Rabash, Shlavei HaSulam, “According to What is Explained Concerning Love Thy Friend as Thyself”
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The Book of Zohar – Selections, Chapter “BeShalach (When Pharaoh Sent),” Item 193
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Baal HaSulam, “Beit Shaar HaKavanot,” Lesson 10
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Rav Yehuda Ashlag, “The Acting Mind,”
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In the process of development, having reached a comprehensive age, we have become equipped with a huge arsenal of images and concepts about the elements of this world. Hence, we are able to divide and connect various pictures and meanings in our imagination or in action. Therefore, when we hear about something, we can imagine it based on what we know about “something similar” even if we have never seen this object and have no relation to it.
As to spirituality, we have no idea about it, nor any contact with it; we have no knowledge of its elements that we could sort and divide or connect in order to imagine something “similar.” We read about spiritual phenomena, and, if we imagine something in pictures, we ought to realize that we are deceiving ourselves. In this case, we take images of the corporeal world that are familiar to us, and, from them, in our imaginations, we put together, as it were, pictures of the spiritual world.
Since this path is known to be false, we, while studying Kabbalah, try not to put anything together in our mind and feelings, but to act from what is described, as “the judge has only what his eyes see.” Adding things (intellectualizing and fantasizing) is not allowed since it signifies form that is not dressed in matter. Kabbalah is against it because we have to attain a form dressed in matter. If we start imagining forms that are not dressed in matter, they will always be false forms borrowed from our world, and we will never know the truth.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/20/10, “The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah”
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The system of the Upper Governance called “The Tree of the Universe” comes down to us from Above in its ideal form where all of its parts are properly interconnected. Each element is united with all others in absolute harmony, it receives nourishment from everybody and nourishes everybody according to its degree and the common strength of the system, which results in the formation of one common sphere symbolizing perfection.
Everything is permeated by the “illumination of Shechina”; the Light fills all the desires which exist in mutual harmony so they may supplement each other. The law of this system is for everyone to act only in its common interests, consciously and reciprocally. It is created from the side of the Light, bestowal, or the Creator.
We find ourselves in the very center of this system as a broken part, and we need to become aware that this system is broken and opposite to its true form. This is how we reveal our breaking.
Our form is opposite to that of the system. It turns out that I exist in a wonderful world of Light and spiritual harmony, but because I am in my own egoism, I am opposite to the system and see the world in a completely different way.
The Upper Light purposely conceals from us the perfect reality only because it would feel horrible to feel its perfection! Therefore, I see merely a small part of the true reality around me, the part that I am able to absorb with my minute egoism, but I see everything in the opposite form, as bad or evil. I perceive it to the extent and in the form that I am able to accept and live with it.
To the degree that I become corrected and acquire the desire for bestowal, this sphere is revealed to me more and more. It widens and shows me that I am worse and worse! But meanwhile, I am already receiving the force of bestowal and correcting myself and my reality. This continues until my perception broadens and encompasses the whole sphere, the whole “tree,” the entire system, and then I can tune into it correctly and with full force.
However, for the time being, we exist in the center of this whole universe, in a form opposite to it, locked inside our own tiny world like a worm in a bitter radish.
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From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/19/10, Beit Shaar HaKavanot
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My Good Environment – Questions of the Day
Sviva Tova (Good Environment) is the worldwide network that connects between points in the heart, and brings them a step-by-step external-corporeal connection to the inner connection of bestowal. Sviva Tova is an order of Kabbalists in our generation for the building of a new society, based on connections of love and bestowal, as the single solution for all of humanity’s problems.
The website Sviva Tova connects you to the daily spiritual stream, updates you in real-time on all events of the worldwide Bnei Baruch Kabbalah Education & Research Institute, and allows you to stay connected with the World Kli at any time of the day.
Our path can be imagined as a computer screen where three windows or documents are opened at the same time. The last window is concealed; I don’t see it. This is me in the state of the Final Correction, in unity and adhesion with the Creator, in the root of my soul.
The window in the middle is my path, my advancement along 125 degrees. The first window is the one I now see in front of myself, my current state.
All three are states of my soul, what it perceives, since “we cannot name anything we do not attain.” Kabbalists have gone through this path, have experienced all these states from beginning to end, and they tell us about the process they have gone through.
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From the lesson on 10/22/10, Baal HaSulam’s Letter 17
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Question: Can a friend be bad despite what he has in his heart?
Answer: First of all we check our friends, but we do it once, at the very beginning. After making that check we have to rely on our unity.
It is called “Mikveh,” which is a special water reservoir for the purpose of purification. When the Light becomes revealed inside our unity, its force cleanses and purifies us. However, if a person is completely unfit for it, then it cleanses others away from him. It influences him in a way that casts him away. This is the effect of the force of cleansing: It either pulls us inside, or throws us to the outside.
Therefore, one should assess his friends only by ascending above reason and caring only about how to strengthen the common force of unity in the group. Then this force, the Creator, will clarify: Who is outside and who is inside.
Those who are really trying to reach unity are pushed inwards by this force, whereas those who don’t merit it yet are thrown back. A person who is unprepared cannot go through the burdening of the heart and a descent. Instead of giving him extra forces, his states will force him to break away to the outside.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/27/10, “Make Yourself A Rav, Buy Yourself A Friend”
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Kabbalists who have attained the foundations of creation tell us that the Creator created a desire to enjoy. This desire is obligated to become equal to the Creator, to become a vessel that is filled with Light according to the law of equivalence of form.
This is the only true formula which the Creator established and created from the beginning. All other forms exist only in the perception of those who receive.
The single creation, the single desire to receive pleasure, exists in equivalence with the Upper Light and is filled with Light, unity, and adhesion. However, it imagines that it is separated and distanced from the Creator, that it differs from Him and has different qualities, that it is broken and separated into many parts. Now, from our end we have to decide which actions are necessary in order to return to the only existing, true state, the place where “He and His name are one,” where the Light and the vessel, the creature and the Creator, are united with each other.
The science of Kabbalah pays special attention to the current phase, which is the preparation for ascending onto the first and lowest spiritual level. Right now we do not know what is happening on that ladder. Once we get there, a person’s soul teaches him and we can look for help in the Kabbalah books, receive examples, gain experience, and learn from the previous states.
The entire problem lies precisely here, before the first degree. At this stage we need a great preparation; here the states are unclear and the world is opposite to the spiritual reality.
Therefore, at this stage we have to use the special means that the science of Kabbalah offers us.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/27/10, “Make Yourself A Rav, Buy Yourself A Friend”
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The exodus from Egypt happens like a miracle because the Light of GAR de Hochma which comes from Partzuf Atik works above the nature of the Second Restriction. That’s why it allows us to go from the state of “Egypt,” which is ruled by the will to enjoy, to the state where we can decide for ourselves that we desire to be under the rule of Bina. This is already the beginning of the “Sinai desert.”
In essence, this is the sign that we have come out of Egypt. On our own, we are unable to come out from the rule of our ego; only this enormous Light creates a passageway for us, raising us above the will to enjoy. It helps a person to separate from certain qualities of his egoistic desire, and from that moment on, a person runs away from “Egypt,” from the qualities that hold him inside the intention of “for his own sake,” which deprive him of the opportunity to attain “for the sake of bestowal.” And that is impossible in Egypt itself.
When GAR de Hochma appears, it works like a projector that illuminates a person’s desires so he sees which of them are really so bad that he cannot avoid touching them. This is called an “escape;” a person rises above them and is already protected from using them.
The Light of GAR de Hochma severs these desires like a knife and they no longer come in a person’s way since they are buried inside of him. Of course, later on they will reawaken in order to be corrected, and then a person will reveal all sorts of problems until he comes out of “Egypt” completely.
However, all of this happens by virtue of the Light of GAR de Hochma, which illuminates and clarifies our desires, allowing us to rise above them, to correct them or to use them partially.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/27/10, The Zohar
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Question: Before the Convention many people complain that everything around them suddenly breaks including household appliances and furniture, objects fall out of their hands and break, or crumble right in their hands.
One gets the impression that the material world starts to disintegrate. Is this really related to the Convention that is approaching?
Answer: Of course there is pressure, discernment of the goal, a desire for it, its assessment, the realization of the price I have to pay for my goal, whether my friends correspond to this it, and so on.
However, this is a wonderful time. You should read about how people came out of Egypt: in fear, hurriedly, accompanied by the blows that came down on Pharaoh (egoism), and it happened in the dark.
Question: How should we relate to our friends from the past who used to be with us and left? Maybe we now have an excuse to contact them and invite them to rejoin us?
Answer: The Convention is a gathering of “points in the heart” from the whole world. Precisely now we all have a unique chance to create a single common Kli.
Many people were together with us physically and virtually for many years, participating in the work of the worldwide Kabbalistic group. Regardless of the reasons for their temporary distancing, we would be very happy to see all of them at the Convention.
Everyone who has ever been with us, who has embarked on the path of studying Kabbalah, are dear and close to us.
We are waiting for you! See you at the Convention!
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