Morning Lesson July 2, 2021 Transcription

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

1. Rav’s Introduction: Raising one's self is relevant in two states, in the state of ascent and also in the state descent. It is important to not be unconscious, or even worse, to be in the state of corporeality, beastliness. We learned that we have the degrees of still, vegetative and animate, those that belong to our world, our egoistic world, and the speaking degree which already belongs to the Creator, the degree of Adam. It is important for us to hold ourselves, as much as possible, in a state of either ascent or descent. Why am I saying the descent is also important? Because without it, it is impossible to value the ascent, and to acquire the new vessels for the next ascent. Therefore, both of these states, darkness and light, are legitimate and correct and we move forward through them. It is desirable to go through those intermediate, in-between states as quickly as possible, to let them pass above us and to try, once again, to be in the state of ascent as much as possible. If not, to prepare ourselves for the ascent while in a state of descent. This way they should all be new in our eyes each and every day. There has to be darkness in order to emphasize the next state. We see our attitude toward the Creator by our prayer, that is, a request or gratitude towards Him in both of these states. How do we hold ourselves? How do we value these states? As it says ‘darkness shall shine as light’. We feel, in the state of darkness, that it is coming to us from the state of the posterior of that same Creator, and as much as possible, ascribe both of these states equally to the Creator. This is as we learn from my ‘beloved is like a gazelle’. The Creator seemingly runs away from us, however He turns His head and His face back, so that we will yearn for Him and chase after Him. This is why we measure both these states, either a state of coming closer to the Creator or a state of being apart from Him. We have to arrange other states, when we are seemingly unconscious, and arrange corporeal things with the help of corporeal means. These intermediate states between the ascents and descents should be as few as possible. We should hardly feel them, to be in great leaps with ascents and descents and not to be in the gray state. So let us begin from Excerpt 23.

Excerpt 23 (04:48 - 07:00) Twice RABASH, Article No. 22 (1989), "Why Are Four Questions Asked Specifically on Passover Night?"

2. R. (07:00) We do not catch the point where we start descending, when something starts changing within us with respect to spirituality, the group, the Creator. We don't feel that. Why? Because our descent is an ascent to the next degree but in the posterior, as it says, ‘One is elevated in sanctity and never lowered’. If we are rising on the left line we call that a descent. We have additional vessels that we didn't have before, an addition of incomplete vessels in which we will later feel additional darkness that we did not feel before. This is why we feel that we didn't have such states before, that we were never in them. Why are we working to reach such unpleasant states that we didn't have before? Is this a reward for our work? We need the additional vessels to reach the recognition, the awareness of the Creator. We develop left, right, left, right. We are not pleased when we are in the left, feeling deficient. If we are in the group and hold one another, then we recall very quickly that the left needs to grow in order for us to correct it and in it we discover the Creator, coming closer to Him. Reads: ‘During the descent, he does not see he is beginning to decline, at that point He is hidden from us’ because it is coming from a new Reshimot of Adam HaRishon. When he descends he remains unconscious of the situation. Bit by bit he loses interest but keeps functioning mechanically but without the same emotion or mind, without the same questions that he had before, functioning automatically. After being down for some time, then he gets help from above. He is told that he is in a decline. Sometimes he feels he is declining but he doesn't really care about it that much as he is already in the direction of the decline, he is associated with the decline. Before he was told that he is unconscious, but he doesn't know anything. He cannot feel it. It is as if he was given a shot that rendered him unconscious, in a coma, and he doesn’t feel that he is in a decline. We need that to locate ourselves already at the end of the path, in a new state at the end of the decline. From that we begin to know the new Reshimot, which is deeper than the previous Reshimot, otherwise we would struggle, not agreeing with the descent and would be hindering ourselves from receiving the new broken Reshimot. Reads: ‘However, one should believe that this, too, is so, since knowing does not come by itself. Instead, one should know that these descents were given to him to learn how it is possible to appreciate the state of ascent’. From the ascents and descents, but mostly from the descents, we learn that the ascent is a special state, not according to the quantity or to the height but according to the quality, to the extent that it is closer to connection, closer to us and the Creator. This state of connection between us becomes the vessel, the plate, in which we feel the connection with the Creator. In between descents we have the ascents. We learn the correct attitude to the ascents and descents we should have and how important it is to feel a bit more of the deficiency toward connection, the quality of the connection at the end of every descent. Not so much the intensity as the quality of it, to what extent we feel a lack for a more internal connection between us. We will build and reveal a deficiency for connection with the Creator between us. He writes that one should believe that this decline did not come by itself as it is all planned. These two opposite states, the state of Adam HaRishon before the shattering, and Adam HaRishon after the shattering meaning our general collective soul--determine all of the states that we have to go through. It is up to us to the extent we want it to happen, that we will pray to draw the reforming light so that it will act more. We determine the pace and the path of the correction. However these Reshimot already exist and we cannot change anything. From descents we learn how to appreciate the state of ascents. Only through the descent can one learn anything but during the ascent one can make a true judgment, a true calculation and say that he is in faith. Ascent means faith, bestowal. He now has this force which came from the Creator because the Creator is the force of bestowal, the force of faith, the force of Bina, the force of love. Otherwise I would immediately fall into the state of self-love. The Creator is holding us like a magnet is holding a piece of iron in the air. We can hold on only on the condition that the Creator is operating on us and if he does not make this calculation, the person is immediately thrown. I must understand that I am always under the control of the Creator. As much as I yearn to connect my forces together with the ten, I connect with the force of the magnet that is holding us from above and give gratitude to the Creator for bringing Him closer. Why? The Creator doesn't need our gratitude, however, by that, we connect with Him, we become attached. It turns out that it is impossible to obtain real pleasure from nearing the Creator unless he can appreciate it, as said above, the advantage of light out of darkness.

This means we have two states, ascent and descent. In the ascent we feel how close we are to the Creator, how the increasing connection between us connects us even more with the Creator. We feel the opposite in the descent. I don't need or feel anything, but I am aware that I don't need or feel anything. This will awaken a prayer in me. Where will I take that force of prayer if I am in such a state where I have nothing? I know that I have nothing, but on the other hand I need to receive an awakening from the environment, from my ten. These two contrasting states help me to activate the force of the prayer. That is, the prayer comes naturally during the descent; during the ascent we have gratitude. We get an eruption of gratitude, thankfulness for the Creator bringing us closer to the extent that we connect between us and to the Creator. These two states, the ascent and the descent, disconnection and prayer, and also nearing and gratitude, pertain to our states with respect to the Creator. We strongly feel, and we can measure these states, between us and to the Creator. If we don't have these two states we are in beastliness, in the state of what we call this world. We can rise through connection with the environment, through corporeal connections. This is why we exist in this world and this is how we begin to organize ourselves in an ascent. Raising ourselves is possible in each and every situation. We need to be concerned in advance about those states that we might fall into, about states that we may not be able to rise out of by ourselves, to always prepare the ground, prepare the remedy. If I fall, the ten, the group, work on me and I then join and work on them to elevate them. ‘Each one shall help his friend’ and it is possible to do this quickly. There are times where it is forbidden for us to wait for help from above, but rather we have to awaken the dawn.

3. S. (20:09) If a ten cannot overcome frictions and clashes within the 10, can that cause descents for an individual friend? What does the ten do?

R. You need to be in different, changing states, as much as possible. Check to see if this helps, or if that helps. It is important to not leave anything without an action. We must constantly determine if we need to behave this way between us and towards the Creator, or maybe differently. It's easier, it's better, it's more difficult, more worthwhile, which states and changes can we activate within us to be able to turn to the Creator. We should try all of the different possibilities very quickly. Of course, you will have disappointments and satisfaction in certain states. We spoke, in the previous two lessons, yesterday and the day before, that the most important thing for me is to begin to appreciate an act of bestowal that I perform is the reward for me. That I am pleased that I am bestowing, from the fact that I am not getting anything personally. This is already a sign of an ascent to the degree of Bina. We are going forward together consistently and gradually. It is impossible to skip any states here. Therefore, try to carry out what we are talking about, as much as each and every ten is capable of. We will advance together and not leave anyone behind. But you have to do it.

4. S. (23:04) How can a person feel the descent as an ascent on the left line?

R. If we learn, by speaking about it in the group, that our ascent is due to some negative charge, some problem being revealed which is more negative, what we call a ‘burdening of the heart’ that I feel myself, I have an opportunity to do stronger, more essential work in bestowal. I am given more according to my ability and capability of doing it each and every time. If I am given 5 kg to carry, or 10 kg, it is added according to how much force I have within me, how connected I am to the environment. I am always given some load, some burden, some distancing, some disappointment. This is how we advance.

5. S. (25:02) Is not being in a state of prayer or gratitude a sign that we are in a descent towards unconsciousness?

R. I don't know. I wouldn't think or study so much about these states. We need to yearn toward extra connection between us and be more precisely aimed toward the Creator. Any state that I had before as an ascent becomes a descent. You elevate yourself on the degrees. Whatever was an ascent on the previous degree now becomes a descent relative to the next degree. This is why I don’t think these things are the most important. The most important is to always be in a state of overcoming, towards connection with the ten. We connect emotionally as much as possible. You can measure the extent we have some excitement, some feeling of connection between our hearts. By this we will see how to get closer to the Creator. Specifically from the connection between us, are the conditions, the forms that we will detect and feel to what extent the Creator is coming closer to us.

6. S. (27:25) How can we in The Descent feel the Creator as he approaches us?

R. The fact that each entire 10 is in a state of descent is something rare, if it does happen it truly happens in very special cases which we find, like in the Torah, in the exile, in the tearing of the Red Sea, in certain special events like those. Usually when we advance, it is not everyone that we are in a descent or an ascent. There are these and those, and we have some kind of balance of those who are in ascents or dissents and we advance in such a way. It is like you have these examples of something going forward and backwards but altogether they advance and this is how we are in the connection between us in the Sefirot, that from all these Sefirot we carry between us and soon we will start to work on this and to feel it. From all of these actions we need to see that even now you can see to what extent each and every one is in a different state every time and the differences between these states is not something that we determine but rather it is determined from above, by the upper plan, by the program that is advancing us. We just have to express our willingness for that.

S. The connection in the Sefirot between us?

R. We need to be connected in a way which is like ten desires, not necessarily 10 it can be 8. We will learn these things, and we are connected in such a way to begin with, however it is hidden from us, so when it becomes revealed it is revealed according to our efforts towards connection. That this connection will be carried out by the upper light and in that way we will feel ourselves as a single unit and also we will start to connect with other units. Actually in our unit we will start to actualize our form of connection which is already our vessel that each time is becoming more established, more fashioned. This is how we will feel this melody of the Sefirot that they can work mutually so that each and every one by the upper light, is the Creator who is playing on us. Like it says about David's violin that the north wind comes and plays on the violin, this is how we will feel that the Creator is playing on us.

S. According to the excerpt we learned that the ascent is a gradual process where I have to build my relationship with the Creator. Now the descent is written in the excerpt that we find ourselves as the result in the descent, is that a gradual state?

R. No we cannot feel that we are falling because the fall is also not a fall, it is the revelation of a new record greater than what I had before however in the form that it is still not corrected. As each time we rise it says you are elevated in sanctity, however being elevated on the left line and in our work we shifted to the right. Again we elevated on the left line which is felt as a decline and we are elevated to the right line. We don't feel when the new desire to receive rises in us, it is not covered by the previous work and this is why we cannot do anything with it, we don't feel it. Only after we decline then we begin to feel that I am disconnected, not feeling anything, what happened to me, where did this come from and why? Sometimes we do feel that we are declining however against this decline, usually and especially it is so with the beginners they are not capable to resist it. This is what we feel, whatever is revealed to us is what needs to be and we just need to yearn and each and every instance whatever it is, we need to yearn to be connected and from us, between us, to the Creator, the rest doesn't matter I wish you would pray all day. You will see how much these things are really beneficial and if it is a descent, it is so, if it is an ascent it is an ascent. In truth it doesn't matter but in the eyes of a person who is advancing whether on the left or the right it doesn't matter. The most important is to constantly be in an inclination towards the connection through the 10, to the Creator. Try. Specifically the main work we do, this is in the night. That is in the darkness when we begin to yearn to come to a connection between us and appeal to the Creator. We will study how this is according to the Sefirot that we will begin to enter the darkness, the night and from midnight and onwards we begin to rise towards connection between us and with the Creator. We will study this, it is all ahead of us, don't worry, the most important is to connect to whatever we are studying right now.

7. S. (35:24) Is the intention of rising and falling refining between us in the 10?

R. Any ascent means greater connection that is for certain and to the extent that we connect between us, that will unite between us to become merged, by this we give the Creator of place to be revealed. Because we actually concede our ego which is in between the desires and we want to bring our desires as close to each other as possible even though they are opposite qualities and desires. However, by us yearning towards connection and the single goal to be as one man and one heart we want to nevertheless connect them. Even though they are opposites and more and more we become opposites in our development on the ladder towards the end connection and correction. At the end of correction there is no one with this quality who is not the complete opposite of the other as everyone is completely opposite, hating each other, in each and everything but above it we cover it with love. The great gap between the desire to receive, the hate and the desire to bestow with love reaches such an intensity that the light of Ein Sof becomes revealed.

8. S. (37:30) In everything we read and heard so far that this descent is really a great gift from the Creator and if so is it okay to discover sorrow that the descent wasn’t deeper?

R. You need to work with whatever you were given as this is optimal from above and each moment and exactly what you need. If you prepare yourself for something then you are getting the maximum and therefore, if you already begin to start calculating how much did I get, then seemingly you are becoming wiser than the Creator. You need to execute with the conditions that you are given so try to work less with your intellect. Just do what you are told.

9. S. (38:42) Where do we get the addition of the broken vessels?

R. From the shattering of Adam HaRishon where the Creator created to begin with the desire to receive, that He developed it. From this one speck of the desire to receive that is a little bit different from Him by bestowing upon that desire to receive with all of the lights. And then the desire to receive started inflating through this light and started to discover all kinds of qualities and new descents that are different, whatever the light imprints into the desire to receive. And then that same light that inflated the desire to receive, in that light the opposite quality was revealed between it and the desire to receive by the fact that as it inflates, it also reaches a state of awareness of how much it is farther and farther away from the light that is developing it. That desire to receive and the Light reaches a stage where they cannot stand one another and then as we learn from the four phases of direct light the restriction occurred and later on the cascading. We learned later that this Partzuf that emerged, eventually exploded and smashed and pieces and fell from the degree of the light to the degree of darkness to in order to receive. And these pieces that are in the darkness, in the disconnection, that is from the desire to bestow from the light, these pieces are us. We already need to assist the light, to recollect us once again to the same system as it was before, but with our own participation and this is what is happening. This happens as we engage in the correction of creation, the entire corruption, the breaking that happened before us and therefore all of our records awakened from that vessel that was broken of Adam HaRishon.

S. In the daily work it comes from the efforts to connect?

R. Yes, certainly, everything we attain we obtain out of our efforts to connect.

10. S. (41:49) To continue the friend's question, is the increase, the constant increase of the actions of connection in the 10, does this allow us to take advantage of the descent better?

R. Not only is it better but it is the only way to take advantage of all of our situations for the better, increasing the connection between us. Especially what we have been learning in these lessons. If we later on throughout the day try to go back and to repeat them, to do this, and to execute it, even if it seems that we're not so successful, but we read it a few times. I read it and I have read them dozens of times and all of these articles during the 40 years that I have been in it and believe me that each time you will see something new. There is infinite depth to all of these things because we are reading it inside of our desire, in our desire we can in advance all the way to the end of correction so you always see this as new. As it says “They shall be New in your Eyes”, because the reading comes out of the new deficiency.

S. Is the constant increase something we can check only according to how we put something new into a framework like reading the excerpts that we need to do every day so there's no framework there's no increase?

R. Not exactly, if I am reading by myself it is more like I am studying these excerpts like a student, like a scientist, as if I'm in the University. But if I read it with the friends even though we may not talk about them, however when we read together it works it passes between us, they connect us in such a way that later on we begin to feel that we have some inner connection between us and we truly later feel that our hearts are connected, they are connected and where did it come from, I don't know. We feel that more and more we have an understanding of what is happening in our friends' hearts and how much more and more we need to feel the friend’s heart. We just need to repeat the excerpt more and more as they are like the medicine that swallows and later it works. When we take it together this is truly the best form to take that medicine because we need to reach a stage where we are all incorporated together and that depends on the revelation of the Creator between us. To the extent that we come closer and become incorporated in one another in one Sefira, nothing can be revealed to the extent that we incorporating and to that intensity of the incorporation the Creator becomes revealed more and more.

11. S. (45:34) Do we get the state of ascent through our efforts to connect in the 10?

R. Of course, it’s not through that, it determines it to the extent that we want to come closer, to be together, want to, not that we do it but that we want to do it and the Creator will finish it for me as it says. The Creator brings us closer, He does the action but the desire, the urge, the raising of the prayer for the action that’s on us. We want to do that and then we obligate the Creator. This is why our work is called ‘the Work of the Creator’, because we keep awakening Him to make actions, He is making the actions. If we awaken Him to make an action and He can only make actions of connection, if we pressure Him, if we demand Him to make connection between us, He does and then we get a result from our work. This is the work and why we are called partners with the Creator. Only by wanting to agree and to connect in our desires in a way that the Creator will finish the work and he will bring us together to appear in the common heart. Only by this, we do our part of the work and the Creator is doing it and then he appears there and becomes revealed.

12. S. (48:00) We have the title of the lesson, the topic of raising one's self and on the other hand we learned that a person cannot release himself from prison, so how should we relate to this correctly?

R. If I don't want to raise myself then how will I do it, you start from wanting to raise yourself and then you understand that you cannot do this by yourself but rather you have to do this with the 10. In spirituality, there is no relevance of raising yourself even by a bit, it is only through overcoming with the 10 and our whole ascent is only towards more connection between us. This is the meaning of an ascent, this is the meaning of the desire of being one man and one heart and the Creator fulfills this.

S. The desire to do this, this is what we are capable of?

R. Our contribution is the prayer, the deficiency and the Creator is the operator.

13. S. (49:16) To continue the question about the fundamental advice to review the excerpt we are studying throughout the day, what you said and how you answered, it sounds like by yourself it's like a scientist or a student?

R. That is good too, I am studying the excerpts, the quotes, what is written there, but to apply the action that the quotes are talking about, is by reading it together discussing it and then each one is incorporated with his friend and it really works in the 10.

S. It is clearly felt and in our meetings they become of higher quality and full of meat and there is less of a problem, but the increasing frustration is how to upgrade the work between the meetings during the day?

R. First of all being frustrated is good, it is a good state, it is impossible without it, I am happy you feel that way but, what else to do. You should also have some personal thought of each and every one, how much you appreciate these meetings, these connections and how much you delve deeper into what is written in the quotes. I myself as much as I have read, reading them dozens of times, the quotes in the articles. I don't just read. I get in there and change things and see them from different perspectives, breaking the original text apart as this is how I learned. This is how I get connected with the text all of the time and I still do it to this day. When I come to the lesson then I review these quotes, this is not new to me. I read them both last night and today because I want to be in the same wavelength of the author and to be with them and to be the connector between him and you. I think that these quotes need to be always in front of our eyes.

S. Is there a difference between my thoughts when I am by myself versus my thoughts when I am in the zoom with the friends?

R. Sometimes there are states where you need to be on your own. It is not forever, even when you don't want to, you need to obligate yourself to be with the friends and to understand that this is the more advanced state that also advances you. But there are states like this and like that.

S. Usually it turns out that between our meetings a person becomes free and he wants to go back to the sources and read them and you say this is okay, but how do we make the right intention when we are not together with the whole group and reading some source excerpt on our own so it will work towards maximum connection?

R. When I read a quote I first learn what is written, what the author wants to convey to me and how I feel it, how I respond to it and how I can come to the 10 with that, to the environment and how we can realize it. Let’s say that we all swallow this quote and format ourselves based on this quote and we enter it as a system. Let's say that it calibrates itself correctly so that this quote will dress into us. So we all become this instrument, like a musical instrument that is completely corrected and now it plays according to the quote. This is basically what we need to do, this is the true adhesion between the 10 as a vessel and the Kabbalist who makes a connection for us, say Baal HaSulam or Rabash with the Creator. This is how we have to try to see ourselves. Basically, Rabash helps us play the melody of the Creator that is what it means that the Creator appears in us.

14. S. (55:31) The feeling of frustration comes when I see things that come to me against me from the outside, also from the 10 but that I also turned to blame the friend or the external situation and then I realized that it's all coming from the Creator and all for the purpose of my correction so that I'm not working with it correctly. So it gives me a great feeling of frustration and I don't manage to move and it angers me as I lose the directions so how to work with this?

R. I prefer not to work with it at all as what happens outside, leave that alone and don't start incorporating with that, criticizing it, trying to change something as this is not our work. Our work is through connection between us to bring through us to this world more presence of the Creator, more light and this will change everything. All of the different states, all of our treatment in this world that we do besides dissemination is not going to help. The world continues as it is and the ego grows from day-to-day so it can't get better as it actually needs to get worse to discover the evil. The necessity for healing needs to become obvious to all change that you are immersed in that, don't let it pass by and you will see how your inner work will influence the world and not the other way around.

15. S. (58:00) To check myself again because we as a 10 are constantly trying to work this way through unity, however it turns out that the friends get disturbances, sometimes such disturbances that they are not able to overcome, and for us this is like a red light pushing us to connect even more. We do this and the friends distance even more so we take ourselves to see what is going on.

R. I can't get into the group and get into all of those personal states between yourselves so I can't say exactly why they move away from the 10. Perhaps you are making some actions that they don't agree with or that are not in the right order or something, I don't know. You need to try to implement but we learn in the morning lessons so that it goes into our exercises during the day. See, this is what needs to happen so try to do that. Nothing besides that, see, I don't have a situation where one thinks this way and another thinks that way, did you hear the lesson, now determine what you need to do based upon the lesson only and this is how we will advance. So I don't understand what kind of division needs to be in the group, whether one thinks this and another thinks that, ask how you want to implement the lesson in practice. I don't really hear from the group and I am interested in hearing but I don't when they have some problems. They are talking about the topics that we are studying in the lesson and they somehow absorb it. I see that it is absorbed, it could be more absorbed but in the meantime I see that it is happening.

16. S. (01:00:37) How should we meet the friends in faith above reason to magnify the longing in the connection between them?

R. At first I am willing to connect with the friends because that is what is written and we are also used to it in this world that is there is a connection that can be good, also people are doing something and I don't want to be separated from them, I don't want to be different, that is the corporeal nature of people. When I read the excerpts and I try to belong to what I'm reading, there is no choice, I have to choose such connection between us and so that is how we can advance. This is a matter of daily work, if you disconnect during the day, what can I say, if you don't disconnect but that you want during the day to come back to connection between you then it will happen. There is no hocus pocus here. You have to work on it, I don't have any more to say, you have to work. You can't cry like babies and say that is it. You have to grow and try to do what the Kabbalists are telling us. You're not going to find anything besides what they are writing as this comes exactly from the combination of the forces, the desire to receive and the desire to bestow, plus and minus is only these two forces exist in nature and we just have to rearrange the connection between them on all levels up to the very highest level so they maintain the right combination, not in war but in collaboration. There is no other choice but only in this way when there is the desire with the restriction, screen, and reflected light that they all connect as one and then all of the worlds not just ours. In all of nature there will be a positive connection.

17. S. (01:03:51) The most important is to come to intensify the connection with the 10 and you said we can also measure to what extent the feeling of connection in our hearts, so I want to ask this feeling, this examination, is this a common feeling of the 10 and what is this?

R. We don't have a device to measure feelings. We just need from day-to-day to try to feel ourselves how much we are willing to open each other's hearts to the others, each one to the others and accordingly how much we can enter the other's hearts as well. This is called, as one man in one heart.

S. How is this readiness measured?

R. By not being repelled by it, by being willing to do this, trying to somehow come closer to them, this is an inner thing and there are not that many words to it. Willingness to connect is the willingness to connect.

Excerpt 24 (01:05:32)

18. R. We don't correct ourselves, no one corrects themselves but in praying for the friend I want to help the friend, by this I correct him and he in such an action corrects me, one does not save himself from imprisonment.

Reader continues Twice

19. R. (01:08:07) We have, here, a very severe condition, that only one thing will help me, but I asked for the friend and not for myself. On the one hand, this is very reasonable in spirituality and how could it be otherwise as for myself as the desire to receive and for the friend it is not. I don't have the will to receive to help the friend to begin with. Only through my will to bestow can I turn to that and it turns out that one asks for himself, that is a Klipa and by that he even brings harm to himself. One who prays and asks for the friend is helping himself. There is also the question here: to what extent what I asked for the friend I am actually thinking about myself, this you should think about and you will see how much you have all kinds of thoughts for and against. Anyhow praying for the friend is spirituality to an extent, praying for oneself is clearly corporeality, crude and clear. Let's arrange our prayers. Not like every person prays, as every person who lives in this world is praying whether they know or don't know. They don't even know who they are turning to, they just cry and they feel bad. So if we want to be not like people of this world but above them to achieve the truth, opening our eyes to see the true state then we have to only make an effort to pray for others. Only this truly helps our spirituality otherwise it just goes into the same category as the whole world that cries and prays. There are seminaries and synagogues, all kinds of places in the world who pray and cry and what is the use of that, what is the benefit of that? It isn't the deficiency that needs to influence and cause a change in nature, what is influencing is only the deficiency for connection, when everyone wants to understand what the other is lacking and pray for that. Therefore one who prays for his friend is answered first because he is praying for the friend and through him, the abundance will flow through to the friend and fulfill the friend. He only rises higher as a conduit, as the bestowing vessel. Noam Elimelech tells us that ‘one should always pray for his friend as one cannot do much for himself, for his friend he is answered quickly’. By this they are answered and each works on the others until everything is answered and only in this way, look at what we can do in our 10s and let's see how much we have friends who accept this and are willing to do this. Each and every one needs to feel that this is basically his role.

20. S. (01:13:13) He writes the essence of the prayer is in the essence of the thought, is there a prayer that is not?

R. You don’t have to cry out and do all these actions with your hands and legs, it all doesn’t matter, it all works on the person who does it but actually it has to be subjugating the desire and turning it from egoistic individual desire to the point where you understand and you have to pray for your 10 and you are asking for them for the getting closer to the Creator to give Him contentment, that is that you need to check exactly how can you arrange the whole world towards the Creator, how do you turn the whole world to the Creator. That you yourself are just awakening them, that you are standing on the side.

S. What truly is the purpose of the physical actions of the meetings, all kinds of things we do?

R. Each time we awaken each other how much we want to be awakened to be connected in mutual concern that we are in a single vessel and that we are aware that we are sharing the same vessel and this is how we advance.

S. Is it necessary to perform all of these actions in the 10 besides prayer?

R. I think it is good for the meantime even though we are moving from this to a more virtual kind of connection so it is hard for me to say. When I am with you now through these lines of communication, what is the difference between these ways and other waves that pass through the air so either it's through the wires or radio waves or it doesn't matter.

S. There are friends who suffer through this whole virtual connection that they don't feel the friends and they very much need a physical connection.

R. They are still in that kind of development but it will pass. See, you have to try to do things to influence them more. I'm not canceling the physical connection altogether. We even want to do a meal which is not exactly physical, it is virtual, together through the screens. As much as the connection is physical if it is actually physical and not in the 10, let's say that we would come together into a physical Congress like we used to have, would we feel a spiritual ascent with all of these preparations that we used to be bothered with and all of that, I don't think it's very efficient. Our whole work today becomes more working in our thoughts and desires and not physical actions or physical meetings. What is the benefit if I meet someone else's body? That one can breathe and smell and hear through the air rather than the wires? I personally don't really see the problem, but I guess there are some people who are influenced by that and we need to welcome the people who can have a closer connection but it is not that this is mandatory for us to do.

S. Many times we give the example of Rav with his ten, so why should not we?

R. That is true that I have a few friends, people that we meet and we are together, but I don't think that this is similar to a regular 10. Not certain what to tell you, I am not hiding anything, you all know and understand what it is about.

S. So should we take an example from it or should it not be an example for us?

R. I advise you to connect as much as you can virtually if you really want to meet, you can of course in a physical way. The general direction will be virtual because the more that we develop our emotions, our sensations, we will come to a point where we have no connection with the friend's body, his physiological body can't give me anything. We have grown past that development and we are going into a new level of development, something that didn't even happen in the days of Rabash, where he says that ‘I feel the friends being many miles away and the distance doesn't separate us’, he feels this. This is what we need to achieve as well. In our meetings they are not necessarily connecting us more when I hold the friend by the hand and then we are together. We need to make that connection in the heart and it is more suitable for our records, our time and our vessels. It doesn't cancel the previous states as it is like with little children. We have to do what is useful for us. If we are inclined toward that we can do it. If we will be in a stage where we can have a global meeting like we used to have and Israel with 6, 7 or 8 thousand people in a single hall, I don't know if today, as it was a kind of celebration that we would meet physically, but it is not that this physical meeting I think will actually symbolize rising to a new degree, no. It's not that it will give us a desire and a state of more connection. We need to achieve a connection of a different essence as we discussed that we pray for the friends and each one incorporates with the friends heart and that we all incorporate with each other and that it doesn't happen on the ground in a physical space in some shared room. It happens in a virtual space.

21. S. (01:23:03) What is the main complement of prayer, is it desire or thought?

R. Prayer is the expression of the heart's desire, what is felt in the heart is the prayer. So each one, when he feels in his heart how he injects a deficiency into the general system. In this it means that each and every one is praying, what each and every one wants and is aware of, what he feels is in his heart or not. According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, we need to aim ourselves toward a specific prayer that we know what we need to pray for and we realize that our prayer is incorrect and by connection with the friends we want to bring ourselves to a correct prayer, to a new state. This is how we add, this is how we build a prayer, the deficiency for the Creator in a way that is more and more accurate each time. Meaning that it needs to be first incorporated and included with each and every one's personal desires and aimed at the Creator from all of us. Working on the Creator necessitating the Creator to advance us towards bestowal and adhesion.

22. S. (01:25:13) How do I pray for your friend when I feel I'm in a darkest prison, a decline?

R. Try to understand that you can come out of your state to a spiritual state unless you ask for the friends, this is called spirituality. If you ask for yourself this could be called corporeality or even a Klipa, so first of all, know about it and inspect your state to know where you are, Klipa or Kedusha see, there is no in between. If you are also always concerned about yourself then begin to learn how to read the material that speaks about your spirituality only comes from connection in the 10. If you are not connected to the 10 you have no spirituality and to the extent that you connect to the 10 and the quality of connection with the 10, this determines your spirituality. Start thinking about it and look at how you can advance towards that, perhaps far from you but that you would still know the truth and how you need to aim yourself at it.

S. If I feel that the Creator has disconnected me from the 10, I want to go back to the connection but the Creator separated me from the 10.

R. Yes of course, it happens this way each time He gives you a new broken record so you will advance closer to Him. He throws you farther away so that you will go closer to Him. This is how it happens. So you already feel in your state a spiritual state except that it is negative, it is spiritual already as you are far from the Creator and as a result of his actions upon you, so good. Now work towards Him and turn toward Him and demand that He will bring you closer just as He sent you away, He will now bring you back, no problem. If you pray and you ask, you will get it.

23. S. (01:28:35) If I am the weakest part in the chain of the 10 and I am in a decline can I pray for myself and how to do this correctly in order to advance the 10?

R. If I feel that I am the lowest of all of the 10 then it is the best stage because it is true. See, if you advance faster, the more you advance, the more you feel lower than the others. In such a state you need to think about one thing, I don't ask about myself because that is a Klipa, out of my state, I am only asking for how much I can support them in order to raise them. This is Kedusha and this is how I need to try to find my state and my place. Meaning that I thank the Creator, that I am happy that He shows me how lowly I am and that I can invert my personal deficiency that He shows me I am a zero and that I can turn that into praying for the group and not for myself and by that, I truly transform a corporeal desire into a spiritual desire and by that I raise the 10.

24. S. (01:31:01) Praying for the friends as you taught us, is not a problem this is something that is asked for on the other hand the Kabbalist teaches that we have to see the friends that they are in greatness, that they are in adhesion and perfection with the Creator so how do we work with those two channels?

R. How can it be if I see the group as upper and perfect? What can I add to this if I am the smallest and so lonely and broken, what can I add to them? I can add to the 10 in praising the Creator for doing this with them and about myself, for myself I don't ask anything except to have the strength to appreciate the Creator's relationship with the 10 and to elevate them. Then I praise the Creator and the group out of my lowliness and that is a very special effective prayer. I don't ask about myself, I am included with everyone, incorporated with everyone like a baby who goes into a new degree.

S. If I can there is another assumption that if we pray for the friends, that is okay but if suddenly I pray for myself let's say, that I want to bestow to the friends and I know that if I get the quality of bestowing from the Creator that I am canceled, I can't receive anything for myself already is this something that is a flaw or only towards the friends?

R. Towards the friends in the Creator as my deficiency should only be in this, in spirituality there's no deficiency that works for itself otherwise it becomes a cancer that devours others. Every single cell and desire, even the smallest one in spirituality needs to work outside of itself, to give, to pass on and to transfer but not for itself as even somewhat nothing can he receive for himself. This is why all the thoughts that a person has for himself, if he can rid himself of them he feels what a reward in profit he has and not having anything for himself. This is what we spoke about yesterday also where I feel this action of bestowing with the thought of bestowing which I can hold within me as the reward, as the greatest reward of thinking of others.

S. Any state that awakens in me is a record and part of the spiritual process?

R. There is nothing but the records and the way that you realize and implement them in my way either implement them through the general inclusive system which moves everything according to as we call in its due time up to the end of correction and besides that there is nothing, and they are not the same records but rather they operate and are included and operate from the collective shattered vessel. It seems to you as if you have already been in this and this is from not scrutinizing it enough, you'll see later that it is not this way.

25. S. (01:36:11) Through the connection in the 10 we make efforts to attain a mutual desire as a base for our prayer. The question is do we need to speak about that deficiency in words or is it enough just to be united in our desire?

R. Repeat the question.

S. We work in order to attain a mutual desire towards the Creator and when we reach an agreement do we have to pray and words together or this is enough to be united in our desire?

R. It is worthwhile for you to talk about this and agree to decide about this. It is very worthwhile.

26. S. (01:37:45) You said before if I turn to the Creator with the 10, I have to imagine all of the friends in my head and connect to them and then turn to him and I tried doing this exercise and in the beginning it was blurry but gradually I see it is getting clearer. This is what has to be more clear?

R. Continue and continue and may we all do this, not an exercise that I did once and then I forgot about it, until this exercise becomes a clear action and enters into a clear execution.

27. S. (01:38:30) Sometimes we have a precise feeling that we speak about in our meetings during the day and we try to pass it on to each other as a 10, how do we keep this when the next day the conditions are not the same?

R. Conditions change and we change as everything changes from moment to moment and this is why we need to renew our attitude towards it, I, the group and the Creator we constantly need to check this to examine and aim ourselves in this way, all the time, nonstop.

28. S. (01:39:27) I am praying for the friends and I know that I am gaining something from this so how to take this self-benefit out of the prayers so it will really be for them without self-calculation?

R. As long as you pray for the friends and the more that you pray it is also for your benefit and you will see later how this prayer loses its ego and you remain more included within the friends in their desires. You will start to feel that from within them you are praying to the Creator and it is not that you are there and you are feeling them externally and that you are praying to the Creator but rather you are in the friends and from the heart of every friend you are praying to the Creator. Then you can connect all of the hearts of all of the friends and to be within that heart and to pray to the Creator. Then you will feel that you are simply in the Creator. That is how you will grow.

Excerpt 25 (01:41:30) Twice

29. S. (01:44:14) The state that is explained here is what I want to ask about, there are times that you come to society with no forces, and difficulties and suddenly everything wakes up except for the intention in prayer, what can help us to sustain that state?

R. I will tell you as I rise in the morning at least an hour and a half before the lesson and I try to wake up and feel a little how I am waking up even though from all kinds of the opposite two states and then I read materials to awaken myself where I come to here and I hear how you start to prepare yourself for the lesson and this especially awakens me. Even though prior to that may be even more than an hour I was engaged in trying to raise myself and uplift myself but the fact that I see thousands of people participating together to lift themselves to a meeting between them and the Creator this operates on me the most powerful. This is what appreciate that each one adds to the connection before the lesson there is no measure to this, there is nothing that could resemble this in all of reality where people from all of the parts of the Earth, from all different cultures leave everything and wake up and rise and connected seeking a way to connect to him is something and when I look at this I am really moved and so inspired. This is what I gather my strength from in preparation for the lesson. Without it I don't think I would be able to speak, I also know when I speak I am speaking from that fuel that I received from you that you awaken within me otherwise from where? According to my forces I would not have the strength to wake up as it is like a mother when her baby cries she has no choice but to get out of her bed in the middle of the night several times and approaches him to take care of him. This is what we have and this is why I thank you that we can advance together.
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