Awakening From Above

For everything, an awakening from below is required, for this brings a person a desire and yearning for the matter. For one cannot give a person something that he does not want, since even if he receives it, he will throw it away because he has no need for it. Therefore, a person must have an awakening from below so that he will need the matter.

(Rabash, 403, "This Shall Be the Law of the Leper")

An awakening from below is required, since what the Upper One gives without preparation on the part of the lower one, the receiver is unable to feel its importance. According to the rule that anything a person wishes to enjoy depends on the importance of the matter, before the Upper One gives him some feeling, it cannot be said that he wants something.

Rather, after a person receives some awakening toward the work of the Creator, we must believe that the fact that a person has awakened to the need to engage in the work of the Creator means that the Creator has sent him these thoughts, without messengers.

That is, when no one has told him that he should engage in the work, then certainly the person says that this came to him from heaven. But even when some person comes and begins to make him understand and explains to him that it is worthwhile to enter the work of the Creator, and the person is awakened by this, he should still not say that so-and-so gave him the understanding of the worthwhileness that exists in the work of the Creator. Rather, that person, too, was a messenger of the Creator who came to awaken him.

In other words, sometimes a person must say that the Creator gave him the desire without messengers, and sometimes a person must say that this desire came from the Creator through a messenger.

And since this desire came to him without preparation on his own part, he does not know how to appreciate the importance of the matter. Consequently, the person is not so impressed by it and cannot enjoy that matter because he does not know its value.

(Rabash, "What Is the Foundation on Which Kedusha Is Built?")

We should understand why a person must make tactics and counsels concerning how to achieve Lishma. After all, no counsels will help him, and if the Creator does not give him the second nature, called "the desire to bestow," no labor will help a person attain the matter of Lishma.

The answer is as our sages said, "It is not for you to complete the work, and you are not free to idle away from it" (Avot, Chapter 2, 21).

This means that a person must give the awakening from below, since this is regarded as a prayer. A prayer is called a deficiency, and without a deficiency there is no fulfillment.

Therefore, when a person has a need for Lishma, the fulfillment comes from above, and then the answer to the prayer comes from above. That is, he receives fulfillment for his deficiency.

It follows that a person's work in order to receive Lishma from the Creator is only the deficiency and the Kli [vessel]. The fulfillment, however, can never be attained by the person himself, but is a gift from God. However, the prayer must be a complete prayer.

(Baal HaSulam, Shamati, Article No. 5, "Lishma Is an Awakening from Above, and Why Do We Need an Awakening from Below?")

It is known that in order to extend abundance from above, we must first have an awakening from below. We should ask: Why do we need an awakening from below? For this reason, we pray, "May there be a will above."

This means that we need to awaken a will above so as to bestow below. It is still not enough that we have a desire. Rather, there must also be a good will on the part of the Giver.

Although above there is a general desire to do good to His creations, He nevertheless waits for our desire to awaken His desire. That is, if we are unable to awaken His desire, it is a sign that the desire on the part of the receiver is still incomplete.

Therefore, specifically by praying, "May there be a will above," our desire is formed so that it will be a true desire, a Kli that is fit and qualified to receive the abundance.

(Baal HaSulam, Shamati, Article No. 57, "Will Bring Him as an Offering According to His Will")

Song

A melody is merely a kind of revelation of the soul and its feelings. It is revealed in the speech through which a person speaks to his friend about his thoughts and feelings of sorrow and joy, and even more so through his voice.

As it is written in the holy books as evidence of this, when a person's sorrow intensifies, God forbid, he can no longer speak, but only cries out and weeps with his voice.

Therefore, a melody, which consists of joyful or bitter sounds, awakens a person's feelings, in which the sparks and organs of the soul are revealed.

("Bnei Machshava Tova," Rabbi Kalonymus Kalman Shapira)

There is one who sings the song of his soul, and in his soul he finds everything, the full measure of his spiritual fulfillment.

And there is one who sings the song of the nation. He emerges from the circle of his private soul, which he does not find sufficiently broad or settled in an ideal state. He aspires toward lofty heights and cleaves with gentle love to the whole of the nation. With it he sings its songs, suffers in its troubles, delights in its hopes, contemplates lofty and pure thoughts about its past and its future, and explores with love and wisdom of heart the content of its inner spirit.

And there is one whose soul expands still further, until he goes beyond the boundary of the nation to sing the song of humanity. His spirit continues to expand in the grandeur of humanity as a whole and the splendor of its image. He aspires to its general purpose and anticipates its highest perfection, and from this source of life he draws the whole of his thoughts and investigations, his aspirations and visions.

And there is one who rises still higher in breadth, until he unites with the entire universe, with all creatures and all worlds, and with all of them he sings. This is one who engages each day in Perek Shira, and he is assured that he is a son of the world to come.

And there is one who rises with all these songs together in one bond. All of them give forth their voices, all together make their melodies pleasant, and each gives vitality and life to the other: a voice of joy and a voice of gladness, a voice of rejoicing and a voice of song, a voice of delight and a voice of holiness.

The song of the soul, the song of the nation, the song of humanity, and the song of the world all merge together within him at every moment and every hour.

(Rav Kook)

Songs:

https://soundcloud.com/kabbalah-laam-music/sets/desert-congress-acappella-songs

Prayer

With the ascent of the prayer, all these lights and camps journey, form connections, and are all incorporated as one, until the spirit of the lower palace connects with the spirit of this palace, and they become one.

They all enter the pillar in the middle of the palace and rise by its power to be incorporated in the spirit in the fourth palace above them.

Happy is he who knows the secret of his Master and raises His banner in the proper place.

(The Zohar, "The Seven Palaces of AVI of Beria," Beresheet Bet)

"If He sets His heart upon him, He will gather unto Himself his spirit and his soul." This is because the desire and the thought draw extension and perform an action in everything that is needed.

Therefore, in prayer, desire and thought are required in order to aim with them. Likewise, in all the works of the Creator, contemplation and thought perform an action and draw extension for everything that is needed.

(The Zohar, "His Thought Was of Rachel," VaYetze)

A prayer of many rises before the Creator, and the Creator crowns Himself with that prayer because it rises in several ways.

One asks for Hassadim, another for Gevurot, and a third for Rachamim. It is incorporated from several sides, from the right, from the left, and from the middle, since Hassadim extend from the right side, Gevurot from the left side, and Rachamim from the middle side.

Because it is incorporated from several ways and sides, it becomes a crown and is placed on the head of the righteous one who lives forever, Yesod, who bestows all the salvations upon the Nukva, and from her to the entire public.

But the prayer of an individual is not incorporated from all sides. It is only in one way, either asking for Hassadim, Gevurot, or Rachamim.

Therefore, the prayer of an individual is not as corrected for reception as the prayer of many, since it is not incorporated in all three lines, as is the prayer of many.

(The Zohar, "The Prayers of the Righteous," VaYishlach)