that does good, and there’s nothing that He has for Himself, He does not have a will to receive, He's entirely a will to bestow; and therefore, He only wants to bestow goodness upon us and He expects us to want that goodness that He has to give and that we will turn to Him and pray to Him, ask from Him, and that is how we want Him to come closer to us, or to bring us closer to him.
52. S. (01:36:50) You previously said that there is a correction within the blows that we get. What is this correction that lies within the blows?
R. What correction?
S. That’s in the blows?
R. In the blows, because by the blow we move away from in order to receive and accordingly we begin to respect the greatness that is within in order to bestow.
53. S. (01:37:26) You talked about drawing the lights. So, to tell you the truth, I have no desire to connect to my friends and I have no desire to reveal the Creator. I remember I once had it but this yearning for the Creator is long gone. So how can I draw the lights when I don't have the desire to spirituality?
R. Connect to the friends, there are such states where you have no desire whatsoever, but I nullify myself and I am present with them. And at least I do not resist being with them, the single boat, and that is how I advance. That is for today and tomorrow it will change.
54. S. (01:38:16) If a person doesn't feel the descent, does it mean he does not advance? Is he advancing?
R. No, it is possible that he's in a state that each and every day he has small descents that he immediately appreciates as ascents because he understands one cannot be without the other. That depends on the different periods you go through.
54. S. (01:38:46) The matter of the ‘revival of the dead’ sounds really threatening?
R. ‘Revival of the dead’ is not threatening, it's like say, I understood that I can't eat sweets and I stop eating sweets to the point that my desire now for sweet as if disappeared from me; and now I hear from the doctor, let's say, that I need to eat a little bit of sweet because I need that for my brain’s functioning and then I go back to it. But now when I go back to eating sweets, I do not have the same, how to put it, I am no longer enslaved to this sweetness, I already take it like a medicine that's sweet. I take it because it is helpful to my life, and it is not going to ruin my health. And that is what it's called ‘revival of the dead’, that we take these desires that we have determined are bad desires which is for our own good and now after the correction we keep working with these desires but in a balanced way.
55. S. (01:40:29) It is the start of all the problems, the struggle with gaining weight, being addicted. It's not clear how to do it, how not to fall to the pleasure again at the start?
R. I used to smoke, until a month and a half, with some breaks in life, but I would smoke a pack of cigarettes a day, what brand of cigarettes did I smoke? American Spirit, well I'm not even talking about when I used to smoke non-filtered, that's a real cigarette. And a month and a half ago, I was told, and I decided that I have to adhere to this because the group told me. And I had to and I stopped. So, what kind of friends do I have that would take away from me the most pleasant thing, so it is possible it is possible.
56. S. (01:42:05) On the one hand connection between us is felt and that is the condition to turn to the Creator; on the other hand, we see how distant we are and how much we have to connect. How to work with these two ends?
R. Just understand everyone that the distance between you and the Creator is, all in all, the distance between all of you, between each other, that is it, that’s all. It is like when you ride the train, you go from one station to the next then to the next and then the Creator’s the last stop. So similarly, you have to connect from one to the other and to the other until you reach the Creator and you can do it any other way.
57. S. (01:42:59) If the Creator is only the will to bestow, can we say He only gives us the will to bestow?
R. The Creator is only the will to bestow and all He can give is the will to bestow, that’s correct, yes. Do we need anything else? No. Because the will to receive He created this is called, Bar, ‘Bria’, outside of Him. That is how he created the darkness, the will to receive. And what we are asking from Him now is just that will to bestow. This is called ‘a part of God above that we want to take into ourselves’, or you call it a soul.
58. S. (01:43:51) Previously you told a friend that impatience is the wrong way to work on spirituality but if I close that impatience, what will help me to advance towards the Creator?
R. I'm saying that just any kind of impatience is bad, it is a bad thing. I'm saying that each and everything has to be balanced with the counter force. So I need to treat my impatience in a way that, yes I am impatient, I want everything now, but with it I'm willing to go gradually and because I am within, inside nature and nature has its own laws, I can’t jump to the state of final correction. It's just as a child wants to immediately become some strong, adult person. He needs to know that he will advance towards that gradually and it's not because we turn to the Creator and the Creator can just make that leap happen right away, He can't make it happen right away because the Creator Himself is nature, and that system called ‘nature’ determines that we have to gradually advance from in order to receive to in order to bestow. From in order to bestow to bestow to receive in order to bestow. This is a gradual process of our correction until we come from a state that is opposite from the Creator, the shattering of Adam, all the way to the form where we are included in receiving in order to bestow in full. So be patient.
59. S. (01:45:56) By what criteria can I check that I'm using my will to receive correctly in the work in the ten because it seems that every time we connect the will to receive still triumphs?
R. That is a bad summary of your connection. If you connect between you and as a result the will to receive grows in each and every one and it is not that you can raise everyone to a higher level of bestowal, then that is not good. That is not good, pay attention to that. Such results we cannot have must not have.
60. S. (01:47:27) Can I demand more unity in the effort from the ten or everything depends on my efforts to connect to them?
R. Typically, I cannot demand, usually I can’t demand any efforts from the ten. Rather I have to cause such a state for them that they want to make an effort and advance, and move forward. So, either I am the first who's carrying them and dragging them after me, or I'm in the back, I am the last one and I am pushing them forward, but I have to think how do I basically integrate with them.
61. S. (01:48:24) It is not clear how to overcome and rise above the will to receive when there is a big problem in my life, necessities. How to overcome the Creator in every state?
R. I don’t know. If there is a big problem in necessities that can be food, sex, family, money, honor, power, knowledge. Usually it's these corporeal things. I cannot say but you have to see, you have to look at these things and look at what's really lacking and sort out the necessities from those that are not necessary. See how to focus your strength towards the necessities and solve it in such a way and other than that turn to friends perhaps or our management and ask for some help.
62. S. (01:49:43) How to put the Creator between us when the heart is blocked?
R. When the heart is blocked you need to, but is it a single blocked heart or many different hearts, alienated hearts? If it’s one single blocked heart that’s good. That means there's at least something that connects all the hearts together and that they're all blocked. That is very good, that is a very good degree. There is still some connection although this connection is because everyone's feeling bad but we need to really appreciate that we have a blocked heart because this collective heart comes from the Creator. The Creator is giving us this sense of blockage collectively, that we are all in this sort of black dark bubble, disparate and separate from Him. We have no connection to Him, to the Creator and as a result we also have no connection between us. There is just indifference, a formality of sorts and we don't want, we're incapable and it’s unimportant to us. That’s a very, very useful state for realizing what is the will to receive. That it can be in this state where it is considered dead. It’s called dead, we are dead in that state and then from that state we can rise to the revival of the dead. Then we need to discuss between us how to do it. Talk about it. You have this indifference, this blockage is coming from Him so turn to Him.
Just as He gives you this indifference He will give you light in the connection between you because you feel that you are in the darkness and the darkness ties you together, binds you. This is the opposite form of the Creator that exists among you. So ask Him to turn to you with his face, towards you. As we learn that my beloved in like a gazelle. The Creator is seemingly leaving you but in doing so He's also awakening you because there are many people in the world who see no darkness, they don't think about any darkness and you do. You feel that the Creator makes it dark between you. So force Him together between you, force Him to illuminate between you, to shine to you. Actually women can demand this much much better than the men. Try. As much as I know you, you're capable of demanding in such a way that the Creator won't stay indifferent to you. He will answer you. So activate yourselves.