TUESDAY PRAYER: TIFERET-TIKKUN CHATZOT תקון חצות – LESSON WITH RAV MICHAEL LAITMAN
READING: BETWEEN AFTER MIDNIGHT AND DAWN TUESDAY
Zohar for All. Introduction of The Book of Zohar. On the Night of the Bride, item 125
Morning Lesson January 22, 2023 Transcription
Transcription is made from simultaneous translation which leaves a possibility for differences in the audio
Part 1:
Zohar for All. “Introduction of The Book of Zohar”. On the Night of the Bride. #125
Reading Item 125. (00:33) “Rabbi Shimon was sitting and studying the Torah..”
1. S. (07:53) How to build the bride between us?
R. How do you build the bride? The bride is broken and shattered in all of us, it’s called Shechina in the dust and by connecting we raise her from the dust meaning we reattach all of her parts. In each one of us there’s a part of the bride, of that Malchut and through the connection between us by asking the Creator, eventually it all depends on our request. He connects these parts of the Malchut and He places her in a state of wholeness each time more and more until we reach the complete correction. Then we come to the holiday, the festive day of Shavuot, the day where the bride, where the Malchut that was shattered in the sin of the Tree of Knowledge rises again with all of her corrections. And the upper light fills her meaning she connects with the Creator and then the bride and groom are together in one Zivug, one coupling.
S. In order to come to connection with the Creator, with the groom do we need to do something special for it or just work on strengthening the bride?
R. If we want to connect between us this means that we are building the bride, we are making the bride, we connect her, we correct her. That’s exactly our work, that’s why we are called the children of the bride, her parts.
Continuing reading item 125. (10:48) “It is easier for me to continue..”
2. R. (12:12) We have to reach a state where all those different parts of the bride, the Malchut will reconnect again and she will be whole, and she includes us in this connection. This will be the end of the correction of the Malchut, of the bride, and the Shechina. Why Shechina, why divinity? Because in it the upper light can dwell, the Creator.
3. S. (12:47) When we say connection between us is it a connection that’s created after a dispute or a sense of separation?
R. Certainly after all the conflicts, arguments and separation they get inverted, they become connection and coupling.
S. It’s such a state that as a child I have to ask for my mother to get married to the Creator? Is that the right way to say it?
R. It’s not our mother rather we are her parts, we include her. That’s why we’re called the members of the bridal hall or the children of the bride, where we all connect, we raise divinity. That’s how we should see it.
S. What does it mean to make corrections at night?
R. Night is a state that we understand, it’s a state where the bride is empty. She can’t organize the upper light to receive the groom, depending on the language you wish to use to describe this state, and that state is called night.
S. We see that night is what he calls exile?
R. The exile is when we’re not in connection between us and that’s why we cannot raise the bride, she cannot receive the upper light and the revelation of the groom in her.
S. And how do the friends have the power to make corrections when the night increases?
R. That’s our entire work at night. All the days of the exile are called night until we reach a state where through our requests, our prayer to the Creator, we obligate Him, we ask Him to raise the bride or divinity. Then she will be worthy of receiving the upper light, the groom in her.
S. We know that the Zohar only writes about spiritual states and he writes here about the exile. It means that there is such a state in spirituality, after a person already entered spirituality he has a state of exile, of night?
R. Specifically when he enters or he approaches spirituality he can feel just how much he is not in spirituality. This state is called night or exile.
S. Where are we now then?
R. According to how each one discovers it and feels in it. I can’t say on myself, that I truly feel the exile, I’m entirely in darkness and I lack adhesion with the Creator. In such states where I am falling apart because of lack of light that fills me, that I must be an integral part of Divinity, of the Shechina, we lack this feeling. Meaning it’s there to some extent but it’s not that state we can say that we will obligate the exile to end.
4. S. (17:22) The text says what is the meaning that they make the Torah, what does that mean?
R. Through all the acts of connection that we make between us. It seems to us as if we are doing these corporeal actions, that we are coming closer to one another; we come to certain actions, certain deeds, connections, meals, all kinds of different things. Soon we wish to take off for the desert, to the Arava. Through all these deeds, these attempts to connect, by these actions we begin to come closer internally between us until we reach a state where thanks to the upper light that works on us, the connection reaches at least the first degree and we reach the first degree of wholeness. And Malchut with all her parts connects as one man in one heart, into one structure. And we go, we cleave to one another, all the friends until more or less, we begin to feel that our connection works to such an extent between us, it exists to such an extent that the upper light, the Creator is revealed in it. We take steps to come closer between us and between us the Creator is revealed. We become as one man in one heart and the upper light is revealed in all of its intensity in us. This is called the Zivug, the coupling of Shechina, divinity which is us, all of us, the created beings with the upper light of the Creator.
5. S. (20:28) What is to be purified from good and evil?
R. When we discover through our inclination for connection just how much we are not in connection, this is the good and evil that we discover. And only after we discover all the states of darkness and opposite them all the states of light, then we come to a state where we are truly worthy of being a vessel that feels a deficiency for connection, a deficiency for the light, for the filling which is the Creator that will be revealed in us. That’s how we reach correction.
6. S. (21:50) We are preparing ourselves in the entire previous day and previous night, that’s what we understood from our experience that we have to do. Can we say that we are building the Chuppah by holding together onto Torah and Mitzvot in the previous day?
R. Wanting to connect all of our states and by that to establish the canopy, the Chuppah. Chuppah is a canopy, it covers us, encloses us, that we wish to be under the force of the Creator who is one and we will also be as one. And this is the meaning of preparing ourselves as the members of the bridal chamber, of the canopy. That’s how we obligate the Creator to be revealed in us until we reveal Him in practice and that’s what we need to see as the goal of our studies, a result of our connection. Then we are all called the members of the bridal chamber, we are all parts of the Malchut that connect between us and the upper light will appear in us, in Malchut.
7. S. (23:37) When we gather we come together and create this field for the Creator to be revealed. What opportunity are we actually getting?
R. When we connect between us we put together the pieces like in a puzzle, the piece that exists in each and every one of us. And by that we construct the Shechina, the divinity, meaning a place of Malchut, a place where the upper light is revealed, the Creator. And that is why we are called the sons of the bride, the children of the bride and our connection is called the bridal chamber. That’s what we need to do.
S. When we acquire all these qualities we will then have to what, reconnect the world?
R. No, we need only to connect the desires in us, to have them connect and each one completes and compliments the other until such a state where we collect the parts of the Malchut together. Malchut is called a bride and until we raise the bride, by that we finish our correction. This is all of our work that we need to do.
8. S. (25:35) It’s explained here that first we have to engage in Torah then the writings, what is this order?
R. We don’t know this yet but the moment that we wish to come closer between us then it happens in us in such a way that the light appears from above and shows us where else we need to connect, what else we need to do. This was all called learning, engaging in the Torah. We gather, we assemble correctly according to our qualities and the states of our connection.
9. S. (26:26) The Shechina is our connection, the connection itself or it’s an existing state that our connection awakens?
R. Our connection, the one that we need to raise from the shattering, from the exile as we call it, this connection is called divinity, Shechina because this is where the Creator is destined to dwell.
S. So it’s not that we awaken something that’s dormant, we really assemble it?
R. Yes.
S. The next stage, what do we do then with that?
R. First come to this, first we come to this. We’re not speaking about something that’s happening after the end of correction.
10. S. (27:28) He writes here that BON will return to SAG and MA will be AB. So this means that Adam Kadmon was cut in half and becomes half a world?
R. Perhaps. He’s not writing about it but Malchut has to rise to Bina and ZA has to rise up to Hochma, to AB, that’s it. And the Zivug between Hochma and Bina gives us the level of intensity of Keter, that’s how it’s revealed.
11. S. (28:13) I wanted to ask what is this action when the friends are holding the Torah?
R. There’s a concept and also a corporeal structure called Chuppah, canopy. It protects and covers the bride and groom that stand under the canopy. The Chuppah is above them and it symbolizes for us that both of them enter into connection between them, unity. So the Chuppah, the canopy is a place, is a covering from above that helps the bride and groom to connect and continue the correction together.
S. I was asking about the friends, why specifically the friends are those who made the connection?
R. They are called the members of the canopy because they are the ones who assemble it, they themselves are parts of the canopy.
S. What is the action of the friends?
R. Yes, all the created beings have to be in the desire, they have to reach a state where they want to connect and by that they bring the upper light to shine on them and that’s how they become members of the canopy.
S. He writes here that all the friends should be bonded with the holy Shechina.
R. They need to collect themselves, assemble themselves to such an extent that the Creator will be revealed in them. The place for the revelation of the Creator in the created beings is called Shechina and the Creator is called Shochen, the one who dwells in it. We have to come to it.
S. So what, why only specifically the friends make the connection?
R. Because they connect and they build her from the parts, the pieces like a stone, a brick of the building of the canopy.
S. He continues here and says that these actions are done specifically in the night of the exile.
R. It’s because during the feeling of the deficiency they have to connect in order to give the Creator a place to be revealed, in order to bestow contentment to the upper light, to build a vessel. That’s what they do.
S. So this connection, they only work on it in the exile?
R. During the exile, according to the feeling of exile, above that feeling they can rise and connect. They can ask in their prayers and then the upper light will influence them from afar; meaning that the Chuppah, the canopy, comes to them and covers them, encloses them into one vessel and then the coupling happens.
S. But the groom still doesn’t appear in the bride, so why doesn’t the groom do the actions instead of the friends?
R. Because they lack the yearning between them, they have to be the ones who connect the bride and groom together, these are the many members of the bridal chamber.
S. So the connection of the friends is to connect between the groom and the bride?
R. Each and every friend feels themselves relative to the other friends as not wanting to connect and in order to skip over this gap or this distance they yearn to build the canopy, the connections between them. That’s why they are called members of the bridal chamber, they build the bridal chamber.
12. S. (33:04) I would also like to continue this scrutiny, meaning we can assume that the bride, Malchut, already exists in the ten. Can we assume that, we just need to regroup it?
R. The bride is discovered as, if you reach the first degree of connection in the group you will feel the revelation of the Creator.
S. But there are 125 degrees of revelation, so hypothetically in our ten let’s say we achieve some connection and we discover this bride in a broken state, but there’s another 125 degrees.
R. These are called the concealments of the bride that rises from this world to the world of correction, through all five worlds.
S. So it turns out that this ten has to go through all 125 degrees, and in this process let’s say something happened in the ten.
R. This is not for us to worry about, we need to worry about the maximum connection that’s it. Don’t become an engineer or a scientist or a philosopher. We want to simply as much as we can more and more connect in the hearts. Aim the desire called the heart towards connection with everyone together so it will become one structure.
13. S. (35:46) Why does the unification with the bride happen at night when there’s a lack of light, why doesn’t it happen in the day when there is light, there is connection?
R. All the days of the exile are called night. Until we reach the first coupling between the bride and groom it’s all called night. Also night is called a state in which we already yearn for connection between us and for connection with the groom for the revelation of the Creator and before that we’re not even getting into a period called night.
S. So it happens in the first hours of the dawn when the coupling begins, that’s where it happens?
R. It has nothing to do with the dawn of the physical corporeal sun, it has to do with the connection between people without any relationship to day and night taking place here on Earth.
14. S. (37:35) How do we pray for connections between the friends? Is that raising divinity from the dust?
R. Of course of course, this is in fact the only action we should take.
15. S. (38:15) There’s such a terminology here that there’s a groom, the husband, the friends.
R. It doesn’t matter all those names for the groom, the bride, the guests, and all those who participate in this event called in total the connection between the groom and bride, all of it belongs to the connection between the bride and groom and we’ll learn about it. There are many discernments in it that will become clear to us, for the time being let’s go from lightest to the heaviest.
S. It says here also that ultimately there will be no separation between them and at first they correct the evil inclination.
R. It will become clear and now simply listen, don’t jump ahead.
16. S. (39:46) I heard you mention that we feel a little bit how far we are removed from the light. What will help us to feel how far we are from the light to a much greater degree so that we will have a greater deficiency?
R. As much as we approach the connection we begin to feel how difficult it is, how impossible it, then we begin to attain that it’s not up to us to finish the work, rather what’s on us is to ask the Creator to do it. That’s why our work is called the work of the Creator.
17. S. (41:00) This night, the dark night, it’s a particular Reshimot and what does it particularly correspond to that it’s so dark to what it was before the breaking, if I’m correct in asking it this way?
R. The feeling that we are on the path to connection between us, specifically in that we begin to discover more darkness and more darkness. We see that we don’t approach the Creator but we discover how distant we are from Him.
S. What is this dark night, this deep night? What does it correspond to before the shattering?
R. To discover the deficiency for the connection between the bride and groom that has to happen, it has to happen in the connection between us and when we build that connection between us we construct the canopy under which the groom and bride can connect. So the work of our preparation is to reveal the complete deficiency, that’s how we prepare the work for the building of the canopy.
18. S. (42:47) Entering the canopy happens because we feel the light or we feel impaired and we invite the light?
R. Both. By awaking the light we feel how much we lack it.
19. S. (43:14) If the bride is in exile from where does she take the deficiency for connection if the bride is in the dust?
R. Even though we are in exile the upper light shines to us from afar, it shines on the lack of connection between us and then we feel the exile, the lack of connection, we feel how distant we are from the filling, from connection. Hence the feeling of exile is specifically when the light does not shine in the vessel, but instead it shines from afar as surrounding light. Then we feel a deficiency for the lack for this light as inner light, this is the feeling of exile.
20. S. (44:48) Can we say that the friends are Netzah, Hod and Yesod and that the canopy is a screen and that if we can understand NHY we can release Shechina from the dust?
R. I don’t want to speak of things that we did not learn yet. We should advance only according to what we are reading, it should be clear to everyone.
21. S. (45:38) What is this state called the ones who hold the Torah?
R. They wish to establish the canopy, the screen that’s above us out of the desires of the friends. This is the meaning of wanting to hold the canopy, the Torah.
S. Is this the state where we feel how much we depend on one another?
R. Of course, along the way discover all those things.
S. You gave the example before of holding the canopy that you need all the friends to be holding the canopy so it will be stable. That’s the screen?
R. Yes.
22. S. (46:35) You explained how to build the canopy between us. How to protect it and strengthen it?
R. We will talk about it, this is our work to protect it, to strengthen it. This is all through the connection between us, the growing connection. It grows each time we discover in it flaws and that this is our work, descents and ascents. Without descents we will have no need for the ascent and that’s how we build it.
23. S. (47:22) In accordance with the connection between the friends who gather in the bridal chamber, what is the simplest work and what is the most complicated work in the ten?
R. We’ll be in it and learn and feel it on ourselves, don’t jump forward.
24. S. (48:18) You said that there’s no connection between spiritual day and night and corporeal day and night in this world so why do Kabbalists use these words specifically?
R. Because that’s root and branch like all our definitions. We don’t know anything about the spiritual world, we rather use the language of the branches.
S. Is it something similar?
R. There is nothing, you have to read, we’ve read this many times.
S. What does it mean root and branch?
R. That there’s a spiritual root and a corporeal branch therefore we’re taking the spiritual root and using the name.
S. There is a connection, we have to grasp it.
R. There’s no connection and again I’m saying until you read what Baal HaSulam says about roots and branches, the language of the branches then there’s nothing to talk about with you. Go to part one of TES and see.
25. S. (49:38) He explains that after the time of receiving the Torah it’s like the end of correction but after that you have the sin of the golden calf. Can you explain it?
R. Well it’s like if I found myself with people who didn’t learn anything. How do you jump from this thing to that thing? We study gradually bit by bit.
S. How from a state of wholeness, the one he describes there, the end of correction can you fall into corruption?
R. I don’t know. We’ll get to the final correction and then we’ll see how to fall back from that if that even happens. We will learn. You seem like you’re not used to studying. Study always happens gradually, cause and consequence and so forth, and here you’re asking about things that are totally unrelated to what we’re studying.
26. S. (51:27) During these yearnings for connection between us and between us and the Creator, night. During this time we construct the first screen?
R. Yes.
S. And that’s a very important time.
R. Of course.
S. And afterwards all the screens we build at night?
R. We build all the screens at night and receive for them the lights, called days.
27. S. (52:11) Where does the bride take place in the system of Adam HaRishon, before or after?
R. Everything that happens happens in the general Malchut.
Reader continues (52:39) “Those who hold the Torah members of the bridal chamber…”
28. S. (58:35) Does the strength of the Masach which is built during the exile depend on the darkness felt during the exile?
R. Of course otherwise how would it be built? You have to feel the exile, you have to raise a prayer to be given strength to overcome the time of the exile, the night, the darkness and still achieve connection. So even though you feel darkness it will not separate you from the Creator. You rather build above it a connection and that means that you are correcting the exile, correcting the darkness, that you can receive the darkness as the light. How? If you work not through light of Hochma which gives you a light or darkness but rather through light of Hassadim. Meaning that you only want connection and not the result from the connection. And then it turns out that you overcome the exile and achieve redemption, only in this way can we correct the darkness.
S. So I have to be grateful for the exile?
R. Of course, of course the Creator designed it deliberately.
29. S. (01:00:34) When it says “the bride rejoices with her maidens when she’s corrected by them”, does it say that because the maidens are the partners of the Creator, when we talk about being partners? Normally we say the Creator corrects but here we say the maidens corrected?
R. Meaning that those children of the bridal chamber their request, upwards, is that they ask for screens because they want to be covered from the upper light, not to allow it to spread, but to remain in darkness with regards to the will to receive, and thus reveal the lights only on the condition of in order to bestow and then by that they build the Chuppah, canopy.
30. S. (01:02:08) Once He corrects, what does He want from us, the Creator?
R. The Creator only wants our connection, that we will want to connect in order to reveal Him, as it writes, “His desire is to dwell in the lower ones”.
31. S. (01:03:05) What is Rav Pe’alim uMekabtze’el?
R. Rav Pe’alim uMekabtze’el is a special force from above that collects, accumulates all of our efforts, endeavors, exertion, and puts them together until we build a single screen for the entire upper light, and then the final correction is revealed.
32. S. (01:03:55) What does it mean that those who serve the bride, sometimes these use it as the male, sometimes is female, what is that?
R. That is how it is according to the action we will talk about it.
33. S. (01:04:24) What is the action of ‘receiving the crown on the head’, being crowned?
R. What?
S. It says ‘to be crowned’, what is that?
R. Something that is even above the head.
S. The upper light does this?
R. I don’t know, we will learn.
S. And also, what is the difference between the state where we receive the crown and the state after we receive it?
R. I don’t know, we will learn, if I’m your Rav then you need to learn from me how to learn.
S. I try
R. Everything is gradual.
Reading item 126 (01:05:43 – 01:10:14)
34. R. (01:10:16) Meaning that it’s not a book of remembrance to punish, that it says what each and everyone did, but rather to transform all the transgression to merits.
Reading (01:10:34 – 01:12:58) “This is the meaning of what is written in the book of remembrance…”
35. R. (01:13:01) Okay so far, it’s enough for us for today.
36. S. (01:13:06) You said that it’s not a Book of Remembrance in order to punish but in order to turn the transgressions into merits, so there are no punishments?
R. First of all, it’s not what I said it is what is written, that is one, and two, there are punishments on the path, there are, but it’s not punishments the way we are looking at it. It’s a different kind that we will, when we will transform our minds to see where are the transgressions, where are the sins, what are the punishments and what is the opposite, then we will understand how the Creator treats people. But in the meantime, it is incomprehensible to us because our head is opposite.
37. S. (01:14:24) When a person sins, it is our first freedom of choice, it turns out this is the first state that we do by ourselves?
R. We will clarify that.
38. S. (01:14:47) He writes, He comes to multiply, maybe here again I don’t understand?
R. You have the text.
S. Not in front of me.
R. What do you mean, you don’t have the book? If you don’t have the book, get of the screen, what is that, you can’t learn this way.
39. S. (01:15:36) You said earlier that we have to act not towards the light of Hochma but towards the light of Hassadim, can you explain what is it and how do we do it?
R. I don’t know what I said about it.
S. If I understood correctly: to try to grasp reality not a light of Hochma but in light of Hassadim?
R. Well, yes, because we need to reach vessels of bestowal, maybe that’s what I meant.
S. What is this action, during the light we read all sorts of things, I feel good, I feel bad, what does it mean to relate to it towards light of Hassadim?
R. All the time to think how to be with respect to the discernments in order to bestow.
S. But I feel like that, I’m sort of the drug addict that depends on the light of Hochma, if there is no fulfillment I feel bad.
R. The fact that if there is no fulfillment and you feel bad, this is your nature, nothing to do about that, but what would you like to feel in your vessels? Like the importance of Hassadim, the importance of bestowal, so by nature you have importance for Hochma, for wisdom but when you start learning you start having some relation to Hassadim. Then you will see how you reach that, so by connection with people when you get their deficiencies, their desires, by connecting to them you begin some relative relation to Hassadim and you come closer and closer to them, to these vessels.
40. S. (01:17:35) We raise here two short questions, “the one who renews the words of Torah”, what does it mean to renew the words of Torah?
R. Each and every time, see the opportunity to come closer to vessels of bestowal more and more.
S. Okay, and then “who gets a reply of love, his bad deeds become good deeds”, so what does it mean “to get a reply of love” an answer of love?
R. It means that the vessels to receive in order to receive, you invert them to become in order to bestow.
S. How’s it done in the ten?
R. By the upper light when you call it on you. Out of the connection between you.
41. S. (01:18:54) the text mentions three times, “it is vain to serve the Creator”, what does that mean? It’s not ‘in vain’, it is ‘vain’.
R. I am not sure what you are referring to, it is ‘in vain’?
S. Right at the beginning of the text it says, “it is vain to serve the Creator”, so I’m wondering does it mean should it just be grateful to serve Him and not feel?
R. What is he saying?
S. At the very beginning.
R. If you can read the text, okay we have the text.
Reader reads passage.
S. “It is vain.”
R. It is written, “It is in vain to serve God, and what profit is it that we have kept His charge? Not only are the doers of wickedness built up but they also test God and escape. Then those who feared the Lord spoke to one another, the Lord listened and heard,”, so what is question about that? About the vain, towards the final correction when the great light comes, all those sins will become merits and all the worst things will be inverted to become Mitzvot.
S. Thank you.
42. S. (01:21:15) On one hand we learn that we have to try to justify the Creator and accept every state as the best, and on the other hand we learn that we have to come to state where it is impossible to bear it any longer, the inequivalence of form with the Creator, so what prayer gives the Creator the most contentment, where I accept or when it is impossible to bear the inequivalence of form and ask changes?
R. The second one, the second choice.
43. S. (01:22:05) I have noticed in 126 that Rabbi Shimon and the friends were filled with joy, overjoyed and “will be written in the Book of Life”, so the state of joy is it a state of the righteous one?
R. Yes.
S. And how is it possible to cultivate this even if it’s fake, if we have to act this state out?
R. Yes.
44. S. (01:22:51) Is ‘the clothing of the bride’, the connection?
R. Yes we can say that, yes, because it is the crown of the bride.
45. S. (01:23:21) How to depict the state of ‘the dressing of the bride and groom’, the light and the vessels is it the connection between us?
R. The connection is tangible, we have to go into that and you will feel the answer.
46. S. (01:24:17) Who will be written in the Book of Remembrance and what should we do about it?
R. Those who know how to perform actions in order to bestow, give contentment to the Creator; they are written in the Book of Remembrance, what is this Book of Remembrance? Malchut everything happens in Malchut then they awaken Malchut in order to perform actions to bestow.
47. S. (01:25:15) Question as follows: if I don’t have joy from my current state, can I be joyous from being on the path, and there is a chance to be in adhesion with the Creator?
R. Repeat please the question.
S. Let’s say I don’t have joy from my current state and where I am but I have to be in joy, so can I be in joy from being in adhesion and I have a Rav and I’m on the path, can I use this as joy?
R. Of course.
S. And this is enough, if I’m not happy?
R. I don’t know if it’s enough for you.
S. But it’s not enough.
R. So that is not good, so what do you want?
S. I want to feel that I’m advancing and every time I feel the opposite.
R. Try to perform actions towards adhesion and you will see how much the actions themselves, even though you don’t attain adhesion, they still give you some satisfaction. And the satisfaction you will feel and the actions, although not from the results, that is called satisfaction from Hassadim, contentment with Hassadim. And when you go into that, you will start feeling that you can pass from Hassadim to Hochma.