MONDAY PRAYER: GEVURAH-TIKKUN CHATZOT תקון חצות – LESSON WITH RAV MICHAEL LAITMAN
READING: between after midnight and sunrise of Monday
Lesson on the topic of “Pesach (Passover)”
Morning Lesson March 25, 2023
Transcription is made from simultaneous translation which leaves a possibility for differences in the audio
Part 1:
Passover – Selected Excerpts from the Sources. (For Lack of Spirit and for Hard Work. #109)
1. Rav’s Introduction: (00:50) We are learning what happens with the person as he advances towards the purpose of creation and how much this way is not a way where it seems to the person that he is advancing towards a good goal because each time it becomes more and more difficult for him. And here he has all kinds of disturbances, external and internal disturbances also and the person has to cope with them and mostly he has to understand that the main thing that he has to understand in such a state is that everything is coming from the Creator. That There is None Else Besides Him and it is the Creator who is placing before the person all kinds of disturbances and if he accepts this in such a way and nevertheless, he is holding himself in connection, in unity, in keeping everything that he has then accordingly he advances.
And if he thinks that there are many other forces that operate in such a way so as to make all kinds of goals and discernments that are not connected to each other and do not stem from a single source then the person is truly mistaken and he moves away from There Is None Else Besides Him. This is why we have to specifically grow stronger in such times to be even more as one, even more together, even more in mutual support and then these things that go by and we reach the following stages. And the following stages will not be necessarily more convenient, they will be even better meaning more difficult but accordingly, the person receives each time the strength, the support, the opportunity through the group and the study and through the teacher and then the person nevertheless, receives the ability to balance himself and to organize himself that the spiritual purpose of life for him is the most important and greatest thing and it is not that he is performing earthly calculations, making corporeal calculations as if these were forces of nature operating on him but it is God, Elokim that equals Nature in Gematria.
He is the only thing that is operating on him and the person should accept this and listen to it and arrange himself within that, in adhesion which is our goal on each and every step. So we, for the time being, we’ll go to number 109 is it? And you can send us as many questions as you can in whatever way you can send us questions and we will try to answer them as I usually answer, so let’s start.
Reading 109. (05:07)
2. R. (06:22) This is actually the whole purpose, to feel the domination of the evil upon us more and more in order for us to need the great help, the great lights. And the central place of this whole status is in the Red Sea when the judgements are getting stronger, for full strength. That is on the one hand and on the other hand the Creator is making a path in the middle of the sea and the people of Israel pass through this path from Egypt to the land of Israel. So we have to realize that all of these disturbances are in order for us to demand greater lights and greater help and stronger connections between us and with the Creator. Otherwise he would not be able to give it to us because we won’t have a deficiency for it. The deficiency has to be there first, it has to proceed the reception of the help so here we have to learn how much the Creator is awakening in us a deficiency for his help and how much we understand and feel it and advance in this way.
3. S. (08:16) When the person feels the state for a tank or a cannon against him it is not immediate that it is me that awakens, there is a moment or more of disconnection. How from this disconnection where there are the blows and it stands and silences the person who started receiving a need for working towards the right request as it should be?
R. The fact that we feel disconnection is in order for us to discover the need for the help of the friends. When I lose my corporeal grip on the friends that I am together with them in some corporeal connection and that from this connection I awaken it and I rise to a spiritual connection and I already asked not from the friends that I remain connected with them but from the Creator that inside of this connection he will give me the forces so that I will be able to advance towards an even greater connection between us so that I will hold the friends together. One connection, one circle as much as possible and likewise each and every one of the friends also gives to this connection his part and then we actually discover a collective, common connection and in it we already feel how this connection begets in us a new place. So that we actually do come towards the land of Israel. The land of Israel is when we are connected. Israel is a desire which is directed to the Creator, straight to the Creator and the land Eretz is a desire and this is how we already establish for ourselves a way which is more directed and straight and more correctly to the upper force and we hold onto each other and we also hold onto the Creator and we begin to come closer and closer and closer to him. There are many other disturbances on the way but they are all the result of the same corrupted desires of ours of the Klipot, the shells that still live in us and that this is how we advance.
4. S. (11:48) The hardening of the heart is in order for us to draw more light if I understood correctly?
R. Yes, certainly.
S. So what needs to be the request, the prayer that would cause us to draw more light?
R. That we will feel the hardening of the heart, that we have a goal but we do not want to reach it sufficiently we cannot reach it but we are not holding each other enough and this is how we keep advancing [..]
S. But the feeling of the burdening of the heart is coming from above. We were in a state of connection. I did feel good and all of a sudden we felt detached and […]
R. This is within, from within us because inside of us there is the entire program for hardening the heart, for increasing the will to receive until the end of correction.
S. So what should we ask when the next phase of the burdening of the heart unfolds, what should we ask in order to rise above it?
R. Only the force to understand that this comes from the plan of creation, and according to this plan then we need to ask, we need to ask for help and the help is actually in the connection between us.
S. The request should be above what I need to ask that he will raise it. What should this life give us in order to raise us above the burdening?
R. We need to arrange ourselves above the blows, above the force of separation and in this way to try to see ourselves connected, tied together, holding on and helping each other even though each ten you will feel the force of separation. This is how it is in our life everywhere, in the family, at work, in the spiritual work of course, and between the friends in the ten we should always feel on the one hand this force of separation that is pulling us away from each other outwardly and along with that we need to stand guard. This is considered that we are keeping and guarding the temple at day and at night in all kinds of different states and in this way in spite of everything we build and come closer to each other more and more, this is considered that we start stepping on the degrees. And you need to try to make it more and more tangible that this is our work, this is our life until we will get into states, soon it will happen, where we will feel on each and every step that we are coming closer to the Creator and we will feel in each and every step that we are coming closer to each other and the Creator becomes more and more clear and more apparent between us. Until we will start to have contact with Him with greater and greater embrace with Him and in that as much as the connection with the Creator will become more important and greater and more clear to us then we are going to shift from the feeling of this world to the feeling of the upper world. That for us this same contact, the same sense, this connection from between us too and with the Creator this will be the actual feeling of life and vitality and necessity and all of this life, the corporeal life we will feel it as things that only accompanied us to the entrance to the upper world.
5. S. (17:28) Where is the burdening of the heart, what’s not always there is the understanding that this is the hardening of the heart. Many times it is just grabbing hold of you unprepared, and you told us Rabash many times that he also had the different challenges and you said that Kabbalists would go through hundreds of these states in a short time so what does the frequency depend on? On the one hand we are talking about Kabbalists going through it in a long time and the tension is there on the other hand fast.
R. In principle we should not ask about this because it all comes from the Creator directly and this is deliberately according to the plan, it is passing through a group and in all kinds of different states and events and there is no point in asking about this because for us our work is that even though we see these things the way they transpire and as much as they confused us, our work is only to grow stronger. Our work is only to grow stronger and to connect more and more. So this is why as much as you may ask about it, maybe I will be able to explain a small part of this thing to you but ultimately, it doesn’t help you. When we get questions we should always distinguish between these questions how much they will help us to advance and how much they might do the opposite, how much they will stop us where we are and then we are talking about things they’re actually, we are not going to understand the causes.
S. Actually not to pick into it because many times during the ascents we are picking into ourselves but to quickly go through the states like the Kabbalists who went through 400 states a minute.
R. First of all except that everything that we get is coming from the Creator, that there is none else besides him and it comes in order for us to strengthen our connection, between us and with the Creator, insure this is the answer that we should have. It should be a simple answer. We are connected and strengthened as one man with one heart and this one heart is ready to open itself up so that the Creator will fill it, that’s it. And precisely why it is and how it is we are never going to know this because it comes from us to that point where the Creator decided to create a desire to receive and create it in such a way and as it is written the essence of knowing is that you will not know.
6. S. (21:35) It says, “the need, let’s say, to draw great lights is to overcome the strong Klipot.” Why does it say in the text that “one who is going to fight against someone with the hand of, let’s say, a stick, when he does not need to use a tank or cannon against him”? Why not use a higher force, why does it refer to some equal force, that there is no need for a stronger force, what does it say?
R. It means that I can fight with a disturbance precisely at the height of that disturbance, precisely at the height of the disturbance. If I see some forces in nature that in a particular way they rise against me, I search for how I can overcome them but it is actually according to these forces, this is how it always is, this is how it always is. From the side of nature also I cannot find much greater forces than those that wake up as disturbances; look at where we are, we see throughout history, each time that we have certain disturbances from the side of nature or what we see from history, we also come against them with our defense which is according to the disturbances from nature. We build all kinds of walls, we accumulate water supply or food, we do not have something else that everyone can do because this is how it is built. A person should advance through degrees and on each and every degree, he attains something of who he is and what nature is, this is how it is, this is how we advance.
S. Does it have to do with searching for a certain balance against if you have a certain foreign force working against you, that you are searching for balance and equivalence of form?
R. Yes, it is right because we have to give answers on the same degree, we have to understand it and reach balance with nature on the same degree where nature is awakening us, by opening up, by opening up the evil forces, let’s call it. This is how it always happens, as it is written, ‘quid pro quo’, measure against measure, by this the Creator through all kinds of natural events develops us.
7. S. (25:23) Do you need Klipot to draw great lights?
R. Certainly, without the Klipot, the shells, a person cannot grow, he cannot advance towards the Creator, specifically through the Klipot we can grow and understand just like in our life. If we have vegetables and fruits and everything that we have, it is all wrapped in a shell and a shell guards the fruit, the fruit grows only by that and then it reaches a state where it’s worthy of eating. This is not only with food but also with knowledge, understanding and awareness, whatever we have, each and everything there is the matter of the shell that precedes the fruit.
S. You said yesterday that I have real Klipot, so where are the big lights?
R. If there are great shells and we receive them correctly and we know how to work with them, then we can get great lights according to the shells. All in all, the shell comes in order to evoke us, stimulate us, build in us the right deficiencies and then the reforming light arrives accordingly.
8. S. (27:32) If the Klipot do not allow us to enter the spiritual world, how are they protecting us?
R. The shell protects us, it develops us, it prepares us to understand sanctity, bestowal, love and connection. The Klipot awakens us, it takes care of us, it helps us to grow, like a nanny in this world who takes care of the child until he grows up, it is the same with the shell. And accordingly it frees up little bits of blocking, its stopping and then we are able to receive portions of light, one after the other, in small doses until we reach a state where we on our own build the screens and we receive the lights through the screens.
9. S. (29:16) You said if we work correctly with the shell, what then is the right work with the shell?
R. The right work with the shell is that we know that it comes from the Creator and it precedes the vessel, the fruit, just like with an apple, that I have to peel off the shell, the peel in order to reach the apple. That we must not simply remove the shell, just like that, because the fruit will rot, this is why we have to know how to work with the shell in order to guard the fruit and we have to know how to peel off the shell and when. This is not with eating on the but with each and everything in science and wisdom, in our corporeal nature, in our lives, in the family, with the group, the shell is always, it always comes first before the revelation.
S. In order for me to feel that this is a shell, what should I do, and also to feel that it comes from the Creator, what am I supposed to do with the shell?
R. We can peel off the shell only by connecting more between us more correctly, actually there is no other means by which we can peel off the shell from ourselves. As much as I connect with the friends we begin to cleanse ourselves from the shell and we’re able together to receive the upper lights.
10. S. (31:47) How can I know that I am facing great, strong Klipot, what is a strong Klipot?
R. The shells come to a person and they are felt in the person according to the degree of that person, as much as he is already very feeling a great disturbance, then he is feeling it. And as much as he is not, he does not feel a great disturbance but rather a small disturbance, it’s just like how we teach children, first grade, second grade, third, fourth, etc., this is how it is with the shells. And therefore we must not jump as though we are able to learn something that is greater or higher or more advanced. But instead, according to how we go forward and connect between us, according to the measure of our connection, our ability to connect, our inclination to connect according to that we can take off the shells and reach the fruit; the fruit means the understanding, the attainment, the feeling of the Creator.
11. S. (33:20) What does it mean to attract the great lights in the work of the ten?
R. This happens by me wanting to be in those great lights. I make a tighter connection with the friends, a stronger connection with the friends, and into this connection I pull, I draw a greater higher light, this is how it works.
12. S. (34:18) In this transition from degree to degree, is only they help of the Creator needed or we also have to put some pressure from our part?
R. Of course we have to make a greater pressure in order to be connected and worthy of the upper light dressing into us.
13. S. (34:57) There are two methods to undergo the states, the fast one or the qualitative and the quantitative, If we’re talking about the four hundred states a minute. What is the right approach: to go through it quickly or to go through it qualitatively? Because if you allow yourself to go into the state and scrutinize and long for a prayer to the Creator from a deep scrutiny then the great lights are drawn?
R. Both this and that both, we need both it is not a correct question, we need both of them together, start doing it and you will see.
14. S. (36:00) Yesterday you gave advice to push the connection through the friends so that we do not despair of our own strengths, and the next degree creates new labor for us, a new place to work. How to relate to this additional labor as a great finding and to treat it with joy because I want to force myself to be in joy even though, despite the burdening and it creates a difficult feeling, how to overcome it?
R. Only by coming closer to the friends, I have no other advice.
15. S. (36:51) To be worthy of great disturbances depends on our great labor?
R. Yes, the more we will put in effort we will be given greater disturbances, this is how we will rise on the ladder.
16. S. (37:15) How to overcome the fear of losing myself in the annulment of the ten?
R. Do not worry about it, let her lose herself, so what? So I simply remain with the ten, that’s it. We should all reach a state where the “I” seemingly disappears, and what remains then, the ten in my feelings.
17. S. (37:58) From the shells, we can catch them both in a sweet and a bitter way and that allows us to continue the work?
R. Yes, of course we can feel the shells with all kinds of different tastes.
18. S. (38:30) You said once that we should not be afraid of punishments or disturbances.
R. Because the concealment, if it is more important than the deed, if the goal is more important, then I am drawn to the goal and it does not matter through which action or deed I reach.
19. S. (39:03) I work to peel the in order to receive for myself by the connection with the friends, what can I do to awaken the friends to that same work, it feels like an individual work?
R. I don’t understand the question.
R. I’m saying what we are talking about now, that we’re coping with the Klipot through the connection, how is it possible that this coping will be helpful to all the friends, the whole ten, It feel like it’s individual work, how do I awaken the whole ten for this work?
R. What is the goal, what’s the purpose
S. The goal is to reach connection to bring the Creator contentment.
R. So it should be group work.
S. But sometimes it feels that I’m coping with the Klipot on my own and I’m not sure the friends get any use out of that?
R. Now, you are asking something else, think about it, you’ve asked a few questions, you have asked a few questions.
20. S. (40:29) I heard you saying that over time we will be able to discern the Creator more and more, so my question is when there are more friends we will feel the Creator more?
R. No, the number is always ten, preferably not more than ten, and that’s it, it does not depend on the specific number.
21. S. (41:10) We are talking about making it tangible. During our time our work is always to keep the balance to annul and connect to the friends and again so in our time when we really feel everything that the Creator is giving us, what does it mean to accelerate, to hasten our work?
R. I do not understand what you are asking.
S. Now in the time we are in, all the states we are going through it is as if we are keeping the balance, meaning the process is in its time and all that we do each time we establish a connection we annul and I am asking: What does it mean to accelerate, hasten this process?
R. We can hasten the process only through increasing the connection between the friends. This is the only way of accelerating the path that is for sure; there is no other way.
22. S. (42:35) Can the person even measure the size of the Klipa or the disturbances he receives or does it even matter?
R. We cannot measure the size or the magnitude but we can feel it and process it correctly. This is something we have to do.
S. What does it mean to feel it and to process it correctly?
R. We have to feel that it is a Klipa, that is obstructing me. I have to invert it actually, to seemingly peel it off from the fruit and then I will be able to work with the fruit, meaning to eat it up in order to bestow.
S. Disturbance means that it obstructs the connection with the friends?
R. Yes.
23. S. (43:30) Can we talk about connection? Are you speaking about a spiritual concept or a corporeal concept?
R. For the time being we are talking about the friends that we are familiar with and somehow we also feel them because the spiritual concept nobody has it yet.
S. We are talking about some corporeal connection like in all other groups, when people try to get together for a certain purpose because I hear that we are speaking about connection and attaining lights and all kinds of such concepts but what I understand is that as long as we do not have the spiritual attainment, there is no such thing, it is some sort of an illusion?
R. Yes, it is some kind of an illusion that we are getting closer to without it, it’s impossible, without having something to depict for ourselves as a spiritual goal. But if someone feels that illusion, he feels that he is connected, he feels the Creator and has nothing to pray for. How do we reach a common prayer?
S. You sit in the ten, you hear that people feel the Creator, they feel the lights and all kinds of spiritual concepts, above reason and there’s no prayer so how will we reach the common prayer? How do we reach the outcry to come out of Egypt?
R. Don’t get too hot or revved up. Each and everyone imagines these things as much as the Creator lets him feel them and in the end we all feel it and we all connect and we all come closer to the end of correction.
S. I am not talking about the end of correction. The end of correction is a long time away. We are talking about the beginning of correction: How to reach a common outcry to come out of Egypt, this is what we are talking about, in Egypt.
R. We are coming closer to the outcry because we are not able to come out of Egypt.
S. Yes, about if somebody’s thinking that he’s already in spirituality he’s thinking that he’s out of Egypt so he’s not trying to get out. I am talking about the sweet illusions that you’re connected, we have lights, we have the group and we have […]?
R. Yes, we have that too, we are connected to some extent there is some light that fills the space between us and we are coming closer to the land of Israel we have that as well.
S. Yes, we have that too but for that we have to take the first step to come out of Egypt because nothing happens?
R. Yes and we are coming closer to that, to the border of Egypt.
24. S. (46:40) During congresses or holidays we feel that the Klipot retreat or go back, so how can we hold onto this state because later on when the Klipot come back, the hard work comes back?
R. When we feel that the Klipot are moving away from us that they are almost not there and they’re coming back to us and they clothe over us, these things happen and they need to happen in this way. We learn about that, we can even know about this from the book of the Torah how much they had these states and those states and each time these states are different, even though we do not yet quite feel these differences between them, the essential differences and therefore, we simply need to continue, we simply need to continue.
Then eventually we will discover after the quota is filled, as it is written, when the quota is filled, then we are going to feel that we already went through this stage and we are before a breakthrough of the boundary of the border of Egypt from within. That we are truly on the eve on the night of the exodus from Egypt. It is in the night, in the darkness, in the feeling of fear and helplessness and lacking any means. However, out of the lack of choice we run away and it’s not that we understand or feel or that we know that somebody’s going to accompany us but rather the exodus from Egypt is always in a state where I am better off dead, I have to get out of this state, that’s it.
S. The connection in the congress shows us the future state we are aspiring to?
R. Yes.
S. Seemingly we come out of Egypt, we are being shown at the congress, so how can it be?
R. Let’s say so but what are you asking? During the congress we are connecting stronger because of the amount of people who each want to nullify their ego and only feel the more advanced spiritual state and therefore, this is what we feel as if we are transcending ourselves. Some cannot do this, they are still inside their egoistic sensations but still they also receive some impression from this, from the general crowd and the some people feel that they are already willing to rise and detach from the general mass of people outside in the world and only be attached to the crowd that exist within our organization here in this event, in this Passover and this is how we advance.
Our whole study is in order for us to make a common effort together, all of us, men and women together wishing to rise above in order to receive to in order to bestow, to connect, to become as one and then even if we achieve it, even just for a moment, this already means that we have detached from this world, we are going to have the feeling of detachment and thus, we will advance.
25. S. (51:20) It is really felt how this Passover we are going to go out through the light. As we are read, without the hardening of the heart of the Pharaoh it is impossible to leave Egypt. How much we, as an individual ten can we do it for the unity and connection of the whole world group, that this is going to be our intention to make a connection in the ten for the sake of the world Kli?
R. It depends on how connected we are, that depends only on how connected we are. I hope that in this week of congress we are going to have a whole week, it is not little, so all the friends who are going to come here and all the friends overseas, all of us as much as we can because it is a working week, it is not a vacation, holiday for everyone but we are going to try to be connected in our idea, in our plan, in our goal. That we wish to achieve such a strong connection where we feel connected between us and with the Creator and the connection to this world which burdens us and buries us.
26. S. (53:00) Through the outcry should it be common or each is crying out in his own time?
R. More or less each one in his own time but over time, the duration being a week we end up with a collective and cumulative cry.
S. What is a common cry?
R. That all of us want to come out of it, so today you are feeling it more in the morning and then tomorrow your friend is feeling it more at noon, somebody else and so forth but all together we cover this entire week with our tendency to connect and exit the will to receive in order to receive.
S. Does it mean that if in the ten not everybody is crying out then we won’t come out and nothing will happen?
R. Not to everyone, it is not that we count everyone. Altogether most of us want to come out of in order to receive and be in order to bestow in our connection and the main thing in our connection is to feel the Creator and to connect to Him. This tendency to connect between us and inside our connection discover the Creator and in that common feeling we have to feel the upper world entirely, meaning we and the Creator connected as one, that’s what we want to attain.
S. What is a common outcry?
R. Common cry means that in our hearts we all cry; that we all want it.
27. S. (55:12) Are we building connections when we pray for the friends from the bottom of the heart and are we accelerating or hastening development of time through these prayers?
R. Yes.
28. S. (55:30) If a friend defeats the Klipot by working with the Klipot how can he bring this light to his friend’s, so how can the ten benefit from a friend’s victory?
R. But we are all connected somehow and if each is coming with some additional portion of light that of course it influences everyone so much so that instead of each of these lights each one brings we begin to feel the source of the light which is the Creator.
29. S. (56:18) My question is: You said a few minutes ago, that the essence of knowing is that the purpose is, that we do not know. What does it mean not knowing or not understanding?
R. I cannot explain that. You will have to feel that.
30. S. (57:15) Even if the friends cry at me or they are upset with me or they have a different view I still have to connect with them. Does it mean that I did not make a sufficient effort that the Creator does not give me rejection from the connection?
R. The Creator is always giving us the best possible state for us to work in.
31. S. (57:50) Why here in the text he is speaking about the Klipa and not the ego? What is the difference between them?
R. The Klipa means that it is preventing me now so that I’ll peel it off and reach the insides and the ego is something general, it is nature, it is not good or bad, just appears and according to its appearance we can advance. Without the ego we would not advance. The ego is the general will to receive and the Klipa is what hinders me for now from advancing towards the Creator.
32. S. (59:05) We have a question from our ten from before, if the Creator is revealed in the ten why are there burdens that are not related to the ten, what is their purpose?
R. Are there burdenings that are disconnected from the ten? Almost none. If you would see the general picture you would see that everything influences the whole ten even if it’s a personal burdening of the friend.
S. How can we link it to the ten if we don’t feel it?
R. We should try to connect it in heart and mind but we should accept it as a burdening.
S. Then what will we do?
R. What we do is we cancel all the disturbances besides those that are between us. Then we have to really cancel and engage in them in order to transform them from disconnection to connection but if someone, one of the friends has something on the side that is bothering him, even if it’s things on the sides with his family, with his relatives, that we have to see as things that nevertheless, are disturbances inside the ten and try to calm them down.
S. How can we help a friend overcome above these disturbances?
R. Speak to him and see. How do I know? But still first you have to shape the ladder, what is more important and what is less important and not just jump on everything at the same intensity.
33. S. (01:01:18) I hope the question is phrased correctly. I came to the conclusion that when a person says Pharaoh is hindering him, the ego is hindering him, these are all excuses. There is the desire for the greatness of the Creator or lack of desire for the greatness of the Creator. Seemingly a person can control it that he can ask the Creator to have such a desire but he doesn’t yet ask and that also comes from the Creator, everything comes from the Creator. How can we nevertheless, can we want to ask? Do I need the friends for that or does a person himself have such forces? It seems like some kind of sabotage where you realize you could do something but you don’t do this and even that comes from the Creator?
R. You are lacking the pressure from the friends.
S. Meaning it is under our control? We can actually gather together and cancel all of this ego?
R. Most important is to do it together where you can’t pressure yourself the friends will.
Reading Item #110 twice (01:02:50) “When a person begins to work..”
34. S. (01:06:45) I would like to ask you during the work should I let or allow my ego to grow and just worry about its direction towards bestowal or should I just recognize it as evil and repress it?
R. No, I have to try all the time through the beginning of the work until the final correction to always bring myself to connection. That we are really doing one continuous work of connecting all the broken pieces from the vessel of Adam HaRishon that was shattered we bring them back to being one vessel, that is what is important to us. Accordingly, we measure and weigh not now but we will be able to later measure and weigh our work exactly what exactly we are doing, what degrees of coarseness, what kind of lights can appear in the vessel we have corrected and so forth.
35. S. (01:08:05) How is Lo Lishma different from the Klipa?
R. Lo Lishma is simply in order to receive and Klipa is the one who wants to receive in order to receive.
36. S. (01:08:43) What is the payment that I should pay at this stage where we’re trying to get rid of our shells?
R. Our payment is that we rise above our ego and we don’t want to take it into account to any extent.
37. S. (01:09:17) Should we request the Klipot?
R. To ask no, we can only ask for help from the Creator through the friends and the Klipot are always against us and we have no reason to turn to them.
38. S. (01:09:50) How can we feel our reality through the connection between us until we would feel that the whole of reality for the connection between us, how can we depict it?
R. Well, this I can’t tell you because you don’t have the vessels in which you can depict it. It is a single vessel where everyone is interconnected and everyone is connected and everyone is willing to be one for all the others, that is the correct vessel we all discover.
S. Can we say that it starts by giving the Creator importance more than the corporeal importance?
R. Yes, yes.
39. S. (01:11:00) In order to reach Lo Lishma and in general to even direct ourselves toward this work, we have to measure the activeness of our advancement towards connection or towards my attempts, my effort to see that I’m doing all of it in order for self benefit?
R. I have to make sure that I will be completely connected to everyone, simply dissolving into everyone.
S. Anytime that I try to do so, I realize how good it is to be together with the friends, to dissolve in them. Does it give you some protection?
R. You do it for your own sake.
S. But what should I do?
R. Try to depict that you’re doing it for their sake, that you’re connecting to them, to connect everyone, otherwise you shouldn’t try to connect, otherwise you are a Klipa.
S. Meaning the Klipa is when you enjoy this connection?
R. Yes, of course.
S. What is this whole thing about what the benefit should be for them or what?
R. That you want to bestow.
S. And what do you have control over it, over yourself, like you say I don’t want to do it for myself?
R. How will you operate differently? If you don’t control yourself, what will your work be?
S. I’m asking how can I hold on to it? On one hand I aspire for connection and on the other hand I look at myself and I don’t see that?
R. Don’t look at yourself, only look at the connection and that you’re become included there only in order to strengthen that connection. Well, okay it doesn’t matter, it happens, it happens, it goes up and down.
40. S. (01:13:39) When a person begins to yearn for the work of Lishma, is this the entrance to Egypt?
R. No, he doesn’t know it’s Egypt yet. To yearn for work in Lishma is already when you’re on the way out of Egypt.
S. When is the entrance to Egypt?
R. The entrance into Egypt is when he begins to feel a connection with his friends, like Joseph and the brothers and when he simply wants to come closer to reception, to bestowal, to giving, it doesn’t matter to what but he is willing to receive all the discernments that there are in Egypt from the perspective of the will to receive and the will to bestow, he is willing to accept it and grow.
41. S. (01:15:10) What does the Klipa do? Does it take the light or not let it pass through? Does it make the vessel dirty or with what force does it do it because you taught us that we can only get reflected light: How does the Klipa take the light?
R. The Klipa is created even before the appearance of the vessel. Look at how all the fruits grow from the state of being green and unripe. There’s nothing tasty about them, there is no inner content in it, it is all just the envelope and this is how it grows out of the Klipa, out of that shell.
That shell grows gradually, develops gradually and several states become organized in that vessel and inside of the fruit, with the seeds created in it and around them, the content of the fruit itself which is sweet and tasty and a person can use it. This is how the desire develops gradually from the lowest which we cannot use, to the highest and most pleasant which we can already use. This is also what we see with animals, there are animals that eat fruits that are unripe it doesn’t matter to them but human beings cannot even if physiologically you get a bad stomach Etc., get a bad stomach if you eat unripe fruit, in other words at any level of development it’s its own food.
42. S. (01:18:26) How can we discover the importance of spiritual work if there is no reward and we do not feel anything?
R. We feel it, we have to feel it. Also, when we come out of the lesson and we don’t feel anything we have to believe that we went through several stages, steps forward because this is what Kabbalists tell us, our teachers and although we don’t understand or feel, we have to believe them that we did take a step forward.
43. S. (01:19:28) Is the Klipa a parallel system to the system of sanctity or is it the formulation of the will to receive until we refine it and receive the inner lights of the Partzuf?
R. Yes, yes, yes. It’s written, God has created them one opposite the other.
44. S. (01:20:00) At what moment does the Creator finish the work and help us? Is it when we come out of Egypt?
R. The Creator doesn’t finish the work with us. He is with us all the time until the end of correction, every step of the way.
45. S. (01:20:32) We have a question from the ten. How can we know practically that we are going from Lo Lishma to Lishma? How did we know we are working correctly?
R. Only according to our feeling of getting closer to the Creator, only according to this.
46. S. (01:21:20) How do I reach the faith that I will reach Lishma? What does it mean that I start to believe?
R. When I succeed in doing something that’s not for my own sake.
47. S. (01:21:48) You answered Chile that you can only measure towards the way we come closer to the Creator. And here in the excerpt, it says that every time we advance more in the work we feel that we’re moving backwards and we feel further away from the Creator. We also learn it, we feel it, a person has to get used to moving backwards like he writes in Shamati. A lot of times I hear you say that we will start feeling more and more, that we’re coming closer to the Creator. It will become clear when we’re in contact, in a hug with Him and so how to say this right? We feel that we’re moving away on one hand, further away from bestowal, a person feels it’s not in him. On the other hand I hear you say we have to come closer to the feeling of the Creator to come in contact with him to hug him?
R. Why does it interrupt?
S. Because it’s two opposite feelings. On one hand we have to get used to moving supposedly backwards. That the more I advance, the more I move away, nothing happens, everything is swallowed in the ground and so on.
R. And so what?
S. Because I hear you say that we also have to feel how much we are coming closer to the Creator, to hugging Him, to contact Him.
R. Well, it’s not already an embrace, a contact but it is to know the way.
S. What characterizes the advancement that a person feels moving away from bestowal or closer?
R. A person has to feel that he is getting closer to bestowal even though he’s walking on two legs. On one leg that is moving further away, the other leg is moving closer and he is basically in the middle between those two legs. This is how he moves forward. If he didn’t feel moving away, moving further, he also wouldn’t feel that he’s getting closer. It is always like that with us.