HOD: TIKKUN CHATZOT תקון חצות – LESSON WITH RAV MICHAEL LAITMAN
Baal HaSulam. Study of the Ten Sefirot. Vol. 1. Part 2. Inner Observation. Chapter 2, item 21
Morning Lesson May 23, 2022 Transcription
Transcription is made from simultaneous translation which leaves a possibility for differences in the audio
Baal HaSulam. “Study of the Ten Sefirot” (TES). Vol. 1. Part 2. Inner Observation. Chapter Two. #21 (“Now you can understand what we asked above:”)
Reading Item 21: (00:15)
1. R. (01:38) After the restriction we cannot measure a vessel of reception according to the will to receive because that was disqualified and only the reflected light that rises from the will to receive and works seemingly in the opposite direction and that reflected light because of the restriction becomes the vessel of reception in place of the fourth phase and it is building the reception of the light which is called a Kav, meaning a line.
2. S. (02:22) What do we give back as created beings, as reflected light?
R. From the will to receive we show our will to receive only in order to bestow. As much as we can present our will to bestow to that extent you can receive.
S. We are created beings we have the will to receive. What does it mean that we can give some light back?
R. I reject my will to receive for a kind of pleasure in place of that I wish to receive the pleasure not for myself but above myself for the sake of the giver.
S. So I need to connect to the giver?
R. That connects me with the giver of course. Yes.
S. So it turns out that phase 4 how does it participate here?
R. Phase 4 rejects the pleasure that is coming to her she does not want to receive it she rejects it repels it and in place where it rejects it it wants to use that to bestow to the giver it wants to resemble the Giver.
S. Phase 4 rejects the pleasure but how can she give to the bestower if she doesn’t receive?
R. No it receives but not in that same desire. Remember where we read about the guest and the host? That will to receive those vessels of reception were disqualified from receiving directly and now they work in reverse but they work. You cannot do anything without the will to receive that is why it is called that is why it is called the wisdom of reception, the wisdom of Kabbalah. It is not called the wisdom of bestowal because there is no bestowal. There is a certain form of reception the opposite form of reception. Reception remains reception but the intention here is added to the action and that is all the wisdom. That is a trick.
S. In what vessels does phase four receive if not in her initial vessels?
R. After performing a restriction on the will to receive it then opens up her restricted will to receive with the intention to bestow as much as she can and then it receives in order to bestow. Of course to enjoy, to feel pleasure in that will to receive because that is the form of her bestowal, the measure of her pleasure from what the host is giving her. So she is receiving all of the food that he prepared for her but now it is called bestowal because he performed a restriction, a screen, a reflected light and it is clear to her and to the host that she is not receiving for herself but only in order to bestow to him.
S. So it turns out that she takes this pleasure by adhesion with the giver?
R. She receives these things in opposition to the host, opposite to the host, she refuses to receive pleasure directly from the host and she places a condition on herself she doesn’t want it, performing a restriction, creating a boundary between her and the host. I want to now receive only on the condition that it will be for your sake. This is a severe action. It can receive maybe only one gram of all of this great offering that the host has prepared but she is getting up and she is saying that she is interested in this form of reception in order to bestow. You can say but it is egoistic she does not want to feel hurt or harmed she feels herself ashamed and that is why she doesn’t want it. It is possible that she is simply protecting her ego, her flaw, her shame no matter how much you twist and turn it but reception in order to bestow takes place against or in contradiction with the will to receive that the host created in the guest.
S. I am constantly reminded of the example that you gave up Rabash how he would eat so heavily, so complicated. If I understood correctly it was a significant exercise for him not simply to derive pleasure so I want to understand how it is happening. Kabbalist is doing it out of adhesion with the Creator? What is his inner Direction?
R. Yes, you could not see it just like that in Rabash but I could see it from him annulling his simple pleasure from corporeal enjoyments and only wanting to enjoy under the condition that he feels that he is bestowing to the Creator through it, that he is working above his ego.
S. How can you imagine such a thing? Let us say that the food is tasty and he did not feel pleasure or he felt the Creator inside this pleasure? I don’t get it.
R. We will all try to gradually come close to this but it is good that we already understand that these things aren’t so simple.
Reading Item 22 (09:53)
3. R. (12:20) We will speak about that a lot it’s before us that the vessels of Rosh the vessels of Toch the vessels of Sof the roots of the vessels the real vessels, we’ll check about that later on but the main thing is the Rosh that’s the roots, the intentions, the decisions, the plan and then the implementation is in the Guf the body what’s in the Guf there’s nothing new in there that didn’t come from the Rosh.
Reading Item 23 (12:59)
4. R. (14:12) Meaning we need to scrutinize these four phases in the will to receive how every phase is unique and has its own character and as much as they support each other and develop from one another.
Reading Item 24 (14:30)
5. R. (14:41) That happens in each and every one, everyone should stick this on himself.
Continues Reading: (14:53) “There are three fundamental disturbances …”
6. R. (15:32) Then we have as he says the matter of the vessel, the restriction in the vessel, and the screen in the vessel that’s why we have to scrutinize because it’s the three components that present the entire vessel.
Reading Item 25 (15:55)
7. R. (17:08) We will get to it later, okay? Next.
Reading Item 26 (17:15)
R. (17:26) I just want to remind, the intention of the study. I see that there’s some kind of weakness in everyone. What’s up with the intention? It doesn’t matter what I’m studying, I’m learning about a means to obtain the Creator to accept the upper abundance that the upper light can bestow upon me and correct me and will open my head, my brain, my heart to feel the upper system. I want to live in that upper system. I want to reach adhesion with the Creator. I want to know all of this reality. It’s possible only by the bestowal we get from the study and I can’t forget about that. I’m not allowed to forget about that. I’m expecting the study to affect me, work on me and open my mind and heart.
Item 26 Continued (18:30) “We should note that there are two…”
8. R. (19:47) Yes if there are no questions so we just have to maybe repeat it later on. Let’s keep going a bit more, another one or two.
Reading Item 27 (20:06)
9. R. (22:08) These are things that are very complex. How can it be that part of a higher degree inverts and becomes part of the lower degree. Malchut of the Upper ones becomes the Keter of the lower one? It’s very unclear but we will scrutinize it.
10. S. (22:33) In general how can it be that Keter and Malchut will be in the same Partzuf? If Keter is part of the Creator that wants to bestow and Malchut wants to receive, how can they even meet? How can they co-exist?
R. I think that there’s no problem about it because Keter we’re speaking about something that clothes in the created being and presents itself towards of created beings and Malchut and Keter and all the Sefirot are still presentation or an appearance of the Creator in the will to receive, if we speak of something that we attain so we attained it in the will to receive only. Nothing else. Then it turns out that the Keter and the rest of the Sefirot are all the will to receive and it can’t be that there’s anything else but that. That’s why if you go and such a way to research these things, you’ll see that all in all, we are speaking about the will to receive that existence from absence that’s a created being and the upper light which is actually the force of the Creator which appears in them in the will to receive and then the will to receive, receives all kinds of forms and changes. All in all the result is from the upper light that bestows upon it.
S. Meaning if I understood correctly that Keter is something that Malchut attains?
R. Of course, that all these things were speaking about and learning we learned it from the attainment of the Creator of course, attainment of the Creator.
11. S. (25:00) The upper one always wants to expand its intention to hold the desire?
R. The upper one I don’t understand. Why are you speaking about the Upper one? You have to speak about the lower one. The upper one is always bestowing, Bestowing in all forms that are good for the lower one. That’s the upper one. Anywhere that you will see otherwise he wouldn’t exist. When you’ll reach his degree you’ll see that you’ll want to receive qualities to bestow to the lower ones then you’ll reach the degree of the higher one only that way.
12. S. (26:19) It says in 21 the reception of the light stems from phase four but the vessels of reception where the reflected light rising from coupling and striking and phase four is reflected light have vessels of reception, how do the vessels of reception appear in the reflected light?
R. If we feel the lights, reflected light, inner light, direct light so we feel them through some kind of vessels too because without vessels you can’t feel. You need something that will reveal the light for you, only in that way we can reach a feeling. The feeling of the light that it will be accepted in some kind of vessel and this vessel will be felt in our will to receive then we discover it.
13. S. (27:24) Does the reflected light acquire the qualities of phase four during the coupling and striking?
R. The reflected light goes through all the phases, clothes through them and then in that way changes and we can measure the reflected light. There are many kinds of reflected light by the way
14. S. (27:47) Does the reflected light spread down below the screen with the pressure of direct light or as a result of the weakening of the screen?
R. The reflected light goes through all vessels and the vessels receive it to the extent that they can relate to it, identify with it, more than that I can’t say. We will learn the rest of it and that is obviously a very general question but I have no choice but to answer in that way right now.
15. S. (28:28) Reflected light in the ten, is this the desire from the bottom of the heart to care about the friends without both about myself?
R. Yes, the fact that I’m concerned to every ten in general is that concern to sustain everyone, to develop, to nourish everyone, to be concerned in general, About the ten, that is my reflected light.
16. S. (28:56) Is reflected light that you ego?
R. No, reflected light is a result of the ego that I have to want to be in my anti-ego above my ego.
17. S. (29:30) Where do we use these things? The screen,restriction,reflected light does this happen in the group or in daily life?
R. How can you use our world, our lifes screen, reflected light restriction and all these things that’s why their wisdom of Kabbalah is the wisdom of the concealed, that nobody knows it because we don’t need it in our corporeal life, if we’re on the animate degree we don’t need the Wisdom of Kabbalah. Only under the condition that we reach the speaking degree that we need to bestow to one another, we want to bestow, we yearn for bestowal, we speak about connections above our ego, then we need the wisdom of Kabbalah. Then we need restriction, screen, reflected light, forces to perform these actions but if we don’t want to determine between the relationships of bestowal so we don’t need the wisdom of Kabbalah and we don’t need spiritual forces because spirituality is entirely love and bestowal and then we’re just in this world.
18. S. (31:14) Does the phenomenon of the line that desire to pay attention to the line Malchut of Keter becomes the will to receive in phase one, so what does it mean phase one?
R. Where is he reading from? Malchut to Keter here there line are.
Reader Item 27: (31:53) “Malchut of Keter herself came down and clothed..”
S. (32:12) The second line in the second paragraph says that Malchut would have Keter becomes the will to receive in phase one?
R. Where does the will to receive come from from the upper one having a desire to bestow that’s what gives birth to the will to receive in the lower one and the cascading from above downward the will to receive development where does it develop from from more and more of the world trip is still being revealed on behalf of the Upper one by this the will to receive on the lower one develops you don’t know it but the appetite comes with the eating. Meaning there’s a law that the abundance itself reveals the desire and grows it. That’s why the upper light that expands from above by expanding it builds the vessels on itself and then the will to receive can and then that way advance. That’s it, that’s how it cascades.
19. S. (33:48) I want to ask about the four phases of direct light. On the one hand he said about the four phases that this is the development of the desire. On the other hand you described the desire itself with the four phases so this desire is going through this inner development constantly?
R. Yes of course, keep developing and dividing with no rest. it’s like you can see and particles in the atoms, in molecules are constantly in motion, in motion endless.
S. In the four phases there is this innovation of renewal transition between state and state. A new creation each time. That’s how it lives within the desire each time?
R. Yes yes yes, the desire and endless motion. Like matter exchanging and all of creation, imagine all of the universe that it’s like one grain, compared to the spiritual world if you could even say it and look as much as there’s constantly different actions that are contradicting and diverse and so on.
20. S. (35:27) Why is it that in item 24 it says that the restriction is a personal choice and the screen does not happen out of choice?
R. The restriction is the result of the feeling of shame, the feeling of the difference between receiver and bestower. That’s why it comes from the lower one and the rest of the actions are a result of that action of the restriction.
S. But the restriction is a free choice and the action is also free? He writes that this action is not free?
R. I don’t understand exactly what you mean by every action or not a free action if I feel shame and the shame is burning me and isn’t giving me any possibility to run from this feeling of shame. I must do an action in order to turn off the shame, to fix it, to change it. Where did you see in action in the created being called freedom of choice like you mean? There is no such thing. Also in us and in each and every person, big, small, all Kabbalists, simple. All our actions are essential and the freedom of choices only in the intention. We’ll speak about it.
21. S. (37:28) Very interesting and appealing to learn the giving of Torah, of Matan Torah and TES, I want to ask we’re going out to the day and all kinds of desires will descend on me various forces will work on me and part of those desires I’ll refuse to fulfill I won’t fulfill them in order to work with the ten to connect with them to go with the lesson again so the question is what we’re learning about here the four phases in the restrictions is that related to the actions were during during the day when we disconnect from certain desires toTo be with my ten?
R. Make a calculation to be with my spiritual society no matter on what level they are. If I make a decision that I prefer to be with them instead of giving some corporeal pleasure to myself to my body so obviously these are spiritual actions already and they are considered and accepted in the general Malchut and according to that I can already receive new discernments in my spiritual advancement.