Audio Version Of The Blog – 01.15.15

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Cut Off The Edge Of Your Heart

Laitman_509The Torah, “Leviticus,” 12:3: And on the eighth day, the flesh of his foreskin shall be circumcised.

On the eighth day, the son, the new level that was born out of the seven Sefirot, totally detaches from the mother. But in order to exist in the future, he cannot use the flesh of his foreskin, his greatest and most egoistic desires.

He has to resist them and not allow himself to use them, as it says: “cut off the edge of your heart,”i.e., desires, because we can only use our most egoistic desires after the end of correction.

First all of humanity undergoes correction by including only the desires of Keter, Hochma, Bina, Hesed, Gevura, Tifferet, Netzach, and Hod. And Yesod, the last Sefira of the Lights that descend from Above through which the Light enters Malchut (the created being) has to be cut off, to be restricted.

This means that we also use the Sefira of Yesod but it is restricted so that it will not convey all the Light in it to Malchut. This is important!

In addition, circumcision symbolizes the connection between all the Sefirot and Malchut that is fulfilled through Yesod. This is the reason that it is called a covenant (in Hebrew). This connection cannot exist without the circumcision of Yesod, without the restriction of its dominance over Malchut.

The term circumcision refers to the fact that we remove the greatest desires, the heart of stone (Lev HaEven) that cannot be corrected into love and bestowal. However, all the other desires can be used. Therefore it is actually after the circumcision that a person is considered Jewish (Yehudi) stemming from the Hebrew word “Yihud” (unity, connection) since now he can connect with the Creator.

Question: Why is the flesh of the foreskin thrown to the sand?

Answer: It is because you cannot use it; it is equal to corporeal dust.

The flesh of the foreskin symbolizes the greatest, cruelest egoistic desires that you cannot use in order to bestow, but at the same time, these desires are very valuable and so although they burn in you, you now equate their value to dust.

Question: Will there be a time when we will not have to circumcise the newborn?

Answer: At the end of correction! Then there will be no more prohibitions, no commandments, because all the commandments are partial corrections of the attribute of love and bestowal. If you correct everything, there will be no limitations left in any of the desires! You will begin to use them freely since you will have the intention of in order to bestow on top of every desire.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 2/12/14

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Nature’s Self-Cleaning

Laitman_703_04Question: When will our world become ecologically clean?

Answer: It is only according to our inner correction. During this process the world will undergo different changes and will become cleaner externally according to our inner purity.

The world cannot be better than we are internally. Therefore the more we develop, the more our ego grows, the more we waste. Look around you! I am sure that the moment we begin to clean ourselves nature will begin its self-cleaning.

Question: Do you believe in self-cleaning?

Answer: I don’t believe, I know it is so. Our internal change leads us to use nature only as much as necessary, in a rational manner, and it will gradually restore itself to its pristine condition.

We will convey the power of the Upper Light through us (through the human level – Adam) to the levels of the animate, vegetative, and still nature, and they will all be corrected and ascend all the way to the level of absolute wholeness. Our forefathers didn’t know that because they always acted egoistically, and now we especially don’t understand what it is.

So before this world disappears from our sensations, we have to bring it to its perfect state by experiencing the current descent and start to ascend up the parabola. Accordingly, the still, vegetative, and animate nature, which totally depend on us without any account of themselves, will be cleansed and will ascend.

We can only imagine it as “and a lion will lie down with a kid and a small child will lead them.” Although this is said as an allegory, it will really be so, which means that the global nature will change according to human nature.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 2/12/14

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Letters Are The Symbols Of The Upper Force

Laitman_151From the blog post The World That Does Not Have A Place, if I want to record the two forces from above (reception and bestowal) acting on our world, I must illustrate this in a graph: how one force acts and how another acts, and then how they both act on a certain material.

I record the net effect of these two forces on the material in the form of a symbol, then looking at this symbol, I know that now these two forces affect the material in this way.

Say this symbol is the letter “Shin (ש).”  A letter is a symbol, and the Shin is the general form of these two forces that print inside our material, the desire to receive, the desire to enjoy, because it is the entire material of our world.

There are 22 letters and five so-called final letters (Mantsepach). Altogether, there are 27 letters, i.e., symbols, combinations of the two forces, standard forms, like a press that imprints itself inside the material, the desire to receive, our ego, and with this impression, it begins to live and change.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 12/21/14

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The Best Place On Earth

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Earlier you said that it is possible to do spiritual work while sitting behind the computer screen. So why are you now saying that someone who hasn’t come to a convention loses?

Answer: I was asked me a question, “Are there special, sacred, and unique places in the world in which spirituality is felt more than in other places?” I answered that there are no places like that. Everything in the world is found under the control of the one unique force, the upper light, which is found at absolute rest and fills all space equally.

Also, I said that if the person wants to advance, he must find a good place. What does that mean? There are places in which the higher force is revealed to a greater extent and there are places in which it is revealed to a lesser extent.

The force itself exists everywhere, but if in some place there are groups of people who are engaged with connection between them, then they are able to make from themselves and their mutual connection a detector of this power. They perceive it, it lives within them, and they increase it through their mutual interaction.

This is not saying that if I live in an apartment next door to such a group that I will be under its good influence. But if I enter into this group and try to unite with it, then I will be under the influence of what the friends accumulate among them and then I will find a good place on earth.

There is nothing sacred in geographic locations, rocks, trees, or other objects. Holiness is found where people gather who want to resemble the higher power in their mutual properties. You can advance more quickly and precisely among people like these. This is the most blessed place.

So those people who have not come to our conventions have lost a great deal. They were not included in that blessing, in the good that was here during these days. It is unfortunate, because they won’t find another place like this. In life, there are very few places with opportunities like these for a person, and so it is necessary to take advantage of them.
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From the International Summer Camp In Bulgaria “Day Two” 7/12/14, Lesson #4

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Spiritual Concepts As Perceived By Ordinary People

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: You use terms like a soul, the upper world, or spirituality that are also used by many religions and different spiritual methods. But I feel that they give these concepts a different meaning.

Can you explain more accurately what the wisdom of Kabbalah refers to by concepts like the upper world, a soul, or reincarnation?

Answer: The wisdom of Kabbalah was founded 5,774 years ago. The first Kabbalist was called Adam.

He wasn’t the first human being on earth, because humans had existed and developed tens of thousands of years before he appeared. The only thing special about Adam was that he discovered the system of forces we are living in and described it in his book The Angel Raziel.

An angel is not a winged creature that can fly, but a force. Adam called it a hidden force because we cannot perceive this force in our corporeal senses but only can perceive the implications of its consequences. Adam was the first to attain this force that manages the whole world and he was the founder of the wisdom of Kabbalah.

Modern science can discover many forces by means of research in physics, chemistry and other sciences. But there are forces that we cannot discover because we don’t have the tools to do so. These are basically forces related to thoughts, the mind, and desires. These forces exist, but we cannot perceive them.

We can identify, with the help of measuring brainwaves how a person concentrates thoughts, but we cannot examine the quality of the thought, especially if these are ideas that relate to humanity and are part of nature. Today, physicists say that our world and the whole universe seems to them like a thought and that we exist in the universe in a thought. This thought is the thought of creation.

The wisdom of Kabbalah teaches us how to feel this thought, this force, the thought that existed before the creation of the universe and which created the universe through the Big Bang and leads it to its final definite form. There are no coincidences in nature. Everything is accurately connected and defined.

The wisdom of Kabbalah helps us develop additional senses through which we can feel the forces and the attributes that our body doesn’t feel. In order to do so, we must exit our body and connect to other people, be incorporated in one another, and create a kind of a collective emotional, energetic, mental platform that is not in each of us, but among us.

Thus, by the cooperation between us, we can begin to perceive the force that exists around us, the thought of creation, the thought of our evolution. According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, it is called attaining the Creator because this force created and develops us.

The wisdom of Kabbalah revealed this long before religions appeared. People began to read Kabbalah books, but at the same time they didn’t engage in practical fulfillment by way of self-correction, development of the connection between them, and in ascending above their egos. They couldn’t understand what the books said exactly, and all religions stemmed from this as a result of this lack of understanding.

They took the names of the forces that exist in nature (spirits, angels, demons, etc.) and began to embody them in different images. Kabbalah books speak only about forces, but because people perceive these concepts through their corporeal senses, they began to imagine reality through these concepts.

The point is that everything we see and feel inside us are only forces that are perceived by our mind and are depicted in our minds like electromagnetic forces depict different images on a computer screen. In fact, nothing really exists.

By putting together a picture of the different forces and placing electrodes in a person’s brain, we can change this picture and do practically anything. But does all that really exist externally to us? No. It is only a fictitious reality that we perceive in that way.

The wisdom of Kabbalah tells a person how to correct his perception of the world and feel it, not with his body, but by using totally different senses. We are gradually approaching this level.

As for the spiritual concepts, they were really taken from the wisdom of Kabbalah by different spiritual methods. Many people use them without any reference to the wisdom of Kabbalah and this is very confusing for a person who demands correction. The right perception of reality requires a great deal of work on myself.
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From the International Summer Camp In Bulgaria “Day Two” 7/12/14, Lesson #4

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Signs Of A True Spiritual Action

laitman_569_01If I don’t think about the reward I will receive from my action but only worry about the benefit of others, it is bestowal. It is a special action that doesn’t exist in our world and is not familiar to us.

We think that a mother who takes care of her baby is an example of bestowal in our world: She doesn’t think about herself and does whatever is necessary.

But a mother acts from her natural instinct and there is no ascent above nature here. She simply feels that her baby is dearer to her than herself. She doesn’t see him as a foreign body, but actually feels that he is inside her like before he was born.

But we are establishing a special connection between us that unites us all into one integral system and changes us so that we will be able to operate in order to bestow. Thus, our actions are divided into an intention and the actual action. The intention is altruistic, which means for the benefit of others, and it determines the action.

If the intention is not for the sake of others but for my own sake, then even if you bestow to others, you expect something in return: at least to be in a good mood, have self-respect, or receive praise. If I cannot calculate things only in order to bestow unto others, this actions is called a transgression and the breaking of the Mitzva (commandment) since I use an egoistic intention.

It is according to such signs that I can check whether my intention is clean and whether it is really for the sake of others or not. After all, I may be acting for the sake of others but expecting to receive something for myself as well. These are the accounts that determine my place on the spiritual ladder along spiritual correction. Accordingly, if my action is for the sake of others without any self benefit, as if I don’t exist at all, my action is more sublime in the spiritual sense.

Therefore, I should totally restrict my ego before every action so as not to expect any reward for myself, as if I don’t exist at all. Baal HaSulam says that we simply have to be a pipe, a channel, that conveys everything through it, and which passes everything onwards. Thus we build ourselves by restricting our ego.

But after the restriction, I can already plan what I can do for the sake of others, for the sake of bestowal. If I can come up with such a plan with the help of the Light that Reforms, it means that I build the head of the spiritual Partzuf. With this head I can already use my desire to receive by ascending above it.

Although the ego wants everything only for its own sake, I act above it with the intention only for the sake of others, without any account for my own sake. This action is called receiving in order to bestow, which is spiritual work.

The ability to perform spiritual work comes only from the Light that Reforms. This is the reason that very few people in this world can understand and fulfill this work, and in fact there is no need for many such people.

Our group will never be big. Most people will simply go through it: They will come and go. Therefore we will keep on consolidating as a group that leads humanity along the right path of our evolution. Our power is in quality, not in quantity.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/13/14, Shamati #60

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A Good Place For Developing The Soul

Dr. Michael LaitmanThe reincarnation of the souls is like the recycling of water in our world. This is a constant exchange that takes place between different energy levels in which are found our energetic characteristics called the soul.

A soul is something ephemeral, an energy state of a person that is constantly rising and falling. Cycles like these are necessary to realize the constant blending, adhering, and division of all the souls with each other. They constantly create mutual correction, mutual integration, and bring all the individual souls into a single, generally shared state of one single soul.

This state is called the completion of correction, and we must attain it soon. Therefore, both the wisdom of Kabbalah and the crisis have appeared in this world. Not much time is left for us to reach this state, either through the blows of nature, through huge problems, or through learning and proper use of the method of  the wisdom of connection (Integral Education).

Question: In our world are there any energetic places that can fulfill the soul?

Answer: No, there are no places in the world with such unique characteristics. They influence our mental, physiological, and even our emotional attributes, but not the soul, not spirituality, meaning not the ascent of a person to the characteristic of bestowal and love.

Only in a strong group that is created correctly and in which people mutually cooperate in the right way is the focus of a state like this to be found where a person can enter this society and develop very rapidly.

This is not a geographic location; rather, it is simply an energy that is accumulated by many people yearning to discover the central force of the world. Only a Kabbalistic group is a good place for developing the soul.
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From the International Summer Camp In Bulgaria “Day Two” 7/12/14, Lesson #4

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The Science That Reveals The Secret Of Creation

Dr. Michael LaitmanWe are living in a very interesting times that are very unclear. Humanity has always been accustomed to making plans for 10 and even for 50 years ahead. People knew why they were alive and in what direction their nation was developing. But around 30-40 years ago, we lost our direction in life and and we now no longer know why we are living and developing.

Every person, family, and nation is in a situation like this. It dominates us so much that we no longer want to learn since we don’t see any results from it. Children are not connected to their parents and don’t want to marry, create a family, or give birth to children.

They don’t have any particular, clear purpose in life, such as building a home, raising a child, and so on. Pople have lost the taste for life. Many people in the world are depressed, and to forget, use drugs. The percentage of divorces is rising at a dizzying rate.

This strange time shows our distancing from each other, our loosing connection with our nation, with our family, and with friends  There was a time when there were very strong ties between relatives. Today this is not so, people can travel to another land and live in a society with a different culture.

The sensation of meaninglessness in life has spread everywhere in the world in different forms. We don’t set any unique goals for ourselves and don’t think about what will be in another 30, 40, 50, or 100 years. In the past this was interesting, if not for the individual person, then at least the nation, but now this doesn’t interest anyone. Everyone lives only for today since that is easier and simpler.

Never has the world been in such a state, which is a sign of a period of transition. We must pass from this state to a new state, meaning that we must begin to search for new values that make life worth living. Today there are no such values for people.

This meaninglessness is appalling. Even if person has a desire, he or she cannot realize their hopes and goals. Everything is falling apart on all levels: materially, spiritually, culturally, physically, in families, and in society.

It is precisely at this time that the wisdom of Kabbalah has been revealed to us. It originated 3,800 years ago in ancient Babylon. It says that once we were in the same state of mutual rejection that we feel today. Our ego reached such dimensions that we lost the connection with each other and were scattered throughout the world and distant from those strong societal connections in Babylon where we had lived and worked. Much cultural evidence has remained for us that reminds us of the separation that we experienced in Babylon.

Today we are beginning to enter into a similar situation, except on a new level. Today our planet is becoming smaller, as in ancient Babylon, and like the Babylonians, we don’t know what to do. Again, it is not clear to us how it is possible to get along with each other. We also don’t want to get along, so we divorce, separate, and disconnect. Each one feels himself an individualist.

Kabbalah speaks about this, and that today we must rise above our ego and understand that the same problem that is being discovered today in us, in our children, the family, society, the nation, and  the world has been awakened so that we will rise above ourselves and begin to develop connections between us.

This connection raises us to the next level of existence. Through the system of connection between us that humanity is creating, we are beginning to feel a new world, an absolutely new state. After all, today we perceive creation through our five corporeal senses, but we are ready to feel it via an additional, integral sense that we can develop if we connect to a system of communication and cooperation between us.

That is, instead of perceiving my egoistic, private world, I will feel the world as integral and connected. I will then begin to feel the entire system, the whole of  creation, and the interaction between its parts to such a degree that I will feel the world and myself in an absolutely different way.

Today we feel that we exist in the world for the number of years in a web of interactions between us. But if we begin to connect with one another, in spite of what our ego dictates to us, we will acquire a new system of communication and discover ourselves existing on another level, in an integral dimension in which there is no beginning or end. After all, the connection between us will make it possible for us to see the world through others, a multidimensional world and not linearly the way we see it today.

It is not easy to explain this to a person and for them to reach a perception of this world. But as a result of unique exercises, according to the method of the wisdom of Kabbalah, we can reach this and see an absolutely different creation.

The wisdom of Kabbalah tells us that whether we want it or not, we must reach this. So we are found in a state of crisis in all of nature, which shows us that nature itself is integral and all of its parts are found in complete harmony with each other, and a person is not ready to exist in such a harmonious picture because the ego takes him out of it.

Since we are the opposite of nature, we constantly damage it and don’t want to be a part of the integral picture. And so we feel the confrontation with nature in the form of a crisis.

The present crisis will continue until we reach the same direct integral cooperation in a good connection with nature like all of its other components.

The still, vegetative, and animate nature are in harmony, homeostasis, equilibrium. Man, using his egoism and devouring with this egoistic nature more than is necessary for his existence, violates this harmony and eventually leads to the crisis itself.

Therefore, the confrontation with nature will continue and will lead us to such a shock that we still have to find a way to continuing existence. Indeed, despite the technological advances, we can not live a normal life without the proper interaction and harmony with the environment.

Harmony can be found only if we pass through a certain period of re-education, through efforts to remake ourselves, rising above our selfish nature and arriving at the correct interaction between us.

This is the main subject of the wisdom of Kabbalah, which tells the history of man’s appearance on the planet and about reaching the end of his egoistic development, when he is compelled to change himself. The wisdom of Kabbalah explains how we can change ourselves to emerge from the crisis, which will be felt on a more and more brutal scale by the individual, the family, society, the nation and the world.

So we are obliged to learn how to interact between us. For this there is the method of integral education that allows an easy way to implement this: gradual, correct interaction between us with the help of special exercises.

Very rapidly, other forces of nature will be revealed before us that are opposite to the negative, egoistic forces that cause conflicts between us. A person will feel that he can balance them with the altruistic forces to the extent that he will begin to feel the world as good and not cruel.

He will begin to understand the forces of nature, why nature behaves like this with him, and in what form he can use the forces of nature for his own good and truly benefit from his very existence on the planet.

When a person begins to interact correctly with other people, meaning that he begins to connect with them correctly, he will begin to feel himself in the unique network of communication that connects everyone.

He will feel that he is exiting the framework of time, space, and motion and existing in an absolutely different dimension in which the main thing is not our individual bodies, but our one collective body and collective existence where we begin to pass to another state, another dimension.

Together with this, the world will dissolve from our feelings, and in its place we will begin to feel what is called the higher world, meaning a shared existence in which all concepts of time, space, motion, birth, aging, and death will disappear.

We will stop feeling the world as it is now and will enter into its inner comprehension. After all, we now feel it only through our five corporeal senses, and so we only feel the world as long as our physical body exists. And if in its place we create another body, which is the connection between us, then through it we will begin to feel our entire environment in its true form that is not distorted and limited by the body.

A person who is involved with correction of himself, according to the method of integral education, will gradually pass from feeling our world to feeling a double world: both our world and the inner, higher world. And when his body dies, he will continue to exist only with the feeling of the higher world, the world that he discovered and acquired while in his physical life.

This is the goal of the wisdom of Kabbalah: to bring a person to the perception of the integral world. After all, the crisis through which we are passing is created by nature specifically to bring us from a perception of the limited world through our bodies, to the integral perception by way of a general connection between us.

Today many people in the world are engaged in the wisdom of Kabbalah. In its time, Kabbalah predicted that humanity would reach a state where it could not fulfill itself with anything, that people would feel emptiness and lose the goal and the meaning of life. All of this would bring a person to the question, “What is the meaning of life?”

People would gradually discover the secret of the meaning of life. It is not latent within our bodies and not limited by its framework; rather, it is much higher above this. The entire universe and the whole of creation is a completely different system and not as we perceive it today. The sciences of this world already speak about this.

In the framework of our organization, we are making all efforts to give to everyone who wants it, an opportunity to be engaged with the wisdom of Kabbalah, and to gradually acquire the sensation of the higher world.
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From the International Summer Camp In Bulgaria “Day Two” 7/12/14, Lesson #4

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Daily Kabbalah Lesson – 01.15.15

Writings of Rabash, Shlavei HaSulam,” Article 38 

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The Book of Zohar  – Selected Excerpts, “Prayer,” Item 69

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Talmud Eser Sefirot, Histaklut Pnimit, Vol. 1, Part 1, Chapter 1, Item 8 

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Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol. 6, Part 16, Item 93

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Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol. 2, Part 6, Item 7 

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