Audio Version Of The Blog – 08.18.16

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Ynet: “The Thin Line Between Hatred And Love”

Tisha B’Av [the 9th of Av] is the direct and closest expression of the clear connection between the unfounded hatred among the nation of Israel and the destruction, but it is not the only thing. As long as hatred exists, destruction will continue to haunt us. On the eve of the 9th of Av let’s take a minute and stop our daily chase and convene in a joint stock-taking. Using Kabbalah books and the guidance provided by our spiritual teachers—the Kabbalists, we can learn to love again.

“Five things happened on the 9th of Av: our forefathers first heard that they will not enter the Land of Israel; the first and the second Temples were destroyed and the city of Beitar was conquered and plowed. When Av arrives we diminish joy.” (Talmud Bavli, Masechet Ta’anit).

The eve of the 9thof Av is the end of the three weeks of the days of Bein Hameitzarim (the days between the 17th of Tamuz and the 9th of Av). It is a symbol of the destruction of the second Temple for many, but a brief look at our history books reveals the startling truth that the Temple and its destruction does not matter as much as the immense unfounded hatred among the Jews in Jerusalem at the time. The hatred was so profound that it is the root of all the destructions and the suffering of the nation of Israel throughout history.

Not only did the destruction of the first and the second Temples occur on the 9th of Av, many other disasters did as well: the tables of the Ten Commandments were broken on this date, Jerusalem was conquered and destroyed by the Romans, and Bar-Kochba and tens of thousands of his followers were killed in the city. In later times, the Jews England were expelled from England in 1290, the Jews of France in 1306, the Jews Spain were expelled in 1492, and during the Holocaust massive deportation of Jews to the death camps took place on this date.

What is the root of unfounded hatred?

Unfounded hatred is a natural part of the development of mankind. According to Kabbalah, “man’s heart is evil from his youth,” and the negative egoistic force continuously grows and separates us. To prevent additional destructive events and to build brotherly love, we have to add the positive force to this process that will balance the negative force of the ego. The positive force is the force of connection, a force that exists in nature, although it is hidden. However different from the force of the ego that develops naturally, the positive force is created only by our efforts. Once we begin to make efforts in order to bridge the gap between us and get closer to each other, to tighten the connections between us by rising above all our differences, not by trying to blur them, we will spur the positive force that is hidden in nature.

As long as we neglect to treat our ego, it will only keep growing until it erupts in the form of mutual rejection and bitter hatred that will bring another disaster upon us, so that we will wake up and get back on track. This is what happened to the children of Israel when they came out of Egypt. The egoism grew to new dimensions and swept them to unfounded hate, to futile internal conflicts, and to endless personal accounts. Under the attack of thoughts of hatred stemming from the root of Mount Sinai, the children of Israel were required to unite as one man in one heart. The condition they were faced with at the foot of the mountain was clear: You either unite or this will be your burial place. The great tension between the mutual rejections they felt and the need for mutual guarantee generated the need for the right method of connection.

It was Moses, the leader of the nation, who was faced with the people’s demand to connect. He climbed to the top of the mountain and received the Torah: the means by which to spur the force of connection between people. But the nation of Israel chose separation and hatred instead of preparing for the sublime moment of the receiving of the Torah.

“While Moses was with them, he united and connected them while the assembly of Israel below were as one man in one heart. They were as a strong wall against the external forces, which could not penetrate into the whole of Israel, but only when there is a crack in the wall of Israel (“Shem Shmuel“).

The children of Israel used the small crack in the relations between them and preferred to build the golden calf, a symbol of the worship of the ego, which cultivates competition and the brutal chase of achievements at the expense of others. When Moses came down and returned to the people, he was surprised to discover how far the people drew away from the goal for which they were made, and broke the tables, the values of unity and mutual guarantee, as an expression of his feelings.

“After the event with the calf, the children of Israel lost the level of connection they were on and needed to reconnect (“Shem Shmuel“). Only when they agreed to make a covenant and to accept unity as the uppermost value were they worthy of receiving the Torah.

“The main idea the Torah is based on is unity and so when they received the Torah they immediately felt responsible for each other, of course (Likutei Halachot). Thanks to that, the second tablets of the Ten Commandments were not broken. Having the method of connection, we continued to conquer the land of Israel with greater connection and love and then built the two Temples. “It is by the Temple that we became one nation and when we were divided, the place of the unity of Israel was destroyed, and so it was because of unfounded hatred that the city and the Temple were destroyed.” (The Maharal from Prague).

The Destruction Has Never Ended

The 9th of Av as a reminder of our mistaken preference to develop along the narrow egoistic path instead of love of others is becoming increasingly more relevant. As long as the ego continues to grow and swell, it nourishes unfounded hatred and destroys the relations between us, and so “we were commanded to reinforce the unity between us in each and every generation (Sefer Hatoda’a).

The world today is in a deep crisis in every aspect of life and the uncertainty regarding the future is so great that a third world war may break out, and so we have to carry on from the point from which we have stopped. The golden calf is now revealed to all and the disappointment it brings with it leads us to the verge of an abyss. “All the troubles and their purpose is to provide a person with mental reasons so that he will feel sorry about the destruction of the spiritual Temple in his heart, which is the path to redemption” (Michtav Me’Eliyahu). Despite the moments of success we had throughout the two thousand years of exile, we are still facing a mountain of hatred and are required to make a decision and choose the good.

We have to recognize egoism as a disease that is gnawing us from inside and prepare ourselves for receiving the Light of the Torah. “Just as the sages said (Masechet Kiddushin): ‘I have created the evil inclination, I have created the Torah as a spice,’ which refers to the Light in the Torah that Reforms” as Baal HaSulam says. The force of connection in the Torah can illuminate all the dark and hidden places in our relationships, patch up the connections that were broken, and give us a good feeling of wholeness and eternity. Only then will “a great Light come out of the darkness, the curse itself will turn into a blessing and the destruction of the Temple will turn into its construction” (The Holy SHEL”A).

Thus, it is specifically in our times that the best remedy is revealed, the method of connection, the wisdom of Kabbalah. It explains why our egoistic nature and helplessness dominates us, and at the same time enables us to evoke the positive force hidden in the right connection between us and can thus help us avoid the troubles lurking around the corner. “The depth of evil is a good depth, the depth of hatred is the depth of love and if we were destroyed by unfounded hate, we will be rebuilt by unfounded love (“Orot HaKodesh“).
[191762]
From Ynet article 8/11/16

Must I Examine Myself?

laitman_238_01Question: Must I examine my every desire, thought, and response? Or is my work just to contemplate how the upper force works within me?

Answer: A person doesn’t need to examine anything within oneself! You don’t know how to do this and you don’t need to know how! You don’t have this system; you don’t have an internal expert who has it. We don’t have to do it.

We just need to read Kabbalistic books and pass the material through ourselves as through a meat grinder. Think, feel, and let the information move through you again and again. And most importantly, you should participate in group activities. You will see how it helps. It is enough for a person to grab an hour a day to learn and another hour per week to be together with the group.

That is how it was during the time of my teacher. I studied many hours every day, three hours in the morning with the group, after that a few hours with Rabash personally. But once a week we had a gathering of friends in which we read the article that he wrote for that week. When we gathered together, we tried to unite and realize what was said in the articles about the unity of friends. A total of one hour was devoted to this, a maximum of an hour and a half per week. Besides that, we studied the wisdom of Kabbalah a few hours every day.

But a person doesn’t need intensive work like this today. It is enough to study one hour per day and participate in a gathering of friends another hour per week. Especially since it is possible to do all of this virtually today and that is enough to establish strong relationships and to clarify all of the relationships and the principles of mutual cooperation of group work. We also arrange conventions that I highly recommend every student to take part in.

If a person will use the possibilities for learning and will participate in our shared activities, this will draw him forward. He will feel how he changes, how the world around him changes. He will begin to understand it more and suddenly will see that in fact it is different, complex, and managed. Moreover, he will be able to participate in management to the degree that he becomes adapted to the positive force that manages the world.
[191621]
From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 4/17/16

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The Spiritual Gene, Part 1

Laitman_632_1Question: If inside every person there is in addition to a material gene also spiritual DNA, then how does it get to him? Is this spiritual gene also inherited from parents to children?

Answer: It is very difficult to explain. We can say that the spiritual genes are not inherited, but the qualities that facilitate their awakening are transferred.

By giving birth to a new life, the mother gives material dressings for spiritual DNA. Of course, there is some connection between one another, since the characters of a mother and a father are passed to a child. These are relatively material qualities, but they nevertheless affect realization of the spiritual gene. After all, absolutely everything is aimed at the realization of spiritual DNA.

The material world has no importance on its own, no goal of its own; everything is designed only to achieve the realization of the spiritual gene.

Question: I have four children, but they are so different. They received the same genes from the father and mother, so why are they so different?

Answer: Because the father and mother are also different. Although they are the same people, inside they include many different qualities. And most importantly each time the spiritual DNA , the Reshimo, enters the world, it has a special purpose.

Therefore, for the sake of the spiritual destiny of the child, from the father and mother are selected qualities that aren’t the most dominant, outwardly displayed, and visible to us, but the ones that are most suitable for the proper growth of the spiritual DNA of the embryo.

Spiritual charge defines all other qualities. If our spiritual DNAs are connected between each other, we have to realize this connection. However, since we are not ready for it yet, we are placed into a material shell and it seems to us that we have material bodies, common affairs, and some kind of relationship.

However all this is just an imaginary reality, designed in order to bring spiritual DNAs closer to each other. This is the only function of this world. And then it disappears.

Question: Does it mean that any connection with some people at work, with neighbors, with husband or wife, any interaction between two people has a purpose to realize spiritual DNA that starts this entire process?

Answer: Of course. This world doesn’t have any other function apart from this: providing us with a place of work and bringing us closer to each other at a time when we can’t yet influence our spiritual DNA and begin working with it directly, like in a laboratory.
[191245]
From KabTV’s “A New Life” 7/12/16

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Gradual Correction

laitman_549_01Torah, “Deuteronomy,” 7:22: And the Lord, your God, will drive out those nations from before you, little by little. You will not be able to destroy them quickly, lest the beasts of the field outnumber you.

If you decide to correct those desires that you can’t control, you won’t be able to persuade them to turn from egoistic desires into altruistic ones. You won’t have the inner pressure to correct them. The pleasure that you have to give up is too great; it lurks behind them.

Or you will have to overcome very great difficulties and pressure in order to correct them to bestowal to others. Or, in seeing what fulfillment you pass to other people, you won’t feel that they are the same as you, even greater than you. A lot of different obstacles appear here, and therefore it is necessary to do everything gradually.

After all, if you won’t be able to correct desires on the human level, then you’ll have problems on the animal level with desires that are called beasts of the field. They will attack you and you won’t be able to deal with them.

Therefore we shouldn’t get ahead of ourselves. The Torah speaks about gradual correction where a person clearly ascertains in himself all his possibilities and abilities and understands what he does.

How often in life do we undertake some vows, but in a couple of days break them? We understand that we don’t have the strength to keep them.

When you are going to perform some corrections you should understand what you are refusing and how you will feel if others will get everything you refused. It means that this entire beautiful, perfect fulfillment that you were receiving in your egoism and enjoyed, you gave to others and now they enjoy and feel spiritual joy.

It turns out that you go into some kind of seclusion and they enjoy. At the same time they are at the same degree as you are.  Envy, jealousy, etc. may erupt. And all this is in order to finish the current degree of correction.

This actually is the part when envy tears you apart and turns into a new egoistic degree. Exactly here the correction starts. After all, you can return it and receive double the pleasure—what you took from them and from what you are filled with. So the beasts of the field arise in you.
[191368]
From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 4/27/16

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To Be Reborn Each Day

Laitman_715Question: If everything that happened was according to the Creator’s plan, can I make a covenant with Him now and nullify the outcomes of some things that I did in the past that interfere with my life today?

Answer: You can stop worrying about the past since there is no past. A person is reborn every moment. Therefore, start working from this moment onward, no matter how old you are. I am already 70 years old and I begin to work every time as if I have been reborn. And there are no problems.
[189801]
From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 4/10/16

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New Life 756 – Love In The Bible

New Life 756 – Love In The Bible
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Yael Leshed-Harel

The Torah defines love differently than we do. On the whole, for us all the stories in the Torah are great secrets.

It is based on the principle of love of others, which means caring about the wellbeing of others, to do others good and to live only in order to fill others, not thinking of what I will benefit from or what I will get in return.

The Torah doesn’t tell us about people but about spiritual systems. Spiritual love is giving and not receiving in order to satisfy my desires; spiritual love is overcoming the ego. Getting married for example, means to connect with the desires of another and to fill them.

The purpose of our life in this world is to reach love and connection because no one can really fill himself.

Therefore, the desire to love is deeply rooted in us, but we have to learn how to bring it out and to develop it.

The wisdom of Kabbalah teaches us how to build love above the hatred we feel, to connect above the egoism that separates us. Spiritual love doesn’t depend on others but on the degree of your giving. It is through others that a person connects to the Creator.
[191833]
From KabTV’s “New Life 756 – Love In The Bible,” 8/9/16

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Daily Kabbalah Lesson – 08.18.16

Preparation for the Lesson

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Writings of Rabash, “Dargot HaSulam,” Article 27

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Talmud Eser Sefirot, Vol. 6, Part 16, Item 110

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Writings of Baal HaSulam, “A Handmaid that Is Heir to Her Mistress” 

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