Joshua Goldstein, Chairman of the US Division of Herut North America, meets with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman to discuss the dream society built by Jews.
Joshua Goldstein, Chairman of the US Division of Herut North America, meets with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman to discuss the Jews’ responsibility for building a network of positive connection in the world.
Joshua Goldstein, Chairman of the US Division of Herut North America, meets with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman to discuss the origins of anti-Semitism and the essence of being Jewish.
Joshua Goldstein, Chairman of the US Division of Herut North America, meets with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman to discuss the unity of Jews, and awareness of how it influences the world.
Joshua Goldstein, Chairman of the US Division of Herut North America, meets with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman to discuss the origins of anti-Semitism and its role in directing Jews toward unity.
From My Facebook Page Michael Laitman 10/23/19
I met with Joshua Goldstein, Chairman of the US Division of Herut North America, to discuss the origins of anti-Semitism and the essence of being Jewish.
The wisdom of Kabbalah states that Jews have a specific role—to reestablish and reveal to all humanity the method of building positive connections between people above the constantly growing human ego, and by this reveal the upper force of love and bestowal.
Why should we believe it? Is there any practical proof that this is what Jews are obliged to do? What if they don’t want to do it?
The laws of nature don’t ask anyone to agree with them. They just exist and function. The states laid out in nature unfold, and according to natural development, today we face a deep and comprehensive crisis of human relations caused by the tremendous growth of the human ego. If it keeps going this way, we’ll destroy ourselves.
Therefore, the only way to deal with the current situation is to implement the method of connection revealed by Abraham to the group of people collected out of 70 nations living in ancient Babylon 3,800 years ago: the Jews. This means that the Jewish people have a specific place in the structure of nature giving them an explicit duty, and if they refuse or fail to perform their role, the whole world will react with extreme pressure and forceful demand for Jews to bring the system to balance.
Therefore, indeed, the role of the Jewish people is that they have to develop a sense of a single unity and drive the whole world toward connection.
The Times of Israel published my new article “What We Can Learn from the Deadly Attack Outside the Halle Synagogue”
The shooting attack near a synagogue in Halle, Germany was yet another dreadful act of anti-Semitism on the holiest day of the Jewish calendar. However, it could have been much worse if the 27-year-old attacker, who identified with the far-right, had broken the synagogue’s doors and slaughtered the 80 worshipers who were conducting the Yom Kippur prayers.
In a video he shot leading up to the shooting, the attacker denied the Holocaust, denounced feminists and immigrants and stated outright that “the root of all these problems is the Jew.”
Upon news of the two people who were shot to death, condemnations came one after another, from German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas tweeting that “shots being fired at a synagogue on Yom Kippur, the festival of reconciliation, hits us in the heart,” and “we must all act against anti-Semitism in our country,” through Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu commenting for a “call on the German authorities to continue taking determined action against anti-Semitism.”
Among all the cries, prayers and warmth for the victims’ families, there is a clear demand for a significant shift to take place against the anti-Semitism that has rapidly spread worldwide. However, other than desperate words, there is an air of helplessness in the face of the growing phenomenon.
Helplessness. Desperation. They sound like very undesirable feelings. But could it be that such sensations are actually a positive outcome of the exponentially rising anti-Semitic crimes and threats?
Perhaps when we are repeatedly stunned by an irrational phenomenon that has haunted our people for generations—one which makes no differentiation between genders, between Yom Kippur and a weekday, and between synagogues in Berlin and Pittsburgh—then maybe this is what will goad us to look into what the Kabbalists have been trying to tell us for generations?
Whether in The Book of Zohar or other Kabbalistic texts, what have the Kabbalists been trying to communicate to the Jewish people? Simply put, if we Jews unite with one another, we invite a positive force dwelling in nature to spread not only among each other, but among all humanity. By awakening nature’s positive, unifying force through our unity, we can bring peace to the world. On the contrary, if divided, where every Jew remains within him- or herself in his or her own prayers, then we provoke the opposite: hatred and conflict. As Kabbalist Rabbi Yitzhak Isaac Haver wrote, “Creation and choice, correction and destruction of the world—all depends on Israel” (Siach Yitzhak. Part 2, Likutim 1).
Hours after the deadly shooting attack, German chancellor Angela Merkel attended a vigil to identify with the victims at a historic synagogue in central Berlin. She stood with the Jewish community as they together sang, “Ose shalom be Meromav” (“make peace in His heaven”). Ironically, sometimes the answer to our toughest questions can be found right under our noses. Sometimes we need only open our ears and listen to the words we’re singing…
Amen.
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The Times of Israel published my new article “Jewish Post-Trauma: The Cause, Diagnosis and Cure”
Post-trauma from recurring anti-Semitic incidents, the Holocaust and the pogroms has permeated entire generations of Jews. In Israel, anxiety and traumatic events are part of the daily reality affecting children, adolescents and the population in general. The average Israeli has experienced or knows someone victim of terror or war. Drugs may numb symptoms of this phenomenon, but the real cure can only come from our unique capacity to build a safety net when we connect as a Jewish nation.
Israel has the strongest army in the world, yet it provides no immunity from the trauma of losing a friend in combat, or the constant gray cloud of threats from enemies inside and outside the country. Loads of combatants at various levels are exposed to anxiety, from adults and seniors who have participated in Israeli wars in the past, to young men who have completed combat service.
The phenomenon, however, is much broader than merely the Israeli army. It includes all of us. We are a nation living in trauma on a daily basis. It is not only due to the permanent threat that has engulfed the State of Israel since its establishment, and not just because of the hidden fear of occasional violence and terror. We are constantly traumatized for being Jewish.
The trauma that grips us—from the threatening future, the hostile present or the haunting past—permeates all avenues of the nation. Children attend kindergarten in areas attacked by rockets, breathe hidden panic in the atmosphere, quickly drop everything and run to shelters whenever warning sirens sound nearby, and shiver whenever the alarms sound on their phones that another rocket has penetrated a more remote part of the country. The trauma is already within us, whether or not we’re conscious of it.
We tend to take pride in our Israeli roughness, the outward toughness. But those who feel safe do not need such armor. They can afford to be outwardly sensitive as well. This is another symptom of Jewish trauma: the need to defend, fortify and play tough so as to not get hurt.
Why is this happening to us? Who are we Jews? Where did we come from and where are we headed? What is it all for? What is the purpose of this world? What is our role toward the world?
We must answer these questions distinctly, and reach the realization of our important role in humanity, even if it seems like a heavy weight on our shoulders. On the contrary, the implementation of our role will make our current difficult reality become lighter and more pleasant.
The prophet Jonah, whose story we read on Yom Kippur, also suffered from trauma. His story, which describes our experiences, began with the mission he received from God: to warn the people of Nineveh to turn away from their evil ways and begin to act as reality requires—with mutual affection.
Jonah tried to flee from his destiny. He boarded a ship that sailed far into the sea, and his escape caused a storm. The sailors on board realized that the cause of the storm, which created much hardship, was the “Jew” on their ship. Thus, they threw him out to sea. A whale swallowed Jonah. While in the whale’s stomach, Jonah underwent an arduous self-scrutiny until he agreed to carry out the role assigned to him. Afterward, the whale brought him to safety, to the city of Nineveh.
The story of Jonah is the story of the people of Israel.
We have a role that has always accompanied us: to establish unity among us, and serve as an example to the world. However, we try to avoid this role. Therefore, every time the world suffers from a given crisis, minor or major, it marks us Jews as guilty for the trouble. Also, every accusation we face becomes a trauma that accumulates over and over in our Jewish experience, whether or not we feel it.
Our destiny is inevitable. It is the result of rigorous laws of nature written in the Kabbalah books. We must learn them in order to understand what we have to do, otherwise we will continue experiencing amassing blows from the nations of the world.
It is correct to treat the entire Jewish nation as suffering from trauma. We should not blur the problem, but accelerate the understanding that healing such trauma depends on developing an upgraded, unified approach to each other and reality as a whole.
Yom Kippur is a time of introspection, both for individuals and for the Jewish nation as a whole. We can use the time for self-examination at Yom Kippur to positively affect our destiny if we also agree to realize our role, unite and become “a light unto the nations.”
By raising awareness and working on uniting among each other, we will satisfy humanity’s demands upon us and radiate a positive light to the world, as it is written, “for they are life to those who find them and health to all their flesh” (Proverbs 4:22).
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The Times of Israel published my new article “Anti-Semitism in Australia: The Deeper Cause and Solution”
Two anti-Semitic events involving children that hit Australia in the past week are just the tip of the iceberg showing a worldwide boost in anti-Semitic sentiment, crimes and threats.
The first was a 5-year-old who was revealed to be subject to anti-Semitic bullying at his school’s bathrooms regularly for months. It reached such scales where the boy would wet his pants in class rather than use the bathroom to avoid the ridicule. All it took was his classmates finding out that he was circumcised for the abuse to begin, which included calling him a “Jewish cockroach.”
At another school, a 12-year-old Jewish student was taken to the park by his classmates, who forced him to bend over and kiss the shoes of a Muslim boy. Of course, the act was photographed and spread on social media. In the months following, the child suffered from anti-Semitic slander, physical assaults, threats and curses. Beyond an injury to his face, which ended with a visit to the hospital, the child began to suffer from acute anxiety.
In both cases, the schools denied involvement in the incidents, and faced minor backlash from the Jewish children’s parents and Jewish organizations. Both Jewish children eventually left the schools.
Despite these events coming to light in the media, there is no guarantee of a safeguard from future such events. We are left with no reason to believe that other Jewish children won’t face similar or worse bullying.
The 2018 Anti-Semitism Report of the Kantor Center reported an unprecedented 59% increase in anti-Semitism cases in Australia compared to the previous year. The cases included phone and email harassment and threats, verbal abuse, vandalism, and anti-Semitic posters and graffiti spreading in the public sphere unimpeded.
These are just some of the cases. Most cases are not reported at all, and Jews continue encountering harassment and curses on a regular basis whether on their way to synagogues on Shabbat, whether at Jewish festivals or other Jewish events.
It’s no wonder that Jews and Israelis living in Australia are starting to feel uncomfortable, to say the least.
I have quite a few students and friends there. Debbie and Avi are part of a large Jewish and Israeli community, living in Bondi Beach in Sydney. Debbie stated that she shivered when she saw the pews of Sydney’s northwestern neighborhoods covered with swastikas and graffiti that call for killing Jews.
Aviva and her family also migrated to Australia a decade ago in her work for a small town near Byron Bay, which has a large community of Israelis. One day when Aviva was sitting in a little café, as she usually did, she was surprised to discover a swastika adorning her coffee. When she asked the waiter what this meant, he explained that Hitler was basically pursuing peace and equality, and his ideas had good intentions.
Apparently, even in a stable and tolerant democracy, in which Jews are free to maintain their beliefs and customs, there is reason to fear. Again, we find that Jews have nowhere else in the world to escape and shake off their role.
The wisdom of Kabbalah explains that Jews have a special role in the human puzzle: “Israel’s purpose is to unite the entire world into one family,” writes Rabbi Kook. The people of Israel are a special people who rose with the common agreement to love one another and live “as one man with one heart.”
The method of uniting the Jewish people, which can also unite humanity, has been instilled in us Jews. Therefore, it is our duty to use it, and to bring about the long-awaited union between us—to set an example for a humanity that is suffering from increasing division and hatred. But as long as we continue letting ourselves get driven into conflict with each other, failing to transcend our egos and connect with each other, anti-Semitism intensifies and gives us a hard reminder that we have a role.
The only way to stop and even reverse the rising trend of anti-Semitism around the world is if we Jews realize our unity above our growing divisions, and to spread this unifying tendency to the world.
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The Times of Israel published my new article “How Kabbalah Explains Anti-Semitism”
The wisdom of Kabbalah explains that anti-Semitism first surfaced together with the emergence of the Jewish people around 4,000 years ago in ancient Babylon. Also, Kabbalah explains anti-Semitism as a natural phenomenon that ignites especially at times when the world needs more unification, subconsciously expecting unity to come from the Jews.
Understanding Kabbalah’s explanation of anti-Semitism means being aware of how the attainment of unity 4,000 years ago differentiates the Jewish people from other nations. It also means recognizing that the stature of a united people, which the Jews attained, remained with them throughout history.
Ancient Babylonian society experienced life-threatening division due to an outburst of the human ego, i.e. the desire to enjoy at the expense of others.
Seemingly out of nowhere, without warning, people simply started hating each other.
The story of the Tower of Babel describes how ancient Babylonian society experienced chaos when the human ego blinded people into prioritizing their self-interests over the interests of society. No one could consider other people’s needs, and society moved head on toward ruin.
Among the social turbulence, a Babylonian priest emerged—Abraham.
Abraham explained the cause of the social division and hatred that was spreading among the people of the time as being rooted in the growing human ego. He also promoted the fact that he had discovered a method for rising above the ego, uniting, and discovering the single force of nature through such unity.
Abraham called for people to rise above their conflicts, unite, and made his teachings available to whoever wanted to join in this process.
The Essence of Abraham’s Method: Love Will Cover All Transgressions
As I mentioned, the human ego is a desire to enjoy at the expense of others. It is embedded in every person from birth. This ego grows continually over the course of history and throughout our lives. However, the ego undergoes periods of exponential growth bursts, as well as periods of more stable growth.
The essence of Abraham’s method is the person’s elevation above the human ego in order to attain unity with other people and nature, thereby experiencing a harmonious life.
Moreover, by using Abraham’s method, we can rise above the ego in advance of the ego’s growth, in order to ensure a peaceful unified life, and not fall to the destructive patterns that come from a bigger ego dictating its demands, which causes increasing hatred and division.
The group that implemented Abraham’s method became known as “Jews” (“Yehudim”) from the word for “unity” (“yichud”). By uniting, they attracted the force of nature. (In Kabbalah, “God” [“Elokim”] and “nature” [“HaTeva”] have the same meaning. This is reflected in Gematria as the words for “God” and “nature” have the same numerical value.)
Abraham called that group, “Israel,” which translates to “Yashar Kel” (“straight to God”), i.e. a group aimed directly at the attainment, understanding and sensation of the upper force.
Many people who lived in ancient Babylon and followed Abraham dispersed around the world, and they received the name “the nation of Israel.” The nation of Israel is not a nation in the biological sense. It is a gathering of many people who lived in ancient Babylon, who experienced the confusion and division that existed during the period of the Tower of Babel, and who implemented Abraham’s method to unite above their divisions.
Also, what does it mean that Abraham’s group dispersed around the world?
It means that after attaining a degree of unity at the time, they experienced a further growth spurt of the ego that divided them 200 years later in what is known as “the ruin of the Temple.” They were expelled from Babylon after they stopped following Abraham’s method. They entered a state of unfounded hatred, and accordingly, dispersed around the world.
If the nation of Israel fails to sustain their unity above all problems, divisions, confusions and conflicts, then they fail to hold the condition that identifies them a nation.
Anti-Semitism: A Force that Holds the Jewish People Together
The nation of Israel has no natural unifying sensation as do other nations. Therefore, what can demarcate the nation of Israel while they’re detached from each other?
It is precisely the hatred toward us Jews from other nations.
If we would experience no such hatred, we would try to vanish in all directions until we would completely lose our identification as a Jewish nation. This inclination to lose our national identity happens to no other nation but our own.
Today, the twelve tribes of Israel have disappeared. Only two are left, which is about 20% of what once existed. The fact that the nation of Israel has sustained a degree of identification as a Jewish people, even that minimal extent of connection, has given us a certain spark of the sensation of the unifying force that we once attained—the force of nature that dwells between all parts of reality.
This tiny illumination has somewhat positioned the Jewish people in the world differently to other nations. For instance, it is the reason for the Jews’ disproportionate success compared to other nations.
How Kabbalah Explains the Cause and Solution to Anti-Semitism
The wisdom of Kabbalah explains the phenomenon of the role of Jews in the world, and how the cause and solution to anti-Semitism relates to the Jews’ success or failure in realizing their role.
As the world becomes increasingly integrated, humanity looks more and more like a single global organism experiencing two conflicting tendencies: increasing interdependence vs. increasing division and hatred.
While the world endures this growing rift and the need for positive connection rises dramatically, since the Jews once achieved unity above division by implementing Abraham’s method, the Jews are expected to once again bring unity to the world. Otherwise, a widespread threat of destruction grows all the more imminent.
Therefore, anti-Semitism, the hatred toward Jews, awakens in the nations of the world in order to express their need for unity and their dependence on the Jewish people to pioneer a process of global unity.
Hatred toward Jews thus becomes fiercer and more intense the more society experiences negative effects from its growing division. The nations of the world simply feel that the Jews somehow block their experience of a happier and better life.
However, neither the nations of the world nor the Jews know about this core reason for anti-Semitism that Kabbalah explains.
If you ask Jews today, they won’t tell you that they have a method of unifying humanity above its growing divisions at their fingertips.
Anti-Semites, too, will often only point out reasons for their hatred of Jews that don’t point directly to their core, e.g. that they’re not anti-Semitic but that the State of Israel is the problem, or that Jews hold too much influence in their nation’s governance, politics, finance, commerce and other fields, as well as many other reasons for Jew-hatred.
The wisdom of Kabbalah points to the core reason for anti-Semitism: the need for the Jewish people to unite for the sake of humanity’s unity, and their failure to do so when it’s required of them.
Over thousands of years, the wisdom of Kabbalah was concealed. Today, however, it has become revealed because today we have grown up into a global world, and we have all the conditions necessary in order to implement this method.
Therefore, the wisdom of Kabbalah surfaces widely today in order to explain where anti-Semitism originates, what its solution is, and how we can implement the solution to experience a more peaceful and harmonious world by uniting above our growing divisions.
It is my hope that, sooner rather than later, we will learn the ways of uniting above our divisions and realize what a wonderful world we truly live in when we’re freed from our egoistic impulses.
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