Ask anything about week 4 lesson and materials and get an answer from a senior Kabbalah instructor.

Hi Mona,

The Creator instilled in us our egoistic nature. Defying His will in this context means being able to rise above this egoistic nature and aiming to bestow instead.

Baal HaSulam talks about this in the article Shamati 19, here’s an excerpt:
Then one has close contact with the Creator to help him turn the will to receive to work in order to bestow. One must believe that from this extends contentment to the Creator, from his praying to Him to draw him near in the manner of Dvekut [adhesion], called “equivalence of form,” discerned as the annulment of the will to receive, so it is in order to bestow. The Creator says about this, “My sons defeated Me.” That is, I gave you the will to receive, and you ask Me to give you a desire to bestow instead.

Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2025/07/my-sons-defeated-me/

Albert @ KabU

Hi Luz,

1. Different groups have different schedules. So it depends on your group.

2. As we learn, “there is no coercion in spirituality”. No one will force you to do anything you don’t want to do. But through our participation in the group, we exponentially speed up our spiritual development. So it’s highly recommended.

All this will be more relevant for us in the advanced semesters of KabU, where everyone will receive their own virtual Kabbalah group and learn how to properly work with it.

Albert @ KabU

Hi Olav,

It’s important to find a good balance between our corporeal lives and our spiritual aspirations. Without a good balance in our corporeal lives, we won’t be able to advance in spirituality either. This is called “no flour, no Torah – no Torah, no flour”.

Meaning a Kabbalist continues to exist on the level of this world throughout the entire spiritual ladder. So I cannot just turn into a monk and disconnect from this life and only focus on spirituality. On the other hand, if I only focus on corporeality, then I’m no different than an animal.

So the important thing is to find the right balance between the two: to take care of all of one’s normal necessities: to work, take care of the family, health, etc (this is called flour) and to set aside some time on a regular basis to focus on spirituality (this is called Torah).

And how much time to set aside for spirituality, that depends precisely on our spare time. If after all my normal necessities, work, family obligations etc, I have just one hour a day, and I invest that hour into the Kabbalistic studies, then I’m 100% invested in the goal. On the other hand, if after all my normal necessities, I have 6 hours of spare time a day, and I invest 3 of those hours into studying Kabbalah, then I’m only 50% invested.

So this calculation is personal to each one, and each one needs to aspire to find the right balance between corporeality and spirituality. And in the more advanced stages of our development, we will see how our day to day life and obligations also help us with our spiritual development.

Albert @ KabU

Hi Alice,

A person who crosses the barrier is called a Kabbalist. There have been many Kabbalists throughout the generation.

Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2015/11/the-great-kabbalists-and-their-works/

Albert @ KabU

Hi Claire,

The Kabbalists tell us that “love the other as yourself” is the main rule that we need to follow to correct everything.

Just keep in mind that we practice this type of spiritual work primarily in the Kabbalah group. The Kabbalah group is like a lab where we practice manifesting the Creator’s qualities of love and bestowal. In the group we build a strong connection with other points in the heart that are together with us on the spiritual path. This becomes like a nucleus. Once we build that nucleus, we will be able to add to it wider and wider circles of the world, until we’ll come to include the whole world in that connection. But this is gradual work. And until we build that nucleus, we have nothing with which to do any spiritual work towards the world.

Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2015/09/where-is-the-upper-world/

Albert @ KabU

• This reply was modified 3 months, 2 weeks ago by Albert - KabU Instructor.

Hi Claire,

It’s good to set aside some time to regularly return to the Kabbalistic texts and lessons. And in the more advanced semesters, when we start to do spiritual work in a virtual group, we’ll see how it’s exponentially more effective to be concerned that my group stays connected and focused on the spiritual goal throughout the day, rather than me focusing on myself.

Albert @ KabU