Egoism Helps Us Return to the Creator

Egoism was created as an aid to humankind. Gradually, while struggling against it, each person acquires all the senses necessary to experience the spiritual. For this reason, each person should look upon all obstacles and suffering with a full consciousness of their purpose, that is, to induce one to ask for the Creator’s help in receiving redemption from that suffering. Then, egoism and other unpleasant aspects transform into “help against you”—which is actually against egoism itself.

Read the rest of this entry »

What “There is none else besides the Creator” Means

The entire spiritual body of law is intended to help us overcome our egoism. Therefore, the spiritual law, “love thy neighbor as thyself” is a natural result of attachment with the Creator. Since there is nothing else besides Him, when a person understands this, all the creations, including our world, merge in our perception of the One Creator.

Read the rest of this entry »

The 10 Rules Of Spiritual Work

The Maggid of Mezrich, a great Kabbalist of the previous century, proclaimed: “There are ten rules of spiritual work. Three of these rules can be learned from an infant and seven of them can be learned from a thief.”

Read the rest of this entry »

The Means of Perceiving the Creator

We must come to the realization that the very feeling of being distanced from the Creator is specifically the means by which we will be able to perceive the Creator. These two senses are known in Kabbalah as kli (vessel) and or (light). The first of these is a desire to experience the Creator, which is gradually born in us while experiencing obstacles (thoughts and desires).

Read the rest of this entry »

Everything Comes from the Creator

Even though the spiritual work of raising altruism above egoism is carried out within the heart, while that of raising faith over the assertions of the intellect is carried out within the mind, both are contingent upon our rejection of the intellect that was given to each of us at birth, as well as upon the rejection of self-gratification and self-affirmation.

This is because, even while working towards altruistic aims, one still prefers to see and know to whom one gives and who receives the fruits of one’s labor—and in such a case one has nothing but the faith in the existence of the Creator and the faith that He is accepting the fruits of one’s work.

Read the rest of this entry »