We don’t appreciate the power of the work that everyone of us by ourselves can do.

I would like to share something I am terribly excited about. One of our friends in Israel came to me after checking for the chametz, and she had a letter from a friend who knew Rav Brandwein. She wanted to give it to the Rav, but it hadn’t happened yet.

I asked to borrow the letter. There is much to understand. This year, this letter came to us.

This letter was written by Rav Brandwein in 1968. He wrote it to a person who had assisted Rav Ashlag in the writing and printing of the Zohar.

You have to realize Rav Ashlag passed away in 1955 and Rav Brandwein wrote this letter in 1968.

He said: I asked about you in Jerusalem. I have not seen you for a long time, and they told me you had moved to Tel Aviv. They say a relative of yours is living in Tel Aviv. I looked for your relative and gave him this letter to give to you.

This is the first time I have seen Rav Brandwein talk about the passing of his teacher, Rav Ashlag.

He said: Now I want to tell you about his death. When my master and teacher, the righteous soul, Rav Ashlag was on his death bed, I came to visit him. Rav Ashlag asked, Where is that young man, Abraham, that would bring to me the text of the Sulam to be edited before the actual printing? He was a young man helping with the print.

Here Rav Ashlag was about to leave this world, and he was asking for Abraham. He was told Abraham was in the army. And Rav Ashlag said in a weak voice, Woe, Abraham, where are you? He told me (Rav Brandwein), if you see him, tell him that I want him to come to me. I want to see him because he has a very holy soul.

Rav Brandwein was told by one of the other students of Rav Ashlag that when Rav Ashlag’s soul was leaving his body to go to the heaven, he said in a weak voice, Where are you, Abraham? I ask that when you get this letter, come to me and we will go together to the grave of Rav Ashlag. I know he really wants to see you, to connect to you.

That’s the letter. There are so many things I got out of it. I want to share two of them.

One is that we hear often, but don’t truly appreciate, the gift of the Zohar. The question is how much certainty do we have in that gift? Before the Creator created this world, He knew there would be pain and suffering, so he gave us this one tool, the Zohar, prepared before the Creation of this world.

The Kabbalists say it is the connection to the Zohar that can bring the end of pain and suffering in this world.

The second thing I ask is that we strengthen our certainty and understanding of the Zohar. For those of us who make our connection, we are still lacking in our certainty of its power.

The third point is the connection to ourselves. Imagine it’s Yom Kippur, 1955. Rav Ashlag has met thousands of people in his life. The one person he is asking for is a simple person who was helping in the printing of the Zohar.

It makes very clear to me the power of the Zohar. There were many people around who did good actions, but this was someone who helped in the printing of this amazing gift.

Thirteen years later, Rav Brandwein writes a letter and says I know you have a holy soul.

The Rav (Berg) says the whole world is here. There are certainly a lot of people. We don’t have the appreciation that Rav Ashlag had for the simple soul of Abraham.

I think one of the reasons we merited to get this letter on Pesach is because this connection can create a tremendous change in our lives and in the world. We have to ask for and beg for these three points now — that we strengthen our certainty that pain and suffering can end, in the gift of the Zohar, and in ourselves.

If everybody in this room did those three things, the amount of change we can create might be enough to bring the redemption.

Let’s not try to understand too much. Let’s just ask. Consciousness is 99% of the work. In each of the things, what we have to do is awaken consciousness. That’s why they baked the matzot before, and that’s why it is the difference between a person who is connected and a person who is disconnected…

Let us ask, beg, open ourselves to this level of certainty. If everyone of us, in unity, opens to this desire, this request, we can create a tremendous change for ourselves and for the world.

Chag Sameach