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

Daily Morning Lesson: September 6, 2025 

Part 1: Recorded lesson - Recorded lesson - Nov 15, 2021

Baal HaSulam. Shamati 59. Concerning the Staff and the Serpent

Reader: Hi friends, in first part of the lesson, we'll learn from a lesson that was given on November 15, 2021. Before watching that lesson, we'll read the article. The article is in The Writings of Baal HaSulam, page 554 in the Hebrew version, Shamati article 59, “Concerning the Staff and the Serpent.”

Reading: (00:41) Baal HaSulam. Shamati 59. Concerning the Staff and the Serpent

I heard on Adar 13, February 23, 1948

“And Moses answered and said: ‘But, they will not believe me,’” etc. “And the Lord said to him, ‘What is it in your hand?’ And he said, ‘A staff.’ And He said, ‘Cast it on the ground…’ and it became a serpent; and Moses fled from it” (Exodus 4).

We should interpret that there are not more than two degrees, either Kedusha [holiness] or Sitra Achra [other side]. There is no intermediary state, but the same staff itself becomes a serpent if thrown to the ground.

In order to understand this, we will first bring the words of our sages, that He had instill His Shechina [Divinity] on trees and rocks. Trees and rocks are called things of inferior importance, and specifically in this manner He placed His Shechina. This is the meaning of the question, “What is it in your hand?”

A “hand” means attainment, from the words, “If a hand attains.” A “staff” means that all his attainments are built on the discernment of inferior importance, which is faith above reason.

(Faith is regarded as having inferior importance, and as lowliness. One appreciates things that clothe within reason. However, if one’s mind does not attain it, but it rather opposes one’s mind, then one should say that faith is of superior importance to one’s mind, it follows that at that time he lowers his mind and says that what he understands within reason, that he resists the path of the Creator, faith is more important than his own mind. This is because all the concepts that contradict the path of the Creator are worthless concepts.

Rather, “They have eyes but they will see not, they have ears but they will hear not.” It means that he annuls everything he hears and sees. This is called “going above reason.” And thus it seems to a person as lowness and Katnut [smallness/infancy].

However, with the Creator, faith is not considered lowliness, since man, who has no other choice but to take the path of faith, considers faith as lowliness. However, the Creator could have placed His Shechina on something other than trees and rocks.

Yet, He chose this way, called faith, specifically. He must have chosen it because it is better and more successful. You find that for Him faith is not regarded as being of inferior importance. On the contrary, specifically this path has many merits, but it appears lowly in the eyes of the creatures.)

If the staff is thrown to the ground and one wants to work with a higher discernment, meaning within reason, degrading the above reason, and this work seems low, one’s Torah and work immediately become a serpent. This is the meaning of the primordial serpent, and this is the meaning of “Anyone who is proud, the Creator tells him, ‘He and I cannot dwell in the same abode.’”

The reason is, as we have said, that He has placed His Shechina on trees and rocks. Hence, if one throws the discernment of the staff to the ground, and raises oneself to work with a higher attribute, this is already a serpent. There is no middle; it is either a serpent, or Kedusha, since all the Torah and the work that one had from the discernment of a staff, all has now entered the discernment of a serpent.

It is known that the Sitra Achra has no lights. Hence, in corporeality too, the will to receive has only deficiencies, but not satisfaction of the deficiency. And the vessel of reception remains forever in deficit, without fulfillment, because one who has one hundred wants two hundred, etc., and one does not die with half one’s wish in one’s hand.

This extends from the upper roots. The root of the Klipa [shell] is the vessel of reception, and they have no correction during the six thousand years. The Tzimtzum [restriction] is placed on them; hence, they do not have lights and abundance.

This is why they entice one to draw light to their degree. And the lights that one receives by being adhered to Kedusha, since abundance shines in Kedusha, when they entice one to draw abundance to their state, they receive that light. Thus, they have dominion over a person, meaning they give him satisfaction in the state he is in so he will not move from here.

Hence, one cannot go forward through this dominion since he has no need for a higher degree. Since he has no need, he cannot move from his place, even a slight movement.

In that state, he is unable to discern if he is advancing in Kedusha or the other way around. This is because the Sitra Achra gives him power to work more strongly, since now he is within reason and can therefore work not in a state of lowliness. It follows that thus one would remain in the authority of the Sitra Achra.

In order for a person to not remain in the authority of the Sitra Achra, the Creator made a correction that if one leaves the discernment of the staff, he immediately falls into the state of a serpent. He immediately falls into a state of failures and has no power to hang on, unless he accepts the discernment of faith, called lowliness, once more.

It follows that the failures themselves cause one to take upon himself the discernment of a staff once more, which is the discernment of faith above reason. This is the meaning of what Moses said, “But they will not believe me.” It means that they will not want to take upon themselves the path of working in faith above reason.k 

Then the Creator told him, “What is it in your hand?” “A staff.” “Cast it on the ground,” and then, promptly, “it became a serpent.” It means that tmmm.   Mmk here is no intermediary state between the staff and the serpent. It is rather to know if one is in Kedusha or in the Sitra Achra.the  m m. Mm o km o 

It turns out that in any case, they do not have any other choice but to assume the discernment of faith above reason, called “a staff.” This staff should be in the hand; the staff should not be thrown. This is the meaning of the verse, It means that all the budding he had in serving the Creator was based specifically on Aaron’s staff. This means that He wanted to give us a sign to know if we are walking on the path of truth, or not. He gave us as a sign to know only the basis of the work, meaning what basis one is working on. If one’s basis is the staff, it is Kedusha, and if the basis is within reason, this is not the way to achieve Kedusha.

However, in the work itself, meaning in the Torah and in the prayer, there is no distinction between one who serves Him and one who does not serve Him. This is because there it is to the contrary: If the basis is within reason, meaning based on knowing and receiving, the body gives fuel for work, and he can pray and study more persistently and more enthusiastically, since it is based on within reason.

However, when one takes the path of Kedusha, whose basis is bestowal and faith, he needs much preparation so the Kedusha will shine for him. Without preparation, the body does not give one the strength for work, and one must always exert extensively, since man’s root is reception and within reason.

Therefore, if his work is based on earthliness, he can always be fine. But if the basis for the work is on the discernment of bestowal and above reason, he needs perpetual efforts so as not to fall into his root of reception and within reason.

One must not be distracted for a minute, or he will fall into his root of earthliness, called “dust,” as it is written, “for dust you are, and to dust shall you return.” And that was after the sin of the tree of knowledge.

One examines if one is advancing in Kedusha or to the contrary, since another god is sterile and does not bear fruit. The Zohar gives us that sign, that specifically on the basis of faith, called “a staff,” is one imparted fruitfulness and multiplication in the Torah. This is the meaning of “the staff of Aaron budded”: The budding and growing come specifically through the staff.

Therefore, as one rises from one’s bed daily and washes oneself to purify his body from the filth of the body, so one should wash oneself from the filth of the Klipa, to examine himself if his quality of staff is in completeness.

This should be a perpetual examination, and if one is distracted from it, he immediately falls to the authority of the Sitra Achra called “self-reception.” One immediately becomes enslaved to them, as it is known that the light makes the Kli. Hence, as much as one works in order to receive, to that extent he needs only a desire to receive for himself and becomes remote from matters concerning bestowal.

Now we can understand the words of our sages, “Be very, very humble.” What is that fuss that it says, “very, very”? It is because one becomes needy of people by having been honored once. At first one receives the honor not because he wanted to enjoy the honor, but for other reasons, such as the glory of the Torah, etc. One is certain of this scrutiny since he knows about himself that he has no desire for honor whatsoever.

It follows that it is reasonable to think that he is permitted to receive the honor. However, it is still forbidden to receive since the light makes the Kli. Hence, after he has received the honor he becomes needy of the honor, he is already in its dominion, and it is hard to break free from the honor.

By this one acquires one’s own reality, and it is now hard to annul before the Creator since through the honor he has become a separate entity, and in order to obtain Dvekut [adhesion] one must annul one’s reality completely, hence the “very, very.” “Very” is that it is forbidden to receive honor for oneself, and the other “very” is that even when one’s intention is not for himself, it is still forbidden to receive. 

Reader: Now, we're going to go and watch the recorded lesson. 

Question (Unity 4): (18:17) In the article, it speaks about humbleness. What is humbleness in our work? 

M. Laitman: Humbleness? Humbleness means I'm not demanding anything other than to be annulled. As if I don't exist with my will to receive in the light, in the Creator. I want to, at least in one dot, to raise Malchut to Bina. That's what I want to do. To enter as a drop of sperm in the womb, Bina being the womb, the upper one, and I am Malchut. So, at least in one drop, meaning I cancel my own desires, and I want only to cling to Bina and simply cancel myself before it.

This is called the sperm comes and it attaches itself to the womb. That's what I want. That's the entry into spirituality. Afterwards, we will learn with you that there are the three days of absorption of the sperm. They are the beginning of the three lines. The three days of absorption of the sperm, and then 40 days of the creation of the embryo, until we see that we have an embryo. 

Now, this little body it's already the will to receive, but it is entirely annulled to the extent that it can annul itself before the upper one. To that extent it grows in the upper one, in Bina. And this is what it's given. It absorbs the quality of the bestowal as much as it can. It inverts itself to be similar to these qualities of bestowal so they will control it. Then in this way it develops in the mother, in Bina, because everything follows the equivalence of form. Then after 40 days, 40 days or degrees of ascension from Malchut to Bina, when he receives the qualities of Bina on his will to receive, he remains in his will to receive. Otherwise, he won't be a created being. 

Then the will to receive then grew during the 40 days of creation of the embryo, when it's already to some extent similar to Bina, this is called going through the first stage of development. 

Then there are three months, and three months, and three months. Months according to the moon, not according to the earth. We count in spirituality the months, we count them by the moon, lunar months, because Earth is the will to receive. The moon is ostensibly here and in between, an intermediary degree between the will to receive, planet Earth, and the sun, the will to bestow. As much as we can, between Malchut and Keter, to be more and more in the degree of Bina. This is what the moon symbolizes. Then we will talk about what we discover about the moon. What we want to discover, what we reveal, that they don't tell us. There are very interesting things there about how a person comes to the moon, touches the moon.There are things very interesting, very interesting things about it, but that's along the way. 

So, this is how we develop. Constantly annulling before faith above reason, constantly thinking about the group, the Creator, and in this way it is called days of development of the embryo.  

Question (French): (23:43) What is this honor in the work that he talks about in the text, and what should we do in order not to receive the honor? 

M. Laitman: In order not to receive honor, a person has to keep himself, guard himself. It is very important work. I would say it's the first test in entering spirituality. If a person is absorbing respect or not, and how to guard himself from this. He should be constantly immersed in the Ten.This will guard him from being in order to receive, and mainly, it concerns respect, honor.

Question (Kyiv 1): (24:52) In the beginning of the text it says, that the Creator told Moses to throw the staff. So, why did he throw it? What for? 

M. Laitman: It's an example of learning. That if we throw the staff which is called, of inferior importance, lower importance. Meaning we help with going above reason. Then our staff, which should lead us on the way to the end of correction. When a person walks with his staff all the time, he becomes a serpent. He becomes a serpent. 

Student: The question is, why did the Creator specifically tell him that? 

M. Laitman: So he would learn from this what is happening to him. So he would learn from this. Did you go, you went to, to, to, to, on walks? They had a walk in the desert. How to shift from this world to the spiritual world? How do we shift? You walk behind the one who is in front of you, and where he places his feet, in those same places you place your feet, and you should always walk with a staff, this walking stick. If you follow someone he is the guide he's called the guide, and you place your feet exactly where he does, and with your staff you do as he does. Then it is certain if you do that, it is certain that you're advancing correctly. You don't need to see anything else; only how to advance precisely in all your steps and all your movements after him, behind him. This is called advancing correctly. People who walked on real hikes, they know. There are many rules to it, but that's the main rule. 

Question (Moscow 6): (27:30) It says at the end of the article that after one receives honor, it's hard to stop receiving this honor.

M. Laitman: It's egoism, it's ego. If he receives attention, a special relation and doesn't create a shield against it. Sometimes you have to receive attention from the friends or from others who respect you. Otherwise, you have no respect for them. You have to show that you enjoy their relation to you, that you're thankful, you're grateful to them for it. You have no choice. And the greater a person seemingly is, then he has to show everyone that he's willing to receive from them. Otherwise, he will seem proud, like, who are you to bring me anything. So, this is why we need to relate in this way. Actually, the more a person- the lower a person is, the more you need to relate to him with more attention.

Question (Hebrew 10): (29:17) What kind of examination can a person do in order to make sure that indeed he jumped, but he's not just imagining it. There’s a great fear that I cannot trust my own judgment. Also, you answered to a friend before that examination is in the Ten. It's still a question because you can always turn what the friends are saying, and they always judge you to the scale of merit, they justify you. 

M. Laitman: I'll tell you more. It's not a check in the scrutiny in the Ten, it's implementation in the Ten. We just don't see it. We can't imagine that spirituality is actually, it really is in the friends. If you depict to yourself what is a spiritual womb, it doesn't exist anywhere. There is no such thing. It is only if you enter the group. It could be the smallest group, it could be two, that much. But if each one annuls himself before the other, they can achieve spirituality. Two is the least plural. And that's it. So, the group is the spiritual womb. Don't imagine it as being somewhere. The essence of the connection among the friends, and it exists although you don't feel, don't see, and don't understand it that it exists, but it does exist. All of our degrees until the end of correction exist. So, if we exert to imagine our spiritual state as here and existing, then we are already on the way to the truth. This is why- where is the womb? In the group, in the connection within the friends.

Student: Yes, so if the friends are always judging me to the scale of merit, they justify, then how do I check that I'm in the right direction?

M. Laitman: If you truly want to see the whole group and each friend on the side of merit, then you need to feel every single moment how you are veering off from seeing everyone on the side of merit. Then the Creator begins to give to you the opposite, an additional will to receive, so you will grow like an embryo in the womb. And you need to absorb another piece of the will to receive into the womb. Adapt it to the connection with the Ten, some more in order to bestow, and what happend yesterday was good, but today you're already not so well organized with the Ten, you see that you have some more criticism, other problems, and then you need to understand that all those things are problems of growth. Growth pains, pains of development, and there is no other way. That's how we grow. 

Question (MAK Israel): (33:10) It says that it's forbidden to receive honor. So, how can I praise the friend in a way that doesn't harm him?

M. Laitman: Normally, we don't do it. We can do it, maybe in L’Chaim, when we get together in the Ten, but the truth is, we have to elevate the whole Ten, and more than that, to elevate the Creator. Say cheers to the Creator, L’Chaim to the Creator, for holding us, for positioning us correctly, and for promoting us. Of course, we should speak a little bit about the friends as well, but the most important is nevertheless that everything begins and ends with the Creator.

 Question (PT 12): (34:23) If a person leaves the discernment of the staff, he immediately falls into the Discernment of the Serpent, and immediately he enters the state of failures. So, he writes that there is a state of serpent, but also a state of failures. Seemingly, these should be two states where one follows the other. So what is that state of failures? 

M. Laitman: It depends on the extent to which you feel the situation. You might be in the serpent, but still don't feel the failures. So, he agrees to live in his will to receive, although he understands that now it is operating on him and he doesn't want to get out of it, on the one hand. On the other hand, if he falls lower than the serpent, when he feels the failures already, this is already the recognition of evil. That's the recognition of evil. I might feel myself inside the ego, and I'm an egoist, and I don't want to change. You understand, there are such states in us as well. And afterwards comes a state where I do want to change. I can't stand this ego. I can't stand its control over me. So, there are many states. You are not in such a state of the control of the serpent over me until I hate it. And through the hatred, I separate from it. I move away from it.  

Question (PT 19): (36:26) Let me understand, Rav. The more we advance, there are more problems, is that what you said? 

M. Laitman: The more we grow, the greater the problems become. Don't you see it from your corporeal life? 

Student: I'm not an example. I always have problems. The question is, according to what you say, I have to understand, if in the Ten I have no trouble, everything is fine, we're sitting, we're together in the morning…

M. Laitman: It's a sign you're not working. The connection is just a group of lazies, there's no value to this Ten. 

Student: What do you suggest we should do in the ten, if that's what we feel? 

M. Laitman: Try to reach a more internal connection in our desires, in our yearning for the Creator. Everyone wants to reach the revelation of the Creator. Everyone wants to reach equivalence. The revelation of the Creator can only be in vessels that are suitable for Him, that are like Him. Where is my vessel in which I resemble Him, the vessel of bestowal? Where do I grow them, develop them? Only if I'm in a group. And this team that I have to train with and see if I'm ready, yes? And how much I can be in order to bestow. And as much as I don't want to be in bestowal toward the friends I have to tell myself that even more than that, I'm not willing to bestow to the Creator. Because usually we think, no, of course I want to bestow to the Creator. It's a lie. Because that's what your ego is saying, that it's worthwhile, that he's going to profit somehow. But if you can't reach bestowal towards your friends, where you annul yourself there, and you cleave to them, to help them, to be with them in each and everything, you're not getting to the Creator. You're simply not getting there to be as one man in one heart. And then you come to the Creator, because the Creator is the all-inclusive of all our connections.

Student: I have to learn from you, Rav. You said that you used to be with your teacher almost alone, without a group. So, how did you advance with Rabash? If you didn't have a group, what did you do? No. You fight with him all morning long? So I don't understand what you did. 

M. Laitman: That's not for you. Elijah came, I sat on his wings, and he took me up. Why don't you believe me? 

Student: I believe you. You can do that as well. But a serious question. I want to understand more. In our group, in our Ten, what should I do, in your opinion? You say, annul yourself.

M. Laitman: You're in a state. There's never been such a good state in all of reality. Never been. So we say, no, the students of Rabi Shimon, they would sit in a cave, eat a slice of bread, something. They had nothing else. They were in dire straits, and that wouldn't help them. Place yourself like that. Make a cave in your living room. Get in there, take some dry bread that they toss out from the deli next door, a bucket of water, and get in there. Start annulling yourself completely towards the friends, towards the friends. And you'll see how much it's helping you or not. I don't know what you want. A person has to work in the state that he's in. He doesn't need to limit himself in anything. All the limitations have to be inside.

Student: You think also not to be afraid of arguments in the Ten? 

M. Laitman: You can be in a bad Ten, a good Ten. You can be a billionaire. It doesn't matter what or whom. It all depends on how much you're preparing yourself inside. It has nothing to do with what you've got outside. So, make the effort.

Question (Nikolaev-Sochi): (41:55) In this article, there's a great depth that is still concealed from us. It's written that he placed his divinity on trees and rocks.  It's clear that it's lower than the degree of Adam. Where is the animate level here? 

M. Laitman: All the degrees of still, vegetative, and animate are included together, and a person has to rise above them. All those things have to be not important to him. The spiritual degree has to be the most important out of all the degrees of the still, vegetative, and animate, where we exist. The human degree is above all of it. It's already spirituality. We are not human. We belong to the animate degree.  

Question (PT 35): (43:00) We always say that the feeling of faith above reason is when I'm willing to go without any support. And here, I'm confused. Do I need the rod? Don't I need the rod? 

M. Laitman: The rod, the staff, you need to walk with it. Mate, staff, it means lower in importance. But all of my mind and my feeling, I'm not throwing them out. I'm walking forward with them. How do I advance towards spirituality? By stepping on my mind and my feeling, and by that, I know that I'm moving correctly towards spirituality. Do you hear that? Only in this way is the meaning of Moshe, Moses, is pulling them. Moshe, pulling them out of their ego, out of Egypt toward the land of Israel. Meaning a desire aimed at the Creator. How is he doing it? He's walking with the staff. Each time he's going lower, he's putting the importance of reason below, and he's putting degrees of faith above it, he's building those degrees above it. The greater the reason, he needs to build a greater faith to cover it above. The reason grows higher, faith needs to grow higher still, and that's how you advance.

Student: So, in faith above reason we need support or don't we? 

M. Laitman: In faith above reason we need to annul toward the group, and to that extent to receive the reforming light from above. Important thing is the main thing is not to forget those.

Reader: On the next part of the lesson, we'll go to The Preface of the Wisdom of Kabbalah. Lesson from the 22nd of October 2006.