READING: between after midnight and sunrise of Tuesday.

The power in the study of the Torah: The reforming light

The power in the study of the Torah: The reforming light – Selected excerpts from the sources

1. RABASH, Article No. 12, (1988), “What Are Torah and Work in the Way of the Creator?”

We engage in The Torah in order to subdue the evil inclination, meaning to achieve Dvekut [adhesion] with the Creator, so that all our actions will be only in order to bestow. That is, by ourselves, we will never be able to go against nature, since the mind and heart that we must acquire require assistance, and the assistance is through the Torah. It is as our sages said, “I have created the evil inclination; I have created the Torah as a spice. By engaging in it, the light in it reforms them.”

2. RABASH, Article No. 267, “Man Was Created in the Torah”

The Torah has the power to reform a person, referring to the evil within man, meaning the will to receive, that it will work in order to bestow.

In this manner, he will have Dvekut [adhesion] and will be able to receive the real pleasures and will not be considered a receiver. Thus, through the Torah, it will be possible to sustain man in this world, for the Torah will reform him.

This is the meaning of “Let us make man,” which they explained, “I and you will establish him in the world.” That is, from the Creator comes the will to receive and from the Torah comes the desire to bestow, and from those two, man will be able to exist in the world. That is, through those two, he will be able to receive abundance yet remain in Dvekut.

3. Baal HaSulam, Shamati, Article No. 34, “The Advantage of a Land”

What should one do in order to come to love the Creator? For this purpose we are given the remedy of engaging in Torah and Mitzvot [commandments], for the light in it reforms him. There is light there which lets him feel the severity of the state of separation. Bit by bit, as one aims to acquire the light of Torah, hatred for separation is created in him. He begins to feel the reason that causes him and his soul to be separated and far from the Creator.

4. RABASH, Article No. 12 (1988), “What Are Torah and Work in the Way of the Creator?”

Feeling the vitality in the Torah requires great preparation to prepare his body to be able to feel the life in the Torah. This is why our sages said we must begin in Lo Lishma, and through the light of Torah he obtains while still in Lo Lishma, it will bring him to Lishma, since the light in it reforms him. Then, he will be able to learn Lishma, meaning for the sake of the Torah, which is called “Torah [law] of life,” as he has already attained the life in the Torah, for the light in the Torah will have given such qualification to a person as to be able to feel the life that is in the Torah.

5. RABASH, Article No. 12 (1988), “What Are Torah and Work in the Way of the Creator?”

It is our inability to do anything for the sake of the Creator. Only the light of Torah will correct the heart, for the heart is called “desire,” and by nature, it is a desire only to receive. But how can a person go against nature?

This is why the Creator said, “I have created the evil inclination; I have created the Torah as a spice.” It follows that he is not learning Torah for the intellect, to understand, but he is learning in order to understand so as to achieve Dvekut with the Creator, who is clothed in the Torah, and this pertains to the heart. Through the light he will receive, it reforms him, meaning that the will to receive for his own sake can receive strength from above that enables it to work for the sake of the Creator.

6. Baal HaSulam, “Concealment and Disclosure of the Face of the Creator-1”

One’s request to become stronger in believing in His guidance over the world during the concealment brings one to contemplate the books, the Torah, and to draw from there the illumination and understanding how to strengthen his faith in His guidance. These illuminations and observations that one receives through the Torah are called “the Torah as a spice.” When they accumulate to a certain amount, the Creator has mercy on him and pours upon him the spirit from above, that is, the higher abundance.

But once he has completely discovered the spice—the light of Torah that one inhales into one’s body—through strengthening in faith in the Creator, one becomes worthy of guidance with His face revealed. This means that the Creator behaves with him as is fitting to His name, “The Good Who Does Good.”

7. RABASH. Article No. 12 (1988) “What Are Torah and Work in the Way of the Creator”
A person must make a great effort before he comes to learn so that his learning will bear fruit and good results, meaning so the learning will bring him the light of Torah, by which it will be possible to reform him. Then, through the Torah, he becomes a wise disciple. What is a “wise disciple”? Baal HaSulam said that it is a student who learns from the wise. That is, the Creator is called “wise,” and a person who learns from Him is called a “disciple of the wise.” What should one learn from the Creator? He said that a person should learn only one thing from the Creator. It is known that the Creator wishes only to bestow. Likewise, man should learn from Him to be a giver. This is called a “wise disciple.”

8. RABASH. Article No. 12 (1988), “What Are Torah and Work in the Way of the Creator”

Prior to learning Torah, a person should examine the reason for which he is learning Torah, for any act needs to have some purpose that causes him to do the act. It is as our sages said, “A prayer without an aim is as a body without a soul.” For this reason, before he comes to learn Torah he must prepare the intention.

9. RABASH, Article No. 22 (1985), “The Whole of the Torah Is One Holy Name”

During the study we must always pay attention to the purpose of the study of Torah, meaning what we should demand from the study of Torah. At that time we are told that first we must ask for Kelim, meaning to have vessels of bestowal, called “equivalence of form,” by which the restriction and concealment that were placed on the creatures are removed. To the extent that this is so he begins to feel the holiness and begins to have a taste for the work of the Creator. At that time he can be happy because Kedusha [holiness] yields joy, for the light of doing good to His creations shines there.

10. RABASH. Article No. 12 (1988), “What Are Torah and Work in the Way of the Creator”

It is beneficial to elicit the light from the Torah—if he aims while engaging in the Torah, to learn in order to receive the reward of the Torah, called “light.” At that time, the learning of Torah is good for him. But when he is distracted from the purpose of studying Torah, the Torah does not help complete the work of making the vessels of bestowal and not using the vessels of reception for one’s own sake. Otherwise, his Torah vanishes from him. That is, the force of Torah and that should have subdued the evil inclination is cancelled. This is the meaning of the words, “Any Torah with which there is no work,” meaning when he does not aim for the Torah to do the work of turning the vessels of reception to work in order to bestow, “is finally cancelled,” meaning that that force is cancelled.

11. RABASH, Article No. 12 (1988), “What Are Torah and Work in the Way of the Creator?”

If in the beginning of his study, when a person comes to study, there is no desire to thereby achieve complete faith, which he can achieve through the light in the Torah by wanting to adhere to the one who wears it, who is clothed in the Torah and gives the light of Torah and none other, it follows that he is learning Torah, which is the clothing of the Creator. Through it, he wants to achieve complete faith, adhere to the one who wears it, who is the giver of the Torah.

Here there is unification of three discernments: 1) the Torah, which is the clothing of the Creator, 2) the Creator, who is clothed in the Torah, and 3) Israel, the person who is learning Torah with the above intention.

This is called “unification,” called “the Torah and the Creator and Israel are one.”

12. RABASH, Article No. 12 (1988), “What Are Torah and Work in the Way of the Creator?”

The essence of our work is to achieve Dvekut [adhesion] with the Creator, as it is written, “to cling unto Him,” it follows that the Torah is the means to adhere to Him. That is, while learning Torah, we should aim to be rewarded with connecting to the one who wears it. This is done through the clothing, which is the Torah, in which the Creator is clothed.

13. Baal HaSulam. “Introduction to The Study of the Ten Sefirot”, Item 18
The Creator, who created it and gave the evil inclination its strength, evidently knew to create the remedy and the spice liable to wear off the power of the evil inclination and eradicate it altogether. And if one practices Torah and fails to remove the evil inclination from himself, it is either that he has been negligent in giving the necessary labor and exertion in the practice of Torah, as it is written, “I have not labored but found, do not believe,” or perhaps one did put in the necessary amount of labor, but has been negligent in the quality. This means that while practicing Torah, they did not set their minds and hearts to draw the Light in the Torah, which brings faith to one’s heart. Rather, they have been absent-minded about the principal requirement demanded of the Torah, namely the Light that yields faith. And although they initially aimed for it, their minds went astray during the study.

14. RABASH, Article No. 16 (1984), “Concerning Bestowal”

First, one must see if he has the strength to come to be able to act with the aim to bestow contentment upon the Creator. Then, when he has already come to realize that he cannot achieve it by himself, that person focuses his Torah and Mitzvot on a single point, which is that “the light in it reforms him,” that this will be the only reward that he wants from the Torah and Mitzvot. In other words, the reward for his labor will be for the Creator to give him this strength called “the power of bestowal.”

15. RABASH, Article No. 21 (1988), “What Does It Means that the Torah Was Given Out of the Darkness in the Work?”

The Torah was given specifically to those who feel that their will to receive controls them. They cry out from the darkness that they need the Torah in order to deliver them from the darkness that is the control of the vessels of reception, on which there was a Tzimtzum [restriction] and concealment so that no light will shine in that place. But that place is the cause for the need to receive the Torah.