READING: BETWEEN AFTER MIDNINGHT AND DAWN MONDAY

Rabash. What Does It Mean that the Creation of the World Was by Largess?. 5 (1989)

LESSON MATERIAL

What Does It Mean that the Creation of the World Was by Largess?

Article No. 5, 1989

The first ones explained that the creation of the world was not because of lack, for it cannot be said about the Creator that He is deficient. Rather, the creation of the world was out of largess. That is, as it is said (in Midrash Rabbah, Beresheet), “The Creator said to the angels when He wanted to create Adam HaRishon, and they said, ‘What is man that You should remember him?’”

The Creator replied to them, “What is this like? It is like a king who has a tower filled abundantly but he has no guests.” This is not a lack; it is simply that He wants to give with largess so the created beings will enjoy. A lack is what a person must receive, but cannot receive it. This is regarded as a lack. But to bestow is not considered a lack. Therefore, we learn that the creation of the world because of His desire to do good to His creations was out of largess and not out of a lack.

But one who receives something must have a deficiency. That is, if the receiver wants to enjoy what he is receiving, the receiver must choose only those things he wants. Otherwise, he will derive no pleasure from this. He wants to enjoy but it is impossible. This is what we see in our nature. Moreover, the extent of the pleasure he receives depends on the extent of the yearning. Thus, the yearning for something determines the extent of the pleasure from it, whether a lot or a little.

In order for His desire to do good, meaning for the creatures to enjoy the delight and pleasures, He created in the creatures a desire and yearning to always crave to receive pleasure. If they cannot satisfy the lack for the thing they want, they suffer, and the extent of the suffering from not being able to satisfy the lack also depends on the extent of the yearning for it.

Sometimes, the suffering becomes such that a person says, “I’d rather die than live,” if I cannot satisfy my deficiency. But this is because of the suffering he suffers from his lack. Naturally, when he receives the satisfaction of his need, of which he said “I’d rather die than live,” what pleasure he feels when he receives the filling!

When speaking of the work, a person must come to such a lack at not having Dvekut [adhesion] with the Creator that he says, “If I cannot achieve Dvekut with the Creator, this absence causes me such torments that I say, ‘I’d rather die than live.’”

This is called a “real desire,” and this desire is worthy of satisfaction. The order of the work is that each time, a yearning for Dvekut awakens in a person, and when he walks on the path toward Dvekut with the Creator, he always checks if he has been granted nearing the Creator. That is, when it says, “And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart,” does he really love the Creator or does he love himself, as well?

This is as our sages said (Sukkah 45), “Anyone who joins for the sake of the Creator with another thing is uprooted from the world.” This means that he prays to the Creator to help him be able to do everything for the sake of the Creator, meaning that his only aim will be to bestow. However, he also adds a little bit of the aim for himself, as well, which is another thing from “for the sake of the Creator.” “For the sake of the Creator” is to bestow, while he, during the prayer that the Creator will help him, wants also for his own sake, which is another thing from the desire to bestow, the complete opposite.

This is why he is “uprooted from the world.” That is, the Creator created the world in order to do good to His creations, and from this world he is uprooted due to lack of equivalence of form. Hence, each time, he criticizes himself to see if he is walking on the right path. If he sees that he is not, it pains him. But the suffering must be to a great extent, meaning that the suffering is the result of the need.

That is, it does not mean that he should suffer, but he must have a need, and the need causes suffering. In other words, the suffering he suffers testifies to the extent of his need.

It follows that the birth of the created beings with a desire to receive was necessary, for without a desire and yearning to receive pleasure, we would not have the concept of pleasure. Thus, why are we not feeling pleasure when we already have a desire and yearning for the pleasure, and we must labor or we will not be given pleasures in corporeality or spirituality?

The answer pertains to the above-mentioned intention to do good to His creations, as it is written (in the book Tree of Life), in its beginning: “The Tzimtzum [restriction] was in order to bring to light the perfection of His deeds.” It explains there (The Study of the Ten Sefirot, Part 1) that it means that “Since there is the matter that every branch wants to resemble the root, when the created beings receive the delight and pleasure from the Creator, there will be shame in them. Hence, there was a correction in favor of the creatures, that if they receive in order to bestow, there will be no shame during the reception of the pleasures.”

Accordingly, we should understand that if we say that the Creator desires to do good to His creations out of largess, from where do the wicked come? This implies that one who does not want to receive the delight and pleasure is called “wicked,” but why is he called “wicked” if he does not want to receive the abundance, and one who does receive the delight and pleasure is called “righteous”?

The matter of observing Torah and Mitzvot [commandments/good deeds] is as our sages said, “I have created the evil inclination; I have created the Torah as a spice.” Through Torah and Mitzvot, the evil will be corrected. But what is the evil? It is that we cannot receive delight and pleasure because of the disparity, which causes us the shame. Because of the shame, we cannot be given, since the shame prevents the completeness of the delight and pleasure. This is why we are not given the delight and pleasure. Hence, they are told, not only are they not given delight and pleasure, but they are also given a name, “wicked.”

We should understand why they are called “wicked” if they cannot receive delight and pleasure. Since the Creator created the world out of largess, it is like a rich man who has everything and does not need a thing. He wishes to give almsgiving to the poor, and since he wants the poor to feel elated when they receive the almsgiving, and not feel any unpleasantness, the rich person said, “I will give the almsgiving, great or small, but on one condition.” That is, the almsgiving, great or small, does not depend on the giver, but on the receiver.

This is so because from the perspective of the Giver, He can give much more than the receiver can attain. That is, the receiver cannot know how much delight and pleasure the Giver can give him, since the receiver does not know what is the possession of the Giver. Instead, to the extent that the receiver tries to demand delight and pleasure, according to what he evaluates and understands that the Giver can give him. And indeed, what the Giver has to give to him is also above man’s intellect, and he cannot evaluate anything above his intellect.

Therefore, he must believe that there are things that are more precious and important than what the receiver can imagine, since all the attainments of the lower one are built on a corporeal, external mind, whereas spirituality is built on an internal mind. It is written about it in the introductions: “Each lower world, with respect to the world above it, is like a seed of mustard compared to an entire world.” For this reason, all the giving of the upper one, which we say is a great or small giving, does not depend on the upper one, but on the ability of the lower one to meet the conditions of the Giver. Only to the extent that the lower one tries to meet the conditions, to that extent the lower one receives. That is, if the lower one can place an aim on great giving, he receives great giving.

And what are the conditions that the Giver wants to give, which the lower one should meet? since the Creator created the world out of largess! That is, He is not deficient, so why does He need the lower one to follow His will? It seems as though the Giver does not want to give to him unless He receives from the receiver something in return.

The answer is that the Creator placed conditions at the time of the giving, that the receiver would not receive the almsgiving because of the yearning of the receiver, although the yearning for the giving that the Giver wants to give is very strong. Still, the Giver wants that on this reason, he should relinquish the reception and receive the almsgiving only because of the pleasure this gives to the Giver, who bestows upon the receiver. Our sages called this, “All your works will be for the sake of heaven and not for your own sake.”

However, we must know that this condition, that the Creator wants everyone to work only for Him, and not for one’s own sake is not in order to benefit the Creator, as though He needs this. Rather, the fact that the creatures work for the sake of the Creator is for the benefit of the creatures! That is, it is so that the creatures will not feel unpleasantness when they receive the almsgiving from the Giver. This is why the Giver placed this condition that they must do everything for the sake of the Creator and not for their own sake.

Now we can understand what we asked, Why are those who do not want to observe Torah and Mitzvot called “wicked”? After all, the Torah and Mitzvot were given in order to cleanse Israel with it, as Rabbi Hanania Ben Akashia says. It follows that one who does not observe Torah and Mitzvot will not receive delight and pleasure.

But, why are they called “wicked”? This is like a great doctor who comes to a hospital where cancer patients, which is a terminal illness, are operated. He says that he has a cure, and if they take the cure, they will all survive. Moreover, everyone will say that now they are enjoying life. That is, they will say that now they see that it was worthwhile to be born in order to receive these pleasures. And afterward, everyone will say wholeheartedly, “Blessed is He who said, ‘Let there be the world,’” since they will be in a world that is all good.

However, there is a group of people who are not letting the doctor come into the hospital. And when the doctor finally enters, after several pleas, and gives his cure to the patients, this group interferes and insists that they should not take the doctor’s cure. The question is, What name should be given to this group, which does not let these patients heal, since the patients are under their control? And it is so because as long as they are sick, this group has provision, but if they were cured from their illness, this group would have no provision. Certainly, they are regarded as wicked!

From aside, each one understands that if the doctor can punish them for not letting the patients heal, the doctor should certainly do so. No one will even think of saying that the doctor is angry at these wicked ones because they are disobeying him, but the doctor is punishing them for the sake of the patients. That is, the doctor wants to heal the patients out of largess and does not need any reward, since the doctor does not need anything that the patients should give him, but he comes to heal the patients only so the patients will feel good and be able to enjoy life. Certainly, one who sees what the doctor does will not say about him that he is doing something for his own sake.

For this reason, when the doctor says that this group, which does not let the patients take the cure, is wicked and deserves punishment, so that through the punishments they will suffer, these sufferings that the wicked will feel will cause them to stop interfering with the patients so that they can take the cure, as everyone understands that this is for the sake of the patients and not for the sake of the doctor.

By this we should interpret that although the Creator created the world out of largess, and the Creator has no lacks that the creatures can give Him something to complement it, since the Creator is complete and has no lacks in Him, still, because He wants the creatures to enjoy life, He sets a condition that the creatures will receive everything because the Creator wants them to receive delight and pleasure, for by this the delight and pleasure will be without any shame. This is called “the completeness of His actions.”

This is the cure that the doctor wants to give to the patients, who are near death, called “the wicked in their lives are called ‘dead.’” Through the cure, called “desire to bestow,” they will achieve Dvekut, and will adhere to the Life of Lives. It therefore follows that those who do not want the patients to receive, do not let them engage in Torah and Mitzvot, by which they can be rewarded with the cure called “desire to bestow.” In these Kelim [vessels], the Creator can place the delight and pleasure, since when they receive the delight and pleasure in these Kelim, they will not lose the Dvekut called “equivalence of form.” Dvekut means that they emerge from the state of “the wicked are called ‘dead,’” and are rewarded with life.

Thus, what does it mean that this group does not want and interfere with the reception of the cure? With what do they interfere? By not letting them observe Torah and Mitzvot, for by this they receive the cure, which is the aim to bestow. Naturally, it is clear why they are considered wicked for interfering with the reception of the cure. That is, the cure by which they will be rewarded with life is called “desire to bestow.” The forces that interfere do not let them take the cure, called “Torah and Mitzvot,” as our sages said, “I have created the evil inclination; I have created the Torah as a spice.”

For this reason, those who interfere, who are considered wicked, deserve punishments. Through the suffering they will feel, they will stop interfering with the reception of the cure. It follows that everything that the Creator does, meaning the punishments, is all for the sake of the created beings.

LESSON

Morning Lesson November 11, 2023

Transcription is made from simultaneous translation, which leaves a possibility for differences in the audio

Part 1:

Rabash. Article No. 5, 1989. What Does It Mean that the Creation of the World Was by Largess?

1. Rav’s Introduction: (0:43) Okay, so we’ll read the article; what does it mean that the creation of the world was by largess, this is on the Creator’s part according to the nature of the created beings, why should it be this way? Interesting, because the relation of the Creator to the created beings we can always add to it more and more aspects and it will shine on the relation that we should have towards the force of the Creator, so please.

Reading Article. (01:35)

2. S. (27:44) The desires given by the Creator, the yearning is the group and the fear, does it come from me or from the Creator?

R. I would say the Creator gives everything, the Creator gives everything.

3. S. (28:12) How to increase the need for Dvekut with the Creator in order to feel suffering when it’s not achieved and what would become a true desire?

R. To increase the need for Dvekut, that’s possible only if I get closer through the friends and from them I get the need.

4. S. (28:56) Why is the Creator not pleased with in our present state?

R. From our state, that’s what the Creator is unhappy with. He wants us to always, always get closer to each other and all together to get closer to Him. Not physically of course but from our emotional efforts.

S. The love of the Creator stems from the love of friends?

R. Yes.

S. And when we enter into the love of friends this is the beginning of the work of the Creator or first there has to be the love of friends and then love toward the Creator?

R. That’s also true.

S. What’s true; first love towards the friends and then towards the Creator?

R. Yes.

S. Or first the revelation of love towards the friends that’s already love towards the Creator?

R. No.

5. S. (30:17) This group of wicked who prevent the created beings from receiving the cure, they themselves first need a cure so they stop being wicked and they would be able to help, to serve the doctor but here in the text says he that they need to receive punishment, seemingly that that’s the cure for them, that that’s their correction. There is no sweeter education they can take so that they will obey the doctor’s will?

R. It depends what you call a cure and what do you call punishment in their place, how do they determine?

6. S. (31:19) With this allegory of the doctor and the patients he asks: What does it mean eternally that the doctor punishes the wicked?

R. The doctor gives the will to receive of the person a sense of punishment and then a person understands that he should think about what path he’s taking and whether he should choose another path.

7. S. (32:16) It turns out that the lack, the need, the demand that we feel, that it’s an opportunity to feel an empty space through the light and that’s our motor, our engine for advancement? And our common lack should be related to bestowal, that we will want to connect in such a way then we will receive a new sense, a new perception above our five senses?

R. That will already be our common quality of bestowal.

S. And in the sense we will feel the sense outside of our body but each one will feel it in the root of his soul and his place?

R. Yes.

8. S. (33:11) Is it right to say that the Creator likes our love for Him?

R. Yes, the Creator has a deficiency to be loved but it’s not that He needs to be loved, rather the created beings need it.

9. S. (33:54) if I am to bring contentment to the Creator at the end it tempts me, so knowing this how can I feel that I am giving contentment to Him knowing that at the end I’m giving contentment to myself?

R. Yes, but bit by bit as you feel that you are bestowing to yourself it pushes you towards correction because you understand that this desire is broken.

10. S. (34:45) Why the created beings must labor in order to bestow if the Creator is in wholeness and He does not need anything? Why is this labor, this effort so important?

R. The labor is important because by the labor the created beings achieve a desire to bestow like that of the Creator and they come from their degree of the receiver to the Creator which is to bestow and then they reach all the goodness; they reach correction.

11. S. (35:57) At what point in the connection with friends can one feel that shame is no longer present?

R. When a person reaches a desire to bestow and he works through the friends toward the Creator then he achieves the desire to bestow.

12. S. (36:54) Why is it important for us to know that the creation of the world was by largess?

R. That the Creator doesn’t need anything from us.

S. What does it mean He doesn’t need anything from us?

R. He doesn’t need anything from us in return.

S. So why did He create us?

R. To give to us, to benefit us.

S. But He needs us to receive this benefit?

R. Yes.

13. S. (37:40) It says here, when a person unites for the sake of heaven with something else, when he adds something more or adds more to it he is uprooted from the world, so how can we ask in such a way that we don’t add any egoistical intentions or desires but only ask for bestowal?

R. If you ask only for the benefit of people but not for your own benefit because the Creator doesn’t need anything, so only for the benefit of people and then you will succeed making a correct request precisely from the Creator and you can receive what He can give to fulfill.

S. This temptations, a Kabbalist who stands before the Creator before the King who can ask these questions and give them all the benefits not to use that but to actually ask to aim, to direct it to the friends in order to give Him contentment, how does a Kabbalist succeed each time in choosing bestowal in such a state?

R. He gets closer to this gradually by building a restriction, a screen and reflected light.

S. The restrictions, screen and reflected light, what is it really, what is it, some energy that comes, the importance of the Creator, the greatness of the Creator?

R. Yes, the importance of the Creator.

14. S. (39:40) This interfering of reception, let’s say of this cure, by not letting them observe as Torah and Mitzvot by this they receive the cure, so I don’t understand this. Can you explain this? By not letting them observe the Torah and Mitzvot, by this they receive the cure, it’s as if it’s a contradiction there.

R. No but they feel that they can’t carry out Torah and Mitzvot because they don’t have the right qualities for it and therefore they have to change their qualities, their nature and then they can carry out Torah and Mitzvot and through that reveal the Creator and achieve the general correction.

S. And is that an active interference?

R. Yes.

S. How do you come, let’s say to an active interference, to do that correctly?

R. To the extent that we advance toward connection between us and we turn to the Creator to help us connect in order to bring Him contentment, ultimately, so to that extent we begin to understand, and get to know, and feel the system.

15. S. (41:48) What can we call a largess of the Creator towards the created beings?

R. The largess of the Creator towards the created beings is in giving them the possibility to attain from such a lowly state, to achieve adhesion with the friends and adhesion with Him, whereas to begin with they were cut off from Him, from the connection with Him and from the friends and that is His largess.

S. Why the suffering?

R. The suffering is not suffering in itself, it’s rather a feeling of lack of correction and so the more we advance, the more our rejections are from rejections from each other and we can make corrections within us.

16. S. (43:32) The article says a lot about the fact that we have received the abundance, the benefit and we have to eliminate the shame, so how is the calculation done of someone who works in bestowal? Does he think about the pleasures he is going to receive or how does he do it?

R. Say the question again.

S. It says a lot in the article about the fact that in Torah and Mitzvot gives pleasure and that you have to receive it in the vessels of bestowal, why does it speak so much about the pleasure? If someone who works in bestowal you shouldn’t be thinking about these pleasures, right?

R. He receives these pleasures in order to bring contentment to the Creator, meaning he deals with them and he’s always in them.

S. How can it be that if he receives such pleasures, how is it possible that they will be taken into account? They shouldn’t be taken into account for someone who’s taking an intention to bestow?

R. So how will he bestow to the Creator? By receiving pleasure, feeling the pleasure, appreciating the pleasure, enjoying the pleasure, all of that will be passed onto the Creator.

S. Yes but it says here that in order to bless the Creator, to feel the pleasures but on the other hand, it says in order to receive the pleasures, like you said, I have to receive because He wants me to receive it.

R. Yes, to bring Him contentment.

S. I don’t know, I can’t imagine to myself how it’s possible to get out of this confusion from all of these upper pleasures. How can it be that I don’t even think about them, how can we build an intention to bestow without thinking of the pleasures?

R. Because what’s important for you is the Creator and the pleasure isn’t what you do with them, it’s just a means to turn to the Creator, to fulfill the Creator. All of this is just a means.

S. Why, let’s say, the feeling of pleasure in some work in the ten for example, or with respect to the world Kli, why immediately afterwards parts that something he receives the pleasure is incorrect, it’s not the pleasure with the right intentions and so on.

R. Because it’s very important for us that our pleasures will be correct, that they won’t be dipped in the Sitra Achra because the pleasures are for our own sake then they go through our own egoism and we’re actually not aiming towards the goal.

17. S. (48:23) This may be a clarification, when we talk about bestowing contentment to the Creator by connecting between us potentially to reach an equivalence of form, my understanding is that the Creator doesn’t have vessels of reception. In the Masach, when we reach the tipping point we have said at one point that when we reach equivalence somehow to the thought of creation where the will to receive and the will to bestow meet or emanate from this point, so are we reaching the equivalence of form to the thought of the Creator and is that different than the Creator, the thought of creation?

R. The thought of creation is to benefit the created beings and the Creator is a force, the central quality in creation. Of course these are two things.

18. S. (49:42) In the text it mentions that the wicked will receive some form of punishment. The first question is, are we talking about a specific friend that is wicked within the ten or is it the whole ten that is wicked?

R. I didn’t understand the end of the sentence.

S. He’s asking if there’s a specific friend who is wicked or the whole ten is like that?

R. That’s a question. I can’t give you one rule of thumb for it, it depends on what state you’re in.

19. S. (50:42) He writes that if the lower one can put an intention on great giving he receives great gifts. The question is what are these great givings or small givings, what’s the difference?

R. To the extent that it’s important to him, that’s it.

S. In order to open up the passage for the abundance it’s not enough, a person should also depict what he wants to happen as a result of the abundance being passed on or not?

R. One should try to depict it, yes. What will he have when he passes the abundance.

20. S. (51:39) The article met with great difficulty from the inner scrutinies. I understand that a large part of my prayers for the working of the world etcetera stem from the fact that I actually want to see them living like a herd, without any problems and the understanding is that we actually live in order to bestow. How should I change the direction of my prayer, the direction of my relation from this understanding? Now I feel that actually my prayer was just for us to live like sheep, not for me because I can’t live like that but what prayer should it be for the whole world? We want this all to come home safely etcetera but not in order for everyone to live like animals, you know peacefully but in order for this unity to cause work. How do I change that in me? The article managed to create a large part of this but how can I keep this from here on, please.

R. Are there answers to that within our friends? Yes or no? Raise your hands if you can provide an answer. No. Okay, we’ll continue. We’ll see about that later on.

21. S. (53:34) It says that a deficiency is when a person should receive but he cannot receive. What does it mean that he cannot receive?

R. He can’t because he doesn’t have a screen; to receive requires a screen.

22. S. (54:26) There’s no doubt that the people of Israel were chosen for their role to serve the Creator in order to pass the whole abundance to the created beings, to the whole world. I just want to understand, why is it so difficult for us to accept this role? We see in our history that when we agreed to take on this role we saw that in our history we had ups and downs and only when we truly get close, we get a little bit of insight that we have to serve the Creator. Why is it so difficult for us, why are we so stubborn?

R. Because we don’t know what we need to do, what role the Creator prepared for us and what we’re supposed to do, we don’t understand any of it. We just have to be willing to accept this role upon ourselves as it comes to us from Mount Sinai, from the Creator, from Moses. Other than that we don’t need to have any issue with it, just a simple preparation, willingness that we’re ready. “We shall do and we shall hear.” First we do, and then we understand why it’s so and what it tells us.

23. S. (56:09) How can we connect the mixed multitude with people who yearn for correction?

R. I didn’t understand what he’s asking.

S. I’m asking how can we connect the mixed multitude with those people who do yearn for connection, how can we put them together?

R. We can’t connect them together, we have to correct the mixed multitude.

S. How do we do that?

R. That’s not up to us right now, you want to get into things that we don’t have the preparation for. Check – when you learn, learn only the stages that we can understand and prepare ourselves for and fulfill, one after the other.

24. S. (57:24)The Creator always sends us signs for how to get rid of the suffering and pain in our lives that the Creator Himself caused but we simply don’t know how to read these signs. Now the question: how can we learn to understand the Creator’s language, only by uniting in the ten or through the personal suffering of each one of us?

R. Say the question again.

S. How can we learn to understand the Creator’s language? Is it only through our suffering in the ten, uniting in the ten or through the personal suffering of each one of us?

R. Through the suffering we won’t be able to learn, only by uniting because the language of the Creator is the language of bestowal. Therefore, the more we unite and we will try to scrutinize these manners of bestowal for each other and all of us together, by this we will get to know the Creator, understand the Creator.

25. S. (59:01) How is it possible to reach a true desire if my desire is still broken?

R. Through the corrections, by the reforming light all of us will reach a matching congruence with the Creator.

26. S. (59:39) Who is the provider of the gift, who creates it? Is it the Giver or the receiver because I understand that the giving force is like infinite and static; it seems like there’s a gift created according to the need. Is it me creating it or Him?

R. Him.

S. But the giving is something static and infinite, it’s not suitable, compatible to a certain state is it?

R. The giving is, no, it’s the light of Ein Sof that is ready for you.

S. So it’s adapted to a specific state or I create it?

R. It’s suitable for all the states.

27. S. (01:00:34) I heard you once say that the Creator has a deficiency to be loved, that we have to love Him. Does the Creator have a deficiency to benefit us, does He lower himself to our degree?

R. Yes, the Creator is everywhere, including in our level.

28. S. (01:01:47) When we try to love the friends, sometimes we feel resistance because the friend doesn’t see that and that makes us feel suffering. Does the Creator feel this kind of suffering, when He wants to bestow and can’t?

R. It’s impossible to answer that, we don’t feel the Creator. When we will reach the feeling of the Creator we will be able to talk about it.

29. S. (01:02:48) Help us understand, a small desire or big desire that the article speaks about can be different in different states or..?

R. It can be the same desire, yes.

S. And in what state is our desire big and what state is it small?

R. It depends on the circumstances.

30. S. (01:03:26) The true measure of the bad deficiency appears in a person before a person turns to His help?

R. Yes.

S. Is that at once or several times?

R. It can be several times.

31. S. (01:03:54) According to the article, is the Creator the doctor and if so how can we justify the doctor that gave us the disease to begin with?

R. He didn’t give us the disease, the illness. Ask the question again.

S. Is the Creator the doctor and if so, how is it possible to justify the doctor that caused the disease to begin with?

R. He created the evil inclination that is true and He gave us the possibility to become separated from the evil inclination and instead of it to shift to the good inclination. This is why we cannot turn to the Creator with some accusation, it’s His fault because we have the evil inclination in us. He only wants to take us through several states so that we will be able to feel all the goodness in creation. Without us going through that, creation seems to us as all bad but after we go through these few states in creation, creation already seems to us as all good.

32. S. (01:05:56) How do we check whether we were awarded with adhesion with the Creator?

R. How do we check if we were awarded with adhesion with a Creator? By not thinking about anything or anyone except for the Creator and all of our actions are only in order to fill Him.

S. How to go through the states and the corrections correctly, to not have resistance from the friends in the form of suffering?

R. Again.

S. Friends asked before and you said that we feel the suffering because we don’t go through corrections. How to go through corrections correctly so that we don’t have the rejection from the friends and don’t feel it as suffering?

R. We must feel these repulsions, otherwise we won’t be able to detect where else we have qualities that we need to correct. Therefore such states must exist, the evil inclination must be revealed otherwise we won’t know what we need to correct.

S. How do we approach this desire to be servants of the Creator, what is the reason for wanting to be a servant of the Creator and nothing else?

R. These are your appeals to the group and to the Creator.

33. S. (01:08:11) We have an opportunity now to delve into the article and get a greater, more general kind of deficiency. How to do it now?

R. Only to connect.

34. S. (01:08:47) There are a few quotes from the text and then I’ll ask a question. Deficiency is when a person needs to receive and if he doesn’t have the ability to receive this is called a deficiency and to bestow is not a deficiency. Then it says that the yearning is given to the person by the Creator and according to the extent of the yearning he can achieve the deficiency. The desire to always enjoy is what he created in us and if one cannot fulfill this deficiency then he feels a suffering, meaning suffering appears in the person when he doesn’t receive the fulfillment and this is called “I’m better off dead.” The question is this, it’s such a loop the Creator created, so that we don’t blame Him for what’s coming to us: the deficiency, the lack of fulfillment, this desire for pleasure that develops in a person, as if it doesn’t come from the Creator, it comes from himself. With all of this loop, how does the pleasure pass through the person when he feels like he’s working in the group and he receives no fulfillment? How does this passageway work or transition from desire and yearning to fulfillment, to have to receive this connection between the bestowing and the inability to do that?

R. I’ll tell you, only through connection with the friends, when we try to reach being one body, as one man with one heart. In that heart they will feel the answer, the solution and not in any other way.

35. S. (01:11:13) Question about the pleasures: you said that a person needs to receive the pleasure and feel it, appreciate it and enjoy it. The question is whether the pleasure is actually a result of the work or that one first works with a pleasure and then there’s a result of that work?

R. Certainly first there is work and then there is the payment, the reward, the answer for the work.

S. So the pleasure is the outcome?

R. Yes.

S. When we say that a person receives pleasure or works with vessels of reception in order to bestow, does that mean that he receives from the Creator resistance, coarseness, that’s what he gets? Then the more he works with this coarseness, with the restriction and screen and reflected light, then as a result the pleasure is what he gives to the Creator?

R. Yes.

36. S. (01:12:28) The doctor wants to heal us, he doesn’t want us to be doctors but the Creator wants equivalence of form. Is our disease the disparity of form?

R. I didn’t understand the end of it.

S. What exactly does the Creator want from us? We learned that it’s equivalence of form.

R. He wants us to connect to such an extent, to be one as He is one, then one receives One, so that we will adhere to each other; all of the created beings as one with the Creator, Who is One. 

37. S. (01:13:58) As your students we are exposed to two realities, one that appears externally and one that we learn about every day. What’s the right response for one to whom the Creator exposed these two layers, how does he study the Creator through that?

R. It was always this way for the Kabbalists, they lived in this world with all of those around them and they were also connected between them to a certain extent. In the entrance to the upper world it was always this way, there’s nothing new about it.

S. But how from these two levels they extracted the most correct study of the Creator and the purpose of creation?

R. I don’t understand, who..?

S. In connecting these two realities and learning from that about the Creator, is that the right way to work, this attempt to study Him this way?

R. I don’t understand what you’re talking about, it’s like we’re not speaking about the same thing.

S. A reality outside is revealed to me, an external reality and there’s the reality I study about every day in the morning lesson. The attempt to connect them and to project, to understand the reality on the outside, is this a correct attempt?

R. We don’t do that, when did you see that we’re doing this: when I see what happens sometimes or always, what’s happening before us on the outside through our five senses and how we want to connect that with the five senses of the soul?

S. Yes, to understand what is revealed to me in my five external senses, it’s also a teaching from the Creator, He’s educating me this way.

R. Where did you see that, that he’s explaining something like that to us?

S. I asked you yesterday if every situation that’s revealed to me is as if the Creator’s speaking. You told me everything is speaking of the Creator.

R. Right, but from this you’re taking some kind of yourself and turning yourself into a new observation of reality.

S. Should our relation be that there’s only one reality, no other realities, only one reality?

R. Yes.

S. So the external reality I don’t understand it right now, I can’t interpret it?

R. It’s fake, it’s not even a reality.

S. Yeah, it’s not a reality, it’s a process that’s happening which I don’t understand. Like I see a fruit on the tree and I see it as bitter and I don’t understand the process, I don’t know the stages, so there’s no point dealing with it. I need to relate only to one reality, ours, in the study, in the ten, and the imaginary, external reality I just have to do there what I have to. Is this how I should relate to it?

R. Yes, right, that’s what we learn and that’s how we’re trying to exist.

S. When we feel a certain repulsion from a friend, how can I see it as a gift from the Creator?

R. You can’t see it because you’re not in the same picture. You can’t connect the friend and you and the Creator together.

S. The minute I can’t, there’s a way to look at it intellectually and correctly, a way that I can work with it?

R. Yes.

S. How?

R. Try.

S. The question is, if I am repelled by a friend because of something, is it a quality that is in me that I don’t want to see so I see it in the friend?

R. Yes.

S. And the Creator is showing it to me as augmented, increased so it will take my attention?

R. That you will distance yourself from that quality yourself.

38. S. (01:19:33) The deficiency and the yearning for the Creator in the yearning to receive the medicine, is it also a deficiency or is it an incomplete deficiency?

R. The yearning to accept the remedy is like yearning for the Creator.

S. Sometimes a friend feels a very powerful deficiency for correction but then it disappears, so it’s an incomplete deficiency?

R. Yes, probably, yes.

39. S. (01:20:20) Corporeal pleasure, when it disappears it’s as if the engine that pushes me to the goal disappears. From where can we get the feeling of the spiritual pleasure when we don’t feel the corporeal pleasure?

R. We are coming closer to it through an increasing connection between us and gradually it organizes a vessel that in it we can receive new degrees.

40. S. (01:21:33) So I guess besides Himself, the Creator wants to cancel everything, so is this love?

R. The Creator wants to cancel everything except for Him and us being in complete adhesion.

S. I don’t know, my evil constantly tells me the Creator is the biggest liar, I’ll tell you straight.

R. Why and what is He deceiving you?

S. Look at all of reality, the whole system, how should we understand it? There’s no completeness. I don’t know, I have no words.

R. It’s very good that you’re in such a state, you’ll be in it another day or two and then it will be clarified and you’ll have new awareness.

S. You speak beautifully all the time. I’m young but I’m smart, too, and I think there’s no answer. I don’t see an end to the road, do you understand?

R. The end of the path is revealing the Creator in equivalence of qualities with Him. That’s it, to be like Him, that’s the end of the path.

S. But it’s written in the article if I don’t give you water all day long. Water is the most important, the most basic desire. If I don’t give you water and you want water, it’s most important if I give you water, it’s the biggest gift from me to you. So is this bestowal?

R. L’chaim.

41. S. (01:24:03) A few days ago you answered the friends who asked, who is man, and you said he’s the son of the Creator. The question is, there’s such a deep meaning in this wholeness, that this wholeness created us so incomplete. We don’t hear, we don’t see, is there some deep significance to it?

R. Do you have children? How were they born? They don’t see anything, they don’t hear anything, they’re nothing and afterwards they grow.

S. It’s written here regarding charity or alms giving, is this a first phase in creation and then everything will change?

R. Yes.