TUESDAY: YESOD-TIKKUN CHATZOT תקון חצות – LESSON WITH RAV MICHAEL LAITMAN

READING: FROM MIDNIGHT TO DAWN TUESDAY

Rabash. Man Is Rewarded with Righteousness and Peace through the Torah. 3 (1986)

Morning Lesson August 20, 2023

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

Part 1:

Rabash. Article No. 3, (1986). Man Is Rewarded with Righteousness and Peace through the Torah

Reading Article. (00:52) “In the Zohar,..”

1. S. (25:40) He writes, “without Torah we cannot give Tzedakah, the thing is that Tzedakah means faith, it’s impossible to reach true faith, real faith before he has the equivalence of form with the Creator, meaning that all of his actions are only in order to give contentment upon the Creator. It turns out that faith is constantly above reason and goes within reason. Is this correct, there’s stages, meaning you go above reason and then it becomes within reason then they have to go above reason again, is this a process?

R. It doesn’t say that, it’s not written that way, but you say it, okay: why do you need to add, you need to understand what he’s writing now in the article.

S. Okay, he says that faith should be complete so I’m going to ask you, never mind what I said, how does a person come to complete faith?

R. What does it say there, by what?

S. “Without the Torah we cannot come to Tzedakah, the thing is that Tzedakah means faith, it is impossible to reach real faith before he has the equivalence of form with the Creator, meaning that all of his actions are only in order to give contentment upon the Creator.

R. Yes?

S. I’m asking you, basically, what is the process for increasing faith, increasing the vessels?

R. If a person is longing to increase faith then he has the study and the group.

S. The study and the group?

R. Yes.

2. S. (28:14) There’s a law that ‘bad doesn’t come from the Creator’, what kind of bad is it talking about?

R. What seems that way to the person, if we say that the Creator is the source of creation so there’s nothing in creation that is bad, and if it seems that way to the person that indicates his lack of correction.

S. But the bad changes in the person if it’s in the will to receive, it’s an actual bad, I don’t know, I’m not thinking money or something. In the society here, bad is something else, I want to know what they mean in the verse?

R. They meant that a person uses the force of his ego which is opposite the Creator and this is what we call bad.

3. S. (29:14) Rabash repeats many times the word, Tzedakah, here I’m asking here what is the word Tzedakah?

R. Bestow.

S. Alright, should we always look in our studies: what is a light and what is a vessel?

R. I don’t know.

S. So how will we know?

R. It’s not written that in every place you need to find the Kli and light.

S. But perhaps we need to look for the right intention?

R. Yes.

4. S. (30:17) How do we come closer to the Torah?

R. According to the deficiency, if a person wants to correct himself then he has, even he only needs to look for the Torah because the light in it reforms.

S. So what does it mean to look for the Torah?

R. That we, wherever he reads or hears, he directs himself to the light so that it will correct him and serve him.

S. And while not during the study, how can a person come closer to the Torah?

R. It doesn’t matter that he is learning or not learning, where a person’s thought is where he is.

S. So my thought is that even while not reading the article I can still draw the light of the Torah?

R. Yes.

S. What thought?

R. It depends on where you are, it depends on where you are. Basically, a person always needs to have the matters of Torah in his mind. How did people know many things by heart, because they would always memorize them, they would always repeat them, and then that’s how they would connect to them. I remember I heard a long time ago from the Rabbi from Lubavitch and he said that he was released from jail and it was when he would read something from Psalms. So what did he do when he was in prison, he would just repeat the Psalms that he remembered. Back then, people used to be full of these texts so he would repeat it. So what does he recall that when he said some eighty of them or something like that, then they came into him and told him that he could leave. So you understand the example is that people used to, didn’t used to detach from the Torah.

S. [No translation]

R. So we need to make sure the words of Baal HaSulam and Rabash will really wash our brain so we won’t forget about them, yes, and not just them, also Psalms.

5. S. (34:45) So Rabash writes that “first of all, a person needs to be rewarded with a vessel of bestowal, needs to obtain those and then he can continue”, so what are vessels of bestowal and how can we obtain them?

R. We call that ‘bestowing in order to bestow’ in Kabbalah, first using that and then receiving in order to bestow.

S. How do we obtain them?

R. So most likely we first need to reach a state where in all of my thoughts and desires I think only about what’s outside of me, that I don’t want to aim anything to myself but only to the other for the benefit of the created beings and then benefit of the Creator.

S. And we begin in the ten, right ,the work is in the ten?

R. Yes.

6. S. (36:01) What is the order of the work of Torah, Tzedakah, and peace, and faith? How are they connected?

R. These are four stages that a person needs to go through in order to achieve wholeness, Shalom, peace or wholeness, is already the name of the Creator, it’s the final degree.

7. S. (36:41) What can help a person see his real place in the work?

R. That he puts himself in the ten and together with them being a continuous, non-stop embrace as much as possible, that’s what he tries, he wants to reach the purpose of creation with them.

8. S. (37:13) What does it mean that “the stages of the Talmud made the path of Torah easier than the path of Mishna?

R. It says there that, well in short, ‘made it easier’ means that, well let’s say yes, that one can work more easily.

9. S. (37:54) Why is faith called Tzedakah?

R. Because the power of faith helps him be in bestowal.

S. What intention do we need in order to be rewarded with Tzedakah, peace from the Creator?

R. If we want to be rewarded with the force of bestowal then we need to receive from the Creator the light that reforms and this light comes to a person according to the labor that a person makes. And the exertion, the labor that the person can give is on top of the level of coarseness that a person overcomes so as to be aimed at bestowal, at the Creator and therefore that’s how we can measure.

10. S. (39:23) Here at the end of the article he describes the situation where a person has not been rewarded with vessels of bestowal and he is in striving, he’s got strife, he’s quarrelling with the Creator. We, too, are not, we don’t have the vessels of bestowal, we’re on the way. How do states between us that we seemingly scrutinize, how do we not get into strife but overcome? Sometimes we imagine that we are overcoming the situation but we’re only quarrelling with each other so with what are we rewarded, nothing?

R. I don’t know, to me it seems that to be in a strife with Creator is something big, it’s not that simple, it’s something great and we’ll continue and see when we’ll get there.

S. So when states where there is tension and scrutinies with each other, these are real states, so how do we take the right state, let’s say, we come into a situation and we’re going through something, so how do we not defeat but take it to the right place, justify and not take it toward ‘here I won, I came out righteous out of this state’, how do we take it correctly?

R. Who accepts it correctly, means that you’re working according to what you learn from the Torah.

S. I’ll tell you, there are states, I’m talking about the ten, I’m taking it to the ten. If we come across a situation, insults, I don’t know, sometimes disconnection from the friends, here, right between us and it continues, each one thinks he’s right?

R. But along with that you also need to understand that these states only come from the Creator and that you need to direct it towards progress.

S. How do we direct it?

R. The Creator doesn’t just awaken any disputes between you but rather each dispute awakens in order for you to scrutinize it, sort it out, overcome and connect above these disputes and continue onwards to a higher degree.

S. Would this be considered achieving wholeness or peace in the situation?

R. Yes, in the meantime from fight to peace.

11. S. (43:08) What does it mean “not to disconnect from the Torah”?

R. To always try to be on the way towards connection, the whole Torah is the names of the Creator, that they all speak of connection, that’s it.

12. S. (43:53) You said a person has to constantly have words of Torah in his hand but I read the article and nothing enters, you should get excited, I’m trying to follow. I marked everything here but it doesn’t, I don’t know what to take from this for the rest of the day, how am I supposed to approach it?

R. You knew, at least from yesterday, that this is what we’re going to read today, so did you have an interest, did you look into it, did you open it up, read it, did you make some notes there or questions, coming to the lesson today to scrutinize it? Did you want to scrutinize in the lesson what was really bothering you, that you disagree with or don’t understand and so forth, so you have to be ready for that. When I come to the lesson and then I only hear about what we’re studying, that’s insufficient, do you have a ten?

S. Yes, sure and we go over every article but specifically this article, I look at how it’s built and I look at the title, “Tzedakah is rewarded with peace”. I’m trying to think what I have to take from this article with me?

R. That’s okay.

13. S. (45:43) What does it mean to give that Tzedakah?

R. To give Tzedakah means you give of yourself without directing yourself that you will receive in return, it’s not as some sort of a trade or gift simply to give, that’s it, in absolute bestowal.

S. To whom do you give Tzedakah?

R. To those you give, here, we’re talking about the Creator.

S. Also with respect to the others we give Tzedakah?

R. Yes.

S. I noticed that I barely feel any pain from the others, of the public, I feel more from the connection with the friends, the goodwill of the Creator that wants to fulfill the vessels, do I need to ask the Creator to feel the sorrow and pain of others?

R. You can do that, yes.

S. So that’s necessary, right, if I want to?

R. You can ask anything from the Creator.

S. And it’s correct to ask for?

R. It’s like a baby and the mother, whatever it has it turns to her and demands of her and cries, it doesn’t matter, he knows that this is his source.

14. S. (47:24) The work in the ten against my desire when I make an action in the ten against my desire, it provides me with surrounding lights?

R. I don’t know.

15. S. (47:51) Who are “those heroes of the heart that are far from Tzedakah?”

R. Couldn’t hear you.

S. Who are those heroes of the heart who are far from Tzedakah?

R. ‘Stubborn hearted’ are those who have a stiff heart and they cannot ask to have a tendency toward righteousness or charity, Tzedakah.

S. It’s unclear, they want to study the Torah, they want to get closer and they can’t?

R. These are two different things: On the one hand, of course I want to come closer, I heard it’s good so I have a tendency toward it from nature; but to pay for it as they say, I can’t.

S. So they want to stay in their ego, don’t want to come out of it.

R. Yes.

16. S. (49:01) With Rabash, you, did you learn the Psalms or Torah, the Bible?

R. To the extent that he wrote in his articles, basically we studied his article according to what he wrote, at that same pace, we studied from day to day, we would go over them. When I was next to Rabash I would read it before as well, the day before when we were going over it, sometimes.

17. S. (49:53) I also have a question about the stubborn hearted, they say, he says “how hard are the hearts of the wicked, they see the trails ways of the Torah and do not look at them”, so they know what the direction is?

R. They have a big will to receive good and they also have a tendency toward the purpose of creation but they cannot submit their hearts before it, they can’t agree to what the Torah demands.

S. What do you do with them?

R. You gradually surrender then, you subjugate them, the Creator and the forces of nature that He operates, subjugate them from all kinds of angles, if not in this life cycle, then in the next.

S. And there’s nothing to do to speed up the..?

R. Of course you have the means, you have the study, you have the society, you have everything.

S. Yes but the stubborn hearted are within us, they’re not somewhere?

R. Yes, so at the same time you can subjugate yourself to study more, to be more connected to the friends, and in this way advance.

S. Let’s say we just heard that it’s worthwhile to fill up your day or your time with words of Torah and fill the mind with it, you said?

R. Of course, what, is this new?

S. No it’s not new, but the stubborn hearted will say ‘okay there’s more important things and so forth.’

R. It’s always like, the Creator’s directing them, He’s directing them, He stands behind them and directing them to stand against, to have an opposition, otherwise you won’t have a resistance, against what, what will you have to overcome?

S. But without the words of Torah they can’t be pushed away, they see the trails of the Torah and don’t look at them?

R. I guess you need to be smarter, more, yes, to know how to get along with that in order to circumvent them, jump over them, go next to them, pass by them, and in this way overcome, there’s nothing you can do.

S. Is there a way that with the help of the ten each one can overcome this stubborn hearted within?

R. Yes, for sure, the ten is nevertheless, the force that can do it.

18. S. (53:14) Rabash typically starts with a quote, let’s say from the Zohar, and then he interprets it. In this article I didn’t find what to hold on to?

R. Are you holding on only to the Zohar? I didn’t get it?

S. No, I’m saying both what he brings from the Zohar or what he interprets, I can’t find what to hold on to….?

R. What do you mean ‘hold on to’?

S. I feel it’s too high, I can’t find the point of contact with the article.

R. What the friends are saying, you understand?

S. Yes but I can’t connect it to what Rabash writes.

R. So what does Rabash write?

S. He writes, he discusses bestowal and Torah.

R. Yes, that through the Torah a person comes to equivalence of form and then he understands and feels the Creator more than before, and in this way he comes from degree to degree, well?

S. So where’s the ten, let’s say, inside everything he writes about?

R. The ten is like an infrastructure without which he does not progress, the Torah is revealed in the ten, his path, the road is revealed in the ten in connection between everyone to the extent that he has a correct network with the friends, by this he is advancing toward the purpose of creation.

S. So what is Tzedakah, let’s say, in the ten, what is faith?

R. It’s the relationships between them and with the Creator.

S. What to do when you can’t connect to the article?

R. With a pencil, take the article the day before we study it, and go over it meticulously.

S. And what to try to extract from there?

R. What is clear and what is not clear, and also what is clear about what is clear and what is not clear about what is not clear, and then you will at least come to the lesson equipped.

S. So then I come to the lesson with that, what do I need to do there?

R. You want to get the answers that you couldn’t get on your own, perhaps a day before you should read it together, yes, most of you do it.

19. S. (56:50) I wanted to ask about this matter. He writes, “Tzedakah is called faith and faith is that he takes upon himself the burden of the kingdom of Heaven without anything in exchange, completely in order to bestow”. Now, it’s clear that it’s in the ten, that there’s no doubt we want to bestow to the friends, now what is ‘the matter of without any reward’. How do you work with that?

R. Gradually by receiving reforming lights, it fills us and gives us this infrastructure called faith.

S. That requires a lot of attempts, I guess.

R. It takes time but when we yearn for it, we work on it, connect the efforts.

S. Question is this: When you think about a friend or the friends in the ten, there’s always this tension like opposite poles, polar magnets that can never touch each other?

R. This we need to have.

S. Where do you take the force to stay in that kind of attraction/rejection state?

R. Constantly hold on to it.

S. And not to expect something to change to happen, just to be there?

R. Constantly be in this because the power of bestowal is not in our nature, we have to establish it, and hold it, keep it.

S. And still, not to think that something from this action will provide a reward or something will come out from me, my friends, the Creator?

R. Is it not good if I can finally hold on to the power of faith?

S. It’s very good but he says there should be no reward?

R. Yes, well if there’s no reward then there’s no problem, we’re working for the reward, and here the reward is that we have to tell ourselves that we’re working without a reward and this is the reward.

20. S. (59:29) I will continue, we try, say, to bestow to the friends in what we understand, to help them, but what is the feeling of no reward entering our work, what does it mean that I help the friends with no reward?

R. It gradually comes between us by feeling ourselves being in one network, one support, giving each other examples, supporting each other. Only a person who has a ten behind him can be certain that he will not fall.

S. Where is the matter with no rewards, all you said now we can do without thinking of whether we have or don’t have a reward, we just do it. And here it seems to be some need to be without reward?

R. What does it mean ‘without reward’?

S. I am asking what does it mean to work in bestowal between us without rewarding, I need to aim for it, yes, but where is it?

R. ‘Without reward’ is when the Creator gives me the force to bestow in order to bestow, it is already Lishma, [for her sake].

S. There’s no such discernment in the work in the meantime between us that I need to do this without reward. I don’t feel that I look for some reward in that action, for which, so that I can overcome and say I don’t take it?

R. We do try to do this but we will come to such states without having any reward only with help from above because it is already above our nature.

S. First, I have to feel that I work for the reward?

R. Yes, all of me.

S. And what is the reward I’m supposed to feel when I get there, when I feel that I’m working for a certain reward, what will that reward be?

R. This reward will be a power of bestowal, that I can bestow above my force of reception.

S. So that is already a reward that we should, that we’re permitted to look for, what is the reward that I should work on so that it’s without a reward, what is the person looking for in the ten from his will to receive that it’s a wrong reward?

R. Why should he be looking?

S. It says that without reward, that I should bestow without reward, now, what is the reward that I look for that I can say I want to go without, I want to overcome it, what is that reward that my heart is supposed to find and I’m supposed to overcome?

R. Force of bestowal?

S. But that is the desired reward, what is the not desire for reward?

R. That I discover how much I’m demanding the filling.

S. Fulfillment is what, to obtain spirituality, that I’m looking for something for myself, what?

R. Doesn’t matter what, strength.

21. S. (01:03:16) I want to ask about the preparation for the lesson and reading the article in advance with the ten. We typically read the article the day before, I notice that it is in the middle of the day, in the middle of the day and then there is a ten meeting, and when I manage to collect myself and focus the day after lesson is something totally different, I see it every time. But the problem is that, at least in some cases you can’t collect yourself, you’re bothered with daily matters and the friends are in the background, that they read it but you don’t really hear it and you come to the lesson you don’t feel the same. In short, I want to ask if, maybe, if it’s worthwhile instead of reading the whole article, to take a paragraph or two and read it and force each other to talk about it, to sort of pull the person out of what he’s busy with?

R. Day before?

S. Yes.

R. Do what you want.

S. I’m trying to understand the benefit of it?

R. I don’t know, you tell me the benefit afterwards!

S. What’s the benefit of reading the article a day in advance?

R. To get to know it, to get to know the friends who are connected to the article.

S. I need to try to understand it the day before so it sits in me, that I come with it to the lesson?

R. As much as you can, yes, understand, feel, maybe write a few questions, yes.

S. So that is more important than having it in the background?

R. It depends for who.

22. S. (01:05:38) We see in the third degree that they talk about reaching peace as a goal, what does it mean ‘reaching peace’, actually?

R. To reach peace means to reach balance, for both sides to be balanced.

23. S. (01:06:12) When will the Creator cut off that stony heart, does He decide on that or it depends on our request?

R. That is the Creator’s decision.

24. S. (01:06:44) Is it possible to say that this strife is a calling from the Creator to connect?

R. Yes.

25. S. (01:07:13) Is it in principle possible to attain complete faith, or is it always some part of a process?

R. Complete faith is probably attained at the end of the road.

26. S. (01:07:41) Can you explain what is the difference between Mishna and Talmud mentioned here in the article?

R. The Mishna was written first, after the Mishna the Talmud was written which interprets the Mishna. Mishna speaks more concisely about spiritual laws and Talmud speaks about them in the more elaborate language.

27. S. (01:08:39) So what I felt is that in the article it says “without Torah there is no Tzedakah and without Tzedakah there is no Shalom, peace”.

R. Right.

S. So in the corporeal life I know that to give Tzedakah I do that from my income, right?

R. Yes, yes?

S. So in the spiritual world can we say that the income is direct light and Tzedakah is the reflected light and then we can achieve peace, peace being in the equivalence of form?

R. Correct.

28. S. (01:09:44) As a ten we tried to always go in the direction that the teacher is in, is that a correct approach?

R. Yes.

S. So can you share with us what intention he’s in or prayer he’s in before he approaches every action so that as a ten we can have the same intention like the teacher?

R. It is very simple, we have to connect between us and all of us together, as one, approach the thing we have to understand or solve etc., very simple. The whole point is together that is the secret of success.

29. S. (01:10:52) The question is about this quote from Introduction to TES that “the sages Talmud made the path of Torah easier for us, that they created a new thing for us which is the light that reforms”. So the question is what is ‘the light that reforms’ that they invented and continuing that, what is up to us Bnei Baruch, your students, to come up with in order to make the paths to Torah easier?

R. We have to be as close as possible to Torah, meaning to the Mishna as well and Talmud and all the books of Torah, they are generally called the Books of Torah, by which they tell us how we are connected to the upper light which is what really corrects us. This is the purpose of Torah, to bring us to connection with the upper source that when it shines it elevates us above our egos, above our nature.

S. I just want another question to refine it, it is said here that “they have made something new”?

R. Yes, the reforming light.

S. So I’m asking as they did it, can we too come up with something to make the paths of Torah easier than what they did even?

R. No, you can only with your will to receive and each one has his own will to receive and from generation to generation they want to receive grows worse, grows bigger. So in your generation you can try to draw reforming light according to your will to receive and in this way correct yourself.

30. S. (01:13:17) It is said “therefore we have to understand what is the greatness and importance of Tzedakah”, as it sounds that Torah is the lower degree than Tzedakah; by the Torah we can get to Tzedakah, what is this transition in the work in the ten from Torah to Tzedakah?

R. That we want to be connected to each other without any reward, this is already adhesion and devotion.

S. It is like the Torah is the play or the script of the play and then you put it on as a show that is the Tzedakah?

R. Could be.

31. S. (01:14:06) How can we direct all actions to the Creator even before we reach real faith?

R. Try, to the extent that we can, partially direct ourselves to the Creator, and this way we will advance.

32. S. (01:14:39) The initial stage is approaching to the Creator and the final stage is peace and there are stages between them. It seems to me the initial stage is the most awkward, difficult and different from the other stages. Why is the stage important and what is its benefit, can’t we just start climbing degrees by acquiring vessels of bestowal?

R. But it speaks of acquiring vessels of bestowal, to climb the degrees means to acquire vessels of bestowal from the lightest to the heaviest, And bestow in order to bestow and later even receiving in order to bestow.

33. S. (01:15:34) How can a person see his friend greater than him so that he will be able to do, to make all transactions as substantial for him and so the heart will open and faith will enter and he will see the friend in complete faith?

R. Try to connect above reason, above the ego, above all the calculations. The important thing is simply to hold on to one another because each one of the friends is your soul, part of your soul, so you have to be adhered to him. The fact that we’re here together appears to us like something random, like a bunch of students who gathered study in college, but it’s not a coincidence rather there’s an upper needs in the upper degree for us to connect with our souls and by that the Creator Who, the Creator will descend into those souls and will be closer to all of creation, by that we will feel ourselves as the Creator’s messengers.

34. S. (01:17:31) Regarding the preparation for the lesson: I noticed that when we gather the day before and we read the article for the next day, there’s some fulfillment, some illumination and in the next day’s lesson there is no more deficiency or a deserve to wake up. Or maybe we hear the lesson, like half listen to it, how to maintain the good preparation but for the lesson to be also with high quality?

R. You do not come to the lesson with a deficiency, with the desire to receive something from the lesson; you’re not coming to the lesson in order to receive, response, a reaction, and you don’t feel this deficiency, lack it. That is why you can’t feel the fulfillment, consequently you sit in the lesson quite comfortably, there is no inner tension, to attain, to understand, to feel, you have to be better prepared.

S. So what are we doing wrong in the preparation so that such false fulfillment is coming to us?

R. Try to write down your mutual questions, the one you want to ask the following day.

35. S. (01:19:45) The question is Torah is the means, the light that corrects the vessel, and righteousness is complete faith in the Creator meaning of the vessel of bestowal; if this is so, is the peace, the degree of receiving in order to bestow?

R. Shalom, peace, is wholeness, is the complete degree in order to bestow.

36. S. (01:20:36) An interesting thing happens: We can’t come closer because we lack faith, on the other hand, we can’t be rewarded with faith until we come closer. It’s like two straight lines that never meet, how can we bestow to each other?

R. This is something we need to overcome by prayer, by prayer.

37. S. (01:21:22) This passage was quoted. I will repeat it but I’ll ask a different question; “and so we should understand what is the importance and the greatness of the righteousness, it means that the Torah is in the lower degree than righteousness”. Here’s my question: the Torah is the basis of all our qualities, whether it’s faith or peace, how can the Torah be lower than righteousness?

R. I don’t know, try to answer that.

38. S. (01:22:08) What is the force that’s in Psalms, what can you tell us about Psalms?

R. All of the light that exists, exists in the Book of Psalms.

S. Any person in Israel can read Psalms?

R. It doesn’t mean he’s connected to Psalms, that he’s attaining it, of course everyone can read it but it’s not power.