Who Is With Me?

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How can we, your students, join your mind?

Answer: What does it mean “with me?” You are with me if you annul yourself, lower your desire before my desire. If you attend lessons, it does not necessarily mean that you are with me. This is not the study in the true meaning yet.

After all, uniting should be inner; it’s not about the words you hear. We unite through desires, goals, and common actions. The one who evokes the property of bestowal into action is the one who studies. In this case you indeed study the wisdom. You will not be able to receive the wisdom, the Light of Hochma (Wisdom), from me if you do not activate the Light of Hassadim (Mercy) as a vessel. And Hassadim is self-annulment and unity when you are ready for this.

You vacate a space for every soul in your heart, and then all souls fill this volume. The entire reality returns to you. However, it returns precisely through your annulment.
[41697]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/30/2011, “The Acting Mind”

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Brothers, I Want To Embrace You

Dr. Michael LaitmanTo the extent that you want to see the group united and whole, existing in mutual, inner guarantee, you influence the whole group and infuse them with your power, your desire, the quality of bestowal. You want to permeate the friends so that they are filled with this quality. This is the meaning of “love thy friend as thyself” since you strive to fulfill them as you would yourself; moreover, they are even more important to you.

How can this be unclear? Everyone can feel it. You want to imagine your friends unifying together and you filling them to the brim! Here you don’t think about your personal benefit or loss, but only about the friends, about Shechina (Divinity). And if you’re only thinking about them, you will not experience any personal descents or ascents, but will continue living their desires.

When you undergo a descent, the reason is that your desires are locked. Your ego doesn’t feel that it can fulfill itself in any way. There are no pleasures to chase, and so you fall into hibernation and wait until your state changes with the flow of time.

This standstill happens because there are no new desires revealing in you. If you were to feel a new desire at that time, you would immediately awaken and wish to receive the whole world! Everything depends on desire.

It follows that if a great desire is revealed in you, you are overflowing with energy; if the desire is small, you are calm; but if the desire fades altogether, you die. But this can only happen if you’re working with your own desire.

However, if you work with the desires of others, you are continually renewed. This desire will no longer depend on you, but you will always have the desires of others. Therefore, you will not undergo ascents and descents; rather, you will keep rising and rising.

That is to say, ascents and descents will be of a different nature, determined not by the desire but by the Light: What else can you give, what else can you tear away from the will to receive and use for the sake of bestowal so as to add to your bestowal to the Creator?
[41629]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/27/2011Shamati No.1

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Faith In The Sages

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: If a person is raised in religion from childhood and filled with the notion that there is only the Creator, why do people believe in all kinds of impure forces?

Answer: How can you believe in the Creator when you have never seen or otherwise sensed Him? What can you ask of a person who believes in second-hand stories? One person has one story to tell, another has something else, but neither of them has seen anything with their own eyes, and neither have I. There cannot be blind faith!

This is why the wisdom of Kabbalah speaks only of actual attainment, as it is said: “A judge has only what his eyes can see.” And by no means can we deviate from this principle.

We must know the Creator by revealing Him, not by believing in Him. Kabbalah says that there is some higher reality that we don’t perceive, which is still concealed from us. We know that looking at the world with nearsighted eyes you can only see a few feet in front of you, but with glasses you can see a mile away.

Similarly, there is another opportunity to infinitely expand our perception (vision, understanding, sensation) and also to add new qualities, to reveal new dimensions. All of this is possible. We accept this as a hypothesis, just as in science. We believe the Kabbalists that if we do certain actions which they speak of, we can achieve this new level of perception: achieve attainment, enlightenment, and sensation. The method is not about blind faith.

I have faith in the method; that is, I accept it with a question mark so that I could test and actualize it in practice. And then I see that the method is very logical, that it clearly explains to me how I can use the environment so that it changes me; I realize how I need to act with respect to the forces that exist in nature.

I believe only when I see that the method gives the desired result, though the actions themselves are clear and obvious. The notion that I can use the environment to work against my egoistic nature, to achieve a quality that’s opposite to it, is quite realistic. This is called “faith in the sages,” when I follow their advices.
[41636]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/27/2011Shamati No.1

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125 Degrees Of Drawing Closer To The Light

Dr. Michael LaitmanOur perception of the whole reality is very shaky since we don’t know how to relate to ourselves or the world in which we exist. Where do we exist and what do we feel now? Is it a dream or the truth? Is this world an objective reality or merely our temporary perception in distorted organs of perception? Possibly, when we correct our qualities from reception to bestowal, we will perceive a completely different world.

And this does not mean simply understanding it or feeling it better with the same senses that are more developed. Instead, I can completely change my sensations and perceptions that are attuned to reception and stop accepting reality egoistically; I can begin to perceive it in bestowal, an aspiration to my neighbor.

It turns out that instead of my own desire, I acquire the desires of others, and I begin to truly feel through them. And then I will sense a completely different world, another reality!

Who depicts this reality to us? Kabbalists say that it is the upper force, one, unique, and unified, besides which there is nothing else, which is good and does good to all, the wicked and the righteous alike. It is the upper Light that exists at absolute rest, and we can reveal it only by becoming equal to it in our qualities.

There are 125 degrees which correspond to the Light, and I will feel the upper Light in me to the extent that I receive the quality of bestowal, depending on the extent that I can correct myself and make myself similar to the upper Light which bestows kindness and all that is good. If I acquire the same qualities, I simply will exist in this quality of bestowal, thereby feeling it.

In other words, there is a force of bestowal called the “upper Light,” and a force of reception called “the creature.” If the creature acquires the force of bestowal over the force of reception, this force that begins to govern over it is perceived as fulfillment: a screen and the Reflected Light, the degree of bestowal that gives the creature a sensation of fulfillment.

How do we relate to this upper force? Will we ever be able to feel it, or do we just imagine it somehow according to the qualities in which we perceive it and the sensations, thoughts, and desires that are awakened in us? Kabbalists say that the upper force itself is Atzmuto, the essence of the Creator, which is not felt or attained by us. He has no form that we can perceive. However, to the extent that you try to draw closer to Him and become like Him, you will be able to understand various qualities that pertain to bestowal.

He is like a “giver” to you, but He himself has neither the quality of bestowal nor reception; He is above all this. Only His attitude towards the created beings is called “bestowal,” “love,” “giving.”

However, if it is written that He is “good and does good,” “there is none else besides Him,” “I did not change my name (HaVaYaH),” “the law is given and cannot be contravened,” which means that He is invariable, good, and perfect, then how can we ask Him for something? How can we ask Him to change and have pity on us?

This pertains only to the creature’s attitude which perceives the Creator in this manner and tells us about it, as it is written: “The Torah spoke in the language of the people.” Therefore, all our prayers and our attitude towards the Creator are essentially our attitude to ourselves, the way that I judge myself and desire to change in the direction of bestowal. However, all changes occur only in the created beings who, due to their own changes, feel that the picture of the Creator changes.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/27/2011, Shamati No.1

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A Prayer Book Is The Saga Of Spiritual Life

Dr. Michael LaitmanThe soul’s reaction to the states it passes through is reflected in the words written by Kabbalists. That reaction is collected in the prayer book entitled Siddur (the “order” of undergone states). We don’t understand what the prayers describe, nor the soul’s impressions that are recorded in the appellations, letters, their combinations, or the arrangement of the words in the sentences.

The entire prayer book is organized so that for any soul that experiences transformations in a specific state this process is expressed in the same words of the prayer. It is not necessary to articulate the words out loud. The soul will feel them within; the prayer will become its internal construction.

Every letter is a certain order, a sequence of the forces that receive and bestow. Additionally, within the letters, there are “vowel marks,” the fillings, a complete TANTA (Ta’amim, Nekudot, Tagin, Otiot or lights, points, crowns above letters, and letters), the states we are going through.

Our internal desires alter and assume all kinds of forms that instill various feelings in us. In turn, when transferred to paper these sensations receive a specific form of spiritual elements in letters, words, and sentences.

In other words, a prayer is an external expression of internal spiritual sensations. A person doesn’t really need a prayer book. If he is experiencing such internal states, they will become his prayer.

A prayer book is needed in order to look at the shape of the letters and visualize (if we are already able to do so) what states we need to undergo, to imagine what awaits us ahead. If I am already in the spiritual world, then based on what I am reading in the prayer book, I can somewhat perceive what is going to happen to me, what states I am going to enter.

In this world, I am familiar with various human emotions. Hence, while reading a novel for example, I can feel and experience the events being described internally. The same goes for the spiritual world.
[41128]
From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/21/2011Beit Shaar HaKavanot

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The Night Heaven-Sent For Escape

Dr. Michael LaitmanBaal HaSulam, Beit Shaar HaKavanot (The Gate of Intentions), Chapter “Concerning Passover Exodus”: On the Passover night, Zeir Anpin grows to the greatest state, and hence, on this night, such enormous Light is revealed that it is greater than the Light of Sabbath.

All that there is in Zeir Anpin of the world of Atzilut is passed down to the souls. If we here, below, don’t ask and don’t evoke ZA, it remains in its constant small state, VAK, whereas Malchut is just a point. When there is only the Light of VAK in ZA, Hassadim (Mercy), Malchut has nothing since she has receiving desires and cannot be filled with only the Light of Hassadim.

Therefore, this is a preparatory state that has nothing to do with any spiritual action yet. All the other states are defined by how high ZA can rise (upon our request) over the small state.

The process we undergo during the exodus from Egypt, from being enslaved by the desires located below the Parsa, is not simple and doesn’t correspond to the usual work order: six “weekdays” followed by the seventh “day,” Saturday. Saturday is arranged “in likeness to the future world,” and, according to the spiritual work performed during the six “business days,” brings us the “awakening from Above” and its result: corrected desires.

However, the exodus from Egypt is a “night,” not a day as Saturday is. It’s a sign that a very big Light of Hochma (Wisdom) is revealed that is not covered by the Light of Hassadim. Hence, it feels not as Light, but as “Egyptian night,” the enormous Light of Hochma that cannot emanate to us.

We are constantly present within an ocean of Light, and we are either unable to establish any relationship with it (and then we simply don’t feel it, as right now), or we can approach the Light and obtain exactly the same property as it has. Then, according to the law of equivalence of form, we will be able to feel it. If I am in the same bestowal as the Light, then between us, a common sensation appears that is regarded as the revelation of the Light, the Creator, to the created beings.

Alternatively, there can be an opposite state where I don’t feel that I am approaching the Light, bestowal, but on the contrary, I feel coming closer to reception, my opposition to unification. This doesn’t pertain to mere material gain, but specifically to the lack of unity of the souls that makes me feel darkness. This has a spiritual meaning.

We always deal with what lies above the animate level, meaning with the internal work that bears a “positive” or “negative” fruit, and a person senses transformations as either an unfolding Light or darkness. However, in the worst case, a person feels nothing whatsoever, which means he is not working at all. The essence of the Passover story is an unusual order (Seder) of receiving the Lights that wake us up and lead out of Egypt.
[41131]
From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/21/2011Beit Shaar HaKavanot

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Children Of The World, Unite!

Dr. Michael LaitmanWe are developing the method of correction during our daily lessons. We build it from the primary sources and their explanations, from questions and answers. We are creating an educational system within the same framework.

A special channel of dissemination of Kabbalah for the entire world opens here. After all, education is every parent’s headache or, actually, a heartache. Everyone is concerned about their children in every part of the world, North and South America, Asia, Africa, Russia and Europe, China and Japan. The problem of education is awakening everywhere to various extents.

This is why the world is ready to listen to our developments in this area. We are communicating with UNESCO, the top organization responsible for education around the world. We were very well received, and our representatives have already participated in two events in New York and Moscow.

We have discovered that the world is aching to solve this problem, but no one has the solution. UNESCO has high expectations for us, and they are inspired with the quantity of our materials regarding this topic. It is true that today, our materials are breaking all boundaries. Every week we produce 50-100 pages of new text. At the same time, we are working on a new book which will be published under the aegis of UNESCO. Several more large projects are waiting in line.

There is no doubt that if we manage to create one “good” generation, in their turn, they will know how to raise their children. For this reason, the entire problem is in figuring out a way to form one generation that will receive an education instead of plain knowledge, which will give us the ability to turn the children into human beings in the  full sense of this word.

They will know the reason and purpose of their existence, how they can connect with one another, why they begin with the breaking, and why they need to correct themselves. Briefly speaking, they will know how to have a proper attitude toward the world.

Next, we are realizing educational programs with the group of our children. We correct it and find many new approaches along the way. For example, we have discovered that children teach one another very well. For instance, the fourteen-year-old teaches the ten-year-old.

This is because the younger ones see the older ones as role models, and they want to be like them, while the older ones are proud of their role. In the end, the age difference creates a great bond. Overall, children growing up according to the new method become completely different.

Essentially, the entirety of Kabbalah is a science of education; we use it to educate ourselves. However, this becomes very evident among children. It is no mistake that they happen to be growing up in our arms from their infancy. The matter depends on us because they are already prepared to receive the spiritual method of education from us.

The Study of the Ten Sefirot explains the growth of the spiritual person within us. We can raise a child according to the same principles as we take him through the years (degrees) toward maturity, not just the physical one, but the spiritual one. This is the method we are trying to develop, build, and realize.

This summer, we are planning to open a two-week summer camp for children around the world. The program will be broadcast over the Internet so that every child can connect to the common activities since this will be happening over the summer vacation. We will try to support the children’s unity in the future as well so that they will eventually grow into the new, international, virtual as well as physical group.
[40957]
From Lesson 6, WE! Convention 4/3/2011

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Writings of Rabash, Dargot HaSulam “General and Private Attainment”
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Explanation of the Article, “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah,” Item 12, Lesson 6
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Rav Yehuda Ashlag, “The Freedom,″ Lesson 17
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“Ask The Kabbalist” – 17

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