A question I received on my post Depression – the Epidemic of the 21st Century: I usually hear you talking about materialistic psychology. What is it?

My Answer: Materialistic psychology explains everything that is based on precise experiments, statistics, without the use of philosophy or psychological theories – it’s nothing but bare practice!
The following is an excerpt from the article “The Wisdom of Kabbalah and Philosophy,” where Baal HaSulam writes about materialistic philosophy:

“Not only is it the wrong place to argue with them about their fabricated conjectures, but also their time has already passed and their authority revoked. We should also thank the experts of materialistic psychology for that, having built its plinth on the ruin of the former, winning the public’s favor. Now everyone admits to the nullity of philosophy, for it is not built on concrete foundations.

… For that reason we are grateful to materialistic psychology for having beaten it a deadly blow.”

Related Material:
* BLOG POST: Philosophy and Kabbalah
* LESSON: The Wisdom of Kabbalah and Philosophy – Baal HaSulam’s article with commentary by Rav Michael Laitman, PhD – wmv video | mp3 audio [57:39]

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A question I received on my post Hyperactive Children – the Result of Evolving Egoism: I don’t understand your use of the term “egoistic.” And it becomes more confusing to me when used in opposition to the word “altruistic.”

Can you perhaps explain more as to what we did wrong back in Babylon when we decided to go the route that placed us here today – and more importantly how we can fix this problem going forward.

My Answer: Abraham discovered that his fellow citizens in Ancient Babylon (the city of Ur, to be more precise, where he used to live) had an increasing tendency to use each other for egoistic reasons.

Through analyzing this problem, he discovered why it was happening: egoism constantly grows so that people can rise above it, and use their ascent for altruistic growth (like elevating over a constantly growing mountain that’s under our feet). Such a principle of existence is referred to as “faith above reason” – giving over receiving. Regardless of Abraham’s attempts to convince the Babylonian residents to realize the law of nature that was disclosed to them, they chose otherwise. They chose the path of compliance with egoism, and submitted to it: I do what I want, as much as it is possible for me to do so.

Today, this path has brought us to a dead end. We now need to accept upon ourselves this method of correction, either involuntary or on our own accord.

Related Material:
* ARTICLE: Havoc in Modern-Day Babylon – the idea of unity among all human beings is no more to us than an imaginary children’s story. Back in babylon, someone had a way for humanity to unite. Today, our world needs such a method more than ever.

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A question I received: You say that there is nothing any lecture or class you see on a street corner can give someone, other than temporary relief, which is followed by even greater disappointment, and that it is because egoism cannot be corrected by physical exercises, meditation, medications, and even by observing the commandments. On the contrary, egoism grows and gets bigger, which eventually brings a person to Kabbalah, which is precisely the method for egoism’s correction. But until a person finds Kabbalah, there is a long path ahead of him, full of suffering.

My question is: What can be done to awaken the desire for correction in such people? What can be done to make them realize that egoism is evil, and that this evil is corrected through the study of Kabbalah?

My Answer: Only consistent dissemination over a long period of time, in which time all the other methods of “elimination” and “correction” come crashing down.

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