Audio Version Of The Blog – 03.14.16

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Our Desire Determines Everything

Laitman_198Question: What does an ordinary person practically gain from the wisdom of Kabbalah?

Answer: I don’t know what an ordinary person is. Everything is determined by a person’s desires. Each of us is a desire to receive, a desire to enjoy.

If the desire to enjoy is like a cat’s desire to catch a mouse, then I am a cat. If it is like a cow’s to eat grass, then I am a cow.

If my desire is to plant a tree, to build a home, and to have children, which in this world means that I am a human being, then I am a human being. If I have a desire to be rich, to acquire knowledge or respect, then I am a great man in this world and I already aspire to grow to this level. But all this is in the framework of our world, depending on my needs.

The point is that we have desires that cannot be fulfilled in our world, and this is where the need to discover the meaning of life stems from. It is seemingly a simple question, but it remains without an answer.

When a person begins to ask himself what he is living for and doesn’t find an answer in anything he does and this question leads him further onward, he is already called a human being because he asks himself about his goal, not about the animal inside him but about the human being inside him.

Question: Is a person programmed to attain spirituality?

Answer: Yes, the attraction to spirituality can awaken in a simple guy whereas it can be dormant in an Einstein type. It doesn’t matter.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 1/10/16

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Dispelling Myths About Kabbalah, Part 2

laitman_219_01“The age of 40” in Kabbalah

Question: There is a rumor that a person can start studying Kabbalah only after the age of 40. Is that correct?

Answer: It is a big misunderstanding that one is not supposed to study Kabbalah until he is 40 years old. In the wisdom of Kabbalah, the number 40 means the level of Bina.

A person who has reached the level of Bina obtains the absolute property of bestowal where he can reveal the entire enormous Light of Hochma that governs the entire universe. Therefore, the wisdom of Kabbalah has two parts: before the level of Bina and above it. Everyone is able to study up to the level of Bina. However, above it, only those who are capable can continue and rise further.

The level of Bina is called “the age of 40.” Therefore, the only people who can “study Kabbalah”—meaning, receive the Light of Hochma—are those who have reached the level of Bina, which is defined by the number 40. However, this has nothing to do with the biological age of a person.

As proof, there is the example,of famous Kabbalists who died at a young age without reaching the age of 40, such as the ARI, Rabbi Nachman from Breslav, and others. Obviously, they began studying Kabbalah long before they were 40 years old.

There was also a ban for unmarried people to study Kabbalah. It was considered that a person with a family was more stable and balanced, and as a result, they would be more suitable for the study. However, during those times, people used to marry when they were 16 to 17 years old.
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From the Israeli Radio Program 103FM 2/28/16

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The Formula For Revealing The Creator

laitman_232_10Question: Einstein came up with the formula for energy. Can you give us the formula for the revelation of the Creator that everyone would understand and can you explain it so that we would constantly be able to remember how to do it and check ourselves?

Answer: You should think only that you are dealing with the good Creator, always and in all circumstances, and never leave this thought.
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A Cup Of Coffee Or How To Give Pleasure To The Creator

laitman_543_02Question: Can I determine independently which of the 125 spiritual levels I am on now?

Answer: It is possible, but the question is how will you measure your state? What do you know about yourself?

First of all, a person must acquire tools, measuring instruments, for these parameters. A unit of measure for a spiritual state would be one gram of bestowal, one gram of the force with which the person bestows. In this world, we don’t possess tools and instruments like these because we don’t have these units of measurement.

Let’s suppose that someone approaches me and wants to make coffee for me in my coffeemaker. At first, I am doubtful because I feel sorry about wasting electricity, coffee, and water, and after that, even milk, sugar or honey. But in the end, so I won’t appear stingy and so that I won’t be condemned and hated, and in order not to get treated the same way in the future, I agree.

However, even if I make an effort to arouse absolutely pure thoughts about people within me and want to give them pleasure without making any calculations, how much could I measure the amount that I bestow? Is it through the amount of coffee, sugar, milk, water, electricity, and the depreciation of my coffeemaker? How do I do it?

It follows that we don’t have the tools and instruments for measuring the force of bestowal, so we cannot understand where we are. However, if a person ascends the spiritual ladder, he can measure precisely where he is in relation to his ego, in relation to all of the conditions. There is no deviation in any direction there. All of the counting, the initial ones, the changes, further changes, and so forth are connected together to give a person an account of where he is.

Together with this, a person must always observe himself and see how he can use himself and for what. In the spiritual world, a person is no longer a puppet managed from above. Rather, he does everything consciously. The entire system is under him. He is included in it and gradually can run it. Instead of carrying out all kinds of automatic actions unconsciously, he must manage those actions, meaning that he thinks about them and makes decisions.

Question: Your example with the coffee impresses me. Suppose that I drank the coffee. It was very tasty, and I tell you that. How would you react then?

Answer: I would begin to get pleasure from your saying this to me, that you respect me.

However, the next time, it would be much more difficult for me to prepare coffee for you because another calculation would come. I would begin trying to clarify if I am giving you the coffee so that you would respect me even more, and it could be the other way around. I would not do anything for you when I get the feeling that I am working against my egoistic desires. So, when I clarify that I am doing this and discover that I am doing this so that you would begin to respect me, I would prefer not to do it, and you would not receive any pleasure. That is, I must oppose my egoistic thoughts and prepare the coffee for you in spite of everything. But on the next level, I must not take your attitude toward me into account. This is an entirely different matter.

Question: Where is the Creator in this entire scenario of calculations? There is coffee, there is you, and there is me. Where is the Creator?

Answer: The Creator is not in this scenario if I do not insert Him into it myself. Inserting Him into the scenario amounts to the meaning of life. If it weren’t for the Creator, I would never prepare the coffee for you. After all, this is talking about giving someone pleasure with no compensation. If I expect bestowal from you in return, it means that I am not bestowing.

For what would I want to attain a state of full bestowal? It is to give pleasure to the Creator. So, I am ready to make coffee for you, and I am not making the coffee for you, but to give pleasure to the Creator. This is a requirement for a spiritual level. What’s next?

Let’s suppose that I am doing this for the sake of the Creator, and now the Creator treats me well. Will I need to get that good attitude from Him? If I get that kind of attitude from Him, then we have a transactional relationship. How can I reach a state in which I bestow to Him, to you, or to any person with no calculation? Can I do this?

If I am an egoist, I cannot bestow without compensation. I need to fulfill my ego in the same way that one must fill a car with gasoline so that it will run. This means that I must insert a pipe into my ego and fill it. Only after I have filled it can I bestow. When I fill my ego again, I will be able to bestow again. However, if I bestow and am filled only after that, this becomes a problem.

I must be sure that I will be filled. If that succeeds for me, then good. If not, then that’s it; the pipeline of trust ceases to exist. If I truly want to bestow, the Creator must change my nature. I see that billions of people pray to the Creator, do everything that He says, each one according to his understanding, but there is no benefit from their actions.

How can we humans achieve a relationship with the Creator so that He will be able to change our nature so that we won’t depend on our ego? After all, somehow He can help us rise above ourselves since He created the creatures, meaning that only He can change our nature.

So, a person must begin to act in the direction of bestowal. In the meantime, since he cannot bestow without compensation, he asks the Creator to help him so that he would be able to bestow in one direction. If a person truly has a drive toward this, the Creator brings him to a group. It could be that the person was in it even before then, but he didn’t know how to use it and what to do with it. It could be that this same person even carried out everything that the Kabbalists say automatically, but there is no benefit in this.

Now, he is beginning to understand that when he is working with his friends, when he seems to be bestowing to them, he is receiving from them, and they all intend for the Creator to make it possible for them to operate in one direction without receiving any response in return, with no compensation, no future benefit, with no calculations. Then, the group has become a laboratory for him in which he is beginning to change and shape himself as an immaterial creature who can bestow without receiving anything in return.

But the person himself cannot do anything. He just receives energy from the Light that the Creator gives him. It is as if a pipe has been inserted into a person, like at a gas station. Through it, he becomes filled, and then he can bestow.

There is a normal cycle in nature: a person bestows to others in order to bestow to the Creator, and when the Creator sees that a person can bestow, in exchange, He gives him the energy there. However, this is not a payment, but the potential to bestow.

This energy is called the Upper Light. It comes and fills the person by making it possible for him to bestow. Eventually, the person begins to work without pay.

There is a very simple reciprocal relationship between the person and the Creator here. The person understands that if the Creator created him and the Creator created his ego, the Creator must make it possible for him to work with this ego, and this is not a payment, but the potential and opportunity to work.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 1/10/16

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Blitz Of Kabbalah Tips – 12/27/15

laitman_570Question: Is it true that it is actually Kabbalists who have the biggest ego?

Answer: Yes. Those who study the wisdom of Kabbalah more, develop, thanks to their ego, which constantly grows.

Question: Do people harm the Creator by depleting natural resources and destroying nature?

Answer: They first of all harm themselves, while the main thing for the Creator, who is the one force that contains all, is to bring humanity to wholeness.

Question: Does praying help us feel the spiritual world?

Answer: Only if it is the correct prayer, which means your desire is correctly aimed at unity.

Question: The Machsom (barrier) is a very vague concept. How many people in the world have transcended the Machsom? Do they still feel the internal question of “have I transcended the Machsom?”

Answer: No. If a person transcends the Machsom, which is the barrier between the corporeal world and the spiritual world, he knows, sees, senses, and feels that. He has no more questions. I cannot say how many people in the world have transcended the Machsom. You will discover that when you feel the spiritual world. You will discover yourself and those who are on the other side of the Machsom.

Question: Does the engagement in music help a person be part of the spiritual world and advance towards it?

Answer: I wouldn’t say that, although there are very special Kabbalistic musicians, and the greater a Kabbalist musician is, the deeper he is. But Kabbalists greatly appreciate music and welcome it because it can express attributes and impressions that cannot be conveyed by words.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 12/27/15

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New Life #612 – Jewish Terrorism

New Life #612 – Jewish Terrorism
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Nitzah Mazoz

Why are radical groups emerging in Israel, why are all the current ideologies in the world, both religious and non-religious, basically mistaken, and what is the spiritual condition for fulfilling the goal of creation?

Summary

We can interpret the Torah in many different ways, just as history is full of different versions and contradictions.

Inner conflicts between Jews destroyed our nation in the past. In fact when it comes to the Torah and its implications, everyone is wrong since they don’t attain it internality.

The only remedy is the Light that can correct a person and show him where he lives. It can only be attained by studying the wisdom of Kabbalah. We have to connect above all our differences and it is actually as a result of the division between us that we build the connection.

Today everything is becoming more extreme since we are nearing the phase in which we will ask: Why are we living?

The wisdom of Kabbalah tells us that the goal of our life is to reveal the Creator, the force of the leadership and providence. The truth is that if we connect above our differences, the upper force, the next world, is revealed between us.
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From KabTV’s “New Life #612 – Jewish Terror,” 8/16/15

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Daily Kabbalah Lesson – 03.14.16

Preparation for the Lesson

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Selections on “Fundamentals of Kabbalah” 

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The Book of Zohar, Selected Excerpts — “Good and Evil,” Item 138 

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Writings of Baal HaSulam, “The Peace,” “Necessity to Practice Caution with the Laws of Nature”

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