Every person’s soul is like a mirror reflecting sunlight.

A light beam descends, reflects off a soul, and withdraws into space.

Humankind, the civilization of egoists, is like a vast mirror array, reflecting light in different directions, making a sea of chaotic light.

However, merge the reflective light beams to be as segments of one immense parabolic source, and what do you have? At first, it looks like all beams are aimed differently, but as a whole, the light beams aim a common light at a common center. Their correct merger sparks a critical temperature, brings about a new substance – plasma – and bursts into flames.

And this is how each person’s light arouses the fire of love among friends. Their unity with one another, together with their aim at a common goal, produces a new state that’s unimaginable and unreachable using our common sense: adhesion with the Creator, an ascent to the Creator’s level. Such a state is unimaginable prior to achieving it, because it’s created only when everyone unites.

According to legend, Archimedes also set enemy ships on fire by aiming polished bronze mirrors at them. His contemporaries were so stunned by this phenomenon that even today, thousands of years later, people still talk about it.

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Questions about an article I wrote in 2000:

1. Did this interview really take place?
2. If it did, do the below quotes accurately portray what you said?
3. It’s hard to understand how a Kabbalist – someone who is a complete altruist – could recommend military rule, preemptive strikes and abandoning the peace process. For example, you said:

“It is not a government of national unity that we need, but a military rule that will have absolute power, assume the responsibility and come forth with an intense preventative strike against Syria, our main enemy. Then we would completely destroy its military machine and the camps where terrorists are trained.”

In other parts of the interview you recommended the following,

“These days we don’t need a Knesset (parliament) whose seats are filled by our natural enemies – the Arab deputies (who don’t hide this fact), and the peacemakers who have paralyzed the people’s will to live on this land.”

4. Finally, even if we agree, and accept the fact that we can’t see the proper course of action because we haven’t yet crossed the Machsom (barrier), shouldn’t a Kabbalist understand that such statements won’t influence Israel’s politics? Did you truly expect people to pay attention to your advice?

My Answer: This wasn’t an interview, but an article I wrote called, “The Threat of Destruction,” and yes, I am for preventative actions, like what Israel did in the Six Days War. It’s obvious that if you’re being attacked, you have to defend yourself. But the question is: Who will be the first to strike? The aggressor? Or the party for whom the strike is intended?

Imagine that a group of criminals have surrounded your son and are about to kill him – and you’re advising him to wait for peace. Or that your daughter is about to be raped! Would you stand around and reason about it, or would you take all the necessary measures to prevent the attack?

Evidently, in our case, you don’t feel close to the victims, the way you would with your children. Egoists, who can’t perceive others as themselves, are calling for inaction and hence are the evil of this world, allowing the killers and rapists to multiply.

King David spent 40 years in continuous warfare, killing and at the same time writing Psalms, which are recognized as the height of love for humankind and the Creator…

And as to no one taking notice of my advice, you’re incorrect about that. People, just like you, took notice back then and are taking notice now. And I didn’t expect anything less. Reactions such as yours bring understanding. You can love only once you acquire power, severity and mercy – in equal measure. It’s because love is the most corrected property – the fourth phase of the Creator’s revelation.

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A question I received: It’s been a while since we had the Kabbalah congress in Israel, but I still can’t shake off the feeling of how simple and open you are. I’ve always thought, like most people, that sages conduct themselves differently; that they’re overburdened by wisdom and need to evoke awe. After the congress, I find it harder to respect you, and without being able to respect you, I don’t have the same energy I once had to trust you and what you teach – that it’s the path to my future. What would you suggest I do?

My Answer: Baal HaSulam writes, in his Future Generation manuscripts: “The masses think that he who is in contact with the Creator stands above nature and they need to be afraid of speaking to Him or at the very least being near Him. For such is the nature of man: to fear what transcends nature’s bounds.

However, in reality, there’s nothing more natural than attaining contact with the Creator, for He is the master of nature. Truly, every creature is in contact with its Creator, although it neither knows nor feels it.

He who merits contact with the Creator merely obtains the knowledge of it, for there is nothing new in the universe, and it’s only that he was ignorant of it beforehand.

As a result, man becomes simpler and more natural, for he understands all people, maintaining quite intimate relations with them; he is close to the masses and loves them.”

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1. Globalization has become a key factor in the world’s economic, political and cultural development. It incorporates the international market, all the social processes, and the lives of each and every one of us. However, it doesn’t solve any political, economical, social, cultural or religious problems.

2. A new kind of education is needed to reconcile us with this new reality. In the past, education was structured within the boundaries of an egoistic and disconnected world. New education should take place naturally, rather than through Nature’s painful influence. One way or another, Nature will force us to change – to change our way of thinking and to make our relationships truly global. But unlike previous transformations, we don’t have to undergo the current transformation by force. For the very first time, we can do it ourselves, consciously.

3. The common culture should not be replaced with a global culture forcefully, like how we usually do things. For instance, today we are forcing our children to study by old methods, even though they are ready for “the new humanity.” We instinctively strive to suppress everything new, while they naturally strive toward it.

4. For the first time in history, mass media must assume an educational role. Instead of being a dubious source of information, mass media needs to earn our trust by contributing to the education of the new generation. Mass media should initiate the change, and later, educational institutions will follow. This is because all social changes need to begin from “below,” in other words, they should touch people’s lives, morals and cultural-religious traditions. The new should not replace the old by force, but naturally, by revealing the globality of nature and society. Then the new will replace the old painlessly.

5. Kabbalistic education is not coercive, because it does not strive to bring everyone to the same educational and cultural level. On the contrary, people can keep all possible levels and cultures, because Kabbalistic education raises people above their various cultures. Instead of making them collide, it unites them even more strongly due to such differences.

Therefore, Kabbalistic education prevents the clash of cultures, ideologies, and nations. As Baal HaSulam writes, everyone can remain in their religions.

6. Even though Kabbalah brings everyone to a single consciousness, bringing people together as cogwheels in a single mechanism, it doesn’t lessen anyone’s individual role. This is because it helps a person find his or her place in the mechanism, in the mutual connection of all people. Each one of us discovers the best possible state that Nature has prepared for us.

Kabbalistic education enables people to accept the same principles of existence in the world, so that one’s individual consciousness turns into collective consciousness, and later into the consciousness of one civilization. After that, as Baal HaSulam writes, the boundaries start disappearing and a single civilization emerges, in which the citizens are single-minded in their aspiration to unite with the Creator.

Parting with independence, the disappearance of boundaries and cultures, and the creation of a single spiritual authority should not happen coercively, but by realizing the need to unite with the Creator.

Mass education can happen through TV shows and internet games, and by prohibiting the glorification of egoistic fulfillment and forceful influence over the world.

7. Globalization evokes the sensation that the world is small. Yet the growing awareness of the single system of souls makes it a warm world, where we can all rely on one another.

Related Material:
My Article on Ynetnews – A Kabbalistic Interpretation of the Economic Crisis
The Consumer Effect

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A question I received: Lately people in Israel are talking about combining traditions with children’s education. They want to bring the traditions and elements of Judaism into the general curriculum, but as the national culture, rather than religion.

Even secular parents, who weren’t taught to honor traditions as children, want their children to adopt these traditions, hoping that this will give them a different perspective on life and the world and prevent problems like drugs, alcoholism, depression and other diseases of our time. They hope that this will keep their children away from harm and make their lives safer.

My Answer: Kabbalah says that traditions can have a positive influence on people, as long as they are perceived as the nation’s cultural heritage and as long as they are kept for strengthening the family unit. However, in every other respect, people should live according to what Nature demands of them, according to its program of evolution.

According to Nature (or the plan of creation), man must understand Nature, discover how it is connected into a single, integral and perfect system, and consciously integrate himself into it as an integral, intelligent element.

In order to make us want to understand Nature and consciously integrate with it, Nature shows us our lack of harmony with it. We perceive such imbalance as all kinds of suffering, like wars, problems and distress. Gradually, we start realizing that all these problems are global and interconnected, and that they are all symptoms of one problem.

We then start understanding that maybe we’re the ones with the problem. This is what Nature is pushing us to understand, and not to uphold traditions. However, if traditions and other boundaries help us become corrected and fulfill Nature’s global plan, then of course, we should have them as well.

Concerning the plan you describe, of what the teachers and parents are hoping to do, I’m certain that it won’t work, because children have no such desire. Subconsciously, their desire is already directed at discovering the purpose of creation – the existence of the Creator. Our children are a completely different generation: They aren’t simply enormous egoists. Their desire for spirituality, called “the point in the heart,” is already being revealed. This desire is the embryo of the soul, and it is demanding its development. Previous generations did not have such giant egoism within their points in the heart.

Egoism has been evolving over thousands of years, demanding fulfillment from this world the whole time. However, today it isn’t the egoism that demands fulfillment, but the point in the heart, and this is why children no longer desire our world, but something else… something that’s still unclear. By acting the way we do, we imprison them; but to us, it seems like this is what’s best for them. Our generation does not have the time nor the place for these experiments. We need to immediately figure out what is going on, and then we will understand how we should raise our children!

Related Material:
* ARTICLE: Raising the Next Generation of Children
* ARTICLE: Education

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I would like to invite you all to share your ideas on creating new games for children!

The games should be aimed at showing children how we triumph when we connect with others, and as such, they should act as live examples of the greatness that lies in achieving the goal that Nature is urging us toward.

As well as showing children how we triumph when we connect with others, the games should also show how without such a connection, we fail. In short, the main principle that should be put across is that

• if you connect with others, you succeed, and
• if you don’t connect with others, you fail.

Moreover, in order to create such a connection, you need to slightly let go of yourself.

The critical point in the games should be when the child realizes that “I really don’t want to let go of myself, but if I can do it, then I win with everyone else.” Winning can only be together with everyone, and not alone. This is where the main artistry in creating these games lies.

I recommend that you watch the video clip below (from yesterday’s lesson) before sending your ideas, where I provide a broader explanation of this proposal.

(Note: Send your ideas in the comment form below.)

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The wisdom of Kabbalah is a teaching about the harmony that exists in the world, nature, the Creator, and the work humanity must perform to achieve that harmony. Although this process is predetermined by nature, its realization depends on us.

My meetings with Ervin Laszlo were dedicated to the question, “What is the best way for us to change our civilization?”

Professor Ervin Laszlo was a Nobel Peace Prize nominee in 2004 and 2005. He is a doctor of philosophy at Sorbonne University, an honorary doctor at universities in the U.S., Canada, Finland and Hungary, a professor of philosophy, systems science and futurological research. He presently resides in Tuscany, Western Italy, and lectures throughout the world. Professor Laszlo is the founder and president of the Club of Budapest, founder and director of the General Evolution Research Group, president of the Private University for Economics and Ethics of Vienna, member of The World Academy of Arts and Sciences, member of The International Academy of Philosophy and Science, member of the International Medici Academy, and editor of the international journal, World Futures: The Journal of General Evolution.

Professor Laszlo is the author of 47 books, translated into 20 languages, and the editor of 30 books, including four volumes of the World Encyclopedia of Peace. In April of 2006, Ervin Laszlo was an honorary guest at the Ashlag Research Institute in Israel, headed by Professor Michael Laitman. During this visit, the two scientists, and co-authors of the book From Chaos to Harmony: The Solution to the Global Crisis According to the Wisdom of Kabbalah, held numerous discussions regarding the future of the world and the development of an effective solution to the global crisis.

* BOOK – From Chaos to Harmony: The Solution to the Global Crisis According to the Wisdom of Kabbalah – Free PDF Download | Purchase Print Version

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A question I received: Why do you “feminize” desires? Why do you say Ratzonot Egoistiyot (which is the feminine form of saying “egoistic desires” in Hebrew), when everyone knows that “desire” (Ratzon) in Hebrew is masculine?

My Answer: Even though desire (Ratzon) is grammatically masculine, it is feminine in function and actualization. In Hebrew, Nukva (female), is a hollow which becomes filled by the Light, and Zachar (male) is he who fulfills this hollow by performing the act of filling, called Zivug (coition).

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A question I received: Why do you reveal all of this secret knowledge to gentiles?

My Answer: I suggest that you familiarize yourself with the original sources: Baal HaSulam’s articles “Messiah’s Horn” and “The Arvut.”

A mutual guarantee (Arvut) among a single nation is capable of initiating the correction of the whole world. Likewise, all nations are incapable of carrying out this correction simultaneously. It is as the sages said: The Creator offered the Torah to all nations (through Abraham in ancient Babylon), but they declined the offer, because the magnitude of their egoism, their self-love, made it impossible for them to accept it.

Thus, Abraham created a group of Babylonians (people with desires for spirituality) who were ready and willing to renounce their egoism, and this group became known as the nation of Israel. The only difference between the Babylonians in this group and other Babylonians of that era was that Abraham’s group accepted upon themselves the method of rising above their egoism. Moreover, Abraham, who was a Babylonian priest, became the first Kabbalist. Therefore, by accepting upon themselves the required guarantee (Arvut), the nation of Israel was obligated to be the chosen people among all other nations.

In any case, the correction of the whole world will take place when all nations unite in their aspiration toward the Creator, and the Creator will reveal Himself to all nations. It is as it is written: “The earth will be filled with the knowledge of the Creator, and all of the nations will flock to Him.” As such, the nation of Israel holds the responsibility for leading humanity to love for thy neighbor, and ultimately, to the goal of creation, which is to merge with the Creator.

My Current Mood: energetic

Related Material:
* ARTICLE: Who Is to Blame? – Selected pieces from a discussion on Baal HaSulam’s article “Introduction to the Book of Zohar”

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A question I received: How did man evolve on Earth? You wrote that millions of years ago a primitive man appeared on Earth. How did he get here?

My Answer: Well, he obviously wasn’t put together with clay. His mommy and daddy gave birth to him just like our mommy and daddy gave birth to us – the same as how all animals’ parents give birth to their offspring. So what’s the difference between this first man and his parents? The difference lies in the Reshimo (spiritual gene) that appeared within him, the characteristic of our world’s final, egoistic stage.

The Reshimo of the still, vegetative, animate and human natures (also called “the four degrees of HaVaYaH”) is the template according to which everything evolves. Darwin, as well as every other theorist, is mistaken in thinking that a following, higher phase can evolve from a phase that preceded it. It’s simply impossible to evolve in such a way.

However, as a result of the souls’ decent into our world, there exists information (Reshimo) about the following phase in the last link of the preceding phase. As such, it only takes one generation for monkeys to beget people.

The first people are pretty much indistinguishable from their parents. However, they gradually evolve over the generations according to what their human nature dictates to them. They thus separate from monkeys and become more and more evolved human beings. The Reshimo within them progressively continues to manifest new signs of evolution and unity, starting to make them experience more and more suffering on the human level. As a result, they become evolved human beings.

Everything is initiated by the Reshimo – the informational gene – and not by the evolution of blind nature, as Darwin thought.

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