Question: After the generation that came out of Egypt died out and was replaced by the next one, Moses tells the new generation: “Remember Egypt.” But how can they remember it if they were never there?

Answer: There is no such thing as “they were never there.” After all, this is not about physical bodies but about spiritual states.

The Torah speaks of people who have gone through all the stages from Abraham, and in some sense even from Adam, to Egypt, and exited it with a great desire, with immense emptiness, with the “darkness of Egypt,” and now they feel that darkness as a desert.

The fact that they no longer care already indicates a correction: nothing grows here, fine; nothing gives fruit, fine. They are ready for anything, so long as they can rise above the Egyptian darkness, which evoked a negative attitude in them toward themselves and toward the Creator. Now they want to bring themselves to a state that even slightly resembles Him.

Therefore the state of the desert becomes desirable for them. Even if I have nothing, and I find myself in a state of complete emptiness, I am still glad of it compared to the state I was in before, where I enjoyed all sorts of egoistic acquisitions and felt at ease under Pharaoh’s rule.

Now it is the Creator who governs me. Although I do not see any fulfillment of my egoism in His governance, I perceive it as goodness. Even though I walk on hot sand without water, surrounded by snakes and scorpions, I rejoice in this desert because in it, the Creator rules over me. He goes before me and shows me the way, whether through a pillar of fire or a cloud.

Through the rejection of egoistic fulfillments, I feel that by rising above my ego, I am already following Him even into the desert.

This is the generation that must be born in the desert and enter the Land of Israel. That is, I have gone through all the inner stages from the Babylonian egoism that developed in the generations of the forefathers, then through the generation of Egypt, and later Mount Sinai and the desert. Now I approach the state called the “Land of Israel.” In doing so, I have built all these states within my egoistic desire.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 3/16/16

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Question: When Kabbalists communicate with each other, do they speak in an ordinary language or in some kind of incomprehensible language?

Answer: They may not say anything at all and connect via a shared screen. Why do they need this body if they can communicate with their souls, with a common screen between them?

Of course they can also talk to each other. In addition, they can communicate, and each limit oneself to a certain range and not open up to the other.

There is such an option and sometimes a need not to harm each other or to reveal themselves—all things happen despite everyone’s good intentions.

That is, there are a huge number of opportunities for Kabbalists to communicate: through books, through songs, through music. And they, as they internally construct these sensations and pictures, as they live in the material world and at the same time in the next dimension, they are in it in their senses, and thus they communicate, but only according to the law of similarity of form. This is the general, most global, most fundamental law of nature.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Kabbalists Say” 8/21/10

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Question: What is the desert that exists within a person?

Answer: The desert within a person is their egoistic desire that cannot be corrected immediately. One must come to this desert and try to dwell in it in order to eventually come out into a “land flowing with milk and honey.”

That is why our forefathers began with the desert. Abraham went into the desert, descended into Egypt, returned to Beer Sheva, and so on. Isaac and Jacob were connected with the desert their entire lives. Moses fled from Pharaoh’s house and met Jethro in the desert, and he traversed the desert.

Naturally, this refers more to spiritual actions than to corporeal ones. However, they also occurred in corporeality in accordance with the law that every spiritual force must at some point touch its corporeal branch and imprint the same sequence in the physical world.

Therefore we must come to understand what the desert is and how it can be transformed into a blooming, fruitful land, as it is written in the Torah. This does not depend on physically relocating, as in our world. In spirituality, a change of place means a change in one’s internal qualities.

“Place” in the spiritual sense is a person’s inner desire. If my inner desire is like a desert, then I dwell within it. And if my desire is like a seashore or a garden, then I live in a garden. Everything depends on how a person corrects their inner qualities. Based on this, one should understand what is described in the Torah.

The Torah describes the process that takes place within a person who transitions from the internal state of a desert full of scorpions and snakes to a flourishing land. After forty years of correction while wandering in the desert, we arrive at the land flowing with milk and honey.

Question: So does that mean the desert is bad?

Answer: The desert is not bad; it is the initial state from which we begin our development both internally and externally.
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From KabTV’s “New Life – 924,” 11/28/2017

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Preparation to the Lesson

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1st part of the Lesson — Writings of Baal HaSulam, “Arvut (Mutual Guarantee),” Items 19, (11.10.2003)

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2nd part of the Lesson — Lesson on the Topic “Preparation for the Convention”

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Selected Highlights

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Question: It is interesting that when you are physically near someone, it is easier to associate yourself with them. But doing so through thought alone is much harder. How can we work through thought without slipping into mysticism or telepathy where people claim to sense each other at a distance?

Answer: People can feel one another and even think together. But this is not like Wolf Messing, who could supposedly read minds; that is simply an animalistic sense.

Anyone with enough training can develop such abilities, regardless of their internal qualities, whether good or evil. This is something many charmers and shamans are capable of. It is not difficult, and it can be developed in anyone.

But if we are talking not about reading thoughts, but about an inner connection between people, then that arises only through the quality of bestowal, which is above our egoism. This kind of connection through bestowal requires mutuality, reciprocity, love, and inclusion of one another. It is when a shared vessel is formed where all thoughts and feelings become common and merge together.

What is fascinating is that individuality is not lost in this process; it actually expands through others. It is as if I have absorbed you into my vessel, and you have absorbed me into yours, and so with everyone else. As a result, I exist within everyone, and everyone exists within me.

This is the principle of a healthy, properly functioning organism where every cell is integrated with all other parts and cells of the body; it gives itself to them and receives from them. Then each cell feels the entire body, becomes one with it, and feels eternity, infinity, and the boundlessness of everything within it, and not just the tiny, isolated part it would otherwise feel in a lifeless state, barely aware of itself.

That is why mutual inclusion through the quality of bestowal gives a person an entirely new level of existence, what we call spiritual life. It is the feeling of eternity, infinity, perfection, and boundlessness because ultimately you absorb into yourself countless other souls.

This is a unique state, and it is precisely what we must attain. It is not far off, and at first it depends only on our mutual concessions to one another. Later it deepens into a connection on the level of true internal adhesion.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Kabbalists Say” 8/21/10

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All of a person’s work at the beginning of the spiritual path lies in seeking the upper. The entire universe is structured such that there is only the upper and the lower, and nothing else. The vast world that seems to surround us, both the upper worlds and this world, is in fact nothing but our own inner desires, which only appear as external to us.

In reality only the upper and the lower exist, which  are a sequence of spiritual degrees that extend from above downward. These degrees or worlds do not exist independently; they are within us. As we develop, ever greater parts of our desire are revealed to us, which are filled with the perception of existence, and this is what we call our next degree.

That is, the entire spiritual ladder is inside a person who ascends it and thus increasingly feels, understands, and chooses.

So who are these two, the upper and the lower, the only ones that exist in all of reality? The upper is me in my next state to come. And the lower is me in my current state.

The upper, my future state, is where I am more similar to the Creator. All my states, from now onward until absolute perfection, are comprised of increasing similarity to the Creator, to the levels of a human being that resemble the higher.

Everything is always structured in ten Sefirot, a complete portion, a full transformation of my desires from one “complete” state to another (from Yechida to Yechida). This is the minimal full change within me called a degree.

The degree of the upper relative to the lower is like the Creator relative to creation. When I rise to that upper degree, meaning I become similar in qualities to the Creator, I become like Him, and that upper degree that is revealed to me at that moment is the Creator (Boreh), which means “come and see.” For I have risen there and now “see,” that is, I receive the light of Hochma into my spiritual vessels.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/27/2012, Writings of Rabash, Article 195

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Question: The holiday of Passover tells about the way the Jewish people came out of Egyptian slavery. In fact, for Kabbalists, it sounds different. There is our egoism, our nature, and we talk about how we come out of this egoism.

I have a feeling now that this is not a Jewish holiday, but a worldwide holiday, especially considering the events that have happened in the world.

What does the Passover holiday mean for the world? How do you feel about this?

Answer: The world feels that it feels bad. But it does not know what the reason is. What the cure for the fact that it feels bad, it does not know either. Like a child: he just feels bad and that is it. There is no recognition of evil, that is, it does not know what the cause of suffering is.

And the reason for suffering is a large, sharp increase in egoism, which sometimes freezes a little and suddenly grows with a jerk.

Question: Does it mean that it is impossible to say that the world feels like it is inside Egyptian slavery, under the slavery of egoism?

Answer: It depends only on the way people feel. But they just feel that they feel bad.

Question: Has the Passover holiday not reached humanity yet?

Answer: I think it is not quite right to call it a holiday. The world does not feel that its egoism is the cause of all its suffering.

But it is necessary to feel that! If we begin to look closely at our egoistic nature, at how we treat each other, then we can conclude that our whole world is evil because we are such egoists, because we wish evil to each other, and we are in opposition, in contradiction, in internal and external confrontation with each other. We are slaves of this egoistic force that guides us, twists us, and pushes us.

To recognize the evil of our nature is the most important thing. Because after that we can already come to an understanding of how to get rid of it.

Question: If we assume that a person begins to feel this, what will his thoughts be? How can one get rid of this? Except for the inner cry: “I want to get rid of it! I do not want to be an egoist!”—what else do we need?

Answer: Nothing! Only to demand from nature that it change us. Nothing else. We do not have to make any extra effort because there is really nothing we can do. If we are inside egoism, then any of our attempts and actions will still be egoistic, and we will only deceive ourselves with them.

What we can do, however, is to gather, discuss our state, conclude that it is simply terrible, and that there is no way for us to get rid of it ourselves unless we just convince our nature to leave us alone, that we do not want to be under the control of egoism. Take away from us this alien will, this upper force, so that it does not command each of us and does not push us against each other!

Question: Will a person then have a feeling that he is under the control of the Pharaoh?

Answer: Yes, that he is a slave to the evil force of nature. Then he will begin to understand this story correctly. He will begin to treat it correctly, that in fact, this evil nature was created in such a way on purpose. By whom? By a positive force, the Creator, so that we turn to Him personally, so that He removes this evil nature from us.

If we convince the Creator to remove this evil egoistic force that pushes us against each other and does not give us peace, then this will become a truly worldwide holiday in which everyone is interconnected, in which everyone begins to treat each other correctly—with love, with knowledge, and with the understanding that we are one, a single system.

Question: What is “the people’s exit out of slavery”? Are people the whole world?

Answer: Absolutely the whole world.

Question: What about the leader who leads them? The Torah says Moshe or Moses—what is it?

Answer: This is from the word “Moshech,” pulling. It is the force that pulls people out of their egoism.

This force comes from above. The force of recognition of the evil in which we were, and the good in which we can be.

Question: Do you think that humanity should reach out to this force?

Answer: Everyone should feel from within himself that he is shouting, that he wants this. We need nothing else. There is no need to follow any people, leaders, redeemers, messiahs, and so on. We do not need anything else.

Question: What is freedom then? After all, this is a holiday of freedom.

Answer: Freedom from egoism, freedom from the fact that you are under the influence of evil all the time and it is your inner evil that pushes you to be evil to others. All this is the holiday of redemption. This is the holiday of spring.

Only egoism is the cause of our suffering. There is nothing else. There are only two forces in the world: positive and negative.

Question: Then why do we not just concentrate on this point?

Answer: We do not want to, we resist with all our might just not to get close to it because we are all egoists. Only in egoism do I feel myself and the whole world. I cannot imagine how to feel the world outside of this quality.

Question: In principle, does the wisdom of Kabbalah speak only about this—how to feel who you are, your nature, and how to exit it?

Answer: Yes.

Question: What to do to make people start doing it?

Answer: If we do not want to do it, we will be forced to. But everything will be fine.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 4/15/22

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Question: Earth is the only planet in the universe where life is possible. Nevertheless, there are areas on the globe that are uninhabitable, such as the desert. Why are there places on earth with virtually no water and conditions that are very difficult for survival?

Answer: There are places on the globe that are not intended for human existence: the north and south poles, as well as the area around the equator where deserts are mainly located. Apparently, for homeostasis and balance in nature, such extreme conditions must exist: extreme cold and extreme heat.

Similarly, one might ask why there are four seasons; would it not be better to have a constant pleasant temperature of 25 degrees Celsius? We fail to understand that external conditions are a reflection of our inner state. The same processes are happening outside as inside. Winter, summer, spring, and autumn alternate inside me—cold and hot states, states of dryness of the soul and life-giving rain.

Therefore all conditions must be perceived as necessary for a special cycle in the climate, in mood changes, in the inanimate, vegetative, animate, and in humans. The whole universe is built in four stages. After all, there are only two forces in the world: the force of giving (the property of the Creator) and the force of receiving (the property of creation), as well as the transition from one to the other and vice versa.

We cannot be in the receiving force alone; it is impossible to live in it. We are finally becoming convinced that we cannot continue to exist in such egoism. But you cannot live only in the force of bestowal either; you need to combine the two forces.

Even in the spiritual world, which is perfect, we cannot survive without egoism; we need it for the left line, to counterbalance holiness. Without it, it is impossible to study, imagine, or measure the spiritual. One is always evaluated relative to the other. Therefore we need both a plus and a minus, and to reach their correct combination.

Question: What is the inner desert?

Answer: The inner desert is hot and dry. These are very difficult conditions where there is no second force—humidity and coolness. There is no balance between the two forces; that is why it is so difficult.

In opposite conditions, when it is very cold, it is also impossible to survive. It can be 70 degrees Celsius in the desert and -70 degrees at the poles. Both are a problem.

We need to come to a balance of two opposing forces, as taught by the science of Kabbalah. Then we reach the middle line, that is, the balance between the force of giving and the force of receiving, and can live well—at peace with each other and each with himself.

If one day we manage to achieve the kind of inner correction that the science of Kabbalah talks about, we will also influence the external climate and the nature of animals, as it is said that the wolf will live peacefully next to the lamb.
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From KabTV’s “New Life – 924,” 11/28/2017

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Comment: You say that Kabbalists can communicate without words. In our world, communication usually happens through letters and sounds.

My Response: In the spiritual world, however, it happens through thoughts. Thought is the greatest, eternal, most faithful, and perfect force.

It has no limitations and spreads in all directions with infinite speed, anywhere, in any way, between worlds, between the living and the dead. Thought is everything.

Question: Can you communicate with Kabbalists of the past through thought?

Answer: Of course. It does not matter with whom. With my teacher, certainly, I still communicate with him; I still feel him.

After all, when he was physically near me, I sensed him, and that sensation remained within me.

So what difference does it make whether I saw him with my eyes or heard him with my ears?

What was inside me was his inner, not outer, image. It is the same now. That image remains within me—not a physical image, but his attitude toward the world, toward me, toward himself, toward the Creator—in other words, his spiritual image.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Kabbalists Say” 8/21/10

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