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Question: What rules the Israeli nation today? What state is it in?
Answer: Now concealment rules the Israeli nation. There are no false philosophical perceptions, but there is no truth as in the wisdom of Kabbalah; there is nothing but the animal mind and feeling to fill themselves somehow without any spiritual element or at least its human parallel.
I am not saying that things are any different in the world, but the values there are also different. We measure the Israeli nation in comparison to the times when it was in the height of spiritually, whereas today it is on the lowest corporeal level. There is no spirituality and no yearning for it; everyone is confused, and at the same time they are sure that they are not confused, that everything is clear.
It is perfectly clear to people that this whole world is material and they don’t need anything more than economic prosperity and success in this ordinary life. There is no connection, no relationship, no contact with the nation’s spiritual role and its duty towards the world. People are not aware of these things, and they don’t know about them. The nation is in a state of unconsciousness, like a patient lying unconscious in bed while a group of doctors discuss how they should treat him.
I am speaking about the Israeli nation living in the land of Israel. It is because the assimilation in the outside world has reached such a state that it has lost the external form of the nation. In fact we cannot call these people “Jewish” anymore. It may be that some of them go to the synagogue in order to say Kadish on Yom Kippur or give charity, but the young ones have cut off this chain. There is no more “Israeli nation” outside the state of Israel.
On the contrary, the Israelis and the Jews in the diaspora are separated. It is enough to look at the American Jews who are dispersed both physically and morally; they don’t worry about Israel, only about themselves. What’s more, they want to show that they have no interest in the state of Israel, that they are “just like everyone else in America,” dedicated only to the country they live in. Once they were proud of their roots, but this has disappeared.
They not only show the breach with their own people, but even more than that, they show disrespect towards Israel. Some prefer that Israel didn’t exist at all. It isn’t by chance that Obama has so many Jewish aides. The Jewish vote for the presidential elections is also very meaningful. Under such conditions, the term the “Israeli nation” becomes very theoretical and actually doesn’t exist at all.
This means that the name the “Israeli nation” refers to those who experience the shattering, the general global destruction, and who begin to emerge from different places in the world to connect to a group that is aimed at the Creator “Yashar – El.” This is called the “Israeli nation.” In other words, it is our whole organization with all of its participants who have come together from all over this modern, human Babylon.
It is a new situation and it shouldn’t be underestimated; today we must at least worry about the Jews who live in the land of Israel since they share the same corporeal fate. It isn’t by chance that they found themselves in one place since it is also organized by Providence. We have to treat them as those who carry the Reshimot (spiritual genes) from the shattering, from the previous state. During the time of the Temple they were in the spiritual height and have already fulfilled their potential. This is why we have to evoke them since we are obligated to awaken them as Baal HaSulam says in the articles “Matan Torah” (The Giving of the Torah) and “The Arvut” (Mutual Guarantee).
So there is an “Israeli nation” in the spiritual sense according to the intention of “Yashar – El” (straight to the Creator), which are those who join our global group, and there is the “Israeli nation” in the general accepted meaning, who are Jews from birth, who have Reshimot from the previous spiritual states, and who have better chances of awakening to correction than members of other nations.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/24/12, “The Wisdom of Kabbalah and Philosophy“
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Question: It is written that the righteous lament lacking suffering in their lives since it is pain that expands the vessel of perception.
Answer: It is not about the suffering of the ego when a person, looking back on the life he has lived, feels bad about missed opportunities: “There I missed the opportunity to get rich, here to make love, and here to take a break!” and so on, so that in his old age he would be reproaching and chewing at himself. This is a terrible state!
Spiritually, there is no such thing, since we discern where in my life I was unable to exert extra effort for the sake of connection with others, for the sake of their and my correction, for the sake of rising over our egoism onto a higher level, the human degree.
But this isn’t suffering because to the extent that I am experiencing it right now, I immediately correct it.
Question: Then what do the righteous mean by “suffering”?
Answer: They worry about missed opportunities and instantly fulfill them.
After all, they still experience desires. Conversely, they sort of pick up where they left some “unfinished business” in life. For example, at present I wish to see my students in a perfect state. This is my greatest wish, and it is already implementing the rest.
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From KabTV’s “Foundations of the Integral Society” 3/11/12
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Question: In our world, people strive to win: I am ahead of everybody; I am the greatest; and so on. When does a person win and when does he lose in the world of common integral mind?
Answer: Let’s remove the entire perception of our world as selfish and hence totally unrelated to the next state—the human degree. This means that everything we experience in our world as food, sex, family, wealth, fame, power, and knowledge is an empty zero at the next level.
The next state is a filter through which only purely altruistic processes may pass, meaning actions excluding any personal benefit, aimed solely for the benefit of others. You have to become one with others, feel their desires as your own, in order to be able to fulfill them.
Question: What is considered winning in the integral state, and does it imply losing?
Answer: There could be victories and defeats, yet all of them lead to winning nonetheless because a defeat is merely a discovery of some flaw, a lack of certain instruments that can help you become corrected and move on.
Question: What are these tools?
Answer: They are forces, properties, the power of bestowal, your connection with others, communication with nature, comprehension of the spiritual environment you are placed in.
Basically, there is only one tool—the property of bestowal; but it has many, various functions.
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From KabTV’s “Foundations of the Integral Society” 3/11/12
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Opinion (Anatoly Wasserman, political consultant): “We are experiencing a crisis, connected with deep conditions. The deeper conditions are, the deeper the crisis is. Now, the causes are not only not resolved, but the real reasons that led to the crisis are not really understood.
“This means that we cannot get rid of these causes, and they will continue in the future, as long as we do not understand them. And in order to understand, it is necessary, among other things, to drop the economic theory, which for political reasons was proclaimed the only true and acceptable one. As long as we are told to consider this theory exclusively true, we will not get out of the crisis.”
My Comment: Insight comes gradually. All that was said to politicians, sociologists, and in general to everyone in all our materials is starting to become clear to them from their failures, losses, crashes, and coming disasters, until a world war.
When the realization and acceptance of the need to change society, through the method of new integral upbringing, to match to the new laws of nature and society, the law of integral interaction (mutual guarantee), depends on in which way we reach the next stage of development: a long path of suffering and war or a short kind, peaceful path.
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Question: Human nature is such that in a desperate situation, one is ready to accept any illogical solutions. So if Israel finds itself in a truly critical situation, it will say: “So what can I do? Let’s try to connect.”
Answer: It is impossible without a deficiency, without sufferings. The problem is how to ease these sufferings. People have to see in advance that this is the good and easy way that solves all their problems: political, military, economic, ideological, etc., eliminates anti –Semitism, and changes the whole world so that it will treat us well.
But until we reach the minimal general connection among us, we will have to guard all our borders simultaneously. However, the moment we reach general unity, we will see clearly how unnecessary these borders are. We will summon the balance that this world needs.
I am not fantasizing; I am a very realistic person. I am speaking about the fact that there are forces in this world that we, the Israeli nation, can use, and it is a pity that we don’t do that. So it is as if the whole world is telling us that we are the reason for all the suffering, which is true.
We have a serious scientific method, although on the outside it seems like a game of “being good kids.” We have to study and implement it.
[94710]
From a Talk about the situation in Israel 11/22/12
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Question: Many people find it easier to believe in God rather than in the method of mutual guarantee…
Answer: We have already seen throughout history that blind faith in God leads to nothing. It may ease a person’s life, but it isn’t what is required of us.
We are required to intervene accurately, toughly, and wisely in nature. We have to create an additional good force in nature, in order to balance the evil force that was created that way on purpose so that a person himself will balance his evil egoistic nature, and create a better, balanced state in it, and thus develop and rise.
We have to act subconsciously, to build a second nature together with the egoistic nature and connect the two in a balanced way—it is in the balance between them without erasing our ego, but by using it as it is and by that adding a positive attitude towards others to it, thus balancing it.
It is a whole system that begins to raise us above our world. I hope it will succeed because I simply don’t see any other way out. Eventually it will bring us to the level of eternal existence that is whole and logical.
But how much suffering will our people have to go through before they begin to hear this, to open our home page, for example, and to penetrate into this method a little. Since it is against our ego, people are immediately repelled by it and don’t believe it. It seems silly and illogical to them—where are the missiles, where are the military forces? People have always counted on power, but it is only now that we begin to understand that it isn’t the solution. For the first time in our existence we begin to see that the solution is not in military operations.
Eventually people will understand the truth, but it is a pity that we may have to go through much suffering in order to capture people’s attention a bit, to summon fear in people for their future, and to force them to listen.
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From a Talk about the situation in Israel 11/22/12
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Let’s first clarify the relationship between the wisdom of Kabbalah and philosophy.
On the whole, philosophy studies what life is, what is its meaning, its purpose, and what man’s attitude to life and to nature is.
In one word, philosophy seems to encompass everything. At the same time it isn’t called a science, because it studies man and the human level of reality, in other words, the sphere that we cannot measure. There are no clear and accurate opinions here that can be accepted as facts.
In scientific methods, we study the still, vegetative, and animate nature, which are lower levels that man looks down upon from the height of the next evolutionary level. We can descend to them, perceive them, investigate, and understand them. This also applies to our body that belongs to the animate level of nature.
But we cannot study the “human” in us accurately. We try to classify different phenomena, responses, perceptions, thoughts, and inner desires scientifically, but we don’t succeed. Why? Because it is our own level, the same level, and I can only study what is below me.
This is the whole problem. It is common knowledge, although science actually started from man’s approach to himself and to life. It is no coincidence that degrees in all fields are called “Doctor of Philosophy” (PhD), although they have nothing to do with philosophy. The general approach to yourself and to reality is simply called “philosophy.”
This term is actually derived from the wisdom of Kabbalah. Here is what 16th century German humanist and linguist Johann Reuchlin, one of the greatest experts in ancient languages, a personal advisor to Emperor Maximillian I, and who maintained contact with the Platonic Academy says:
“My teacher Pythagoras, the father of philosophy, probably received his wisdom from the Jews and not from the Greeks, and he is the first who had translated the word “Kabbalah”, which was not familiar to people in his times, to the Greek word “philosophy.” Pythagoras’ philosophy stemmed from the infinite sea of Kabbalah… the wisdom of Kabbalah doesn’t let us spend our lives in the dust, but raises our mind to the summit of knowledge.”
Philosophers would like to show that their field encompasses every aspect in life. By the way, until recently, in order to study Kabbalah at a university, one had to be accepted to the faculty of philosophy. People still assume that Kabbalah is part of philosophy, although the true philosophers themselves admit that it is not.
In any case, this is a different matter. The modern world disrespects philosophy and rightly so, since many study philosophy today only in order to get a degree. But when we speak about philosophy, we refer to a worldview, to a perception of life, a paradigm of some sort. Each of us is a philosopher internally. Accordingly, we have to understand, what about these approaches is important and what isn’t.
A person’s perspective, his attitude to life and to himself, is constantly changing, and eventually over this sphere rises the wisdom of Kabbalah, the opening of philosophy, just as it was discovered from other religions, after ages of concealment. This wisdom waited for humanity to grow and develop. In the beginning of history it generated sciences and philosophy, and today in times of global crisis, it is revealed again, after the religions and philosophy, by being the only approach a person has to life. The wisdom of Kabbalah includes all the perceptions and so eventually it replaces them.
[94693]
From the 4th part the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/4/12, “Kabbalah and Philosophy”
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Question: Will everyone have to exert himself on the spiritual path?
Answer: Everyone. After all, it is even impossible to go through the path of suffering without exertion, without making efforts, without building a vessel, without the necessary investment in developing my deficiency and my yearning. How can I feel spirituality without all this? How can I feel the spiritual world? How can I discover the Creator if I am not adapted to Him, if I don’t acquire an equivalence of form with Him?
I must attain this, but the question is by what means? Through more or less troubles and sufferings, or by yearning that I develop in me. It too brings about blows, but in an opposite form.
One way or another, I have to feel and to go through a certain amount of pain and suffering, detachment, urge, and yearning. There is a desire and there is a yearning. So the yearning is my exertion. I am given the desire, but I have to add acceleration to it. And how? By sufferings or with the help of the group, this is already my business.
We can advance under the pressure of very unpleasant things: wars, disasters, bankruptcies, plagues, etc. And it is also possible to advance differently, under the influence of the right environment. Still the obstacles remain and I still have to discover the thickness of my desire, but I sweeten the path by my yearning for the Creator, by needing Him—pangs of love instead of pangs of hate.
Eventually, no one can escape God’s work, but it is possible to advance under the blows, under the load of “Pharaoh,” and it is possible to yearn for the goal by the help of the environment. According to the absolute value, it is the same thing, but according to the content, these are two totally different things.
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From the 4th part the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/4/12, “Kabbalah and Philosophy”
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Baal HaSulam, the article “ Exile and Redemption”: A secular ideal stems from humanness and hence cannot raise itself above humanness. But a religious idea, which stems from the Creator, can raise itself above humanity.
We always need to see this test in front of us: Whom do we wish to please? And the opposite, before whom do I fear being disgraced? In the eyes of the public, the surroundings, my relatives, or strangers? Or I only take the Creator into account, although this calculation may be the opposite to everything that happens to me on the level of this world. Usually this is how everything is arranged for us, one thing in place of the other.
For example, I am shamed in this world and through that I am brought closer to the Creator, or I prefer to refuse to approach the Creator only not to feel the shame in this world. Here a person always checks himself, to what extent is he able to suffer.
This is a very painful point. It is a major moment since shame is at the core of our nature. Thus it isn’t enough to just to restrain or to justify yourself with one’s own exclusivity, that we inherited unwillingly. No. When all the shame is revealed to me, I need to agree and so via this concession to invite one gram of bestowal to the Creator, which He doesn’t even know about.
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From the 4th part the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/3/12, “Exile and Redemption”
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