Audio Version Of The Blog – 7/18/22

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Slaughter in America

183.01Question: There was another tragic school shooting in America; an 18-year-old resident of Texas opened fire at an elementary school, killed 19 students, two teachers, and seriously wounded his grandmother before that.

“President Biden on Tuesday evening urged Congress to end the ‘carnage’ of gun violence after more than a dozen elementary schoolchildren were killed by an 18-year-old in Texas.

“’As a nation we have to ask: When in God’s name are we going to stand up to the gun lobby?’ Biden said in an address to the nation. ‘ … How many scores of little children, who witnessed what happened, see their friends die as if they’re in a battlefield, for God’s sake?’” (Washington Post)

If you were given all the powers, that is, if they told you: “Dear Michael Laitman, here is the money, here is the power, here is the law, here is the police, here is the army, whatever you want, just change this situation,” what would you do?

Answer: I think it is unrealistic to confiscate weapons from hundreds of millions of people. (And each gun has a couple of barrels.) I remember, I went into a basement in New York—there is a gun! And everything else as well—please, in bulk, take it away.

“A gun? Please, take it.”

And what can you do? It cannot be changed in a split second. For this it is necessary to educate people; it is not easy.

Comment: That is, for example, if you were given all the authority to forcibly take the weapons, pull it out…

My Response: It would not help. They can buy them in any alley.

Comment: Close all stores, close the alleys.

My Response: There is no way to do that. Anyone who wants—specifically wants to buy a weapon in order to kill someone—can do so anywhere in the world.

Question: This problem of America is well-known. What is the solution?

Answer: There is no solution except for gradual education of society.

Question: What should society come to?

Answer: Society must come to the conclusion that it is not good to kill another.

Question: This is the basis of all religions, all spiritual practices. What you said is repeated: killing is not good, only peace. But humanity is not improving in any way, and it is getting worse and worse. You see what is going on, right?

Answer: Naturally. Egoism is growing, people around me are getting worse, so I take a gun and start “correcting” society.

Comment: The “correctors” of society are a terrible thing.

My Response: Nothing can be done. I do not see anything else except what Kabbalah says: education, serious education, universal, from a young age and throughout life.

Question: What should it lead to?

Answer: To the fact that there is no place for violence. He who raises his hand against another must receive punishment.

A person must understand that he has no right to rule over the life of another. Only good, kind things can he do to another. Just set a good example. And he has no right to show violence; this is not his authority. To act against the wishes of another is not in his authority.

Question: Why have all the practitioners that talk about the same thing not succeeded and Kabbalah will succeed if you conduct education according to Kabbalah?

Answer: It is true that no practices have succeeded in this, and many are talking about it. But they talk, and they do it differently.

And Kabbalah will succeed because it uses the upper force. It causes the influence of the upper positive force on a person, and then a person changes.

I do not see any other way out. It says what needs to be done. It is necessary to be accustomed to “love your neighbor as yourself” from a young age. Literally each and everyone. If it happens on a daily basis and on the scale of, say, a country, then it will have an impact. This together with the media and everything else.

Question: So you say the whole task is to summon this positive force upon yourself. To do this, I have to understand that there is nothing positive in me or around me? Is that what I need to understand as a student?

Answer: Of course. This requires very serious explanatory work. Very serious! Who we are, what we are, and what is happening around us, with us, and where we are going. Everyone suffers from this.

Question: How can we invoke this positive force? What should I say, think, do?

Answer: It is invoked by constant patient explanation. Movies, clips, anything else, television, the Internet, all this should be filled only by what educates a person for good. Otherwise, we are going nowhere. It is nature. Go against it?

It is necessary to direct a person’s thinking only to the positive, and people will gradually get used to how to speak, how to address, how to think. At least, such excesses will not occur, and people will not be able to realize them because they will not exist.

They will not want and will not be able to do it because there will be nowhere to get firearms and so on.

Comment: You are talking now as if you are taking the supreme law and connecting it with the practice of this world. A simple law that you cannot get weapons and so on.

Answer: One by one. It is necessary to limit people from this. According to their own desires.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 5/26/22

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What Is Bestowal in Intention?

608.02When you take care of humanity, you not only do not lose strength, but, to the contrary, you receive spiritual energy from it.

In the corporeal realm, another law applies: there, the more you give to others, the more you lose strength. And in the spiritual—the more you give, the more you feel strength and progress because in spirituality everything depends on the intention, and in the corporeality everything depends on the action.

Bestowal in intention is when I want to give to the host and I am filled with what He wants to give me. After all, the whole source of energy is concentrated in the Creator, and I receive energy from Him to the extent that I want to give to Him. It turns out that by doing this I open a channel to receive all the good from Him, and I am fulfilled by it.

The one who gives in spirituality, he receives and does not lose! I want to give, but I have nothing to give except intention, and it turns out that in practice I receive because by this I open a channel toward myself.

It all starts with my desire to give to the Host, and I am ready to do anything for this: to receive, to give, to make a restriction on everything I have, and to take into account only the interests of the Host, to be incorporated in Him, to see how to fill Him. Just like a mother who feeds a baby and wants him to get as much milk from her as possible and this fulfills her. It is such a pleasure for her to see how the baby eats that she feels that she is receiving and not giving.

We see such an example even in the corporeal world, and the same relationship should be between people and between man and the Creator.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/12/22, Writings of Baal HaSulam, “The Meaning of Conception and Birth”

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“The Connection Between Ice Cream and Self-Hating Jews” (Times of Israel)

Michael Laitman, On The Times of Israel: “The Connection Between Ice Cream and Self-Hating Jews

When the multinational corporation Unilever recently announced that it had sold the rights to produce Ben and Jerry’s ice cream to the current licensee in Israel, it was thought the deal would end the year long pro-Palestinian boycott of the product sales in Israeli settlements in Judea and Samaria, as well as in East Jerusalem. However, then the Jewish founders of the ice cream brand—the main promoters of the boycott—reminded the world that they will not rest until Israel is isolated by concocting a new way to cause trouble.

The frozen relationship between the Ben & Jerry’s Jewish founders and Israel again became evident. As part of the company’s independent ideological board, they decided to sue Unilever to block the sale to the Israeli licensee that would allow the unrestricted distribution of the product in Israel as a whole. They claim that selling their brand in the “Occupied Palestinian Territory” is inconsistent with the company’s values and integrity.

This division between Ben and Jerry’s Jewish founders and Israel exactly highlights our main problem as a Jewish nation: the separation between us Jews. It is our separation that weakens our foundation and portends gloomy ramifications for our future. It is our internal division that invites attacks and boycotts and gnaws away at our strength.

Why can Jews be antisemites? It is because we Jews have a point that connects us to humanity’s corrected and unified state—“love your neighbor as yourself”—which we once discovered under Abraham’s guidance some 3,800 years ago. Together with that point, we also play host to the shattered egoistic desire, which opposes the point of unification, detaching us all from each other.

Every Jew accommodates this duality: an egoistic desire to receive, which seeks personal benefit at the expense of others, coupled with the altruistic point of unification that is attached to humanity’s peak unified state of development.

Whoever feels closer to the central point of unification is drawn to develop differently than those swept into the rat race of the masses, to positive connection in society. Whoever resists such development, letting the ego determine his or her goals and pleasures in life, is against unification, and is thus, according to its deeper definition, an antisemite.

Beyond differing political views, there are disputes about Jewish practices, legitimacy of certain denominations, distribution of funds and donations, and more. These are all weighty issues worthy of serious discussion. However, above and beyond all our disagreements and differences we must agree on this: No matter what, we need to stick together as one nation.

If we want to advance good causes, we need to start by setting an example of unity to humanity and by doing so, we will spread harmony to the entire world. It will give us the taste of our lives, as it is written in the book Maor VaShemesh, “When there are love, unity, and friendship between one another in Israel, no calamity can befall them and by that, all the curses and suffering are banished.”
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“Our Folly Has a Purpose” (Linkedin)

My new article on Linkedin “Our Folly Has a Purpose

One of the most perplexing questions haunting humanity is why the most intelligent species on the planet cannot manage its life intelligently. After every self-inflicted cataclysm, we analyze, reflect, and draw conclusions in order to avoid its recurrence. Yet, every time, without fail, we fall once more into the same pitfalls of vanity and shortsightedness that lead to yet another cataclysm. Why is it that the most intelligent species must keep treading this march of folly?

The surprising answer to this question lies not in our makeup or in our intellect. The answer lies in our purpose, the purpose of our existence.

If we were developing according to Darwin’s laws of evolution, meaning naturally, we would not be making any mistakes in our behavior, just as animals know when to do what, and their species survive millions of years with very few changes.

But for humans, there is another goal besides physical existence. We are destined to become omniscient, knowing and understanding everything about Creation: why it exists, how it persists, and how it will achieve its goal.

To understand how everything works, we need to consciously connect with everything. Just as evolution advances from the simple to the complicated, from single-celled creatures to trillions of cells working in unison to sustain large bodies such as ours, our consciousness must gradually evolve from focusing only on ourselves to focusing on all of humanity, then on the entire planet, and finally on all that exists.

We are already connected, but we are unaware of it and behave as if we are not. While animals follow their instincts, and therefore do not break the connections between all parts of reality and cause no harm, we follow our whims and whatever comes up in our minds. Since our minds do not perceive the connectedness of all of reality, and even resist perceiving it because of our ego, we act as if we can ignore the rest of reality and do whatever we want. The result is the chaotic world we live in, where each one is trying to impose one’s will on everyone else or destroy them.

The purpose of the chaos, therefore, is to make us acknowledge our folly. It is to make us see that whether we like it or not, we are responsible for everyone, and each of us is responsible for all of us. Unless we acknowledge our connectedness and begin to behave with due consideration, we will destroy everything.

Moreover, unless we acknowledge our connectedness and begin to act the part, we will not perceive what we are intended to perceive. We will not be able to understand the world we live in, how it persists, and why. Indeed, we have come to a point where our physical existence and our spiritual development are interdependent. Only if we develop our minds will our bodies be able to survive.
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“For Hezbollah – a Tough Hand; for Our Brothers – a Soft Heart” (Times of Israel)

Michael Laitman, On The Times of Israel: “For Hezbollah – a Tough Hand; for Our Brothers – a Soft Heart

The Jerusalem Post just reported that Israel’s Ambassador to the UN Gilad Erdan has asked Secretary-General Antonio Guterres that the UN Security Council “condemn the Hezbollah drone operation targeting the Karish gas rig in Israel’s territorial waters last week.” While the drones were shut down before they could do any damage, Erdan insisted that the attack “may lead to an escalation in the region and [therefore] the international community must sharply condemn it.”

In my opinion, any condemnation, however strong, will accomplish nothing. Hezbollah has proven time and again that the only language it understands is that of power. Therefore, we should retaliate with deadly force, with missiles aimed not at the drones, but at the places that send them. At the same time, we must enhance our solidarity and cohesion. Only such a two-way movement will solve our security problems.

When I speak of firing missiles, I do not mean exchanging fire, as it happened previously. I mean making them realize that we have had enough, and we are not willing to tolerate their aggression any longer. We have enough conventional military options to make sure this happens, and we should use all of them and not take anyone’s opinion into consideration, just as no other country would hesitate to use all its power against an aggressor who has declared his intention to wipe out the defending country and has repeatedly tried to do so.

On the military level, our problem is not Hezbollah, but our own hesitance against it. Hezbollah has declared war on Israel, not the other way around, so why are we not treating it like an enemy that has declared war on us and says explicitly that it will not rest until we are gone? Why are we not destroying it? Would any other country avoid doing so?

At the same time, we must not neglect our inner fortitude, which comes from our cohesion. This is the key factor in our struggle. When it comes to solidarity, we are our only enemy. Internal division within the people of Israel has always been our biggest woe and our only real enemy, since as long as we are united, no one challenges us.

Currently, our hearts are soft toward our enemies, and tough toward each other. Unless we reverse the direction of our hearts, we will continue to suffer blows and our enemies will grow stronger and more brazen.

Internal unity, therefore, based on solidarity and cohesion within our nation, is our “ultimate weapon,” not because it destroys our enemies, but because it destroys their enmity. If we act decisively on both fronts, military and social, we will succeed and the world will support us. If we neglect either, we will not succeed and the world will condemn us, as it does today, and Hezbollah will keep winning.
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Through the Egoistic Filter

 202For success in our attempts to treat various medical problems and to sharply slow down the processes of human aging, it is clearly necessary to understand the languages by which cells communicate with each other. We have managed to accomplish this, to some extent. It appears that the languages we were looking for, are, in fact, hidden in the 98%, “junk” DNA contained in our own genetic apparatus (P.P. Gariaev et al).

Question: It is hard to imagine that the main informational structure of a human, his genome, is almost 100% “selfish junk” whose concern is only its preservation in our chromosomes and it is not doing anything useful. What indeed is our genome?

Answer: In essence, this is the way we perceive our genome because we are egoists ourselves and in reality we are in fact this “junk.” Meaning, “garbage” senses “garbage.”

The problem is that we are unable to read it in a different way since we research a person in the direct, egoistic approach. This is our concept apparatus, the form of our research, and how we are built inside.

A person represents a desire to receive pleasure and exists in this desire. Everything he senses and looks at he senses within himself, in his egoistic shapes, forms, desires, thoughts, and feelings.

According to this, everything that he researches passes through this sort of filter. It means I perceive everything through my egoistic filter and it does not matter whether I study the genome or certain macro objects. The only thing I perceive is whether or not something is a yes or no, beneficial or harmful, for my egoism.

There are a multitude of various components and many forms of the researched matter in the surrounding space: macro or micro, inanimate, vegetative, animate, biological, or even the internal, moral, sensory, or spiritual. Whatever I research, I look at it only through my egoistic filter and I do not see all the rest.
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up, Human Genome” 7/17/11

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Where Do Dreams Come From?

565.02Dreams are impressions of the material world or other various wandering currents in our subconscious that a person sees in his mind.

Question: So is sleep a consequence of what you have experienced during the day?

Answer: Not necessarily what you experienced. Babies do not experience anything. It is only wandering streams or currents of information or restructuring of all sorts of cells, of brain activity, and so on that cause such sensations. We are talking about the physiology of our animal body.

As for the dreams described in Kabbalistic sources, for example, the dreams of Pharaoh or Jacob, here we mean a partial attainment of reality, not complete but partial when a person attains 60 and not 100 degrees in his feelings. This is called a dream.

Question: In the corporeal world, we separate sleeping and dreaming because sleep can be without dreams. What about spirituality?

Answer: It is the same in spirituality. Moreover, dreams in spirituality are not some kind of signs for the future. Kabbalah does not operate with such concepts at all.

Question: Can dreams be used for spiritual development?

Answer: No. By no means. In our life we must clearly, absolutely clearly try to be similar to the Creator, the good that does good, and unite with those who are like us, and with mutual help, attain the Creator together.
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From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 6/28/22

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Society of Joy

293.1The future society is a society that lives according to the principle “love your neighbor as yourself,” a society of joy, smiles, and rapprochement.

Question: How does a person feel in it from the point of view of the perception of reality? Does he feel his neighbor, does he feel the social structure?

Answer: He feels himself in an environment that is absolutely identical to what exists within him. After all, the border of perception that there is me and something outside of me is being destroyed, leveled. There is no difference between his internal state and the external environment.

At the same time, a person’s sensation of our egoistic, closed, angular, limited-by-time world disappears.
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From KabTV’s “Kabbalah Express” 6/24/22

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The Image of the Creator

13.07Question: What does the expression “the image of the Creator” mean?

Answer: When we talk about the attitude of someone toward someone or to something, then such an attitude of one to another can lead to a certain image, behavior, picture, and so on.

We are trying to depict the image of the Creator in His attitude toward the created beings. Of course, this can also be done in relation to inanimate, vegetative, and animate nature but mainly to humans.

The Creator is the general force of nature, absolutely not materialized, inanimate, above everything that we can imagine. The wisdom of Kabbalah studies how this quality nevertheless is presented to a person and what it wants from us.
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From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 5/21/22

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