Question: What is the difference between a group for Kabbalah students of ten people and a sect whose purpose is to exploit its members?

Answer: A group of Kabbalah students is based on absolute pure love and in such a group you don’t obey those who manage it but only its spiritual goal. Therefore it is up to a person whether to join it or not.

In a sect, on the other hand, there are many conditions; it is very limited and closed, has its distinct ideology, and the closer one gets to the center of the sect, the more and more hidden it becomes. A sect also has typical rituals such as prayers, meditations, etc. Such things are not part of studying the wisdom of Kabbalah.

A group of Kabbalists is not closed. It is based on the principle of mutual love, honesty, warm-heartedness, mutual inclusion, and mutual help according to the principles of Kabbalists and the sources that are studied. The only ritual it encourages is sharing a meal.

There are no conditions as to religion, race, or a nationality. A person who wants to join the group is accepted and if he wants to leave, he can do so. Everything is open and free; all the study materials are available on the Internet in every language; there is no barricade or separation.

The wisdom of Kabbalah encourages the unity of all mankind in mutual love and good mutual relations without any coercion, equally for everyone and with everyone.
[174496]
From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 11/29/15

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Question: Is there a law of fate, called Karma, that depends on the actions of a person in this world?

Answer: A person indeed can influence his fate, but not on the level of Karma, but only through his own aspiration along with those like him for greater unity. Then his influence will be positive. However, if he does not act according to those opportunities that are given to him for unity, his influence will be negative.

In this world, we are very limited by our philosophies and inventions. We have only one possibility: to unite and create a connection between us or not. Accordingly, we are either cut off from the higher forces and discover negative influences, losses, and suffering on all levels, or we make it possible for them to pass through us and create a positive influence.

Question: Is the attainment of wholeness and transition to a higher level a common inheritance, or will some of us not merit reaching this?

Answer: We are involved in everything that is required to hasten the spiritual development of the whole so that each one will take his place within spirituality and all of us will reach the final state through the good and rapid way, not the slow way of suffering.
[172781]
From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 11/8/15

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Question: What determines the life expectancy of different people? After all, both wonderful people and vile killers die young. Could it be that, from the point of view of the maturation of the soul in this current life, the first souls already have ascended higher, while the latter are hopeless, so they are taken away in order to be reborn?

Answer: All of this relates to reincarnations. No calculations are made here regarding the bodies. You can be a good or evil person, but in egoistic terms, it does not matter.

The calculation focuses only on the general system in order to bring it optimally to complete correction. Therefore, it is only about the fulfillment of a person’s soul. The body is given to a person so that by his free will he will place himself in the general soul in connection with others in total love and bestowal.

If he can do that, he finds his soul. Then the calculation is according to his state at any given moment.

If he cannot do it, he is given a certain amount of time to be incorporated willingly into the general society and perhaps even into the spiritual world. If he doesn’t use this opportunity, it is taken away from him, and he moves on to the next life. The same spiritual gene will be dressed in another body with new data in a new environment, and he will still be given an opportunity to fulfill his mission.
[170773]
From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 11/1/15

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Question: You say that everything develops according to a particular program, and at the same time you speak about freedom of choice. Isn’t there a contradiction here?

Answer: No, indeed there is a general program of development in relation to all of humanity and a particular program of development in relation to every person. However, going in the way that is intended for you, you can go against your will where you are pushed from behind through suffering like a beast or you can go rapidly in a conscious way like a human being. This is the entire difference.

Freedom of choice is an independent and conscious choice of forward movement, with a choice of accelerated development. It doesn’t exist for everyone else. But when you choose the conditions for movement and independent advancement, you determine for yourself everything that you perceive on the way, and then everything feels completely different.

Question: But a person always strives to be free. There is freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and so forth.

Answer: All of this doesn’t exist. On the level of our world, everything is determined from the start. However, we are talking about the spiritual development of a person where a person can advance only through realizing freedom of choice.

Question: Yet, how is it possible to choose a mate or a profession for myself correctly? Does the wisdom of Kabbalah speak about this?

Answer: No, it is only if you study the wisdom of Kabbalah and begin independently and consciously to advance forward in the proper implementation of your environment (group, teacher, method), then freedom of choice appears for you.

However, it doesn’t exist just like that! After all, I am an egoist, and at every given moment, I search where it will be better for me, how to find some benefit, to profit more. This is not freedom, but a search like a dog that looking for food in the street.

Question: What is the system that throughout life arranges all kinds of problems and blows for a person just so that he would begin to think and reflect upon the meaning of life?

Answer: This is an absolute system of connection between all of its parts. Therefore, all of us determine the fate of one another.
[169239]
From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 9/27/15

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Question: Does Kabbalah teach the correct attitude to all kinds of events occur during the day?

Answer: Kabbalah does not teach how to navigate your way in this life, but how to find the entrance to the upper world, to identify where the door is that I will open in order to enter it.

Question: What if I’m interested in corporeal life? Let’s say I have a problem with the bank.

Answer: Kabbalah deals with the upper management and helps a person to create such signals to our world that then his life in this world will also start to change.

The method helps us to pass from our world to the next higher state. It depends how we use this method. Someone uses the wisdom of Kabbalah from the top down, and some from the bottom up. But most important is that we direct the connection to the upper management that engages in our world and also the spiritual world.

Question: And who arranges our physical problems?

Answer: We are talking about the overall management system, and if you attain it, you will see how you are surrounded, managed, and with this you will understand how to manage it yourself.

A person begins to understand what the essence of his or her free choice is, and where one is enslaved. He discovers that until this moment, in fact, he had no free choice in life; all his movements were compelled; he was completely programmed.

But now, he can exit from this slavery to freedom, to the extent he begins to recognize, understand, and realize the highest management program. He begins to connect with it to merge, and to enter it as a free element, as a factor in the equation.

And all his problems in material life: the choice of a profession, the country of residence, a life partner, etc. will be resolved by themselves.

A completely different system of values will appear in him that will change his plans.
[168370]
From the Lesson in Russian 9/20/15

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Question: If our brain receives all the orders and thus operates our body, it means that I also receive thoughts about freewill and the wisdom of Kabbalah.

So what does it mean to be a free man if we don’t control our thoughts and our actions? How can a person ascend if he doesn’t receive such orders?

Answer: A person receives everything from the Upper Light and from there his path depends on his connection with the environment and to what extent this connection resembles the structure of the upper level. If it resembles it, he discovers it, etc.
[167178]

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Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar,” Section 61, 63: The answer is that the world, during the six thousand years of its existence, is like one Partzuf divided into three thirds: Rosh (head), Toch (interior), Sof (end), meaning, HBD (Hochma, Bina, Daat), HGT (Hesed, Gevura, Tifferet), NHY (Netzach, Hod, Yesod). This is what our sages wrote, ‘Two millennia of Tohu (chaos), two millennia of Torah, and two millennia of the days of the Messiah” (Sanhedrin 97a)….Hence, only after the completion of these lowly souls can the Highest Lights manifest, and not before.

There is a general rule that is called the “inverse relation between Lights and vessels” (Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah, Section 24), so that the vessels that fell to a greater depth were higher before the Shevira (breaking).

Which means that even though we are in a state of breaking, in the lowest state, through our correction we can add very great power to the general Kli, and as a result of this, a great Light will be revealed.

The first generations excelled in realization and their desire to receive was relatively refined, so the Light of Hochma was not revealed that much. This was not the same method and not the same Light that we discover within our Kelim. And on the other hand, according to the inverse arrangement of Lights and Kelim, the Light of Hochma will be revealed within the Kelim of HBD, while we belong to the Kelim of NHY.

And at the end of correction all of the Light and every Kli will be a single circle.

Question: Why are the 6,000 spiritual levels described as 6,000 years? It seems that the Creator created the creature and gave it an ultimatum, to finish the correction in the specified period and not beyond it.

Answer:  A system of worlds exists, ABYA (Atzilut, Beria, Yetzira, and Assiya). In this system, the world of Atzilut is the world of correction and doesn’t belong to the broken Kelim, but was created to correct them. The worlds of BYA are the place, the environment, the state, in which the broken Kelim, the broken souls exist.

In reality only one soul exists, the soul of Adam HaRishon (the First Man). This soul was divided or broken into a multitude of parts that fell according to their spiritual level into the worlds of Beria, Yetzira, and Assiya and must be rediscovered. According to the intensity of the breaking, these parts are divided into three groups: HBD, HGT, and NHY.

They are revealed according to a particular order: Beria, Yetzira, and Assiya, from light to heavy. The parts that belong to the worlds of Beria and Yetzira and the upper two thirds of the world of Assiya are revealed according to the program of creation. After all, in the present stage, the Kelim are still not divided according to the right line and the left line in such a form that they can activate their freedom of choice.

And only in the Kelim of the bottom part of NHY, meaning beginning from our generation, which is called the last generation, is there a possibility of developing more rapidly and efficiently than the program of creation. Previously the program of creation determined the connection and the relative rates between the Lights and Kelim according to an awakening from above, which is truly considered to be 6,000 years. And now the new method is discovered.

This is because creation is not just a product with characteristics that are given to it initially, devoid of any potential for development of new things so it is not clear why it exists. And specifically we who want to realize the program of creation by ourselves with our own powers, justify the Creator, confirming that it was not just created without any benefit; it is not just automatic. The benefit is that creation makes it possible for a person to search and find possibilities of joining the process according to his freedom of choice to hasten the correction and advance creation through elevating MAN. And then all of creation belongs to a person, the whole world belongs to him.

And so, the time of development is shortened, not because there is a need for this, but rather, this is a sign of how much the person himself yearns to finish and correct creation. Why? Because in the corrected Kli it is possible to give great contentment to the Creator.

What this means is that from now on we are ready to dedicate our time so that all of our actions will be in order to bestow, and through this we attract the whole world towards correction.

Question: Why is this process still connected to physical time?

Answer: In your perception you make a division between spirituality and physicality. But in fact, physicality is what is called an intention for the sake of reception and spirituality is an intention for the sake of bestowal. How can one be without the other?

Everything comes from above, and the spiritual root determines the physical branch. The physical branch includes the nature of the still, vegetative, and animate, everything that we see, all the desires that are not ready to determine any change regarding the Creator independently. This includes the nature of Adam, which is not a person in our world, rather an Adam (Man) who is ready to resemble the Creator. Only people like these belong to the level of Adam, bestowing and not receiving.

It is the same thing regarding time. There are times that belong to the nature of the still, vegetative, and animate, and there is a special time for those who belong to the level of Adam, those who ascend above their nature. They feel their time, their state, their level, to the same degree that they correct themselves. For them time is not determined by the clock and not by dates on the calendar. The dial on the clock simply vanishes from your feeling if you reach your individual end of correction.

And so we are living at the end of the 6,000 years, and our period is unique in that we have the possibility of freedom of choice. We are working not only for ourselves but for all six millennia. After all, those who formed the ladder of spiritual levels depend on us. And if we attract the smallest Lights, they are revealed above as the greatest Lights.

This is correct even though it is difficult for us to appreciate our work because we don’t see its results.
[128358]
From the 3d part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/25/14, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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Question: On the one hand, we see that the person is part of nature, and everything that happens with him affects him. However, on the other hand, we place ourselves at the top of the pyramid as the crown of creation, something higher that stands above all of nature.

We are different than other creatures in intelligence, in our wisdom, and in the ability to plan and develop. We have a special addition that is not the same for any other part of nature. What place does the person hold in the system of nature?

Answer: Without a doubt, man is an integral part of nature. Our bodies belong to the animate level; all of its systems are like animals’, and there is nothing special about them. We produce children exactly in the same manner and take care of them like any animal.

A human begins where his thought, his education, and the power of his intellect, his intelligence, is awakened and developed from generation to generation, and along with the intellect, emotions are developed, the awareness of who he is and where he is. These questions are aroused in every generation, but with a newer quality.

There is a very great role for education here. In addition to development from the side of nature, we develop ourselves with the help of special systems within us, and we pass our scientific knowledge and experience from generation to generation. This is not like the survival experience that animals transmit to their offspring.

Humans transmit wisdom, scientific knowledge, and a perception of the world to their children. So, we are stronger than all of them and are ready to develop means that animals do not attain. The ape doesn’t know how to use anything besides a stick, and a human invents more sophisticated tools.

Animals are entirely activated by nature on the level of instincts and don’t ask where the orders that they obey come from. However, a human can ask why this is happening this way and is it possible to do this differently? He searches for how to leave unpleasant situations and achieve maximal comfort. It is as if he were guided by the same motivations as animals, but the animals act instinctively, like a machine. And even though many latent instincts and habits are incorporated in man and are transmitted from generation to generation, what is unique about him is that he learns constantly.

A human learns from an environment that influences him very strongly, and he changes according to the environment. Latent in him is the aspiration to leave the place where he is, to develop, to conquer new areas, to feel that he is in control, and to understand and exploit everything around him with his own powers. But we see that if a human being acts this way according to his desire, he must constantly escape from the troubles that he causes himself. As a result, he becomes more miserable, even though he is above all of nature.

We develop under the pressure of our egoism, which doesn’t exist among the animals. Animals act only according to instincts, and humans have freedom of choice: what and how to do something. So, it follows that in every situation in life, I have a possibility of doing something good or not good in relation to others, and clearly I make a choice according to my personal benefit. However, I must check carefully as to what exactly is beneficial to me. After all, a person is different from animals by also having the power of destruction, and he is capable of harming himself.

This destructive power is the control of our ego, and humans must fulfill the commands of this power even if they understand that because of it, they are sentencing themselves to a very difficult life. They must submit to this internal aspiration. They see that they are on the threshold of war, but they still cannot stop and are ready for death because their ego is stronger than their survival instinct.

An animal never goes against the survival instinct. A female is even ready to abandon her cubs to the mercy of predators to escape them herself. The natural instinct dictates that a greater and healthier part is more important than a small and weak one, and therefore the female must be saved first. That is how nature obligates animals to act in accord with the procreative instinct. However, a person can act completely differently. A mother is ready to risk her life to save her children, which is not typical of animals.

An animal simply fights for its territory, food, and continuation of the generation. But the moment that it feels that it is weaker than the enemy, it will withdraw without shame and remorse. These feelings simply don’t exist in animals. They have a normal instinct, as if it is some force working rather than the biological body. They simply gauge which is the stronger force, and the weaker surrenders. But a human is ready to fight for “truth” and “justice,” but all of these are expressions of his pride, his ego. The human must prove that he is justified, and with this he manifests his personal feelings.

Our body is no different than the body of animals. The human within us is our pride, envy, and lust. It is specifically these characteristics that differentiate us from the animal world. So the place of the human in nature is not like the place of the still, vegetative, and animate, and we instinctively distinguish ourselves from them. In addition, we can control other parts of nature: killing animals, putting them in a cage, domesticating them, and using them for food. Moreover, we absolutely dominate the nature of the vegetative and still, so we consider ourselves as being above all of nature.

But if we look at the human being, we see that what stands out is his envy, his aspiration for control and respect, characteristics that are irrelevant to the animal instincts, and so they elevate the human above everything. At the same time, even humans are managed by nature. After all, if I don’t know what will happen to me in the next moment, this brings me to the level of the normal animal. If I don’t control my future, even for the next moment, I already am dominated by nature.

So, I must clarify: Who am I really? The one who acts or the one who is activated? It seems as if I activate levels that are found above me. But I have no control over myself nor over human society. On the contrary, I am activated from above, that is, I am given the opportunity to control the nature of the still, vegetative, and animate, but I don’t control myself and what is above me, my fate and my future. In that, I am completely controlled.

This is the tragedy of the human who seems so strong and successful in all that he does. He possesses emotion, intelligence, a developed consciousness, and powerful means. After we developed to this level, we suddenly discovered that we cannot even touch what is most essential.
[128375]
From KabTV’s “A New Life” 2/23/14

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Baal HaSulam, “The Arvut (Mutual Guarantee)” Section 20: Thus, each and every Mitzva that each person from Israel performs in order to bring contentment to one’s Maker, and not for any self-gratification, helps, to some extent, with the development of all the people of the world. This is because it is not done at once, but by slow, gradual development, until it increases to such a degree that it can bring all the people in the world to the desired purity. And this is what our sages call “shifting the balance to virtue,” meaning that the necessary weight of purity has been reached. And they compare it to weighing on a scale, where the shifting of the balance is the attainment of the desired weight.

These are very serious conditions. There are people who are more ready to comply with them, and there are those who are less ready. This depends on their previous preparation. It depends on their past and the root of their soul. There are people who cannot comply with this, and they leave. When a person comes to study, in the first years, he doesn’t hear what they say to him, and it is good that he doesn’t hear! Therefore the wisdom of Kabbalah was concealed for so long so people wouldn’t know about the serious conditions.

Specifically because of this condition, the Shevira (Breaking) happened, the destruction of the First and Second Temples. Therefore, we needed to move away from the place of Shevira because we were not ready to withstand it. So, we were forced to endure exile for 2,000 years to gradually get closer to the condition due to which the great people fell in the days of the Beit ha Mikdash (Temple).

In our day, we have reached readiness, and we have received all the explanations from Baal HaSulam in the article “The Arvut (Mutual Guarantee)” so directly and openly that it places us facing this condition such that there is nowhere to flee. But even after all of this, people who come to study don’t absorb what is said at all in the first ten years.

But at least they are near these things because throughout previous incarnations they were far from discovery, and the message has been revealed now, even though, in the meantime, they are not absorbing it. There is still resistance. There is contact, but it is not yet internal. And later these words gradually begin to penetrate into a person through disappointments, various unpleasant problems. and events.

They must continue in spite of everything, and the Light will continue to work.

The environment obligates a person, gives him various tasks, sending him to disseminate, to various duties. It awakens and obligates him. He must do his duty, otherwise they won’t let him rest. So, this is very influential on him and advances him, hastening his development, and finally he begins to see that he has no choice and that spirituality is not at all the way he used to think about it, and he doesn’t attain and is unable to attain true spirituality.

He begins to understand that everything is determined by emotion and not intellect, but it is impossible to control emotions. He is not dependent on us, but only on the Light that Reforms, which changes a person’s feelings, his desire. So, gradually, he digests these concepts: what the love of others truly is and how impossible it is to attain it on one’s own; it depends entirely on the Light that Reforms.

So, he begins to organize all of his activities so that the Light will influence him and correct him. This is a great revolution that happens in a person after many years within the group in the process of correction, study, and dissemination, and the entire world must go through all of this.

But it is up to us to understand that every action we make adds to the favorable balance of the entire world. In the integral system, nothing happens to me individually without being felt by everyone. At the end of correction, what we did for everyone and what everyone did will be revealed. We will have a common understanding and common sense, and all of us will be able to feel this entire system together. Each one will be equivalent to the entire system.

Then, in exactly what form each one within this entire system acts for the good of others will be discovered. They will not take into account how they brought the person down from above, pushed him, and what the conditions were that he was given. Rather, it will be what the efforts were that he invested in the conditions that they gave him and whether he realized his freedom of choice.

All of this will be revealed at the end of correction, and each one will be ashamed of himself due to the achievements of his friend. This is how we correct the shame that is rooted in us and is the cause for the evolution of all the worlds.
[129011]
From the Preparation for the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/4/14

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Question: I have had unusual moments in life that I don’t know how to explain. An example of this is when I have needed to make a “Yes-No” decision, and I felt, knew, or wanted to say, “No,” but I was terribly afraid of saying this.

And suddenly for a few moments, I saw my future if I were to say, “Yes,” and I saw and felt fear and an anxiety that was much stronger than the fear of saying “No,” so I said, “No.”

There were more situations in which I acted in an apparent split. Logic told me one thing, whereas the body did something else and said something else, something that I would never have said or done. All of these events changed my life drastically.

I suspect that this happens to all people, but they simply don’t pay attention to this. my question is: What is this? From where does this intervention come that seems external to me?

Answer: We are constantly under external influences, since there is simply nothing else. More precisely, this is internal influence. It builds in us a feeling of this world and of ourselves. The wisdom of Kabbalah reveals to us the possibilities of influencing this source of feeling about ourselves and our world and for us becoming the builders of the world and of everything that is felt in us, which is Olam Ein Sof.
[164625]

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