Safety Belt For Ascent

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Sometimes we feel totally down. Is it possible with the help of our mutual guarantee to always keep us from falling below a certain threshold?

Answer: We can help one another in some way, but still it depends on the state of a person. I may read some article and be impressed to tears and a cat resting next to me will be dozing or looking at me without any understanding of what is happening to me. In a similar way we go through the same states: one time as a crying human being and another as a cat without any understanding.

We have to justify all these states and accept them as necessary ones. The only question is our attitude toward them and how we use them. Therefore, one can experience any descents. We only have to use every way to prepare ourselves for them in order to not fall into a completely dead state. We still have to manage to carry on at least in something and at the same time try to come out from this fall. We have to build a safety belt that will not allow us to fall below a certain level.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/13/13, Shamati #33 “The Lots on Yom Kippurim and Haman”

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A Temple In A Person’s Heart

Dr. Michael LaitmanThe Torah, “Exodus”, Truma, 25:8-25:9: “And they shall make Me a sanctuary and I will dwell in their midst. According to all that I show you, the pattern of the Mishkan and the pattern of all its vessels, and so shall you do.”

A sanctuary is an ardent egoistic desire that is corrected in such a way that it can already work oppositely from itself in order to bestow upon the Creator, when the Creator is more important for it than itself. This determines its level.

A “sanctuary” exists in every person. It is actually in this innermost egoistic grain, in the fourth part of the ego, that the holy of holies is established, the great egoistic desire. So the great priest who can enter the sanctuary is the greatest egoist.

Before the destruction of the Temple in the sanctuary, people used to buy a place in the Temple for great sums of money. The great priest used to sell this place since he couldn’t overcome his ego, although he knew that he would die on Yom Kippur because of that. This just comes to show us how great his ego was.

This means that the holy of holies is the place inside a person in which the Creator is revealed. It is the greatest egoistic desire that is corrected and becomes in order to bestow. It is in an amazing and incomprehensible ego and at the same time also the attribute of bestowal and love in contrast to the ego.

This means that there is a tiny white point in the dark center of the ego which illuminates the darkness. There are also different “structures” around it: a courtyard, a tent (sanctuary), hoops, etc.

There are many drawings of this subject that were made according to the pattern of the upper worlds. Attributes such as south, east, north, and west are created in our world according to the attributes of the upper worlds, as this structure indicates. A person who can read the drawing and translate it to his own attributes can imagine how to combine his forces, attributes, and intentions in order to attain a state called the revelation of the Creator, which means the place for the revelation of the Creator.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 5/27/13

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A Place For The Revelation Of The Creator

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: (The Torah, “Exodus,” Truma, 25:10) It says: “They shall make an ark of acacia-wood; two and a half cubits its length…” How can such drawings be so accurate? What is the gold that the crown of gold outside the temple was made of?

Answer: It is talking about the ten main Sefirot each with its own ten Sefirot and then another ten Sefirot in each, etc. It is about how they are divided into certain attributes and discernments and the combination of the connections between them.

There is the still, vegetative, and animate nature, and man—the parts that participate in resembling the Creator. Each part has to be made of its main attributes. A priest, for example has to be married. Certain types of animals have to be kosher, which means that they should have cloven (split) hooves and ruminate.

Why is the ark made of acacia wood or cedar of Lebanon, and why is it covered with gold, silver, and copper? Because those particular materials exist in nature in their natural form in nature; they do not need to be made artificially.

They are used in a particular combination, creating one form or another. It is because you don’t just take a certain attribute, but rather have to change it and to give it a certain form by your action. A greedy irritable person, for example, becomes generous and kind. This means that we should gather all the attributes correctly, since each one should be combined in a certain way with other attributes. Thus the place for the revelation of the Creator is built.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 7/29/13

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The Correct Realization Of The Concept Of Unity

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: During presentations of our methodology, how can our friends respond to tough questions or allegations: “You are communists; you are making waves”?

Answer: The unity of society is not necessarily communism in the form that was presented in the Soviet Union. On the other hand, much of what was at the basis (not the implementation) of the Soviet Union were good ideas and wonderful goals. But they fell into the hands of lowly officials, and with this everything fell to either Stalin or to the bureaucracy, or to the destroyers or enemies of the people.

But in principle, the concept was correct. The fact is that entire idea was not properly implemented, and although much was said about education, the work of education itself was not carried out.

So when the party leaders, all of the elite, the millions who were found in control, didn’t set an example, then certainly nothing worked. In an identical manner we command children: We don’t want to do something ourselves, but we demand it of them. But the children understand that while we demand this, we lie and play about it, so they won’t do anything, and if they do, it is only for the sake of appearing they do and not really correcting themselves.

The same thing happened in Russia. But nevertheless, we just have to show that the solidarity and unity were not for Russia; everything remained just talk. And most importantly, nothing was realized there through the upper force.

By the “Upper force” we mean the power of unity between people. If tens, hundreds, thousands of people, all the people, as is written in the Torah, were to unite, then we would create or naturally discover within us this great and singular power; and it would correct everything. For all that happens with us in our world, personally and all together, on all levels, is all a lack of conformity with the unified power of nature.

Nature approaches us and shows us its integrality, unity, and interdependence. And we, on the contrary, run away from this, separate, detach, move away, hide behind our computers, and don’t want to know anything. As a results, we have to understand that nature will push and squeeze us until we agree to this.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/25/13, Question and Answers with Dr. Laitman

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Audio Version Of The Blog – 09.20.13

Listen to an Audio Version of the Blog
Download: MP3 Audio
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Under A Temporary Shade

Dr. Michael LaitmanSukkot symbolizes joy. It is a wonderful, pleasant, light, and simple holiday that people really love. The truth is that it requires preparation in advance, but still, it is very joyful. Why is that?

First, after all the clarifications after the receiving of the Torah in Shavuot, after the 9th of Av when we saw how shattered we are—as it symbolizes the shattering of the Tablets of the Ten Commandments—it also symbolized the partition of the tablets. Then we reach the recognition of evil in the Jewish New Year (Rosh Hashanah, the beginning of the new year), and we make a decision that we must be corrected. And then comes the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur), which in Kabbalistic terms is described as the embrace of the right and the left line, as the revelation of the properties of the court, Dinim (judgment) and Hassadim (mercy), the sweetening.

Finally, there comes the festival of Sukkot, which stands for special corrections when I already can raise all my desires to bestowal. The Sukkah symbolizes this entire process. It is all very simple. I use my simplest desires in the form of branches and leaves for building a temporary home. They are worthless, but it is through using them that I build my temporary home, a Sukkah, that provides a shade over my head. The Schach (the covering of the Sukkah) is made of worthless materials that can be found everywhere.

After establishing this temporary state, I rejoice in it. Thus, it symbolizes the spiritual vessel in which I receive the Light. The Schach symbolizes the Masach (screen) since I don’t want to receive the Light directly, and the shade must be much greater than the Light, “Its shade is greater than its Light.”

I am happy since I have managed to build a Masach above me which enables me to conceal the upper abundance and remain in the shade. I, on the other hand—with the help of the Light that Reforms, of course—can hide from the pleasures in the spiritual vessel.

This process continues and I correct myself more and more in my vessels as they develop. I stay in the Sukkah with them, which means that I can open them and use them thanks to the Schach.

Then, I reach Simchat Torah (Joy of the Torah). The Torah is the Light that Reforms that I received on Shavuot. I use this force to correct my vessels and now I come out of the Sukkah. In other words, I already have an unlimited Masach and I don’t need to worry about the Schach (canopy) anymore.

Coming out of the Sukkah (“hut”) symbolizes that now I am free to roam around all of reality all over the world. There is no need for a Masach over my head anymore since it is inside me now. I now sit in my vessel corrected.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/18/13, Lesson on the Topic: ”Sukkot”

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The Battlefield Is Actually Inside Me

Dr. Michael LaitmanRabash, Letter 36: Sukkot resolves all the questions even the most difficult ones and bad since we know that Sukkah stands for the shade of faith that should prevail over the sunlight, that is over knowledge. “Its shade should be more than its Light.” However, we should make great efforts to receive the shade and to say that it is the shade of Holiness since this whole shade comes from Heaven and not from the Sitra Achra (the other side) and it was given so that a person would have a place to accept faith.

What is important is that the force of the group is opposite to our ego. If it isn’t so, a person falls and sinks deeply into his ego, into his thoughts, and has no hope to succeed.

One must constantly hold onto the right thoughts, to keep himself above, in the right awakening, holding onto the right force in the right direction, sustaining himself. This is possible only with the force of the group and its ceaseless help. There is no other way. We must take care of that.

After all, most of the time, we still are absorbed in ourselves. However, if I don’t disrespect my friends and they have a strong affect on me, I wake up and transcend myself.

This is a real problem. I can build a shade only if I am strongly impressed by the environment and consider it more important and stronger than my own nature. This is an inevitable struggle and I must constantly be concerned as to who is going to win this struggle. I have to see myself as a battlefield in which there is constant fighting between the shell and holiness.

How can I promise myself that from now on the group will impress me more than any of my egoistic claims, attributes, desires, or thoughts? How can I be under its strong and faithful impression all the time? My future is secure only if I succeed in doing so.

So, the more we work on the connection between us, the greater chances we have to succeed.

Question: What helps us win this struggle other than simple luck? After all, I constantly see that I definitely am losing this battle.

Answer: You will always lose. You can only win on one condition: if you make sure that the friends do not succumb to their nature. My influence on them should be stronger than their nature which pulls them downward. So I influence them by inspiration, impression, and the importance of the goal.

A mother also constantly thinks of her children no matter where she is and what she does. In order to do so, we must work on mutual guarantee. We are all in the same boat, and we all will drown if someone drills a hole in it.

It is all in our hands, and only we can fulfill this. There may be blows that will help us understand that we are really in the same boat.

Question: I constantly feel that I am absorbed in myself and not in the group. How can I shatter the illusion that I operate by myself?

Answer: You must keep on trying. Worrying about yourself won’t help, of course. However, by that, you at least will see that it doesn’t help and that there should be mutual concern for the friends. We need one, big, common vessel that includes all our friends in Israel and abroad and, of course, to make more efforts.

There will be different disturbances along the way but they will be revealed as help against you, and then you will begin to think twice about how to be and what to do.

Eventually, you should understand that, if you don’t want to connect, you will be sent more disturbances that can tear you to pieces, throw you in different directions, and put you into different problems. The only thing you should do on top of all these interruptions is to connect. This is the answer to all the future, external disturbances that will come so that we will reach the right connection.

Question: However, waiting for the disturbances is the path of suffering.

Answer: If you overcome them both on the corporeal level and on the spiritual level, then it is fine.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/18/13, Lesson on the Topic: “Sukkot”

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How The Soul Grows

Dr. Michael LaitmanSpiritual development is in feelings because the material of creation is the desire to enjoy. And we can use the mind only on condition that it helps us to correct desire. Otherwise, it can hurt us.

Therefore, it’s said that “there is none wiser than the experienced.” That is, first you need to go through all kinds of feelings and impressions in your desire to enjoy and then from this you obtain wisdom. We cannot work in the mind with what we have not experienced in our desire, that’s called philosophy, which has no real basis. After all, everything is based on the material of desire.

States are changing every second because, if a state does not change, then time is not moving. Any state changes due to the fact that first we cancel ourselves before the influence of the Light. All the work is done by the Light: The Light is primary. It creates a desire, affects, and changes it. We are only required to accept the action of the Light, let it enter, we express our consent, a request, a prayer, to persuade it to do its work.

It all depends on our state: whether we demand like babies or ask like adults. There are many types of relationships between the Light and a person, or rather, the desire for the Light, asking the Light to influence it and make some action on it.

Why is it necessary that the desire turns to the Light and asks it to act? Because through this, the desire understands what the Light is going to do and agrees with this. It acquires intelligence, the head, and makes itself similar to the Light. It cannot perform the action itself; the action relates to the work of the Creator, but because of this, the desire grows until it becomes equal to the Light. My task is to draw the Light on all the actions that I want done to me, and the Light performs everything.

Every request like this begins from self-annulment: I want that a change to be made in me, but don’t know exactly what. After all, this will be a new state, I cannot recognize it or see in advance. It’s impossible to talk about something that I have not yet reached, so I need self-annulment, and I ask the upper one to make this action on me to save me.

I don’t know what He will do and into what He will turn me, what I will become in a moment. Even if the head and the body change, that is, the thought and action, everything, so that I would not recognize my former self as I was a second ago, to such an extent that I would become an entirely new creation. I don’t care what I will become, it’s most important for me to give myself to the Light so that it would perform its action.

I have to be ready for this and wish more than anything else to want to cut myself off from all of the past so that nothing is left from the past, and I would not see a single old property in myself and even that there would be no transition between the past, present, and future. Only then it means that I am ready for the impact of the Light on me.

It should not come from the desire to escape from the previous state. I am asking to be changed not because I feel bad. I don’t ask to be saved from problems as that would be a selfish request instead of the advancement to the next spiritual level. I ask one thing: Help me become like the Light, to become somewhat similar to it, to become a giver for someone.

All that I can clarify is only in the group with respect to the friends, to humanity. Thus I am preparing myself for the true prayer. I am looking for it because I don’t know what this feeling should be. So, I search, work, study, disseminate, do everything I can. You have to be sensitive to what you are given to advance toward the burst of the true prayer, which leads to the answer to it from above.

Thus I come to self-annulment, the feeling of joy, solidarity, loyalty to the Light, which is called the devotion of the soul. I know that everything it will do to me will be correct. And it is not because I want to run away from troubles and I have no other choice, but on the contrary, I am fine and have no shortage in anything. I lack only one thing: handing myself to the Light and becoming included in the quality of bestowal so that it would rule over me and allow me not to think about myself but to be loyal to that one property.

This is called the correct prayer, the request for the first action of the Light, which is the beginning of the spiritual embryo. After that, a person begins to feel his connection with the Light to the extent that he feels like a drop of spiritual seed that must cancel itself inside the property of bestowal.

This starts a long process of spiritual growth of the embryo that passes in constant self-annulment relative to the Light, which every time passes more properties of bestowal to the embryo. The entire spiritual path, the entire ladder, birth, suckling, and maturity, is the acquisition of additional properties of bestowal over the previous state. Thus the soul grows.
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From the Preparation for the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/16/13

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I Am Dreaming Of Becoming A Slave Of Bestowal

Dr. Michael LaitmanIt is said: “The Cup of blessing should be filled to the brim.” In order to make the Light work on me, I have to ask the Light to do so from out of all my desires that it has to correct.

I don’t know what kind of desire this is and about what part of myself I ask, but it must be the full measure. I don’t know how it happens and whether I am going in the right direction to find the necessary desires. I just have to constantly work to give myself to the thoughts, desires, and actions of bestowal as much as possible, and to be included in the group until I come to the right cry organized for me by the Creator.

The true prayer is already a consequence of the influence of the Light. After all, we ourselves do nothing, but preparation. The prayer itself is the result of many preliminary steps and preparation, the prayer before the prayer.

The Light gradually affects us by small illuminations in the dark, in the states of helplessness and powerlessness until our despair reaches the limit when the person is ready to do anything to become a slave of bestowal, which will rule over him and fill his entire mind and heart.
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From the Preparation for the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/16/13

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Analysis Of Social Cohesion

Dr. Michael LaitmanIn the News (from DW.de): “Germany’s Bertelsmann foundation has compared 34 OECD and EU countries for social cohesion. …

“The study finds that social cohesion is strong in the wealthy Scandinavian countries Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland, whereas it is weak in the southern European countries hardest hit by the economic crisis, with Bulgaria, Greece and Romania at the bottom of the list… .

“Solidarity (social cohesion) is important for shaping the future of a society, ” said Liz Mohn, deputy chairperson of the Bertelsmann foundation, as she presented the study in the western German city of Gütersloh on Tuesday.

“Solidarity has a positive effect on individuals in society. More solidarity means a rise in subjective well-being,” she added.

Sociologists at Jacobs Bremen University gathered relevant data from 34 countries going back 25 years.

“The countries include European Union countries, as well as other members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), such as North America, Oceania and Israel.

“Germany is in 14th place, just ahead of Great Britain and France and well ahead of the Baltic States, but below the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

In small European countries such as Switzerland, Austria and Luxembourg there is a strong feeling of togetherness.

“People were asked a series of questions about their social networks, whether they had friends and got along well with their neighbors. They were asked how they felt about the justice system and fairness in society. …

“They found that an even distribution of wealth, a small income gap and high education standards are conducive to a feeling of togetherness. Economic hardship, however, has the opposite effect: It leads people to fend for themselves rather than close ranks, the researchers found. …

“Immigration, however, has no measurable impact on social cohesion. The researchers found no indication that a higher number of migrants affected the answers in any way.”

My Comment: The forces and connections that emerge in the process of integral education will be able to change any society quickly and bring it to cohesion up to the feeling of brotherly dependence and love.
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