YESOD: TIKKUN CHATZOT תקון חצות – LESSON WITH RAV MICHAEL LAITMAN
Baal HaSulam. The Freedom
Morning Lesson June 13, 2022 Transcription
Transcription is made from simultaneous translation which leaves a possibility for differences in the audio
Baal HaSulam. The Freedom (The First Reason: The Source, the First Matter)
1.R. (00:15) I’m happy we’re learning this article, it’s a very fundamental article, it’s not easy, scientific it’s none the less worthwhile going over. Of course all the articles of Baal HaSulam we need to go over because even though we don’t understand them they remain in us they are processed in our vessels, in our mind and heart, our soul is corrected. We need to work so please the four factors.
Reader: (01:01) “Bear in mind…”
2. R. (01:25) Meaning, so there’s nothing new under the sun there is something that precedes everything and so also everything that exists on its way it also gives birth to the next day.
Reader: (01:40) “Therefore we must understand…”
3. R. (02:29) Meaning we see that he explains to us from the inside to the out. Wo first of all on the inside the foundation of everything that is present in reality is the first matter, the source, and it has its own matter in which it can develop, called the cause and effect related to the sources own attributes, that’s B and C its internal conducts of cause and effect that they themselves change by contact with foreign forces, as a result with the contact and so the fourth one is changes as a result of this contact. So this is our development from these four factors and so the result is also the first four phases in the world of Ein Sof also, we’ll talk about that later, the main thing will go according to this.
4. S. (03:42) These four foundations, are these Kabbalistic definitions, are these sort of spiritual objects that Baal HaSulam is describing or is it a general approach?
R. He sees it from the side of Kabbalah. He’s not giving you some summary that he read that he came to after reading all kinds of scientific books, if he has some foundation here from scientific books I don’t know. I don’t want to get into that and debate that at least in the last 50 years I wasn’t connected to science already you could say so I don’t know what’s happening in modern science regarding this development and so I cannot say. But it’s clear to me that he didn’t look or barely looked at books of foreign external wisdoms, chemistry, biology, zoology and so on rather he wrote this out of his understanding and sensation, his attainment of the internality of nature.
S. When he speaks about an element, a foundation, is this light that comes because it’s a bit abstract the way it reads, the source?
R. What do you mean by foundation? You talking about A, the source?
S. Yes item A, the source, so I’m asking here he speaks about Kabbalistic terms concepts or?
R. It’s the state from which all other states are born so this first state is called the source, the foundation.
S. This is clear from the text but what does he mean? Is this the first state?
R. No no no. Let’s learn how he is saying here, don’t take us in any other directions. What is he saying here? That you have in development four stages of development in everything: the source, the cause and effect related to the source that are in the source, the cause and effect related to the externals and how they change as a result. So let’s learn how these four stages need to be in each and every created being that by this each created being develops so we’ll see where we are in this and what’s occurring by this where he wants to draw us to is that we will ultimately know what is up to us to do in order to reach the perfect state, the complete state. That’s all. Everything else, I don’t care.
Reading Item A (07:36)
5. S. (09:40) How can we define this emergence that he is referring to here?
R. That same state comes and adds and adds and adds to its qualities but usually we speak about this that he wasn’t made opposed to the previous state but just rather adding scrutinies to the previous state. Usually that is how it is called, yes.
S. But he says about the source that the final state already exists in the source and in the process of development only external forms are added to it but nothing really changes.
R. Yes.
S. What is this primary matter? What is it made of?
R. The desire of the Creator that exists in the created being. The part of the Creator from above.
S. And the forms?
R. The forms are what are added upon themselves from realization.
S. Actualization? Implementing?
R. Yes, realization, actualization of the desire of the Creator.
S. So what is the difference between the first form of the matter and the last form?
R. That the Creator wants that the created being will receive all sorts of influences from Him, from the first form that the Creator created in Him, that is called I created the evil inclination and up until the final form where the created being received all the forms from the Creator upon the first form.
S. So the emergence that he speaks about is the emergence of the Creator in the created being? The revelation of the Creator in the created beings fully?
R. Yes, well you can’t call it revelation but yeah let’s say so. It’s an addition from the Creator to the created being but this addition comes in all different forms, even opposite, a big will to receive.
6. S. (12:14) We’re not sure that we understood about the source: is the source the Creator?
R. Part of the Creator from above called existence from absence that it is a drop of seed that comes from the Creator and it is in the created being. We will orient to learn on this onwards. The entire article will actually be about this because everything stands upon this first drop.
7. S. (12:53) How can we work with this article? Seemingly Baal HaSulam here gives us facts that kind of block you.
R. That is how your private period is like this, it’s okay, it’s okay. You will advance a bit, be patient without too much excitement and you’ll see just how much now you are absorbing the material. In a few more days you will feel that it is clarified.
S. Because really like you said in the beginning it is a scientific article, so how should we work with it right now in the lesson?
R. No, it doesn’t matter. We continue to read and talk about it and each one soaks up in the extent that he soaks it up in his feelings, in his mind or this and that and both. It is a spiritual article with lots of details and we’ll see how we will advance towards it. Do not worry, in sum total what do we want? We want to somehow pass through us all of the materials of Baal HaSulam, that it will enter us, be received in us in something and then it will gradually work. The main thing is the result of the reception of the material, what is happening there?
I don’t know, it’s like I’m eating something there and I don’t know exactly what is happening with all of the digestion inside of me, I don’t know but I live from it, I live. So what do I care what is happening here, all the enzymes and different things in my stomach breaking up the food. The main thing is that I live and so the same thing is here. Lets fill ourselves with his articles and from this we will understand more, we will get closer, we will feel more what he wants to talk about because in the meantime right now I feel myself like a baby that is opening its mouth and don’t understand what mom and dad are even saying. They are saying something but it doesn’t understand to such an extent that they are saying something important and he is playing with something else and it is because he does not yet perceive that they are turning to him. That is how we are. So we will make the effort to connect between us with a material and then surely it will be easier for us to perceive it to receive it and then we will feel it, we will understand it, it is all before us.
S. Regarding the article, what defines the quality of the source, any source is different so what defines the qualities, the attributes of it?
R. You see that he doesn’t talk about it. I too don’t want to talk about it. Let us not jump, we will go at his pace, at his direction and that is it. We do not know what the source is, we know what develops from the source. Yes? That is it. It develops existence from absence and the source for me in the meantime is absence, we do not know. There is a spiritual force there that is the foundation for the spiritual development from it.
S. You said two things that seem to contradict each other so it is not clear. The source, is it the Godly part from above or is it the will to receive? What exactly is it?
R. A part of the Creator from above and the will to receive.
S. Is that the same?
R. The Creator said I created the evil inclination afterwards we will speak, we will divide it into light and vessel, later. I’m also not afraid that people might get confused. I see this confusion as a great thing and it is desirable to go through it and to learn from it.
8. S. (17:54) What is the difference between the thought of creation and the source?
R. We are not learning that now so please do not jump ahead. We are now learning that yet. I’m only answering questions that are here before us in the text.
Reading the 2nd Reason B (18:26): “This is the conduct…”
9. R. (20:40) Meaning there is in each and everyone a source, a foundation, a beginning to the next form that comes out from it and the next form needs to be that same form that was like before, yes from like the wheat, something like that, now let’s say 10, 20 and not just one even. So meaning that there is some change here from what was before, it is the same type but there is some multiplicity here.
10. S. (21:28) I nevertheless want to try to attach this to myself practically. What is the source inside of me and what is the development of the source? I could be fat, thin, I can have ten children? What here pertains to the source and what pertains to the development of the source?
R. This belongs to development both in corporeality and spirituality. We now want to learn and reach spiritual development on our part that will come from it, will result from it, so let us continue. These are correct questions but we still don’t have a foundation to answer them with.
Reading the 3rd reason C (22:20): “This is the conduct…”
12. R. (24:14) Thus it’s called the internal factor, internal cause.
Reading: (24:18) “Hence we define them…”
13. R. (24:40) This is the third reason. Let’s keep reading. Fourth reason, last one.
Reading Reason Four D (24:50): “The fourth reason…”
14. R. (25:20) Meaning that they do not need to be in development of that same foundation. Yes let us say that same wheat but they joined by chance. That there is here, some process, additional process that is more external, more external causes factors that can appear or not.
Reader Continues: (25:46) “And you find that…”
15. R. (26:52) Everything is clear? All right, I’d rather simple things for the meantime let us continue then.
16. S. What do you mean simple? If you can go deeper.
R. These four reasons we see, the first reason, the second reason are in the wheat, the third reason was tied to it and the fourth reason is more external. There is nothing here that, meaning these four factors can have influence upon us in our advancement towards the purpose of life and we will talk about it later. He explains how it is by us, not on the wheat but rather human beings.
Reading Hereditary Possessions (27:50): “The cause of…”
17. S. (28:32) Meaning in each of us for sure there’s something from his parents, from their parents, grandparents excetera excetera and who knows how far back.
Reading Continues: (28:45) “But the difference is …”
18. R. (29:13) Meaning that there is something here that I receive from my parents but since I receive it in an abstract form then their qualities in me can invert into many different other forms and let us see how that happens.
Reader Continues: (29:35) “For the same ideas…”
19. S. (31:25) I’m trying to understand the difference between the source and the continuing cause-and-effect from itself, meaning the source is the first matter or the first force?
R. Source.
S. So it works within that essence and makes some interchanges. What is the second cause?
R. No, this force is the cause, the source is the cause.
S. But it works on something,what does it work on?
R. It develops. It has nothing to go into action with, it develops since it develops out of its inner force, it starts receiving its connection to the environment. In this way it starts multiplying and developing but it is according to the plan that exists in its program.
S. So the first and second reasons is a force that develops from within itself even if he wouldn’t touch it? It would go through an inner process?
R. If it has the conditions for it it will develop like a grain of seed, it’ll develop. It needs external forces but to develop itself it already has what it needs from within.
S. For the wheat to grow that inner force is already there?
R. Yes, already exert everything already exists inside there.
S. Three and four can change with the environment ?
R. Yes, that is good.
S. What does it mean that the spiritual possessions come with inheritance?
R. I don’t know, this is called the ancestral worth of a myriad of forefathers but you need to set up the conditions for it. You need to create the necessary conditions for it. He does not write a lot about it. We will talk about this later.
S. But what inheritance and spiritual tendencies, it is not genetic right? We say that spirituality does not go with inheritance and has nothing to do with the body so what does it?
R. No, it’s not incorporeality, it is only in spirituality. Meaning that if you are connected to someone then you receive from him like we learn in life. The spiritual force pases person to person in a way that it merely depends only on the desire.
20. S. (35:00) What is the None Else Besides Him expressed in every state if everything comes from the source, and what is the freedom of choice?
R. None Else Besides Him stands behind that and sustains it for it to exist.
21. S (35:23) Many times we have learned that our ancestors were our incarnations in the past and here he is speaking about something else.
R. I don’t know what to tell you. You see that is how you define it and he thinks about it differently.
22. S. (35:53) He says that everything that our ancestors dealt with came to us in inheritance. Meaning even if you learn something corporal or spiritual it also goes from one generation to the next?
R. Yes, even that we learn about it corporeally it passes from generation to generation.
S. What can we learn about what was just read?
R. Anything that changes in a person from generation to generation it also passes on to his offspring. Everything passes.
S. But we say that spirituality can’t go with inheritance.
R. It’s not spirituality in a way that if you’re to something your grandpa and it doesn’t pass on to you.
S. We have to work independently; it doesn’t come in inheritance.
R. True and we see it in you.
23. S. (36:53) Is this form of changing a quality that comes from the source? Should I loveit? Should I embrace it because it all comes from the Creator?
R. Yes, it already exists in the source. In the source we have a program that propels all of these forms for them to develop, like a computer program that forces development.
Continues Reading: (37:48) “But because …”
R. (39:41) Meaning we will still have to scrutinize what does development of that initial
source. First reason that everything comes from depends on. All in all, what are we studying this for? How can we correctly direct ourselves in the right direction in the best possible way for our development so that we won’t get confused on the way and that we will follow the correct and shortest path. That’s what we need.
Reader continues: (41:28) “The Influence of the Environment: The second reason is..”
24. S. (45:44) Everything in the father’s heart is concealed and revealed in the son. How does the son discover this?
R. Doesn’t matter how. The son, meaning that same wheat which will reveal such things that don’t exist in its source in a revealed way and in it is already revealed.
25. S. (46:12) About the corporeal development we know it from science but about the spiritual development who if we knew how to explain who that person or that body or that part that is developing all these years and now he goes through to the new physical bodies that acquire it and the connection between all these things.
R. We’re talking about desire. How does our desire develop so much so that in it we can feel because desire is everything but that it received such a form that in it will reveal the Creator.
S. Desire is okay but this desire is affected throughout his chronological years from all kinds of other physical bodies where is that desire and how does this system between that desire that is eternal to the physical bodies that affect it and are affected by it in some way. In simple words we never try to explain this thing called incarnations.
R. No, this is something that we still can’t talk about or can’t talk about yet. I see that it’s still too early. We don’t feel the souls of all them or their incarnations that we will rise above the soul to it’s incarnation to the previous and future states and causes for these changes. We still can’t talk about this.
S. Because that is actually the key that with it you can somehow explain the wisdom of Kabbalah and the rationality behind it to any person.
R. In the meantime I can’t explain because there’s no one that can understand because people are still not connected to their incarnation so what can I do. But it’s good for the person to at least know that by being connected to the environment we see that we’re learning about the influence of the environment, that a person will know how he can affect his incarnations that by connecting to the environment he will hasten his development and will discover his future incarnations more quickly, more easily too.