No one will give us a break— nature will demand a reckoning from us. We must ask ourselves: what’s the right way for us to go through all the blows. Because only with the help of mutual #inclusion can we rise to a state where all forces of #nature will influence us kindly.

The #coronavirus won’t go away quickly. There is one iron rule that will always safeguard us: if we match the laws of nature, we will be able to eradicate the plague; and if we go against the laws—we will be imprisoned.
From Twitter, 3//21

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Question: Iceland is considered one of the safest countries in the world. You were there and you saw that the murder rate there is lower than in most other countries. People do not lock their cars, and this is especially true in rural areas. People there know each other.

Perhaps we should take an example from such countries and try to adopt their way of life?

Answer: No, you cannot do that because Iceland is an island. They live only by raising birds, sheep, etc. and have no massive industry.

Tourism there is quite developed and they have the right conditions for that. We cannot compare ourselves to them. It is impossible to live according to their way of life. What is more, these are people with a totally different state of mind.

You can see a line that is half a mile long to buy bread, and I am not exaggerating. A person there can stand in line for half an hour and even more.

Question: Doesn’t he get angry about that?

Answer: No, he waits patiently

Question: How can that be?

Answer: It is because they are not connected to the rest of humanity. It makes no difference to them that they have so many tourists and all means of communication. In spirit, they are so…. non-European. The distance from one house to another there is several kilometers.

Question: But is it possible to live this way and be happy? To be disconnected from each other and live?

Answer: But we cannot. It is impossible for all the people in the world to live this way. Who would want that today? You need to have a special character in order to live like that.

In Iceland, the land itself is such that it does not make people sociable. It is because it is all made of rocks! Only rocks.

Question: What is the future of humanity?

Answer: The future of humanity is unity, of course. Nature will give us such conditions that will force us to unite. But people in Iceland will be the last to feel the desire to unite.

Question: Does it bother you? Doesn’t it bother you that they are happy and satisfied with life and have no need to unite?

Answer: No. I wish people joy.

Kabbalah is opening to the world that now evolution is reaching a dead end. Then Kabbalah says: “That’s it, it is my turn now.”

Question: And you are saying that they will be last in line?

Answer: Yes. And they will stand. A kilometer long line—they will stand.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 12/4/18

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My new article on Linkedin “The Benefit in the ICC’s “Unbiased” Investigation against Israel”

Fatou Bensouda, the prosecutor in the investigation of the International Criminal Court (ICC) into possible “war crimes” against Israel, promised that the investigation “will be conducted independently, impartially and objectively, without fear or favor.” Right. As Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pointed out, the ICC, which was established to prevent atrocities like the Holocaust from happening again, is now coming after the Jewish state. Instead of genuine impartiality, “It turns a blind eye to Iran, Syria and the other dictatorships that are committing real war crimes left and right,” said Netanyahu. As always, the easiest way to expose antisemitism is to look for double standards, and in this case, it couldn’t be more patent.

If we want to win the world’s favor, we have to stop treating each other with such guile and odium. We have to stop hating one another or the world will not stop hating us.

Yet, anyone who knows me, or who has read my books, The Jewish Choice, and Like a Bundle of Reeds, will not be surprised if I express no grievances against antisemites or the existence of antisemitism. In fact, I fully understand where it is coming from and I treat it as a natural phenomenon and a call to action rather than as an unwarranted accusation against my people.

I am not in the least surprised that the world judges us by a different standard than it judges the rest of the nations. They expect something different from us and judge accordingly. We may state that we are the same as everyone else, that we are no different from any other nation, but no one believes this declaration, and deep down, neither do we.

Instead of complaining about the world’s double standard against the Jews, we should see it as both a compliment and a challenge. They expect us to be more righteous than everyone else, more ethical than everyone else, and when we fail their test, they accuse us of crimes against humanity.

We try to be righteous and ethical but the world does not believe us. It is wrong, of course; no army is more careful with human rights violations than the Israeli army, but no one believes us, and for a good reason: This ethical conduct is unreliable for a very simple reason—the way we treat each other. We first have to learn how to relate to one another, and then the world will listen to our arguments about being virtuous. They see in our treatment of each other a testimony to our wickedness, and they will not believe a word we say in court before we act out who we profess to be.

Let me ask you this: Would you trust someone who you knew was mean to his own brother, stole from his own sister, framed his own parents in order to put his hands on their money and property, and then told you he’s a good person? No, you wouldn’t, and rightly so. This is how the world sees us Jews—as a band of warmongers stealing from each other, cheating on each other, betraying one another, while pretending to be harmless and innocent. In their eyes, we are guilty before the trial at the ICC even started, and it makes no difference what we will say in our defense.

If we want to win the world’s favor, we have to stop treating each other with such guile and odium. We have to stop hating one another or the world will not stop hating us.

They know we are smart; they know we are able; and they know what we have contributed to the world. However, they also know that they cannot trust us because they see how we treat one another. If we want fair treatment anywhere, we must start by doing so among ourselves, and then we will begin to see the world changing its approach toward us.

For more on this topic, read my books The Jewish Choice: Unity or Anti-Semitism, historical facts on anti-Semitism as a reflection of Jewish social discord, and Like a Bundle of Reeds: Why unity and mutual guarantee are today’s call of the hour.
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My new article on Linkedin “Entanglement Will Save Us or Destroy Us, but It’s Here to Stay”

I think it’s fair to say that countries no longer dream of self-sufficiency. The idea that one country, however vast and however developed, can provide for all its needs by itself is not only unrealistic, but also very dangerous to any country that tries to implement it. The price such a country would pay is horrendous. At the same time, interdependence has also done a lot of harm, shifting jobs and industries from some countries to others, and depleting job opportunities in countries that suffered from job migration. This process, of growing entanglement and interdependence, is irreversible. However, if we play our cards right, we will benefit from its advantages and avoid its harms.

And since our egos will continue to grow, we will have to work on our relations even harder, to keep from falling back to alienation. As a result, our relations will grow stronger and closer to the extent that our egos grow more intense. If we stick to this simple formula, we will win the war against hunger, poverty, sickness, and sadness anywhere in the world.

The first, and most important point to understand is that our growing entanglement is a goal oriented process, at the end of which we will all take care of each other and no one will need to worry about anything. To understand how this is possible, think of our planet as the home, where all of humanity lives. There is plenty of food in our home. In fact, there is so much food that we trash half of it because we cannot eat it all. There are also enough clothes to dress everyone, enough energy to provide everyone with heating in the winter and cooling in the summer, and enough money to pay for everyone’s education, health care, housing, and even entertainment.

Nevertheless, many people in our global home are starving, many have no clean water, many are sick and have no health care, and many more lack proper education. Why? Because we do not care about each other, and because we do not care, we also do not share. In other words, the problem is not one of production, but one of distribution, which stems from our alienation. And because we treat each other like aliens, the result is competition and destruction instead of complementation and construction.

Yet, there is a reason why we treat each other so appallingly. The more we evolve, the more egoistic we become. You would expect egoism to drive us apart from each other, but it actually does the opposite. Because we are growing increasingly selfish, we want to benefit from one another, use one another, enjoy not only what we have, but also the knowledge that we have more than others. Our desire to be superior to others has become our prime pleasure, and it impels us to live in societies where we can compete and defeat one another. It turns out that our egos are pushing us to live together, yet hate each other, and that atmosphere is toxic. This is why our house, Planet Earth, is in such disarray.

There is even worse news than the growth of our egos: They keep growing and there is no way to reverse the process. In other words, we are destined to become increasingly entangled until, eventually—unless we find a way out of the catch—we will destroy ourselves.

However, as I said in the beginning, we have more cards to play than we have used so far. If we play them right, we will be victorious.

The first card we need to play is awareness. So far, we have not been aware that we are so completely dominated by our own egos. We also didn’t know that the ego is an ever growing power. Now that we are aware, we know that the ego is our true enemy and we can start devising tactics to defeat it.

The second card to play is to use the entanglement that our egos have created to our mutual benefit, instead of for destructive competition. Just as no country can be self-sufficient, neither can people. However, if we decide to supplement for one another what we can’t provide for ourselves, we will have more than enough of everything. As said before, our house has more than we need, but it is in disarray and there are deficiencies because of our alienation from each other. Reverse alienation and you have erased deficiency.

And since our egos will continue to grow, we will have to work on our relations even harder, to keep from falling back to alienation. As a result, our relations will grow stronger and closer to the extent that our egos grow more intense. If we stick to this simple formula, we will win the war against hunger, poverty, sickness, and sadness anywhere in the world. Even better, we will discover that the goal oriented process of the growth of our entanglement has always been to bring us so close that we would not only secure everyone’s needs, but truly become as one, united all over the world. If we do not succumb to our egos, we will triumph over our egos and raise humanity to new heights. If we surrender to our selfishness, we will destroy ourselves and our children will have to do the work we haven’t, much more laboriously.
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My new article on Linkedin “The Case against Cancel Culture”

One of the most injurious consequences of the effort to maintain political correctness is what’s become known as “cancel culture.” Basically, it means that if someone says or writes something that is not in line with the PC (political correctness) guidelines, that someone is canceled, ostracized, banned from social media, often fired, and always chastised by self-appointed censors of public discourse. Cancel culture is not only nefarious at its core; it goes against the nature of human society, against the nature of being human, and in fact, against nature.

Life is incorporation of different things that join to create more complicated and higher entities than their individual selves. If we want to develop, we must embrace incorporation for the sake of our collective evolution as human beings. If we want stagnation and death, let’s cancel each other out until none of us is left and evolution will continue in our absence.

A human being who is excluded from contact with other human beings cannot develop. Human contact is indispensable for human development, and the more diverse the people one meets, the more one develops. A child who grows up seeing only one kind of people, with the same line of thinking, the same beliefs, and the same manners, will evolve to be the exact replica of his or her parents. This is not necessarily bad, but it is also not the purpose of humankind, or of creation.

All elements of nature were created to evolve, to change, and rise to higher levels of existence. Humans are not excluded. Think of water, for example. Water consists of two gasses: hydrogen and oxygen. Alone, they are invisible, undetectable in any way. Even worse—they are toxic. However, if you connect them to each other, you get water—the bedrock of life, and what every creature needs for its survival.

Likewise, connect sodium, which is a type of metal, with chlorine, which is a yellow-green gas, and you’ve got table salt, which gives taste to the food we eat, and which our ancestors used as a preservative. Everything works this way: Take water and flour, and you can make bread or cakes, or pasta. All parts of reality are compounds built upon compounds that create still more complicated compounds, which eventually form the ecosystem that is Planet Earth. Planets, in turn, make up the Sun’s solar system, which form the Milky Way galaxy, and galaxies create the universe.

None of these would have happened if at any point during the making of the universe, cancel culture had been applied to any of the elements of reality. Human civilization, too, would not have evolved if at any point, only one race or one faith, or one culture had managed to take over. When cancel culture was applied, such as in Nazi Germany, it ended in disaster.

That said, opposing cancel culture does not mean that any level or manner of mingling is healthy. Just as compounds in nature do not lose the identity of their particular ingredients, each of us must retain our uniqueness as individuals. However, growth exists only when we combine our individual selves with other individual selves to create something that is new, more complicated, and indeed of a higher order than ourselves. That something will not exist without all of us, yet it is neither of us, but something new that our incorporation has created. Think of the water again: Hydrogen exists in and of itself, and so does oxygen, but only when they work together do they create water, life.

Indeed, life is incorporation of different things that join to create more complicated and higher entities than their individual selves. If we want to develop, we must embrace incorporation for the sake of our collective evolution as human beings. If we want stagnation and death, let’s cancel each other out until none of us is left and evolution will continue in our absence.

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Baal HaSulam, “Peace in the World”: Everything in reality, good or bad, and even the most harmful in the world, has a right to exist and must not be destroyed and eradicated from the world. We must only mend and reform it because any observation of the work of creation is enough to teach us about the greatness and perfection of its Operator and Creator. 

Question: Terrible things have happened throughout history: monstrous murders, the genocide of entire nations. Can you explain how the worst states help advance humanity toward a higher goal?

Answer: The fact is that we consist of one very vivid desire to enjoy. We want to feel good. And when we feel bad, it pushes us to the next, as it seems to us, better state. In it, we feel like we are coming out of the past for a while, but we still feel that it is bad in it. It also pushes us to the next state. And so we move constantly.

This is our destiny, our fate, our history, our development, and everything that happens.

How can we not move like that by chance, along Brownian motion, from this “bad” to another “bad,” a third, and so on? How can we see our path in advance so that we can move from bad to good, and from good to even better?

This does not happen. There are better periods, worse periods, but in principle, nothing radically better happens.

So we have a problem: what is happening to us and to nature? We see how intelligent nature has created physical bodies, minds, qualities, feelings, and everything else, that is, a huge super-organism in which we are small, but very nasty bugs.

Question: Is all this for us to realize the evil of our egoistic nature?

Answer: Not only. Obviously, through this awareness we can come to change ourselves, and in accordance with this, to change the whole of nature. After all, on the one hand, we are the most egoistic beings in this world, and on the other hand, we are the most active, strong, and powerful.

So we need to figure out what we can do with our great potential and our great evil egoism.
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From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 5/13/19

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My new article on Linkedin “The Hypocrisy of Sex Scandals”

Every once in a while, and today more often than before, a sex scandal explodes in the media and everyone is shocked to hear that this or that celebrity, who used to be a role model we all grew up on and admired, is really a monster in disguise. When this happens, moralists click their tongues in disapproval, and quickly turn to social media to express their righteous indignation and disbelief that this person, the idol of our youth, was actually a sex predator, a villain of the worst kind.

When we talk about climate change, pandemics, power outages, or even a traffic jam, we don’t realize that these are manifestations of our connectedness. The only reason they are here is that we are unaware that our thoughtless and careless attitude to one another causes them.

I think they’re hypocritical. First, when such a scandal blows up, you will always find people who knew about it but kept silent, or would have known about it had they not tried so hard not to see the obvious. Second, there is nothing new about this phenomenon; sex perversions have been an inseparable part of human perversions throughout the ages. In ancient cultures, such as in Egypt, Greece, or Rome, some perversions were permitted and acceptable, and others were regarded as an abomination. In more puritan times, such as the Middle-Ages, one could find oneself tied to the stake for having done the same thing others did in antiquity, without anyone making a fuss over it. It is not that the condemning puritans did not commit the same “crimes” they had accused others of committing; it’s just that they hid it better, and were mainly better connected to the authorities in charge of exposing such “immoral” behaviors.

The truth about these scandals is not that such misdemeanors are burgeoning, but that they are used more often than before against their perpetrators. In other words, today, accusations of sexual misconduct are a weapon that politicians use in order to destroy their rivals. Exposing sex crimes will not prevent the next crime or make potential victims safer. It will, however, affect the accused, even if the accusation turns out to be false. Therefore, the next time a sex scandal breaks out, check who benefits from its exposure.

If we want to prevent sex crimes, we needn’t focus on punishment, but on educating the public. I’m not saying we should not punish sex offenders; I am merely pointing out that if we want to prevent such crimes, the way to do it is not by intimidation but by education to consideration.

We are brought up in a social environment that teaches us nothing but to focus on our own wants and needs, and ignore those of others. With such a narcissistic upbringing, people are bound to be inconsiderate and apathetic to other people’s suffering; they will not cringe at the thought of hurting other people.

But the truth is that such behaviors hurt the offender too, and not only the victim. In truth, we are connected and dependent on each other even if we aren’t aware of it. We could become aware of it; we could know how to conduct ourselves in a way that’s satisfying to us and to everyone around us, but we must first be taught to see ourselves within the bigger picture of humanity.

When we talk about climate change, pandemics, power outages, or even a traffic jam, we don’t realize that these are manifestations of our connectedness. The only reason they are here is that we are unaware that our thoughtless and careless attitude to one another causes them.

If we were educated about our interconnections, we would know how to conduct ourselves so as not to inflict pandemics on ourselves. Moreover, there would be countless benefits to such awareness: We wouldn’t hurt each other since we would feel, not just intellectually, but truly feel it in our hearts that we are all connected. And just as I wouldn’t hurt myself, I wouldn’t hurt anyone else.

Can you imagine how living in such a society would feel? We wouldn’t have to worry about sex crimes, or any crime, for that matter, since people wouldn’t dream of hurting other people; they would feel connected!

It turns out that the true knowledge we all need is not the next tech gadget, but the awareness that we are all connected and affect each other in myriad ways. If we knew this and lived by this awareness, we would treat each other humanely, the way human beings should treat other human beings, and there would be no scandals of any kind.
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My new article on Linkedin “The Way the Pandemic Has Strengthened Religious Beliefs”

When one cannot come to terms with a somber reality, looking towards heaven is an instinctive reaction. In the US, half a million lives have been lost in the COVID-19 pandemic in a year since the outbreak of the virus. A recent survey by the Pew Research Center reveals that people from economically developed countries claim that the eruption of COVID-19 has boosted their religious beliefs, particularly in the US where nearly three out of ten American adults say the coronavirus plague has strengthened their faith.

The coronavirus is a reaction to humanity on the part of the harmonious nature, a sort of catalyst for re-bridging the gap that has been created between humanity and nature. Therefore, what we urgently need are positive connections between us—in other words, the religion of love.

The development of civilization has distanced us from nature; therefore, we are unaware of its conduct and feel more vulnerable to it. Thus, despite our tremendous technological capability, we stand helpless in the face of global epidemics, climate change, and other crises. We do not know where to flee, how to cope, and certainly do not see a bright future on the horizon.

The uncertainty of these times, the lack of clear answers, and the fading of hope sends people searching, as they have since time immemorial, for a higher power they hope might be guiding their fate. They begin to grope in the dark and ask: Where is this power that is creating this evil in the world that we see around us now, how can we survive the next blow, and in general, what is the meaning of this world? As we hear of more and more people dying from this plague, our sense of security is undermined, fear for our loved ones grows, and life takes on an unfamiliar, ambiguous gray tone. On the other hand, living conditions have drastically changed in the past year. Work has moved into home, children have become immersed in distance learning, and the framework of life has been reduced to within family boundaries. Our world has shrunk.

With reduced choices in the search for some ray of light that provides security now when people really do not know what to count on or where to pin their hopes, religion becomes an anchor, a source of stability. One may not necessarily find in it an answer to every question, but at least it gives some sense of relief from the frightening reality people face.

It is not a sign of a backward trend or a tendency to a more religious and conservative world. Instead, it is a sign of humanity seeking, in a time of turmoil and crumbling foundations, for the meaning of life, and a growing desire for a confident connection to the future in closeness with the Supreme Force that governs life. But in this quest, those who find religion insufficient for providing lasting calm and fulfillment will keep searching for answers.

Even before the main religions expanded to the whole world, numerous beliefs, rituals, and idolatry practices existed. The human being has always needed a sense of security and answers for the inexplicable. This notion prompted the controversial Karl Marx to claim that “religion is the opium of the people,” while Voltaire said “if God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him.” As a matter of fact, it is good for a person to seek a connection to a higher power. It manifests throughout our historical axis of development: tribes danced around bonfires to honor their goddesses, bowed to statues, and worshiped the power of nature in different ways until such practices evolved into structured religions and systems of belief.

The strengthening of religious belief in the recent days of the pandemic, as the latest survey shows, actually indicates a broader developmental process that humanity is going through. The global COVID-19 plague is teaching us that we are one small worldwide village, and we are all interdependent under a supreme force that controls every detail in reality.

We are all in a single harmonious natural system, connected in all its parts, and a person, as a result of one’s opposite egoistic nature, time and time again severs the threads of connection between himself and others, thus violating the laws of nature and tearing human society from the feeling of the supreme power surrounding us. The coronavirus is a reaction to humanity on the part of the harmonious nature, a sort of catalyst for re-bridging the gap that has been created between humanity and nature. Therefore, what we urgently need are positive connections between us—in other words, the religion of love.

There is nothing wrong with the temporary tendency to return to the embrace of traditional religion, it contributes to our progress. Firstly, it connects people and hints to them about the good found in unity. Although in the meantime it is an egoistic connection, later it will be corrected to become altruistic. Secondly, religion reveals to believers their weakness in relation to integral nature and brings about dependence on the Supreme Force.

Such a deep relationship does not conflict with any religious practice, custom, or tradition, but goes with them in one turn. Foremost kabbalist Rabbi Yehuda Ashlag, Baal HaSulam, wrote in The Writings of the Last Generation, “Apart from ‘loving your neighbor as yourself,’ each nation may pursue its own religion and traditions, and one must not interfere with the other.” Because when you love, there is a place for everyone, for each and every one. That is the biggest strength of every society.
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New Life 1297 – An Era Of Lack Of Direction And Uncertainty
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Yael Leshed-Harel

Today, all four generations are confused: grandparents, parents, children, and grandchildren. In earlier generations, life was simple, whereas today we feel that something has gone wrong, the world is unpredictable, and we don’t know what to offer our children. Evolution has exhausted our power of development: the desire to enjoy, our drive, our fuel.

The world has reached a dead end. There is a sense of helplessness and despair. For the first time in history, young people lack a good example to follow and this brings us to the big question of what happiness is in the first place. Today we will no longer be able to manage in life or survive without a method that guides us. Everyone needs to come to an understanding of the internal state of the world.
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From KabTV’s “New Life 1297 – An Era Of Lack Of Direction And Uncertainty,” 2/7/21

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Comment: The Torah examines four relationships between people. One of them: “What is mine is mine and what is yours is yours” is regarded as the worst and is called “Sodom.” And in our world it is considered normal.

My Response: No. This is an abnormal state because it cuts off all connections between people. I have no right either to give something to you or to receive something from you. So everyone in the society is absolutely isolated from each other. In addition, they even spy upon each other to comply with this condition.

Question: It is against unity, against the tendency of nature to bring us to one common whole?

Answer: This is completely against nature because nature is built on interconnection between atoms, particles, cells, and people at least in something, at least in some way. And here, everything is based on isolation.

The second state: “What is mine is yours, and what is yours is mine.” This is the essence of the nature of a primitive society where everything is common property: wives, children, dwellings, and animals. This state is characteristic of undeveloped egoism, in particular, of a primitive communal system.

The third state: “What is mine is yours, and what is yours is yours.” In the Torah, it is called Hesed.

This is a good but incomplete state in which I am practically locked on giving to another person and thinking about others.

This is good for small groups of people, for children, for weak societies, for the sick, and old people, when I give away and transfer everything to them. But this is a flawed state in which there is no flow of information and forces, no exchange. Everything goes in one direction, and nature is not built that way.

Nature is based on the fact that all of its parts are integrally locked in one common system, and  between them there is an exchange of energy, information, and vital forces to support the entire system together in its integral, correct interaction.

The fourth state: “What is mine is mine, and what is yours is mine” is called “criminal”—when I get from society more than I should.

Basically, all these four types of interaction between people exist in egoism. None is perfect. Kabbalah raises us above them.

A perfect state is when we are in complete interaction with each other, in inclusion in each other. This is not the case in any of the four states.
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From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 5/13/19

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