Audio Version Of The Blog – 03.14.13

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From Total Restriction To Total Revelation

Dr. Michael LaitmanOur spiritual growth and development begins from the restriction of the desire to receive, which initially dominates us. The moment we try to restrict ourselves, we enter the state of spiritual Ibur (gestation) about which is said: “An embryo in his mother’s womb sees from one end of the world to the other. There is a lit candle above his head and he is taught the whole Torah“.

This means that he is not limited in any way since he has totally restricted himself—the small egoistic desire he has at that moment in which he feels the corporeal world. It’s because he hasn’t felt the spiritual world at all, but only this world, the fictitious reality, like a person who is unconscious and is hallucinating. But when he restricts his desire to receive, he becomes unlimited, he doesn’t need to receive anymore since the Light of Ein Sof (Infinity) illuminates for him like the Surrounding Light, which is like being in a mother’s womb. Thus he goes through the stages of Ibur.

After he is born, he already begins to work with the first Aviut (thickness) of the desire instead of the root Aviut, and then he is limited again. The Light of Ein Sof that doesn’t grow weaker in any way, doesn’t reach him since he doesn’t try to totally annul himself and adhere to the upper. He builds Masachim (screens) of his own and increases his desires in order to actually reach the Light of Ein Sof by his own work and to dress it in his vessels.

There are different limitations in his work now, and the Light illuminates only to the extent that he can receive it in order to bestow in his corrected vessels. Therefore it says that “the Creator hates the bodies,” which means the desires to receive. The desire to bestow, however, is not called a body anymore, but a soul, a Godly part from Above.

Thus, there is a state in which a person restricts himself so that the Light of Ein Sof can reach him limitlessly. But the wholeness is in allowing the Light of Ein Sof to be revealed without any restrictions on a person’s part. A person has to discover himself with the help of a Masach and to work on the level of Ein Sof by himself, in order to attain full adhesion with the Light that is not limited by any restrictions.
[102517]
From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/12/13, Shamati #15

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I Am Listening To You, Over!

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: We have to yearn for the changes that the Creator sends us along the spiritual path. But these changes involve unpleasant feelings, how can we want them?

Answer: When a person’s ears get clogged, he has to listen more carefully, “Has anyone said anything? Did I understand correctly?” This is the inner effort to hear the one who turns to you.

We have to feel the same about the Creator. Something happens every minute: someone is looking at me, someone is talking to me, something happens in the world; inside me, I have had different thoughts, I have had different desires, different problems come up… All this is the Creator’s language. He is the one who sends me these messages.

Let’s take a certain object, for example, that is being bitten on all sides by particles in the air, by atoms. I am also constantly under the influence of the Creator. I only have to increase my sensitivity, and then through my “skin” I will actually start to discover Him; I will decipher his “conversation” and understand how and what He does.

It is all about my inner sensitivity. Even if I grow tired of paying endless attention to everything that happens, I have to ask for such sensitivity. It comes thanks to the mutual exercises I do with the friends, and with their help, I discover that at any given moment I am given different opportunities to have a dialog with the Creator. If I don’t miss them, then there is no room for thoughts, everything turns into feelings, and the feelings don’t go back and forth between us, but rather become common feelings…

We have to apply simple, direct psychology here and as little “accounting” as possible: eventually it is the Creator turning to me through different “garments.”
[102482]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/11/13, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar

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Silver-Coated Photographic Film

Dr. Michael LaitmanAt any given moment the Creator kneads a person like dough, and the question is to what extent a person feels that and is ready to feel it and to accept the Creator’s ceaseless work on him.

There are different periods, since on every level we have to go through all the discernments: the still nature, the vegetative, the animate, and the “speaking.” And there is a certain time that we are asleep. This doesn’t depend on us, but is rather part of the general work on all of creation that also includes us. We feel only a small part of what is happening with us, so there are many periods in which we are unconscious of what we go through.

First we have to yearn to acknowledge that there is none beside Him. Second, you have to nullify yourself and try to be objective. An “objective perspective” is looking through a “lens” and not through your own eyes; it is looking through some independent tool that is external to my subjective sight and that can enlarge or minimize different details and sharpen the focus artificially, regardless of my feelings and preferences. This is called a subjective perspective that photographs the situation like a camera.

We have to feel many inner subtleties and discernments in order to become such a camera lens. What do I want to photograph by using my camera? I want to photograph the Creator! So what kind of camera do I need for that?

My desire to receive is a photographic film in a camera on which I take a picture. This desire has to be independent of me and under full restriction, free of my subjective approach, of my attitude. I have to rise above it, and then it will reflect the true picture and not the picture that I have made and retouched Adobe Photoshop. This is the first phase of the work.

Everything depends on how sensitive I can be with regard to all the figures and the relations the Creator displays before me, which are constantly changing, to what extent I am ready to start a dialogue with Him according to what is happening to me and to detach from myself as much as I can. This is very difficult, since to detach from myself actually means that I carefully examine myself in order to constantly see what ties me to my ego.

To the extent that I do this kind of work, I can identify the Creator’s image more clearly. To the extent that I neutralize myself at any given moment, I allow the Creator to imprint Himself in me, to be revealed in my photographic film, on the layer that is sensitive to the Light.

This sensitivity depends on the “silver coating,” the material used in photography, and it depends on how much I cover and conceal myself. Then internally, the Creator’s image in its opposite form can appear in my matter, like a negative.

I can receive such a coating only if I subdue myself before the environment. I have no such coat, no Masach (screen), behind which I can hide my ego; I have nothing to cover myself with. The only chance is to place myself under the care of the environment, like a baby who wants to hide in his mother’s arms.

But a baby does it instinctively because of his ego, the desire to do good for himself, whereas we have to do a great deal of work against our ego in order to annul it, to subdue myself before the teacher, the group, the study, and the dissemination. This will provide us with the coat.
[102477]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/11/13, Shamati #15

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Greenhouse Gases Have Heated The Earth

Dr. Michael LaitmanIn the News (from CNN): “Global warming has propelled Earth’s climate from one of its coldest decades since the last ice age to one of its hottest – in just one century.

“A heat spike like this has never happened before, at least not in the last 11,300 years, said climatologist Shaun Marcott, who worked on a new study on global temperatures going back that far.

“If any period in time had a sustained temperature change similar to what we have today, we would have certainly seen that in our record,” he said. It is a good indicator of just how fast man-made climate change has progressed.

“A century is a very short period of time for such a spike. …

“If not for man-made influences, the Earth would be in a very cold phase right now and getting even colder, according the joint study by Oregon State University and Harvard University. Marcott was the lead author of the report on its results.

“To boot, the range of temperatures from cold to hot produced since the industrial revolution began are about the same as the 11,000 years before it, said Candace Major from the National Science Foundation, ‘but this change has happened a lot more quickly.’

My Comment: The cause for all the changes is to encourage people to correct themselves. But a person arrives at this decision only when, after many misfortunes and sufferings, he finally becomes convinced that there is no other way—he has to change himself. How much and what kind of suffering we have to go through to accept this decision is unknown.

Everyone who understands the necessity of following the laws of nature, to become similar to it, and to become connected by the good ties of mutual guarantee should make every effort to disseminate the knowledge about it. By these actions we will definitely bring the correct decision closer and reduce suffering.
[102689]

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Either Him Or Me!

Dr. Michael LaitmanHow can we be taught what bestowal is? In order to do that nature has planted a desire to enjoy in us through which we learn about bestowal by its oppositeness, by its opposite attribute.

Our desire to enjoy receives certain impressions that evoke different responses in it and imprint different holes, cracks, pits, and dimples in our desire. Thanks to that, the desire begins to feel to some extent that these impressions are different in size and character, and that there is a certain connection between them that we don’t understand.

We suddenly discover that our desire to enjoy is versatile, multi-layered, and very complex, and accordingly it receives different complex impressions. Thus we learn about our nature. The more we know about it, the more we attain the opposite attribute, the opposite nature. After all, all our study is based on the clash between two opposite attributes: receiving and bestowal.

It says, “And they shall have no other Gods before Me,” which means that by studying precisely about these “other Gods,” we study about the Creator and can form His image in us. Otherwise, He has no image and no form allowing us to somehow imagine what it is, who He is, and how to discover Him.

How can we discover that which is impossible to discover? Only by negative impressions that are perceived negatively in the desire to enjoy can we gradually build an opposite attitude so we begin to imagine what the attribute of bestowal is. We cannot attain it any other way: not by using our imagination, not by our feelings, or by any action on our part that can be directly adapted to Him.

Everything takes place only due to some special force, the Light that operates in different states and evokes different responses in us. Our work is to attribute everything to the one upper force as we determine that there is none else beside Him. This, however, encounters great resistance on the part of our desire to enjoy, which until then thought that there is none else beside itself and now has to settle for this. One annuls the other, which means that an argument begins: Who will rule?

Both of these claims nullify one another: it is either Him or me! This conflict is the basis of all our states. We shouldn’t be afraid to stand between these two opposing sides and to deal with the two insoluble dominions, to endure it, to accept, and to surrender, but to attain and justify, to understand and resemble the force of bestowal. If a person doesn’t escape this clarification, but can work under the conditions of this split, the conflicting opinions and the feelings, if he doesn’t count on his animal mind and doesn’t escape from the battlefield, he receives a new mind and feelings from Above. In that case he acquires a form that is similar to the Creator.

Until then, it is impossible to understand what bestowal is. When a person finally attains it, it is called the Creator’s help, a finding. A person who accepts all the forms of work that are given to him and who lowers his head, not following his own mind, which seems to understand everything and determine everything, then he succeeds. The main thing is, as it says not to believe in yourself until your dying day, which means the death of your ego. After that you already acquire faith.
[102425]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/11/13, Shamati #15

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The General Plan And Every Step Along The Way

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Why does it say that if one performs a Mitzva, it protects and saves him and whereas the Torah protects and saves a person when he deals with it and when he doesn’t? Why is there such a division in the correction?

Answer: The Torah is called the Light that surrounds a person on the spiritual path. Even when the Inner Light that used to fill his vessel on the current level disappears, there is still the illumination of the Surrounding Light, which sustains a person. After all, if there is no Light that shines for a person, he ceases to exist. All of life is sustained only by the Light.

When a person doesn’t perform a Mitzva, meaning that he hasn’t discover a certain Light—the Light of Hassadim or the Light of Hochma—there is still a general illumination called “Torah” thanks to the state he has attained. This is the general plan of creation that is before a person and shining for him. He understands this, but at present, he is not dealing with a certain item in it with a specific correction.

These Mitzvot are a person’s actions according to the specific Reshimot (spiritual genes) that are revealed to him in which the Inner Light, the Surrounding Light, and the spiritual Partzuf take part. It is working on a certain self-correction. Therefore, there are 613 Mitzvot that include all the Torah. The Light of Ein Sof (Infinity) is called the Torah, the Light that will be revealed at the end of correction.

Torah is a system of desires (vessels), Lights, Reshimot, and different relations between the point in the heart and the Creator. This whole system that is meant to bring the point in the heart to adhesion with the Creator is called Torah.

Mitzva is a concrete step that we have to take on our way to attaining the goal.
[102408]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/10/13, Shamati #6

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The Friends I Live Among

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How can I move from “me” to “we?” What is the meaning of justifying the Creator only when a person is happy not because he is successful but because his friend is successful?

Answer: The point is that you should adhere to the friend and through him feel reality. How can I check my devotion to my friends? It is according to how happy I feel when they are happy and how sad I feel when they are sad, bringing myself into the group only in order to help them reach the good state.

Here I begin to discover to what extent I actually want the opposite: what fire of hatred and envy is revealed in me towards them, and to what extent I cannot want anything good for them because I like this separated state.

There is a great deal of work I have to do here so that these examinations will bring me to the right conclusion: I have nothing but the friends among which I live!

If my friend has a problem, I work with it as if it were an obstacle standing between me and the Creator. It makes no difference. I will be able to annul myself there, my “I,” and on the other hand, will feel great with respect to the friends, meaning that I want to do everything so that that they will feel good, like a good mother.
[102406]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/10/13, Shamati #6

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Who Determines The Taste Of The Bread From Heaven (Manna)?

Dr. Michael LaitmanThe Lord spoke to Moses, saying “I have heard the complaints of the children of Israel. Speak to them, saying ‘In the afternoon you shall eat meat, and in the morning you shall be sated with bread, and you shall know that I am the Lord, your God.’” (The Torah, Exodus, BeShalach, 16:11-16:12)

In order to understand what “manna” is, we should consider the following comparison. Someone wants to release a new machine, a “3-D printer,” which are filled with proteins, pastas, legumes, soy and much more. You just key into the printer what you want to eat, and shortly you will get the desired dish. We can get sausage that is made of soy and it tastes like meat.

This device has various cartridges: pepper, lemon, etc. When the order is placed, the printer prepares the order and gives it to you on a plate. Have we ordered a spicy smoked barbeque? Please, enjoy! Do we prefer any other flavors? No problem! All these “tastes” are made of one filler ingredient, for example, soy.

So, what is “manna”? The upper Light doesn’t have any particular characteristics; all the properties are set up by the consumer. After all, the printer cartridges don’t have any specific properties; we define the parameters; we choose combinations we want and define them by setting the order. So you think you want meat in the evening and bread in the morning. But in fact, only one product goes in the machine, only the consumer determines the flavor, color, and appearance.
[102224]
From the TV Program “Mysteries of Eternal Book,” 2/4/13

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Daily Kabbalah Lesson – 03.14.13

Preparation to the Lesson

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Shamati #53The Matter of Limitation

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The Book of ZoharSelected Excerpt, ParashatBalak,” Item 470, Lesson 23

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Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol 3, Part 10, Item 42, Lesson 19

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Introduction to The Book of Zohar

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