David asks:

Please explain the phrase that the Torah is given for sinners. And if I do not feel like a sinner, does that mean I cannot study the Torah?

Answer: You can study the Torah. But for the Torah to teach you, you need to feel a little bit like a sinner.

Question: And there is no way around this?

Answer: That is why it is given.

Question: So I should need it?

Answer: Yes.

Question: What if I need it for knowledge? There is so much in it.

Answer: No, knowledge has nothing to do with it. The Torah is needed only for correction, for extracting the egoism from a person, and for making a person stand before the Creator one-on-one.

Question: So the path I take through the Torah is my path to the Creator?

Answer: Yes.

Question: Did He intentionally give the Torah specifically to sinners? Was it given precisely when we sinned?

Answer: Essentially we are born sinners. And then as we gradually recognize ourselves as sinners, we can appreciate the Torah, its depth, its power, and its ability to correct.

Question: What does studying the Torah mean to you? “I study the Torah…”. What does it mean?

Answer: I study the Torah, which means I act so that the Torah penetrates me and I can absorb its words, its strength, and its convictions. So that this becomes an unshakable part of me, and I think only about how to implement what is written in it. That is, essentially, what we must do.

Question: If you reduce it to something very simple and concise, can you say what is written in it?

Answer: About love, but not in our usual sense.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 4/15/24

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Question: Translations do not give me anything. Even though I do not understand Hebrew, I try to feel the Hebrew letters. And this has an effect.

Can translations serve as a conduit for feelings? Should we still read, for example, The Book of Zohar in the original Hebrew and try to feel it?

Answer: Yes and no. It is not necessary. The Book of Zohar will start to appear before you as a network of forces and attributes within and around you, like an internal and external matrix, and you will begin to feel it.

Question: Do you feel this clearly when you read The Zohar?

Answer: Of course! It is such a power! I am simply astonished, in awe, trying to understand, accept, and interact with it in some way, somewhere, somehow. It is as if you are in some inner and outer space with which you interact.

You study it.

Question: But do you get some kind of satisfaction from this? Or is it a completely different sensation?

Answer: There is no satisfaction comparable to this.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Unlimited Bliss“ 3/7/10

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Compared to other parts of nature, a human being is a creature that rises above its animalistic side and becomes a social element by creating society, state, and family, not just a temporary family for reproduction, like animals, but a long-term family. Then he develops industry, science, art, etc. Everything that exists within a person is the makings for one’s elevation to a spiritual level through the connection of one’s  inner parts.

How does this happen? We exist in our world to push a person toward returning to the spiritual state where one was initially. First, we create various communication systems between us, such as trade, financial systems, etc. We engage in wars and alliances just to understand how we can progress.

After undergoing multiple splits and disappointment in the ability to unite properly, we turn to Kabbalah. The first to turn to it was Adam, 5,780 years ago. He was the first to reveal this system.

The system’s design is providing humanity with the means to connect correctly. This connection, known as a mutual guarantee or Arvut, can be achieved similarly to how inanimate, vegetative, and animate levels achieve connection within the systems existing in our world. If we study these systems, we will see that they operate according to mutual guarantee. For example, each part of the human body is responsible for the entire organism. Feeling its responsibility, it automatically acts as needed to maintain the physiological life of all other parts. That is why the body exists.

However, when the connection between parts of the organism fails, a person immediately becomes ill. And if the interconnection between cells and internal systems further fails, the person dies. The same applies to society. This law operates at all levels.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson 2/17/20, “Preparation for the Convention”

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Preparation to the Lesson

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1st part of the Lesson — Writings of Baal HaSulam, “The Last Generation”

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2nd part of the Lesson — Writings of Rabash, “Letters 38-1”

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All of us, all of humanity, originate from one common desire that shattered into tiny particles, and each of them represents one of us. Therefore, we must reconnect these particles.

To the extent that we can rise above each person’s egoism and start working on our desires toward a collective connection to become similar to the Creator, the Creator will be able to clothe in us as we get closer to each other.

That is what we need to achieve. Essentially, this is the subject of the wisdom of Kabbalah. It explains how we ended up in our current state, how we can connect into a single system, and how the Creator fills us as we unite into this system.

In this process, our egoism does not disappear; it develops even further, and we must connect above it despite its presence. Then, we will represent a single unified desire composed of many desires.

Our connection is always above egoism. As egoism grows, we must rise even higher to unite our aspirations. Thus, egoism is called “help against you” because it pushes us toward greater unity, and in this way, we can reveal the Creator even more between us.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson 2/17/20, “Preparation for the Convention”

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Question: How can one become righteous in the family?

Answer: Make an agreement with your wife, and she will turn you into a righteous. I am speaking quite seriously. If the wife wants to, she will systematically influence her husband in every matter, in every action, and he will involuntarily correct himself.

Question: We learn that everyone goes through ascents and descents. Presumably, a woman does too. She may not always be able to influence her husband. What should be done during these moments of decline?

Answer: Of course, mutual effort is necessary here as both want to make their family correct and righteous so that their children become the same.

Therefore, go ahead and act, and you will succeed.
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From KabTV’s “Man and Women” 5/14/24

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People differ from animals in that in addition to desires for food, sex, shelter, and procreation, they also have so-called social desires for wealth, power, and knowledge, which can be satisfied at the expense of the surrounding society.

These additional social desires called the human desires of our world can be either directed toward subjugating society, suppressing it, being above it, or toward raising oneself, one’s development, in the likeness of nature, in adhesion with the environment, in connection with society for its benefit.

And here a paradox arises: when I act for the benefit of society, I begin to feel everything that is in it, inside me, and I enrich myself internally. And if I exploit people around me, then I do not rise above them, but on the contrary, being on my animal level, I suppress human qualities in them.

This is where the difference appears in what a man spends his additional desires on. He does it either to improve his corporeal life—create comfort for himself, supposedly take care of the environment, develop engineering, technology, and so on—or none of this simply matters to him.

For him, only internal development matters—how to realize himself. After all, how many years does he live on this earth? Anyway, his body will rot, his house will fall apart, etc. Why should he think about something that is transitory? He should think about the eternal! About what he can develop in himself and what he really can achieve the next stage, his eternal state, which is realized only in our world.

Precisely in contrast to his preferences: “What should I turn myself into: for the benefit of others or for their detriment? For the benefit of my animal or spiritual state? So that I reach the Creator and become similar to Him through love for my neighbor or so that I love myself and indulge myself in everything until the last moment of my life? This is the choice!

But the choice is precisely in relation to the desires that are beyond necessities. Nobody talks about how much I should eat or sleep. I should not live in a cave. I must have a family, normal food, and clothes. That is all. Nothing more is said about this. It is said: “Where are you heading other than this?”

Man’s freedom of will consists in preferring the choice of activities. This is what determines whether he is a spiritual or an earthly person.

People who strive for spirituality feel haunted by the question about the meaning of life. A person must answer it; otherwise, he feels no point in living. In other words, there is no point in using one’s qualities to become rich, powerful, or even smart. So what? I will die and that is it. Why waste my life on this?

And many do not want to. They either fall into depression, drugs, and even alcoholism, or they are still looking for a way out.

And here comes a kind of luck, a quality of fate that leads them to the method of revealing their correct realization.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. The Dead-end Path of Human Development” 1/24/12

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Question: The Midrash Rabbah says: “She went and married a wicked man, and she turned him righteous.” Why can a woman make one righteous and another wicked?

Answer: This is not really a question for me. The point is that in the end, everything depends on the woman. If she wants, she will control her husband in such a way that he will become a righteous man.

Question: Does the woman decide for herself, or does the Creator direct her this way?

Answer: We do not know that. It is not important. The main thing is that the husband sees her instructions.

Question: What if he does not see her instructions?

Answer: This means that she does not act, does not put pressure on him. Every woman can influence her man. We believe that the man is the leader in the family, that he is in charge of everything, but this is only how it seems to us.

This can be compared to a very beautiful car the appearance of which everyone admires but no one looks at the engine inside. A woman is such an engine

Question: Can a man somehow influence a woman if he also wants to become a righteous person or if they want this together?

Answer: If they want it together, then maybe. There are many different tricks here. But basically, this is the prerogative of women.

Question: So you need to adapt to “her voice”?

Answer: You cannot say that you need to adapt. That is just how life works. But if they both decided to become righteous, then mutual work certainly takes place between them.
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From KabTV’s “Man and Women” 5/14/24

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