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

Daily Lesson (Morning), September 25, 2024. 

Part 1: Baal HaSulam. The Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot 

Hello, we're reading in the book The Writings of Baal HaSulam, “The Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot.” We have reached Item Number 15. You can find the study material for the lesson on Sviva Tova and also on the Arvut system.

Likewise, you can ask questions through those platforms. Here in the study hall, anyone who wants to ask a question is requested to stand up, hold the mic close to the mouth, and speak loudly and clearly. “Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot,” Item 15, from the Writings of Baal HaSulam in the Hebrew version, that's page 773.

Reading: (00:46) Item 15 

Thus, it has been thoroughly clarified that one should not expect that engagement in Torah and Mitzvot Lo Lishma will bring him to Lishma, except when one knows in one’s heart that he has been granted faith in the Creator and in His Torah appropriately. This is because then the light in it reforms him and he will be rewarded with “the day of the Lord,” which is all light, for the Kedusha [holiness] of faith purifies one’s eyes to enjoy His light until the light in the Torah reforms him.

Yet, those without faith are as bats. They cannot look at the light of day because the daylight has been inverted for them to a more terrible darkness than the darkness of the night, as they are only fed in the darkness of the night.

Likewise, the eyes of the faithless are blinded to the light of the Creator. Hence, the light becomes darkness for them, and the potion of life is turned into a potion of death for them. It is about them that the writing says, “Woe unto you who desire the day of the Lord! Why do you need the day of the Lord? It is darkness and not light.” Thus, first, one must make one’s faith complete.

M. Laitman: Questions? Again.

Reader: (03:28) Item 15

M. Laitman: Questions? 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (05:39) He writes here that one should not expect that engagement in Torah and Mitzvot Lo Lishma will bring him to Lishma except when one knows in one's heart that he has been granted faith in the Creator and in his Torah appropriately. Why does he write here that the person should not expect that engagement in Torah and Mitzvot Lo Lishma will bring him to Lishma? Because we always talk about that in which we do need to yearn and want to attain the light. But here he says you should not expect that that would happen. 

M. Laitman: A person who truly wants to achieve faith in the Creator does expect the upper light, the light of the Creator to influence him. And he will be awarded with spiritual outcomes, with this light influencing him and shaping his attitude to corporeality and spirituality, to the state that he's in.

Student: So, we do need to expect that engaging in what we do in Torah and Mitzvot Lo Lishma will bring us to Lishma? 

M. Laitman: Yes, we have to be in such a state where our engagement in Torah and Mitzvot brings us to Lishma, yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (07:39) What is this process of purifying the eyes? During the whole process of correction, we talk about the purifying of the eyes. What is that?

M. Laitman: That a person sees in what state he discovers the reality before him, either in darkness or in light. The difference between that is the whole difference between corporeality and spirituality. And that's why Baal HaSulam pays so much attention to explain that to us so that we don't just study it like some knowledge from science. Rather that we'll feel it, that we'll clarify exactly where does it happen within us; how can we change? And by what do we merit opening the eyes in the Torah? 

Student: Does this purification take place one time or is it a process where a person gets more and more purification until he gets to higher degrees of faith?

M. Laitman: In small portions.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (09:20) He gives a condition here and says that the person should know in his soul that he has been awarded with faith in the Creator and in his Torah appropriately. And when a person checks himself, he always reveals that?

M. Laitman: That that he has not been awarded yet. 

Student: And he gets more distanced, could get in closer. So, what do we do?

M. Laitman: We pray, we ask. 

Student: At a certain point, would a person feel that, that he'll know in his heart that he's being granted faith in the Creator? 

M. Laitman: Yes, yes.

Student: Is that an individual state of a person? 

M. Laitman: Personal state of the person. 

Student: Until a person feels that the light doesn't work on him? 

M. Laitman: The light works all the time, it just depends on what pace, what shape, what direction.

Student: Other than prayer, is there any way a person can speed up this process? 

M. Laitman: As we learn, only actions of bestowal – to work on all of humanity to bring them closer to the Creator.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (10:43) Yesterday, we in the Ten discussed this item for a long time, and this question came from the Ten. How, before receiving the light of faith, are we in darkness? How do we work in practice during the darkness? 

M. Laitman: We have to check and understand, and feel in what state towards the Creator, towards the upper light, are we in, and accordingly, to work. So, when we start working, it's clear to us that we have no connection with the Creator, with the upper light, the upper degrees. But we just have to follow what is written and continue that way. 

Student: What holds the person in the state of darkness? 

M. Laitman: What holds the person is his desire, which the Creator awakens; the desire that pushes him to revelation. 

Student: Does the Ten have a role, here, when the person is in a state of darkness? 

M. Laitman: Certainly, the Ten around each and every person has to be like some safety circle.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (12:47) It seems as if only when a person has faith in the Creator, then the reforming light comes to reform him.

M. Laitman: That, we're going to have to learn soon.

Student: How do we have faith without the light? 

M. Laitman: You cannot be in contact with faith without attaining the light, it's impossible. Meaning, first of all, we don't feel where we are with respect to the Creator. We don't feel when it's more and when it's less, and whether the light of faith shines on us or something else, these things are still abstruse. So, what we have to do is to understand, like he writes here – where is that? “Then the light in it reforms and one will merit to the light of day, which is all light because the light of faith purifies the person's eyes so they can enjoy the light of the Creator until the light of the Torah reforms him”. Meaning, that is his state, “yet those without faith”, meaning if he didn't acquire it first, then basically he has nothing to continue with. “They are as bats, they cannot look at the light of day because the daylight has been inverted for them to a more terrible darkness than the darkness of the night, as they are only fed in the darkness of the night. Likewise, the eyes of the faithless are blinded by the light of the Creator. Hence the light becomes darkness for them, and the potion of life is turned into a potion of death for them. It is about them that the writing says, woe unto you who desire the day of the Lord. Why do you need the day of the Lord? It is darkness and not light. Thus first, one must make one's faith complete”. Meaning, when the Creator shines on a person who wants to advance in the darkness, he awakens the person by changing his direction of development and his means for development. And then a person begins to relate differently to the forces that shape his path. 

Student: On what condition does the reforming light shine to a person? 

M. Laitman: The condition that a person really wants to attain it, the light that reforms’ meaning, to attain the light of faith.

Student: What faith is demanded of a person in order to attain the light that reforms? What previous faith does a person require in order to attain the light that reforms?

M. Laitman: Faith in the Creator, that the Creator exists as Good that Does Good and He treats the person's desire and gives man's desire all kinds of means so that one will change the desire and get closer to the Creator. That's how He gives the person a possibility, an opportunity. 

Student: When a person is rewarded with faith as a result of the reforming light, how is that different to the previous faith that he had? 

M. Laitman: Previous faith, what previous faith did he have? 

Student: In order to be rewarded with the reforming light, you said now that the person needs to have faith in the Creator.

M. Laitman: Yes?

Student: And then he gets the light, and then he's rewarded with the faith in the Creator. So, what's the difference between the faith before the light and faith after the light? 

M. Laitman: No, you can't call that faith.

Student: What is that faith before he's rewarded with the light? 

M. Laitman: It's an illumination, a small illumination that shines on the person, then he somehow navigates in his unclear path for now. 

Student: How does the person attract that illumination, what's on the person's behalf? 

M. Laitman: From man's perspective, it's the desire – from the Creator's perspective, it's the light, and both man and the Creator have to work on shaping man in a certain way, a safe way towards the light, the Creator. And be able to advance himself to that light more and more.

Student: And what is the faith in the Creator that the person's rewarded with?

M. Laitman: The faith in the Creator that a person acquires is a force that he receives from the Creator, which ties him to the same path and that's how he advances. There is such a quote, I can't remember it. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (19:48) He cautions the person so that the light won't turn into a potion of death. What does a person need to be cautious of here? Because it's not clear because the Creator is acting here.

M. Laitman: It depends on the Creator and the person but the person determines. Does he want to receive this help, these discernments from the Creator or not?

Student: Which is that first faith, that base, that foundational faith that the friend was trying to scrutinize?

M. Laitman: I don't know, you're relying on what the friend earlier wanted to scrutinize.

Student: That's what I heard, that this cautiousness is not, how can a person be careful from that in which the light turns into a potion of death for him? That it, as if, kills him and then he needs to awaken that potion of death again. 

M. Laitman: Okay, we'll talk about this more later on. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (21:01) So, in the study now, how should we progress – I'm afraid to continue reading – I want to be in the correct place, in the correct study. Here, there is a very strict caution, if I would have it my way, I would just sit for two hours just trying to reach the correct form. To reach faith, to have some kind of connection, some kind of certainty that I'm going in the correct direction and not that I'll be causing harm to myself. So what now do I and do we need? 

M. Laitman: We have to stand in place and look for how to increase the light of faith. 

Student: How do we do that?

M. Laitman: How to do it? By the light that reforms. He's going to talk about it in a few lines.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (22:14) Each day when we come to the study, as if this workshop and we ask ourselves, what do we want to attain through the study? And usually with the old intellect, the person wants knowledge. He doesn't want faith, he gives effort. He expects some reward for his efforts. And here, we need to exert and demand something within us to change. That this old intellect that wants reward for every action will become a null. And this is this new operative system that comes into us that wants bestowal. How do we get rid of that old intellect so it's not always trying to get things? 

M. Laitman: As usual, something we don't want loses importance and gets thrown out of us. 

Student: Seems that we need to work in such a way where you exert and you don't expect reward for yourself.

M. Laitman: No, the labor you have to put in and you also have to receive the reward.

Student: How do you depict that reward where I expect to receive it? So that it won't bring me back to this Lo Lishma that makes calculations with what will I get from that in every motion?

M. Laitman: I don't really think this is the problem, it's a very narrow egoistic problem. What we do need is to bring ourselves to a clearer feeling and understanding that other than the light that reforms we don't need a thing. Only the light that reforms, that we must have, and to that we should always yearn for. 

Student: In a few places it's written until he'll be rewarded, until he'll be rewarded. That word pressures because it gives this feeling that on your behalf you do all the exertion you can possibly do and nothing will happen.

M. Laitman: That's true because a person has a hard time not getting confused with the need to be in faith and to study in faith. And thus, check with respect to the light of faith, what does he have in terms of reason? How can he be nourished by darkness or light? But we'll discuss that over a few pages that are in front of us. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (25:50) Continuing trying to scrutinize this matter of faith, it seems as if there's this lack of clarity in terms of the terminology with this term.

M. Laitman: Yes, faith is not clear to us. 

Student: It's also unclear, we don't understand what the friend tried to scrutinize in relation to faith earlier. Faith is as if this force, like you say, it's a force of bestowal, which is spirituality. As it is written in Item 15, faith in the Creator and the Torah appropriately because then through the light that reforms him he'll be rewarded with the day of the Lord, for the Kedusha of faith purifies one's eyes to enjoy His light until the light in the Torah reforms him. That it's this holy thing, the faith. And then the light comes into the picture here.

M. Laitman: Yes?

Student: Now, in order to be rewarded with coming to this state, the person needs to be complemented with complete faith, it's still not complete faith?

M. Laitman: No. 

Student: Complete faith, so, soon we're going to also learn that we need to strengthen in faith in the Creator. So, faith is the basis to reach that in which the light will influence you, what is this faith? This simple faith that we need to complement, we're not talking about the faith that's holy faith over there but this faith that needs to be complemented with. 

M. Laitman: It's a force that works on a person's will to receive and gives the will to receive an opportunity to get closer to the desire to bestow. And to the extent that it enters the desire to bestow, the light of the Torah shines and reforms him.

Student: He writes that the light in the Torah doesn't illuminate but to one who has faith. So, only when I have faith, then the light comes to me. What is the faith I need to have in order for the light to illuminate upon me? What kind of faith is that?

M. Laitman: That you can do some actions that are, that provide you with the possibility to be in contact with the Creator's actions and receive from them the light that reforms. 

Student: What actions, exactly? 

M. Laitman: Actions, that's clear to us as actions of bestowal. 

Student: Meaning, our work in the love of friends, at its core, that's what builds this ability? 

M. Laitman: Say it again?

Student: The work in love of friends, those are the actions of bestowal that you're talking about? What are those actions exactly? Again, the light in the Torah only illuminates  to one who has faith. And then we need to have complete faith in order to be awarded the light that reforms. He also gives an example of complete faith, that you need to have faith upon all one's acquisitions. So, what is that complete faith through which we can acquire the light that reforms? 

M. Laitman: A special connection with the Creator, that a person is with him, openly, and wants to draw from the Creator all of the light that reforms. That exists only in the Creator and by no means in the person until he is reformed. And if he doesn't, then he'll be thrown back to previous states.

Student: There's a certain contact with the Creator, as you said, now, but a person who enters the path still has no such contact. So, how does the reforming light illuminate upon him, if he doesn't have that contact with the Creator?

M. Laitman: It shines on him in some other forms, not directly, not under the screen. 

Student: Is that called that the light that reforms shines upon him?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: The light still shines in Lo Lishma before he's rewarded with faith. So, he says here that the size of this light is according to the?

M. Laitman: The validity of his faith is what he has acquired so far. 

Student: So, that's an accumulative process?

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: It doesn't depend on a person how urgent or demanding he is for it. Where is the light, this light that reforms, where is it, so that the person will know how to aim toward it correctly.

M. Laitman: The Creator.

Student: That's clear but a person who gets into it now, what is this intellectual or action in the heart that a person needs to do. So that he comes to faith and draws the reforming light maximally, with its full potential? What does a person need to do? 

M. Laitman: That is what he needs to do, he has to rise to such a degree, to such a state, with the Creator that he demands from Him to receive the light that reforms. 

Student: I'm asking, practically, let's say how the lesson operates. We have this time in the lesson in which we can draw the reforming light. We have no way of measuring whether we worked correctly or not or am I mistaken? 

M. Laitman: You can't measure.

Student: We can't measure, so how in these holy two and a half hours that we are together, where I can say that I did everything I could possibly do to correctly draw the reforming light?

M. Laitman: So, we talked about it and studied it and read about it. That we want to be connected with all the friends together, and with everyone to long to reach the next states of our development. That this is why we're getting close to each other, as one man in one heart – one desire. And we raise all our desires to the Creator with the quality of the requests. 

Student: When a person is in this inner thought and action, that is the work, yes? 

M. Laitman: But we always have to be in that thought, it's not that one will be in it.

Student: Yes, the question is, in addition to the thought about the friends, the connection of adhering to the Creator. Do we also need to think specifically about the light? That the light will come and will reform us, where is that light? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: Yes, so we also need to think about that. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (34:35) Continuing that, what is this change of my attitude to the force I receive from the Creator? 

M. Laitman: Changing the attitude, yes, that your attitude is changing. 

Student: How, you said earlier that I cannot check myself in faith, it's impossible to check myself. So how do I check really that my attitude is correct to everything that I receive from the Creator?

M. Laitman: Just like he writes, we need to try to understand them accordingly.

Student: Is the connection between us in the Ten the one place where I can measure correctly whether my connection with the Creator, what I receive from the Creator? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (35:41) Many times I find myself sitting, and I'm enjoying a lot. And it seems as if I understand everything, and it feels as if I'm annulled before you. What do I lack in that state where I'm not finding what I lack in order to enter, more deeply?

M. Laitman: You don't find connection with what you're engaged with right now, what awakens in you, and what state you wish to reach, yes?

Student: I didn't understand.

M. Laitman: When you hear a certain question, do you identify with it or not? 

Student: Yes, and it feels as if I understand it and that I'm inside that question.

M. Laitman: So, what's the question? 

Student: What else do I lack? That feeling where I just enter, and I am there and?

M. Laitman: Keep going for now. 

Student: And I'm annulled before you and I don't have work within myself.

M. Laitman: So, you should continue. 

Student: Continue in what?

M. Laitman: Continue to search, as you do now, continue searching these definitions that come from Kabbalah and where they are. Where is the light that reforms, where is the force of the Kli, and so forth?

Student: Do I need to as if try to exit your screen? 

M. Laitman: Mine? 

Student: Yes, that feeling where as if I'm in that. 

M. Laitman: No, no, no, no, that's not good. That's not good that something like that comes up in you, that you're in my screen. 

Student: Does it just appear to me to be that way? 

M. Laitman: It seems to you and it's incorrect.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (37:54) Item 14, Baal HaSulam talks about the matter of complete faith and he connects it to the time a student invests in the Torah and the light of the Torah. He says that measurement, this matter of time because that’s something you can measure, it’s something simple.

M. Laitman: No, no, we can't measure according to that, what is the state of my faith, today?

Student: Meaning, there's a friend who comes to the lesson, goes home, and let's say he forgets about the work until the lesson the next day. And there's a student who comes to the lesson and during the whole day he listens to the lessons again and does all kinds of actions. And there is no difference between them or you cannot measure the difference between them. 

M. Laitman: I don't know if there is or not; I don't know exactly how you measure that.

Student: So, what would give us some better direction to progress in this work? 

M. Laitman: Maybe we'll find here how we get closer to the Creator, how we check ourselves, and where is this whole mechanism in front of us? How do we get in contact with it, how do we work with it? 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (39:45) A person comes to the lesson, gets some influence from the sources, through you, through the friends, he exits. And he goes out to the world that wraps him and then all of a sudden he comes to the afternoon lesson, the Zoom, and then he thinks again about the friend. These thoughts, these beastly thoughts that come from the world, is that the influence of the reforming light?

M. Laitman: I don't know, I don't know, you should ask and understand from the Creator's answers what does it mean, the light that reforms? 

Student: I feel a force that returns me to the source, so again, I'm having all kinds of thoughts and actions that I need to do. I have a response to a certain action I do. 

M. Laitman: That will be endless.

Student: This is a process that brings a person, as is written, complete faith, a day of the Lord? Gradually, one drop at a time, and get to?

M. Laitman: No, we're not talking about our development in such a way.

Student: That's how they're writing, there. 

M. Laitman: They write, okay.

Student: So, there's no other influence. Morning lessons, Zoom, Yeshivat Haverim, afternoon lesson, evening lesson. These thoughts that suddenly come to me, where I'm just a beast, which is, what are these thoughts? Thoughts that come from the fact that we get this influence from the lesson? 

M. Laitman: The thoughts are outcomes of influences from above. So, what are we doing? Sixteen? 

Reader. (41:55) Item 16. 

This answers yet another question in the Tosfot (Taanit, p 7). We say there, “Anyone who practices Torah Lishma, his Torah becomes to him a portion of life. And anyone who practices Torah Lo Lishma, his Torah becomes to him a potion of death.” They asked, “Yet, we said, ‘One should always engage in the Torah, even if Lo Lishma, since from Lo Lishma he will come to Lishma.’”

According to the explained above, we should divide it simply: One who engages in Torah for the Mitzva of learning Torah, and believes in reward and punishment, but associating self-pleasure and benefit with the intention to bring contentment to his Maker, the light in it will reform him and he will achieve Lishma. And one who learns Torah not for the Mitzva of learning Torah, since he does not believe in reward and punishment to the extent that he should labor so much for it, but exerts only for his own pleasure, it becomes a potion of death for him, since for him, the light in it is turned to darkness.

M. Laitman: So, he corrected it here, simply, the approach – divided it to two: The person who receives the light and begins to work with Torah and Mitzvot according to the light that shines on him. Or he receives the light and does not pay so much attention that in his hands he has the device that can turn him around from one end of the creation to the other. Questions? 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (44:37) It seems as if w. And here he's giving it to us in this simple way. I want to continue this simple way.

M. Laitman: I don't.

Student: I'll ask and maybe you can see if you want to answer me?

M. Laitman: I certainly don't want to answer. 

Student: I wanted to ask the Creator, who we say is Good that Does Good and the Torah that he spoke about, and reward and punishment. He divided faith into three things that a person needs to strengthen in: Faith in the Creator, faith in the Torah, and faith in reward and punishment. And these three things, the person before the study, does he need to organize them in himself when he starts studying? 

M. Laitman: How will he arrange it, if he doesn't know them? 

Student: But here, too, there's a rooster and there's a bat according to a person's intention. Either a person aims for his self-pleasure and he wants to exit that into a new intention. And they say that whoever didn't bless the Torah in the beginning, if he didn't approach the Torah in order to correct oneself, so then he doesn't take the medicine that he doesn't need. It's a potion of death for him.

M. Laitman: It's all true.

Student: So, when I say that the Torah that the person names himself to, is that some kind of calibration? That a person exerts to calibrate oneself towards in order to receive the light through the study? 

M. Laitman: How will he calibrate himself? 

Student: Through the environment? 

M. Laitman: How will he change himself, how will he turn himself around? 

Student: So, what depends on the student, the student comes, he has a will to receive, an ego that draws only into itself. Now he comes with his ego to the study, with that will to receive.

M. Laitman: Right?

Student: He wants to make one step forward, what depends on him? 

M. Laitman: What depends on him? It depends on him probably to be responsible for what kind of Torah he receives from above. Does it change him in the right direction or in the wrong direction?

Student: And if he wants to change in the correct direction, should he make an effort? Whose Torah is he studying, what does he want from it, where does he want to reach? 

M. Laitman: It seems so. It seems so.

Question (Kyiv 1): (47:41) You said that from the response of the Creator, it's possible to understand what the reforming light is and whether we draw it in a correct way. The question is how can we understand it from the response of the Creator? 

M. Laitman: The light that reforms is in fact the same upper force that comes from the Creator. Where I want to change within me the attitude, the direction, to where I am and where I'm aimed at with respect to the Creator. Therefore, it's very important to me where I am; so, he says here that there is still this matter of faith. “However, those who lack faith are like bats who can't see the light of day because it turns to darkness for them. A darkness, horrible than the night because they are used to the night. And so, those who lack faith, their eyes are blinded by the light of the Creator, and the light becomes darkness for them, and the potion of life becomes potion of death. And about them the verse said, those who crave the day of the Lord. And why do you need that? It's darkness and not light. But first, you need to complete yourself with complete faith”. So, it puts a new condition now, which is that we have to achieve complete faith.

Student: All friends yearn for the light, come to the lessons, participate and do the work. On the one hand, we yearn for the light, on the other hand, it's understood that the person is an egoist, I want to enjoy. So, does that mean that I should not yearn for the light but I should yearn differently because for me it's darkness?

M. Laitman: Now, you are beginning to understand in what state you are.

Student: Here, you read in the excerpt that I should as if not yearn for the light but I should yearn for faith. What does it mean to yearn for faith and not to yearn for light? 

M. Laitman: That's a completely separate thing. 

Student: What should I yearn for in any case?

M. Laitman: Calm down and from expressing yourself, now, that's not going to give anything. The issue is that the person has the opportunity to achieve the quality of faith. And each time to draw upon himself this quality of faith which will give him a sense of getting closer to the Creator. But if he doesn't have the awareness that he lacks faith, then, as it writes, “from the lack of faith their eyes are blinded towards the light of the Creator and so the light becomes darkness for them, and the potion of life becomes a potion of death. And it was said about them, that those who crave the day of the Lord, why do they crave it? It is darkness and not light”. Meaning, they're not on the same track – they don't understand it exactly – but they're not getting closer. Meaning, first, we have to acquire the light of faith. And in the light of faith, we can begin to discern where we exist in a path that leads towards the Creator or that comes from the Creator, that's it. And this is really all the whole question there is here in this place.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (53:50) There's one thing that a person wants to feel what is written here and to observe it. On the other hand, he's in a group, and you feel that you need the whole group to be in that state because it's all seemingly a part of you. 

M. Laitman: Yes?

Student: I, now, do not know how to progress in the lesson.

M. Laitman: How did you advance before? 

Student: I came here, I had a guidance from a Kabbalist who said that until you come to a complete faith and that kind of connection with the Creator. So, If you leap over that, then you're in a state that it's forbidden for you to be in. 

M. Laitman: There's something to that. 

Student: And I need everyone in that; now I'm in a state where I'm stuck, I don't know what to do. I see that it's not heading anywhere, you cannot cover everything, so, how is it possible to even study now? Before we reach complete faith, the feeling that the Creator gives you that state that you will receive his medicine correctly,

M. Laitman: but you have a test in your hands.

Student: I have it in my hand but I feel that I haven't reached that. I feel I'm not in that state yet. 

M. Laitman: Yes?

Student: Now we read this excerpt after the previous excerpt and I cannot even listen to it.

M. Laitman: So, Item 15, we'll read again, yes?

Student: If it starts acting on me, then I feel that I have lost the importance for what he said before that. Because the importance of what he said before that is very painful and it dwells within me and I cannot progress beyond that. 

M. Laitman: “Thus it has been thoroughly clarified that one should not expect that the engagement in Torah and Mitzvot Lo Lishma will bring him to Lishma except when one knows in one's heart that he has been granted faith in the Creator and in His Torah, appropriately. This is because then the light in it reforms him and he will be rewarded with the day of the Lord, which is all light for the Kedusha of faith purifies one's eyes to enjoy his light until the light in the Torah reforms him. Yet those without faith are as bats. They cannot look at the light of day because the daylight has been inverted for them to a more terrible darkness than the darkness of the night as they are only fed in the darkness of the night. Likewise, the eyes of the faithless are blinded to the light of the Creator. Hence, the light becomes darkness for them and the potion of life is turned into a potion of death for them. It is about them that the writing says, woe unto you who desire the day of the Lord. Why do you need the day of the Lord? It is darkness and not light as first one must make one's faith complete.” That's the whole thing, if we have complete faith, we will certainly see that the right track is truly the correct track and that it will all be filled with light, alright? 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (58:40) Continuing the scrutiny of the friend, this first faith that a person needs to work in in the beginning is that work above reason? And continuing that when he writes that he's rewarded with complete faith. Does he know the Creator, then? 

M. Laitman: You're not using the words that he's writing with. 

Student: In order to reach complete faith, it’s as if you've been rewarded with something that becomes your knowledge in feeling. I'm speaking from the scrutinies that I'm making and I'm trying, like the friend said, how do I continue in the work? Because I need here a certain faith as we constantly try to scrutinize and to reach a state of knowledge of the Creator because only then is it the correct thing. And I don't know if within myself, like the friend, whether I'm working correctly or incorrectly? The scrutiny here, whether it's going in the correct direction or not? That's the state where I really identified with the friend – he really spoke with my words. 

M. Laitman: Okay, so you don't know, any others like that, are there more people who say they don't understand? 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:00:25) It's hard to differentiate between these different concepts of faith. And I know that there's also different concepts of light, there's light that comes only after complete faith and we need to start from some place. And it's also clear to me that if I am afraid of the potion of death and I won't do anything. So, I won't reach anything. So, I need to go through that potion of death at some place. So, seemingly what I can do is to read Rabash and do… 

M. Laitman: You have to read a lot, that's true, but not that it will help you in the meantime. But over time it will have an effect, and then you can somehow stabilize yourself. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:01:35) The concept of faith, really, on one hand, it's the most important, as he says, but it's also very vague to understand, fully. So, another question here to add to the scrutiny: He says here that the faith is how much you rely on someone who gives you a loan. And how does that explanation of the faith go together with faith being bestowal, that we need to be in bestowal? 

M. Laitman: I don't know, he hasn't touched all the points, yet.

Student: And here, he gave about three or four explanations of what is faith and the reality of the Creator, and the force of faith. Meaning that, on one hand, it's the most important thing and it's unclear what it means. What do we do with that? 

M. Laitman: What do we do, we wait patiently, what can you do? Anyone who's trying to cut short the explanations, here, and try to make some opening towards some quick attainment, that's not going to be successful. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:03:03) Is there a difference between faith in the Creator and adhesion with the Creator? 

M. Laitman: Two different things.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:03:13) What does it mean to believe in reward and punishment, and in working the Ten? 

M. Laitman: That we can make actions of reward and punishment and see how it affects our spiritual state. 

Student: How do we know that we've been rewarded with faith in the Creator? Does a person know that? What does a person need to search for in an internal way in the work? 

M. Laitman: Well, that's where he begins to open before me, the way I feel it, all of TES. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:04:21) Work in connection and in love of friends, does it protect us from the potion of death? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: It's like insurance, where we don't need anything else, just to engage in that? 

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: In relation to the expectation for reward, what is the scrutiny that a person needs to do who is in the study? And checking the reward, what reward is he expecting? 

M. Laitman: Well, he has to scrutinize what he's expecting. Where will the reward come from, and when, and so forth? 

Student: There's one paragraph where he writes that it depends on the extent of his faith in reward and punishment. Where if he believes that the reward and punishment, that is great, that the reward is great, should he be believing in that? If he believes that the reward is great, so then he'll be able to give all the exertion he needs to give, is that how it works? 

M. Laitman: Or, the other way around, it doesn't matter; but what you say, we're going to study this soon.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:05:48) What's the difference between complete faith and Lo Lishma? 

M. Laitman: The complete faith and faith that is Lo Lishma, it gives us a definition. That a person is willing to settle for whatever shines on him even just some part of the Torah that shines on him and that's it. 

Student: Because he writes that those who've been rewarded with complete faith, then their engagement will bring them the light that forms. So, faith is Lo Lishma?

M. Laitman: Complete faith is completely Lishma. 

Student: So, can you explain that in item 13 below? When they've been rewarded with... 

M. Laitman: Item 13, wait, wait, wait.

Student: It starts with, “but those who…”. Item 13, the last paragraph, the beginning of the last paragraph. 

Reader: (01:07:24) I will read it. You don't have it because it's what we read yesterday. It starts with the words, “but those”. 

Reading: But those who were imparted complete faith are guaranteed in the words of our sages that because they engage in the Torah even Lo Lishma, the light in it reforms them. They will be imparted the Torah Lishma, which brings a happy and good life in this world and in the next world, even without the prior affliction and sorrowful life. It is said about them that the verse says, “Then shall you delight in the Lord and I will make you ride upon the high places of the earth.”

Reader: I will read Item 15, second paragraph. 

Reading: (01:08:31) Yet, those without faith are as bats. They cannot look at the light of day because the daylight has been inverted for them to a more terrible darkness than the darkness of the night, as they are only fed in the darkness of the night.

M. Laitman: Yes. How could there be such a thing? 

Reader: (01:09:05) Likewise, the eyes of the faithless are blinded to the light of the Creator. Hence, the light becomes darkness for them, and the potion of life is turned into a potion of death for them. It is about them that the writing says, “Woe unto you who desire the day of the Lord! Why do you need the day of the Lord? It is darkness and not light.” Thus, first, one must make one’s faith complete.

Student: So again, we've returned to complete faith. He even says that if you have complete faith, so then there's a chance that you'll shift from Lo Lishma to Lishma. 

M. Laitman: Can you, where was that? 

Student: At the end of item 13, which you don't have in your file. 

M. Laitman: I don't have that.

Student: So, I don't understand, so you need Lo Lishma to maybe transition from Lo Lishma to Lishma. How does that work out? 

M. Laitman: Make a jump and accept that and acquire that.

Student: Okay, I'll try. 

M. Laitman: That's it, no more to add, you need to explore.

Student: Another question in relation to doubts. He says here also that Manoah's doubts will not be rewarded with the light. But our whole path is full of doubts so how do we work with that?

M. Laitman: I don't think that in your case it comes from lack of knowledge. Rather, doubts come from the state, itself, where you are. And if you were uncertain to dwell on the right material which you study and scrutinize, and reveal it correctly, then you would have no doubts.

Student: Does that depend on the material we study?

M. Laitman: Yes, yes.

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:11:51) You touched on a point earlier I wanted to ask you. You said that you need to pay attention to the light that we attract. What does it mean to pay attention to the light in the work? It seems that it's something very important in our path, in the work. So, what is it to pay attention to the light? 

M. Laitman: It's the light that reforms, as he himself writes. 

Student: What do I need to pay attention to, the changes in me? 

M. Laitman: Yes, of course. 

Student: To the relation between us with the friends? 

M. Laitman: Everything, it is my observation, from my mind towards all of reality in front of me.

Student:  It's my individual work towards the friends, and then through them to the Creator – I'm always working in that place. How do I work with that, in that the light's not working? How do I make a conclusion as to whether I'm working in the correct place? 

M. Laitman: You probably have to ask and clarify: Why are you standing in place?

Student: Each day is a new day, that's what we always say to ourselves. Each day we make a new day each day. We always need to give overcoming and effort and that effort is what draws the light. And each time we reveal changes in ourselves, so, we also read these excerpts. And tomorrow I'll read these excerpts and I'll see them maybe differently because the light's acting on me?

M. Laitman: Of course, because every time you're in a different form. 

Student: Where is the point here where you say to yourself, I have reached complete faith? 

M. Laitman: No, there's no such thing, so far. 

Student: So how can I apply self-criticism so that everything that I see in the friends, it's really what I need to receive from the Creator? How, on every point, every day anew, I'm always, I find myself in the correct place toward the friend, toward the Creator, before the friends?

M. Laitman: Don't ask me, I don't have an answer. 

Student: (01:14:27) Also in letter 15 he says that those who lack faith, their eyes are blinded by the light of the Creator; he says that they are like bats. So, the whole matter here is faith, the question is, is there a way to know if one has faith or not? 

M. Laitman: He has the ability to know and he has the ability to measure even. What level or power of faith exists in him and he needs to demand that 

Student: What's the clearest way before our eyes to measure? But that's a result, I want to know if I have faith.

M. Laitman: Faith is the consequence of the light that fills the person, and to the extent that a person feels how the light fulfills him. To that extent, he feels that he is inside the faith.

Student: So, the light is the measurement if I have faith or not? 

M. Laitman: That, too, yes?

Student: And how do I know the light filled me? It's like an inner feeling? 

M. Laitman: It's an inner feeling and we have to get to know this light that reforms. And that we can be in that, inside the light. I don't know how to complete this sentence.

Student: We say that also in the wisdom of Kabbalah, Kabbalists explain that the Creator is concealed. And you have no one to work with only with the friends. That's your indication, if you want to check your relation to the Creator, so see how you're relating to the friends and it's the same. 

M. Laitman: Yes?

Student: That light that reforms, is that when my attitude towards the friends inverts and that's how I know the light worked on me? Or is it something else? 

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:17:38) Complete faith, is it felt that it's like a process of perception of reality till it's whole, so a person understands reality is whole. So, in this process, the process of seeing, what strengthens or changes until it becomes whole? 

M. Laitman: Again?

Student: This process that, eventually, is called complete faith, that's felt as a process of perception and the way a person sees reality till he sees it in a complete way.

M. Laitman: Yes.

Student: So, in this process of this observation, what strengthens and changes until it's called complete? If we'd want to feel this process so a person starts seeing reality in such a way.

M. Laitman: Person begins more and more his vessels, his desires to receive. And if his vessels, his desires to receive, if they can receive in order to bestow, then according to the extent in which they can receive in order to bestow, that's the extent in which he will advance 

Student: In order to bestow, does that mean that the goal and intention is to give contentment to the Creator? 

M. Laitman: To bestow, yes, in order to bestow. 

Student: If I want to depict what it is to give Him contentment, what should my intention be? What do I want to want? 

M. Laitman: What do you want to want? You want to want everything the Creator sends to you, everything He puts through you. 

Student: Everything He puts through me, what do I want to do with it? 

M. Laitman: You want to be immersed in this, to be made of it. And this is what needs to be given to you. This is what should give you satisfaction from all of creation. 

Student: That I'm a part of it, that I'm a partner?

M. Laitman: Yes, and so on and so forth.

Student: I have a means called, a Ten; the beginning of the spiritual reality, there's this thing called, a Ten. What do I do with it to be part of this, a partner in this? Where is the Ten's role in this process? 

M. Laitman: You receive these vessels with which you were created, you were born. And with them, you want to implement, realize your attitude to the sources, to the spiritual sources and then you start to work with them.

Student: How do I connect the friends in the Ten to something called spiritual, Creator, sources? What's in them, how do I start grasping it? 

M. Laitman: I start connecting my friends in the Ten with my friends in the spiritual vessel, only under the condition, that I can bring light that spreads in my vessels of the Ten. And the light which spreads in the vessels of – I don't know how to say it, I don't know. In the end of the day, it reaches an equal value where I relate to my Ten and I'm in my spiritual vessel in one way. And cannot divide them into several parts, I can't, but where I'm not capable to divide them and to depict them as I am with them, to such an extent together, then I cancel, I nullify. I cancel my perception of it, and my grip of it, and altogether the whole thing. I don't yet know how to explain this to you in a clear manner. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:24:16) You told the friend in my Ten that you have to take the light that expands through your organs, the light that reforms, and draw it towards the friends in the Ten. How does that action, how can I do it in a way that the light I give to the friends will be as a remedy for connection, for extra connection and not as a blow? 

M. Laitman: Because that's what I receive from above into my Ten and I have nothing else to tempt the Creator with. 

Student: What do I concentrate on so it will be for the benefit of the Ten, what I'm doing? In what can I hold on to make sure that I'm not harming them, not choking them, not sinking them but feeding them.

M. Laitman: We'll learn that. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:25:40) We need to reach giving contentment to the Creator or at least want to give him contentment? When I pray to the friends for the connection, for my corrections, or just asking for forces of faith, do I need to want it in order to give Him joy?

M. Laitman: Check yourself. 

Student: It seems that that should be the reason for my prayer, of why I need the connection and faith, but it's the most difficult to want to give the Creator joy because there's nothing to grasp there. 

M. Laitman: And what next? 

Student: I don't know, I have to pray in order to reach a state where I give joy to the Creator and there's no desire to give him joy. There's no grasp in it so then it turns out that there's like a wall. So, what do I need faith for? 

M. Laitman: That is something that we're going to scrutinize. For that, we have equivalence of form.

Student: I'll try again: Eventually, also now, in this state, I need to hold an intention that it's also for Him to enjoy our connection, my corrections. 

M. Laitman: Well, for the time being, that's all still like a game, it's not realistic, yet; it's not human. 

Question (Petah Tikva Center): (01:27:51) We learned that attaining spirituality has two stages: From love of the others, we're building the first degree and from it, on the second degree, we can rise above it. So, in the stage where we don't have the attainment of the force of faith, yet. If all our work is by the force of Arvut, commitment towards the friends, all these things, do they compensate the force of faith? 

M. Laitman: What is compensating? 

Student: Instead of it, instead of the force of faith because we don't have it. The faith that lets us go through all these stages, it's your force of faith, you cover us all, you connect us. All the deficiencies of the friends. I, like you, I can't absorb the questions from the friends, it comes from all kinds of directions. But you sit and you help us concentrate together in the same direction. So, your force gives us the opportunity.

M. Laitman: Seemingly. Well? 

Student: So, I'm asking, our efforts, so what we're left with is just to reach despair and pray, there's nothing left. That's what lets us reach the light that reforms?

M. Laitman: Yes. 

Student: So, to reach the cry, at least.

M. Laitman: That's how he explains it to us more and more. 

Question (Petah Tikva): (01:30:15) Today the friends asked that we start studying from the Study of the Ten Sefirot, Part 6. So we wanted to start reading it bit together, after all, the introduction, we’re already learning so we can also do that now, if you think it’s right.

M. Laitman: It’s not important to me, as long as you are aimed towards this and you’re ready for it and you want to scrutinize this.

Student: I think so, the friends said!

M. Laitman:  Then okay, then let’s do it!

Reader: (01:30:56) So, well go to the next part of the lesson, TES, Part 6.

Song: (01:31:02)