Morning Lesson October 26, 2023
Transcription is made from simultaneous translation, which leaves a possibility for differences in the audio.
Part 1:
Rabash. Article No. 19, 1985. Come unto Pharaoh - 1
1. Rav’s Introduction: Yes, there are answers here to a few questions related to our correction. First of all, why do we have to approach Pharaoh to come closer to Him? I would understand it if we were told to run away from Pharaoh. That's what we have to do as it says about Moses, but not that we have to reach him but apparently reaching Pharaoh is what the Creator obligates us to do and He makes us in such a way in our life that we are born and we live close to Pharaoh and this is how we advance. So, come unto Pharaoh is the Creator’s invitation to each and every person from the moment he is born until he completes his correction. This takes place within him each time that the will to receive grows so that he is constantly thinking about how does he work with himself, and how he can advance with his evil inclination that doesn't leave him alone even for a minute. Okay, well let's go.
Reading Article. (02:08) “Come unto Pharaoh, this is perplexing....”
2. R. (24:59) Thank you Moshe, and it’s an excellent article that explains a lot.
3. S. (25:17) How can we distinguish which are the corporeal pleasures that we have to relinquish?
R. Any pleasure that is aimed at our hearts meaning at our own good, our own benefit, then we have to think about how to give up on it and replace it to receive in order to bestow, that we will have pleasure only from bestowing to the Creator.
4. S. (26:00) How can I see myself brokenhearted to come to a prayer?
R. You have to try to take the line of bestowal and not the line of reception until you see that you can't, and you overcome, and thus you reach both a true prayer and a true action, that we want with all our strength to come out of in order to receive and enter in order to bestow.
5. S. (27:03) How can we increase the quality of our work in connecting between us for the sake of the Creator?
R. Only by prayer. We don't have the forces to connect, we get these forces from above from the Creator. Therefore we have to ask Him to connect us so that we'll feel Him as our connector, our designer, and that's how we come to a state where everyone truly feels everyone and then we can all receive in order to bestow. Alright.
6. S. (28:05) It says that we will go together. I will go with you in order to change nature, but I want you to ask of me only. How can we be rewarded with such a state where the Creator truly takes you by the hand and leads you through all of the different states and you feel that you are going together with Him hand in hand?
R. This depends on the person. Man needs to ultimately feel that he depends on the Creator one hundred percent, that there is no one else who can help him and there is no one who understands what the help is, besides the Creator. Which is the force of, The Good That Does Good to the good ones and to the evil ones. So, a person needs to feel that he depends on the Creator one hundred percent and thus advance.
S. In those important moments you forget that the Creator is leading you, so how to go with Him, nevertheless? Here it says there is no room for despair so how not to forget, how not to lose this connection with Him?
R. If he always wants to be aimed towards the Creator in going towards the Creator, thinking every moment how one will make another step towards the Creator then it will work out for him. We simply need to constantly think about how I am advancing now, another step, and another step, and another step, and each time count my steps of how I am coming closer to the Creator. How I need Him and how He is basically putting His hand out and asking for help.
S. How to count these steps correctly?
R. I don't think we can count these steps correctly yet, but simply go this way all the time towards the Creator.
7. S. (30:36) We can break the wall in one day and then reach this connection, but the text is so high and there are such examples there, we are not even familiar with the tastes of simple things certainly not with the profit of the intention to bestow. Is there no other way? What does the study of such high texts give us? Why do we have to develop to such a high level, such an intellectual level, so that we can understand it?
R. If we were correcting the ten then there is no problem. Pretty quickly, well not quickly but maybe in a few years, we can grasp this idea and start using it correctly.
8. S. (31:44) There is this amazing expression here, it says that in spirituality if a thought enters into the vessel, this thought, that was born through the will to receive, then the abundance goes to the external ones instead of Kedusha. I mean it's all very clear, but maybe you can explain how to keep this subtlety? Eat bread so that the Kedusha won't be stolen.
R. This is only in the way that one will help his friend where we will help one another in order for our Kli to be complete. That is how it can be and no other way, clear?
9. S. (32:55) What does it mean that we bestow to the Creator?
R. When we give to the Creator, we are giving him some opportunity to help us to give us and that's what he needs, no more than that.
10. S. (33:28) Can you please explain the reference made to the mosquito entering the work before? I didn't quite understand what is that reference in the context of this article.
R. As the mosquito is the smallest creature we can identify and it's an egoistic one, it's clear how it sucks blood from us and the mosquito, meaning even the mosquito is of greater value than you if you don't correct yourself because it was born before you, it emerged before you. That's why don't be proud that you are worth more than a mosquito.
S. The article also talks about how the Creator supplies a steady stream of abundance, an abundance we are unable to observe and sense because we don't have a proper Kli so all that abundance goes to the Sitra Achra. Are we able to sense or observe the abundance that the Sitra Achra takes? Is it possible for us to sense it that way?
R. Yes, we can feel all the forms of abundance that come to the Sitra Achra that come to the correct side, yes we will locate that.
11. S. (35:34) This fool understands that he is a fool out of an egoistic calculation or is it out of the sorrow or for not having the quality of bestowal?
R. A person attains his qualities from his oppositeness with the Creator.
S. He receives that from the group, from the ten?
R. In the ten he receives the feeling of what an egoist he is, in relation to the friends in relation to advancement towards the Creator.
12. S. (36:36) When there is a deficiency let's say there is a strong deficiency, I know that if I just stay in the will to receive and if I operate that and only fill it up it won't take me to any good direction, it will operate in bestow it is good, but at the same time there is a great resistance of the body it can be through fear, it can be through rejection, so at that point precisely, how do I use come unto Pharaoh how do I work with it?
R. I use the unto Pharaoh where each time I feel that the will to receive is hostile, that it is against me, just as it is written, “That I see the Creator before my eyes always,” so accordingly I can always ask the Creator to correct me and to advance towards him.
S. Is success in the action do we need to understand that beforehand there has to be a lot of preparation before we reach this action?
R. There certainly needs to be preparation where a person doesn't feel anything natural unless it's in the open will to receive that he's born with.
S. So if we reach that point of decision and we feel that there is a high level of resistance or great concern, a great fear of going in the right direction. Necessarily we have this dilemma it means that I also have the force to overcome and do it, or it's not necessarily so?
R. There is a force to overcome, but only if I feel that the Creator is helping me.
S. So if I go along with the Creator, I will succeed in overcoming it and if I didn't succeed it means I wasn't going along with the Creator?
R. Correct, yes.
13. S. (39:06) Where is Pharaoh? He's inside of us here in the article it says that we have to go down to the depth of our heart together with the Creator in order to discover the evil that exists inside of us?
R. Yes, the evil inclination is inside of a person in all of one's qualities, in all of one's desires, and thoughts, it's all truly within one nature.
14. S. (39:50) How does a person feel that he receives the help of the Creator when coming to Pharaoh?
R. Where does he feel, or what does he feel?
S. How does a person feel that?
R. How does a person feel about the Creator?
S. When the Creator comes with him to Pharaoh.
R. When the Creator comes with him to Pharaoh is because he feels that specifically within his desire to receive, which is his, where he sees this, that the Creator is there and he's guiding him towards Pharaoh. Toward the desire in order to receive and he doesn't let a person emerge out of it unless a person asks with all of his might and correctly. Then the Creator will free for him, let's say, the handcuffs with which the shackles with which he's bound to his will to receive.
15. S. (41:30) In the article it says that we should know what our demand is, what is it that we demand in return for engaging in Torah and Mitzvot. What is the difference between demanding a reward when engaging in Torah and Mitzvot and in some other case he's afraid that they will demand for him that he will pay for it?
R. Yow are given special exercises to rise above our egos and through these efforts we make we receive a good correct connection with the desire to bestow with the Creator. That's why all of our work is how to come closer to the Creator and to perform actions just as he would like us to do and for that, he will draw us towards him.
S. A question about growing stronger in Torah and Mitzvot. What does it mean and how can a person receive such strengthening?
R. A person who wants to come closer to the Creator needs to strengthen himself and adhere to The Creator in all that is possible, that's it. It's a very simple thing to the extent in which it's possible and he can, he should do it.
16. S. (43:57) The efforts a person makes in order to overcome the will to receive are our efforts within reason. Are there efforts that are above reason that we can do in our work?
R. Efforts above reason we do only with the help of the Creator because above reason we cannot work alone. But, if the Creator helps us then we do, we do.
17. S. (44:57) Why was Moses afraid of meeting Pharaoh even with the help of the Creator?
R. Because a person himself doesn't have forces against Pharaoh, it is the nature itself of all of this world and only the Creator knows to battle with him, to beat him.
S. It also says to receive the sublime goal that is a reward, but to reach this we need to undo ourselves from corporeal pleasures, this seems impossible. So how do we undo ourselves from corporeal pleasures, how do we do this?
R. By asking the Creator what we need, we must rise above our desires, above the desires of receiving in order to receive, and then the Creator performs this drill on us, and we become stronger than the will to receive that is awakening within us, and this is how we come out of Egypt. This is the whole miracle of the exodus from Egypt.
18. S. (46:39) Is it possible to get out of this state of being like a donkey? In the article, it speaks about a donkey. How can we eat the bread he talks about and be rewarded for not being a donkey?
R. If our intention is in order to bestow then we will be able to eat bread. If our intention is in order to receive, then we will want to eat only what a donkey eats, what an ass eats.
19. S. (47:37) We won't be able to hold on to our appeal to the Creator without the evil inclination and the Sitra Achra chasing after us?
R. No, we won't have a need for it. Clear, okay?
20. S. (48:05) We learned that Pharaoh is inside a person, so what is this thing that he talks about the external ones that they will take it, that they know the value of holiness, there is this concern that it will cause some harm. What is this thing?
R. The external ones is the will to receive that seemingly is outside of our heart as a Klipot, a shell upon the heart that covers our heart, and we want to actually use, we choose to use, only the desire to bestow which is called the internality of the heart. Okay.
21. S. (48:50) What should a person do when he discovers the evil inclination within him, that it controls him, and how he behaves in the ten? To the level, he truly wants to kill somebody in the ten. He doesn't have the strength to ask the Creator even. So, what should one do, and how can such a person be helped?
R. Ask the Creator, ask the friends to be closer to the friends, and then you will have the power to battle the Creator.
S. But if the friends can't stand him at that point, what should he do?
R. You need to talk to them, you need to talk and note that everyone understands that the main thing we need to do is to be against the evil inclination, against the egoism, and that this is how we need to connect, and then we will win. Okay.
22. S. (50:20) I heard you say that we bestow to the Creator that we give him an opportunity to help us, so the more we reach this point where we feel that we need help from the Creator, it means that we are bestowing to him more, in fact?
R. Yes.
S. So I noticed when you send us to scrutinize a common problem or a single deficiency a single common deficiency we should ask for or to reach some agreement then through these scrutiny’s we actually reach more and more this point where we truly need the help of the Creator because it is impossible without him helping us. So, what else will bring us closer to reaching such intensity of needing help from the Creator so that through this needing of his help we will bestow to him more and more?
R. We need to understand that the path basically includes two steps: one step is the connection between us, and from the connection between us to the connection with the Creator, that's it. There is no more than that, and this is what we need to constantly see ourselves being drawn to the Creator by connecting between us.
S. The question is at a time when we connect, we don't always have a common scrutiny that we reach a common agreement sometimes our connection is about a common reading or sharing an impression or a prayer. We always have room or put emphasis on, let's scrutinize something and reach an agreement around something, but specifically in those places there is a need for the Creator's help. The question is, is it important to bring this every day into our meetings?
R. I think that we need to all day long, not every day, but throughout the day from morning till night think just how we connect between us, how the connection between us guides us to the Creator and that's it, we have no more than that. Rather these two points; at the beginning of the way, is the connection between us, and at the end of the path it's our point with the Creator. Okay.
23. S. (53:10) Is it our mutual guarantee that keeps the light within our common Kli?
R. Yes, of course. The Kli of mutual responsibility is the Kli that helps us be in contact, in constant contact with the Creator with the light and with the purpose of creation.
24. S. (53:46) This question has been sitting in me for a long time: This definition that with the sweat of your brow you will eat bread. Is it somehow related to the reflected light or the screen and the light of Hassidim?
R. Of course it's connected to that.
S. So is sweat the reflected light and the face is the screen, and the bread is the Hassidim?
R. Yes.
25. S. (54:36) A person makes efforts along the way and there are two options: one is that the Creator will help him, and one that will not. How to give exertion in such a way that my friends will persist on this path and is my only exertion prayer?
R. Only prayer and nothing more is needed.
26. S. (55:16) What does it mean the quality of the exertion and how can we measure it?
R. If there is an answer then you have the right quality, only this way.
27. S. (55:39) It says come unto Pharaoh. This is almost like saying we have no forces where we can make any change, any kind of change unless it is with the Creator.
R. Yes, correct.
28. S. (56:03) How can one adhere to the ten and not work on tactics to accept the will to receive?
R. If he wants to help the friends and this is his goal, then he has no problem, he will not fall, he will advance.
29. S. (57:09) In the text Rabash writes that this is why we should know that the main reward that we want for observing Torah and Mitzvot is adhesion in the Creator which is equivalence of form. This means Rabash is telling us that after moving through these walls, this stone, and the revelation of this dark spot in this ocean of light, then from there onwards in the ten, in the group, and incorporating with friends we observe Torah and Mitzvah?
R. Yes.
S. And then the text basically has guidance for this?
R. Yes.
30. S. (58:12) The Creator wants to teach me how to go on my own to go alone, but what I learned is that I am not capable of doing even one step alone or without his help. So, the question is how can I grow when I constantly feel that I am dependent on the Creator?
R. Precisely because you depend on the Creator and you feel that in all your organs, all your thoughts and desires you depend on the Creator. By that, you can grow, in what, in that even more and more you enter into your connection with the Creator, in that you grow.
31. S. (59:24) Rabash writes that despite there being many virtues and ways to come out of one's nature he remains naked like on the day of his birth. Why does he write in such a way that there are many virtues and many opportunities? What are these opportunities?
R. It doesn't matter why, but it doesn't advance through those but only through persistence this is clear?
32. S. (01:00:07) We touched here in the article about the matter of quality and quantity of the exertion. In one of the answers, you said that the quality of the exertion is where you feel that the Creator answers you. What is to feel that the Creator has answered you, how not to delude myself into thinking that somehow, I am thinking that I am seeing it?
R. That now you received another answer. That the Creator is giving you an opportunity to advance towards him. To advance towards him, through such and such action, and through this you will get closer to me. This is what he wants to tell a person, that's it. Try to discern such answers that come from the Creator, by what can we take a step towards him?
33. S. (01:01:33) We read and I'm quoting, “That it is worthwhile for us to give up the pleasures of the body.” The question is what pleasures of the body are we talking about?
R. Beastly pleasures that animals also have.
S. What does that mean, does it mean to stop enjoying?
R. Yes, well yes. Stop enjoying with your body.
S. So what should you get vitality from on a daily basis?
R. Do you want to remain with the beastly pleasures? Go ahead and stay there.
S. I'm sorry, now when I eat, I'm supposed to not enjoy it?
R. Yes, yes.
34. S. (01:02:29) Can we in a ten or as an individual build a screen, the Masach, that is strong enough so that we can turn corporeal pleasures into the Ohr Hozer?
R. Of course all of the corporeal pleasures so that we can elevate them up to the spiritual level and to reform them and to make them be in order to bestow; this is the end of correction.
35. S. (01:03:12) I am also going back to the question of the corporeal pleasures. What am I supposed to do with every pleasure I'm eating, am I supposed to aim it at the Creator so he enjoys it? After all, we still use our corporeality in our pleasures.
R. That is right, but we should try to shift any possible pleasure that passes through us so that it will be in order to bestow to the Creator. That we receive it in order to bestow it to the Creator. This is all of our work and in this way bit by bit we arrange and direct all of our pleasures to in order to bestow.
36. S. (01:04:22) How do we come unto Pharaoh in the ten, and what is this urgent need to go to Pharaoh in order to change one’s nature?
R. It's not an urgent need it is a need that if we have grown so far then we are able to connect between us in the ten and together to go to Pharaoh and demand of him to change our nature.
37. S. (01:05:08) What's the difference between me receiving pleasure for myself and me receiving pleasure for the Creator? One way or another I am receiving pleasure, so what’s the difference between this feeling and the other?
R. Well there is a difference, what for? The intention.
S. Put the pleasure remains I receive, I enjoy.
R. That doesn't matter if I receive in order to bestow, this pleasure is not considered as my pleasure, but rather to whom do I want to bestow by receiving this pleasure?
S. So what do I lose if one way or another I've received pleasure? What do I care if it's the ego or not?
R. Well think about it. You think about it. I can't explain it anymore, think about it, try to have the friends explain it to you.
38. S. (01:06:05) A question about the compensation in the study of Torah. It is written that we should give up the pleasures of the body if we understand that it bothers us to reach the goal. Does this say that if there are certain qualities that are bothering me to come to the goal then I need to sock it in the teeth?
R. Strike it in the teeth in principle yes of course. Remove all obstructions in any possible way.
S. How to discern specifically between the qualities that bother and that are for us? We understand the necessity of each of them, but not all of the qualities in us are suitable for our advancement, after all.
R. It is very easy to distinguish between them. If they strengthen your connection with the group then you would leave them, let them be. If they are contradictory to your connection with the group then you move away from these qualities.
39. S. (01:07:24) It's written “A person was created on the eve of Sabbath so that if his mind would wander, he would be told that a mosquito precedes you in the matter of creation.” So, what does this have to do with the refinement, the purity of one's mind?
R. On the Eve of Shabbat, in which the Heavens and the Earth were created, and then everything in them was created before the Eve of Shabbat. You can read about it in the Torah at the beginning of the Book of Beresheet, Genesis. Man was created, the last one, so he shouldn't be arrogant or proud that he is so special because even a tiny mosquito that drinks the blood of animals was created even before man.
40. S. (01:08:45) The pleasure that we receive for the sake of the Creator is it a personal pleasure between a person and the Creator or is there a filter of my ten in there as well?
R. No there is no filter or Assiya or Yetzira, I'm not sure what you mean.
S. On the ten, on the group?
R. So there is a filter over the ten of course. The whole ten should be as much as possible connected between them and to the Creator, on the one hand, and to the purpose of creation on the other side, and in this way, it establishes itself and this is how it advances.
S. So the content of the original pleasure that is there can be found in a completely different place if it is filtered through the ten and the Creator later?
R. Well, yes.
41. S. (01:10:00) How do corporeal pleasures connect to the work that we have in the ten? The work between us was to work on the connection between us, so what do the corporeal pleasures have to do with anything?
R. Corporal pleasures are what separate us from the purpose of creation. When we rise above them, we don't want to receive them, we don't want to work with them, for our benefit, and by that, we come closer to the purpose of life.
S. How is that connected to the work on the connection between us in the ten?
R. As much as we can connect between us by that we become more connected to the purpose of life, to the purpose of creation.
S. Does that help us forget the corporeal pleasures?
R. I wouldn't say to forget about them, but to write above them yes.
42. S. (01:11:11) A certain pleasure comes to a person; how does he raise it to bestow to the Creator?
R. The same pleasure that the Creator presents before him he wants to give it to the Creator.
S. How can I give it to the Creator? How can he present it to the Creator?
R. He experiences a certain pleasure that the Creator wants to give him as a gift and this pleasure he brings back, he turns it back to the Creator.
S. How can I turn this pleasure to the Creator, can I do this in a certain way? Do I do it in the ten?
R. Yes this is one of the ways.
S. And how can I rise above that pleasure, let's say, we use the example of food or something like that?
R. Send it back to the Creator.
S. What am I giving to him? He doesn't want to eat; he doesn't have any need for food.
R. You are passing pleasure, not a piece of something sweet.
S. Okay, so I'm passing the pleasure. What am I actually passing on? When I enjoy, I want to give Him my love?
R. Yes of course, just like you enjoy the way that you feel it you want him to feel it.
S. So I want him to feel what? The connection between us is the fact that I am enjoying in love, what do I want to pass on to him?
R. All of it together.
43. S. (01:13:10) Do we need to create another source of light, are we using two sources of light?
R. What two sources of light?
S. One comes from the Creator, the other one is reflected light.
R. Well you can put it this way. Of course, it's not the source of light, it's reflected light. Of course not.
44. S. (01:13:58) When you try to aim a pleasure at the Creator the pleasure itself disappears. So, then what do you aim for, what do you do with that state?
R. Of course the pleasure disappears because you and the Creator still don't have some understanding of pleasure from the same action, from the same object. So, when you think about how to give pleasure to the Creator your own pleasure disappears it only proves that you are still in your ego totally.
45. S. (01:14:45) When we are in this constant state where the heart gets hardened and then softens throughout the prayer suddenly this gate shows up that I can't pass through, and it feels like a shattering. I don't have the power to keep going, so what is the connection that has to develop with the friends so that I can ascend to the next degree?
R. Connection, connection.
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