Morning Lesson February 06, 2024
Transcription is made from simultaneous translation, which leaves a possibility for differences in the audio
Part 1:
Rabash. What Are “A Layperson’s Vessels in the Work?” 34 (1990)
1. Rav intro: Questions?
2. S. (37:05) Why is it only through the servants of the king he revealed the greatness of the Creator? Why did he not reveal it directly through his connection with the king?
R. Because they have no contact with the king, but through those who are close to the king they do have it.
S. What can we learn from it? What does a person have to do truly?
R. He needs a mediator to tie him to the king. Like you, like me, each one needs to have someone who serves as a point of contact with the King.
S. It's the Ten through which I have to connect and everything else there?
R. Let's say it's the Ten, who knows what else.
3. S. (38:11) What does it mean that he hid his vessels, that person? The lower one, when he saw the king, why did he have to hide the vessel? That he is already prepared, he prepared the meal already he was waiting for the king but when he saw you was in greatness he hid all the vessels.
R. Because he saw that he lacks corrections and the ability to connect to the meal of the king.
S. Meaning he saw the gap, the difference between?
R. Yes.
4. S. (38:51) It's not clear because it is written that he was ashamed to use the vessels of reception even though they were in order to bestow. He already had the greatness of the king. What else was he lacking so that he could really use these vessels?
R. Help me answer him.
S. Seemingly, he already has vessels, he's connected with the Creator, the Creator tells him he's coming for the meal, he prepared everything, but he lacks corrections in order to receive the fulfillment of the vessels. What other corrections does he need? He has the greatness of the king, and he has vessels that are in order to bestow?
R. For being in vessels that are opposite from the Creator I would say that he has it but the fulfillment to receive the fulfillment inside his vessels he doesn't have it. The fulfillment of the filling is a light of Hochma, and he doesn't have correction for the light of Hochma.
S. What does it mean that his vessels are in order to bestow and that they are corrected?
R. They're in order to bestow, yes otherwise he doesn't want to even approach the king. He doesn't want to receive in order to receive, but it's not the vessels in which you can receive in order to bestow. We see that in vessels we have degrees of coarseness, coarseness of the screen, the hardness of the screen, what kind of light we can receive in order to bestow, to be revealed in him Nefesh, Ruach, Neshama, Chaya, Yechida.
S. Seemingly, the entire article speaks about the fact that this created being that the king comes to dine with he has vessels of reception he corrected them and later on he realizes, what is this later on? After everything is ready, what other work is there that he could truly receive in these vessels? What later causes him to agree that the king will dine with him?
R. Because it is not enough to receive, it's to enjoy it.
S. What is this work? What else needs to be done in order to truly enjoy from it?
R. He does it to benefit the king, delight the king, because from the pleasure in those vessels he wishes to reveal his delight in the king.
5. S. (42:05) Does it mean that to bestow in order to bestow, it's not yet vessels of reception that are corrected, it's only acquiring a certain relation towards the Creator? But when he comes to use the vessels of reception in order to enjoy for himself, he needs to make additional corrections on these vessels. Is this why he is ashamed when he reaches this point?
R. Yes.
6. S. (42:38) Who are the angels?
R. The angels are the qualities of the Sefirot.
S. Why do they argue and seemingly claim that they deserve it and not the people?
R. Each one thinks that he has in him all the data of the will to receive, to be able to receive correctly the purpose of creation and that is it and he is ready for it.
S. He writes there that the angels are the servants of the Creator but also they are the servants of the soul. The Creator is hidden, that's clear, so if they're servants of the soul why are they hidden from us?
R. I don't understand because we are not prepared to receive them properly.
S. How to create this connection?
R. How to form a connection with the angels? To try and walk in every situation that is revealed in order to bestow.
7. S. (44:13) It's a wonderful article. I would summarize it with a single sentence out of the desire of the emanator to bestow necessarily the will to receive is born in the created being? Is this correct?
R. Correct.
8. S. (44:46) It's such a deep article and it touched the heart, but he didn't quite go in, the questions, and the answers and the scrutinies. Is it possible to read the article again so we will really get into it? It's a very deep article.
R. I don't know. He wants us to read the article again because he was impressed that the article is very deep. I think I can't take everyone's general time. What do you think? Who's for reading it again, who's for it? Who's against it? We are not going to reread the article. Let us hope that we will discover its essence in the remaining articles.
9. S. (46:22) What does it mean to cover the body with a Tzitzit, a prayer shawl?
R. A Tzitzit, there are these kinds of corrections, corrections.
S. How could Moses rise to the Creator and the angels saw his vessels of reception? How is it possible to bring up to the Creator vessels of reception?
R. He keeps them in order to use them later in order to bestow, for the time being he is restricting these vessels. In all of our actions, we don't cross out the vessels, we don't use them, part of them for the time being and that's how we ascend and then we bring them out more and more to all kinds of actions and we derive forces to ascend and degrees to ascend.
S. How can one be certain that the key will not be lost from these vessels of reception? I mean Moses went up there and every moment he could fall again, reception could overcome him?
R. The screen is a result of the attitude toward the Creator so then the light shines and he gives me the powers, forces that I can receive in order to bestow.
10. S. (48:22) Continuing about the angels, it feels like the angels are competing between them. There is this mutual envy. Seemingly they have their own existence, but they don't have a will to receive of their own?
R. The angel is the will to receive at any given moment and they appear against the advancement of the person toward the Creator so you'll get to know better how to advance, and we will ask for it.
S. The angels simply cope against us?
R. The angels are our helpers, they typically advance through questions but these questions, they build the person, they format him, and they raise him.
11. S. (49:42) Usually the Creator is the boss or the landlord and he set up the table for the person and the person comes with his appetite. Here the example is the opposite, the person is seemingly the host, why is it here like that?
R. I don't understand.
S. Here the Creator comes to the meal as a guest. Why use this example? He says, usually the king prepares the meal for the person who comes to dine with the king, here in the allegory does the opposite example, the king comes to dine with the person.
R. By the person preparing the meal.
S. Right, why this inversion? What does it mean?
R. It's because you're either doing it in order to receive or you're doing it in order to bestow. If it's in order to bestow it's as if you are feeding the king and if it's in order to receive, it's as if you're being fed.
S. Different actions?
R. The actions are different but the essence of the action inverts it. The intention is that which does everything.
12. S. (51:32) How does a person open the doors of these Sefirot?
R. This happens slowly as a person speaks about them and begins to feel a bit more what is each Sefira, and it comes to them like that. Not that there's something more to that, maybe we'll hear more questions.
13. S. (52:30) What is the thing that sustains the Creator the most?
R. Equivalence of form with Him. Meaning the exertion of the lower one who wishes to obtain equivalence of form with a Creator. This is what sustains the Creator.
14. S. (52:56) It was written that the souls rise for MAN. What is this ascent? Where does the MAN begin?
R. Raising MAN means raising of a deficiency from the lower one who wishes the Creator to manage him to care for him, to fill him, in this ascent, the ascent of the deficiency is going from the lower one to the upper one to the Creator.
15. S. (53:56) I think that the essence of the article is in this paragraph if you agree, likewise the ARI says that only the souls that rise to MAN they raise ZON to AVI to draw additional Mochin because the souls require the light of Hochma because they have vessels of reception. Here if it's correct, in fact the Creator works with the created beings in a give and take, you keep the vessels of reception I will give you the light of Hochma if you correct them and rise up and get to know the names of the Creator and the angels will not be rewarded with it. Why? Because to begin with they don't have the need for it. They were created for the purpose of receiving the light of Hassadim, only the light of Hassadim they are corrected. That is the guidance that they pass on to us, is that true?
R. Excellent, beautiful.
16. S. (55:09) In what way should we speak of the dishes? Is the food a state of reception or of bestowal?
R. I didn't understand, repeat please.
S. When we speak of the angels or communicate with them is it when we are in the state of reception or in the state of bestowal?
R. The connection can be only through the vessels of bestowal, only vessels of bestowal.
17. S. (56:08) The concealment of the vessels is something that happens intentionally, in the intention, in what way can we control the intention?
R. Only through the request.
18. S. (56:37) In the text it says that the king said know that I will come to dine at your place and prepare it for me. What is the meaning of that, what attitude should we prepare in the Ten when the king says prepare something?
R. The king tells a person that he is interested in the corrected vessels of the person so that the person will accumulate, that he will accumulate in these vessels whatever the king will receive from him, what he wants to give to the King.
19. S. (57:49) Why the inner Torah, or the internality of Torah belongs only to Israel?
R. Only after we correct the external laws relatively what we see and understand that we have to do, then we reach the inner vessels. This is called the internality of the Torah and then we reach a connection with the Creator and therefore laws who already reached the internality of the Torah they're called Yashar-Kel straight to the Creator, aimed towards the internality then they are called Israel.
20. S. (58:52) We will come to feel the meaning of each and every individual Sefira. What does
it means to feel an individual Sefira?
R. The Sefirot are qualities and when we get closer to the Creator we begin to feel these qualities and through them we have a greater and greater grip on the Creator.
21. S. (59:36) Is there specific work that we can do between the friends in order to prepare this lampstand for the Creator or is it exclusively between the person and the Creator?
R. I didn’t think about that. We will reach it and see.
22. S. (01:00:02) He writes in the article that the angels are from above concealed Hassadim and from Chazeh below are the souls revealed Hassadim. What's the difference between the two kinds?
R. The difference is in the vessels that covered Hassadim or revealed Hassadim. There is a difference, actually we want everything to be revealed so we need the souls so that they will be revealed.
S. Meaning when the light of Hassadim shines it means that it's revealed?
R. Yes.
S. What eventually do the angels receive from the Torah, what do they expect to have from it? What is the difference between what they do receive and what they do not receive from it?
R. It is from Chazeh above and Chazeh below, if we use the angels then we only use the vessels that are from Chazeh and above and if we already use the souls, then we use the vessels that are from Chazeh and below.
23. S. (01:01:45) It is written that even though the Creator has everything nevertheless he desires the vessels of the lower ones which he calls the vessels of the lower one, the vessels of the layperson on the vessels of the lay person so we have to understand what are the vessels of the layperson. So we should understand what are the vessels of the layperson that the Creator desires specifically?
R. The Creator does not have the vessels of reception, but we do. Therefore using them is actually the work that we can do and by that give him contentment.
S. What is a lay person? In the answer of Moses to the angels he said you have the evil inclination. Have you been to Egypt? What is the essence of that?
R. It is the opposite, it says you do not have the evil inclination.
S. He asks?
R. So?
S. What is this addition?
R. Of the evil inclination?
S. What does the Creator gain from?
R. The Creator gains from it that the lower ones start to play with all of the lights from zero to Ein Sof.
S. How can we understand the point that we wish to prepare a meal and we discover that we lack the correct vessels? How does it work?
R. We’ve been through the shattering, and we have to start correcting our vessels, so what is the problem?
S. Are we not going through everything that's been described in this article? That is my question.
R. I don't know but it is upon us to do it. To correct ourselves from the shattering from the depth of the shattering, the more we go down to the bottom of the shattering so then we can correct the vessels and through them to rise higher and higher.
24. S. (01:04:27) If the principle is that we correct from the externality to the internality from the lighter vessels to the coarser vessels, then theoretically it should have been that after correcting everything in order to bestow we should have gone down to Egypt and obtain coarser vessels?
R. But they are ready already.
S. That is the question. What can we learn from the fact that the vessels are already prepared but they have not been used up to now?
R. Because they don't have the forces for it. Bit by bit through the vessels of the bestowal they prepared themselves for the correction of the vessels for reception.
S. How did they come out of Egypt?
R. By having the screens over all of these vessels bit by bit gradually they come out of Egypt.
S. The Exodus is not all at once?
R. No, actually it is through a process, it is a process, it does not end even after they leave Egypt.
S. Meaning that what they say about how they borrow vessels from the Egyptians?
R. That's not enough in order to disconnect from Egypt.
S. Each time we go back to Egypt?
R. We do not go back but this inclination remains because they cannot disconnect entirely from the vessels of reception. Look what happened after Egypt, what other stories we have.
S. How can it be that they are correcting vessels of bestowal if they have vessels of reception that are not corrected yet and what is their source, are they not revealed?
R. They are revealed gradually. The Creator reveals these vessels and the lower ones get these vessels and this is how they correct them.
25. S. (01:07:01) I heard that the angels advance through questions. What does it mean that they advance through questions, the angels?
R. They ask, they ask.
S. Who is asking who and who is answering?
R. They awaken these questions in a person and the person by having to answer these questions he actually fills the angels. He corrects them.
26. S. (01:07:45) What is the evil inclination and by which condition does it become a vessel of reception?
R. The evil inclination is the will to receive in a person that to begin with this is how the Creator created him and later on it was filled a little bit with this evil inclination and later on it was broken.
S. It is not clear, what is the role of the evil inclination? We have vessels of reception and a desire to receive from the Creator everything he has, that is the fourth phase, why do we have the evil inclination? What is this addition?
R. No it is all called the evil inclination. All of the vessels of reception are called the evil inclination.
S. Is the goal to receive all the goodness and delight from the Creator or the goal is the equivalence of form?
R. To achieve equivalence of form by correcting themselves completely. This is called to receive 100% from the Creator in the entire vessel.
S. The reception from the Creator is the result?
R. Yes.
27. S.(01:09:20) They called the two stages the correction of creation and the purpose of creation. I couldn't understand why the middle of the way, of the path is the correction of the creation because they only acquire vessels of bestowal?
R. Wait a minute, we correct our desires to receive so that they will be in order to bestow and before that even to bestow in order to bestow, vessels of bestowal, we correct them and then we turn to the vessels of reception and then we correct them.
S. That is the purpose of creation when they use the vessels of reception in order to correct them?
R. Yes.
S. The question is, this stage when you acquire the vessels of bestowal that middle point, why is it called the correction of creation, it's not the final correction?
R. It doesn't matter but it is a correction.
S. To correct vessels of bestowal so the intention to bestow on the vessels of reception that's the correction?
R. When we correct the vessels of bestowal we prepare them for correction.
S. Prepare them for the correction?
R. Yes.
28. S. (01:10:48) This article, there are all kinds of articles by Rabash. Here he gives many examples of the king who announces to his lover I'm coming to dine at your place, prepare yourself, it's not what he thought, it's something else, the angels talk to Moses. What should we take from here, what kind of impression, what power, what should we take from this article for a day-to-day beyond being impressed by the forces that he's describing?
R. It becomes revealed in each and every person in different forms and different states and accordingly a person receives it and goes along with it.
S. I'm asking because yesterday you said we were close to entering this phase, so what to take from this, each one takes what he thinks? We take something from here into the Ten or take something from here from the general force of the vessel?
R. Of course, all of our corrections are in the Ten. When I want in my Ten to build such a connection with the friends that it will be similar to the spiritual vessel. I need to connect with my friends in all the different possible states until I reach a state where according to that I begin to discover the revelation of the Creator within us.
S. What do you do with the examples that he gives here? There's a story about the king that tells them that I'm coming to visit you, prepare us something, all that?
R. Well, during the work this is how a person feels his relation to the Creator.
S. What do we have now? After we learned this article, we studied it for an hour. It's interesting. The article is interesting but what do we take from this here now?
R. Each one according to where he is, each one according to where he is. I think maybe after the lesson we need to read it again without explaining anything just to read it again, be impressed by all of it and this way continue through the day.
29. S. (01:14:03) When we are speaking about internal and external vessels, I heard you say that from the externality we reach the internality, right? Usually we learn that from the inside we correct the outside so what is the difference?
R. Internality and externality are always according to the situation. For us now internality is vessels of reception and externality are vessels of bestowal, in this way we get from the externality to the internality.
S. Are there differences in correcting the souls or the worlds?
R. Yes.
S. What is the difference?
R. The truth is that the worlds don't need to be corrected, the souls need to be corrected.
S. So our correction when we try to connect that connects us to what is happening in the worlds? It should connect us to what is happening in the worlds?
R. Yes.
30. S. (01:15:42) The law of equivalence of form works in both directions just as we from a will to receive cannot see the picture that the will to bestow creates the same way the angel, the will to bestow can't comprehend the will to receive, how can the angels comprehend man? Just like the rich cannot understand the poor and the poor cannot understand the rich. You said that the angels awaken the questions in man, how can man on his behalf connect to the angels correctly?
R. We are in connection only with the Creator. Those are the questions that the angels awaken in us.
31. S. (01:17:07) In this world if I see a person is great I have no problem to annul to what he's saying, but I do not feel shame, where does the shame come from?
R. Shame comes from receiving and wanting to receive. All of us are in vessels of reception and in this we are opposite from the angels, from spirituality which are vessels of bestowal, so from that state we begin to participate to ask for our corrections.
32. S. (01:18:02) When we read the article again, can we say the first time we are getting vessels?
R. No, it's not necessarily so.
33. S. (01:18:32) According to what you said, the evil inclination was created by the Creator on the other hand, according to the article so the Creator does not have a deficiency so I did not understand this information if you could please explain it?
R. I did not understand the question. The Creator has no deficiency except for one thing, He wants to see us corrected at the end of correction, because this He established as the purpose of creation and the correction of creation.
S. When we are speaking about the evil inclination you said that the Creator created the deficiency in man but when he comes to the meal so the Creator had a deficiency to take His lack from him, what was that?
R. Don't ask about the Creator, ask about the person.
34. S. (01:19:50) Our process of the work towards correction and working in bestowal do we create angels that help us in this connection?
R. Yes, yes.