Question: What does the word “Zohar” mean?

Answer: “Zohar” means “upper radiance.” It is the upper light, the light of illumination, understanding, love, and participation, which includes everything in it. It descends upon a person and gives him a sense of the upper governance, the upper force, the higher purpose.

The upper radiance brings us a sense of belonging to the general force of nature called the Creator and makes one feel on a completely different level.

The Book of Zohar leads a person to connect with the Creator. To a certain extent, it can be called an instruction on how to connect with the upper force, to reveal it. You don’t need anything else in this world.

Therefore, it is called Zohar, that is, the radiance one receives from the correct revelation of the Creator. It gradually influences us, corrects, builds, forms and fulfills us.
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From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 2/15/22

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Question: Some states pass laws against magic and shamanism. Do you support such laws?

Answer: Yes, but the fact is that the law says nothing. We adopt so many beautiful, good laws around the world—in the UN, in the European community, and so on. And what’s the point?

The main thing is that we accept these good laws upon ourselves. I think that no one in the world can say that he is against the ten commandments of the Torah: “Thou shalt not kill,” “Honor your parents,” and so on. But who actually uses them? Where is it accepted?

A person is an egoist and he immediately perceives any rule that he hears in accordance with his egoism, and subordinates it to his ego.

Question: Why does a person have a great interest in the other world?

Answer: On one hand it is connected with us. On the other hand it has not been studied by us at all and we cannot have any clear interactions with it. Where can I find this upper world? How can I influence it? What can I even do with it? I don’t know anything about it.

But the craving for everything hidden is inherent in human nature, like a child is drawn to what is incomprehensible, to what is unknown and can give him some kind of fulfillment.
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From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 2/1/22

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What are some interesting characteristics of Jewish people?“

Israel has the world’s highest rate of kidney donations to strangers, which serves as an example of a paradox: On one hand, we find such displays of sensitivity and support in Israel, and on the other hand, we see a place where people’s egos often collide. How do these two extremes coexist?

It is indeed characteristic of Jews, who both rise to the sky and also fall into the depths of the abyss. Our nature is such that we cannot be only in one extreme, but since we were originally established as a people who reached a state of unity above our divisive drives, then it becomes characteristic of us to hold two opposites within ourselves.

We now have to make all possible efforts in order to elevate ourselves from the depths of the abyss, i.e. from immersion in our egoism—our desire to enjoy at the expense of each other—to correct our egoism, and instead use our desires to bring benefit to others.

We have the ability to invert everything that appears negative to its positive, i.e., to the benefit of others, with the help of the intention. The intention is the thought of what we wish to get out of a certain action, and a good intention is one where we aim to benefit others through our actions. Likewise, every person has the ability to conduct their every action with a good intention for the benefit of others. It is thus worthwhile for us to exercise this ability—to engage in building environments that nurture the creation of a good intention—in order to reach a more harmonious, peaceful and happier state of existence.

Based on the video “How Two Extremes Can Exist in the Same Place” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman and Oren Levi. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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War teaches us how much the common force, the mutual inclusion, the unification of people, is more powerful than the force of an individual who wants to rule over the community. There is a war between the general and the particular. And to the extent that the strength of the community overcomes the strength of the individual, this will determine the outcome of the war.

Previously, human society was always ruled by two rulers: power and money. But now, it suddenly turns out that truth does not win on the side where there is more money and more physical strength, that is, weapons, but on the third side, where there is power of unification.

Only this power is above all. There are no physical or financial wars left in the way of our development, only the war for unification. The unification will show us the correct state of human society in which everything will be fine and everyone will be satisfied.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/14/22, “Winning the War (Against the Evil Inclination)”

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When the desire to receive begins to develop from zero, at first it is only a desire to preserve its existence. Then an intention is added to this desire. Why am I doing this? Why do I need it?

The initial degrees of the desire to receive care only about their existence; the inanimate, vegetative, and animate degrees are not called evil. This is just nature, and there is no evil in the nature of plants and animals. It may seem so to a person, but animals do not have an evil intention to harm another. Even if a predator attacks prey, it initially does not have the goal of harming it, it just wants to satisfy its hunger and nothing more.

However, the desire to receive directed at using another and enjoying harming others is the egoism of the human level. Therefore, we develop starting from the fact that we just want to take something away from others. But this is not called real evil yet because I want to take his possession simply because I like it myself. I have no intention of hurting the other, I just want to please myself.

Only when I want to harm another and receive joy from his humiliation, from his pain, then the real vile egoism begins. It turns out that in order to reach true evil, we need to develop our egoism.

This is why our world is now entering a stage where people are beginning to enjoy humiliating each other. I do not need your possessions, but I want you to feel that I am above you and you have to obey me.

An even higher degree is when I will do everything to ensure that you obey and serve me with gratitude. Although you do not want to love me, I will force you! These are real Klipot, impure forces.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/14/22, “Winning the War (Against the Evil Inclination)”

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Medium published my new article “Why Is the Purim Holiday Today More Relevant Than Ever?”

Costumes, masks, double identities. Behind the joyful celebration of Purim there is a profound story about good and evil. Unlocking its secret meaning can save the world today especially when reality looks so gloomy and uncertain.

Thus, this holiday is meaningful not only to the Jewish people, but to all of humanity.

The customary reading of “The Scroll of Esther” during the Purim festival does not merely celebrate an event that happened a long time ago. Instead, it describes a spiritual state not yet apparent that stands before us and that will be discovered as soon as we unite. Indeed, Megilat Ester or The Scroll of Esther refers to “the revelation of the concealed,” because in Hebrew, “guilui” means revelation, and “ester” from “hastara” means concealment.

In the story of Purim Haman raised the claim to King Ahasuerus that the Jews should be killed because they were separated, and were thus deemed unnecessary: “There is a certain people, scattered and dispersed.”

In response, Mordechai appealed to King Ahasuerus for mercy on the Jews through Queen Esther, but she said it was impossible for her to help them as long as they remained dispersed and not united. So Mordechai went on a mission to pass on this call for unity of the Jewish people. When they eventually come together and unite, Esther was able to persuade King Ahasuerus to have mercy on them.

As with all the stories from the Torah, the characters and the interaction between them represent attributes and powers that play out in our thoughts, desires, attitudes, and relationships. Mordechai symbolizes a positive force that cares deeply for everyone because the future of the world depends on the development of the sublime qualities of love and giving, and on the development of a perfect integral connection between all parts of reality and all human beings. On the other hand, evil Haman symbolizes the negative force, an egoistic tendency to control everyone else, to bend everyone under us, to take everything that is possible from them, to exploit them to our advantage.

“Man is a small world,” our sages explained. It means that within each of us lie all these forces described in The Scroll of Esther, even if we do not feel them. They define the direction of development that will save us from the egoistic struggles of self-benefit at the expense of others, which threaten to degenerate the human race into self-extinction.

The more we develop, the more these powers intensify. The ruthless will to rule and control increasingly surfaces within people and great forces of separation operate to tear us apart. Therefore, the core message of the Purim story is that unity will be our salvation, and that our neglect in overcoming the differences between us endangers, harms, and may even annihilate us.

In other words, the elevated state that humanity is so eager to achieve and that is so desperately needed these days is concealed now. As soon as we learn to connect properly with one another, above our egoism, we will remove the root of all evil from our lives, and a world of all good will be revealed.
Happy Purim to all!
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Question: What is war in spirituality? Is war a natural human state?

Answer: War is the most natural state, up to the complete correction of the world. After all, the world consists of two opposite forces: plus-minus, day-night, etc. By any signs, any quality can always be decomposed into its opposite and into antagonistic relations between them.

Comment: Enlightenment philosophers Thomas Hobbes and Jean-Jacques Rousseau looked at humanity differently. Thomas Hobbes said that war is a human condition, a person is born in it. And Jean-Jacques Rousseau believed that this is just a derivative of circumstances and environment, but in itself a person is good.

My Response: The whole of nature consists of two opposing forces that are in a certain state of relative equilibrium with each other. This balance is constantly being disturbed and partially restored again. This is called life.

For millions of years, negative and positive forces alternately dominated each other until they came into balance and the planet Earth was formed.

It turns out that war is an absolutely natural state and peace is unnatural. There is no peace in the world. It can be only if we achieve it on the right balance between two opposing forces.
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From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 3/1/22

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My new article on Linkedin “The Scarred Children of the War”

Any war is horrific, but a war that involves civilian casualties is many times more so. Of these civilians, children are the most vulnerable. The war in Ukraine will scar its children and change them forever. Still, I believe that it will plant in them the conviction that war brings nothing good, and there is no way to justify the harm and pain that it inflicts.

In the past, wars meant occupation, plundering of possessions, and enslavement of the captive. Today conquering another country has no benefits. What will you do once you have conquered the capital? You will have to rebuild it after having ruined it yourself.

The advancement of technology and international commerce and industry have made war irrelevant as a means of obtaining supplies and wealth. Today, war is simply redundant, and I believe that today’s children sense this very deeply through their parents and through everything that they themselves are experiencing. The blasts, the blood, and the corpses on the street, the biting cold, the fear, and the uncertainty are injuring their souls, and they will pass the scars they carry on to their children and their children’s children.

Even children who are not under an immediate threat of rockets and bombs are sensing what is happening. Humanity is a single body; when organs in that body fight against each other, the whole body suffers, and the whole body learns the lessons. Therefore, I hope the lessons that the children of the war are learning through pain will sink into the consciousness of all of humanity, and everyone, around the world, will understand and feel the futility of war.

The next generation will feel that instead of fighting, they would be better off complementing each other’s needs by trading. They will know that only through cooperation can they succeed in this world.

The insights that today’s children are gaining are priceless. My only regret is that they are gaining them through pain. I wish that we could teach them this through simple education, but life has chosen a different mode of teaching for them.

Still, if we can understand what reality is teaching us—that brute force no longer leads to victory, but rather collaboration and mutual complementation—without experiencing brute force firsthand, it will help us transition to a new state of mind where war is not part of the paradigm. It will help us, and it will help our children even more.
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The meaning of blessings before and after a meal is that we do not forget that we are in a constant, multifaceted, absolute connection with the upper force, and therefore, we should relate to it in this way.

In all cases of life, at every, even the smallest, step, in each of our movements, internal or external, we must feel that we are interacting with it.

Question: Do even such animalistic actions like eating food still need to be blessed?

Answer: But we can translate this action from animalistic to human. If I feel that I receive this from the Creator in order to revive my body and I begin to act in it in the direction of ascent to the Creator, to attainment of the Creator, then it is not just animal consumption of some calories.

It is written in the primary sources that concealment and revelation of the Creator testifies to what I say: either I bless the Creator or curse Him. It turns out that if the Creator is revealed to a man, then he involuntarily blesses Him. And if concealed, then he involuntarily curses Him.

The fact is that the Creator can be concealed and a person does not even want His revelation because he is afraid that it will bring him down and harm him in his good deeds. Therefore, the concealment or revelation of the Creator is not so unambiguous in the sense that if the Creator is revealed, then I will be righteous, and if concealed, I will be a sinner. This is partially true, but only partially.

It is possible that a man will reach such a state when he will be able to bless the Creator also from the states of concealment.
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From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 2/8/22

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