Audio Version Of The Blog – 12/31/23
Posted on December 31st, 2023
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Michael Laitman on the Times of Israel: “The Allegory of the Four Candles: Peace, Faith, Love and Hope”
Four candles flicker softly in a room. The first whispers, “I bring peace, people don’t know how to protect me,” and it goes out. The second declares, “I am faith, people don’t need me,” and extinguishes. The third laments, “I embody love, people don’t appreciate me,” before vanishing.
Suddenly, a small child enters, frightened by the growing darkness, and begins to cry. The fourth candle speaks, “Do not weep. I am hope. As long as I shine, you can relight the other candles through me.”
As long as hope persists, life endures. It guides our path toward growth. Hope compels people to traverse vast oceans, seek new lands and make new discoveries. It embodies the essence of dreams and fuels the spirit.
But how does one sustain hope amid the absence of peace, faith and love? When all seems lost, we surrender to life, to nature, or to a higher power, placing complete faith in them. Each candle fades to enable a crucial moment—just before complete darkness—to grasp the thread that links us to our source, i.e., that which connects us to the source of our lives, the force of love, bestowal and connection. We can then continue our journey together with that force.
Hope serves as the tether between humanity in the physical realm and the higher spiritual world. It remains eternally lit, symbolizing the everlasting connection. So, if hope momentarily fades, it is a sign that we need to realign ourselves: to acknowledge the harmony, happiness and peace ahead when we connect to our lives’ source force of love and bestowal, and this should give us the strength to move forward.
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It is said in the Introduction of The Book of Zohar that there are three types of fear and only one of them is real.
The first type of fear is when a person keeps the commandments in order to be protected from bodily and monetary punishment in this world.
The second type is fear of punishment in the future world. But real fear is the third type when a person is in fear before the Creator.
Since the Creator is a common force that includes and holds the entire universe, fulfilling the laws of the Creator, that is, His commandments, is the most important task of a person. By this, he not only ensures the correct state for himself, the people, the world, and the entire universe, but also looks into the future, sees, and attains everything that can happen, and corrects it.
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From KabTV’s “Introduction of The Book of Zohar” 12/10/23
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Question: When a person is impressed by spirituality because he somehow frees a place within himself to receive this feeling, it is like a gift for him. But when he turns on his mind, he falls out of this feeling. In this case, how does one regulate the balance between feeling and reason?
Answer: This is all done by the Creator. There is nothing we can do ourselves except to ask Him not to move away and to bring us closer to Him. We can connect and thus convince Him not to leave us.
He must do everything based on what each one needs: give someone an understanding, give someone else a feeling, and so on. The only thing we should do is ask to be connected with each other and come closer to the Creator. Understanding and feelings will come by themselves.
Question: Is it necessary to force the brain to receive vitality from spirituality or should it be a natural process?
Answer: I do not think you should do it. This is a natural process. We should only think about our connection, and coming closer to each other in tens, hundreds, and thousands. If we come to this, then together we will get closer to the Creator.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/17/23, Writings of Baal HaSulam “The Action Affects the Thought“
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Question: The cat said, “Rabbits are unworthy of being taught. I’m offering cheap mouse-catching lessons, and not even one rabbit was interested.”
In principle, the entire system of education is built on this. I am a “rabbit,” and I am constantly being poked and forced to study things that do not suit me at all. I don’t need anything.
How should the education system truly be structured? As a “rabbit,” what should I be given? Should I learn how to get cabbage and carrots correctly, or should I be taught how to catch mice? What should I know?
Answer: First and foremost, you should learn to exist safely. This is the most important thing for a living organism.
Look at what animals teach their offspring, exactly that. So should we provide such knowledge to the new generation: what to defend against, how to defend, why defend, and so on. That’s the first priority. The basics should be there.
Question: What’s next? Where am I heading?
Answer: Next? Multiply and provide for children, if this is the philosophy of a rabbit.
Question: We always talk about the goal and where to go. Should I somehow be guided toward it?
Answer: Of course, they should always show you your new goal—more detailed, higher, and so on.
Question: Should I be prepared for some lofty goal?
Answer: In principle, I think it’s not necessary. I believe that problems start when you chase after this lofty goal. We try to push our loved ones into it, and overall it doesn’t lead to good.
The most important thing for us is to provide people with knowledge, confidence, how they can safely build a family, and surroundings in which they can exist.
Question: What about the lofty goals you talk about all the time? Connection with others. Or does that fall under safety? Good connections with others and so on.
Answer: But that is not a lofty goal; it is a necessity for existence.
Question: So is this what we need for existence today? Good connections with others. Where is the supreme governing force in this whole system? Where is the Creator?
Answer: Where it is necessary, you will find it.
Question: So should I come to the necessity of the Creator in my life?
Answer: To some extent. Not excessively. If you promote the Creator and the connection with Him, you will run into very big troubles. There is no need. As much as a person can live peacefully and exist in his small circle, that is what he should be given.
Question: What’s next?
Answer: There is no next.
Question: Just to live according to these goals?
Answer: Yes. Who are we that we need something more?
Comment: We are thinking, conscious beings after all.
My Response: All our thinking and all our actions are only to start dominating others. So I don’t think it is a good path. It is an unsafe and generally harmful path that leads to destruction.
Comment: That is, when you talk about safety, you are saying that destroying others cannot be a safe path.
My Response: We must understand that a wise person is one who knows how to be content with the normal fulfillment of oneself and the surrounding society. That is, if we come to the point where only the necessary is enough for me, everything will start falling into place.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 11/9/23
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When Laurens van der Post one night
In the Kalihari Desert told the Bushmen
He couldn’t hear the stars
Singing, they didn’t believe him. They looked at him,
Half-smiling. They examined his face
To see whether he was joking
Or deceiving them. Then two of those small men
Who plant nothing, who have almost
Nothing to hunt, who live
On almost nothing, and with no one
But themselves, led him away
From the crackling thorn-scrub fire
And stood with him under the night sky
And listened. One of them whispered,
Do you not hear them now?
And van der Post listened, not wanting
To disbelieve, but had to answer,
No. They walked him slowly
Like a sick man to the small dim
Circle of firelight and told him
They were terribly sorry,
And he felt even sorrier
For himself and blamed his ancestors
For their strange loss of hearing,
Which was his loss now. On some clear nights
When nearby houses have turned off their televisions,
When the traffic dwindles, when through streets
Are between sirens and the jets overhead
Are between crossings, when the wind
Is hanging fire in the fir trees,
And the long-eared owl in the neighboring grove
Between calls is regarding his own darkness,
I look at the stars again as I first did
To school myself in the names of constellations
And remember my first sense of their terrible distance,
I can still hear what I thought
At the edge of silence were the inside jokes
Of my heartbeat, my arterial traffic,
The C above high C of my inner ear, myself
Tunelessly humming, but now I know what they are:
My fair share of the music of the spheres
And clusters of ripening stars,
Of the songs from the throats of the old gods
Still tending even tone-deaf creatures
Through their exiles in the desert.
(“The Silence of the Stars” by David Wagoner, from Traveling Light: Collected and New Poems)
Question: Everything is the other way around in this world. Whoever hears the stars is sent to the doctors. Tell me, please, who is sick after all—the one who hears the stars or the one who does not?
Answer: I cannot say about the stars.
Comment: We probably mean nature by this.
My Response: Yes. Anyone who does not hear nature is, of course, ill. He is cut off from nature, and I feel sorry for him.
Question: What does “hearing nature” mean?
Answer: To hear nature is to be close to it. A person close to nature is a person who perceives everything around him as the attitude of the Creator toward him. And that is why he does not see anything wrong with it. Right up to his death, which he also sees nothing wrong with, it comes, it goes, and I go too.
Question: Is it possible to live like it: warm, calm?
Answer: Of course. It is an inner voice in you that just needs to be revealed.
Comment: But we were deprived of this quality of hearing nature.
My Response: It is our egoism that locks us within and does not allow us to turn anywhere.
Question: So, it is better for it that we do not hear nature?
Answer: It is an evil force that acts in parallel with a good force, but we give advantage to this evil force.
Question: And how can we feel that we miss nature, this hearing?
Answer: Trying to get inside nature means connecting with the Creator. We must try to get closer to Him. And then we will succeed.
Question: But this needs clarification. What is the Creator for an ordinary person, what is it?
Answer: Everything around us.
Question: All this is the Creator?
Answer: Yes. And even everything that is inside us is all the Creator.
To come closer to Him means to reveal your feelings so that there would be no boundaries or barriers between you and the Creator. And then you will feel that the whole world is filled with delicate singing. I would say it like this.
Comment: Beautiful! Tell me, is this necessary for our survival?
My Response: It is not about surviving in this world. The point is to be in harmony with it. And that is how it comes.
Question: Now a lot of people leave cities, go to some forgotten villages, abandoned houses, rebuild, and even go into forests and live there. Mainly, what is it? Is this an escape from suffering or is it a search?
Answer: It is a search for harmony when I feel good about what I have. I am content with it, I am satisfied with it. I do not need anything, I do not have any complaints about anyone. That is how I live. This is a good attitude toward the world.
Question: At one time you said that once the real Hasidim, Kabbalists, left everything behind and went away for almost a year. Without anything. Without bread, without money, they went into the world. What kind of move was that? Was it a search for that harmony, as you say?
Answer: Yes. This is called “going into exile.” But in fact, it was an exile from oneself. And a lot of people did that. It was not only in Russia. This was also the case in Central Asia.
Question: So, it is not just Judaism? Other religions also do this?
Answer: Many nations, yes.
Question: They were leaving to hear this gentle sound that you were talking about? Is that what drove them?
Answer: Yes. They were not hermits, they were surrounded by people, but they strove to be as independent as possible. In this way they strove to feel the Creator.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 11/20/23
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Question: You said that I should be in fear before the Creator. How can I be in this fear? What is it? Is it a thought? A state?
Answer: This is a state where I am looking for ways to please the Creator and what I can do to bring contentment to Him.
Comment: I have a feeling that every day I miss so many opportunities to bring contentment to Him.
My Response: Eventually, all the opportunities will come together, and everything will work out for us.
Question: How can I come to feel at least once that I am really bringing Him contentment?
Answer: Try to hug your friends and raise them all together to the Creator. Awaken them so that together you would come closer to Him.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/18/23, Writing of Rabash “What Is “The Earth Feared and Was Still,” in the Work?”
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Question: By making corrections and advancing forward, do we somehow influence the external environment, our relatives, and colleagues?
Answer: Of course we do. By influencing outer circles, we bring them closer to the accelerated path of development (Achishena).
In no case should we abandon them. After all, they, in turn, support us, without them we will not be able to move toward the Creator. So this work should be constant and strictly directed.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/17/23, Writings of Baal HaSulam “Introduction to the Book Panim Meirot uMasbirot“
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Question: If we show love in the ten, can it sugar-coat egoism and do harm?
Answer: No, love can never harm.
Question: If it is not a sincere manifestation of love, but manipulation and lies, what should I do in such a situation?
Answer: Continue to love. You should feel that those who want to advance together support each other only with love, not criticism.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/14/23, Writings of Rabash “What Is Hanukkah”
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Question: What does it mean that we have to choose work above reason every time, even in a situation where we see an opportunity to work within reason?
Answer: Working within reason does not lift us up the spiritual ladder. Only work above reason corrects and connects us.
Question: What is our next common state that we need to reach? What should be our ultimate goal, and where should we aim every day? For example, athletes have training every day, and their ultimate goal is to win the World Cup. What will be our victory in our championship?
Answer: We will reach victory only when we rise above reason in faith and try to constantly stay at this level.
Question: When can I make scrutinies with my friends?
Answer: At any time you can scrutinize where you are and try to reveal the common desire that you are in.
Question: How in the ten can we come to the realization that the force pushing us out of egoism is in it? How can we surrender to its influence and feel the common heart of the ten in order to reach a new state?
Answer: Rely on each other, then the Creator will be revealed between you and will start supplying His force to you.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/16/23, Writings of Baal HaSulam “And Israel Saw the Egyptians“
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