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

Daily Lesson (Morning), June 22, 2024. 

Part 3: Mishna. Perkei Avot.

Reader: We are reading from the “Mishna,” “Chapters of the Fathers.” We're going to start today from Chapter 1. Can I ask, before? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Reader: We're starting something new that we don't usually read.

M. Laitman: Well, “Chapters of the Fathers” is something that's well-known. In every prayer book you have “Chapters of the Fathers.” 

Reader: What do we want to extract from such a study? What to pay attention on? 

M. Laitman: What they wrote, the fathers, the sages who lived, who lived, I don't know, a thousand-something years ago. There was a period, the era of the fathers. Let's read, and accordingly, we will understand who they are, who did this.

Reader: (01:21) Chapters of the Fathers, Chapter 1. Number 1. 

Reading Item 1: (01:26) 

Moses received the Torah at Sinai and transmitted it to Joshua, Joshua to the elders, and the elders to the prophets, and the prophets to the Men of the Great Assembly. They said three things: Be patient in [the administration of] justice, raise many disciples and make a fence round the Torah.

M. Laitman: (02:10) Yes, meaning, as we said the elders, the fathers are the sages who lived thousands of years ago, and through them, we received the Torah, that's it. Now, what he is telling us, we don't really understand. That Moses gave it to Joshua, this we know, Joshua to the elders, okay, we heard it. The elders to the prophets, the prophets to the men of the Great Assembly, and that's it. And from the men of the Great Assembly, we already learned everything that was before them. They said three things: Be patient in justice; raise many disciples; and make a fence around the Torah. So, we need to understand what they mean, and to try to be in this. 

Reading Item 2: (03:26) 

Shimon the Righteous was one of the last of the men of the great assembly. He used to say: the world stands upon three things: the Torah, the Temple service, and the practice of acts of piety.

M. Laitman: (03:51) Meaning, what is written in item 1, after what is written in item 1, so, there was Shimon the Righteous and he was among the last of the men of the Great Assembly. One of the last to remain from the Great Assembly. And he said, the world stands on three things: The Torah, work, and almsgiving, basically. We don't really know the essence of these things. Torah, work, and almsgiving, but that's what he said. 

Reading Item 3: (04:47) 

Antigonus a man of Socho received [the oral tradition] from Shimon the Righteous. He used to say: do not be like servants who serve the master in the expectation of receiving a reward, but be like servants who serve the master without the expectation of receiving a reward, and let the fear of Heaven be upon you.

M. Laitman: (05:25) Shimon the Righteous was among the last of the Great Assembly, a group that was called the Men of the Great Assembly. The last of them was Shimon the Righteous and this is what he said, do not be as servants serving the teacher in order to receive reward. But be as servants serving the teacher not in order to receive reward. And besides, the fear of heaven should be upon you. In other words, fear of heaven. 

Reading Item 4: (06:31) 

Yose ben Yoezer (a man) of Zeredah and Yose ben Yohanan (a man) of Jerusalem received [the oral tradition] from them [i.e. Shimon the Righteous and Antigonus]. Yose ben Yoezer used to say: let thy house be a house of meeting for the Sages and sit in the very dust of their feet, and drink in their words with thirst.

M. Laitman: Anyone wants to ask about this?

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (07:33) In the previous letter it said, be in order to not receive a reward. But we want to receive a reward to be in order to bestow? We want to receive it, so how is that considered, we want a reward? 

M. Laitman: I don't think that they call it a reward, this is number one. Number two, this is not what it's about. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (08:17) He says that your house should be a home of the meeting of the sages.

M. Laitman: It means it should be open so people can come and sit there and discuss something. 

Student: Can I ask about the previous letters? 

M. Laitman: Yes, depending what.

Student: In the first part he said, the first item, that there are three things: justice, raise many disciples, and make a fence around the Torah. What does that mean? 

M. Laitman: A fence is a fence, a limitation, so that those who study Torah will determine for themselves, that beyond this limit, these conditions, he cannot go otherwise he'll be confused, otherwise, it's not considered studying Torah or learning Torah.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (09:27) We see that the “Chapters of the Fathers,” it's part of the “Mishna.” It's the only part that never got an interpretation, not in the “Talmud,” and why is that? Why is it like that?

M. Laitman: I don't know, I don't know much about history. We don't learn it.

Student: Not history, we're reading things that are very whole and precise. 

M. Laitman: Still, they determined that the “Chapters of the Fathers” should be in every prayer book.

Student: How to relate to this, how should we draw the light from this? 

M. Laitman: The light is as usual. When we want to all learn the “Chapters of the Fathers,” we have to know what is the literal meaning, simple meaning, and we connect between us in order to attain all the degrees above them, that's it.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (10:52) I just wanted to add about a fence around the Torah. It says in many places, the (...) says, that at least one of the meanings is not to accept taking any interpretation of the Torah, except from the Kabbalists.

M. Laitman: Okay. 

Question (Kyiv 1): (11:19) You mentioned that the “Mishna” has a Kabbalistic meaning, too, not only in an external or verbal way. So, how to relate to these texts? Just the language or to search the light or?  

M. Laitman: I don't know what to advise you. With these texts we search for the force that can connect us, and then the Creator will be able to be revealed within us. 

Student: It's written in these first points about the giving of the Torah, through Yose, through the sages. What does it mean to pass the Torah, onward? 

M. Laitman: The Torah was not written then, it was passed on orally, all of it. And what each one received, he conveyed from himself to his disciples. And this is how all of this passing, conveyance, is built. Antigonus received from Shimon the Righteous such and such knowledge, and then passed it onwards. Yose ben Yoezer, man of Zeredah, he received from Yose ben Yohanan, man of Jerusalem and passed it onwards, Yose, man of Jerusalem. In other words, what did they pass on? He taught his disciples this rule that he writes there, etc., etc., and likewise, each of them.

Student: So, they pass their spiritual attainment, the connection with the Creator? 

Reading Item 5: (14:05) 

Yose ben Yochanan (a man) of Jerusalem used to say: Let thy house be wide open, and let the poor be members of thy household. Engage not in too much conversation with women. They said this with regard to one’s own wife, how much more [does the rule apply] with regard to another man’s wife. From here the Sages said: as long as a man engages in too much conversation with women, he causes evil to himself, he neglects the study of the Torah, and in the end he will inherit gehinnom.

M. Laitman: You want to ask about this? 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (15:05) Just that there won't be confusion: When a Kabbalist writes, a woman, he speaks about a person's will to receive?

M. Laitman: I don't know, I see what is written because otherwise I can interpret it however you want, in every style and language. 

Student: So, I'll ask otherwise, me and my wife have a lot of talks about spirituality, and it gives me a great deficiency to come to the morning lesson and connect to the Ten. Now when he talks not to speak to your wife, he's not speaking about my corporeal wife. I just want to understand this. 

M. Laitman: No, don't speak a lot with the woman also talks about the physical woman.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (16:13) Is there a condition to receive correctly? We're studying the wisdom of Kabbalah, how to receive. 

M. Laitman: It depends on the conditions. Where the one who's giving is and where the one who's receiving is. In what period, what era they come out, why they receive and give in this specific way, etc.. 

Student: We'll go into deeper resolutions. For instance, to receive love, I want to give love or to receive love, how to receive it correctly? 

M. Laitman: We will learn about it. It may, perhaps, it's written about it.

Reading Item 6: (17:07) 

Joshua ben Perahiah and Nittai the Arbelite received [the oral tradition] from them. Joshua ben Perahiah used to say: appoint for thyself a teacher, and acquire for thyself a companion and judge all men with the scale weighted in his favor.

M. Laitman: He said it well, concisely, succinctly.

Reading Item 7: (17:44) 

Nittai the Arbelite used to say: keep a distance from an evil neighbor, do not become attached to the wicked, and do not abandon faith in [divine] retribution.

M. Laitman: Very true words.

Reading Item 8: (18:11)

Judah ben Tabbai and Shimon ben Shetach received [the oral tradition] from them. Judah ben Tabbai said: do not [as a judge] play the part of an advocate; and when the litigants are standing before you, look upon them as if they were [both] guilty; and when they leave your presence, look upon them as if they were [both] innocent, when they have accepted the judgement.

M. Laitman: (19:00) Well, it's clear, this is how we have to relate to it from a judge, an arbiter. This is how people should see him.

Reading Item 9: (19:18)

Shimon ben Shetach used to say: be thorough in the interrogation of witnesses, and be careful with your words, lest from them they learn to lie.

Reading Item 10: (19:49) 

Shemaiah and Abtalion received [the oral tradition] from them. Shemaiah used to say: love work, hate acting the superior, and do not attempt to draw near to the ruling authority.

Reading Item 11: (20:12)

Abtalion used to say: Sages be careful with your words, lest you incur the penalty of exile, and be carried off to a place of evil waters, and the disciples who follow you drink and die, and thus the name of heaven becomes profaned.

M. Laitman: (20:45) The Torah is called water, so one who accepts it, relates to it correctly, is regarded as receiving, drinking clear water from the right source, spring. And those who don't, then it's to the contrary for them. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (21:24) It's written, be careful, stay away from a wicked neighbor and don't connect to an evil person, and do not abandon faith and retribution. What is that?

M. Laitman: Whatever you can imagine.

Student: What does it mean not to abandon faith and retribution? Today, we're seeing that a lot of retribution comes to the world. So, what does it mean to not abandon, to expect that it'll pass, that it's something that has to happen and I..?

M. Laitman: I think retribution, actually, means calamity here; I think it's when people allow themselves everything, anything, whatever they can reach.

Student: What does it mean not to abandon it, not to lose faith in it? 

M. Laitman: That the world is in such qualities and when that happens, know that there is a minister above everything. Who guards them and lets them develop and lets them open and operate between people. Only to the extent that people need it in order to digest, to grasp the evil that there is in nature.

Student: Even now it's very tangible that we see people that are willing to take the world apart and their country. So, to relate to that patiently, and to understand that we're going through a process by the Creator? 

M. Laitman: Yes, yes. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (23:33) When we read number 8, I remembered a friend’s question. He speaks about if you see people with the judgments before you, so see them as wicked; and if they're righteous, so they got rid of that judgment. And what I remember from the friend's place is that I have to be like a judge who sees everybody as good and be above it. So, how to see these two things: On one hand, I have to see the wicked and the righteous, on the other hand, everybody is righteous. 

M. Laitman: Maybe the middle line, I don't know, we have to see the meaning. 

Reading Item 12: (24:46) 

Hillel and Shammai received [the oral tradition] from them. Hillel used to say: be of the disciples of Aaron, loving peace and pursuing peace, loving mankind and drawing them close to the Torah.

Reading Item 13: (25:16) 

He [also] used to say: one who makes his name great causes his name to be destroyed; one who does not add [to his knowledge] causes [it] to cease; one who does not study [the Torah] deserves death; one who makes [unworthy] use of the crown [of learning] shall pass away.

M. Laitman: Who can translate this for us?  

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (25:57) There's the English text, there, they write it in simple words, so I can read from there. He used to say one who makes his name great causes his name to be destroyed. One who does not add to his knowledge causes it to cease. One who does not study the Torah deserves death. One who makes use of a crown shall pass away.

M. Laitman: Very well, okay. That's enough. So we'll get back to it, God willing, tomorrow from item 13. What else do we have today? 

Reader: (26:55) Announcements 

Song: (28:32)