The Reason For Our Suffering, And The Alternative Path

reasonI received many questions on the reason for our suffering and the current crisis. Here’s my answer:

Kabbalah states that there is only one reason for everything that’s happening: man’s failure to observe the law of balance with Nature, or in other words, failure to observe the law of equivalence to the Creator. Precisely this failure to observe balance on the highest level, called “Human,” to have interpersonal relationships according to the principle “Love your neighbor as yourself,” leads to a breach of balance on the lower levels. As a result, the animal and plant kingdoms are dying out, and the balance of forces on the still level of nature are disrupted as well. All of this is an outcome of our egoistic thoughts, desires, and actions.

It’s no accident that the leading financiers have correctly pinpointed the reason for the financial crisis: it is a crisis of moral values, where greed has given rise to an avalanche of irresponsible accumulation. But as we can see, the suffering teaches people, even financiers, to see the reason for their misfortunes. As a result, the great suffering (to the point of hunger and near-extinction) will force us to restructure our egoistic attitude to humanity and the world.

Kabbalah offers us a way to implement these changes voluntarily and pleasantly, before the crises will catch up with us. Otherwise they will only keep mounting, like the plagues of Egypt.

It is difficult to understand how our egoism can influence natural disasters and global warming. But here too, the suffering will help us figure out the reason for what’s happening. The storms all over the world will keep gaining momentum, and the melting glaciers in Greenland will cause tornadoes. When this happens, it will suddenly become clear to us that the reason for these phenomena is our egoism and unfounded hatred for one another. In this way, Nature will teach humans to become “Human,” to observe the law of equivalence and attain balance!

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Prince Charles On The Crisis: “We Have To Alter Our Perspective Of The World”

Article in the Newspaper "Yedioth Aharonot"On November 25, at the Foreign Press Association Media Award in London, Prince Charles stated:

Humanity has a natural tendency to consume and if there are no limits on that tendency we can become obsessed simply with satisfying our desires. The desire grows ever more potent as we consume ever more, even though we achieve very little of the actual satisfaction we desire…

We hear so many people admitting to feeling deeply dissatisfied. This reminds me of that wise observation about Gross National Product made by Robert Kennedy forty years ago, that it “measures everything except that which makes life worthwhile.”

…many do not even realize that we have lost something very precious – what I might best describe as that intuitive sense of our interconnectedness with Nature… I consider our problems today not to be an environmental crisis per se… nor a financial crisis. They all stem from this fundamental crisis in our perception.

…the denial of our real relationship with the universal truths through a deep connection with Nature and her laws has engendered a dangerous alienation. In denying or forgetting the invisible “grammar of harmony” we create cacophony and dissonance.

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What Do Kabbalists See? (And What Do They Eat?)

The intention of attaining the Creator does not conflict with careerThree questions I received on the experience of being a Kabbalist:

Question: People come to you asking about what to change their name to, couples asking if they should get married and what to name their babies. How do you know what to answer them?

My Answer: I do not have any supernatural abilities. I give advice as a person with lots of life experience, and I may be wrong.

My recommendations hold no mystical spells or powers. In fact, no one has such powers! People such as Wolf Messing have a natural ability to see our world and to see the future; however, none of these “psychics” are Kabbalists. They’re only able to sense our world better than other people, but not the Upper World.

I’m a Kabbalist – I see the Upper World and the path leading to it. During our Kabbalah studies, to the degree we aspire toward correction, we evoke the Upper Light – the Creator’s force of love and bestowal, which corrects us. Even the beginners, who don’t yet have the qualities to clearly sense the Light, can feel this force and its influence during the studies.

However, in all other respects, I am just like everyone else.

Question: Do Kabbalists eat meat?

My Answer: They always have.

Question: Is Rav Laitman a Kabbalist?

My Answer: I don’t know, but he eats meat!

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The True Meaning Of The Revival Of The Dead And The Coming Of The Messiah

trueTwo questions I received on the Messiah and the revival of the dead:

Question: Would you care to comment on this statement? “The Messiah will come only when he is no longer necessary; he will come only on the day after his arrival; he will come, not on the last day, but on the very last day.” It is a quote from the writings of Franz Kafka.

My Answer: Kafka was a philosopher. His words once again prove it is impossible for the human mind and heart to understand nature, life and man. To do this, one needs to reveal the Creator.

Question: What is the revival of the dead and the coming of the Messiah according to Kabbalah?

You’ve said that the revival of the dead means that people will stop being egoists. Revival of the dead is described in the book of Yechezkel, and it is not the same as what you’ve said. Did you imply that during the revival of the dead the material world will unite with the spiritual world, and then people and souls will exist in one world? And if not, if everything is spiritual, then is the Messiah also spiritual rather than material?

My Answer: The Messiah isn’t a person, but a force that corrects us. After all, what can a person possibly do!? This force will correct the egoistic intentions accompanying all our desires, making them altruistic. Then we will all become equal to the Creator and attain the goal of creation – adhesion with Him.

To break it down even more: people will discover within them the force to correct their egoism. This force, which pulls them out of the egoistic perception of this world, is called the Messiah (which means “to extract, to pull out” in Hebrew). Instead of their egoism, they will acquire a perception of others, a connection with them through desires and sensations, and be one whole with them. As a result, they will acquire their souls.

The soul is a part of the Creator, the quality of love and bestowal. When all the people will do this, being that all people are interconnected, they will lose the perception of their differences – the perception of their physical bodies. Then, within their common perception, they will reveal the World of Infinity and adhesion with the Creator.

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We Can’t Change The Laws Of Nature

lawTwo questions I received on “easy fixes” to the financial crisis:

Question: What you write in The Financial Crisis – an Analysis, is a new way to look at the unfolding crisis, and I appreciate the common sense attitude of the article. However, I take issue with the answer to the fourth question:

“Hence, countries will try to move away from globalization. However, this won’t help them, because then they will stop developing. Without full communication and exchange, they will cease developing and regress to feudalism!”

This country had development, communication and exchange before globalization. Globalization was a bad idea: America stopped developing. We stopped exchanging and took what the foreign recipients of our commerce gave us, and on their terms. We didn’t complain too loudly about industrial chemicals in baby food out of fear that they would stop selling us baby food and refuse our dollars. That’s not communication, it’s supplication.

My Answer: Everything taking place is governed by the law of development, so it isn’t a product of blind fate or a coincidence. We see that whenever something happens in the developed countries, the less developed countries are forced to follow suit.

We can’t change the laws of nature. We exist inside them and it’s our obligation to study and observe them. This is also to our own benefit. Nature has a goal for everything it does, which is to bring man to a special state: the highest level, called “the Creator.”

The development either takes place by means of pressure, which we perceive as suffering, or through man’s conscious understanding and cooperation with Nature. Kabbalah explains what to do to be on the second path.

Question: If the crisis is actually a crisis of people’s trust, then why can’t we stop it by advertising positive forecasts? The mass media should be forbidden from talking about bad news and instead made to tell everyone that everything is good.

My Answer: This won’t improve anything, because the illness will still keep developing until it will reach the point of being irreversible. We must first reveal the evil, and then correct it.

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In Spirituality, Nothing Disappears

The Secret Things Belong to the CreatorTwo questions I received on our connections with other souls:

Question: You say that before the destruction of the Temple, the entire nation of Israel, millions of people, all had spiritual attainment for centuries. What was their contribution to our civilization? What role did those millions of people have? After all, we only use texts produced by a handful of individuals from that nation. Did those millions leave nothing behind except for their gene pool?

My Answer: They left us their spiritual gene pool – their corrections in the common soul. Moreover, they continue taking part in the world’s correction together with us, now. It’s because the spiritual world is an entity that exists constantly, where nothing ever fades or disappears.

Question: The souls are corrected via the correction of egoistic desires and return to their source – the one Soul. Through our correction we build our Kelim, and after our physical death we retain the sensation of the spiritual world in these Kelim. How are our Kelim connected to the souls that have undergone their corrections through us?

My Answer: The soul is the quality of bestowal that a person can acquire only while being in a corporeal body in this world. All that he feels through the soul before the body’s death is what he’ll feel after. Through this quality of bestowal, a person feels connected with the other souls – with those who have undergone corrections through him, as well as those through whom he, too, had undergone corrections.

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