Question: We are asking a question on behalf of a friend; this question bothers him a lot. Can he charge people money for blessings in order to help them with difficult situations in life? He also proposes doing this as a part of our local group work because he believes this to be dissemination and a way to attract new people to Kabbalah.

He has money problems, so he’s facing a choice between taking a risky job or trying to make money by giving people blessings. This question confused us so we are turning to you to avoid making a mistake.

Answer: It is absolutely forbidden to use Kabbalah to make money, especially by cheating people, and if a member of the group is found to be doing this, then you must immediately expel him from the group. Never use Kabbalah to make money. It completely excludes a person from the spiritual path. Do not do blessings of any kind; they are a lie!

Only the desires of the group and selfless thoughts about a friend can help him. It is forbidden to use Kabbalah to make money! It is the same with curses like Pulsa DeNura, as if someone could actually hurt another person using such things. These miracles do not exist!

We can only aspire towards the Light, the force of love and bestowal, which is the only positive force in the world. This force is our only opportunity to actually do something in the world. It is the only freedom of will that exists.
[20997]

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: We All Guarantee For Each Other
Laitman.com Post: How Can You Help A Friend?
Laitman.com Post: Authentic Kabbalah Does Not Try To Sell Anything

Filed under: Free Will, Kabbalah Dissemination, Q&A - 1 Comment →

Those who are called “Isra-El” (striving to the Creator) advance by their own individual work and separately from the rest of humanity. This is on account of the Reshimot that have awakened within them and the Creator wishing to bring them closer to Himself.

They enter a special process called the revelation of the soul (the Creator or spirituality which is one and the same). Step by step, they have to gradually uncover the continuous process that every person needs to go through in accordance with the speed with which their Reshimot are realized.

We can only accelerate this process, not change it. We can hasten our development if, by using all the means possible, we process our states faster and more correctly. We do not change the states themselves or the order in which they come. Our only freedom is to make use of the study and the connection between us in order to enhance our awareness and sensitivity so as to understand these states faster and justify them.

By being prepared for these states, we make them pass at a faster rate and thereby build a different attitude toward them. Then, we perceive every state positively and with understanding. Other than our attitude to what’s happening to us, we are absolutely powerless to change or influence anything.

Our attitude to all the states that we perceive and undergo (which, obviously, come from the Creator) constitutes our intention. The intention is my attitude to my sensations and to their Source for “there is none else beside Him.”

From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/16/10, “What is the Matter of Sufferings in the Work”

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: A Unique Chance To Speed Up Time
Laitman.com Post: To Turn From The Path of Suffering
Laitman.com Post: The Fast Road To The Spiritual World

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Free Will, Group Work, Inner Work - No Comments →

Question: Is it enough for us to correct ourselves in order to correct the world?

Answer: No, it isn’t. Since all the souls are connected, a single soul (degree) can’t complete its correction without correcting the parts of the next degree. No person lives for his own sake; the whole system is a system of mutual bestowal.

Therefore, it is impossible for someone to correct himself for his own sake. Everyone lives in order to provide correction and fulfillment for others. It is impossible for a soul that corrects itself not to have a part which was corrected for it by the predecessors and a part that it must correct for others.

We know that the upper part of every soul, its GE (Galgalta ve Eynaim), exists in the lower part, the AHP (Awzen, Hotem, Peh), of the preceding, higher soul (Partzuf). The soul’s lower part, its AHP, is situated in the GE of the the lower soul.

Thus, our free choice is in the place where we are not connected to a higher or a lower soul; it is in the middle part of our soul, the middle part of the Sefira Tifferet. A free space from all souls is formed there; it is our freedom of will. In essence, it represents a special unification in our soul of the higher and lower souls. In this unification, they are equal, and, thus, they give us freedom of choice.

Outside of the middle part of Sefira Tifferet, the parts of the soul do not belong to the soul itself. The upper part pertains to the higher soul (the previous Partzuf), and the lower part pertains to the lower soul, its “successor.”

Therefore, a calculation is always performed on bestowal to the upper one and the lower one. The decision about this bestowal is made in the middle; there is no other freedom. This middle point arose artificially through the unification of Bina and Malchut. It is called Klipat Noga, and it constitutes my point of choice. Besides this point, everything else belongs not to me, but to the upper or lower Partzufim (plural of Partzuf) relative to me. I am situated in the middle, and I constantly need to decide how I am connected to them.

However, this point that makes the decision is, in fact, the “I” or “human being,” the one who is “similar” to the Creator. On one side, there is Malchut, and, on the other, there is Bina. Thus, there is a special contact of Bina and Malchut (the qualities of the Creator and the creature) at this point. This contact yields a free decision to make the creature similar to the Creator. It is called “Adam” or “similar.”

Until we reach this decision, we are not “human.” The human begins from 1) realization of the difference between Bina and Malchut, and 2) the connection between them. The human being grows from this point to the extent that he is able to serve others with his 613 desires: the upper ones with his 248 desires and the lower ones with his 365 desires.

If you don’t do this, you remain only a point. Yet, if you do, you develop your Galgalta ve Eynaim, and they spread out onto the common Soul: all the souls that are higher and lower than you.

From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/12/10, “The Arvut (Mutual Guarantee)”

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: He Is The Beginning And The End, But I Am In The Middle
Laitman.com Post: Learning From Mouth To Mouth
Laitman.com Post: What Have You Ever Done On Your Own?

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Free Will, Inner Work, Q&A - No Comments →

A person needs the force of the Torah in order to reveal himself and reality in relation to the Creator. Being close to the Creator means being similar to Him, to the quality of bestowal and love. This quality becomes revealed to a person through his attitude to the neighbor, meaning to someone who is close to him by having the same goal in life. This is the right criterion for self-analysis and measuring your attitude to the Creator.

The goal (closeness to the Creator, revelation of the Creator, and unity with Him) is attained in two stages:

1. A person’s qualities become revealed as evil because they don’t allow him to attain the goal.
2. The force of correction, the Light, is revealed inside the unity between people who aspire to the goal. Then the evil inclination, man’s nature, helps him to unite with the Creator.

At first the flaws of egoism (Klipot) seem like great obstacles. However, as we advance we discover the ability to transform them into goodness. They all become our point of independence (Klipat Noga), which enables us to grow.

On the right side we have the Creator, and on the left side Klipa. We form ourselves out of both of them, creating our independent form of similarity to the Creator. When the force of the Light and the force of the darkness connect to each other correctly, they give rise to the form of Adam, a human being, in us. The human being in us is the degree of our similarity to the Creator.

Everything is done by the Light. It reveals the force of the evil inclination in us, as well as its own force in order to develop egoism. As a result, we reveal their single Source, the Creator, and the distinction between good and evil or Light and darkness disappears. All forces and qualities form the image of the only reality, the Source.

This constitutes all of the science of Kabbalah: the revelation of the Creator to the creatures, or rather, inside the creatures.

From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/14/10, Writings of Rabash

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: If The Soul Hurts, Hence It Exists!
Laitman.com Post: Standing Between Good And Evil
Laitman.com Post: The Light That Brings You Back To The Creator

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Egoism, Free Will, My Similarity to the Creator - No Comments →

Question: How do we constantly remain on the “spiritual trajectory,” meaning at the point of making a decision that the spiritual space and unity come before material achievements?

Answer: As soon as we succeed in creating this kind of connection between us, “a place for revealing the Creator,” it immediately fades. This is done so that we are able to make this decision again and again. Every moment should be the “Beginning.” And what helps a person to make this constant choice is only a strong environment which allows him to maintain a connection (see Baal HaSulam, “The Freedom”).

It is impossible to maintain this decision on your own for longer than a moment. We need to bring ourselves to a correct society, like putting a seed into soil, and receive the realization of the importance of the goal from it. Then you will be able to unite the points of decisions, forming them into a straight line to the goal.

From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/9/10, “Rosh Hashanah”

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: The Spiritual Aiming Device
Laitman.com Post: The Fast Road To The Spiritual World
Laitman.com Post: Unification With The Group Leads Us To The Creator

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Free Will, Group Work, Inner Work, Q&A - No Comments →

Question: How do you reconcile the notion of Private Providence and one’s individual prayer with the notion of general spiritual laws that every person must comply with?

Answer: You will not understand this until you stop separating yourself from the general system. The “particular” is a type of connection between you and the system of souls, which stems from your state. Meanwhile, the “general” is the basic condition of the group.

A person can never receive anything for himself. Indeed, on his own he has no capacity in which to receive spirituality. A person’s individual spiritual capacity exists outside of him. It is in the desires of others that he is able to attach to himself with the help of the Upper Light, like a mother who lives within her child’s desires.

Aside from the desires of others, every one of us has only a “point,” their individual root. What can you do with a point? Only connect it to all the other parts of its soul: the desires of others.

This matter of connecting yourself to the general Kli is what we call Private Providence. The notion of “myself” as an individual (a point) does not exist in reality! This point feels itself only with respect to the environment, whether egoistically (our world) or altruistically (the spiritual world). Without the environment it cannot feel anything, even itself.

Therefore, our development relates exclusively to the environment, and our freedom of will lies only in choosing a better environment. After all, my environment today will be me tomorrow.

From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/5/10, “What is the Matter of My Making A Pact in the Work”

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: Only Together Will We Succeed
Laitman.com Post: How To Build A “Spiritual Resistor”
Laitman.com Post: A Rock Separated From The Mountain

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Free Will, Group Work, Inner Work, Q&A - No Comments →

Question: Why does the Creator allow some people to commit brutal crimes?

Answer: The science of Kabbalah illuminates the questions of perception of reality, free will, and human nature, showing that a person who lives in this world does not possess freedom of choice. Therefore, he doesn’t commit any conscious acts.

A person can attain the freedom of choice only in a Kabbalistic group, which is a group of people connected in order to attain the spiritual goal. In this case a person receives or earns some degree of acting freely. However, those who have not reached spiritual attainment and have not reconciled two opposite forces, action and intention, do not act at all!

They arrive at the end of this life as if they have never lived. In other words, they haven’t lived as “humans.” It is their biological body that lived, just like any other type of animal. It is a life dictated by instinctive nature only. A person can only rise above it by way of “faith above reason,” when he desires to attain a different nature.

The unity of these two natures, Upper and lower, is regarded as the human in him. Only a person who achieves this can be said to have performed independent actions that are worth punishing or rewarding. In other words, only a Kabbalist can be judged for his own actions. An ordinary person cannot be judged since he acts in accordance with Nature’s orders. He follows one route and does nothing using his own free will.

Nevertheless, in our world punishing measures are necessary. However, we don’t administer them at will but under orders from Above, although it happens through the government legislature, courts, and law enforcement devices. All of this exists in order to hasten our development!

This is the Upper Governance over all people, who are like puppets, with the purpose of bringing them closer to the point of freedom of choice.

From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/31/10, “What Are the Two Actions During the Time of Descent?”

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: Studying Yourself From The Side
Laitman.com Post: There Is Nothing New Under The Sun
Laitman.com Post: Life Beyond Time

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Free Will - No Comments →

At some point we come to realize that our entire life can be divided into two periods according to how the Upper Governance, the Creator, treats us. The first “half” is our childhood, when nature (everyone around us) protects us in every way, and the second “half” is when this protection ends. I become an adult and nature starts pressuring, demanding, and loading me with responsibilities.

It is difficult to understand why things are this way as well as why a human being is born absolutely helpless, falling into the arms of his mother and father and becoming a burden on society. And why in the second part of his life, as soon as he becomes self-sufficient, he has to work hard and worry about how to protect others and provide a happy childhood for them just like it was provided for him.

This is a reflection of a spiritual law where the lower part (AHP) of the Upper Partzuf descends to the upper part (Galgalta Eynaim) of the lower one in order to push him forward. This happens because our qualities and the Creator’s qualities must penetrate one another, and this occurs in the reverse form, by way of the breaking, known as “Adam HaRishon’s original sin.” With the help of the original Evil (the snake), we acquire a special hollow area within ourselves, the place for the future soul. It is the place where we will find ourselves merged with the Creator and attain His height, having known good and evil.

This is the path we will have to walk. For now we still don’t possess this point of independence and we are governed with the help of “angels” from Above (Upper Forces). In other words, everything we have comes from Him. The Light acts first in everything and we are just derivatives of it.

How, then, do we make the creature primary and the revelation of the Creator, the construction of the Creator within the creature, secondary? If I existed in this world without any support and there weren’t any Kabbalists before me, where would I gain an opportunity for free will, this profound point?

The Creator can give me everything else, but this freedom mustn’t come from my will to receive pleasure because even though this desire is completely opposite to Light, it is still fully governed by the Light, only in the reverse form. The Light acts, and my will to receive jumps to the opposite side, like on a swing. So where does my independence come from, without which all creation would have no purpose?

We receive it precisely from the primordial Evil. We have nowhere else to get it from.

From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/15/10, “Introduction to the Book, Panim Meirot uMasbirot”

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: The Serpent Is The Angel of Help
Laitman.com Post: Upbringing In The Spiritual World
Laitman.com Post: From Illusory Freedom To The Truth

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Free Will, Torah - 1 Comment →

Baal HaSulam’s article “Preface to Panim Meirot uMasbirot,” Item 7: Now you can understand their words about the verse, “I, the Lord, will hasten it in its time.” The Sanhedrin (98) interpreted, “Not rewarded – in its time; rewarded – I will hasten it.”

Thus, there are two ways to attain the above-mentioned goal. Through their own attention is called a “Path of Repentance.” If they are awarded that, then “I will hasten it” will be applied to them. This means that there is no set time for it, but when they are awarded, the correction ends, of course.

If they are not awarded the attention, there is another way, called “Path of Suffering.” As the Sanhedrin said (97), “I place upon them a king such as Haman, and they will repent against their will,” meaning in its time, for in that there is a set time.

There are two paths before us that lead to the same goal, and we are at their intersection. At every given moment we should feel that we are at the crossroads that determines our freedom of will, and the choice here is very simple: to take the path of the Light or the path of suffering.

A third path does not exist. We must advance by one of these two paths and decide at every given moment what our next step will be. Your foot is already up in the air, and now you have to choose where to land it: on the path of Light or on the path of suffering.

The moment will pass, and you will once again have to make a choice. Your foot has been lifted from Above to force you to make a step, and it is up to you where to place it, on which of the two paths. In accordance with our choice, you will receive the strength and the means to advance since you have to keep moving ahead, one way or the other.

If you advance by the path of “Beito” (natural development, in due time), the forces of nature are pushing you onward against our egoism since you wish to advance led by your ego. Hence, you are impacted by the forces that oppose your egoism, trying to keep you in bestowal. But on the path of “Ahishena” (hastening time), you start to consciously convince yourself through the environment that being in bestowal is worthwhile. Thereby you draw the Surrounding Light, and it returns you to goodness.

On the path of “Beito,” you receive blows and learn through them. Sooner or later it will result in your request or prayer for correction and advancement like you would have by the path of “Ahishena.” Conversely, if you initially take the path of the Light, you will save time on the first segment of the path, where you would have otherwise wasted time through your lack of desire to listen and exert your own effort.

There is no time to think about where to land our foot! Everything depends on the preparation of the spiritual environment.

From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/4/10, “Introduction to the Book, Panim Meirot uMasbirot”

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: The Two Paths Laying Before Us
Laitman.com Post: A Long Path To Unity
Laitman.com Post: Conscious Acceleration Toward Life’s Purpose

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Free Will - No Comments →

Question: What is freedom and freedom from what? How do we achieve it if both the corporeal and the spiritual worlds are defined by rigid laws?

Answer: The only freedom that exists is freedom from our egoism. I want the Upper Light to descend, take me over, and replace my egoism. I perceive the power of egoism or altruism over me as necessary: It is either one or the other.

There are only two types of nature: the nature of the lower one (reception) and the nature of the Upper One (bestowal). Both are preset, and function in accordance with invariable laws. The only free action we are able to take is to rise from one nature (egoistic) to the other (altruistic). In other words, we can break free from the power of the laws of egoism (reception) and transcend to the “jurisdiction” of bestowal.

We will not be able to evaluate even our own initial nature until we acquire the second, altruistic nature. We are currently locked within a single dimension, and for as long as we remain in it, we cannot comprehend it.

Look how often we err! For thousands of years, we developed within our egoistic nature, and we still do not know it. This is because we are locked inside it, but in order to understand it, we need to have something opposite to compare it with.

If we possessed an opposite nature (that of bestowal), we would be able to compare it with our egoism and thereby comprehend what reception and bestowal mean. However, in our world, there is nothing but receiving. Whatever we do, we do it solely for our own sake and benefit. This is why we cannot understand our own actions and how this world operates.

You see that humankind continues making mistakes, and doesn’t know what further direction to take. And now that we have reached the peak of egoism, our complete inability to understand this world is obvious. This fact pushes us to the realization that none of us has a choice but to transcend our egoistic nature.

Moreover, in order to simply live well within the boundaries of our egoism, we need to step out of it and study it from above. It is impossible to learn about an object while remaining within its bounds. We have to be above it in order to be able to study it. Only if we rise above ourselves can we learn who we are and what the right way to live is, at least in this world. This is what today’s global crisis is pushing us toward.

From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/25/10, Shamati #99

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: Recognizing The Greatness Of The Opportunity
Laitman. com Post: How Do We Our Point Of Freedom?
The Path of Kabbalah: “Freedom of Choice-To Operate Above Nature”

Filed under: Crisis, Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Free Will, Inner Work, Q&A - No Comments →