Everyone is an egoist. People are raised that way and the conditioning continues. The greater your egoism, the greater the perceived opportunity to get ahead of others. We do not understand that true success ultimately means being in the right relationship with others.

We have reached a state where the world is exhausted and burned out from egoism. It can no longer continue moving forward on an egoistic path. All our grand dreams and ambitions are fading away.

Only one question remains: how can we continue to exist? This is possible only if we begin to value the connection between us. Within that connection, we will discover goals, spaces, and a completely different world.

Question: What is the most important advice you can give about how to preserve a friendship to the very end?

Answer: One must understand that whatever bad I see in others, is all within me. There is nothing bad around me, only within myself.

Therefore, one must try to correct oneself until one sees a beautiful world in everything around them. Then you will find yourself in the spiritual world, in paradise. Change yourself within, transform the hell inside you into paradise, and you will see that you are already in paradise.

But if you do not change the hell within yourself, then it seems to you that you are living in hell.

Question: And if you see hell in another person?

Answer: Then it is within you. Change yourself, and you will see that you live in a wonderful world.
[356686]
From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman,” 5/8/26

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Question: If one entity devours another in nature, yet nature is in harmony, is it possible that our devouring one another is also an absolutely harmonious state?

Answer: Yes, but only on the animate level. The inanimate, vegetative, and animate levels of nature are structured on the principle of mutual consumption amidst a struggle against each other. This struggle constitutes evolution.

On these levels the use of one by another is not considered shameful or blameworthy. One animal, when it eats another, does not feel any pangs of conscience. Suppose a human acts against another human,  he may rationalize in order to justify himself, to somehow explain to himself the purpose and reasons for his actions. But animals do not have this; they have a simple calculation: I must eat the weaker in order to continue my own existence.

All this, on the animate level, is considered the norm. But now we are rising to the level of Human. And here a problem arises. We must begin to move forward, not by devouring one another, but precisely through connection with one another, by rising above our egoism and not indulging it.

I hope that people will begin to understand this because otherwise we will not survive. Of course, we will continue to exist, but in very bad states.

Therefore, we face a monumental task: to spread the message as widely as possible that we must come to a collective resolution regarding how to advance toward the goal of creation. And the goal of creation is to bring human society to a harmonious state, to mutual fulfillment, to the right connection between us.

And then the rest of nature (inanimate, vegetative, and animate) will also come to harmony. Then we will be able to restore our ecology, an issue that causes deep concerns for everyone. If we come to a balance among us, everything will be wonderful.

Since we are on the very highest level of development compared to the other levels of nature, we will compel them to come into balance too. The time of the human level is coming.
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From Kabbalah Lesson in Russian, 1/13/19

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All the forms that preceded the appearance of man are hidden inside us. In the process of evolution, matter progressed through the stages of inanimate, vegetative, animate, and human.

At each stage there were also four stages of development: four within the inanimate, four within the vegetative, four within the animate, and four within the human.

That is, from the beginning of the inanimate level to the end of the human level, one must traverse sixteen distinct steps before a human finally emerges from the ape. Thousands of years ago Kabbalah asserted that man appeared as a result of the evolutionary development of the ape.

Nature evolved from the inanimate to the vegetative through an intermediate form, corals; from the vegetative to the animate through a hybrid vegetative-animal form known as “Kelev Sade” (field dog); and from the animate to human through the ape.

We, in turn, must continue to develop as human beings until we attain the stage of development of the spiritual human, one who begins to ask about their root and ultimate purpose.

In other words, we will undergo profound internal, sensory, and intellectual development that we become capable of rising above our innate animal nature and begin to ask questions that are no longer pertain to the animal level: “Who are we? Who created us?” People who are concerned about such issues begin their spiritual development and who turn to the science of Kabbalah.

If a particular species becomes extinct in the course of evolution, it does not truly disappear; rather, it simply sheds its external form and transforms into the next one. This implies that we are the same dinosaurs, only now in the form of humans.

The same form continued to evolve and develop, much like the classic illustrations of Darwin’s theory of evolution, where the ape is followed by a figure grasping a stick, and gradually transforms into modern humans.

This means that all kinds of creatures that have evolved in the past and continue to evolve are ultimately designed to lead to the emergence of a person who will ask himself “Who am I? Why am I here?”.

He will want to discover his root and will reveal it using the method of Kabbalah; that is, he will become similar to the Creator. Consequently, he will be called “Adam,” a name derived from the Hebrew word “Edomeh,” similar to the Creator.” He will become so similar to the Creator that they will achieve a state of fusion, a complete correspondence between them, like two parts of a single whole.

Question: Does it mean that all living beings have something in common?

Answer: What we all have in common is that we all come from the same root, which is called “Creator.” It is He who created our shared substance, the desire to enjoy or “creation.” Subsequently, these creations begin to differentiate into levels and species distinguished by a multitude of diverse attributes.

Question: Over the last two hundred years, a rapid process of species extinction has begun. If in the past centuries only fifty species disappeared each year, today thousands of different species disappear per year. Why is this happening?

Answer: Apparently these species are not required in the process of evolution to advance to the next steps. In this case, these species do not disappear altogether, but take on hidden forms that are incomprehensible to us, and they contribute to the existence of more advanced forms.

Consider, for instance, the dinosaur that ceased to exist in the form of dinosaurs, yet they continue to exist within us in a different form, as latent potential forces. Without this potential, we would not have been able to develop to the level of humans.

This leads to a very important conclusion about the proper attitude toward nature. There is no need to keep endangered species by force, nor to forcibly develop those species that seem more useful to us.

The main thing is to take care of the human species while not destroying anything in nature. In other words, you cannot destroy anything, but you do not have to go against nature and artificially keep species that disappear naturally from it.
[218986]
From KabTV’s conversation “New Life 931 – Evolution: The Next Stage,” 12/12/17

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Question: How should one deal with the evil inclination if a person sits idly and does nothing?

Answer: If a person sits and does nothing, then the evil inclination, by awakening Hisaronot (unfulfilled desires) within them, begins to push them toward various actions. And if they carry out these actions together with the evil inclination, they come to such a state where they feel bad, that is, to such negative results that intensify and unite to such an extent that a person cannot endure them.

At that point they do not agree with such a trajectory and they carry out a kind of inner revolution, taking action to change themselves. However, afterward, gain and again, they continue along the path alongside the evil inclination.

And so it continues until we reveal in our present day that we are approaching a critical threshold: if we continue to develop in this way together with the evil inclination, then our life will become worse than death.

Despair and drugs are flooding the world. A person sinks either into despair or into drugs; there is no escape.

From this, we begin to understand that we must, through hatred toward the state in which we find ourselves, change our attitude to life, to reality, to ourselves. Then an inner revolution takes place in our perception of our entire system of calculation, of our entire nature, of how we develop.

We discover that already since the times of the destruction of the First and Second Temples, we have been developing incorrectly, that a flaw arose then, but it is only being revealed now; that we must not follow the advice of the evil inclination but act in the opposite way. We must take the form from it but in the precisely opposite direction: not in the direction of the desire to receive but in the direction of the Creator.

The evil inclination gives you advice on how to give pleasure to the desire to receive. And you must invert everything so that through this same form, you bring pleasure to the Creator.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/9/26, Rabash, “It is Forbidden to Hear a Good Thing From a Bad Person”

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Question: In the process of evolution, many species have simply disappeared. The Earth has gone through different periods: sometimes development proceeded very slowly with almost no changes for long stretches of time, then suddenly rapid changes occurred, and many species vanished from the face of the Earth.

If evolution is embedded in nature as a gradual movement toward a goal, why do entire species suddenly disappear while processes of development and destruction occur simultaneously?

Answer: One cannot exist without the other; there is no life without death. We are in a process of evolution that includes both development and destruction. In nature, everything operates according to a precise, deterministic law that advances it toward its final goal of development, as it is said: “The final goal is already embedded in the initial design.”

Without this, development would be impossible because it is necessary from the outset to determine where this development is heading and what defines each subsequent form. Each new form must already be potentially embedded in the previous one and only realized from it in practice. Everything is far more complex than it appears in our world where it seems that a man and a woman simply meet and produce offspring.

But where did they come from? What caused them to meet and give birth to exactly such children? All of this was originally embedded in potential, but this information is hidden from us. Although there are “psychics” who claim to reveal it and predict future events.

Future forms already exist and, in principle, can be revealed. But they are hidden from people so as not to deprive us of free choice. Knowledge of the future would turn us into robots. To prevent us from acting automatically, the future is concealed from us.

Evolution cannot advance correctly if the next form is unknown to it. Evolution is not guided by temporary conditions of what is better or worse in a given situation, as scientists assume. Science can reveal only mechanical and biological changes, that is, those already materialized, but not the potential causes that brought about these changes.

Kabbalah, however, reveals these potential causes and explains where development is heading and what its future form will be. Therefore, to understand the inner mechanisms of evolution, it is necessary to study the wisdom of Kabbalah.

Then we will learn why the matter of this world was created and what forms it must go through as it materializes from its initially embedded potential. Kabbalah allows us to understand everything that happens with our world and with us: everything that was and everything that will be.

The disappearance of species is not destruction but a change of forms. Some forms are born and exist for a certain time in order to give rise to more advanced forms. Then the previous form continues to live within the more advanced form that emerged from it.

And within us, too, there are small “dinosaurs.” It does not matter that they became extinct 66 million years ago, because our memory carries information from the very beginning of the universe, billions of years before our time.
[218905]
From KabTV’s conversation “New Life 931 – Evolution: The Next Stage,” 12/12/17

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Question: Should communication in a group be based on the right line?

Answer: In a group, we must constantly try to connect with the right line. It is a state where everyone awakens awareness of the greatness of the Creator, the importance of the goal, and the special nature and uniqueness of the group.

After everyone makes an effort, the gap between us and the surrounding light is revealed. If we really invest our strength correctly, we begin to feel the need for the Creator, and then, once He becomes revealed, we feel great joy.

Then everyone realizes how great it is to let another person feel how great the goal is, and they want to hear the same thing from their friend to realize how far they are from the goal. These two opposing points should always be before our eyes: how small I am and how great the Creator is.

But this feeling must be creative and constructive to turn it into a useful action. Only positive things should be revealed in the group.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/7/26, Rabash, “The Connection between Passover, Matza, and Maror”

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We exist in a special state, in a unique world, in which we do not understand what is happening to us. We do not know what will happen to us now or in a minute; we do not see any clear system of reward or punishment or cause and effect of our actions, thoughts, or physical deeds. We live in relative darkness, in emptiness.

Something happens, but we hardly know how and why. We only see the immediate consequences of our mechanical actions in the present moment, and we do not see above this level.

We do not know the consequences of our desires, of good or evil thoughts. Do the thoughts and desires of others affect me? Do I feel it or not? I do not know, it is unclear. In essence, we find ourselves existing in a space of near total darkness. And this darkness does not even bother us; we have grown accustomed to it.

A small child, we see does not understand what he is doing or what is happening to him. He runs, plays, and tugs at things; a child explores the world through some minimal level of contact with it.

And us? Fundamentally, we are also at a minimal level of contact with the world. Even at the physical level, we do not clearly know whether we interact with the world correctly or not. Only in our time, in this century, are we beginning to realize how our interaction with the world impacts the environment, ecology, climate, etc. But how our thoughts affect the world, the strongest measure of impact, we do not know.

In principle, if we trace the hierarchy of our physical interaction with the world from the lowest level, the human level, which follows the inanimate, vegetative, and animate levels, is, in essence, the level of thoughts, intentions, and a person’s inner attitude toward society or the world in which one exists.

And then it becomes completely unclear where reward, punishment, and consequences of our good or bad actions are to be found.

In general, this is a problem. We are like children running around a room, doing something without understanding its meaning or precise reaction. We say to the child: “Don’t do that!” but he does not understand why. We know, but he does not. And who can tell us what is allowed or not is also unclear.

Only now are we beginning to realize that there is one single higher force (call it nature, or the Creator) that governs everything because it is integrally connected to us, and we must take it into account. We see that everything in nature follows absolute laws that act upon us without asking us. And here arises a very serious system of relationships.

How can we behave toward the surrounding nature, the higher world, the upper force, if we exist within it yet remain utterly oblivious to its presence? Consequently, we, in our folly, inadvertently behave like small children; we imagine we are free to act as we please, only to find ourselves buffeted from all sides by a barrage of painful repercussions.

Yet we fail to give these consequences the attention they deserve, we do not recognize them as the outcome of our own shortcomings, nor do we perceive the direct causal link between our actions and  nature’s response. We simply do not understand the underlying formula governing the proper interaction between ourselves and the natural world.

If we were able to perceive and understand this, then our egoism, our innate desire for a comfortable existence, would unerringly steer us in the right direction. But because this system of management  remains concealed from us, we continue to behave like small children; whatever interests us at the moment, we immediately snatch to try, without paying attention to the consequences. And if there are consequences, we do not connect them with the cause. Here lies our ignorance of governance and all our life’s problems.

Of course, this is a miserable existence, but there is nothing to be done. The higher management and the clear connection between our actions and consequences is hidden from us to raise us to a level where we ourselves will perform the correct actions not by coercion, but because we will want to be in direct connection with the Creator and will want to be good and kind.

This is precisely what nature demands of us, the unreasoning beings that we are need to realize the reality we exist in and to act in accordance with this awareness.
[247697]
From a Kabbalah Lesson in Russian, 3/17/19

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Reality does not have to end its development with an explosion. You can end the War of Gog and Magog in a small laboratory, or you can unleash it on the entire world, it doesn’t matter. What matters for you is to recognize evil.

If you have a microscope, you recognize evil before it breaks through and begins to develop. You see in advance that there is an infectious agent that can destroy the entire world! And that’s it. We need to draw as much light as possible so that it will show this to us.

There is no specific external parameter that you could point to and say: “Here it is, Mount Sinai!” This parameter is your tension that is caused by the fact that you can no longer tolerate evil. Baal HaSulam writes that this depends on a person’s level of development.

A developed person who uses Kabbalah, the light that returns to the source, already sees how terrible it is. Nothing more needs to be shown to him.

So there is no point in waiting another hundred years, then it would not be the path of Torah but the path of suffering. The purpose of being given the Torah, Kabbalah, is so that we can go through this development “externally,” without waiting to reach it through natural development. One way or another, we will have to work. The only difference is whether it will be in suffering or in joy.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/12/26, Rabash, “What Is Preparation for Reception of the Torah – 1”

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Our desire to receive certainly grows as we acquire the ability to determine its form. If we were advancing along the ideal path of development, that is, had we emerged from caves and gradually received an ever-growing desire to receive and turned it into a desire with the intention to bestow to the Creator, we would never feel the evil contained within us.

Thus, the entire path of development that we are now going through must bring us to a state worse than any other, but in which we will have the awareness of Moses standing at the top of the mountain. We will understand that there is the Creator and there is the purpose of creation, and they stand above us like a message from above, like something great, and only with their help can we save ourselves.

When we reach such a state, then we will have the true recognition of evil, which is called the War of Gog and Magog. Only then will we truly wish to merit the receiving of the Torah, become fit to receive it, and attain hatred toward our entire nature because we will see that if the Creator does not give us the Torah, then this place will be our burial ground.

It is said in the Torah that this must occur to each individual, then with our nation individually as a single people, and then to all of humanity in the general form, collectively, as all of humanity in relation to the Creator. In other words, it must be revealed both in the particular and in the general.

This is the program, and there is nowhere to escape from it. The more sensitive we are to our states, the sooner we will come to the recognition of evil and overcome it—each individual, the nation, and the entire world.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/12/26, Rabash, “What Is Preparation for Reception of the Torah? – 1”

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Question: Can we say that Abraham changed world history?

Answer: Yes, because Abraham was the first to call on the Babylonians to resist their growing egoism that was flourishing in Ancient Babylon. Egoism prevented them from developing and gradually led the state into a huge crisis, what we call the Tower of Babel.

At that time, Ancient Babylon, located between the Tigris and the Euphrates rivers, was home to 3 million people. By modern standards, this is not a large population, but for the ancient world, it was quite substantial, practically the entire civilization of that time.

People lived peacefully and calmly. They had everything in abundance. They sowed grains—wheat, rye, buckwheat—planted onions and garlic, raised sheep, and caught plenty of fish. Historical evidence of this can be found in preserved frescoes with dedicatory inscriptions: “I present you with a kilogram of garlic,” and so on.

People lived simple, ordinary lives and everything was fine. But suddenly, competition flared up among them, and they began to “measure” one another by egoistic standards: I give him this much and he gives me that much. While previously one person was like a brother, a friend, and a neighbor to another, now completely different criteria for relationships appeared.

Thus the Babylonians entered a wild, terrible crisis from which they could not escape. They began to build the Tower of Babel, a symbol of egoism striving to reach the heavens, because they believed that in this way they could conquer the Creator and make Him work for them.

The belief that the sky had a solid firmament persisted in humanity for thousands of years. I have even read in Russian manuscripts that people thought if they lived near the horizon, they could dry their grain to prevent it from spoiling. That was their way of imagining things, and this notion only began to fade gradually only in the Middle Ages, with the emergence of various sciences in the 17^th to 18^th centuries.

Our entire civilization began with Ancient Babylon. Abraham carried out huge revolution in the world, one could even say the only one. All other revolutions were carried out “from an armored vehicle,” but he carried out a real revolution. He gave humanity the key to influencing our world, our own destiny, and through our world, other worlds as well. What he did was incredible.

Of course, there were Kabbalists before him; after all, he lived in the 20^th generation after Adam. But it was precisely his generation that managed to bring a method for affecting all of humanity to our world, a method urgently needed in times of crisis, and that the world can make use of it.

Question: Noah lived in the 10^th generation, yet it was Abraham who became a revolutionary?

Answer: Noah carried out his own revolution. One could say that he saved humanity, but he did it alone. He did not need a group like Abraham did. He fulfilled his mission by taking his loved ones into the ark. They weren’t actually relatives in the usual sense, but simply people who lived together like one large, close-knit family. In those days, everyone lived that way.

Noah raised this entire group of people above earthly egoism; that is, he saved them from the flood of egoism in the ark, which symbolizes the quality of Bina.

Abraham did the same thing 10 generations after Noah, but in a different state, in a different civilization. He revealed that it was possible to act differently, not through the familial but still egoistic ties as in Noah’s time.

The point is that by Abraham’s time, egoism had already corroded all of humanity. And although it consisted of many different large clans (typical of the ancient world), Abraham managed to convince them that drawing closer into a single family in spite of the egoism ruling over them was precisely their salvation.

They were still not far from understanding this because they had recently lived in peace and friendship, when suddenly egoism flared up among them and they began to hate one another. Therefore, they readily believed him, came together, and realized that this was salvation from the problems they had created for themselves.

In order to return to normal life, Abraham united them into a group in which they began to discover the correct relationships between themselves.
[194598]
From a Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 5/29/16

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