Audio Version Of The Blog – 3/24/22

Listen to an Audio Version of the Blog
Download:MP3 Audio

“Here Comes Another Wave” (Medium)

Medium published my new article “Here Comes Another Wave

While the media is busy covering the war in Ukraine, Covid has returned to haunt humanity. In China, more than fifty million people are on tight lockdown; in Hong Kong, the number of dead is rising; in Israel, the reproduction number (R) is climbing fast and is now well beyond the spreading mark of 1. If we thought Omicron was contagious, the new strain, BA.2, is 30 percent more so, and hybrid variants like the Deltacron are emerging, too. New strains and new waves will keep appearing until we learn all that we need to learn from the virus.

The virus is not here to teach us about itself; it is here to teach us about us. We think of these waves as waves of Covid-19, but they are not. The original strain is virtually gone; we are dealing with a different virus because we ourselves are different. This is why the vaccines that defeated the original strain are no longer effective.

As I said from the first appearance of the virus in early 2020, this virus, or its “relatives,” is here to stay. It needs to teach us how to live more peacefully and harmoniously with each other and with nature, and it will not leave until we learn.

We may not have noticed it, but the virus has already done a great deal of teaching. Our career aspirations have changed dramatically. Suddenly, everyone is talking about The Great Resignation and the fact that so many people now prefer to work from home.

Many people have also become content with less money in return for more peace of mind. The movement toward a four-day workweek is also gaining momentum around the world. Even in Asia, known for its workaholism, big corporations such as Panasonic and others have switched, or are in the process of switching to a four-day workweek.

Traditional education is also falling from grace. “Until 2019, the number of homeschooled students had been growing by between 2% to 8% each year. From 2019 to the fall of 2020, the percentage of homeschooled students changed from 3.4% to 9%.” According to the National Home Education Research Institute, “there were about 3.7 million homeschool students in 2020–2021 in grades K-12 in the United States (roughly 6% to 7% of school-age children).”

These are not minor changes. Fewer working people means more modest consumption, less congestion on the roads, especially if people are working from home, and more family time. Likewise, homeschooled children require a parent to stay home and tend to the education and occupation of the children. This, again, affects many other aspects of society.

This is why I think that Covid is not a punishment but a correction. The only reason that we feel this correction as painful is that we resent the change, so nature imposes it on us.

At our current level of narcissism, without restraint from the outside, we might destroy ourselves and the world with us. The war in Ukraine is only an example of what pride and power-hunger can inflict. Therefore, I think we should be grateful to Covid’s restraints. We are counting its victims, but we have no idea what catastrophes its appearance has prevented.

That said, I do not think we should continue to suffer its restraints. Since nature imposes corrections on us, and we have no choice but to obey, as is clearly the case, we can impose these corrections on ourselves instead of inviting nasty bugs to do it for us.

All we need to correct is our egoistic behavior. To do that, we need to be aware that in a world that has become totally interconnected, thinking that we can take all that we want regardless of others and enjoy other people’s pain is not only reckless, but destructive to everyone, including to ourselves.

We need to understand that if we want to subjugate other people, even in thought, much less in action, we are harming ourselves and our environment. No other being but humans have such evil, narcissistic thoughts. If we annihilate them from within us, we will put an end to war, hunger, exploitation, abuse, tyranny, and everything else that plagues our world. If we are reluctant to learn, the viruses will clear out these plagues from humanity.
[295670]

“Man’s Insatiable Hunger For Power” (Medium)

Medium published my new article “Man’s Insatiable Hunger for Power

Since the dawn of time, man has craved power. Since the dawn of time, power struggles have disrupted people’s peaceful lives. Today, too, the hunger for power is wreaking havoc and destroying countless lives. Power turns people into bullies. We cannot kill it but we can use it positively. Unless we learn how to do it, it will destroy us all.

You could say that the hunger for power is man’s primary trait. We want to control everything around us. This is true not only of pitiless rulers, but of every human being.

Power-hunger exists within us from the moment we are born. Look at how babies grab everything their hand can grip. That, too, is a desire to control, to keep. It is the fundamental state of being of our desire: to want to own and control everything I see, to bring it under my governance, so that I am in control and everything else is subordinate to me.

In other words, the hunger for power begins from the most basic needs and increases to levels where people lose their ability to judge correctly because of their obsession with power. The initial desire is natural, but in humans, it evolves into a disastrous monster.

The problem is not that we want something, but that our desires grow beyond the level where we can balance them. Eventually, they become desires not only to get what we want, but mainly to prevent others from getting what they want, and to have them at my mercy.

There are two fundamental forces in existence: attraction and rejection. They manifest on every level, physical, biological, emotional, and moral. In all of nature, the opposites balance each other out. In humans, the pulling force grows from generation to generation, and keeps growing throughout our lives until it grows out of balance and out of control. In order to maintain the balance that the rest of nature maintains naturally, we must learn how to do it.

From early on in life, we must teach children about human nature, how we can keep it in check, what goals we should set for ourselves, and how to achieve them in constructive ways for ourselves and for society. We need to show children which social environments are good for them and which are not, and why, and show them the harm that reckless egoism can inflict.

Once people have acquired control over their ego, they can use it positively and constructively. If such people have a desire to rule, once they have learned how to rule their ego, they can become great rulers. They will be able to resist the intensification and inflation of the ego, and instead of saying l’état, c’est moi (the state is I), as did Louis XIV, they will feel humbled by the privilege that the public has bestowed upon them to lead it wisely.

Indeed, a leader must have an inherent feeling of unworthiness. Unless a leader feels that other people know better, are more capable, or have more experience and wisdom, nothing will stop him or her from becoming a tyrant. However, humility and a certain sense of inferiority curb the ego and allow the leader to remain attentive, appreciative, and, above all, caring.
[1295700]

A War Is Correction In A Dramatic Way

293Question: Various wars have taken place throughout history: civil, religious, the cold, and information wars. Is there any difference between the types of wars in terms of the correction of mankind?

Answer: Practically not. All wars are the lack of balance between the right and left lines, between good and evil, between the property of bestowal and the property of receiving. This happens all the time only at different levels.

Comment: In our world it is very difficult to figure out where good and evil are because, in principle, all of history is written by the winners.

My Response: It doesn’t matter. We are talking about what is happening, not how they judge it and what they write.

Question: So in our world there is no such thing as one side being good and the other evil?

Answer: You can still say that people who open fire and kill others are evil.

Comment: But they also have their excuses.

My Response: It doesn’t matter. A man killing another man is the greatest evil.

Question: There are even clear laws in the Torah that you can kill only when someone comes to you and wants to kill you. War always means many young people die. What’s the point in all of this?

Answer: War is also a correction, but in a very sharp, dramatic way.

Question: Does it matter how a person dies?

Answer: There are four types of killing a person: burning, stoning, cutting off the head, strangulation. But, in principle, how a person dies depends on the root of his soul.
[295228]
From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 3/1/22

Related Material:
Let Him Make Peace Between Us
Two Versions Of World War III
Movement According To The Ray Of Light

When Attainment Becomes A Covenant

226Everything we attain in this world is attained in our egoistic qualities. Therefore, we must be careful not to fall into egoism at every level on the way to the quality of bestowal and love, and we must make sure that everything we feel and reveal would only benefit the general state of the entire universe, everything that the Creator created.

This device is created by the Creator and is called the soul of Adam. We must bring it to a similarity with Him. Therefore, this state or desire is called “Adam” from the word “Domeh” – “similar” to the Creator.

At each degree of our development as we develop through 125 degrees starting from our level, which is completely opposite to the Creator, to the level of complete similarity to Him, we go through two stages. First we reach the level of Bina (the level of hearing) and from it we rise to the level of Hochma (the level of reason).

Question: How is it connected to the covenant of the eyes (Brit Einaim)?

Answer: This is the covenant. When I reach this state, the attainment itself becomes my covenant. It is already in me, within my corrected qualities. Therefore, it is said that by this I make a covenant with the Creator.
[294146]
From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 12/28/21

Related Material:
A Covenant For Eternity
Making A Covenant With The Creator
The Covenant Of Friends

Virtual World Of Communication

962.3Question: If previously the process of new students coming to your community consisted primarily in the fact that people met physically, got acquainted, and influenced each other, today this is not the case. Does it reduce the degree of connection and the impact of communication?

Answer: I think that, on the contrary, it is perceived more clearly and explicitly.

If, for example, a friend of mine is ill now, then I really feel that I am missing something, i.e., something has formed in me that needs treatment, recovery, and replenishment.

I believe that our world group in the virtual world of communication, if you can call it that, has first of all grown. If there used to be 2,000 of us, today there are already 6,000 or 7,000 of us clearly present at systematic lessons and taking part in the life of the community.

If today we made a virtual, all-inclusive congress, the number of participants would be close to 10,000 people. We see that such communication helps us. It does not oblige people, but on the contrary, does not bind them. You come in whenever you want, attend lessons, and discuss various topics through computer communication.

But time did it all. Therefore we need to actively explore virtual space.

Comment: It is quite possible that by using modern technologies we can also allow such a form of development of your community as a real virtual world in which we will sit in the same hall wearing augmented-reality glasses and study together in one huge congress hall, just as we do today sitting in front of computer screens.

My Response: It is not a problem at all. Today I feel my students from South America to North America, across the entirety of both continents. I feel students living in Africa, Australia, and Asia, in absolutely all countries. They feel like they are with us.

Comment: Imagine such a picture that other people will be able to enter this virtual huge congress hall.

My Response: We are open to everyone. We never hide or close anything. And why? Our task is to connect all of humanity to this.
[294721]
From KabTV’s “Virtual World” 2/9/22

Related Material:
Movement In The Spiritual World
We Demand Non-Stop
Reconnect Every Day

From Physical Contact To The Field Of Sensations

962.6Question: For the past two years, your community of students who study the method of Kabbalah practically has not met physically. You conduct your classes remotely. In fact, you live in a kind of virtual community in which, nevertheless, there are real connections, a real opportunity to change yourself and the community.

How do you feel about it? Have the bonds between your students become weaker or do they remain the same?

Answer: Our ties have become stronger, they are being reshaped and becoming more virtual, and at the same time more obvious.

It is not virtuality, in the sense that we must imagine something for ourselves. We are increasingly refusing some physical contacts accepted in our world and transferring them to the realm of sensations. They bring us to a state where we really understand that the most important thing is the matter given to us in sensation.

Question: Where is freewill here?

Answer: Freewill is here as much as you want! After all, when a person is not constrained by any earthly circumstances—mechanical movements and other tools, he becomes virtual. It shows only his desire. If he wants to be in touch with you, he goes out. If he does not, he shuts himself in, and you no longer see him, you do not hear him, and you do not know him. He can change his ID and that is it, he does not exist for you, he has evaporated from your world.

Therefore, we begin to feel that it is each new circumstance, for example, with a virus and other opportunities, that helps us approach a new world.
[294674]
From KabTV’s “Virtual World” 2/9/22

Related Material:
Movement In The Spiritual World
Separated By Computer Screens
Learn To Live Only In Thoughts

Above The Signs Of The Zodiac

294.3It is said in the Torah that people striving for the likeness of the Creator are higher than the stars and signs of the zodiac. They are not affected by any signs of happiness or unhappiness, divination, witchcraft, or everything else.

Question: If the Creator is good who does good, then why does He give this power only to certain people?

Answer: He gives it to everyone! But only the one who takes upon himself the task of becoming similar to the Creator can overcome all other forces and aspire only to merge with Him. Even the powers of magic and witchcraft are given to individual people precisely so that they overcome them and use them correctly.

Question: It turns out that if a person tells fortunes or conjures, does he harm himself by this?

Answer: Of course. To the extent that he does not use the powers given to him to draw closer to the Creator through the fact that he does good for all people, he aggravates his condition.

Comment: There is also such a phenomenon as Pulsa deNura when a group of people tries to concentrate evil on a certain person. This phenomenon is still associated with Kabbalah.

Answer: No, this is nonsense. On the contrary, in Kabbalah it is called “Avoda Zara,” “work alien to us.”
[294152]
From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 2/1/22

Related Material:
No Witchcraft Against Israel
The Purpose Of Prophecy
The Difference Between Fortune Telling And Prophecy

“Are The Arab Nations And Israel Going To Ever Have Peace?” (Quora)

Dr. Michael LaitmanMichael Laitman, On Quora: Are the Arab nations and Israel going to ever have peace?

An editorial published by the Kuwaiti daily Arab Times called for the Gulf states to normalize relations with Israel. Arab Times Editor-in-Chief Ahmed al-Jarallah urged that “All the Gulf states should normalize relations with Israel due to the fact that peace with this most advanced country is the right thing to do” and also condemned the Gulf states’ support for Palestine, mentioning that Palestinians’ negative attitude to the Gulf states in return is an “insult.”

In general, normalization between Israel and Arab countries is a positive phenomenon, but it depends on our attitude toward reality, humanity and our cousins. In relation to reality, we need to consider how we bring about peace and harmony in the world. In relation to humanity, we need to seek how to bring about education that can guide humanity on how to positively connect above its differences and divisions, and by doing so, realize a whole new life of goodness and happiness. And our attitude toward our Arab cousins should be that we wish to bring them closer to us than even the rest of humanity.

The Arab world will understand that it is beneficial to make peace with Israel when we, the Jews, will soften our hearts and positively connect to each other. By making peace among ourselves, then to the same extent and even more so, we will see how peace emerges between us and the Arabs, the Palestinians and everyone else. By implementing positive connections among each other, the world would also receive the drive to do so.

As a principle, if there is Jewish unity, then unity and its myriad positive effects would ripple throughout the world. Likewise, if division and hatred reign supreme among Jews, then so too such negative qualities expand throughout the world.

We would thus be wise to imagine that the relations we implement among each other—even just in Israel, among everyone living within its borders—influences the whole of reality, all of the nations, and literally every person. I understand that it is hard to grasp, depict, and agree with such a concept, but it is nevertheless the truth.

Based on the video “Arab Times Editor Calls for Normalization between Israel and the Gulf States – A Kabbalist’s Response” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman and Oren Levi.
Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

“What Does The Hebrew Name ‘Zohar’ Mean?” (Quora)

Dr. Michael LaitmanMichael Laitman, On Quora: What does the Hebrew name ‘Zohar‘ mean?

In the wisdom of Kabbalah, “Zohar” refers to the upper radiance, which is also called “upper light,” or the light of illumination, understanding, love and participation, which is whole. When this light descends upon us, it gives us a sense of the general force of nature, also called “the Creator,” which guides our development, and which leads us to the final purpose of creation—a state of eternity and perfection.

By drawing the upper radiance upon us, we fill our lives with a sense that we are within and belong to a great force, the Creator. This force gives us a feeling of living on a whole different level, one that is absolutely harmonious and tranquil.

The Book of Zohar serves as an instruction manual on how to connect with and reveal the general force of nature, the Creator. The more we incorporate with and draw its radiance into our lives, the closer we come to the revelation of the Creator while we are alive in this world, up to a point where we reveal the Creator and reciprocate with the upper radiance.

Based on the show “Spiritual States” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman and Michael Sanilevich on February 15, 2022. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.