The Secret Things Belong to the Creator

The Secret Things Belong to the CreatorA question I received: As a practicing Christian, I would like to know: Doesn’t the following verse from the Bible indicate that studying Kabbalah is forbidden? “The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may follow all the words of this law.” (Deuteronomy 29:29)

My Answer: You can find the answer in the same passage: The things that are still secret (concealed) belong only to the Creator (to the Upper Level), but the things that are revealed (that we have revealed) belong to us and to our children (to our future states), that we may actually follow all the laws (the laws of love and bestowal), just as the Creator commanded us. It is impossible to follow the laws of love and bestowal without revealing the Creator, as it is written “Know (attain) the Creator and serve Him.” If you study Kabbalah, you will understand what the Creator wants of His creatures. People of all religions will have to do this.

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What Is Wrong With the Food That Our Children Eat?

I had a conversation that was recorded on the topic “Child Nutrition and Obesity.” I spoke with:

Tali Amsalem – an expert in alternative medicine,

11 year old Amit and 13 year old Ela, who have been studying Kabbalah with us for several years.

What Is Wrong With the Food Our Children Eat?

If we really loved our children, we wouldn’t allow the food and advertising industries to become so powerful, because they force our children to consume harmful products and develop an addiction to them. Our love is blind and egoistic, and this is why it hurts our children. We have to change ourselves and our society as a whole, and rise above egoism. Until we do so, our inner and outer problems will continue to reflect on our children, their behavior, and their health.

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Don’t Get Lost In All the Angels

Don\'t Get Lost In All the Angels A question I received: What are angels and other spiritual creatures mentioned in the Torah?

My Answer: All Kabbalistic books mention Ofanim, Hayot, and Kruvim. It says in The Zohar (Beresheet, item 77, page 81): “Ofanim are angels of the World of Assiya, Hayot are angels of the World of Yetzira, and Kruvim are angels of the World of Beria.” They all represent a small Light (Vak de Hochma) in each world, and they depend on the human souls. For example, when a person corrects himself, then Kruvim face each other, as it says in the Torah.

There are also spiritual forces that are referred to as lion, ox, eagle, and man; they correspond to Sefirot Netzah, Hod, Yesod, and Malchut. In addition, Kabbalistic books sometimes refer to different levels in the spiritual worlds by the words South (Hochma), North (Bina), East (Zeir Anpin), and West (Malchut). And there are many other terms.

All of this speaks only about the state of the Light in the Kelim (desires) according to the law of equivalence between them – to the degree that the Light and Kli share the property of bestowal, which is attained through our efforts. Instead of getting lost in all these names, I advise you to start using Kabbalistic (scientific, physical) terms, such as Sefirot, Olamot, Masachim, Partzufim, Reshimot, Orot, and etc. After all, no matter how you look at it, not one word in Kabbalah speaks about our world. All the confusion only wears a person out and takes him away from the goal.

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How Old Is the World?

How Old Is the World?Questions I received on whether Kabbalists ever wrote about the age of the world and past civilizations:

Question: In many lessons you have said that our world is several million years old, but that according to the Hebrew calendar we begin counting the world’s age from the moment that the point in the heart awakened in a person named Adam (from the moment he decided to become similar to the Creator). What Kabbalistic sources did you get this information from?

My Answer: Baal HaSulam says in his article, “The Last Generation,” that periods of the Earth’s formation lasted 30 million years each. This indicates that the Earth has existed for millions of years.

Baal HaSulam also writes in his letters that Adam was the first person in the world who revealed the Thought of Creation. Obviously, Adam had parents and relatives, and wasn’t the first person in this sense, but he was the first person to attain or reveal the Creator. In every other regard, all of nature evolves because of the Reshimot that surface and become actualized, going from the still level of nature, to the vegetative level, to the animate level, and then the human level. This happens step by step, and on the surface it appears just like Darwin thought. However, it doesn’t happen through natural selection, but through sequential revelation of the Reshimot according to the pattern of HaVaYaH.

Question: Dear Rav, from what I heard in your lessons, I understood that Baal HaSulam was a man of great attainment. At one of the lessons you said that Baal HaSulam wrote about the Earth’s formation and the numerous shifts that took place between the liquid and solid phases, each lasting for 30 millions years. Have Kabbalists ever mentioned anything about past civilizations?

My Answer: No, because they aren’t interested in this one bit. Kabbalists direct all of their attention upward, above this world – to the goal of creation, rather than backwards – into the depths of history.

There are no intelligent civilizations besides ours. This fact becomes very clear from studying the descent of the Light and Kli from the World of Infinity into our world. We exist in the World of Infinity even now, but our distorted senses depict it as our world. The Ari begins his revelation of the universe from the moment when only the Light exists, and then the embryo of the future creature appears. The only thing that emerges from that point inside the Light – is us.

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We Are Floating In a Sea of Information Like Croutons In a Bowl of Soup

We Are Floating In a Sea of Information We exist in a sea of information. We are floating inside it like croutons in a bowl of soup. Everything and everyone is inside the soup. There is no time here, and that’s why it doesn’t matter whether you are watching a live broadcast or a recording of the lesson – because everything and everyone is inside this sea of information, including Abraham, Rashbi, Moses, the Ari, and Baal HaSulam. Whether you are part of the lesson in “real time” or not is only a psychological impression of a person who hasn’t yet come out of the boundaries of our world.

For example, when a person doesn’t know that the lesson isn’t being held in real time, then he watches it as if it were. It’s because this information doesn’t get old. And it doesn’t matter what time of day or night one studies, because everything that we study immediately enters and becomes revealed in the entire universe.

This information has never been revealed to man, and it is becoming revealed only now, with the help of the united group. This force already exists in the field that we must fill – in the entire volume of the World of Infinity. And we fill it. And then the rest of humanity also exists in this information, because they exist in the same field that we are adding our information to.

We are doing this, because following the Restriction, only a thin glowing line passes from Infinity to this world – to the center of the universe. Everything besides this thin line is empty space, and we fill that space with the work we are doing.

This is why the sensory and rational information that we extract already exists in this space. And all the people, regardless of their location, or whether they want it or not, are already spinning around it, in harmony with it.

There is a good example of this in nature. Have you ever seen a flock of birds fly in the air, and suddenly they all make a turn together? How do they know that they need to turn? It’s because they receive their information from one place. And it’s the same with all parts of nature. Physicists are already discovering that the field of gravity spreads immediately and that elementary particles immediately inform one another about any changes happening to them. Everything we learn already exists “around us” – so just tune in to it and become filled!

This is why there is no time and it makes no difference when you watch the lesson. You get in touch with the spiritual information that has already been revealed in this space – and this information exists there for you.

(Taken from the lesson I gave on 06-27-08.)

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