Entries in the 'Daily Kabbalah Lesson' Category

We Can Find A Common Language With Adam

Dr. Michael LaitmanWhen a language is not connected with its spiritual root, we do not pay heed to its words, the names of the material branches. If a modern day Italian, Greek, or anybody else met a person of the same nationality who lived a thousand years ago, they wouldn’t understand each other. Some languages have changed so much that it’s hard to understand them in the form they existed 200-300 years ago. This is due to the lack of connection between branch and root.

Only Hebrew links branch and root directly, and hence, this language does not change. If Abraham, Adam, Moses, or Rabbi Shimon visited us today, we would all understand each other. In ancient times, the pronunciation was more guttural, which we have lost; the difference between the letters, which today are pronounced almost identically was more expressed, yet the language itself hasn’t changed.

Nevertheless, we have lost some of its words. Rabash used to read Psalms with me, and he occasionally mentioned that he was not familiar with a certain word. That is, their evident branch does not exist in our world; in the spiritual world, their spiritual root is still unclear and blurry, and for this reason, the connection between root and branch has not become revealed yet.

It turns out that we are yet to clarify certain words. For the time being they can only be found in the Psalms of David who embodies the entire general attainment (Malchut). Being dependent on the general correction, Kabbalists do not yet attain these words. There are a multitude of branches and corresponding spiritual roots, but not all of them have become revealed yet.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/10/2011, “The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah”

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So The World Would Be Created For Me….

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Does my intention depend on the intention of the entire environment and the intention of the environment on my intention?

Answer: Definitely! It says in Shamati #225: One cannot raise oneself above one’s circle. Hence, [if one wishes to advance] one must suck from one’s environment. And one has no other counsel, except through much work and Torah. Therefore, if one chooses for oneself a good environment, one saves time and efforts, since one is drawn according to one’s environment.

This is clear. If I receive energy from the environment—and the fact is that I receive everything in order to ascend from it—then I will ascend only inasmuch as I receive from them. I cannot be above this level.

Question: How can I see my environment as great if I do not see my friends as great?

Answer: Therein lies the entire problem. Who do you consider great? There is no one great in your world. Meaning, the world was not created for you. Then what means will you use to advance? The Creator is concealed. The environment is small. You have no one to advance toward and you are alone in the whole world. That is how you feel.

In principle, everyone feels this way and this is what we have to change.

From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/14/11, The Zohar

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From The Branch To Its Root

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How can a simple, ordinary person use the law of root and branch in his daily life?

Answer: His life will turn upside down whether he wants it to or not. And it’s better that a person knows what is going to happen with him so that he could participate in this inevitable revolution himself. If he does participate in it, he will feel good, and if he doesn’t, he will feel bad.

A person needs to understand that perception of reality is relative and depends on the point of reference which can be changed. Through this, reality changes as well since it exists only relative to a person who perceives it.

Hence, if one wants to change his life, it implies changing his reality. He can do it even today: from the present moment and on, and from this world to the world of Infinity.

Question: Do all human inventions (planes, machines, and so on) point to man’s unconscious aspiration to oneness?

Answer: Surely, they do. They are man’s aspiration to merge with the Creator, his desire to attain the upper degree. Every single action a person performs is aimed only at this goal.

And even when he is busy with something completely opposite, when he eats, drinks, or is having a good time, all of it is merely a preparation; it is all included in his movement toward his root.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/8/2011, “The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah”

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A Package Deal With The Light

Dr. Michael LaitmanIsrael, meaning the souls that aspire to the Creator, exists only for the sake of the world’s correction because a broken Kli cannot correct itself independently. Only special sparks awaken in it, including Adam, the generations of Kabbalists that came after him, then Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and so on. This is talking about souls that were able to correct themselves without a method by virtue of their fine and pure nature.

They were able to feel what correction is to some extent without a group or a method because they belonged to the appropriate layer of desires. All the other souls followed and joined them.

Then came the stage where desires grew more powerful and the souls needed to mutually unite by mutual guarantee at Mount Sinai by using the method of the Light that Reforms. From then on, they had to attract the Light by uniting with one another instead of individually with their own forces.

Among them were those who were able to advance alone, practically without unification being a necessary condition. They are called “forefathers.” The others have to unite as one man with one heart and work on the common egoism by receiving awakening and ascent from one another. They bring their common desire to correction and then the Light that Reforms comes to them.

The same Light previously corrected individuals, but this was “personal illumination.” Now the Light does not come in response to someone’s personal desire, but to the common, unified desire that has become “the prayer of society,” the ten Sefirot. Our unity evokes an entire “package” of Light, which does what it has to do. Then the group is already able to correct itself.

However, for now it is only a group. And besides it, there are souls that are unable to awaken on their own. They suffer and are helpless. Therefore, the mission of the souls that have already gone through all the phases of correction and corruption is to unite with them, like Bina unites with Malchut. This enables the “incompetent” desires, the souls of AHP to be able to reach correction as well.

They cannot do anything to themselves alone. Nothing can be demanded from them. They do not have any conditions, method, or teaching. They receive everything from Galgalta ve Eynaim, which broke and descended to them. This happened because it is able to awaken them and to establish the right order among all of the broken souls that belong to itself, to AHP, and to the mixture between the two.

This is the mission of the nation of Israel before the redemption.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/13/11, Writings of Rabash

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What I Sowed

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: If we want to correct ourselves in order to benefit humanity, does this mean that we desire bestowal?

Answer: Yes and no. Suppose some kind of problem has come up for me and I have to correct it. I have to call a doctor or technician, or do something else. Who am I doing this for: those who have suffered or myself?

Everything depends on the circle by which we determine our boundaries. A small person is restricted to himself. One who is more developed takes his family into consideration. One who is even more developed expands this circle to neighbors, the city, the nation, the world, and finally, all reality.

If I understand that the world’s correction must happen through Israel, which exists solely for that purpose, then everything I do externally is the same as what I do for me. Moreover, if I exist in order to correct the world and this is my entire mission, then I must first correct the desires (Kelim) of the whole world, and then I will receive a response through them.

Therefore, “what I sow” is that I turn to the world, bestow to it, become permeated by its desires, and bring them to correction. Then I can hope to receive a response from the Creator to those desires. When this happens, I receive the response first because the world is only able to receive it through me.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/13/11, Writings of Rabash

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Raising The Future Generation

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: What is the best way to educate a child in order to prepare him for the perception of the spiritual world?

Answer: We need to give a child the ability to work with a force called love, which can only be received from the correct environment. This is the only thing a person needs.

It’s essential to place a child in the correct environment. If he starts feeling what love and hate is in relation to a fellow human being, this feeling will help him resolve all problems independently. The sensitivity toward love and hatred for a fellow human being is what determines the human within us.

All that he sees and hears will pass through this perception and will allow him to interpret everything correctly. There won’t be any need to lecture or to force him into anything. A child only needs the society that will constantly engage him or her in relations of either confrontation or love, all for the sake of the spiritual goal. Such society has to be managed by proper educators, Kabbalists.

A child doesn’t need to know anything more: no special wisdom or “the number of angels in the sky.” We must only give him the ability to feel another, and by doing so we will solve all problems. He will begin to see a true reality because this is the only way that it can be revealed. He will see that all people are connected and will understand the relationships between all of them.

These aren’t psychological relationships: He will reveal the upper force hidden within and the program of creation according to which we are all interconnected.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/9/2011, “The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah”

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There Is No Oblivion In Spirituality

Dr. Michael LaitmanThe Zohar, Introduction, “The Second Commandment,” Item 203: …Then fear clings to both sides, the side of good and love and the side of harsh Din, and she is included in them. If fear is included on the side of good and love, it is complete love, as it should be. …since there is love only in two sides—GAR and ZAT de Bina—and love is incomplete on either of the two sides unless there is fear in each of them, since there cannot be Hochma without Bina, which is love without fear.

This explains the completion of all of our work: How to attain love in Kelim (or desires) of bestowal and then also in the receiving Kelim. In essence this is already the full correction of creation in Malchut, which unites with Bina so much that it attains Keter, where its bestowal is perfect in all of its Kelim.

Question: What is fear?

Answer: Fear is the first commandment, meaning the first correction we have to go through. It is a person’s worry and fear: Is he able to attain bestowal to the Creator? This is fear: Will I attain this? Am I capable of this? Will I ever desire this? Then a person has work.

As a rule our work is aimed at maintaining what we have attained. Baal HaSulam writes about this in Letter #2 from 1920:

Wisdom only comes with experience. I advise you to awaken inner fear that the love among you might cool down, even though the mind rejects this view of things. You should go through the trouble anyway. If someone has the opportunity to add more love, but he doesn’t do it, this will be deemed a flaw.

It’s similar to how a person gives his friend a great gift. The love for his friend that becomes revealed at the moment of the action in the heart of the gift’s receiver, is not similar to the love that remains in his heart when the action is completed. Day by day it cools down, until it may reach total oblivion to the gift of love.That is why the person who received the gift has to invent tricks so as to look at it with new eyes every day.

Spirituality is built on the fact that we do not forget the inspiration that we have attained and we constantly keep the same inspiration while expanding it more and more.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/13/11, The Zohar

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Revelation Comes Only From The Light

Dr. Michael LaitmanThe Zohar, Introduction, “The Third Commandment,” Item 204: The six words of “Hear O Israel” are six sides of ZON, and the six sides of ZON must be unified so they unite as one with the six upper sides, which are AVI and YESHSUT. And with them, the desire should be aimed upward, meaning aim the desire and the NRN to be included in them in MAN.

Everything depends on the intention during the study when we expect for the Light that Reforms to come to us from studying The Zohar and to perform these corrections in us.

We do not know how to perform them and we won’t learn it from the text. But under the Light’s influence, we will feel what we have to do, and then we will do it. We won’t find anything out from the study, but only from the Light that influences us by means of the correct study. This has to be clear.

Therefore, the intention has to be aimed at the Light rather than the knowledge because it won’t help me in the slightest to know what result will come from the merging of the Partzufim Aba and Ima in one way or another. This won’t give me anything, and besides there is no truth to these words. When the revelation comes, then we reveal things that we could not know anything about beforehand. Everything happens only by virtue of the Light.

Therefore, a person must constantly expect actions that the Light will perform inside of him so the new sensations, thoughts, and inner definitions will become revealed in him from the inside. This will be the result of the influence of the Light that Reforms. Then a person will attain.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/13/11, The Zohar

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Focusing On Quality

Dr. Michael LaitmanIt’s all about efforts: A person has to believe in the principle of “I labored and I found.” That is why Baal HaSulam writes in Item 17 of “Introduction to The Study of the Ten Sefirot” that “the student pledges, prior to the study, to strengthen himself in faith,” as it is said in “Ethics of the Fathers”: “Faithful is your employer who shall pay you the reward of your labor.” And this reward will be the passing from egoistic intention, Lo Lishma (not for Her Name), into the altruistic one, Lishma (for Her Name).

Before and during the studies, a person must see himself as looking forward to this change in himself. This is where all the efforts lie. In the same “Introduction,” Baal HaSulam explains that one must not display negligence, neither in the quantity nor the quality of efforts.

As we begin to study, we, probably, want to change by way of the study and the Light present in it, but then we forget about it and get distracted, meaning we do not exert enough in the quality of efforts. The quantity may be enough, but the most important is the quality: To what degree I experience pain and, thus, cannot leave the goal, as a sick person who constantly thinks only of healing. Whatever he does, everything is meant to help him get better.

One cannot attain such a need alone. This can only be done with the help of the environment. It will oblige a person through the importance of the goal, and only in this way will he be able to move forward.

Summing up all of the means we have, we see that both the group with its traditions, and I, myself, as well as the Creator, the teacher, the lessons, and the dissemination, all of it is necessary in order to create in a person a strong need for changes, prompted by way of the study. We must arrive at precisely this point; it must be the result of all our efforts.

Then, during the lesson, a true need for the Light will arise in us, and nothing else. It will neither be a need for knowledge, nor for wisdom, nor for distinction in anything—only for inner changes. And the strength of this need will be so great that it will really bring about transformation. This will allow a person to start relating to the Torah as to a “spice” and later, as to the Torah of life, instead of the “deadly poison” which he was using before.

We discover our evil inclination with the help of the Light. This Light is called the “angel of death.” On one hand, it shows a person that he is spiritually dead, and on the other, it then helps to kill his egoistic desire. This is how we advance.
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From the 1st part part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/7/2011, Writings of Rabash

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The Teaching Of Exile

Dr. Michael LaitmanA person exists in this world and develops within his desire to receive pleasure. In order to direct this desire toward the development that matches its level, a person receives upbringing.

For thousands of years the people of Israel have been developing in exile. According to the growing egoistic desire, they were taught the Torah as the “teaching of exile.” They were taught to live for their own sake and even against the others.

I want to be above and smarter than others; I need to have more respect from others; I examine myself in relation to others. This is the correct upbringing at the stage when our egoistic desire grows and understands only the language of reception, acquisition of everything dictated by its inner development, the awakening Reshimot (informational genes). This is the upbringing of the people during the period of exile.

Then, a point in the heart awakens in a person and he or she switches to a different upbringing: through the group or one’s neighbor.

The difference is crucial. In the past, a person was looking for a greater profit in the desire to receive. The Torah of the exile period was intended to accelerate the development of egoism, to give it a boost. The Torah was used as religion, meaning as the “deadly poison,” in order to comprehend and realize the principle of  “I created the evil inclination” as fast as possible.

In the end, having realized and exhausted our egoistic desire, we begin to ask the question about the purpose of life. With this fundamental question, with the point in the heart, we come to the group.
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From the 1st part part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/7/2011, Writings of Rabash

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