HESED: TIKKUN CHATZOT תקון חצות – LESSON WITH RAV MICHAEL LAITMAN
Lesson on the topic of “The Ruin as an Opportunity for Correction”
Morning Lesson July 28, 2022 Transcription
Transcription is made from simultaneous translation which leaves a possibility for differences in the audi
The Ruin as an Opportunity for Correction – Selected Excerpts from the Sources. #50
1. Rav’s Introduction: Yes, on the topic of the ruin it is not enough that we feel that we are disconnected from the Creator, from the friends and we want to connect. The question is for whom do we want to connect? Do we want to reach a state where we need the Creator to give Him contentment and it is not that I regret it and that I don’t pay attention to it, that I regret that I don’t feel good, that I feel bad, that I don’t have a good mood, that I don’t receive what I was dreaming to receive, what I thought spirituality is but rather I need to pay attention that the sorrow should be precisely the sorrow of divinity. Shechina means to make room for the revelation of the Creator which means that I think for the benefit of the Creator, to give Him contentment and not God forbid to give me contentment
I don’t think about myself. It could be that we have such people, I hear it sometimes, that they cry. They are actually crying for themselves, how come it is not good for them, how come they’re not receiving, how come they’re not advancing, how come they don’t have a connection with the Creator; meaning, for their own benefit. This is bad but rather we have to pay attention to what is the quality of our deficiency. What is it that we truly want to achieve, what do we depict as spirituality so please pay attention to that: that if I regret over spirituality that I should check myself precisely on the spot. What is spirituality for me? For whom do I intend spirituality? Then I would be able to correct myself into a more correct direction.
Reading item 50 (02:59): “The whole foundation is…” Twice
2. R. (05:05) This means that our work is specifically to identify what it is that we are lacking in order to reach holiness, the degree of the Creator, bestowal, and if we don’t have it then we have a prior deficiency. How come we don’t have a deficiency to discover holiness?.
3. S. (05:44) A person descends in order to raise sparks or is he brought down?
R. He’s lowered. This means that they add to him a will to receive, in other words.
S. What does it mean to scrutinize into holiness?
R. As much as he’s capable, in that state that he’s in, to aim himself to the benefit of the Creator. That he wants to correct himself for the benefit of the Creator.
4. S. (06:28) What is the meaning that there is no empty place in spirituality, no vacant place?
R. There is no absence, what does it say? As we learned there’s no absence in spirituality. There is no absence, it is not an empty place but rather there’s no absence in spiritually. Nothing disappears even though things do disappear from our sensation, from our senses they do not truly disappear but rather, only for a time, they disappear from our senses only.
5. S. (07:28) It says here that a person needs to ask that all of his thoughts and desires would be only to benefit the Creator. It is probably talking about a very concrete request, our request is not expressed through the prayer. If so, what concretely has to be in the prayer so that I will know, that I will understand, that I will feel that these thoughts benefit the Creator and those others do not benefit the Creator?
R. The most important is the feeling, the feeling, and in my feeling as much as I feel, the way that I feel, even a baby feels, and an old person or grownup feels each one according to their sensation, so whatever I feel this is what I raise to the Creator. I cannot do it any other way. Whatever I have, the feeling in the heart as we call it, the heart means the place that feels. In truth it has nothing to do with the heart but lets say.
So I raise that feeling to the Creator and I want that in that place instead of me feeling all kinds of emotions, I want to feel only one thing, how much I am capable of doing good to Him. This is what I want and I am asking that He will arrange for me the understanding, the feeling, the opportunity and everything that I need so in my feeling I will do good to Him and if I could then I would ask that I wouldn’t even feel that, that I’m doing good for Him because this could spoil my effort that maybe I will do good for that purpose and maybe it would cause me pride but at least to do good to the Creator. This is what we need to check.
S. We can be more precise. We introduce into the prayer every day that the friends will have no problems. We are talking about a problem that the friend has and we ask for this problem to go away. How to clothe the words or the feeling so that these requests will go from the current request to a request that would be to benefit the Creator, because for now it sounds like it is for the benefit of the friends.
R. You can say that we are asking that the Creator will correct us, each one of us and especially our friend who is in a more difficult state than everyone. That we want to be corrected and to connect and from our whole common heart we want to ascribe ourselves to the Creator.
6. S. (11:25) When we are in a descent they add additional will to receive to us. How do we use that will to receive to think of giving more to the Creator?
R. Sometimes we are in a descent but we don’t quite feel that it is a descent. It is a state in between like in a fog, it is foggy and then we need to discover a deeper descent in order to start to rise from it. That helps, that helps.
7. S. (12:29) What does it mean in excerpt 50 when a person has to descend and collect his sparks of sanctity?
R. This is all of our work in this world. We exist in this world in all kinds of forms of the will to receive in order to become incorporated with them, to become immersed in them and to rise and again to become immersed and again to rise and again to be incorporated and again to rise more and more and each time to raise our impressions from the will to receive to a prayer for connection between us and in that way we then connect and raise it until we get from above the reforming light.
8. S. (13:46) What are we missing that we do not understand what it is to give contentment to the Creator?
R. That doesn’t matter but if you just think about it already you feel that it is not in you. This is how I started to speak today. This is how I started the lesson that we usually don’t pay attention that we are constantly praying for ourselves. How come it’s not good for me? How come I cannot bestow to the friends and how come I cannot connect with them and why, why, why, about me. But what for? That in the end I will discover bestowal to the Creator, in order to be with Him in equivalents of form in order to connect with Him and then we truly change our direction.
This is why we need to ask for a correction so it will truly be in order to bestow. There is no word or thought or a request that doesn’t end with that. That we want to bestow contentment to Him and for Him and if we are correcting ourselves it is only for that. Don’t forget about that. Even mechanically when we still do not understand what does this do, what does this cause, we have to turn in this way towards whatever we exist in, towards each and every state we are in. This is called to raise the sparks, this little bit of light that exists in our state, because the Creator caused this state, so this little bit of light to raise it back to Him. Okay?
9. S. (16:18) It says that a person asks that all of his thoughts and desires be for the benefit of the Creator and then immediately comes a picture of lowliness, why is the answer of the Creator like this?
R. That he will pray to be raised from the lowliness, so now he has an opportunity to take another step forward.
S. Is this lowliness a correction?
R. Lowliness is not a correction, it is a state that we receive. The correction is that I ask the Creator to come out of the lowliness in order to thank Him.
10. S. (17:07) You mentioned in the opening question the purpose of the study, why we want to attain spirituality. I came due to the question of Baal HaSulam, the bitter question about the meaning of life. Should I adjust my intention after all this time?
R. Yes, maybe you have other questions that are more important for you so whatever is important, this is what you should ask.
Reading excerpt 51 (17:45): “One should pray for…” Twice
11. S. (21:00) We see here how much we have to be precise in our request, that is, if a person feels that he lacks, then first of all what exactly is he lacking? He’s lacking the Creator to come closer, to be revealed. No. He needs to change it so he wants to get the strength, not exactly the Creator or the revelation of something but he needs to receive strength in order to connect with the friends, to bestow together with them to the Creator so the Creator will receive it and will enjoy from that; Meaning, here one has to start arranging in himself, in his request, the process of what he is doing out of this deficiency that the Creator has sent him from above. How does he process it? Okay?
12. S. (22:20) What helps a person to make his demand, his prayer more precise?
R. It helps him scrutinize himself, what exactly is he lacking, what exactly he should talk to the Creator about so that he will have the right connection with the Creator so that in that connection the Creator begins to develop to him the right connection, the second time, the third time the fourth time. One after the other.
S. How does a person who is constantly thinking about himself, how does he bestow to the Creator? How does he refine his prayer more and more until he will think about doing good to the Creator? What helps him to refine the prayer moment to moment?
R. By feeling deficiency, well that’s on the one hand, the vessels in which he feels and in the vessels where he thinks, not in the heart but in the mind, there he needs to scrutinize what exactly should I do with what I lack? Is it the right deficiency or maybe I need to process it? For whom? In order to do what and so on. When he scrutinizes these things, then he returns to the Creator with a different request. I want this deficiency that you are giving me, I want to turn it to the connection with the friends and together with them to turn it to you, to serve you our common deficiency so that you will be able to bestow in it and in this way you will be able to enjoy from us.
S. Can there be an emotional response to such a prayer?
R. When we start to arrange this feeling, bit by bit we reach an emotion.
13. S. (24:44) We say that we should not pray for bad states to appear. What does Rabash mean when he writes that one should pray for the ruin of the Temple?
R. I pray for or about the ruin of the temple, that I want to establish it, raise it. The Creator is giving me building blocks from which I will build a house, the way children build a puzzle with the pieces that I assemble a picture from. This is how I see the whole of reality that in my eyes in all of my senses it is broken and I ask from the Creator that he will build it and he will put it together and he will arrange it as a complete reality, why? Because then he can be revealed in this complete reality and he can enjoy from the created beings.
14. S. (26:14) It is not always that a person falls into such a descent that he can scrutinize what the Creator wants from him. What can a person, specifically in that state, do? When he doesn’t understand what the Creator demands from Him.
R. He should ask about that. To scrutinize this with the Creator. Go ahead, ask, plead, cry; this is what you need to do.
S. The question is that in this state the person doesn’t know what to turn to, what to demand of the Creator?
R. It doesn’t matter, it doesn’t matter. You need to reach a state where the Lord your God will not be foreign to you, so that the Creator will not be foreign to you. He should be the closest to you because indeed there is nobody who is closer to you than the Creator. There is none who is like Him in that, so go ahead and start asking to come closer, to be close to Him.
15. S. (27:49) If I perceive that I’m entering a descent, a deep descent, what is more recommended, should I ask the Creator to release me from the pain or that he would allow me to perceive, to grasp the depths of this descent and why I received it?
R. Repeat please.
S. Let’s say I feel a small descent, or a greater descent and some despair and confusion. What do you recommend that I do personally, pray to the Creator to save me, to take that suffering away from me or second option, that he would clarify to me why I received this descent?
R. I will ask the Creator that he will save me from this suffering? So then It is an egoistic prayer. Do good to me. This is how each and everyone can pray and from that we don’t get nearness to the Creator. If I ask from him that he will explain to me why this happening to me and where and how that too is considered that I’m not asking for the most important thing for me because He knows why He’s giving it to me and why it is precisely this way and not that way, it is none of my business. I should use whatever I have in order to get closer to Him so I ask for nearing, there’s nothing else that is left.
16. S. (30:15) In the excerpt he speaks about the insolence of asking and being cautious before the Creator. On the other hand, feeling close as close as can be. So how can one ask if not with insolence?
R. That you are doing it in order to bestow. That you are asking that the Creator will help you. So whatever the Creator is revealing to you as a deficiency, he is revealing to you a deficiency that you can invert it to be in order to bestow to the Creator. So if upon this deficiency you ask for nearness to the Creator in order to connect with Him then, if you want to connect to Him so that He will be good to you, so that you will know and feel so it is better that you do not ask and if you are asking in order to get closer to Him and to give Him content by that, that by that you need to bring closer the group not only yourself but also the group because alone you cannot bestow.
This is the difference between the desire to get closer which is egoistic, that then you are thinking about getting close alone or the spiritual altruistic desire to get closer. That you want to bring everyone closer and then the Creator will help. That is we, bit by bit, start to understand that the correct request which the Creator can answer has to be organized nicely and correctly and with wisdom.
17. S. (32:17) In your words it sounds clear and simple. I would like to realize it right now. It is not clear what I will do now? What is the next step? What is the difficulty? It sounds so simple and on the other hand so distant.
R. The difficulty is only in persistence. That I do not run away from arranging for myself this line of action.
18. S. (33:08) Why do I always forget the Creator in the study and get distant as I work? How can I overcome this?
R. Try again and again to go back to it and to ask of Him that He will also give you the discernments. That he will hold you by the hand, or by the ear, doesn’t matter how, so you will feel that you will have to constantly be connected to Him and aimed towards Him.
Reading (34:25) RABASH, Article No. 18 (1989), “What Is, ‘There Is No Blessing in That Which Is Counted,’ in the Work?” Twice
19. S. (38:06) Why should I pray that the Creator will open my eyes and I will attain the greatness of the Creator for what, for what purpose?
R. So you will be able to make corrections. How will you do it? Do you have no fear, come on do you bring the energy the motivation to feel that the Creator is great and to that extent you would be able to be start to that not that you wish to derive pleasure from his greatness. Rather we wish to see that he’s great so you will have the strength and the energy to bestow. Where will you take the energy to bestow from?
S. From the greatness of the Creator? That’s in that take away from the person?
R. No, the freedom of the greatness of the Creator comes only to a person after he can use it correctly in order to bestow.To turn the greatness of the Creator to the power to bestow by a person. He has no other choice. We are not an infinitely mobile machine. We can make actions only when we have fuel for it. Therefore the Creator reveals greatness.to us then we can do something. But when does he reveal it? When we truly want to do inorder to bestow. First we want to do it. Then he reveals himself . We have an opportunity to do it..
S. The quality of the greatness of the Creator, it grows as a result of us coming closer?
R. Yes, also from that. Don’t worry we will go through these stages until we have a clear path.
20. S. (40:31) What is the difference between believing the greatness of the Creator and recognizing the greatness of the Creator?
R. For the time being it is the same, one of the same.
S. Isn’t that like two stages?
R. I still don’t want to talk about it. Maybe the next lesson or a few lessons from now.
21. S. (41:20) You said we have to reach the correct request which the Creator can answer. It has to be organized nicely correctly and with wisdom. On the other hand we know that He hears the prayer of every mouth, in every state you can come to a simple request from the heart every request from the heart even whistling. The question is what is the connection between a simple request coming from the heart and one in a prayer that is well put g scrutinized?
R. It is not like we require intellect for it. Rather it has to be felt deeply,inside our vessels a feeling in our heart. When it is felt in the heart, if it is truly felt, correctly with the right depth then we can express it clearly. Because whatever is in one’s heart the Creator wants our hearts, He’s calling in all our hearts.
S. How can I make sure that the request is coming from the depth of the heart?
R. It doesn’t depend on us, how much we want to approach the truth. Then in this way the Creator will call on the hearts.
S. What does it mean that the Creator needs a well arranged, well phrased, correct prayer ?
R. It is how much we need it, so it will be clear to us where we are, where we are going, what are we demanding? It’s all relative to the person. The Creator does not need any of that.
S. Where is the common prayer? It sounds like the prayer of the individual opposite the upper force?
R. The common prayer is when all of us in the same group work in the same direction, toward the same direction.
22. S. (43:21) How nevertheless to shift from this constant, persistent request for myself on my behalf to a request that is for the Creator, to his benefit for him, how to shift from me to him? You say it has to come out of faith, so we need to have some faith in the Creator, and some feeling of the Creator.
R. This comes to the person slowly, gradually he will discover the time after time when he’s trying until becomes clear to him how to arrange all these impressions into the correct approach, the correct feeling, the correct understanding, when all of it is aimed at the Creator, about a certain state that he depicts for himself, this is construction. It is what we refer to as the building, the construction of the Shechina, we wish to raise divinity from the dust and we turn to the Creator for help.
S. The intention for the Creator, it is not just some thought that I’m operating for the Creator, but rather it is a feeling of this force of this Shechina so that I will not feel myself but I will feel the Shechina. How do we incorporate in this force, how do I not feel myself but I feel this force?
R. Try it more and more each time, try, this will take time. I know people who started a few years ago and today they are the beginning of the correct request to the Creator, the beginning.
S. This force that we want to be incorporated in, and to do good, to bestow to the Creator where does this force exist between the friends in the ten?
R. Where is it? Between our feelings in order to bestow, when we reach in order to bestow it will be clear to us where is this force concealed.
23. S. (46:13) How to reach this deep personal pain and for the fact that holiness is in the state of ruin and lowliness and nobody’s paying attention to it?
R. That’s what we are discussing right now. We feel ruin, we wish to come out of it, we aim it at the Creator, we want to connect for Him, for His sake, we want to receive corrections for Him, so we will connect in practice and in our connection in practice, He will be able to reveal himself and then He enjoys us, and then we enjoy that we are building a vessel for the Creator we bring Him contentment and for that to happen.
24. S. (47:17) What is the role of joy in turning to the Creator when I start to process the lack?
R. What is the role of?
S. The role of joy in turning to the Creator when I start to begin the deficiency?
R. It is not so clear to me what is the role of joy? The purpose of the joy is that I cannot bestow to the Creator or ask anything of Him without Joy. The plea, turning to the Creator needs to be always out of joy of someone to turn to, I have what to turn with, because it’s not always that this deficiency is justified, is connected to my friends, and we are seemingly together, or I am for everyone, but there’s already a true appeal to the Creator and I am in joy, it is certain that if I plea is correct I will receive an answer.
25. S. (49:15) If the Creator doesn’t need a correct arrangement of our prayers, then why do the lower ones need that, He knows all of our thoughts and our desires?
R. The correct order of the request is showing us how prepared we are to receive the fulfillment from Him.
26. S. (49:47) The intention to bestow, we attain it from the sum total of all of our efforts to connect, or can it happen every moment? What can make this difference?
R. On the one hand, this says that the salvation of the Lord is as a blink of an eye, it can happen each and every moment, and we cannot say what moment is more suitable. On the other hand, I should always work towards reaching that so it will open up, so each and every moment I will have an opportunity to bestow to the Creator. That’s what I want to happen, not that I come to it, rather that I am constantly with the tendency towards it with the demand for it, a prayer for it.
The great Kabbalists later asked to be thrown out from all the degrees so they would have another opportunity to pray, to bestow, to offer the Creator the vessel for His enjoyment. It is like a little baby who gives great pleasure to his parents and as they grow up and these babies become toddlers and then children and then all the children we derive less and less pleasure from them. We are the same with the Creator. Do not look down on the fact that we are like little babies because with our smallest actions the Creator will receive a great deal of pleasure from them. So, we need to come to it, we need to bestow to the Creator already right now.
27. S. (51:54) If you could please tell us what is the difference between the state where I’m asking for the collective or am I incorporated into the prayer for a collective that exists already?
R. There is no such thing that you already receive a connection with the society that is ready, that is great, corrected. It is all measured always relative to the person who joins it, so even if you join a society that is already entirely incorporated with the greatest Kabbalists, you still have to get to know them even on the lowest degree in order to connect to them, and they towards you will have to act like like towards a little one, the way we do it in this world to little children, although in spirituality we do it intentionally in many cases. Do not worry, the important thing is that each and everyone do what is required from him.
28. S. (53:32) What does it mean to use the group of ten with the friends, is the ten a reflection of the upper world?
R. What we receive in our corrected ten, this is called the upper world.
29. S. (54:06) Since connection is the most important thing in the spiritual work, should not our prayer be to ask only that every day and nothing else for the Creator’s contentment?
R. I cannot say about all the instances, there are many prayers, many requests, according to, organized by type, by kind, by style but you are learning the general broad strokes.
30. S. (54:52) If a person in his heart wants to receive for himself but with his mouth and his thoughts he tries to constantly get back to it that he wants to bestow contentment, does that work on the Creator?
R. The Creator understands, feels, sees, hears everything in a person. He includes our entirety, all of us, it is important that we want Him to hear from all of us, because it obligates us to make preparations for the prayer, and the preparations are first and foremost the connection. Increase the connection and you’ll see the quality of your prayers will increase as well and how much, to what extent we can turn to the Creator with greater intensity and then the Creator is felt in you and he answers.
31. S. (56:05) There is a certain covenant here between the person and the group, so maybe there is fear of not being able to hold on to that task. How to handle it?
R. I don’t know I cannot speak in this way, the covenant has to be between a man and his group just like in every society, even not the spiritual ones, when we accept the person to study with us, to connect with us, we have to check how serious he is, but when he is serious and accepted in the society, we have to relate to him as if he is with us as one man with one heart, and in this way we raise our general heart to the Creator.
Reading (57:42) Excerpt # 52 “When one prays for the exile of the Shechina…“ Twice
32. S. (01:01:03) Here it says that we need to ask for the general public. What is the difference, we sometimes ask for the connection of the ten, sometimes we ask from the connection of the ten for the whole world?
R. It doesn’t matter for the time being, as much as you can.
Reading (01:01:57) Excerpt #53 “One who is rewarded with repentance…”
33. R. (01:03:36) Yes, we do not have additional questions so let’s read number 54.
Reading (01:03:47) Excerpt #54 “Hears a prayer. There is a question…”
34. R. (01:04:26) So there’s no questions about that as well. Let’s have a workshop: What conditions do we have in order to organize our correct request to the Creator?
WSQ: What conditions do we have in order to organize our correct request to the Creator?
35. R. (01:07:01) What is the summary, the conclusion of what we just learned from these excerpts? What is the conclusion of what we read? What did we get from the lesson?
36. S. (01:10:21) What does it mean that the ten is going in the same direction, does this mean that the ten has the same deficiency?
R. The ten is pretty close, they can’t express it right now, but they are very close in thought and in the understanding of things.
37. S. (01:10:41) When we scrutinize the sparks of sanctity does it mean that we are reconnecting the broken pieces of the soul?
R. Certainly yes.
38. S. (01:10:58) How can I ask to be close to the Creator if I’m the opposite of Him because He made me so?
R. He made you in this way to be opposite of Him, but to the extent that you ask to be like Him, and he makes you like Him, to a small extent, to that extent, through the friends you connect to the Creator. The Creator is already present between you except that you cannot feel it because you are not connected enough and to the extent that you begin to connect, you discover him according to NRNHY.
39. S. (01:11:41) What does it mean that we should feel and connect and feel a deeper descent?
R. If we yearn for bestowal from connection with the Creator then we begin to feel what is bestowal.
40. S. (01:12:11) How can I bring the ten closer to the Creator from a lack that is revealed in me, if this deficiency is not related to the ten but it’s something corporeal?
R. So the time will come and then it will become spiritual. Later we will see that there are no corporeal deficiencies, it is all spirituality.
41. S. (01:12:42) Does a person scrutinize the right deficiency and build an appeal to the Creator or does the Creator do it according to the person’s request?
R. The person asks, the Creator understands what he’s asking for and what he needs to give to a person.
42. S. (01:13:08) What is it that the blessing is not something that is counted in the work, it is written, when I will be able to delight the Creator, the question is, how can the Creator, the force of the bestowal, enjoy, in which vessels?
R. The Creator enjoys our vessels when we begin to receive his revelation.
43. S. (01:13:36) You are saying, you talk more than once about the fact that thoughts are truly a spiritual force, how can we protect ourselves from bad thoughts from others so we do not harm anyone, but rather always do good to the Creator, is it possible?
R. It is possible, it is possible.
S. How to protect ourselves from those bad thoughts?
R. To be in good thoughts, very simple. Do not get into all of the bad thoughts, from the get-go be in the good thoughts and don’t come out of there.
44. S. (01:14:23) What is your advice if a person demands from the Creator for scrutiny but he does not get any answer?
R. The truth the Creator provides an answer, a person cannot feel that he received an answer.
45. S. (01:14:49) What is the right way to speak to the Creator?
R. The right way to speak to the Creator is from the bottom of your heart. If I open my heart to the friends and they enter my heart, then altogether what I have is my ability to speak to the Creator. This is called from love of the created beings to love of the Creator, only in this way.
46. S. (01:15:28) What is the Salvation from the Creator?
R. ‘Salvation of the Lord’ is when a person begins to feel a taste in bestowal.
47. S. (01:15:44) In 52 it says that just as we pray and the sons of Israel in these days, what is that Jerusalem that should be built from our prayers?
R. Jerusalem is our vessel, the connection between us, the 10 Sefirot, the Partzuf, this is called Jerusalem.