Morning Lesson February 23, 2024

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

Part 1: Rabash. Article No. 12, 1987. What Is Half a Shekel in the Work - 1

Reading Article: (00:40) “Now we will explain what..”

1. S. (35:10) I think he clarifies very well what is right and what is left but how from the move between right to left then again, how does that builds, births, the need for assistance called the soul? What is that deficiency for a soul?

R. A deficiency for a soul is clarified and revealed from a person not being able to decide what to do with himself and that's why he eventually turns to the Creator and everything is clarified.

S. Where is it exactly born because it seems that from his explanation that there is right, which is wholeness and then he awakens deficiency and checks and sees that he has nothing and he can't stay there and that's half a shekel. You have to once again take the adhesion in the smallest holiness and elevate that to the right and then again the deficiency, the left, so it's a very beautiful interesting path but where is the birth of a new need from this?

R. From all these states that he acquires on the way he doesn't feel that he attained something. 

2. S. (37:16) A person goes on the right in wholeness, let's say doing some action with the friends and then at some point he decides and needs to examine, what did I do, how is my intention, what actually took place there?

R. He means he stops the right and his desire and moves to the left.

S. That's what it sounds like from the article and that's my question, is that the article decides that he is moving to the left or the Creator moves him. Who's making the switch from right to left?

R. What does it seem to you like?

S. Based on the article it sounds like the person needs to make sure to do it, that it's part of mans’ work that it sounds that way?

R. What does he move to the left for?

S. To elevate the right?

R. Meaning that for him left is not a fall or a descent but it's the continuation of his work as he will have to make the right greater.

S. Yes and I want to clarify this is so that if a person now in a conscious way has to make some examination here, he calls it counting and he checks in his vessels of reception and sees that his intention was wrong and he did it all for himself. Then he does another action which sounds wondrous that suddenly he decides okay that the left now is sufficient, now I go back to the right and I totally can understand how a person after you found that he has nothing in his vessels?

R. Other questions, yes.

3. S. (39:20) Can you explain the matter of ransom? He describes it like a kind of insurance that how can you really go to the left and not get stuck there?

R. Probably the ransom is really some assurance that he's going back to the right.

S. Who promises?

R. Their ransom.

S. What is it, who is it?

R. He pays through his exertion.

S. Unclear, he says that the ransom is on the right. On the right there's at first there's no labor there's wholeness a person feels good?

R. No, it's not that way.

S. Can you explain that Rav?

R. Wait, wait.

4. S. (40:20) I can’t understand from what he writes, where is the work, like the friend just said. It sounds very sterile this work, that you go to the right and to the left and back to the right, basically very simple?

R. Why is it simple?

S. Because it's like a person in front of that state on his own can manage it, can decide what he is doing and what he is doing afterwards, it doesn’t work that way?

R. But he has two different ways in front of him.

S. What two paths?

R. Wait.

S. To me it sounds like you only have the left, that only the left is where the work is and without the left there's nothing to do?

R. That's correct.

S. On the other hand we say that the left is half hour a day and not the main work?

R. It could be that it's enough in order to give us later on all the rest of the time to strengthen the right.

S. This is unclear to me the division here, what do you put in the work where the Ten goes into this whole thing?

R. Yes, more.

5. S. (41:47) What is the measurement in order to check between the right and the left? It's like the left is a quantity and the right is quality, how do you then measure that it's equal, the left and the right?

R. Yes. I understood.

6. S. (42:40) A question that awakened, did Rabash write the articles for people in the time of preparation or a time of attainment or both?

R. It's like we aren’t no, to such people he wrote it.

S. A person in attainment doesn't have to work with these articles like you read only to teach us or it's also for a person when he advances on the spiritual degrees?

R. I'm also learning in this, yes.

S. Right because right left in middle I remember years ago you said that the left line is only really attainment.

R. The three lines is something different.

S. That's the whole article of left and right?

R. That’s how we just learn how to relate to it.

7. S. (43:48) It says here in the article that the work has to be balanced, that the lines will be equal so that each one increases the other. What does it mean that they need to be equal so that each one increases the other?

R. Meaning left and right seems as if each of them cares for the other, so the both of them will be there in as great a possible way in an equal manner.

8. S. (44:50) I want to clarify if in the article there's a feeling there's once left and twice right. He says the first kind of right is that he has to bless and adhere to None Else Besides Him. Even the littlest touch that he has is that he won't be in a state of dead because one who is dead has no correction, as if he adheres by having contact with the Creator. Then there's another left where he decides that now a deficiency can be unlocked, and then there's a right which is felt in the article. Is this supposed to raise him already to another degree of left, it’s not the first left?

R. Yes, because after the left it's a different right.

S. Can we understand this right because the left he awakens, it seems like it's going to devour him and detach him again. This is how it sounds from the article?

R. Correct, there's something in how a person feels it but on the other hand raises him to another degree.

S. After the left that he awakened now he needs the Creator to awaken him?

R. Yes.

S. In the first time?

R. In the first one no, it wasn't.

S. In the first one he made some connection?

R. He didn't have a demand for the right.

9. S. (46:56) If I identified it correctly in the article, the left comes so that eventually a person will come to the work above reason, that's the main work. What exactly is that work of above reason?

R. What is the reason?

S. What is above reason?

R. Well, who knows?

10. S. (47:39) It's very simple reason is when a person takes all the that he receives from all the experience he received on his path, he accumulated all the experience that he received throughout the way that he gets and still a sage comes that he has to go above reason because the experience he received as in his vessels, he removes to receive new vessels.

R. What was the question?

S. What is reason?

R. What is reason and we have to go above reason. Where do you get that from?

S. From the vessels he receives from the Ten, from the group, that's his Kli to go above reason.

R. You agree with that?

11. S. (48:57) Maybe also to add that reason we learned that it's when he's feeling wholeness on the right and then he turns to the left and the body resists the work with intentions, it resists the work of without self-benefit and then he discovers the wicked in him and he discovers the reason that's pulling him downwards, that truly gives him proof of his intellect how unworthy it is to, how much it's not worth while to work not for his own benefit. Then in this state he discovers this evil in him and where does he get this strength to overcome this and to rise above reason, that's already another question.

R. Yes.

12. S. (49:58) We also learned at the beginning of the article that there's the external reason and there's internal reason and the external reason, you said that those are the thoughts that come to us from above. The internal reason that it's written in the article, that comes from Bina actually so it's probably half a shekel, is to always choose the half. Meaning only the inner reason.

R. More.

13. S. (50:31) It turns out that Daat reason is the working going towards the left and then you have to do something that is called faith above reason which is like we understood this something that you received from the Creator, that you can't decide that you're just going above reason on your own, is that right? Can we say it that way?

R. You can say that.

14. S. (51:12) Probably reason is also every thought that serves and strengthens the will to receive for himself, that I can call Daat, reason.

R. Yes.

S. To the extent in which he considers the greatness of the Creator and needs to glorify and praise the King even as much, by what do we measure the greatness and importance of the Creator?

R. According to what a person assesses in his heart.

S. How does a person know that he's not measuring his own greatness but rather measures the greatness of the Creator?

R. That on everything before him he understands that the force of the Creator is greater than that and can say that and can save him from each and every state.

S. There's something that is greater than how he perceives himself?

R. Yes, in any case he can estimate it.

S. By all means it's a means to appreciate the Creator? How does a person use the Ten?

R. He starts from that, he starts from approaching the Ten to his greatest force, that there is in front of him versus all the other details.

S. What does he find in the Ten that with that he can measure the greatness of the Creator?

R. The Ten is a measurement.

S. Yes?

R. So he can take all of the forces that he thinks that he attributes to the Ten and with that he reaches the Creator.

S. It feels like a very precise technique here. How is it done?

R. It’s to the extent that a person is capable of describing that.

15. S. (54:12) Can I answer the question about Daat - what reason is? Can I say what I think?

R. Yes.

S. I think that reason is created from the two lines, the right line, which is the light, to desire to to bestow. and incorporation with the desire to receive, the deficiency and from these two lines that are Incorporated in another a person's reason is born.

R. Yes.

16. S. (54:54) That's exactly my question. That reason is built by the two lines together. The question is whether faith above is the reason accompanies a person while he's in this process or could you say that it's just born in the end?

R. Towards the end.

S. When a person does these actions he's already experienced in them, the intensity in which he does them, is not dependent on some measurement of faith that he has how high he can reach on the right and how much he can draw the left without falling then into the left. Does that whole action not demand something from a person?

R. He doesn't know how to connect the left and right, that's the whole thing and this is really the question, how to tie the left together and the right together.

S. That's what I wanted to refine the question in whether during the action these two actions are kind of like being presented already or is he stuck in each of those stages he's in them and can't rise above them prior to that. Is there something higher that accompanies him during this process?

R. The next state.

S. Does it illuminate something from the next state?

R. No, not really.

S. But he's nevertheless drawn to this work of doing it?

R. Yes.

17. S. (56:49) He has to continue this question I ask each time, how does a person know that enough right came now and he decides I'm moving to the left, and then enough left that's very dangerous the half was done that's it, I'm whole. Now we must move to the right and strengthen the right otherwise the left will become death?

R. The vessels that are filled with right or with left essentially show the person what he should do and what he should be doing.

S. Meaning to the size of the greatness that he discovered before, from here onwards is prohibited to continue on that same line? Yes?

R. Let's say yes.

S. That's a decision and the feeling?

R. Yes.

18. S. (58:02) I'm also in that question, the end of the path of the right line is it where he discovers a new desire that he truly discovers that he cannot bestow by being in the right actually?

R. Again.

S. He's going on the right, he makes the importance of the Creator greater, he truly wants to serve in every group he has to serve the friends and the King as far as he's concerned that's great wholeness. Say he came to a such a state from above he's given all of a sudden a new desire and you with all your smallness, you're not doing anything here. You want to advance meaning it's a new desire that comes?

R. But he is as if succeeded with the previous state, right?

S. Yes.

R. So why is it thrown out now?

S. This is the question, he does the action or does he need to truly devote himself to the wholeness and the smallest grip, as they say delighted in mercy and whatever the upper one will bring me a new desire to advance to discover the wicked in me, then I'll move to the left or does he from his own initiative does he rise up and do the section?

R. I think that in each and every state it's required that a person will show a willingness, readiness for the next state.

19. S. (59:58) The article ends with the assistance from above that a person receives on the way called the holy soul, Kedusha. All these articles of Rabash I have many questions about, how to study an article because you can stumble upon a paragraph and scrutinize it and go deeper there and seek there but you can also kind of do a zoom out. See the article as a machine that a person enters in one state and Rabash disassembles him and reassembles him and he comes out of this article completely different. I was kind of wondering how to correctly and in what preparation should I enter to hear these articles? I just got this example in this article. On the wall there's a defibrillator over there that when a person is unconscious you give him a shock and help him go from the left to the right and a person is brought back to life, it sounds like that. There are many articles I like that and there are many questions that are disturbing me like this one, the article we read. There are hundreds of people, thousands of people around the world and I don't think there's two people that hear the article the same way. How do you muscle the forces to be together in this state? It turns out from such an article that many questions are awakened. Also when we compare and there's a lot of reforming light because it moves a person from this place many steps forward. Also when you read later, some paragraph a little small paragraph from Baal HaSulam where he says I have made you from before and from ahead. It's like it also you get something else completely from what you're receiving here. The attitude towards feeling where Rabash is reviving us where he's giving us and aiding us with this holy soul of ours needs to be clarified how to work with this force that is in the articles?

R. The force of Rabash wants to take us. It does take us from the state we are in and brings us to the state where Baal HaSulam can already start treating us, where we understand what Baal HaSulam talks about.

S. It appears that all the states he's describing are kind of like they are obligated in our reality. It's telling us what we're going through and what we're going to go through and in the end of this, this end will come and there will be an ascent and there will be frustration and prayer. We have to open our eyes and flow in these states and to let them go over us or identify them and agree with them.

R. There's something to that yes so the question is, what can we add?

S. There are many questions, mostly how to not get confused and how to get the importance of this life blow that we get from Rabash. How to live in it? I don't know there's many and there's a lot in this?

R. I agree.

20. S. (01:04:03) Earlier Rav related to the left line, the left is not a fall and descent but a continuation of the work that has to grow to the right. What's the difference between those transitions from left and right between ascents and descents?

R. It depends on what way we relate to our progress, what do we want to awaken in a state called left and a state called right and what are we going to demand from the Creator?

21. S. (01:04:44) Is there a difference between scrutinies and calculations and spiritual work and can we attain something without scrutiny?

R. To attain something without scrutiny is not possible. We have to at least be in a yearning to attain the scrutinies. That one who writes wants to open up to us and as much as we attain as much as we advance. Still we have to learn from the friends how to connect to and push us towards the attainment of the article, somewhat. What does he want? What does it want?

22. S. (01:05:50) What does it mean to serve the Creator if He's managing me in every way?

R. That I agree with the entire form of governance that he shows me and I have no reason to complain. I’d rather accept each and every action is what's going on right now, what happened in the past and what will happen in the future. I take all His actions as whole.

S. Is the agreement called to serve Him?

R. No, this means to approach, the approach to his actions.

23. S. (01:06:47) What does it mean to be the head of Holiness and not the tail?

R. The head of Kedusha means that he thinks and brings up a question and according to that question the upper one takes care of him and this entire action is considered Rosh of Kedusha.

24. S. (01:07:21) Can we say that we will receive the reward in the continuation of the work even though we're not working in Torah and Mitzvot?

R. Not working? What do you mean not working?

S. Is there a possibility to do so without reward and punishment?

R. So what's the reward?

S. That's the question?

R. First of all by Torah and Mitzvot we have to clarify what is the sought after reward that we have to reach, how do we complete ourselves with the reward? That we agree in advance about the coming reward or do we have to change or do we have to change the reward? There are several possibilities here.

25. S. (01:08:21) Does the group connect the left and right?

R. Prayer, there are such prayers that bring together the right and the left, yes.

S. Does the work in the left line and the right line have to end in prayer for the friends?

R. Not necessarily but it would be a beautiful powerful prayer.

26. S. (01:09:11) Can you please explain this prayer?

R. What, what is prayer?

S. Doing a coupling between left and right?

R. No, I can't. There are entire complete articles about prayer but it's a very great thing, lofty thing. It's a means by which we influence the Creator. That is what prayer is.

S. Is there a specific perspective on how to enter into this prayer?

R. I didn't understand.

S. To enter the prayer from the right and then to the left? I want to hear something about this prayer that will bestow to the Creator and when the friend asked what the prayer is for to connect the left and right?

R. You want to learn from that what he asked for and what he received and what's the connection between the request and the response.

S. What is everything by the intention?

R. Everything by the intention.

S. The intention before left and right, it's the foundation it's not the?

R. Come on, help us understand each other.

27. S. (01:11:12) Is the intention something that we prepare before the whole matter of left and right or each time do we put together in the state that you're in?

R. It depends on what state you're in. It could be if the intention includes all of his path and his intentions and everything until the final correction or at least a certain segment towards there.

28. S. (01:11:40) They're using this prayer there's so much we could come to for the benefit of the friends and ultimately for the benefit of the Creator, so everything depends on the balance between this right and left, between passing between quantity and quality?

R. What exactly are you asking about, the balance?

S. To be in balance, that it will be in order to give contentment and it will be a correct prayer to give prayer like you said? [No translation]

R. What do you think should be the answer?

S. To start with gratitude in order to perform a restriction in our request, which can be in order to bestow so that the Creator will enjoy our request. In the end, to return not precisely to gratitude but to faith, it's like saying Amen. It's that which the Creator will answer us that is for sure, it's the Good That Does Good.

R. No other questions?

29. S. (01:14:20) Just to add to the things that have been said, I think a nice example is let's say the order of the assembly where we start with praise and gratitude towards the society, we turn to the left a little, what we're missing, what we want to attain. Then we come back again with gratitude as if we've attained and achieved what we wanted to achieve.

R. That's what he writes, yes.

30. S. (01:15:01) It seems like the agreement with the Creator takes away from me the prayer, how should I relate to this?

R. True, don't agree.

31. S. (01:15:17) Is remaining for too long in that straightness in the right and not moving to the left, does that cause a fall into the Klipot?

R. It doesn't cause it to fall but it weakens someone.

32. S. (01:15:22) Is it possible to use the left line in the Ten and how do we do that?

R. The left line?

S. Yes, and the Ten is there such a thing and how do we do it?

R. No, from the time being we're only ascending on the right.

33. S. (01:16:10) There was a question here. What is reason according to my own opinion of reason, is it self-realization which means the light the Kli and the Masach, is that correct?

R. Yes.

34. S. (01:16:54) You just answered the friend, to not agree with the Creator if it suppresses the prayer. I was very impressed by the answer and I also remember many times you have told us that our whole work is in agreement with the Creator. I wanted to ask, what should I do with these answers that contradict each other that I hear from Rav. How do I work with that?

R. In contradiction.

S. What does that mean?

R. That's how it is. One is not always like the other.

S. What does it mean to bless before the action, to bless before the Minyan, what does that mean?

R. To bless means to connect to the middle line, that is the meaning of to bless.

35. S. (01:18:03) How do you balance between wholeness and deficiency?

R. It's two lines. I can't balance them unless they come to the middle line where through the deficiency I can increase and grow the right line.

S. The middle line is this separate entity in and of itself or is this condition?

R. The merger, the merger we have no more than a plus and a minus.

S. What characterizes the middle line in our work?

R. There's a force there, a demand from the left and a force of the recognition of good and connection on the right.

S. What characterizes it in a practical manner is that a person holds it simultaneously in parallel because going from right to left to right to right left is our constant work. When can we say that a person merges it correctly and that he's in the middle line?

R. When he is needful of both the right and left and he connects both, combines both and he exists between the two of them and in a balanced way he understands that only in this way he can correctly look at creation.

36. S. (01:20:03) He writes that the right and left need to be equal but with me it seems like there's much more right. We're always praising and increasing the greatness and the right of the Ten, how can we make them equal because there is also this infinite left line. How do I reach such a strong big left line?

R. Yes ask if you think you're lacking it or missing it, yes ask.

S. How do we request such a thing? Is there a correct way?

R. There is no problem. Ask.

37. S. (01:20:50) What is the Holy soul that a person attains, is that the left meaning, is that the deficiency or the desire or is it the right meaning the connection and adhesion with the Creator? What is it?

R. It's a Divine part from above, it's what a person attains.

38. S. (01:21:36) The article gives a lot of inspiration and the actions of the Mitzvot are the middle line?

R. [No answer translated]

39. S. (01:22:09) You mentioned that the right is to start to care for each other, where or what is that point that we can add to accelerate this incorporation?

R. If you're doing everything correctly in the current state then you’re receiving commands opportunities for the next state in the most optimal way possible.

40. S. (01:23:03) You said that measuring the greatness of the Creator is possible by this force being greater than everything else, that it can pull you out of every state. How can we increase the greatness of that force and the presence of that force in our lives?

R. Grow the Creator, praise Him, glorify Him and try to come closer to the friends. In principle, these are the two positive forces that pull us forward.

S. But that's a feeling, there's a feeling of this force, yes?

R. Yes.

S. Can we say that's the revelation of the Creator?

R. No.

41. S. (01:24:01) Can we say that in the beginning the Creator takes us through the two lines left and right to come to the middle line and then we can afterward go to the left line and then we can progress?

R. Yes.

42. S. (01:24:25) When we talk about half a shekel do we mean that it's a portion of the left plus a portion of the right that make half a shekel?

R. Yes, you can say that.

43. S. (01:25:02) In our Ten we have a problem where not everyone agrees with the Creator. At least I can say on myself that how do we relate to this state in the Ten when a certain illness comes to a friend. How do we pray correctly for that situation?

R. The friend received an illness and we can justify the Creator. How do we turn to him and ask him to take care of it, right?

S. Yes.

R. So what to do?

S. Because each day we do these zoom meetings and we pray and we think about the friend, we embrace him, we do whatever is possible but it's felt that we don't know what to do. That it's simply we all feel that there is something that awakens in the Ten where the Creator, as if He is checking our Arvut and we are doing efforts but it's also this feeling of what's going to happen with the friend?

R. What will happen with the Arvut, mutual guarantee?

S. Arvut is now under review because everyone is connecting and everyone's around that and everyone's doing a lot of great efforts in relation to the situation. It's really felt and I can also say to myself and I don't know about others, how am I now engaged in relation to the friend where as if beforehand I didn't really care, but now this friend has made it the center of our life?

R. Excellent you see what the Creator did. A very special deed.

S. What will happen in continuation with that same friend where now we've risen to a state where we're thinking about him at every second of our lives. What state a person puts a friend into so that you should think about him so that you be around him all the time but how can you actually pull him out of that state?

R. Turn to the Creator more and more.

S. Only the request all the time?

R. Only the request all the time.

S. Is there something we can add other than the request all the time?

R. No, no, only the request.

S. Prayer and request to the Creator with a Ten all together?

R. Together or each one on his own, it is not important.

S. Even if each friend in their daily lives does some kind of Prayer by themselves?

R. Yes, yes.

S. We will be happy if the friends in the Kli and all the friends will be praying?

R. Write to each one your plea to the Creator and then read it before everyone all these pleas, all these requests and how much how similar you are to one another already.

44. S. (01:28:46) In relation to this matter of left and right, how much are we lead like the rider on the horse through the left and the right and how much do we create the left and the right?

R. I think it's the Creator who is bringing us to these states of left and right. We need only to make some correction with it.

S. What is the correction to reach the middle line? Is it to awaken us to the awareness of the Creator?

R. The correction is to connect in the middle line between us and with the Creator.

45. S. (01:29:52) I wanted to ask in relation to a state of half a shekel. The purpose of creation was to create someone who would be impressed and who could receive fulfillment from all the pleasantness that is in the Creator, wholeness, harmony. The created being is opposite and there is no other way that's the created being, the Creator and the created being are two opposites. If in the end of the path to the goal, the created being enters into souls of the Creator so we haven’t attained anything, there is no created being. Meaning in the final state he needs to remain a created being and there also needs to be the Creator and because of that we in every single stage need to be as if in these two opposite states, where we cannot remain as a created being because a created being is a will to receive and we cannot dissolve into the Creator. That is called the middle line where we need to be between these two opposite states simultaneously. We are the created being we are in a state of adhesion Dvekut when we come to Him and we need to constantly remain with this kind of measurement, this weight of the middle line. Where if we move to the left or the right that is the goal, that in our hands there is only half a shekel that we can aspire to adhesion, but we need to remain simultaneously as a created being and that is the state of the middle line that we need to be in. And accordingly we rise degree by degree and I don't know what's at the end, but at the end we need to live in a state where we're not in one or the other but we're in the middle and we connect those two things together?

R. Yes, annul ourselves and connect.

46. S. (01:32:50) Is the feeling of greatness of the Ten a result of the work of reaching the middle line?

R. I couldn't hear anything.

S. Is the feeling of the greatness of the Ten a result of the work that we have reached the middle line?

R. Yes.

47. S. (01:33:32) You told us about this point of balance, that it is the middle line this balancing point. So what does it mean to go to the new right?

R. The point of balance is likely the middle line and the right is not the middle line. This is why we need to awaken the right versus the left in order to keep something for us from the middle line.

S. So we awaken actually a new right from the middle point from the middle line?

R. Yes.

S. That means we awaken unbalance?

R. We ourselves are awakening in balance in order to reach new balance.

48. S. (01:35:09) Is the left line when the person justifies himself and the right line is when he justifies the Creator and when the person sees that he justifies himself should he immediately shift to a state where he justifies the Creator?

R. That can be in the beginning of the work.

49. S. (01:36:01) Is faith above reason, does it help us remain in the right line but does it also give us the forces to be for a certain period of time in the left line?

R. Faith describes to us all the vessels and if we continue in it then we clean up, we correct all of our vessels.