Weekly Torah Portion – 04.07.11

The Book of Zohar, Weekly Torah Portion “Metzora,” Selected Excerpts
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Every Person Is Important For Perfection

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: It’s easy to love my friends who are studying the science of Kabbalah together with me, but I can’t do that with my colleagues at work. How should I treat them and all other people in the world?

Answer: In principle, we have to treat everyone as parts of our soul. That is how I have to think about everyone, including the greatest villains. They are outside of me in the world because all of these desires and qualities inside of me are not corrected yet. Therefore, externally I have to treat them with tolerance, understanding that this is the path of correction. The time will come when they too will join this path.

The common soul, the single created creature consists of many parts. Some are more important and some are less, just like in our physical body, which is built exactly according to the structure of the soul.

The soul also has a part called “body,” which is the common desire that’s divided into many systems and sub-systems: the brain, heart, liver, kidneys, and other important systems that are interconnected and without which the body could not exist. Some of these systems can be artificially recreated, but they have to be present in the body. On the other hand, there are systems that do not necessarily have to be present in the body, for example, the limbs, muscles, and bones.

The common soul has parts that are particularly important, the brain and heart, as well as those that are less important but still necessary for existence. The brain and heart were mostly corrected from Adam until our time by the lineage of Kabbalists that we know about and whom we study.

Now the phase of the common correction has set in when besides the brain and heart we are beginning to correct the lungs, kidneys, liver, spleen, and so on. These are important parts, but less significant than the brain and the heart. People who study Kabbalah belong to these parts.

All the rest of humanity belongs to, for example, the muscles, bones, and limbs, which are systems that are not necessary for the organism’s existence, but they are necessary for its fullness. That is how we should treat them, and in essence they make up 90% of the entire soul.

They cannot act independently. They cannot feel a yearning for spirituality, but only function according to orders coming to them from the brain and the heart through us, the various important organs. This does not lower their significance because if we are talking about one common soul, then the absence of one tiny cell disrupts perfection.

Therefore, everyone is important and at the end of correction every person is as valuable as everyone. That is the law of a closed system’s perfection. We study this principle on the example of an analog system: It has an entrance and an exit, and if anything is disrupted inside of it then it does not produce the necessary result.

However, there is a difference during the time of correction. Parts that are more important are corrected earlier, and after that the less important parts are corrected according to a hierarchy. Therefore, don’t wait for the world to hear and understand what we are doing because billions of people belong to the passive part. They will join the process because they will see that it’s impossible to do anything else. That is how the world will be corrected. People might be extraordinarily smart or developed, they might be great scientists, artists, and cultural activists, yet be completely deaf to spirituality. That is how we should treat everyone.

Only those who come to the study of Kabbalah through various paths belong to the inner system. Therefore, we have to value every person here because he was chosen by the Creator to be part of an important organ of the common system and is therefore a great asset. Meanwhile, others might not be so important. Even the children of many Kabbalists did not take the same path because every person has his own part in the system and it is not passed down hereditarily. So arm yourself with patience.

The main work takes place among those who belong to our world group, but externally we can also act to advance the world. By disseminating materials about the future, about what might happen, and about the solution offered by the science of Kabbalah, we prepare people to the extent it is possible. However, true work with them lies in the fact that as a result of our unity, they will feel a certain awakening.

What will they awaken to? To join us externally. They will want to be involved and serve the process of correction as much as possible. There are already people like this now and their mission is very much worthy of respect.
[39763]
From the 2nd lesson at the WE! Convention on 4/1/11

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Bestowal Exercises

Dr. Michael LaitmanWritings of Rabash, “Purpose of the Group”: In order to attain bestowal to the Creator, it is first necessary to bestow to man, which is called love for the neighbor.

Our nature is completely opposite to love for the neighbor. I only love myself. All of my calculations, whether conscious or unconscious, are built exclusively on personal benefit.

The way I sit, the way I look, the way I think, and what I see—all of this is funneled through the filter of my egoism, leaving me only with the things that can benefit me or pose a threat. Everything has to serve my personal well-being. That is my nature.

However, I have to achieve universal bestowal, universal love, the Creator’s eternal force, eternal life. And to do that, I need to do preliminary exercises in the group. That is why Rabash continues:

Love for the neighbor is possible only when you reject yourself.

One comes instead of the other. Bestowal and reception cannot live together with each other.

I have 613 desires and as a whole my desire acts only for its own sake. This is the situation at the beginning. Then I begin to cut away from it “piece by piece,” starting with the easiest desires and progressing to the most difficult ones.

That is how I correct myself, step by step, and instead of a part of the egoistic desire, I acquire the desire to bestow. In the meantime, in the rest of my desires I still remain in the intention "for my own sake." That is how I correct parts of me.

However, there is a condition: If I have corrected at least one of my desires for the sake of bestowal, then the rest can no longer remain in the egoistic intention. That is why they have to undergo restriction.

I have a large vessel and at first it is entirely aimed at self-benefit. First of all I make a restriction and only then am I able to transform the first, smallest desire to bestowal to others.

Thus, I have a great desire. I make a restriction on it and then I cut off the thinnest layer of myself. From that piece, I am able to perform bestowal. In the meantime, restriction reigns over all the other desires. Then I cut off the second layer, then the third, and that is how I correct them one after another.

Two desires cannot exist in one person: one aimed at himself and one aimed at bestowal. After all, they are opposite to one another. In order to be able to acquire even the smallest desire of bestowal, all the other desires have to be restricted.
[39945]
From the 5th lesson at the WE! Convention on 4/1/11

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You Can’t “Fall Asleep” And Then “Wake Up” At The End Of Correction

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: As far as I understand, the Creator is playing a game with us and this game has a specific purpose. But every game has an end and that means that this game will end in about 200 years. Is that right?

Answer: Actually, I hope that it will end even sooner. I am telling you with total confidence that we can complete it in several years. There are no obstacles.

Question cont’d: If this “game” will end and we will get where we have to get in any case, meaning that we will correct our soul, then what is the difference between the left and right lines? And what will happen if we choose the path of the left line?

Answer: The purpose of creation is for every one of us, with each of us being a small point of the common Kli or desire, to attain perfection, meaning the same kind of unity with all the other points of this Kli as the one existing among the cells of a perfect, healthy organism.

In order to reach this goal, we have to understand, feel, and attain this entire common, huge system because in essence we are one single organism in which we are united with one another. Even our physical body functions by virtue of being permeated by a certain informational field. It’s not just a lymphatic system, a cardiovascular system, a nervous system, and so on, but a certain common informational system. Therefore, it is impossible for me to take a sleeping pill and fall asleep, or freeze myself for 200 years and then have someone wake me up and I will be at the end of correction. That is impossible!

I have to develop my mind and heart, my ability to understand, realize, and attain. After all, in one hour we cannot shove into a child all of the knowledge that he has to acquire over 20 years of study. And in exactly the same way, we cannot teach a person who grew up in the jungle everything that he has to gradually receive over the course of several decades. We have examples of this.

In other words, every person has to go through his personal path of development, gradually and persistently raising himself. The only difference is whether he will be nudged forward by a “rod” at every step of the way, or if he will advance forward out of his own desire.

We have to go through specific phases of correction and every one of us has to go through them one after the other. And with every step, I am like a child being forced by his parents to read one more word, then one more, and so on. I suffer greatly because I am forced to study, until I understand that I will have to do this one way or another.

But if I am smart, then I understand that I can develop a desire for reading. For example, when looking at my friends who have already learned to read well, I begin to be ashamed of my inability and I get a desire to “catch up” to them. Then I don’t need anyone to scold me but I move forward by myself.

This is the difference between the left and right lines—the path of suffering, when “blows” come down on you from all directions and the “sweet” path where you are in the right environment which awakens the feeling of envy in you. You look at them and envy that they have something you don’t. And this forces you to move.
[39824]
From the 3rd lesson at the WE! Convention on 4/1/11

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Why Is It So Hard To Perceive Spirituality?

Dr. Michael LaitmanThe answer is simple: It’s because spirituality is opposite to us, to our essence, to our egoistic nature. Egoism rules over us; we wish to fill it. Hence, out of everything that surrounds us, we only see what we want to see in our egoism: something pleasant or, at most, threatening.

This is why a person who wants to reveal the upper world, to discover what surrounds him but remains undetected in his egoistic perception, needs to reconstruct himself. For this reason the environment is so critical for a person: It helps to rebuild one’s perception, to attune oneself to the importance of perceiving what is unpleasant to egoism, opposite to it. Then one will be able to witness a wide world that has always surrounded him or her. It is called the spiritual world because it is above the egoistic one.

It seems to us that our views are the result of our experience, but they are the upshot of the accumulation of information convenient for our egoism. And it makes no difference what they say, the truth or a lie: For us the truth is what coincides with our opinion—egoism.

We always look only for what supports our opinion and reject what opposes it. Ultimately, we form ourselves and do not wish to change. Only suffering, the attempts to find the meaning of existence, and a strong spiritual environment, the group, will help a person to become objective, to replace the egoistic perception with the environment’s opinion. And then the upper world that has always existed around him will open for him!
[39906]

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The World Has Lost Its Head

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: What is the biggest problem in the world?

Answer: The absence of a global government is the biggest threat to the peace in the world, and it is this absence in particular that causes all modern crises.

The G20 demonstrated that the parties cannot reach agreement on major issues. The world governing body does not exist, while a global, integral world demands it.

Question: Do you think that after the recent events in the Arab countries, the North Caucasian (Muslim) regions of Russian (Chechnya, Dagestan, Ingushetia, and Kabardino-Balkaria) will also demand change, that is, independence?

Answer: I don’t think so because, as someone put it: "I could take it in pieces, but I need everything." Meanwhile, what’s wrong with receiving funds and everything that’s needed from the future victim and preparing to completely overtake it at its own expense? Why leave if the goal is to take over everything, the entire world?

Question: What stimulates the development of the Kabbalistic society?

Answer: Competition drives the development of a democratic society. The stimulus for the development in an autocratic society is power and then corruption, the use of power not for social interests but for personal benefit. Corruption gradually buys up the state, officials, and infiltrates government agencies with their people.

But a corrupted government is unable to rule the country because corrupted officials are motivated only by their personal interests. This is why such a government will be replaced by a Nazi, nationalistic, regime, which will lead to a world war. Alternatively, it will be a government motivated by maintaining equality of all members of society and then the world.
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Every Person Has To Correct Himself On His Own

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion from a woman: I have a very big desire to become perfect. What should I do: direct this desire towards the men or straight to the Creator?

Answer: Neither. You have to correct it yourself. You don’t have to “direct” your desire anywhere. Every person must correct his or her own desire. It’s just that the means for this correction is the mutual help we give to one another, our connection with each other.

No one can correct your desires. This would take away your freedom of choice, your independence, and the ability to attain the level that you have to attain, the root of your soul.

Only work in the group, both for men and for women, in the appropriate form for each to perform their spiritual work will help them become included in one another with their souls and to feel that all together we belong to one Kli, one common soul, just as before the breaking.
[39827]
From the 3rd lesson at the WE! Convention on 4/1/11

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Being Born Into A New World

Dr. Michael LaitmanToday, it is already obvious that nature is in a state of relative balance, and it demands that we come to the same level. This must manifest in material life with “green” technologies and so on, and in social, personal interrelationships. In this way, we can realize balance between the two levels.

First of all, we must consume only the barest of necessities from nature. Then, it is not important how many billions of people will be living in the world because if nature had made it possible, it means that it is able to feed everyone as long as we are using its resources correctly. Second, balance with nature in everything must be maintained on the human level. Here is where most of the weight falls in the realization of evil.

Moderate consumption is the material realization of evil. Otherwise, we are destroying the entire natural foundation, we are cutting the branch on which we are sitting. Gradually, we must build human society according to nature’s laws, leading it to equality and balance. Otherwise, awaiting us are revolutions, wars, and other cataclysms, which are already flaring up with threatening regularity.

Today, global leaders and rulers have no ability to do anything. We’re faced with a dilemma to either go through numerous wars and a difficult birth into the new world, or a conscious development in accordance with nature’s requirements obliging us to a just allocation. Of course, it is not possible to allocate the same thing to everyone. It is necessary to comply with the culture, region, climate, and so on. The key is to provide for everyone within generally accepted limits.

Besides this, the internal realization of evil shows that we must be connected into one system like one man with one heart. Only this way will we reach harmony with nature.

Internal unity manifests according to one’s individual capabilities. A person can harm others and not feel it. That is why we have to activate the mass media and the system of education so that people all over the world realize the evil of egoistic interrelationships more and more. Everything depends precisely on education.

Furthermore, at some stage in this process, people will see that the quality of bestowal, just on its own, gives them a sense of confidence; it carries goodness. Then, gradually, they finally will hear that true unity, similarity to nature, and connecting to it allows us to feel the power of love hidden in it.

This force connects all parts of nature and lifts up the whole system, the entire universe, all levels from the inanimate to human, onto a higher level. All of this is happening to us thanks to the realization of evil. That very lever, that very means, that stimulus, that instrument, provides the means by which we unite with nature ever more as a whole, and we are coming out into the new, higher, eternal dimension of being.

The entire evolution is aimed at this. Whether we want it or not, we will have to unite with nature. On the other hand, we have the opportunity to sharpen the realization of evil before the misfortunes arrive; we can move forward toward correction by the good path, like good children do in agreement with their parents. We can learn from nature before we summon from it a more serious reaction to our imbalance.
[39205]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/37/2011, The Principles of Global Education

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The Secret Of A Tree In The Field

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Evolutionary scientists see the structure and order of evolution but not its goal, and that is why they stumble. For example, an artificially planted pine tree forest destroys the natural vegetation, and, as a result, itself wilts away from diseases.

It becomes clear that we should allow nature to establish its own order. How can we explain this not only in terms of biology, but in terms of global education as well?

Answer: In other words, the question is about how to correct ourselves in a natural, correct way so that a person, as opposed to those pine trees, does not destroy his or her environment. In order for this to happen, he must grow like a “tree in the field,” meaning to feed only off its environment. The environment takes the first place; the environment is the main turning point; the environment is everything. And a person must connect into it, flow into it. This is the real law of development.

After all, the goal is for the whole of humanity to become a unified mechanism. In the right arrangement, one does not perceive himself or herself as a separate element growing outside of this mechanism, but is constantly searching for possibilities to be absorbed, to integrate more and more into it. This form of development is truly flawless.
[38989]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/24/2011, The Principles of Global Education

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