Preparation to the Lesson
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Lesson on the Topic “Lowliness and Subjugation”
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Writings of Baal HaSulam, “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah,” Item 25
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Selected Highlights
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My new article on Linkedin “Could the Middle-East Drown in Water-Wars?”
Global warming, back-to-back years of drought, and absence of investments in water saving and desalination technologies are pushing the already tense international relations in the Middle-East to the point of breakdown. If the water crisis continues, it will not be long before the arid land will be scorched by gunfire.
Iranian farmers cannot produce crops without water; the Kurds and Iran are at odds over the shifting of water lines; more than 12 million people in Syria and Iraq are losing access to water, food, and electricity; and in Syria, which is still torn by a civil war that began ten years ago, the drought this year is the worst in the past seventy years. Terror saws fear, but you can restrain it with arms. Thirst saws desperation, and nothing can stop desperate people.
Next to oxygen, water is the most vital element for survival. Without it, people will do literally anything to get it.
In a 2017 podcast, Peter Gleick, chief scientist and president emeritus of the Pacific Institute said, “Some of the earliest conflicts over water [appeared] about 25 BC in Ancient Mesopotamia, the land between the Tigris and the Euphrates rivers.” Even now, “In the last decade or so,” continues Gleick, “there have been more and more instances of violence related to water … [which] have been what we call subnational conflicts.” The drought has not improved over the past four years since the interview. It has only worsened, and its consequences have brought the region to the point of near breakdown.
The most distressing element about this crisis is the fact that it is absolutely unnecessary. There are proven technologies that can turn deserts into oases at a very reasonable cost. Israel, once a victim of accelerated desertification, has brought the problem completely under control by constructing desalination plants. Israel has already built several such facilities abroad and is willing to help anyone who wishes to use the technology. Regrettably, the leaders in many Middle-Eastern countries consistently focus on tightening their grip on the people rather than on improving their lives.
In fact, Israel is already channeling water to Jordan as part of the 1994 peace agreement between the two countries. It is more than willing to sign such agreements with other neighboring countries, but at the moment, it does not appear as though there is openness toward the idea on the other side.
While I do not believe that Israel’s neighbors will start a war with Israel over water, it is sad that people who could have access to abundant water are denied this most necessary ingredient because of politics.
My new article on Linkedin “The Israeli Covid Hubris”
There is a famous anecdote that once, when President Richard Nixon met with Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir, he confessed in a moment of candor that it was complicated governing 200 million Americans. To this, she replied, “You may have 200 million Americans to govern, but I have 6 million prime ministers to govern.” To this day, we don’t know how Nixon responded to Meir’s quip.
What we do know is that she was right. In Israel, everyone knows everything about anything.
When Covid-19 came along, the whole world panicked, and we in Israel immediately knew what to do, and we voiced our opinion to anyone who would (or would not) listen. Indeed, we are an obstinate people.
There is a reason for it. Our ancestors were fierce and strong minded individuals who left their own tribes and peoples and joined Abraham to form a new nation that united above all differences. At times, they succeeded and profound bliss had spread among them.
At other times, their adamant selves would take over and they would revert back to their old, opinionated selves. Then, fiery hatred would burst among them. However, after some time, they would remember the principle that had made them a nation—unity above divisions—and they would reaffirm their nationhood.
Today, we still have those fiery divisions, but we no longer have the times when we rise above them. Hatred has grown so intense among us that we can no longer unite above it. This is why every issue that comes along becomes an opportunity for altercation.
The only time when we do show some level of unity is during war. All Israelis feel it, and many admit that if there is anything to be thankful for when Gaza fires rockets into Israel, it is that this is the only time when we stop fighting one another.
For now, I don’t see that this will change soon. But at some point, Israelis will realize that they must unite not only because they are being bombed, but because they have a mission: to set an example of setting divisions aside, uniting above them, and building a strong nation.
Precisely the example of a nation created from strangers is what the world needs to see today, since everyone feels estranged from everyone else. When Israelis unite, they set this example, and this is all they need to do in order to solve all their problems with their neighbors and with the entire world—unite among themselves.
For now, they prefer to unite with anyone but each other. At some point, they will have no choice and they will do it. I hope this point comes soon.
Michael Laitman, On Quora: “How can architecture better serve the social, economic, political and environmental concerns of our present and future?“
The effectiveness of architecture, as with any other art, science and technology that we have developed, depends exclusively on the intention that we apply to its use.
It is not arts, sciences or technologies themselves that are good or bad. Rather, it depends on whether their producers use them for benefit or harm.
Therefore, when we will understand that it is most beneficial to take care of our necessities, and to give everything else to society’s benefit, then we will stop excessively using architecture. Just the opposite, we will do everything incredibly effectively, realistically, and will invert other excesses to favor human society.
This is a tendency that we will witness in architecture, and generally in all spheres of human activity. If we will change the person, then architecture and other arts, sciences and technologies will also assume a different form and appearance.
Based on a Q&A with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on September 9, 2006. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.
In the News (New York Times): “What will our future look like — not in a century but in a mere two decades?
“Terrifying, if you’re to believe Yuval Noah Harari, the Israeli historian and author of ‘Sapiens’ and ‘Homo Deus,’ a pair of audacious books that offer a sweeping history of humankind and a forecast of what lies ahead: an age of algorithms and technology… .
“Just as the Industrial Revolution created the working class, automation could create a ‘global useless class,’ Mr. Harari said, and the political and social history of the coming decades will revolve around the hopes and fears of this new class. Disruptive technologies, which have helped bring enormous progress, could be disastrous if they get out of hand. …”
My Response: People will be replaced by machines everywhere. Today even the question is raised whether it is necessary to launch people into space. After all, 90% of the equipment in a spacecraft is necessary to support human life. What for?!
A machine will handle everything by itself. You can launch it anywhere. It will withstand any overloads, will be able to work in any circumstances, and will collect everything you need. It does not need to sleep, take tons of food with it, and take care of oxygen or anything else.
Today it is all beginning to be perceived in a completely different way. No need for these lyrics, flying somewhere, to some distant stars. A device will fly, film everything, and transmit everything.
(The Guardian): “Yuval Noah Harari examines ‘the useless class’ and a new quest for purpose
“The crucial problem isn’t creating new jobs. The crucial problem is creating new jobs that humans perform better than algorithms. Consequently, by 2050 a new class of people might emerge – the useless class. People who are not just unemployed, but unemployable.”
My Response: The whole problem is in the elites that make money on these people. If the elites did not think that they constantly need more and more “pieces of paper” or gold to put somewhere, then there would be no problem getting rid of a huge number of people.
And so these people are necessary for the elite in order to earn even more. This is the whole problem: how to “make sure the wolves are fed and the sheep are safe.”
This, of course, cannot be done. So the elite’s goal is to reduce the population so that they themselves suffer no damage. I think you can already see how they are beginning to find an approach to this.
[279597]
From KabTV’s “Challenges of the 21st century” 4/24/19
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Prophets, Joshua 13:6: All the inhabitants of the hill country from Lebanon to Misrephoth-maim, and all the Sidonians, I will drive them out from before the children of Israel; only divide it by lot to the Israelites for an inheritance, as I have commanded you.
Question: What does it mean to not destroy, but rather to banish a desire?
Answer: It’s about working with intentions. Desires remain, they cannot be destroyed in any way. Above every desire, the intention must be changed.
If I stop working with some egoistic intention, then this desire dies off, it means “drive him out of this place.” It no longer feels what it can rule over. And then I start to revive it, revive it to work for the sake of bestowal.
To expel is to remove the desire itself so that there is no connection between it and the egoistic intention. And then the desire remains in a completely amorphous, suspended form, and its egoistic intention disappears.
But when the intention is corrected, then it is already possible to work with the desire again. This is called the complete conquest of the land.
[286604]
From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 8/2/21
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Prophets, Joshua, 13:1: Now Joshua was old, advanced in years; and the Lord said to him, “You are old and advanced in years, and there remains yet very much land to be possessed.”
Joshua was old means that his degree had worked itself out. He could no longer be a leader of those desires that would now be revealed. This means followers were needed.
Joshua does not have the strength to cope with the desires that are revealed now in the land of Israel. Therefore, he was no longer able to be in the place of Moses, as he had been all these years. He conquered as many egoistic desires as he could, corrected them to altruistic ones, and he cannot advance farther.
A person feels that there are such desires in front of him that he cannot lead them. He feels that this is not for him, that he is an old man, and this is not his job!
Nevertheless, the work must continue, there must be the next generation. So it is, generation after generation. What is meant here is not a change of a person, but a change of system of how to move forward.
Let us say that Joshua worked on level one of egoism and now we need to work on level two. He does not understand and does not know how to work with it. This is not his nature.
This is called that he has aged because he is not ready for this. The only solution is to pass it on to others.
[286544]
From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 8/2/21
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Question: How does the goal of creation to bring the created beings pleasure, go along with the steamroller of development, pain, and terrible afflictions, which operate in unbelievable cruelty?
Answer: Who has the Creator promised that everything will be fine? Only those who choose the way of getting closer to Him.
Getting closer to the Creator’s attributes guarantees each of us the entrance to completely different natural conditions, to the feeling of life, of our existence, of nature, in a totally different manner. But if a person does not engage in that, he will surely feel like all the beasts and animals living in our world. He will have nothing left.
The Creator does not promise paradise to everyone, and certainly not for free, because a person does not have the attributes by which he can feel spiritual life. He can do so only if he understands how to attain the good states. A person is given the opportunity to do so.
This is the reason there are two authorities. On one hand there is the authority of the rigid control of nature as its developing forces operate on us like a steamroller, and we cannot escape them. On the other hand, we can develop by preceding this development, which means by moving in front of the steamroller, by understanding the forces of our development, and participating in the process constructively.
Question: How can there be two authorities if there is only one authority that manages everything by the upper force?
Answer: Yes, but that authority also enables us to yearn for it more and faster than it manages us.
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From KabTV’s “Fundamentals of Kabbalah” 7/14/19
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In the article “Peace in the World” Baal HaSulam writes: But in truth, the naturally strong and nimble in society benefit from the labor of others and exploit them maliciously against the attribute of truth, for they labor very little compared to the weak and lazy in society.
This is how people serve each other: I serve the one who is above me, the one below serves me, and so on, according to the hierarchy.
The only problem is whether everyone is happy with their place. Does each understand that he has nowhere else to go and that it is better for him to be satisfied with it? After all, our body constantly requires filling. There is egoism inside it that cannot be placated because it is growing all the time and requires change. This constantly confuses us. I cannot stop at any level of development. This is the source of the problem.
Comment: Nature arranged it in such a way that there are strong, domineering personalities and weak ones who are only able to serve them. In principle, by their nature, they are not capable of anything else.
My Response: Each person has his own place in society, and we must agree with this. The fact is that everything is really established in us by nature, but we can use it in different ways. The fact that people are created unequal does not mean that some are better, others are worse, or that a better place is prepared in advance for some and for others it is the opposite.
It is necessary to use everyone correctly so that everyone understands their place and is satisfied with it. As the medieval Georgian poet Shota Rustaveli wrote: “Man, do not complain at fate. Be content and accept it. Let the warrior always be brave, let the worker enjoy his labor.”
Everyone has their own place.
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up. Hope for Peace” 9/9/09
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