Audio Version Of The Blog – 1/21/22
Posted on January 21st, 2022
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My new article on Linkedin “The Love that Science Cannot Explain”
When acclaimed conservationist Lawrence Anthony, who became known as “The Elephant Whisperer,” passed away in 2012, something amazing happened: After being out in the wild for a long time, the elephants that Anthony had saved years before marched 12 hours back to his house to grieve his passing. According to BBC One, the elephants “stayed there silent for two days.” Even more remarkably, “Exactly one year after his death, to the day, the herd marched to his house again. It is something that science cannot explain.”
The world we live in is connected in ways we do not understand, but we are slowly learning. Our self-absorption wants us to focus only on ourselves, but reality is forcing us to look outside, and teaches us that there is so much more out there to be found.
As Anthony’s elephants demonstrate, all of nature senses its connectedness and lives according to its dictates. Humans, however, are devoid of that feeling and therefore act as if they are alone in the world.
However, civilization is becoming increasingly connected, in accordance with all of reality, and forces us to recognize that we, too, are dependent on each other and connected to each other. Today, we are learning that beyond the physical connection there is the virtual connection. Tomorrow, we will learn that we are emotionally connected, too, that we share and project not only actions or bits of data, but also thoughts and desires, even without verbalizing them.
Eventually, we will discover that our connection is even deeper than emotions: It is spiritual. We are all one being, whose organs and cells are all of us, all of creation. This is why the elephants knew when to come to pay their respects for their savior, and to return there the following year, to the day.
When we all feel one another, it allows us to work harmoniously, in a manner that benefits everyone. If we sensed our true reality, we would never make mistakes, never hurt anyone, and no one would ever hurt us since we would feel as one. Why then are we denied such vital knowledge, which all of nature but us seems to possess?
All of nature acts on instincts. Humans lack most instincts that animals have. Instead, we must learn everything from scratch through our own efforts and the teaching of our parents and teachers. There is a reason for it: When we learn through our own efforts, we acquire a deeper understanding of our world and of reality.
The same goes for the knowledge of our interconnectedness and what it entails. We are devoid of the sense of our interconnection so we may develop it through our own efforts. What elephants sense naturally, we must develop laboriously. However, in doing so, we understand how everything works and gain a profound perception of our existence. In other words, our ignorance allows us to achieve the purpose of our lives, but until we achieve it, we are a menace to the world.
There are two ways we can achieve our life’s purpose: The first is to let nature take its course. We can let it drown us in floods, burn us in fires, crush us under the ruins of earthquakes, or pit us against each other to the death. Another way is to take upon ourselves to learn the ways of nature, how everything operates in connectedness and harmony, and start changing our relationships according to what we learn from nature. As we “practice” kindness, we will become kinder and develop deeper feelings for the people and the world around us.
Practice really does make perfect. We can build social structures, such as small groups, where we will “practice” interconnectedness and mutual concern. As we develop these skills in our psyches, we will begin to feel each other on deeper and deeper levels.
If we do this, we will discover what allows elephants to know so well how others feel, as we, too, will become sensitive and aware. In addition, we will understand the “thinking,” the “logic” behind making creation so complex yet so inexorably connected, and what great knowledge and power it awards those who grasp it.
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Michael Laitman, On The Times of Israel: “Anne Frank’s Betrayal and Human Nature”
“In spite of everything, I still believe that people are really good at heart,” wrote Anne Frank, the Dutch-Jewish girl who kept a diary while she and her family were in hiding for two years during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands.
In relation to the Holocaust she questioned, “Who has inflicted this upon us? Who has made us Jews different from all other people? Who has allowed us to suffer so terribly uptill now?” Anne and seven other family members were discovered by the Nazis on August 4, 1944 in a secret annex above a warehouse in Amsterdam. After all were discovered and deported separately to concentration camps, Anne became ill and died when she was only 15 years old.
The question of who could have alerted the Nazis about the Frank family’s location has puzzled multiple researchers for almost eight decades. Following a six-year investigation, an international team of historians and other experts disclosed the identity of the man who they believe betrayed Anne Frank’s family during World War II.
The main suspect is a Jewish notary and businessman named Arnold van den Bergh, a member of the Judenrat in the Netherlands, who presumably disclosed the Franks’ hiding place to protect his own family from deportation.
The presumption that a Jew betrayed another Jew elicited contrasting reactions; there are those who are outraged by the claim and those who say they are not surprised by this expression of Jewish self-hatred. But I choose to look at the humane side of things: never judge someone until I have walked in their shoes.
Many years ago I watched a documentary film about two Jews—one of them a prisoner put to torturous forced labor at a Nazi concentration camp, and the other, his strict supervisor who did everything he could to oppress him. Today they are good friends. And when the oppressed Jew was asked how he could look his former, cruel boss in the eyes, he answered simply: “I understand him. If I had been in his place I would have done exactly the same.”
My conclusion is simple: even if the results of the new investigation are true and indeed it was a Jew who betrayed Anne Frank and her family, we cannot judge people who are under heavy duress. We can talk about the importance of democracy, express ourselves creatively on an enlightened world, play in life like on a theater stage, but once we experience extreme circumstances in our lives and are in a situation where we are trapped, then we discover that psychology takes on a new form: fear and threat can bring us to a new way of thinking. It may even encourage deeds, which in normal conditions would be considered cruel and unthinkable. So is human nature.
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Question: If I see the friends as above me, then how can I pray for them?
Answer: In that case, you should pray to be with them. If you imagine them above yourself, then you should be in prayer to merge with them. By doing this, you raise the group above yourself and pull yourself up to them with your prayer. You don’t have any other option. And again you imagine them higher and still higher, and again you pull yourself up to their level by praying that you want to be with them. And so you constantly, constantly pull yourself up. Here is the lifting technique for you—absolutely simple, clear, and practical.
Question: When I want to see the virtues of my friends, and this includes prayer, does it also refer to “above reason”?
Answer: Yes. If I do not comprehend, but only ask and imagine, then this is higher than knowledge.
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From the International Convention “Rising Above Ourselves” 1/7/22, “Adhering to the Friends” Lesson 3
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Question: What should I do when my feelings regarding my friends suffocate me? Why do I feel the need to overcome them, but I cannot?
Answer: It is good that you feel that way. You are being shown who you are, what your nature is. And because you do not want to feel it, it seems to you that you are being suffocated. And that is correct because you do not want to get rid of your egoism yet.
What to do? Keep the thought that you must get rid of it and start with small changes in you in regard to your friends. Every day be aware of what you have managed to annul in relation to them that day—Rabash writes about it in his articles about connection in the group—and how you are progressing in this every day.
The articles of Rabash about the group should be re-read almost daily and gradually executed each time.
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From the International Convention “Rise Above Yourself” 1/6/22, “Approaching the Creator Through the Network of Connections Between Us” Lesson 1
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If I accept the environment I find myself in as given to me by the Creator, to lead me forward and to meet my main goal, desire, and aspiration to reveal the meaning of life, to reveal the Creator, then everything depends on how I make myself dependent on this environment.
Therefore, the most important thing for us is to try to annul ourselves in front of this environment. When I bow before them, agree with them, suppress my egoism, and put the environment above myself, I ascend to the Creator. The Creator is inside this environment, as He said: “I dwell among my people.”
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From the International Convention “Rising Above Ourselves” 1/8/22, “Deriving the Greatness of the Goal from the Friends” Lesson 4
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Question: Should annulment be an internal action or can it have external expression?
Answer: Annulment must be internal. It can be that nobody knows about it. Although I must show also in action in front of my friends how ready I am to serve and help them. It is very important.
Such examples give us a basis for coming closer together.
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From the International Convention “Rising Above Ourselves” 1/7/22, “Annulling before the Friends” Lesson 2
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Question: We usually talk about connection with the friends. What about connection with the teacher? Is there something different in it?
Answer: Connection with the teacher can only be to the extent that you follow his advice. Then he is your teacher, “rav” is from the word “great.” Then you are his disciples. Otherwise, you are listeners, students.
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From the International Convention “Rising Above Ourselves” 1/6/22, “Approaching the Creator Through the Network of Connections Between Us” Lesson 1
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Question: Could prophets be wrong, and were there false prophets?
Answer: False prophets are those people who simply knew how to expose themselves to the public and the public believed them. But it is impossible to determine who is a false prophet and who is not.
Question: Why was there such a huge historical period as the prophets? What was it for?
Answer: Prophets are Kabbalists who reached the level of prophecy, which reveals the entire universe, and worked on it.
A Kabbalist who attains the Creator at a certain level is called a prophet. Therefore, not every Kabbalist is a prophet, but every prophet is a Kabbalist.
A prophet is one who speaks to the Creator. What does it mean? The Creator is not some material object, it is nature.
A person who penetrates deep into nature in such a way that he communicates with it bilaterally, understands its causes, consequences, positive and negative forces, and feels this harmony of nature’s interaction in both directions is called a prophet.
Question: It turns out that you can talk to nature. In the primary sources, it says that one can hear God and one can talk to Him. Is there any difference here?
Answer: Yes. The difference is in the depth or in the height of the attainment of nature.
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From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 12/21/22
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Question: What is the correct attitude to prophecy?
Answer: Prophecy is the highest level of development for a Kabbalist when he becomes one with the Creator.
Question: For whom did the prophets write if they knew that other people would not understand them?
Answer: It was for people to at least partially understand what they wrote. And in our time a person can partially reach the level of understanding of the texts of the prophets to the extent that he can rise above himself, otherwise we will not understand Kabbalistic texts at all.
Question: Can we say that they wrote for people who are already in some kind of small attainment, and that it is like a map of actions for them?
Answer: This is not a small attainment; to be at the level of a prophet is a very high level.
Question: But can an ordinary person who is not involved in spiritual development at all read some prophecy and take something from there for himself?
Answer: No, it is not done this way. A person should work with himself, with his egoism, rise above it, and use it in the opposite direction, in the direction of bestowal and love. He will achieve in this a certain semblance to the Creator, and in this likeness to Him, he will reach the level of a prophet. Prophecy is one of the levels of similarity to the Creator.
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From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 12/21/21
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