Who May Join This Society Further on, God willing, we will set forth the regulations of the group. But at any rate, at the very beginning we must make it clear that only the following may apply to and become a member of this holy group:

1. You must be a person who truly feels pain and sorrow at your distance from God. You not only recognize your low state intellectually—which everyone realizes this intellectually, unless he is insane or drunk—but in your heart you truly feel the pain because of an embittered soul. This causes you no less concern than do your physical problems. Not only that, at times this weighs so heavily upon you that you cry over the sufferings of your soul and the lowness of your being.

2. You must be a ben Torah, dedicated to learning and keeping Torah—to a greater or lesser extent.

3. Whether you are a merchant, craftsman, or whatever, you must meet with the group at least three times a week. And you must meticulously adhere to the group regulations, which will be described further on, God willing.

4. You must not be inconstant by nature, impetuously coming to a decision one day and forgetting about it the next, casually trampling upon your commitments and “overturning the pot.”

5. You must not be a liar, a dissembler immersed in his own falsehoods.

Some people lie occasionally, heaven forbid. This is very bad, God have mercy, but such a person can at any rate repent of this behavior, after which he would be a candidate to join our group.

But there is another kind of person, one who is in his essence a dissembler and liar, a man who fools not only others but himself as well.

My honored and holy father-in-law quoted a tzaddik to the effect that such person cannot repent, because even his repentance is false, since he fools himself and imagines that in one moment he has become righteous. But in truth, he is not righteous, he has not acted correctly, and he has not accomplished anything.