The Illusion Of Personal Gain

Question: How are we supposed to help each other? Let’s say I am a farmer and most of the time I don’t communicate much with other people. How can I possibly bestow to them?

Answer: Tell me, why and for whom do you work on your land? We think that we work for our own sake, but in fact that’s not what’s happening. A long time ago, humans were at the animate level thinking only about how to feed themselves. They didn’t feel that they were a part of each other or have a sense of community. But with the development of our receiving desires, people were no longer able to provide for themselves. Then, one became a farmer, another a shepherd, and another worked with tools. It is said: “Go and earn from each other.” Our desires grew more complex; accordingly, our world became more complex.

Ultimately, we think we serve ourselves, but in fact, it is really others. We are under the delusion that we act for the sake of our own benefit, but in fact, it’s a misunderstanding. Actually we work to get our salary, which is nothing other than a deception. In fact, we work to bestow and to provide for others.

For example, you grow tomatoes and all day long you are thinking about how to sell them and what you will earn. So remember, if you did not regard yourself through the deceitful prism of egoism, you would see that you simply are trying to find a way to help others profit. You are suppressed by a delusion that all you do is pursue profits because you don’t know how else to motivate yourself because you still don’t know how concern for others will serve the purpose. Well, you can remain under the impression of this lie if you want.

In reality, your pursuit of profit is a complete fraud. Soon the banking sector will collapse, and you will see this. Similarly, we encourage children or trick a donkey by dangling a carrot in front of its nose to make it work.

Question: So, a Kabbalist grows tomatoes, earns half a million by selling them, and constantly thinks about how to use this money for the benefit of others?

Answer: Of course! Otherwise, he wouldn’t be working for the sake of bestowal. What kind of a Kabbalist would he be?

Comment: But, people are constructed in a way that most of the time they don’t think of things like that.

Answer: You keep forgetting because your perception is not connected with bestowal as of yet. A mother feels her child within herself, so she never forgets about her baby. Internally, she never separates from her child; she simply cannot cut off the umbilical cord that connects them together. Wait, you too will discover the cord that joins you to others.

Comment: But even egoistically, I don’t dream about my future salary all day long.

Answer: That’s right! However, you constantly think of various pleasures that attract you. An expert receives sensual and intellectual fulfillment from doing his work well. Eventually, you’ll find out that you are working for the benefit of others. All of us are the Creator’s workers; we are giving to each other all we can against our will and do not acknowledge our bestowal. Instead of a beautiful and perfect picture of the world, we see a perverted and wicked image that alters the reality into its complete opposite.

Eventually, we have to “remove the blinders” and lift the veil of concealment. Nothing will change, except us; but when you change, you will see an inverted world.
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From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/7/12, “The Arvut (Mutual Guarantee)”

Responsible For Everyone

In the article “Matan Torah (The Giving of the Torah),” Baal HaSulam tells us under what conditions the Torah was given to people. First, it must be a group of people who want to be as one man in one heart. The sufferings they have been through leave them no choice and they see that they must escape, but they must escape consciously. It isn’t a blind escape from pain, because the sufferings come from a special force, from the Creator, according to His plan, and within it there is a specific goal.

The Creator brought about the sufferings on purpose. It says “I have created the evil inclination,” which means I have created Pharaoh who brings the children of Israel closer to the Creator. The evil inclination is called “help against,” since it evokes and pushes a person to know the force that manages him. A person asks himself: “Where does all this evil come from? Why am I suffering?” Eventually the searching brings him to the main question: “What is the meaning of my life?” And further: “What is the meaning of life?” Then a person reaches the wisdom of Kabbalah.

So he comes to receive the Torah and begins to understand that there is a need to change something. Instead of changing the world by trying to “bend” it by himself, a person understands that the world is a replica of his internal attributes. Change yourself and the world will change.

This is what we say to everyone: We should correct the person and not the world. Of course, we don’t talk about the perception of reality, about the fact that the external picture is determined by our internality. This cannot be explained at the moment, although there is already some scientific evidence for that. On the whole, a person already understands that today he has to correct himself. Then he is ready to receive the Torah as a spice “to spice” the evil inclination by this method, so that it will taste good.

Eventually we have to put the form of bestowal on the original desire to receive. If a person is ready for that, he receives the Torah, meaning the method of correction, and begins to work. Then he understands the essence of the condition that he was given: what mutual guarantee means, what general unity is, and what the final goal of “Love thy friend as thyself” symbolizes. On the way to reaching this goal, a person discovers his mission, which is defined as “a kingdom of priests” and a “holy nation.” In other words, he has to fulfill what it says not only regarding himself, but also being responsible for the whole world. By judging oneself and the whole world to a scale of merit, a person applies his potential correctly for the good of others by doing what he has to do, which means to disseminate the method of correction all over the world.

Then he corrects himself, since he has no need for anything but that. It is enough to live by working for the general correction, which is called “a kingdom of priests.” Priests have no corporeal estate, “God is their estate,” which means the pure level of Bina. A person should also see himself on this sublime level where the good of others is his only concern above all the other concerns, and the only goal above all the other goals. Although different unwanted desires come up and although the interruptions are global, it is all so that above them he can be responsible for the whole world. Otherwise he will have nothing to work on.

By fulfilling the mission of a “kingdom of priests” and “a holy nation,” a person fulfills the idea of mutual guarantee. The point isn’t that we will be responsible for each other and hold on to each other on the way to correction. No, we are advancing towards mutual guarantee with the whole world, we are responsible for everyone, and unless we correct them, our work cannot be complete.
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From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/13/12, “The Arvut (Mutual Guarantee)”

Don’t Judge What Is Yet to Ripen

Baal HaSulam, Introduction to the Book of Zohar, Item 4: To understand these questions and inquiries, the only tactic is to examine the end of the act, that is, the purpose of Creation. For nothing can be understood in the middle of the process, but only at its end.

For now, our questions remain questions. In the beginning of the work we don’t yet understand it and don’t see where it comes from. One must first comprehend creation in its entirety, and most importantly, see the end. That is when we’ll understand the beginning stage.

Indeed, we don’t determine the work; rather, we actualize it and are its consequences. Therefore, we shall know the beginning only from its end.

In contrast to us, the Creator doesn’t need a process that leads from a starting point to an end point. For Him, the beginning of the path, the path itself, and the end comprise an indivisible reality. Whereas we must go through all the stages of our development, and only after we have completed our work will we understand the path we’ve traveled and the purpose behind it.

This is why Baal HaSulam wrote that we must study the entire process to the end. Indeed, while on the path the coveted fruit always seems unripe, spoiled, corrupted, just as with any other thing that has not yet reached its final state.

We will not receive true answers to our questions until we reach the goal, the end of correction. Every question we have is a void, a vessel, into which we must receive fulfillment, which is really the answer. Therefore, questions about the meaning and purpose of our existence become filled with answers only after we have achieved the final goal.
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From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/14/12, The Zohar

Good Intentions And The Right Intention

On one hand, the commandments “between a person and his friend” are more important than the commandments “between a person and the Creator,” since from the love of the created beings one reaches the love of the Creator. But on the other hand, we mustn’t forget the final goal: We must build the mutual relations among us correctly only in order to connect with the Creator.

Otherwise, we would simply demonstrate “idealism” trying to overcome the crisis, to improve the educational system, to become better and happier people… All this is fraught with evil and leads to an even greater collapse. After all, by that we divert humanity from its internal part, leading it to a side road. Then people would feel even greater suffering trying to leave these attempts, no matter how wonderful they may seem.

We want to stop the hunger and to make everyone healthy, to fill everyone with joy. But if at the same time we don’t aim at adhesion with the Creator, with the goal of creation, if we don’t intend to bring the Creator contentment and to enable Him to reveal Himself, then instead of the direct path upwards, we are choosing a side road, and then more sufferings would be needed in order to get back on track.

Thus, by our seemingly good actions, we would summon negative results, so as it says: “It is better to sit and do nothing.”
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From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/12/12, “The Arvut (Mutual Guarantee)”

From Linear Egoism To The “Round” World

Question: Currently, we move from a linear, narrow-minded egoistic development to a “round,” whole world. How do we build the course of integral education in a way that it quickly shifts a person from a linear perception of the world to a global, universal perception?

Answer: It’s easy! Everything depends on the influence of the environment!

If the environment surrounding a person is integral, there will be a society built on top of specifically equal circumstances. Naturally, there are no equal people, but specifically equal circumstances will serve as a connection among them: friendly and equal, creating integral fields of communication around them where a person will feel as a part of the whole even if this feeling gradually disappears as the feeling of the whole will start prevailing.

Then a person begins to perceive the world in a holistic way. And he will treat everything else outside of his small society as a whole, and he will be able to perceive the world correctly and interact with everything in a proper way.
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From a “Talk on Integral Upbringing” 5/21/12

The Turning Point Of Consciousness

We have to reach a height where we work above our egoism and it doesn’t get in our way, where we rise above it and become completely free from it. Then there are no limitations left for a person.

But for now egoism gets in our way, being “help from the opposite” since it helps me to reveal new desires, problems, and all kinds of flaws inside of me. This incites me to work and act, awakening various sensations in me and a change of states.

If none of this existed, our state would be completely hopeless. That is why it is written that “The greater a person, the greater his egoism.” But as a person advances, he reveals a greater desire to enjoy, and inside of that same desire he reveals more and more details and finer nuances, evoking stronger impressions in him. This is called a greater will to enjoy.

Reaching greater egoism means becoming picky and intolerant about the smallest things which I previously did not even pay attention to. And this spurs me to perform new, finer corrections, eventually bringing me to carry out very precise work against my egoistic nature.

The Creator created the will to enjoy, being foreign to Him and to us. But this lets us feel one notion: our separation from the Creator as “something from nothing” (Yesh Mi Ein). There is nothing besides this in the will to enjoy. It includes just this one quality, and not an ounce of any desire. The Creator created just this one particular point, which emerged “from nothing,” being something completely separate.

And from this separate point the will to enjoy then begins to develop like a spiral than unwinds. Everything that is present in this desire, that comes out of the point of “something from nothing” develops from the Creator, but in the opposite form, like an anti-world.

The Creator created a certain point beyond His boundaries, which exists from nothing, and He brought Himself inside of it. It turns out that there is the Creator and the creation, standing one opposite another. And creation uses everything it has from this “nothing” in order to establish itself in the same status as the Creator.

After all, in reality everything else besides this one point of “something from nothing” is the Creator. And “something from nothing” is the turning point in our mind and feelings, which we must always correct.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/14/12, Shamati

Recognizing Evil In A Good Way

Question: There is news from Europe about the growing economic crisis. There are talks about establishing new governing authorities. Is this “and there was a new king in Egypt” the Torah tells us about?

Answer: The problem isn’t the politicians. It says, “The hearts of ministers and kings are in God’s hand.” The weathervane shows us the direction of the wind and only we can change its direction—the world Bnei Baruch group that works very hard experiencing descents and ascents.

Question: What would we like to happen in Europe?

Answer: We would want for them as for the whole world to recognize evil in an easy way. After seeing and reaching the recognition of evil, people will also see the direction to goodness.

Therefore we have to disseminate as widely as possible the message about the real reason for all the troubles in the world and about how to correct the situation. The world is actually in the state of the recognition of evil, and how exactly this will happen depends on our work. We are the middlemen who can direct humanity to the good way or to the bad one, or to something in between.

No one can imagine what disasters may be expected. The crisis indicates that it isn’t just a collapse but the global integral system that is clearly revealed opposite the egoistic system. The circles are opposed to the straight line, and the link between them is missing. On the whole, humanity will not be able to sustain itself—everything is in abundance, but there is no food. This is already a spiritual problem.

Now there is everything in abundance and enough for everyone, but look at what is happening in the world—disparities between people, inequality, and suicides. Every few seconds a child dies of hunger. This doesn’t happen among animals, but it does with humans.

Humanity desperately needs the revelation of evil, but in a good way. I hope that we will lead the world in this direction. Otherwise “blind fate” will send us such disasters and blows, which stem from the Lights and the vessels facing each other. When there is no “adaptor” between them, it leads to war and destruction. It is scary to even think about such events, especially if we are responsible for them.

We shouldn’t wait. We should start connecting as soon as we can.

Baal HaSulam says in the “Writings of the Future Generation”: “I have already expressed my views in 1933, I have also spoken with the leaders of the generation and my words were not accepted them, although I screamed and warned then about the destruction of the world, it didn’t leave much of an impression. But now, after the atomic and the hydrogen bomb I think that the word will believe me, that the end of the world is very near. Israel will be the first to get hurt, as it was in the previous war. Therefore, it is better to spur the world so that they will receive the only medicine and thus shall live and exist.”

This is our work. Only we can change the news.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/11/12, “The Arvut (Mutual Guarantee)”

Conditions For Those Who Demand Life

It says in the Torah that at the foot of Mt. Sinai the Creator said to the People of Israel: “and now if you shall listen to Me, and keep My covenant, you shall be unique people of all the nations.” There is a condition here: “I shall give you the Torah, which means the method of correction, if you understand that you have to fulfill the formula of correction, the plan of the correction.”

The Creator gives everything, the instructions and their fulfillment, but you have to know where you are headed. Here a certain commitment is required on behalf of the lower, who checks himself: Does he agree to that? And if he hasn’t reached the level of agreement yet, then the exile in Egypt can reoccur and eventually we will find ourselves once again at the foot of Mt. Sinai facing the same condition.

The agreement on behalf of the lower symbolizes the need for clarification—he needs to find out that he really wants this and nothing else. Even if he weren’t given such a strict condition, he would still accept it with his heart and soul by asking for it and wanting it. The condition he was given helps him clarify what he actually has to do.

So why doesn’t a person reach the gathering at Mt Sinai with a clear demand: “I want to be corrected! Please give me the Torah and I will keep it, in order to bring You contentment…” the point is that a person reaches this as a result of the shattering. He has a deficiency but he cannot clarify things independently and so the Light has to operate first. By the Light that is revealed, a person feels darkness—his point in the heart rises to Mt. Sinai and at the same time at the foot of the mountain he builds the “golden calf.” Indeed, how can all his other desires agree to rise to the same level in which he is ready to work in bestowal, doing the work of the priests?

A person must discover the field of his future work, all the thickness of the “mountain” from the top to the bottom. Therefore, he faces this condition. He can refuse and “die,” which means to stay in the desire to receive, to return to Egypt. The people of Israel demanded this of Moses more than once during the journey in the desert. The ego constantly calls to return to Egypt since Egypt is depicted as a fertile abundant land. Everything was in abundance there, so what was the problem?

Egypt fills the egoistic desires to their fullest. They never lacked anything there, except for one thing: to the extent that you are developed you feel darkness and sufferings, and enter the “seven years of hunger,” but it is spiritual hunger, a spiritual thirst, when there is nothing to revive your soul, but only your stomach. The desire to receive is full, but for the desire to bestow it is exile and death.
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From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/11/12, “The Arvut (Mutual Guarantee)”

The Workshops: Not Just Verbal Debates But An Ascent To Unity

Question: How do I work with the group in order to clarify correctly everything that happens with me?

Answer: First, try to connect with the friends. Leave the clarifications for now; you don’t have the right tools to clarify things. First you have to acquire the means, a spiritual vessel with which you can clarify what is happening. At the moment your attitude to life is distorted.

Today you have to build a new vessel in the group since the clarification and actually everything depends on the mutual relationship a person has with the environment.

Question: We are trying to do it in the workshops. How can we correctly clarify the questions that you are presenting?

Answer: You have to want to connect on the basis of my questions. The question itself isn’t as important as everything you are saying in the discussions. The words are necessary so that we will rise above them and constantly think about how to connect with the friends. No matter what nonsense the friend may say, I rise above it wanting to connect with him. I have to see the friends as the greatest in our generation, and on the other hand, I bestow upon them my part of the general bestowal.

The work takes place on two levels: below—hatred and coarseness, and above—love and purity. If these two things exist, it is already a certain type of vessel. If you attain such a great gap between coarseness and purity then the Light, the Creator, is revealed.

Until then, you constantly work in workshops, in connections and in studying in order to attain this gap, which for us is the goal called “Mount Sinai.”

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From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/08/12, “The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah”

Everything Was Set Up Perfectly From Above…

At yesterday’s seminar we had a general, collective opportunity in all the groups all over the world to rise above our heavy sensation. We were pinned down by this heaviness and it was difficult for us to connect and rise in our mind and heart.

We felt that we couldn’t do it. We were missing the necessary intensity of feeling and clarity of thinking, and that is a wonderful state for our work, which we have to enter for one moment in order to feel it. Yet we must know in advance that we are now experiencing this heavy sensation and will discern it in order to immediately rise above it.

Thus, I am experiencing these sensations that pass through my mind and heart: dullness of feeling, dimness of thought and consciousness, and now I rise above all of this. I don’t care what I now feel; above it I want to build a completely new state which is not based on my animate, earthly mind and feelings, but is related to the higher state, spirituality, bestowal.

This means that I will receive completely new instruments of perception and desire, which are above me and completely do not depend on me. I use other’s desires, not my own, but thoughts that are foreign to me, meaning those that belong to others, so that through them I will bestow to the Creator and to them. Then I don’t have any problems since I am not closed inside of myself, but I rise above my egoistic perception.

This heavy feeling came precisely in order to show us whether or not we can rise and fill the world with Light, whether we can give something to humanity. The sensation suited the topic of the seminar precisely. It was a complete package; everything was arranged perfectly from above.

Our groups should have connected together as much as possible, above this entire sensation of heaviness, and thought about our influence on the world according to the topic of the seminar.

Women found a wonderful answer to the question of how we should give to the world and how the world should connect to us, through the example of a mother who breastfeeds her baby. This is a very precise example because is reflects the transition from the roundSefirot (Igulim) to straight desires (Yosher).

That is, we rise above our desires and thoughts and find a new vessel thanks to our unity. When every person comes out of himself and becomes included in others, he comes out of his thoughts and sensations and acquires new desires and reason in which he is not limited by anything at all. This is the form in which we advance.

But some people get immersed in their sensation of bitterness and darkness and suffer because of it instead of turning it upside down and transforming it to Light through their work, ascending above the darkness. A person should ask: why does he prefer to suffer? Does he really love suffering so much? This is stupid and results from our pride, our inability to rise above ourselves.

Or maybe you don’t understand that your spiritual vessel is not inside of you, but above you? And that all of these difficult sensations in the heart and mind are meant to help you ascend. The general force of the group must awaken you and help you do this, so why aren’t you using it? And the teacher tells you that you have to ascend. Don’t you understand that, or don’t you hear it?

But in any case, this is a good study. This heaviness is simply a gift from above, corresponding precisely to the chosen seminar topic. This is how we are being shown how easily we could rise above it, but we weren’t able to. And all of it is due to insufficient value of the environment, lack of importance, and the need to rise above this sensation.

This only shows that the quality of bestowal to which I ascend is less important to me than the sensation in my own stomach. First of all I want to feel good myself, and only then am I ready to ascend higher. Look at how egoistic this condition is.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/11/12, Writings of Baal HaSulam

Love: A Bridge Above Hatred

The whole of reality is divided into three parts: me, the spiritual spark inside of me, not letting me be at peace and wanting to discover another reality, and the world surrounding me.

The world around me is divided into people who are close to or distant from me, inanimate nature, vegetation, and animals. Behind all of that, there stands yet another, higher force. For now, I perceive the whole of the reality as foreign, not related to me. Yet, all of this are parts of me that I do not perceive due to the separation that occurred in my consciousness and feeling.

It is as if I had been given an injection of painkiller into my arm and as a result it completely lost feeling and I don’t feel that it is mine. It could be cut off and I would not even notice, so powerful is the anesthetic.

This is how I perceive the whole of the world as if it doesn’t belong to me. And the work is to fight against this anesthetic, against this feeling.

This is intentional because if I think that this world does not belong to me, as if it has been anesthetized, I can turn from my egoism and relate to it altruistically, bestowing, as if to someone else. I can learn to love it.

I do not need to develop love towards myself; I love myself egoistically anyway. However, now I can learn to love others who are separated from me by the means of this anesthetic, this illusion of separation. After all, love is a quality of the Creator, not the quality of creation.

By the means of this separation, the Creator gives us the opportunity to receive a quality, which is not characteristic to us by nature and does not belong to us. We don’t understand what love is at all. But when I try to learn to love those who are outside of me as I do myself, meaning, to relate to my neighbor the way I do to myself, this is called love.

I am working on it against my egoism. This is a special force inside of me that constantly resists it. Thus, there is an opposition of two forces acting in two different directions. Desire attracts pleasure towards itself, but above it is a screen (the force of my resistance), which pushes this pleasure away and is ready to give it upwards.

And then, from the interaction between these two forces, I can understand what it is to truly love someone else rather than my own child, my own little dog, or my own body.

And as I develop more, my hatred towards my neighbors constantly grows, but I develop the force of love above it. It is called love only if it rises above the hatred. As it is said: “Love covers all transgressions.” Due to the collision of the two opposite qualities, the creation is able to obtain the quality of the Creator. Otherwise, it would be impossible and we would remain inside of the nature with which we were created.

However, if we want to be creations (Nivraim), meaning, independent personalities outside(Bar) of the Creator, and at the same time, to reach His qualities and the high state, then we are obliged to build such a resisting mechanism inside of us. There will always be two opposing forces functioning inside of it: the force of the desire to enjoy and the desire to bestow that we build above our egoism by ourselves, love above hatred.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/1/12, Writings of Rabash

Unnecessary Sufferings

Some people think that the Creator can be reached through torturing oneself, making one suffer. But the Creator doesn’t need our sufferings. He doesn’t send them to us. We feel them because according to the nature of the creation, the Light and the desire are opposite to each other. And by revealing this oppositeness, a person must realize that this feeling is given only in order to rise above it. It is only a sign allowing us to feel the oppositeness and separation from the Creator.

First of all, we should be thankful for getting such a sign, and move away from this bitter feeling as soon as possible. After all, willingly or not, consciously or unconsciously, through this unpleasant sensation we blame the Creator, the source of all that is happening to us. And thus I find myself opposite to and separated from Him, and this is called a sinner.

We must strive only toward lighter feelings, toward getting closer to the Creator. A person’s search for suffering comes from pride. After all, he thinks that he is supposed to be awarded, paid, and elevated for the sufferings. This comes from a misunderstanding of the entire system of reality.

The Creator is called good that does good, and He wishes us good as well. The purpose of creation is in receiving pleasure, and the Creator created creatures in order to delight them. And if you feel something unpleasant at some moment, you should use this feeling to move forward and justify the Creator by staying in an absolutely good state.

We cannot kiss and love the stick that beats us; it is a deception and hypocrisy. If a person works correctly, he rises with the help of the environment and a new scale of values because he appreciates the quality of bestowal more and more each time. He uses every moment; when there is an opportunity to rise, he sees that has not yet reached the full sensation of perfection, he is imprisoned in bestowal of the Creator who is absolutely good. He doesn’t calm down for a moment as his goal is to give pleasure to the father without caring about his own pleasant and unpleasant sensations. He keeps advancing by using his good and bad impressions to find out what else could be improved to reach bestowal.

So the person keeps moving, rising above the darkness and discomfort each time it occurs. After all, they point to his remoteness from and lack of adhesion with the Creator. Thus he is grateful for all of these discoveries; these are sinners that are revealed in him, which he can overcome and rise above toward adhesion with the Creator.

And then, all this revealed evil will become a blessing, a gift for him. He will welcome the darkness with gladness by preparing himself to it in a proper environment in advance. Every moment the darkness becomes revealed in his senses and mind, he will look for something that is left uncorrected.

He doesn’t look for suffering; he looks for black details in his perception in order to correct them. After all, he prepared to be corrected in advance and he doesn’t suffer in vain, which is simply silly.

Here is an entirely different calculation with respect to all the events happening to a man in the world. He sees everything as a means in order to rise above disturbances and reach merging with the Creator. It means that he is climbing the Creator’s mountain. Throughout his journey, he is wary of any unpleasant feeling lasting longer than a moment and then rises above it due to the high importance. After all, a person perceives it as a sign or a springboard for elevation, an opportunity to justify the Creator, to rise above this feeling toward bestowal. And this depends on the importance of the goal and the greatness of the Creator. Then he will highly appreciate the means, which become revealed to him in an opposite, negative form, giving him an opportunity to build himself.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/11/12, Writings of Baal HaSulam, “Letter 8”

We Will Know You From Your Actions

When we aspire directly to the Creator, we study Torah. In other words, we study the actions of the Light, which corrects us.

With regard to that it is said, “From Your actions I will know You.” When we study the Creator’s actions, we begin to understand and attain Him. As a result we come to adhesion with Him.

To study Torah means to study that what the Light is doing within us. Ultimately, when a person reads, he should feel right away as the Light performs changes within him. A transformation comes out from every word, from every letter. After all, these letters, these symbols of spiritual properties, are built by Kabbalists.

When a person reads them, he can see how within they act and correct him from receiving to bestowal. With every word, the person notices changes within himself. This is the way he reveals the actions of the Creator and from these actions the Creator Himself becomes revealed to him.
[29935]From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/16/10, The Zohar

Consumers Of The Upper Light

Question: My exertion belongs to corporeal life and not to spiritual life. How can I ask the Light to change that?

Answer: Our desires change if we yearn for connection; we reach bestowal, and through bestowal, we reach the revelation of the Creator in order to bring Him contentment since it is He who wants to be revealed to us and not that we want to reveal Him by ourselves out of curiosity. It’s only possible to change something in us when the Light changes us. All the work is done through the Light; all the changes in us are preformed from Above according to our request. But in order to reach the Light, to come in contact with it, to pass on our request and our deficiency to it so that it will be accepted, we have to operate through the group. In order to do that, our deficiency must be dressed in the intention to bestow.

We shouldn’t try to change or limit our desires forcefully; nothing will help except a prayer, a demand for the Light that Reforms. We have to put all our heart into this prayer. You won’t be more spiritual if you stop eating, breathing, or enjoying life; you won’t change your attributes by that.

The point is not to change mechanical actions that are performed by the arms or legs and not to use high language, but to change our inner attributes, which only the Light that created them can do. Therefore, we only have to know how to demand these changes! This is possible only if we get together and build a collective desire in the group through which we can turn to the Light with a demand.

The demand that is formed within this collective desire is the one that will be accepted. After all, the Light is in absolute rest, and to the extent that we reach an equivalence of form with It, we summon its action. It depends on the intensity by which we demand it in the group.

This force is abundant, but everything depends on us, the users. The user must include many foreign and strange desires of the friends in the group, which until now weren’t connected by anything. However, they are ready to connect in order to attain the upper one and so their attempts to connect are perceived as a demand from the upper one to connect them.

It turns out that our only request is in connection, and thanks to the connection all our attributes will be corrected. You can’t decide to be a little more generous or more of a saver. You don’t understand which attributes you need. Ask for one thing only—to connect with the friends into one collective desire so that all your attributes will be corrected in this connection. This is the only thing you can ask for and this is the only request that is answered and for which there is a correction.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/08/12, Writings of Rabash

The Nation That Unites Above The Ego

Baal HaSulam, “The Arvut (Mutual Guarantee)”: Thus, because of the above necessity, the Torah was given specifically to the Israeli nation, solely to the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, for it was inconceivable that any stranger would take part in it. Because of that, the Israeli nation had been constructed as a sort of gateway by which the sparks of purity would shine upon the whole of the human race the world over.

It isn’t just about one of the nations that was suddenly given the Torah. The “Israeli nation” is a collection of people who left ancient Babylon. They connected under the leadership of Abraham who taught them to connect through ties of love above hatred. Of course, they didn’t want that, just like all the other Babylonians, but they accepted Abraham’s method. Thanks to the “spark” that is concealed in them, they understood that it is actually a method of correction and that the egoistic nature, the hatred, was given so that we will unite above it and build a group in which there will be these two discernments, one opposite the other: hatred below and love above. Thus they arrived at “Mt. Sinai,” at the state in which we reveal the upper force.

When they connected, they began to work through the connection according to Abraham’s method and then Isaac’s, and then Jacob’s, which means in “three lines.” In this process they received a growing “hardening of the heart” and in their work they went through the phases of HBD, HGT, NHY, including the exile in Egypt. This means that they felt the difficult internal states and overcame them by rising above their ego and reaching the necessity for adhesion. The ego separated them extremely, and they still tried to hold on, as much as they could, by at least keeping their inclination for connection.

Eventually, the necessary tension among them was created—on one hand, the ego that erupted in the form of the “ten plagues of Egypt” and the inaccessible “Pharaoh” on the inside, and on the other hand, the recognition of the necessity of the connection, which they built above them. They were even ready to go to the desert without any reward, just to have a chance to serve the Creator. This is what they demanded from Pharaoh when Mosses gave him the Creator’s message: “Let my people go, so that they shall serve me.”

Then they reached the state in which they could receive the Torah, which means the Light that Reforms. There was enough tension between the ego that was revealed and the pressure aimed at connection. They were given the condition—to become “one man with one heart,” to “love thy friend as thyself,” and they accepted it by saying: “We shall do and we shall hear.” Then the revelation of Light that Reforms began, which means that they received the Torah.

Thus they became a nation. Now they had a collective infrastructure that united them: the Light united them. Without the Light, there is no connection among them, which means that there is no nation. Therefore, Baal HaSulam says that Israel in exile is not a nation but “a bag of nuts.”
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From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/10/12, “The Arvut (Mutual Guarantee)”

Great Light Instead Of A Small Spark

Question: If the spiritual spark has such a great force, then why isn’t a person giving it as a whole, and instead constantly fluctuates, sometimes rising and sometimes falling?

Answer: It’s because a person’s responsibility is to establish a correct connection between the desire to enjoy and the spiritual spark. On one side, there’s the Creator, the spiritual spark, and on the other side is the creature, the desire to enjoy. And I need to connect one with the other, to clothe one in another.

The desire to enjoy is our natural material, the real me. But now, the spiritual spark illuminates me and I lose my head, not knowing what to strive for, to some spiritual world that’s who-knows-where. A person, having felt this draw for the first time, loses balance and a sense of reality. This is why in our days, our whole world seems fragile and distraught.

And our job is to reveal a great Light of NRNHY instead of a spark, and to attain the entire depth of the desire and to connect them together, for that desire to acquire the form of the Light and clothe in it. Then it will become a vessel or vestments for the Light, and we’ll reveal not a small spark, but Light 620 times more powerful.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/6/12, Shamati, #21

Under The Control Of Concealment

We are under the control of concealment, which means that we don’t feel the One operating and managing us, the One awakening our thoughts and desires. Thus we feel as if we ourselves are operating from within our thoughts and desires.

This means that if I did something and succeeded, then that’s my success. If I didn’t succeed, then it’s my fault or from within my ego, I begin to blame my destiny, or my surroundings.

The concealment is given to us to overcome it and to discover the One who is operating us and not just operating us, but operating us kindly. This means the concealment has several shades, and we need to discover the force that operates us. Thus if we want freedom of choice in our efforts, exertion, and actions being ours, it is possible only if we act towards the disclosure of the Creator.

And we perform the rest of the actions because that’s the way the Creator directs us. And it is only in relation to His disclosure that He leaves us some open space since He awaits this from us and wants to be disclosed as the one and only force that is good and does good.

Thus everything that takes place in life, both bad and good, all kinds of situations that occur, the person receives as correct and helpful towards the disclosure of the Creator. And then he sees that he has the ability to act at every moment.

And even more than that, while he feels that he is detached from the Creator, actually he is the closest to Him. It is then that he feels a need to reveal the Creator.

Why is a person given the feeling that he is lacking adhesion to the Creator? This is since he is weak and can’t awaken by himself but needs awakening. And when the Creator awakens him, it is called that the person becomes close to Him.

It needs to be understood and clear to a person when he receives some kind of situation and responds to it that there is none else besides Him, and all that is in a person and his world was sent to him from above. And his role is only to find the deficiency for the disclosure of the root of everything that happens, the reasons for everything. This means to discover the upper force, the Creator, the Keter (Crown).

This kind of prayer and demand must always be in a person so that he will discover the reason for each state that comes to him
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/05/12, Shamati #25

The Simplicity Of The Idea

Question: What is the main idea of the integral method that we can offer to wide audiences?

Answer: The idea is very simple: Everything can only be solved through unification because this is the most important law of nature.

Right now this law openly manifests to us in all the existing systems, including artificial ones we created. And this speaks to the fact that we ourselves are becoming integrally connected inside us and there is nowhere to go: It is the system of nature, which is closing on us more and more, pressing us with the environment and other factors. It turns out that we have no other choice—we ourselves need to become similar to these systems.

The idea is very simple. It didn’t come from the head, from some intellectual conclusions, but from researching nature. Do you want to verify this? Please do! Thousands of scholars from different fields of science, technology, psychology, and political sciences will confirm this for you

Question: And what is this correct connection?

Answer: A correct connection is an understanding of the mutual participation in our shared earthly life. We are gradually becoming closed in. Let’s start to change in this direction. Then we can arrange our life correctly.

In general, people understand this because after all, it drips through the media, it hangs in the air, and there’s no getting around it. We see how interconnected the European countries are, and what a huge problem it is that they cannot communicate and cooperate correctly despite the fact that they’re seemingly tied to each other. Only one factor, a human being, is the source of imbalance and distortions there. All the systems have already become integral.
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From a Talk About Integral Education, 5/20/2012