It 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.”
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From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 2/1/22

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Michael 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.

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Michael 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.

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Question: According to Stanislaw Jerzy Lec, “Illiterates have to dictate.” What does this mean to you?

Answer: They have to dictate because literate people are quietly standing on the sidelines remaining silent.

Question: When you say “illiterates” have to dictate, what do you mean?

Answer: Just these petty egoists who appear everywhere and crawl out through all sorts of holes.

Question: Are these illiterate ones our desires for fame and power?

Answer: Yes.

Question: To whom are they dictating? To the literate ones?

Answer: They want to dictate to the entire world.

Question: Do they manage to do so?

Answer: Of course! They have reshaped the entire world to suit their egoism. Every day and with every generation this world is becoming more egoistic, arrogant, and blunt. No one regrets it and no one is ashamed to use this egoism. It is instead on the contrary. And this all was all done by small, illiterate, stupid, boorish egoists.

Question: When do literate people get involved?

Answer: When people become convinced that it is no longer possible to continue in this way, because by doing these things they bring themselves to extermination and self-destruction. Then perhaps there will be a solution. Perhaps!
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 12/23/21

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Question: Why do some people have a question about the meaning of life?

Answer: The fact is that they have already grown up enough for this and the rest have not.

In the end, everyone without exception must come to this question. We see that it arises in millions of people now. But there are those in whom it does not arise yet.

However, over time, this problem will become global. Even now psychologists, political scientists, and sociologists have no answer to this question, and therefore it is being hushed up.

Look at how much money is spent on advertising, on television, on all sorts of things, only for the population of the world not to fall and disconnect from everything because this causes anger, terror, and divorces. If we stopped this worldwide Hollywood today, the world would collapse.

Question: Does the question of the meaning of life depend on the level of inner development of a person?

Answer: Of course. It depends on the level of the development of his soul. We cannot put pressure on a person. If he is ready for this, we can tell him about Kabbalah. You cannot give a person something that he has not matured to it yet.
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up, Summing Up” 4/7/10

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Is war natural?“

Until we reach the complete correction of the world, a state when we will experience balance and harmony with the laws of nature, then war is the most natural of states.

Nature consists of two opposite forces—giving and receiving, plus and minus, day and night, light and darkness, and so on—and these forces exist in a certain equilibrium. However, such equilibrium undergoes a process of constant disturbances and partial restorations. This is called “life.”

Over millions of years, positive and negative forces alternately dominated each other until they reached a certain balance, forming the planet Earth as we know it. Kabbalist Yehuda Ashlag (Baal HaSulam) describes this process in his article “The Solution”:

First, [the Earth] was but a ball of fog-like gas. Through the gravity inside it, it concentrated the atoms in it, over a period of time, into a closer circle. As a result, the ball of gas was turned into a liquid ball of fire.

Over eons of terrible wars between the two forces in Earth, the positive and the negative, the chilling force in it was finally triumphant over the force of liquid fire, and cooled a thin crust around the Earth and hardened there.

However, the planet had not yet grown still from the war between the forces, and after some time the liquid force of fire overpowered and erupted in a great noise from the bowels of the Earth, rising and shattering the cold hard crust to pieces, turning the planet into a liquid ball of fire once again. Then an era of new wars began until the cool force overpowered the force of fire once more, and a second crust was chilled around the ball, harder, thicker and more durable against the outbreak of the fluids from amidst the ball.

This time it lasted longer, but at last, the liquid forces overpowered once again and erupted from the bowels of the Earth, breaking the crust in pieces. Once more, everything was ruined and became a liquid ball.

Thus, the eons interchanged, and every time the cooling force was victorious, the crust it made was thicker. Finally, the positive forces overpowered the negative forces and they came into complete harmony: the liquids took their place in the abdomen of the Earth, and the cold crust became thick enough around them to enable the creation of organic life as it is today.

All organic bodies develop by the same order. From the moment they are planted to the end of the ripening, they undergo several hundred situations due to the two forces, the positive and the negative, and their war against each other, as described regarding the Earth.

War is thus indeed absolutely natural, and peace is actually unnatural. Peace is nonexistent while we develop through a constant push-and-pull of opposing forces. We can achieve peace only by reaching balance, mutual connection and complementarity between the two opposing forces.

Based on “Spiritual States” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman and Michael Sanilevich on March 1, 2022. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Preparation to the Lesson

Lesson on the Topic “Pesach (Passover)” 

Writings of Baal HaSulam “Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot” 

Selected Highlights

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Listen to an Audio Version of the Blog
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My new article on Linkedin “Can Happiness Be Measured?”

If a country makes the cut, it means that its inhabitants are among the happiest in the world, according to the UN World Happiness Report, a global survey from people in about 150 countries. The study recently revealed a very simple premise that is usually ignored: our levels of satisfaction are related to the levels of generosity and mutual aid which have risen over the past two years due to the pandemic. But does it mean people are happier because they are suddenly more altruistic? How can it be really measured?

Finland is the world’s happiest country, for the fifth consecutive year, according to this ranking which is based on the standard of living and mutual responsibility. Donating to charity, helping a stranger and volunteering have risen 25% globally in 2021 compared with pre-pandemic levels, the report says. That is probably the case but how a survey can penetrate people’s feelings and fulfillment is debatable and therefore, unreliable.

I think we have grown up a bit and are no longer so naive as to take polls seriously. Everyone understands that they are funded and involve political considerations. For instance, if we were to believe the surveys, we might be thrilled that Israel, the country where I live, has reached the respectable 9th place in the global happiness index despite the constant menace of security threats and high cost of living.

The relationship between us is more difficult day by day and the conflicts are exhausting so the conclusion would be that the seventieth place in the happiness index is more realistic for us. Thus, by placing Israel on top of the list, the United Nations are simply trying to conceal their ongoing biased treatment toward us.

If you put aside the glasses through which the UN survey shows us the “global happiness index” and look at the reality itself, you will see that Scandinavians, who take the first places of the list, are hardly a poster picture of joyful outburst.

There are general contrasting waves in reality of heat and cold, expansion and contraction, waves of stinginess and generosity, happiness and sadness. And now a warmer, open and friendly wave is sweeping through the world. It has been preceded by the Covid pandemic and global suffering. But it is only a passing wave and it will fade away.

The world will close itself, and people will once again become vindictive and selfish. This is because life events affect us and draw us outwardly to some degree of connection at one time and then to separation at another. But on the inside, we do not change.

We have remained this way for thousands of years, and continue to live with the same inner instinct that we were born with as human beings. It is the selfish instinct, the ego. That ego does not allow us to be truly happy. It causes us to run over others to achieve what we desire at their expense which in the end keeps us apart and suspicious and hostile about each other. No one can feel truly fulfilled in such conditions and environment.

We are part of the whole of humanity, and also part of the whole system of nature. Therefore, our happiness depends on and is connected to the happiness of everyone else. We cannot feel private happiness if we are not happy with all our surroundings. To be truly happy we must address the extent of the ego’s control over our lives.

When we change our perspective from egoistic to altruistic, we will climb the ladder of happiness without depending on surveys and empty pride. Everyone will feel the inner joy that exists in the harmonious relations between us, the real source of lasting fulfillment.

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Michael Laitman, On The Times of Israel: “The Israeli Education System Is Imploding”

Ayala Moshe, a student of mine, has been a school teacher in Israel for the past fifteen years. This year, she gave up. The audacity of students, the poor salaries, the disrespect and rudeness of parents, and the physical assaults have become too much. “I have been slapped, thrown down the stairs by students, and had to watch security camera footage showing me being thrown, when I had to defend myself in court for being a victim of an assault.”

Ayala is just one of thousands of teachers all over Israel who have had enough. According to a special report by the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics, thirteen percent of the teachers quit within their first year on the job. Within five years, a quarter of the teachers will be looking for a new occupation. Worse yet, the higher a teacher’s education, the more likely he or she is to leave in search of a more rewarding career. Clearly, the education system is imploding.

If I were asked what to recommend, I would advise them all to quit, every single teacher. This may be the only move that will make parents realize that education cannot be taken lightly. The education system should be the most important system in the country, and so should be the status of the teachers. We cannot throw the responsibility for the upbringing of our children on the laps of teachers who are not equipped or meant to handle it, who face mounting pressure from conflicting sources, receive an embarrassing salary, then face public scolding and derision left and right for their poor achievements. Parents must be held accountable for the behavior of their children, and they must take part in mending it.

If the system is already crumbling, it is time for parents and teachers to put their heads together, envision the kind of country and society they want to see, and design a plan to make it happen. A situation where neither parents nor teachers can bring up children to be human beings, where no one knows what values children absorb from dubious sources online and elsewhere, that situation is intolerable.

Currently, children go to school to be force-fed knowledge they neither care about nor need for life. They hate it, and therefore hate the people who feed it to them. Given the growing intolerance in society, it is no wonder that some of them turn violent.

Instead of memorizing material, they should first of all learn how to relate to one another. Afterwards, they need to learn how to learn, since they will be learning their entire lives, and finally, they need to learn how to cooperate in teams that learn together and achieve together.

In the real world, there are no individuals. Everything is achieved in teams and through cooperation with other teams. If people leave school without having learned to be good teammates, then they have been brought up to be misfits. In such a state, they will either adapt to a reality for which school did not prepare them, or they will not be able to make a proper living. Social skills are therefore vital for success in today’s world, and virtually no school teaches them.

Social skills are critical not only at work. They are the basis of every relationship—with the significant other, with the children, at work, and even with pets. If you let a person grow from infancy to adulthood without providing social skills, then you have crippled that person for life.

Now that the education system is collapsing, there is an opportunity to build it right, and our entire society will reap the benefits.
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