HOD: TIKKUN CHATZOT תקון חצות – LESSON WITH RAV MICHAEL LAITMAN
Lesson on the topic of “Faith Above Reason”
Morning Lesson January 20, 2022 Transcription
Transcription is made from simultaneous translation which leaves a possibility for differences in the audio
Part 1:
Faith Above Reason – Selected Excerpts from the Sources. #23
1. Rav’s Introduction: As we continue on the same topic, there is no other topic in truth, and the way I’m getting an impression each day, it’s difficult for us, because we are a new vessel, or a new Kli, a world Kli. It’s a new layer of the will to receive that is rising towards correction from greater and greater depths, as we’re digging up the broken pieces of the will to receive. That’s why the difficulty is understood, it is revealed more and more. But in truth we have to be glad about it, how as we discover all these disturbances, even by thinking that we want to rise above them, we already give contentment to the Creator, and that is in fact the goal.
So it turns out that we can do it quite easily, if we think about this goal and besides that, we are fast approaching the conquest of the mountain of faith, Bina. This is where we can begin to appreciate how much we have to overcome the resistance, the rejection, the lack of forces, the lack of importance. The fact that we are deviating this way and that way, towards our reason, our feeling; whatever is taking place in the will to receive, and we wish to be above it, all of this In order to eventually give more importance to the Creator than to ourselves. By appreciating the friends more than we appreciate ourselves, in this way we grasp bestowal and how it clothes in our vessels and we’re able to shake up the entire system and climb into it.
Let’s see what’s happening, ask, check try again and again to examine how much you are both, in the worst possible states from the point of view of the new will to receive being revealed, the more broken desire because we are digging deeper and deeper, and at the same time how much we understand more, we justify more, we are able to rise above it. And although we feel ourselves lower, we understand less, we feel less, we justify less, together with that we can grab hold of the other end, how more than that we can justify, we can rise above, and we can deal with it, we are capable. I hear from people here and there that they are approaching good kinds of corrections, they understand why things are the way they are, they grasp the way the system works, and this is our path, this is it. All In all, you have to understand that if someone in our system makes a step forward, of course it belongs to everyone. Spirituality cannot be divided. And the fact that we have a few thousand students it’s not like someone’s attainment is divided by a few thousand, and each one gets one part divided by a few thousand. Rather, everyone has it. So we have to rejoice in this friend’s joy and according to what each one can add, and this is the big difference between spirituality and corporeality; since, whatever progress I make, it belongs to everyone. It’s not that it’s divided between everyone and each one gets one divided by thousands of the progress, rather whatever I have everybody gets and it’s a huge profit.
Excerpt 23 (06:07)
2. R. (07:32) This far it’s clear? Ask, and if you don’t want to ask, I want to ask you to offer different examples, maybe you will find something else.
Reader continues: “2, he tells him here is $1,000…..”
3. S. (09:28) What does it mean, that if I don’t count the money in the envelope, but I believe the friend that there is a thousand dollars there? What does it mean to believe below reason?
R. That you take his word for it. This is religion, not Da’at (reason) but Dat (Religion). Whatever they say, you take it, you accept it and you go along with the story. There are many such examples in life where we accept someone else’s opinion without checking. Let’s say little children live according to their parents’ reason, according to their opinion, right?
S. This act above reason, is it against the fact that a dollar is missing and I don’t take it into account? Does that mean, I am giving this space for above reason, and I’m not giving a place for the act itself? Is this what’s important?
R. No, we truly have to count, we must measure. We have to put our opinion, our reason into it, and then go above it with a higher reason. This means that we place Bina above Malchut, faith above reason, we go according to faith. And the reason we need it in order to establish the faith above it.
4. S. (11:45) In our case when you recount the states, say the spiritual states in the 10, what are the thousand dollars?
R. Anything the friends tell me, everything I read in the books, everything there is, I have to try as much as I can. I have to try and examine it, and then later take their word, whatever they say. And according to the contradiction between what I understand and what is written, this is considered the height of the degree. The distance between Malchut and Bina.
S. But those thousand dollars is it some spiritual state in the 10? Or what is it?
R. No, the thousand dollars in and of themselves are nothing, the question is, if I checked and it’s true, is it correct what I’m told? Or it’s incorrect? And then I accept what they tell me even though it goes against my reason. It’s incorrect according to my reason.
S. What are they telling me?
R. Let’s say, like Kabbalists say, you have to bestow, you have to share, you have to connect, you have to do all kinds of things against our original desire.
S. If for example, I look at the ten and I see that we are not connected, or that some of the friends are missing, do I have to depict something opposite from that? What should I depict to myself?
R. You have to think, how are we connected together? And when friends are speaking about connection, you need to criticize it, you need to see how much you don’t want to hear it, how much you are against it, how much your heart and your brain, they suffer, they hate it, they don’t want to accept these spiritual facts and nevertheless, you make efforts and you incorporate in them and you accept these things above your reason. Meaning above your Malchut and this way you build the degree of Bina. A few such actions, when you make it, you’ll feel that it opens up a window to a new world, a new view on things. Not according to your nature, but according to the upper nature, which is seemingly against your logic and it lacks justification, but if you do it several times you will see that you have a new window open up to a new world. Where we don’t understand how you can exist in it, how you can live in it, what’s in it, but I’ve seen an upside down world, an inverted world, that’s how it’s written. But you have to make those exercises don’t wait for it to come, in these exercises should be such where we fall, because it’s written that a thousand times a righteous person shall fall and then get up. Then you have to try and try and see each time how much you have done, first of all, it’s all written on your behalf. All the mistakes and errors and falls it’s all written down, on your behalf. And we keep advancing, each one according to the root of his soul, we go through a certain number of disappointments, of descents, mistakes seemingly, then we receive a ticket in, because it is certain that he will enter the degree of Bina, whomever went through all the discernments of Malchut, and failed all of them. Failed all of them. So don’t despair, the important thing is the importance of the goal. Which we need to place higher than all of our states. I have no choice. That’s it. What should I do? Again I shall fall and again? Yes, I shall do it, but you’re going to fall, that’s what my ego tells me. I’ll fall then. You can’t make it. Of course I can’t make it, it’s clear, Kabbalists are telling me in advance that I can’t reach anything with my qualities, but I have to go through all of these obstacles in this way. A thousand times a righteous person shall fall and rise and when he rises it’s not with his own strength but with the forces of Bina. On this, it’s written, if the Creator won’t build a house all the work they put in will be in vain. Our efforts won’t help us, our efforts need only build in us the importance of the goal, but not the attainment of the goal itself. Gradually it will settle in you, based on your experience. The important thing is not how much I’m talking about it to you, you will see it from experience, and then you will see these things that are written and you’ve read them several times, but you didn’t, couldn’t, pay attention to them.
5. S. (18:36) So basically an act above reason is a practical action in the ten that I have to do, right?
R. Of course it’s practical, our actions are practical. Practical meaning that I need to try and do them in the change in the connection with the friends towards the Creator.
S. And if I do something and the friends say don’t do it, do I have to continue doing it anyway?
R. What does this have to do with the friend, the friends know you’re doing something? We’re not talking about actions you do with your hands and feet, and your mouth. We’re talking about actions you do in your desire. Where in your desire you want to approach a friend and embrace a friend, support them. You ask for their support perhaps, but it doesn’t have to be accompanied by any words necessarily.
6. S. (20:00) What kind of intellect should a person have, when he goes above this intellect, so that when he goes above it, it is regarded as faith above reason? What intellect should a person have so that when he goes above this intellect, it is regarded as going above reason?
R. It is completely not important what kind of intellect a person has. It could be smart, it could be stupid, it doesn’t matter. He has to be of sane mind, healthy mind, normal, but not that he has to possess some special intellect, on that it says it’s not the wise who learns. The wisdom of Kabbalah does not require any intellect, it requires a desire. And if the Creator ignites in us the desire called the point in the heart, everything else depends on a person.
S. So when do we say that a person goes above reason, what kind of reason should he have so we can say that he goes above it?
R. Above reason is that even though he wants to do something according to his own desire he is doing something without any justification, against his desire because that’s what Kabbalists said. That’s for the time being. Later it acquires higher and higher degrees. These are requirements for above reason.
7. S. (23:20) Objecting to my own reason in relation to connection with the friends, does it depend on my adhesion with him?
R. Yes, the answer is yes.
8. S. (23:58) In our work we define the importance of the goal, how do we define the importance and how do we add to it?
R. We still cannot measure those things, rather each and every moment where I wish to add on top of the disturbances, In the matter of adhesion to the friends and to the Creator, and the importance, and the ten, and with the Creator, this is my work. We do not receive practical forces of bestowal, so we can measure practical forces of reception relative to them, and measure one against the other and see where we are. We still cannot weigh those degrees and evaluate them, but it will come soon.
9. S. (25:12) Faith has to be above reason, why faith alone without reason? Why is it not enough, just simple faith, why do we have to go above reason?
R. What does he mean by faith? Faith is the force of bestowal, the force of Bina. I can bestow, I can do something, if it is either above my reason, within my reason or below reason, but it has to be relative to my nature, to my will to receive. So either I am okay with it, that I am giving that I am bestowing, I resist the fact that I need to give, or I measure how much yes and how much no. Meaning I always measure myself relative to reason because faith is the force of bestowal, why am I obligated to bestow? What does it give me? Where do I get the forces to bestow? Or there’s someone that is more important than me, that I bestow to him, or I’m more important than him, so I won’t bestow to him. Meaning the force of faith, is the force of bestowal, which has to be relative, as you measure it, to the force of reception, like it or not, because we have nothing more than the force of reception, the force of bestowal does not exist we seemingly construct it, as it is written you have made me, because by that we make the form of bestowal, the form of the Creator, the bestower. So I can’t simply give, simply bestow, I have to somehow face my will to receive, either it’s for my will to receive, it’s good for it when I give, like a mother to her baby, or I go against my will to receive, then it’s already faith above reason. Or it’s faith within reason. It’s worthwhile for me to do it. I’m not connected to someone but it’s worthwhile.
10. S. (27:50) I know you said we have to have a measurement of some kind in this faith above reason, in this particular case. But what if you, you know, it’s a friend who gave him some money to help him out of a tight situation and he gave you back the envelope saying “it’s all there”, you said its okay but later when you counted it you saw it wasn’t all there, but you accepted it as if it was. Does that change anything or is it still faith below reason?
R. I don’t know, what was your intention? When you are going to count, why are you counting it from the get-go?
S. Just to verify.
R. Verify what? That he returned your debt?
S. Yes.
R. Meaning, for you the important thing here is to get your money back, yes?
S. No, the important thing is that he stayed in the lessons all the time and did not miss and that’s why he was given the money.
R. This, I don’t understand, your example. I need to know, what am I doing? Let’s read it again.
11. S. (29:30) What if you are missing more than one dollar, is this still above reason?
R. Let’s say you get in an envelope and it’s empty. But it has to be $1,000 there but there isn’t even one dollar or maybe there’s a few dollars or maybe there’s nothing. So here’s the question: what do you want from this verification that you make? If by verifying you wish to adhere to the Creator and to do it through the friend then you take what you received from the friend as if it is $1,000. Because for you, the main thing is to go above your feelings and your intellect in adhesion with the Creator through the friend. Now, as much money that is there less or more accordingly you measure your faith. This example is not good for everything but only in order to demonstrate the situation. Will get back to the text.
Reading Excerpt 23 again. (31:27)
12. R. (32:30) Meaning he doesn’t even compare the two, he doesn’t count it, he doesn’t check.
Reader continues: (32:37) “that is he believes him because reason does not object…”
13. R. (32:59) Meaning it’s faith below reason. He doesn’t have any reason, he didn’t check it, he didn’t count it, and his faith is also on that level below reason. In advance he takes it as such, he believes it’s good but in this way he cannot climb the degrees. He’s got no resistance, nothing on which to build his vessel of Bina.
Reader continues: “number 2: here’s $1,000….”
14. S. (34:06) Because he counted it three times and it’s clear to him according to his vessels, not according to the friends’ vessels or the Creator’s, but according to his vessels now it’s clear to him that this is the amount that he was told and then faith is within reason.
Reader continues: “3 he counts the thousand dollars 3 times…”
R. Or two or $999, 1,000. The principle here is that he counted it.
Reader continues: “but he says to the giver I believe you…”
16. R. (35:14) Meaning when he has reason, he checks, he sees, he understands. Together with that he accepts what the friend tells him or the Creator that tells it, he accepts it above his reason. Then it’s called “faith above reason”.
17. S. (35:49) I’d like to give him a more concrete example, maybe. There’s a friend who when he speaks I don’t believe a word he says. He’s the last one who can talk about bestowal or mutual responsibility. How do I connect to him?
R. You can’t check.
S. But I see that he doesn’t
R. No, you go according to your vessels.
S. I don’t understand. I see that he’s not keeping the mutual responsibility in the group. How do I connect to him?
R. You connect with him above what you think and specifically opposite to what you think because you determine according to what you see and think, and this is according to your reason. And you need to go according to what’s customary in the society that we all bestow to one another we all bestowed to one another. You need to say “they have eyes but they cannot see, ears but they cannot hear”. I accept a group as being entirely in the end of Correction except for me.
S. I’d like to add a question to this: do I have to connect to his corrected form or to imagine, to love him in the corrupted state he’s in?
R. In the state that you see him neither corrupted nor corrected, I don’t know what his state is. I know that, “he who judges, judges according to his own flaws”, so what I see in the world including the Creator, I see my vessels.
S. Which form of his do I have to love?
R. The way he is.
S. But he’s corrupted 100%?
R. In your eyes.
S. But you say to love him as he is?
R. Yes, the way you see him.
S. How can I love something that’s corrupted, that’s broken?
R. Try to love him and you will see that according to your efforts, suddenly you will see him more corrected.
S. Is it correct to imagine that the Creator loves us in whatever situation and I have to be like the Creator in this?
R. I don’t know what it means to be like the Creator?
S. I mean the Creator is with us in every situation, He loves us as we are or something like that, and I also have to come closer to that?
R. You need to try and relate to the friends like the Creator. Meaning love them in any state no matter what because the way you see them, first of all the fact that they even exist and they’re corrupted, in all those forms of corruption you see a projection of you. In them, you don’t see them, you see yourself. Sometimes for a few moments you see them beautiful, good, connected, pleasant, you wish to come close to them. And then again, no. Is it because they changed or you changed? You finally have to make a decision on that.
S. Sometimes there are these conspicuous examples: you’ve been trying to connect with the friend for years but you can.
R. So the Creator’s giving you a special opportunity to advance through this friend, what can you do? Each one of our friends in the ten is a copy of one of our qualities, the sum of our qualities.
18. S. (40:02) Is the annulment connection above or below reason?
R. Annulment is below reason, above reason, within reason, it doesn’t matter its annulment. When I annul myself towards the friends and towards the Creator, why, because this is my group, this is what I received from that moment on I have to annul myself. It is like the law of restriction we’re beyond the restriction and we can continue with all kinds of actions and calculations.
19. S. (40:58) If a friend sees for over a long period of time that another friend is not keeping the Arvut according to what he sees?
R. So I have to speak to the other friends. Perhaps it’s my own spiritual phenomena and perhaps it’s a physical phenomenon that everyone sees that this is how he behaves towards everyone, and then we have to decide: can we deal with this phenomenon or not? Perhaps we have no choice and he is completely cut off from the group completely. Then we can eject, expel him from among us.
S. How can we help a friend that doesn’t want to receive help?
R. Speak to him, speak to him. It’s exactly according to what we are learning now. What it means to overcome, how we can overcome our will to receive. What is the condition for rising to the spiritual world from Malchut to Bina?
S. So if I still did not decide with the ten if the friend is worthy or not, it’s only my own personal feeling over a long period of time. The way by which I see the friend, you said that I need to love him as if he is a copy of me. But even if I was like that, I wouldn’t agree to that because it goes against what the Kabbalist write. What is the connection between my need to love the friend as if he is a copy of myself and the conditions that have to work on me as if I was like him? Because if I were like him, I would be ready to accept it, I would think I needed to change. The friend is not enough and this needs to exist in practice?
R. Write down what you’re saying and will speak at some time. You will see how that, too, changes. There isn’t much to talk about here. We still don’t have points from various states from which we can see ourselves, it’s a problem. But it’s not a problem: “there are none so wise as the experienced”.
20. S. (43:45) What kind of an intention do I need to have when counting the money before I discover that I’m missing anything then I accept it. What is the intention with which I need to count the money? What kind of intention do I need to have when counting the money?
R. The intention depends on who you are: if you want to advance in spirituality then, to begin with, you are counting the money in order to discover what will be a relation to what you are discovering in the envelope. But in truth it doesn’t matter, it is a very limited example. Basically you open the envelope. First of all you have to count, without counting it is not good. So you don’t determine anything. You’re going to reason, you’re going to religion. You shut your eyes, you believe what you’re told and this is everything for you. If you want to determine, to establish with respect to spiritual reality, then you have to count. And for this purpose you count; or maybe you count because you have some worldly relationship with your friend. So you check it, how much he gave you, how much he gave back to you and how much he didn’t. It’s a business, as in business. So check where you are.
21. S. (46:02) It’s still not clear, it sounds like additional difficulty in the work. Cause I say that I believe since I count on the Creator and not on the friend but I’m checking the friend and it says that “you have to count again three times”, and be sure that the amount is incomplete, what is the meaning here? What am I checking here?
R. Where in the example did you see that he talks about the Creator? Where in the example did you see it speaks about the Creator?
S. The example… (Cut off by Rav)
R. In the example we were talking about, you took it in the wrong direction. We’re not talking about the Creator here, we’re talking about a person’s relation to what’s in front of him, how he should accept things that are in front of him above, below, or within his reason, that’s it. What’s it got to do with the Creator? It has to do with your relation to reality and how you build reality.
S. So a different question. Where do I get the trust?
R. You don’t have to believe your friend at all, you need to count. And by counting you determine. Read what is written and do what is written, don’t add to it from yourself.
22. S. (48:08) Why when I count and I see that there’s $1,000, I can’t go above that, above this reason?
R. Because you counted, and you have exactly: reason, the knowledge that it is $1,000. So how will you go above it?
S. What does it mean’ to go above something’?
R. Despite. Even though you counted, you place the view of the other higher than your own view. If you’re dealing with spirituality, with the ten, with the Creator, then you place their view above your own.
S. So I can place their opinion above my own?
R. If it is equal then you have no way to advance.
S. So what are you lacking?
R. What you need is an opportunity to go above reason. You’re not given from above an opportunity to rise.
S. So I have to yearn to have less than $1,000?
R. Not yearn but asked the Creator to help you rise, to help you on your way. How? Through failures, through problems.
S. So I do yearn for these’ good failures’, ‘purposeful failures’?
R. Yearn to be able to go with faith above reason and by this you bring contentment to the Creator, yes. In other words, the more it is against my reason and the more it is with the reason of the Creator or the reason of the group. It’s not simple, it’s not simple. Don’t worry it will take months until it settles in but once it settles in you and you are on top of this, you have mastered this rule then you will understand that this is the whole springboard from this world to the upper world.
23. S. (50:37) What do I check in the ten, in the connection, that’s greater than my feeling, what is there in the degree of Bina?
R. We must always check ourselves with respect to the view of the group: do I agree or not with what I am receiving from the Creator? Do I agree or not, to what I have in life, in the spiritual development? Can I every single moment, on the one hand, annul myself and say in every single moment I am getting a complete full envelope and the reason I’m not satisfied with life, with what I’m receiving from the Creator is because “they have eyes but don’t see”. But I am receiving from the Creator a full envelope. And this is how I advance, every time with joy and faith, faith. Even though, every time I will perhaps see myself as being deficient. One dollar is missing in the envelope then 100, then two then a hundred, then 999 then I open the envelope and it’s empty, it’s empty. How, nothing? “Yes, this is what I got from the Creator?” Of course from the Creator, from where else are you receiving, there’s None Else Besides Him. So what do I do, be happy about it; this is called rising above the restriction and adhering to Him, to His view completely.
S. This is a personal test or a test of the whole ten?
R. It’s a personal examination but afterwards you’ll be able to talk about it and give each other strength in this.
24. S. (53:29) The question is: there are friends who think that there are questions that are not worthy, and others are more patient. When they say that “I bring them out of my ego and I expect fulfillment”. How can I ask questions that will be above reason?
R. These questions are in front of you, how do you relate to the friends and the ten? This is the meaning of above or within or below reason, that’s it. Your attitude to what is happening in the ten.
25. S. (54:36) When a person, or the Creator gives less than one thousand or doesn’t give anything, what is the purpose? What is the reason? What should we learn from that?
R. The purpose is for you to compliment what is missing with the power of faith. That is the purpose.
26. S. (55:14) Are these three states separate states, or is it a process that I have to go through all three each time?
R. You can check yourself above, within or below reason, you can play with it
S. It looks as if in the third state, after I checked, and then I rise above it, it goes back to the first state because I erased my reason. How can I conserve my resistance and rise above it, and not erase it?
R. Wait, are you talking about the state where you counted three times as it says and $1 is missing and then you’re saying, no, its $1,000 and not 999?
S. Yes.
R. So?
S. So immediately I go back to the first state, I believe
R. No, no, you already complimented it with faith above reason. It is not like it is correct, you disagree with what is there, but you accept it as if it is $1,000 but it is clear to you in your own reason that it is 999 and you know its 999 and you can’t fool yourself, but you’re saying I accept it as a thousand. This is called elevating yourself to the level of Bina by $1. We will have to work with it. This is really the spiritual vessel, this is how it’s built, and it’s built on top of the vessel of reason, in above reason. Bina is built in us above Malchut because otherwise the vessel of Bina alone is the Creator, we don’t know what it is, we build Him by resembling the Creator, like him, being Dome’, Adam, similar to the Creator.
27. S. (58:03) When the friend chooses the third form he counted three times, he saw that a dollar was missing, the first time it happens seemingly no problem to go above reason, and the second time it happens we understand that the first time you just made a concession, you gave up on that dollar and you kept going. When you go above reason there’s an order of actions a person has to do before, what are they? To justify? To be grateful?
R. The greatness of the Creator, you have to determine that the main purpose of your work is to achieve the greatness of the Creator, and the greatness of the Creator compliments everything you don’t see in your reason, and then basically from $1 that’s missing, and even when 999 or $1,000 are missing, how do you compliment it? With the greatness of the creator.
28. S. (59:12) Faith above reason does it erase your reason? Or I have to build above it?
R. A beautiful, beautiful question. One who goes with faith above reason goes with more faith and then his reason grows, he goes with more faith and then his reason grows even more. This is why Kabbalist are growing smarter, wiser and if they don’t attain faith above reason they remain at a certain level and don’t Advance. Meaning the more they advance in faith above reason, their reason grows higher and they will have to go above it.
29. S. (01:00:00) In the article it writes, even though the reason and the intellect say, there’s less here, he says that he believes. So the question is, if I have a problem with my friends should I develop a different belief instead of solving it by talking?
R. Try not with a conversation or any other way but with your relation. Try to solve the problem in your relation. Meaning you accept what you have with him, above your reason. That’s it. Try this first.
30. S. (01:00:55) Is the full envelope the state of Arvut (mutual guarantee)?
R. The full envelope, well, I don’t want to get mixed up between mutual responsibility and faith here. It’s not good, it’s not good for us to scrutinize this yet. It will confuse you in the terms, they will interfere with one another. It’s an appropriate question but ask it in about a month, write it down and ask it
S. We count because we want to reveal his quality between us?
R. We count in order to Rise to the level of the Creator. This is why we count. Because by this we will know how much we can rise right now to the level of faith the level of Bina, from Malchut to Bina we need to rise.
31. S. (01:02:25) If in the ten we discussed the excerpts yesterday, and we came to a certain conclusion, a certain understanding between us, but today RAV is talking about it, about what we talked about yesterday and it’s as if we have an envelope with more than $1,000 how to work with that?
R. Don’t worry, it will get spoiled. The Creator did this yesterday and today he does that, with me with you, it’s in order for us to learn and approach Him. That’s not a problem, just accept it and keep going, ok?
32. S. (01:03:25) In the third example, when it’s talking about faith above reason, is this an action that we always perform forcefully in overcoming?
R. That’s what faith above reason demands, that there’s reason, I have to go above it. I have to decide for it this state, and accept it, not according to what I want and feel.
S. So don’t wait for a reaction, a response?
R. You’re waiting for it to be within reason? Know your whole example, you don’t want to use it in order to ascend in spirituality. Clear right?
33. S. (01:04:28) There are friends who are certainly bringing only $1 in the envelope but there are those who bring me 2000, so what do I do?
R. Mr. I don’t like wise guys, if you have an example than ask about that, that’s it, don’t do any kind of lotteries for us here or anything like that.
S. No, a simple example.
R. The simple example is what I don’t want to hear.
S. I have to work only with those who you’re certain that you have resistance towards them?
R. Not resistance, maybe, I received what I wanted, or what I thought, but not more. There’s no such thing. Everything is according to the desire, either it’s empty, it may be empty, or full, or half-full, partly full, it can’t be otherwise. You will never receive 2000 because you have no
vessels for it.
S. It’s only in my corrupt vision, it can be, right?
R. Yes, of course, where else?
34. S. (01:05:42) Does everyone get opportunities to rise above reason?
R. No, only those who have a genuine, real disposition to reveal the Creator. If they have a real disposition to reveal the Creator, they come to it, and this is where they test themselves, this is where they are tested. Not everyone gets there and not everyone remains. They go through this lesson, this test, only those who pass this test are those who say we have to have it. Otherwise they can’t enter spirituality and if I don’t enter spirituality I remain a beast and there’s nothing for me to do except wait until my life is over. That’s it. If a person agrees to this, that’s his business.
S. How to identify those opportunities, we have this routine, throughout the day?
R. Hang on to the friends, hang on to one another. No one can be certain that he’ll be able to sail through the stormy sea. Here there is only the mutual responsibility, only the mutual responsibility.
35. S. (01:07:20) So what do we need to count in the ten, what are those dollars?
R. You need to count, well, envelopes, that’s later, we haven’t come to it. You need to count to what extent, every moment you come to a state where you are seemingly satisfied as if you received from the Creator a full envelope, that’s it. That you are happy. You are high-spirited. Filled with mutual responsibility and you fill the whole of society with it. This is how you need to be every single moment.
36. S. (01:08:15) We said that each friend is a reflection of my qualities and if I’m corrected then I see the friend corrected as well. But if another friend comes to me or a few friends come to me and they point out his flaws, how to relate to that?
R. You have to explain to them how we need to relate to the friends. Only if he is really spoiling the ten, corrupting the ten in such a way that we have to get rid of him, but these are very rare situations. In other cases we have to only give him examples of good relationships among us and buy this, help him become corrected and equalized with us.
37. S. (01:09:25) The envelope is empty, I checked it and I need to accept it according to my belief that it’s full. The Creator filled it, I believe that it’s full. I also should be happy, I should be responsible, so what to do now how can I come to these forces, this huge contradiction there? How do I come and approach that I can have this huge force, to be able to have this force to be able to be in this happiness and accept everything?
R. In such cases I recommend that you switch on the last ten’s meeting. Let’s say you connect twice a day, maybe before the lesson, maybe after the lesson, just play the recording and listen to it. Do something that will take you that will envelop you, and annul before them.
S. We do that, we do that constantly. So how do I get there? We’re having three meetings, four meetings a day, we constantly work on connection and praying and asking faith above reason, and we do this every time again and again. We read articles of Rabash, we connect through the center of a ten, we do everything.
R. I understand everything but what I don’t understand is why don’t you remember it when you feel bad?
S. Feeling bad in this case is essential?
R. Yes.
S. You need this essential contradiction to feel so bad, that you go on your knees?
R. Then you will feel it, yes. Then you’ll have a vessel and you’ll already feel what is in the connection. Otherwise it’s just talk we connect. Now you’ll be able to extract strength and power from the connection.
S. You need the power of this deficiency to fill the vessel
R. Yes.
38. S. (01:12:24) How do I rise when this resistance I’m feeling toward my friend with his example we just read, everything in me wants to be right but I want something outside of me to show me that I cannot see within my reason towards my friend?
R. You will have to determine clearly how you relate to a friend, how much you repel him, you hate him, you’re opposite of him, you’re far away from him. At the same time you want to come closer to him, to connect, to embrace. Those two things detachment and connection you will have to discover in your feelings, in your emotional powers, and in this way advance. And, from this the spiritual vessel is built.
S. So, this feeling that we have this connection that we have with the ten this resistance is this the material we need in order to have this prayer to rise above it, because we need something to grasp onto that’s why we have this ten that’s why we have this repulsion this connection with one another?
R. Yes, yes, this is the springboard it’s like a step you have to step on in order to continue.
39. S. (01:14:22) Usually I’m afraid to check on the friends because I know that nothing good will come out of this.
R. Why are you afraid? If it works, it may work badly, but you will be able to rise above it. I’m actually happy, this is called “being happy with the wicked who are revealed” so I can rise above them. Because by looking at them, you cancel them, you revoke them and rise above them, otherwise you won’t be able to rise in spiritual degrees.
40. S. (01:15:08) If a person sees that he is lacking $999 should I still say that there is 1,000?
R. Of course. Not only $999, even if the envelope is empty, he won’t go up to his friend to tell him maybe he forgot to put the money inside, or maybe he made a mistake with my envelope. He is happy, spiritually speaking, he is happy about the spiritual opportunity he has with the Creator; to tell Him that he is walking in complete darkness because he has nothing there maybe, in order to go closer to connection, to adhesion with the Creator.
41. S. (01:15:58) I see that a friend didn’t come to 3 meetings, would it be faith above reason to think that he is giving a 100% of himself to the ten anyway?
R. On the one hand yes, on the other hand still on the corporeal level we have to take care of him.
42. S. (01:16:22) What is the need for faith above reason? Why is the system built in such a way that we have to receive reason and then go above it? Is there a law or a rule that makes us behave that way?
R. There are two forces in nature: the force of reception and the force of the bestowal. According to the force of reception, we are born, we develop, we exist, that is this world; all the forces that are here inside us and around us. There is another world called the “upper world” where there is a force of a bestowal, a force of connection, a force of love; and that world is where we are supposed to come to, that is the world we are supposed to reach. That is why there are two worlds, one world is called Malchut and the second is called Bina, and now we are learning how we rise emotionally, intellectually, purposefully from Malchut to Bina. How we can awaken forces from above that will bestow upon us, and will give us the force to be in the quality of bestowal instead of the quality of reception, that is called “I have seen the world and it is the opposite”. It means that we will discover something that is truly opposite, opposite mind, opposite emotion, everything is the opposite, truly; and that is how we will advance.
43. S. (01:18:33) Do we need to believe that we are counting wrong after we counted or we don’t know how to count?
R. I should count even three times and once I am certain that I have counted correctly, I should accept these things as a fact, as reason and to be above reason.
44. S. (01:19:11) When we count, does that mean as much as the will to receive wants to distance us from getting closer to the Creator?
R. No, you just have to be certain what am I receiving within my vessels, within my feeling, within my mind and my emotion? Because a judge has only what his eyes can see, that is it. Then I already perform an action of ascent, above reason, above what I have discovered in my account; my account is in the degree of Malchut and I raise myself to the degree of Bina.
45. S. (01:20:20) When a person counts and sees that he is lacking money, he still believes that there is a $1000. Why does he say that he believes, what does it come to show us into work?
R. That “they have eyes but see not”. I am told that this is $1, suppose, and I want to accept it as a $1000, so I go according to $1 or $1,000? In corporeality I should go by $1, but in spirituality I want to be in adhesion with the Creator so I walk as if I received a thousand. So, how could it be that I work this way? That is how I work in spirituality. We will see in the future how stronger it is, and more correct, more real it is, than our corporeal calculation.
46. S. (01:21:06) If my friends are corrected and I’m not, why do I have to count the money in the envelope? Unless the corrected friends can cheat me, why should I count?
R. Because everything is with respect to me. Everything. This whole game is for me. When I receive from the Creator, I am certainly receiving from the Creator, it doesn’t matter if it is through the friends or what; but I’m getting it from the Creator, so by receiving from the Creator I make an examination; I want to do this examination, I don’t want to walk with my eyes shut in my life; I want to know where I am in my reason, to determine my spiritual degree above that, and every time to rise more and more.
47. S. (01:22:06) In what conditions can a person go in faith above reason?
R. By wanting to rise to spirituality, in any case. That is what is before me and that is what I have to learn: how to rise, how to live in the spiritual degree, how to think, how to feel; that is what I have to do now.
48. S. (01:22:36) Does the greatness of the Creator allow us to go above reason?
R. Does the greatness of the creator..? Only through the greatness of the Creator can we rise above reason, what else? It’s not in this example. In this example the friend is greater than I am and I believe that what is there, that is he who organized for me. In our life, everything is organized from the Creator so as much as I advance, I have to raise the Creator much higher than I am; that is how it helps me to be connected to the degree of Bina, in a more and more higher way.
49. S. (01:23:35) Is my right attitude towards the shattering and the uncorrected state the corrected state?
R. Everything is organized by the states we have to go through. There is nothing here that is, by chance, everything is planned in the deepest manner.
50. R. (01:24:55) I also understand you because the preface is becoming more difficult. It is a very difficult part as it is before the shattering, and it’s a kind of part of the preface that is not simple. Everyone takes it as difficult, so let’s go through that at a slower pace, differently. So, let’s go to the Peace article.