Entries in the 'Daily Kabbalah Lesson' Category

Knowledge, Not Orders

Dr. Michael LaitmanLeading the spiritual process, we neither “impose arrangements” on the masses nor give out orders to anyone. We only pass knowledge on to people.

For a few hours a day I study reports and analytical articles on the events transpiring in the world today. I don’t take everything for granted, but perform my own analysis, forming my own view on the affairs, which form the basis upon which I act.

In exactly the same manner we leave people the freedom of opinion. We merely pass the method to them, which Nature itself “imposes” upon us. This method is based on scientific research.

For instance, many of the things I read now are familiar to me from my studies of systems laws and cybernetics. Cybernetics is a science about systems and their regulation in different diapasons: biological, mechanical, natural, ecological, and so on. Numerous formulas describe certain levels of regulation: input, output, and sought-for state. It relates to rocket launch, movement under certain conditions, and so on.…

Suppose a train has to reach point B from point A using the least amount of fuel, with minimal wear and tear on mechanisms, going at a minimum and maximum speed at rail junctions, without sudden braking or acceleration. Optimal fulfillment of, say, twenty similar conditions is one of the problems of the correct regulation. In our organism, thousands of parameters balance each other and come down to a unified formula called “life” according to the same principle.

So, today we have to explain to all people what will happen if we do not fulfill the formula of mutual guarantee—to the extent that it is becoming revealed to us today. In reality, we are talking about the corrected and balanced Malchut of the world of Infinity, but we are guided by the current moment. By ignoring the formula of mutual guarantee, we will suffer a loss; we simply must learn to comply to its parameters.

Therefore, our approach is informative. This is how students are taught in a university as well so that later they could apply the received knowledge in life. A person needs to learn reciprocity in his interrelationships with others, and he has to learn it himself without receiving leaflets from us.

Today there are virtually no professions that require no intelligence from a person. After all, he is not an animal. Let him dig a hole, but even here besides physical strength, he needs the head.

Hence, by training people to interact correctly, we present them a field of action for the mind and feelings. We do not leave them at the animate level since mutual guarantee relates to the human degree: Namely the human within me ponders how to co-exist with others. We are talking about an inner, sensual development.

It is not accidental that today people are looking for interconnection, go to demonstrations, and demand social justice and universal unification. This is what they lack, and we explain that this is the dictate of Nature, and according to it, we ourselves have to establish a connection between us. Mutual communication, mutual guarantee, is the law of an integral system we represent.
[53614]
From the 5th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/4/2011, “The Nation”

Related Material:
Only Facts
The Land Beyond The Horizon
Whoever Is Integral Will Come Out On Top

There Are No Breaks In Spirituality

Dr. Michael LaitmanWhen a person attains his first contact with the Creator on some level, meaning the revelation of two opposites together, he immediately needs help from the upper one. The “covenant of circumcision” is merely the first action of the upper one over the lower one.

This is the Light that reveals the upper force as the bestowing and loving one, which stands opposite to the creature’s egoistic desire that wants to use it. But at the same time we now need to reveal a new level of connection between us, attained through the screen and the Reflected Light.

There is still a great deal of work ahead of us, before we attain adhesion. And all this is the work of the creature that evokes the force of the Light to work over it, creating a multitude of step by step corrections of various qualities. We need to understand deeply and thoroughly what we demand that the upper force does with us. After all, the entire meaning of our work is to reveal through it the plan of creation. The process we experience helps us become acquainted with the actual upper force, as it is written: “We will know You by Your actions.”

When we go through all the actions He has prepared for us, we reveal His thought, intention, and the plan of creation through it. This is why every action is followed by another, a more complicated one. There are no actions in the spiritual world that allow you to sit, rest, and enjoy the fruits of completed work, such as the way we allow our egoistic desire to rest a little after the attained pleasure in our world. There is no such thing as breaks in the spiritual world.

There is no notion of time there because we are continually under the pressure of the constantly increasing force of bestowal. There can be periods of weakness and confusion, but it’s impossible to fall from this path and stop doing what’s required.

This is why there is no time. Time is made by alternating swings back and forth, like a clock pendulum that counts interruptions: It stops and hovers in order to swing back. Such breaks do not exist in the spiritual world. The entire spiritual process consists of us connecting Light and darkness together. There are no descents as all the “descents” only happen in order to ascend!

And even when we feel weakness, it is not our fault, but a mandatory condition to reveal a deeper desire. Look how much feeling, weeping, fear, and pleading there is in King David’s Book of Psalms, all this together with the revelation of a new desire that he perceives with joy. Otherwise, it would not have been spiritual.
[53296]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/31/2011, Shamati #95

Related Material:
Evolution Of Consciousness
The Force That Arises From Opposites
“Call Upon Him While He Is Near”

In-Between The Heart And The Mind

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Why is egoism related to “teeth” in spiritual work, as it is written that we need to “break egoism’s teeth?”

Answer: We have 32 “teeth” (Lamed–Bet), the fundamental qualities that “grind,” meaning explore food or fulfillment. This happens after we learn about the kind of fulfillment we can and cannot accept, the amount we can accept for the sake of bestowal and its form. This happens after the final evaluation done by the “lips” (one on top, the other on the bottom) and the tongue in the middle (called the “holy tongue”) that is in the middle line.

Our entire structure reflects the distribution of forces that examine our desires and thoughts. This determines the human form in this world, the imaginary form.

Examination of the fulfillment that we can accept for the sake of bestowal is the “teeth’s” special work, which separate and masticate the desire to receive pleasure as they collide. The mouth is located in the middle between the heart and the mind; it examines and works with thoughts that come from the brain and the desires that come from the heart. And we learn through the proper relation between them what we can accept in the form of the Inner Light as “flavors” (Taamim).

The heart contains desires that have not yet been evaluated finally for correction. The place where correction happens is the mouth. But its most special area is the throat located above the body but below the head, in the place of transition from one to the other. This is why the throat (Garon) sounds like the word “Ger” (one who crosses and joins Isra-El).

It is as though the entire difference between animal and man is contained in the throat, the so-called “speaking” degree that follows the still, vegetative, and animate levels. It’s as if this part I use to speak, the throat, separates me from an animal and makes me human. The entire mind, clarifications, thoughts that stem from the reason, as well as the desires coming from the heart eventually land in the throat, where the entire human essence is concentrated.

The throat contains a special mechanism controlled by the brain by virtue of which we perform clarifications, speak, and sing—essentially, we thus  express our human degree. Everything that exists in our heart and mind is expressed through speech, meaning the throat. One could think: What’s so special about it, considering it simply consists of a pipe, several strings (cords) and muscles?…

But it’s not as simple as it seems. This mechanism of speech needs to understand everything that exists in our mind and heart, and execute it by expressing it. It’s activated by the “five lung areas” from below upward, then it reaches the “five sources in the mouth” (tongue, palate, throat, teeth, and lips). It’s a very complicated spiritual mechanism.
[53323]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/1/2011, Shamati #101

Related Material:
A Lily Among Thorns
Blunting The Illusion Of The Breaking
Holding Your Head Up

A Prayer Is A Desire For Connection

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: If the Creator is my inner property, then who do I raise my prayer to?

Answer: You are raising it to that perfect property which you need to reach. To pray means to desire to obtain some connection with something you want to become closer to. A prayer is a desire, a need for connection, as it is said: “I desire!”

The connection can be external, meaning from a distance, or it can be close and more internal to the extent that there is no difference between us. In either case this is connection. There is nothing else in our reality besides being further or closer to something. I want to distance myself from something bad and be closer to something good to the extent that I become included in him or he becomes included in me.

The way that we feel our connection depends upon the spiritual degrees where we exist. If we sense the upper degree, then it is a more inner connection, where the AHP of the upper one exists in the GE of the lower one. If we sense the lower degree, we enter its inner part and act there.

However, there is nothing other than drawing further away or closer. My entire prayer and all desires are about this: to either become closer to something or distance myself from it.
[53310]
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/1/2011, The Zohar

Related Material:
There Is No Empty Space, All Is Filled With Desires
Walking The Tight Wire Straight To The Creator
Write A Prayer

Reading Is Revelation

Dr. Michael LaitmanThe Zohar, Chapter “VaYakhel (And Moses Assembled),” Item 226: It is forbidden to read in the book of Torah, but only one alone, and everyone listens and keeps silent so that they hear his words as though they had just received it from Mount Sinai. And above the one who is reading the Torah there should be one standing above him, ascending to the Torah, and keeping silent so that only one speaking will be heard and not two.

One should not forget that we are talking about one person. The one who reads the Torah and the one who listens to it, the nation, the Creator and the creature, the mountain and the pillar by which people are praying, all these properties exist in one person. All of them are his inner states. We have to recognize them within ourselves and find out what exactly every word or property relates to.

We are dealing with the revelation of the upper nature to the creature according to the similarity of properties in the degree of the corrections it undergoes. Reading means revelation.

If a person is unable to imagine the true state, it is better to not imagine anything. Otherwise he will begin to imagine a corporeal picture: How they take the book of Torah from a cabinet, bring it to the raised platform from where the Torah is read, and start reading it. That’s all. However, this is not what The Zohar is talking about.

True, these are all symbols reflected in corporeality. However, from them a person has to rise to the original form. Instead of the imaginary world that is being revealed to us now, he needs to reveal the true world: the desire to receive pleasure corrected in all of its parts that manifest in some form, as well as the book of Torah, the revelation of the Light within the desire.

Our desire is constantly changing. It is similar to the letters constantly flying out and becoming revealed, while the vowel marks (Taamim, Nekudot, and Tagin) fill the letters. This way a person reveals the Light within the vessel or desire. This is called the reading the book of Torah, about which it is said that a person has to write the book of Torah on his heart. The heart is all his desires.

Then all my desires, all my properties, and everything existing within me will turn into the letters of Torah. When I want to organize them correctly, I fill these letters with “tastes (Taamim),” “dots (Nekudot),” and “crowns (Tagin).” Then I have the text of the book of the Torah, which I live and sense on myself. This is my spiritual life. The person himself becomes the flow of the text of the Torah. No person is separate from the Torah or separate from the letters of the Torah. All of it is the person himself.
[53173]
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/31/2011, The Zohar

Related Material:
The Book That Connects The Sky And The Earth
How To Understand The Zohar
The Key From The Concealed World

Daily Kabbalah Lesson – 09.05.11

Shamati #118 “To Understand the Matter of the Knees Which Have Bowed Unto Baal”
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio

The Book of Zohar – Selected Chapter “VaYakhel (And Moses Assembled)” “The Firmaments of Assiya,” Item 289, Lesson 15
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio

Talmud Eser Sefirot Part 2, Chapter 2, “Histaklut Pnimit,” Chapter 5, Item 64, Lesson 24
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio

Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah, Item 112, Lesson 49
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio

Writings of Baal HaSulam “The Nation,” (Start with: “This is like the sin of Adam HaRishon…”), Lesson 12
Download: WMV Video|MP3 Audio

Whoever Is Integral Will Come Out On Top

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Do people have any choice left once they’ve heard the explanation of the laws of the integral world?

Answer: No, because these laws do not depend on us. Imagine a fictional scenario where an alien ship is approaching us and is warning us in advance that by the time it reaches us, we have to reach mutual guarantee. And whoever does not is “doomed.” That is exactly how the laws of nature operate: They suddenly become revealed to us and force us to become aware of what is happening.

Nature’s condition is invariable. We have reached the phase of the single system, whose law is the interconnection of all the parts. This is the mutual guarantee, or in other words, mutual support, the proper participation in the common life, mutual understanding and respect, friendship. You can put it any way you like. Say it warmly and pleasantly, but don’t forget to inform people of the fact that this is an invariable law and there is nowhere to run from it.

Today and tomorrow depend on our explanations. The need for mutual guarantee will not disappear. It will only increase from one day to the next and will require us to realize it. The common system will become increasingly more closed and fused together, the interconnection will become tighter, and the transfer of information via communication lines between us will gain more power, pressure, and intensity.

We will become more aware of these processes and whoever understands and recognizes them will come out on top. In any part of the word, in any society, in manufacturing and trade, in children’s upbringing, and in any other area, success will come to those who are able to use this integral system correctly, who become integral on the inside. These people will gain the right approach and the right calculation, will draw up agreements the right way, and will succeed in everything by virtue of having an inner copy or mold of the external system.

Today we lack this correspondence, which is why we are in crisis: I am an egoist on the inside, while the system is already being revealed to me as united, as all-inclusive. As a result, I cannot treat anyone or anything correctly.

Thus, nature places us before an inevitable necessity. However, when we explain it to people, it is nevertheless better to soften this harsh message. Our task is not to take a person’s freedom away or to tie his hands, but to wrap him in warmth despite the inevitable changes.

The process changes fundamentally if we bring ourselves into similarity with the system. Imagine that the nation tries to attain mutual guarantee, mutual empathy. This will give us an enormous desire to help people. They are like children, and even though their pleas are not turned to us, we will be imbued by their desire, which we won’t be able to satisfy. It will tear us apart on the inside like birth pangs, and that is how we will evoke a tremendous force in order to conduct it to others. And then, the Creator will become revealed—for us and for them.

It doesn’t matter that they still don’t feel that this is Him. At the initial stages, this does not appear as the upper force but as an understanding of things and forces that operate in the world, the expression of the universal interconnection and mutual interaction. The air will suddenly become thicker and a person will acquire the general understanding, a common sensation together with others, unity without words.

And that is already a revelation because a person acquires a new mind, a new feeling. He opens up a new perception and suddenly notices things that did not exist for him before.

We are standing at the threshold, and this is a very exciting period. I am very anxious because this has never before happened in history, but today we are being obligated to do it. I am waiting for you to finally attain what you desire. This is a chance for the whole world: Today we can already accelerate and reduce the entire process. Let us hope that we will achieve success.

Until this time we did not advance by our own mind or our own correct decisions, but with the help of the upper force. And still, we have been brought to this. And that is very important.
[53607]
From the 5th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/4/11, “The Nation”

Related Material:
Is It The Economy Or Something More?
The Homework That Is Done Together
Knowledge, Not Orders

Catch The Thief!

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: In our world it is customary to lower yourself before a person you deem important. Why is it so difficult to lower yourself in the spiritual world?

Answer: In our world we lower ourselves before an important person because by doing so, we profit. Our egoism always carries out actions that are profitable for it. If a person is influential, powerful, and wealthy, then it’s worthwhile for me to lower myself before him and to be next to him, to serve him, because I know that usually a small person receives from a big one, and I expect to receive something as well.

That is how we usually act in this world. And if we don’t act that way, then we receive blows that make us learn this principle. Suppose I don’t want to listen to what a policeman says to me. Then I receive a fine or get called to court where I receive a punishment. So next time I will listen. That is, in our world it is egoistically profitable to listen to a powerful person, and if I don’t understand this, then life will teach me with blows.

However, this does not work in relation to the Creator because He is concealed! After all, if His quality of bestowal became revealed to you, then you would run after Him like a thief who runs ahead of the crowd, yelling, “Catch the thief!” It would seem that you love the Creator from the bottom of your heart because you can receive so much from Him. Who wouldn’t want to cleave to this force, which controls the whole world? It’s clear that this is what every person does.

That is why the Creator cannot become revealed to us as great, mighty, and generous. He can only become revealed as an example of the quality of bestowal, which we have to acquire on our own. But then you won’t want Him and will run away from Him. That is why He cannot become revealed to you—not from the good side nor from the bad, not from the side of fulfillment, nor from the side of intention.

The only thing that remains for us is to work with the environment. The Creator gives us a small desire for bestowal, but everything else has to be revealed by us in the environment that inspires us to bestow, to build our desire for the upper force. We receive help and awakening from above only to the extent of our exertion in the studies, the environment, and dissemination.

It’s impossible to advance in any other way. Otherwise we would chase Him, wishing to swallow Him up, or would run away from His quality of bestowal, being scared of the possibility of becoming that way ourselves.
[53599]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/4/11, Shamati

Related Material:
Concealment Makes Us Human
The Creator Pushes, While The Environment Catches Me
Lower Your Head And Take As Much As You Want

The Bitterness Of Inequality

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How can we explain to people the true meaning of social justice?

Answer: Along with the external demands, people feel deep inside the bitterness of inequality, of social and national injustice, of various differences. A person values himself not for who he is, but in comparison with others. Never before have we lived as well as today, but when we look at each other, we feel bad.

Of course, there are people who truly live “from paycheck to paycheck,” and their living standards should be immediately raised to the minimal level. However, all the other imbalances need to be fulfilled primarily by way of mutual unification.

No “just distribution” will help here: It will only aggravate conflicts. Any addition to someone would  raise rumors and criticism, discontent and resentment. Try to increase salaries in one of the sectors, and it will be hated. Even if this is not done at my expense, and even if I am not supposed to get more, I am still wondering why the money was given to them and not to me.

In what case will I be happy for a person who was given a raise? Only if I am connected to him by the ties of love. So, first, I should be taught the right attitude so that I consider him. For starters, before we even reach mutual guarantee, we need to understand that we completely depend on each other.
[53201]
From the 5th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/31/2011, “The Nation”

Related Material:
How to Reach Social Justice
The People Demand Social Justice
Mutual Guarantee

The Prince And The Pauper

Dr. Michael LaitmanIn the world of Infinity, the Light and desire merge into one whole with no difference between them. We are incapable of understanding how it is possible: Do they blend that much or just become alike? How can these two different qualities, reception and bestowal, merge into one?

It happens that one is much stronger than the other and overshadows the other with its power so much that the other becomes absolutely inconspicuous. But this is not something we call becoming one whole. At the moment we cannot grasp how two opposites can merge into one, yet nevertheless remain as two opposites.

For our rational mind, one cancels the other because this rationality is very limited and not capable of combining two opposites. This begets the whole complexity of perception, of our ability to understand the spiritual world and its concealment from us. Our present organs of perception do not capture spiritual reality, even though we are in it.

In order to gain independence and freedom of will, we have to come out of a spiritual state and return back to it from its complete absence. Like the Creator created the creature as “existence from absence,” the same way we should come to His “existing” reality—out of absence: attain reality out of absence thereof.

Then, we will understand what the creature is and from it, who the Creator is. As it is said: “Know Him by His actions.”

Therefore, the world of Infinity divided into two parts: the Light and the vessel, which merge and remain in unity in it. The descent of the worlds from the world of Infinity into this world means the divergence and separation of the opposites that merge into one whole there.

The lower the worlds descend, the further the opposites separate, in a cone-like manner, and get closer to our world becoming two completely separate poles. And now we are capable of perceiving them—one separate from the other, understanding that they cannot co-exist.

That’s why truth and faith, or knowledge and faith, the desire to receive pleasure and the desire to bestow, the work for oneself and for the other, I and the Creator, exist separately in our consciousness. It turns out that the truth of the world of Infinity: “He and His name are one” get separated in our world. And a common vessel, desire, divides into multiple parts; people become opposite to and separated from one another.

Therefore, we see that our fates are completely different, and we don’t understand why one person is given such luck, while the other punishment. We see that there are good and bad times, ascents and descents, and inequality among people. After all, one person earns a lot and easily, but the other labors hard and barely earns a living.

Some are healthy, the others are sick. One was born a prince, and the other was orphaned and left on the street. It only seems to us that all this “injustice” exists, but in reality, everything is arranged absolutely perfectly.

In fact, our vision divides all reality into separate incidents and different times. Therefore, some parts separate from others for us, and we begin to attribute each state to different people, assuming that one is blessed, while the other has bad luck.

However, the cause of that is our distorted perception. And it will remain such until we correct it. Then, everything will join into one whole, and we will see a perfect world.
[52304]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/23/2011, Shamati # 43

Related Material:
Blending Of Opposites
The Truth Lies In The Middle
The Depth Of The Point