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Under The Upper Providence

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: You always say that The Book of Zohar can sometimes be a cure and sometimes poison, what does that mean?

Answer: Kabbalists describe this dilemma by using the allegory of choosing between the elixir of life and the potion of death, or by bringing the example of the rooster and the bat. Everything depends on a person’s intention: Is it the urge for the goal that drives him? This doesn’t mean that by opening a Kabbalah book he necessarily has to focus himself on the true goal because otherwise he will receive the potion of death. It is impossible to demand such things. So the Creator gives a person the right intentions, just like a baby who is under the full supervision of a grown up.

Even if a person comes to study without any basic knowledge and thinks about anything he feels like, it isn’t actually he who thinks and who is operating. From Above he is provided with constant supervision and care. If you could see this from the side, you would see that a person is like a newborn baby, that he has nothing of his own. It is simply a system, a “body” that functions according to a plan. He is equipped with everything that he needs, absorbing and emitting what he has to and thus grows. At this point a person has no freewill and no discernments.

Gradually, however, he grows and begins to move independently. At first he doesn’t feel responsible for what is going on, but later he begins to consciously perceive something and to shout intentionally at something, etc. Gradually he begins to understand what is good and what is bad and under which circumstances he feels good or bad. Accordingly he is played with and shown what he does correctly and what he doesn’t.

There are those who hear better and there are those who hear less, it depends on your innate attributes and on your upbringing. Generally speaking, it is about a huge system called Shechina that takes care of every one and brings everyone to the end of correction.

So, I cannot tell you when a Kabbalah book gives life and when it brings death. First a person is taught all this and after several years he understands that only in a group can he fulfill himself and move on from a corporeal connection with the friends to an internal, spiritual connection.

And then it his choice to reach for the opening of the spiritual network between the friends. It may be concealed from them, but he wants to reveal it. This means that he is attracted to life since this network is totally filled with bestowal.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/23/12, The Zohar

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An Evasive Intention

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: What should I do when I try to hold on to the intention and then the opposite happens and something draws me to the side?

Answer: This is wonderful. The moment you try to hold on to an intention, it evades you or is extinguished by something so that you will hold on to it more strongly. Then by different interruptions, you will be able to differentiate the corrections that you make by carrying on. The Creator shows them to you.

Today it is as if everything is blurred by different problems, but in fact it isn’t so, it is always a kind of help, and it guides you more accurately towards the goal. You aim at it, and suddenly it seems blurry, so that you will “aim” more sensitively and more accurately. And that’s how it is all the time.

Eventually you will be able to recognize the state of the next level from your current state. By the revelation of the ten Sefirot you see reality from end to end and then you are allowed to ascend higher.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/23/12, The Zohar

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What Will Wake Me Up?

Dr. Michael LaitmanSometimes a person is in such a state that he doesn’t want anything. Nothing attracts him: not unity with the friends, not understanding the Kabbalistic texts, no feeling, and no connection to someone important. He doesn’t think about the inner goals that should be fulfilled during the day in the group and at work. It is as if he is “dead.” It isn’t that he feels that he is “dead,” but that he doesn’t feel himself at all, he is asleep.

What can a person ask for in such a case? He can ask for two things:

  • To be a little closer to the group, so that the “currents” that flow through the friends will flow through him too, and will thus shake him and wake him up.
  • A basic desire to place himself under the Light so that it will impress him and revive him.

If he has no clear demand that comes from his deficiencies or his impressions, he needs these two factors: One of them operates from the side of the vessel and the other is operated from the side of the Light.

First I want to belong to the friends so that everything that flows through them will flow through me. The main thing here is to be involved in “spiritual matters.” I come, sit down, and listen to what is going on; I just listen on the spiritual level, by opening all my spiritual “openings” to the currents that flow in the group.

Second, I allow the Light to operate on me, to go through me by filling me and by bringing me back to life
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/23/12, The Zohar

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We Only Need To Ask Correctly

Dr. Michael LaitmanEverything is arranged such that the upper force, the good and the benevolent, is Above in the hands of the Creator. In order to reach this force and to identify with it, a person has to be adapted to it, to adhere to it, and to just discover a desire for that. His corrections and his ascent totally depend on the upper force.

It turns out that there is a negative force below and a positive force above, and a person is in between so that he will be able to determine by himself whether he wants to join the force of receiving or the force of bestowal.

When he sets himself apart from these two forces and begins to determine his state, it means that he is connected to the “human” point in him. All our work is to clarify what the states we constantly fall into mean. The upper force determines all these feelings within our ego, our desires, and our attributes so that we will see how opposite we are from the upper nature that we want to resemble and attain.

Accordingly, we will be able to determine what to ask for. In fact, nothing is required of us but the request, and it is the sum of all our exertion.

Therefore it says: “I have labored and found!” I exert myself in order to check and to clarify my current attributes, which I received as a preparation from Above as a result of the shattering. I have to compare these attributes to the Creator’s attributes, but how do I know who the Creator is?

I have to yearn for bestowal in the group and constantly feel the greatness of the goal. When an opposite force is revealed in me, I will be able to compare the two forces. I don’t compare myself with others, but constantly raise the right line and then the left line is evoked in me. Between these two lines I clarify my deficiency by yearning to resemble the right line together with my left line.

Thus I perform the “holy work” in my correction and do everything in my power to finally discover how opposite I am from holiness and purity. This brings me to a prayer.

Everything is first attained only by the power of prayer, which is the end result of all our efforts. If I discover the right deficiency inside me, I am rewarded with bestowal by the Light, with correction and then with a filling, which means with adhesion to the Creator.

A person attains the implementation of the work in this very special way: From the absolute opposite from the Creator, he adheres to the Creator. We should understand that there is no higher state in our work than the feeling of deficiency, a prayer, if this deficiency is real. This is how the sum, the conclusion, of all our exertion is revealed.
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From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/23/12

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2013: The Food Crisis

Dr. Michael LaitmanIn the News (from Rabobank): “Skyrocketing agricultural commodity prices are causing the world to re-enter a period of “agflation”, with food prices forecast to reach record highs in 2013 and to continue to rise well into Q3 2013. Unlike the staple grain shortage of 2008, this year’s scarcity will affect feed intensive crops with serious repercussions for the animal protein and dairy industries. …

“Rabobank estimates that the Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) Food Price Index will rise by 15% by the end of June 2013. In order for demand rationing to take place, in turn encouraging a supply response, prices will need to stay high. As such Rabobank expects prices – particularly for grains and oilseeds – to remain at elevated levels for at least the next 12 months.”

“While the impact of higher food prices should be reduced by favorable macroeconomic fundamentals (low growth, lower oil prices, weak consumer confidence, and a depreciated U.S. dollar), interventionist government policies could exacerbate the issue. Stockpiling and export bans are a distinct possibility in 2012/13, as governments seek to protect domestic consumers from increasing food prices. Increased government intervention will likely encourage further increases in world commodity and food prices.

“Rabobank expects that localized efforts to increase stockpiles will prove counterproductive at the global level, with those countries least able to pay higher prices likely to see greater moves in domestic food price inflation. This is a vicious circle, with governments committing to domestic stockpiling and other interventionist measures earlier than usual—recognizing the risk of being left out as exportable stocks decline further.

“On top of that, Rabobank warns that global food stocks have not been replenished since 2008, leaving the market without any buffer to adverse growing conditions. Efforts by governments to rebuild stocks are likely to add to food prices and take supplies off the market at a time when they are most needed.”

My Comment: If we distribute food equally among all the population, it will be enough for everybody. The problem is not in the quantity of food, but in its distribution, that is, in human relations. So, we are not facing a food crisis, but a crisis of distribution.

Incidentally, the word “crisis” means “opportunity” in Chinese; if we use it properly, we all have enough.
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The Power Of Love Keeps Us In Orbit And Does Not Let Us Fall

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How can I check whether there is love between friends in the group?

Answer: The love between friends in the group can be checked by how much during the day I am in the awareness of the way, how much the friends, due to our connection and mutual guarantee, take care that none of us falls down, keeping us in constant yearning for the goal, towards the center of the group.

Within such caring for one another and mutual aid, love is revealed.
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The Scenario For The Future Of Every Country

Dr. Michael LaitmanIn the News (from Euronews): “Doctors, lawyers and journalists were among those who went on strike in Greece, on the eve of a national day of action against the latest bout of belt-tightening and reforms.

“They protested in front of the finance ministry over tougher tax and social security measures they claim are crippling their professions.”

My Comment: This results from the improper organization of the population, or rather its absence. They should organize all in integral education courses with free food for all the students until the economy reaches the level of reasonable consumption.
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Germany Is Facing A Wave Of Bankruptcies

Dr. Michael LaitmanIn the News (from The Wall Street Journal): “German corporate and consumer bankruptcies jumped in July from a year ago, according to official data released Friday, a lagging indicator that growth in the euro zone’s largest economy is slowing amid a financial crisis in the region.

“The number of companies that declared themselves insolvent, and therefore unable to discharge liabilities, increased 1.9% in July to 2,580, not including the German state of Saarland. Consumer bankruptcies rose by 2.8% to 8,960 cases, according to Destatis, the German Federal Statistics Office. Together with the insolvencies of other debtors and private estates, total insolvencies in July reached 13,783, an increase of 2.5% on last year.”

My Comment: The most powerful states fall last because they exist at the expense of the weak, but they fall more forcefully and more painfully than the weak, which can lead, as in the past, to war.
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Connections In Higher Places

Dr. Michael LaitmanAccording to modern science, the universe originated about 14 billion years ago. Some “spark,” completely not material, with a plan concealed within it, marked the beginning of the formation of matter. It was a spark of energy that included within it the design, desire, and ultimately, the whole fabric of our universe.

Just imagine, a myriad of stars and galaxies from this one spark. The thought, the plan, is able to give birth to matter without any limits. Another billion stars? Here you are! We simply aren’t able to grasp the difference between the levels of our world and this spark. His plan activated the development of matter up to the human level.

And now, a person living on this Earth, in our world, must knowingly, consciously, and voluntarily clarify what this spark is, the spark that created the universe. The spark wants man to discover it, to merge with it, with its thought and purpose, desire and intent.

Man is truly the crown of nature, but in the meantime only in potential. We will become the crown when we connect with this spark, when we understand what its thought is and what plan got realized from it, down to the appearance of humanity in our world.

All the other systems that lie below this thought were designed only to awaken a person to ascend the steps of the still, vegetative, and animate nature. One doesn’t control them; one can’t change anything there. In the end, one must awaken and rise higher in order to attain that same plan, that same thought of creation that created our entire universe and everything that exists in it.

This to where man’s development leads him; he must achieve it. By our leaning in this direction, we suddenly will feel the harmony between us as well as the harmony with the still, vegetative, and animate nature that is entirely governed from Above. We need to join the higher system, just like a person in our world searches for connection in the “higher circles,” and then all the lower systems will undoubtedly come into order. We, however, sink into the problems of the subsystems.

The general plan is built in such a way as to constantly put pressure on us, encouraging a connection with the “correct destination.” Thus, the reasons for unpleasant and painful events that threaten us with death and even the worst suffering aren’t worthwhile searching for. We can’t be cured from the diseases by treatments at the same level.

Actually, we can only take “tranquilizers” that will allow us to worry about the root of the problem. And on the contrary, by our trying to be satisfied by curing the symptoms, we only invite upon ourselves double beatings.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 10/10/12

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