Entries in the 'Holidays' Category

New Life 805 – From The Greek Culture To The Culture Of Love

New Life 805 – From The Greek Culture To The Culture Of Love
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Nitzah Mazoz

Nature’s press of evolution pushes us to develop. If we understand where it is pressing us to develop, we can save ourselves great pain.

Just as the vegetative level developed from the still level of nature, so can we advance to the next level today. So far we have developed according to Greek culture, but the new level of development requires the development of all new mind and feelings according to the wisdom of Kabbalah.

The wisdom of Kabbalah teaches us how to receive fulfillment not by fulfilling ourselves but by fulfilling others. Our progress stems from the fact that a person wants to know the secret of life and to understand why he lives. The force that develops a person’s perception is the upper force, which we have to learn how to draw unto us so that it will change us.

The future culture will be the culture of “love thy friend as thyself.” It is the most advanced culture. In this new life, a person will receive total, eternal, unlimited fulfillment and satisfaction. The upper force is the force of love and bestowal. It changes us until we are in an unending feeling of love.
[199318]
From KabTV”s “New Life 805 – From The Greek Culture To The Culture Of Love,” 12/22/16

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Why Do We Light Hanukkah Candles?

Laitman_631_2Question: Why do we light Hanukkah candles?

Answer: Hanukkah represents the state of a person that reaches correction and ascent above egoistic material life, and he becomes like a candle that shines in this world. In other words, the candle symbolizes the spiritual condition of a person, and a person is like a candle.

Oil from which the candle burns symbolizes our egoism, and if we use it correctly, it gives us light while burning. The candle’s wick symbolizes rising above the ego, when we ignore egoism, but use it in the opposite way.

The wick dipped in oil, gradually absorbs it, and thanks to the wick (the resistance to egoism), the oil gives light while burning. Egoism is a great force and the lamp symbolizes a correct use of it.
[199562]
From KabTV Program “News with Michael Laitman” 12.19.2016

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The War Of The Maccabees

laitman_742_02Question: How can we see the actions described in the Hanukkah story in the modern world? Can we see them?

Answer: In the modern world we can only see darkness, our mutual hostility, and destruction, the terrible egoistic states up to the complete rejection of each other.

But we don’t see the struggle itself, the struggle that is described in the wars of the Maccabees, because it takes place inside a person who reaches the wisdom of Kabbalah and wants to ascend above his egoism through this method. The war against the ego is called the war of the Maccabees.

Victory in this war is a person’s ascent above his egoism, detachment from it. Then he begins to feel the upper world. Therefore, Hanukkah symbolizes the holiday of the Upper Light, a holiday in which we exit the darkness of our world and enter a new state, a new illuminated eternal dimension.

A person who is in the framework of our world does not see any of that, he just celebrates and eats doughnuts.
[199559]
From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 12/19/16

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The Inner Meaning Of The Hanukkah Holiday

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: What is the spiritual meaning of the Hanukkah holiday?

Answer: Hanukkah symbolizes the ascent of the person above his egoism when he defeats the “Greeks” within him. These are all those characteristics that yearn for knowledge and want to dominate him.

In fact, spiritual attainment is not considered scientific because it is based on overcoming the ego through crises as happens in our world, not by using it.

Therefore, the Hanukkah holiday is filled with Light. It expresses the victory of our overcoming our inner egoistic drives.

Question: Does this mean I have no need of knowledge, called the “Greeks” within me?

Answer: No, beginning from the time of Abraham and on, humanity needed to develop in a completely different way, not physically nor intellectually, but spiritually through the development of our emotions to a state in which we begin to feel the nature that is hidden from us.

The Hanukkah holiday, which is the embodiment of the Light, symbolizes the discovery of the hidden nature.
[199347]
From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 12/19/16

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Hanukkah Is A Stopover

laitman_222_0At some point in one’s life, a person begins to feel it as small, insignificant, and temporary that brings nothing to him and others. Indeed, what is in it apart from ordinary individuals?

What does he leave to his children and grandchildren, and what do they leave? Nothing! Everything is aimless—stupidity! We play games in this life like kids who constantly compete with each other. But basically it is all some kind of a game of nature that seemingly mocks us.

A person suddenly begins to feel that he needs to unravel this mystery of nature. It can’t be that nature created everything in vain: a cluster of stars, large galaxies and us—so small on this Earth! We feel as if we are on a small boat in an ocean of darkness. How do we understand what’s going on? I want to know! I want to control my own destiny!

When a person has this question, he begins to search, and gradually comes to Kabbalah.

In principle, it may take a few lives until he reaches the correct methodology through his developed desire: how to unveil the meaning of existence, its essence, and its mystery.

Kabbalah answers this very simply. Do you want to open your eyes? It isn’t difficult. The eyes should be directed outward and not inward. When you really open them, you won’t see the world you see in front of you now, because you see it within yourself! It is in your mind!

In order to open your eyes to the real world that exists outside of you, you need a special external influence—the Upper Light. You have to fight with yourself to stop looking inward seeing only yourself and all the rest through yourself.

Ahead is darkness, the crossing of the Red Sea, but you gradually will get out of the old vision of the world and with inner sight, will start looking outward, outside of yourself. At the same time, your physical body remains with you, but it will become completely extrinsic because you already exist in a new vision, in a new comprehension of the world, and there everything is different—other forces, and other objects.

Now you are not within your “box” that constantly deceives you and shows you illusory images, but you see forces and universes.
The transition from the bourgeois, ordinary state to the state of disclosing the eternal, perfect world, the huge system above the stars, above everything you observe now is called “coming to Hanukkah.”

This first step from the material you to the spiritual you is called a step toward the battle with your inner egoistic haters who constantly shoving on you more and more of the new pictures, annoy you, and do with you anything they want.

But if you win this fight, you come to a state of Hanukkah that is an intermediate state in the spiritual work, as a stopover on the path, a break, a short vacation.

Then comes the next stage of development, the next span from Hanukkah to Purim, which is an attainment of the upper world, its real revelation, when you take possession of it and begin to clearly use, manage, and own it.

The complete attainment of the upper world is Purim, that is not just a stopover like Hanukkah, but the final station—a great revelation of the entire universe to a person, where he gets all the answers, attainments, eternal, perfect conditions.

Thus, Hanukkah is the first and only stop on the road halfway to perfection, and it is very important. We celebrate it as a completely spiritual stop, because it is a complete separation from the previous egoistic state, but not yet an approach to the spiritual state. This is why it is so airy, suspended, like in a child, when you still do not possess the world, in which you appeared.
[199439]
From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 12/19/16

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Hanukkah, A Children’s Holiday

laitman_600_02Question: Why is Hanukkah considered to be a children’s holiday?

Answer: It is because a baby who begins to perceive the world is basically just a small child. So are we, we are found in a situation like children when we are revealing the upper world.

In other words, when we reach the spiritual holiday of Hanukkah, our state is called a state of Katnut (smallness) of the soul—“Galgalta ve Eynaim.”

So in our world we sing with children and eat jelly doughnuts (sufganiyot). In general, the holiday is very happy, soft, and childlike because that is how we begin to reveal the upper world; in spiritual attainment we are still children.
[199331]
From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 12/19/16

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Hanukkah Is A Celebration Of Victory Over Ourselves

Laitman_155Hanukkah seems like a childish, not very serious holiday. But, in fact, it is the most significant holiday because it speaks about a person’s entry into the spiritual work, his first step, his crossing the border between the material and the spiritual worlds.

In order to cross this border, a person must go against the “Greeks” in him, against his egoism. He defeats these impure, egoistic forces because he stands against them and is not afraid.

Yet, we reveal that we have no strength to stand against the egoistic desire. Where can it come from if we are a complete product of this egoism and all we have is a tiny spark that opposes it.

But if we hold on and don’t back off, then a miracle happens—again and again comes the Upper Light, performs its work, and “conveys the strong into the hands of the weak.” Our desire to bestow is very weak so far, almost imperceptible. However, the miracle happens and help comes from above, giving us the force of bestowal, the altruistic intention, and faith, through which we can win.

The victory comes when a person, on the one hand feels that he is obliged to win this war, but on the other hand has no strength and he reaches despair, having exhausted all his possibilities. We see from history that many Jews left the path of light and adopted the Greek’s approach to life. Only the Maccabees remained, a small handful of the people who started the war.

“The Greeks attacked me,” and at the same time a person feels that he must continue to fight with his last strength, without any hope for success. He can’t give up, because otherwise he will remain enslaved by egoism. Then a miracle happens and he wins this war. The Exodus from Egypt and Hanukkah, the victory of the Maccabees over the Greeks, are all stages of the same war.

This entire war is on the border of the material and the spiritual worlds, between egoistic forces and the forces of bestowal and love. A person sees that between him and the spiritual world is a wall. Only if he can give up his egoistic desires and thoughts, will he begin to feel the spiritual world in this vacant space.

This realization doesn’t come immediately but after a long time and much effort because it is necessary to find new measures and new sensations so that a person will obtain the connection with the spiritual. Then he discovers the “Greeks” that he didn’t see before and realizes that he will have a war with them.

It is a great joy because he finally discovers that he faces a formidable barrier. This barrier is inside the person, in his perception of the world and reality, and in his previous life’s values.

Now he needs to dress into a new person who thinks and sees differently, prefers other values, and acquires completely new feelings, mind, and perception of the world. So begins the Maccabean War with our internal “Greeks.”
[199178]
From the lesson on the topic “Hanukkah by the wisdom of Kabbalah” 12/20/16

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Why Do We Eat Donuts During Hanukkah?

laitman_627_1Question: Why do we eat donuts (Sufganiyot) during Hanukkah?

Answer: Firstly, it is because they are round. The circle represents completeness.

Oil is something airy, from which comes the Light. After all, the Light was always in the lantern, rising from the oil burning on the wick.

During Hanukkah, we eat sweet donuts because this holiday symbolizes the way out of the bitterness of this world into spiritual sweetness. This is a sweet holiday.
[199565]

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New Life 804 – The Secret Of The Greek Culture’s Power

New Life 804 – The Secret Of The Greek Culture’s Power
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Nitzah Mazoz

The wisdom of Kabbalah teaches how a person can ascend above his mind, above reason.

Greek philosophy stems from information Greek philosophers took from the wisdom of Kabbalah, but they did not know how to realize it. To this day we follow the Greek approach. A person develops his reason and thinks that it will do him good.

Every individual can ascend above reason to a new higher level. The world is the reality I perceive. If you expand your instruments of perception, you catch more. Kabbalah tells us how to advance to a different perception of reality.

After we developed the whole world according to the Greek approach, we see that we have achieved nothing. Our emotions tell us that we have not achieved anything as a result of developing our mind, and Kabbalah offers a new approach, which is first of all emotional. It enables a person to open life unlimitedly.
[199314]
From KabTV’s “New Life 804 – The Secret Of The Greek Culture’s Power,” 12/22/16

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New Life 473 – The Miracles And Wonders

New Life 473 – The Miracles And Wonders
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Nitzah Mazoz

What is a miracle according to the wisdom of Kabbalah? What is special about the miracle that happened on Hanukkah and what can we do so that this miracle will also happen in our days and remove all the troubles and distress in the world?

A miracle is something that happens against the laws of nature. The Torah, or more precisely the wisdom of Kabbalah, which is considered the wisdom of truth, explains what a miracle is.

It seems that the world is managed by the force of the ego. A miracle is when the action of the opposite force is revealed, the force of love. There are two lines in our development: the natural egoistic flow and the hidden force of love above it.

Lucky charms, blessings, etc. have nothing to do with miracles or something supernatural. These are simply things that empower a person psychologically.

We had to fight the force of the ego that separated us and to connect in love in order to defeat the Greeks. A miracle occurs only after great efforts to ascend above the ego, but we don’t succeed and need help. The same war repeats itself in every generation. The force of the ego dominates us and we need to connect in love.

There is terrible corruption in Israel but it is actually from the greatest darkness that the Light is revealed. If people begin to connect, the whole world will change its attitude toward us, and will carry us in their arms. Today we behave according to the egoistic Greek approach, and this is the reason that the world hates us.

Everyone suffers from the lack of connection. Israel has to be an example of living in connection and love. This is the meaning of being Light unto the nations of the world. This will be the great Hanukkah miracle of our times.

The wisdom of Kabbalah is being revealed today in order to teach us how to connect despite our big ego. There is a special merit in the wisdom of Kabbalah: it is aimed at reaching a miracle, meaning at the switch in human nature.
From KabTV’s “New Life 473 – The Miracles And Wonders,” 12/14/14

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