From my column in Ynet, “The Secret For A Successful Year” 

Why is it customary to read the Book of Jonah on Yom Kippur? Did the whale really swallow Jonah or is it only an allegory? What is the secret of how to atone for our actions and block all the arrows of hatred directed toward Israel? Rav Laitman’s  guide for the perplexed for Yom Kippur.

Have you ever stopped to ask yourself why you fast on Yom Kippur; why you go to the synagogue on Yom Kippur; why you ask a friend or someone you have wronged to forgive you? We have been used to keeping these customs since our childhood, and it seems the main reason for that is that we all want to be found innocent, at least to some degree, on Yom Kippur.

Those who have the means even compete with the sum of money to pay for the right to read the Book of Jonah in public, a well-known merit for wealth and success in business in the coming year. The sums go up from year to year, but do they understand what they are paying for?

The story of the prophet Jonah begins with a mission he receives from God; he is to warn the gentiles, the people of Nineveh, to repent their evil way, from unfounded hatred to love of others. Just like in the past, just like Jonah, so do we, the people of Israel today have a role that we cannot avoid. The same role that accompanies us since the time of ancient Babylon when Abraham united us into a nation on the basis of love of others—to establish among us the unity that will serve as an example for the whole world. Fulfilling this role is our right to exist.

We have experienced how this law operates throughout our history: when we are united, we prosper and the world prospers too. When we fall into unfounded hatred, we receive blows and the world deteriorates. With time we have failed to build the connection between us to such extent that we don’t believe we can re-establish the good relations between us again. We are repulsed by hearing that our role is to be a Light unto the nations of the world. We have forgotten our role and when we escape from it the storm arrives….

The Storm

Jonah escapes his mission, boards a ship and sails overseas. His escape generates a storm, and the sailors realize that the reason for their suffering is the Jew who is onboard their ship. Throwing him overboard into the sea soon follows.

In today’s global world, the nations of the world also blame us for every crisis there is. The fate of the nation of Israel is unavoidable. The sailors in the story change each time, but our fate is the same. If we don’t awaken from our deep sleep and agree to fulfill our mission, the time will come when we are thrown into the sea is sure to come.

Jonah was thrown into the sea and swallowed by a whale. At the end of his self-examination, he agrees to fulfill the mission he was given, and only then does the fish bring him to a safe shore, to Nineveh.

The Agreement

Like Jonah, we carry within us a method to connect. This is the national genome that binds us into one nation and we cannot escape it. When we connect, we will serve as an example of unity for all the nations. The only question is whether we will be responsible enough or whether, God forbid, we will be thrown into the depths of the ocean so that we will agree to fulfill our destiny.

Our role is to turn the unfounded hatred into love of each other, yet instead of being a Light unto the nations, we do everything in our power to be like all the other nations. But the steamroller of development makes more and more people and nations subconsciously feel that the Jews are responsible for all their troubles, and so the nations will not change their attitude toward us for the better until we discharge our duty.

The purpose of Yom Kippur is to allow us to do some deep introspection, and it is an opportunity for us to take on our mission and come to the decision to connect and be Light unto the nations of the world. Only then will the global turmoil around us quiet down and all of humanity will live in peace, and a Sukkah of peace will be spread over all of us.

A good New Year and may all of Israel be signed and sealed in the Book of Life!
From Ynet 10/10/16

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Question: Does it mean that it is a mistake to think that there is God above who is watching our actions and from whom we need to ask for forgiveness?

Answer: A person goes through various stages of development. Therefore, it is impossible to say that some of his beliefs are correct and some aren’t. He thinks this way today, but gradually he corrects his perception, rising in knowledge and feeling.

And then, of course the concept of “I and the Creator” changes completely. I feel more and more that the upper force is the result of my connection with other people and doesn’t exist outside of it. Only the essence of the Creator (Atzmuto) that is absolutely inaccessible to me exists independently.

Therefore, we must firmly grasp that the Creator exists only in the connection with people. There can be no appeal to the Creator except from our unity; after all, we create the place for His revelation through it.

Then each one must judge himself: how much he is connected with others? This is his entire redemption. It is impossible to judge a person individually. This is an immense mistake that we always make instinctively: thinking about ourselves, counting on ourselves, and acting alone.

This is a fatal mistake that we  have continued to make for thousands of years. The separation from the Creator is the reason for our terrible forgetfulness.

Comment: Regrettably, it sounds very relevant, because separation, disagreement, and hostility between various currents and factions.

Answer: The people of Israel already went through such states during the destruction of the First and Second Temples. Jews were killing each other then, not only with words, but also with real weapons, shedding brotherly blood in the civil wars. I hope very much that today we won’t come to that. We haven’t taken out our swords yet, but we earnestly fight with each other by all other means.

This is because we have forgotten who we are, what the foundation of our nation is, and our responsibility to move toward unity; although, in fact, this is our own correction and the correction of the entire world.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 9/27/16

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Repentance

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My recent article in Ynet: “Today Is A Holiday: The Journal Of A Spiritual Journey” 

What is the reason for all the customs that we so consistently perform – Eating the traditional fish that a mother cooks for Rosh HaShanah, fasting on Yom Kippur, and hanging decorations in a Sukkah? Rav Laitman explains the holidays of Tishrei according to the wisdom of Kabbalah, and reveals how we change our lives for the better with their help.

It is customary to think that the holidays mark historical events, victory in war, the birth or death of a special person. According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, the holidays of Israel are essentially different from the holidays of other peoples, and they describe stations on the way in the spiritual development of every person.

The Israeli holidays and their customs were introduced by the great Kabbalists thousands of years ago. The Kabbalists are people like us, who through studying the wisdom of Kabbalah succeeded in reaching a life of love for others and through that to love of the Creator—the general force of love that exists in reality. They discovered that there is one single purpose for this upper force: to lead us to be connected, happy, and full of love like Him while we are still alive. This force has been granted many nicknames: Creator, Light, Nature, Love and even King, like it is customary to call Him during the Ten Days of Repentance: “We have no king but you” (Ta’anit 25b).

To describe the stations through which the King passes us on the way to His magical kingdom, to become familiar with Him and to discover all the good that He has prepared for us, the Kabbalists established the Hebrew calendar and the cycle of holidays and festivals in it. So a moment before we dip an apple in honey and hang decorations in a Sukkah, let’s stop and clarify once and for all, why we bother so much every year and how we derive from these customs something better for all of us.

The First Station: Rosh HaShanah

“Rosh (head) is regarded a root ….According to the root and the Rosh that a person establishes for himself at first, so he continues his life” (The Writings of Rabash, “Letter 29”).

The first station in the spiritual journey of the person is Rosh HaShanah — “The beginning of the creation of the person” (The Writings of Rabash, “Dargot HaSulam” 882). In this stage, the person is like a newborn. He looks at the good and bad that he has gone through his whole life and asks himself: What is all of this for? Why am I alive year after year? Who is managing this reality and what is the purpose of existence?

If he is lucky, these questions don’t let him go and they lead him toward the goal, toward the significant and final station of the journey: the discovery of the network of harmonious connection between people within which he will feel the positive power of connection in its full intensity—the Upper Force that manages his life.

The first Rosh HaShanah was “celebrated” for the first time 5,777 years ago when a human being asked similar questions. The name of that person was Adam. Like a child who wants to grow up and be like his parents, so do we need to be like the force that created us and wants to be discovered. This entire desire will provide us with the power to rise above our limited egoistic nature, above the private concern for ourselves, and become “children of Adam.”

The Kabbalists call the longing to know why we are alive by the name, “the point in the heart.” The “heart” represents the totality of the egoistic desires of the person that continue to grow, beginning from the most basic desires – for sex, for nourishment, and for family, through the more developed desires – for money, for respect, and for knowledge. The point in the heart is the most developed spiritual desire in a person on the ladder of desires. And when it is awakened, it breathes into a person the spirit of life and a new desire for self-realization. This desire is not satisfied by money, respect, or knowledge, but only through realizing the purpose of life. And when for the first time the change is felt within a person, he celebrates Rosh HaShanah.

From Rosh HaShanah and on, the person increases the pace of his journey. Equipped with new powers, he struggles to reach a true point of connection with others and realize the point that is burning in his heart. But hope is one thing and reality is another thing. Instead of oneness, he discovers a big separation, the most terrible judgment of all. “The day of judgment was established in Tishrei, since those are days of desire. And that desire awakens upon us at that time each and every year, and it is necessary to waken to complete repentance more and more than during the whole year. And the essence of repentance is to unite with each and every one with love and with one heart” “Meor veShemesh”). This discovery leads the person to the next station on the journey, Yom Kippur.

The Second Station: Yom Kippur

“We see the truth through Rosh HaShanah, then one can ask for atonement. So Yom Kippur is after Rosh HaShanah” (The Writings of Rabash, “Dargot HaSulam” 891)

In The Book of Zohar it is written, “’…as far as light excelleth darkness’ (Ecclesiastes 2:13), for the benefit of light doesn’t come except from darkness.” There is no light without darkness, there is no sweet without bitter, and there is no good without evil. To reach the good, we must also discover the evil. According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, Yom Kippur is the recognition that our egoistic nature is evil from its youth. But it is specifically this recognition that makes it possible for us to attain the good. If on Rosh HaShanah the desire to connect with others is awakened in us, everything good is produced through connection with them. So during the Ten Days of Repentance we are gradually introduced to the negative egoistic force that prevents us from attaining unity. After all, on Yom Kippur there is no place to hide the rift and mutual hatred that divides us. So it becomes possible already to ask for correction of our evil inclination, which is good.

“Israel had no holidays like the fifteenth of Av and like Yom Kippur” (Mishnah Ta’anit 4:8). Why? It is because this was a special day of introspection and deep soul-searching. A day of remorse in which it was customary to ask forgiveness “For the sin that we did in your presence through the evil inclination” (Yom Kippur prayer).

The wisdom of Kabbalah explains that “forgiveness” is not just an oral request, “We have been guilty, we betrayed, we robbed….”; rather, it is a stage in which the person becomes conscious of his true state —how far he is from the right connection with others, and as a result of this, from a connection with the good force that manages his life. This difficult revelation actually makes the person happy because as a result, a cry breaks out from him for inner change. This particular request for forgiveness is expected from us, and when it comes, it is answered.

The Third and Fourth Stations: Sukkot and Simchat Torah

“…the festival of Sukkot explains all the questions, even the hardest and worst….” (The Writings of Rabash, “Letter 36”).

At the third station on the spiritual journey, called “Sukkot,” the response to the inner request arrives and we get a special positive force that transforms the evil in us to good. It is written in the Talmud: “leave your permanent abode and dwell in a temporary abode” (Sukkah 2a). The change that we must go through is to leave a permanent abode, meaning narcissism, to a new abode, to altruism. Then our picture of reality is changed. Our senses are apparently reversed. The brain and the heart change direction—from narcissism to altruism—and the picture of the whole of reality is revealed before our eyes. The person begins to get an answer to the request in his heart, and all of his desires that were opposed to connection enter the “Sukkah.”

The Sukkah symbolizes the complete form that every person will reach in the future. The laws of its construction symbolize the manner in which the person rises above his ego and acquires the ability to love and to give. So, for example, the Skhakh (thatch) in a Sukkah leaves more shade than light, as is written, “Its shade is more than its sun” (Mishnah Sukkah 2:2). This custom symbolizes an action in which the person “conceals,” restricts, the usage of his ego so he can go out of it toward the Light, toward connection and love.

Then he is ready for Simchat Torah—he develops the ability to read the texts of Kabbalah and summon upon himself the Upper Light, which is also called the Torah, to raise the connection between us to the head of the ladder of values, and changing his life for the better. This is because the Torah is the force that is prepared to correct hatred and separation between us and transform them into connection and love, which is a discovery that is called “Simchah” (happiness). Then the person senses within himself the entire vast expanse around him, and gains an eternal, whole, and happy life.

I hope, wish, and pray for a year of change, a year of building proper systems of relationships between us.

A good year to all the people of Israel!
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Ynet 9/29/16

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Question: During these last few days of the Jewish year it is customary to ask loved ones and the Creator for forgiveness for everything we’ve done. Where does this tradition come from?

Answer: First of all, we need to understand who the Creator is? This is the upper force of nature. We can’t attain this force by itself.

It manifests in the fact that it created the creation that is the desire to enjoy, to receive fulfillment, and it fills it to the extent that this desire becomes similar to the upper force.

If creation, the desire to receive, makes itself similar to the Creator, bestowing, then the Creator fills it, and to this extent creation begins to reveal its maker.

Initially, people are completely opposite to the Creator; they think about their own pleasure and do not want to give anything to anyone.

However, if we know how to change our nature with the help of the wisdom of Kabbalah, we will begin to reveal the Creator, the force of love and bestowal, which gives us fulfillment, health, the sense of past, present, and future, and perfection, and raises us above time, movement, and space into the world of absolute goodness.

And all this is only to the extent of our equivalence with this force of bestowal and love that is called the Creator. So where is this Creator? He is in the connection between people if we unite with each other. All the levels of nature: still, vegetative, animate, and human are connected into one system. The human stands above all others in this hierarchy, and the connection between all the parts of this system depends only on him.

To the extent that a person will be able to establish good connections between everyone and turn this system into an integral, interconnected, balanced, and kind one, based on mutual help and love, the Creator, the upper force, will be revealed in this system.

This entire network in which the creation exists is called a “place” that is filled with the upper force. It is impossible to reveal this force anywhere apart from this place, this vessel, that is woven from our relationships with each other. The stronger our connection, the stronger is this revelation. This is the only way to feel the Creator; there is no other way.

One’s relation to other people defines the relation of the person to the Creator. The kinder we will make our connections with each other, the more we will reveal the upper force that is manifested between us.

There is no point to ask the Creator for forgiveness until a person pays off all his debts to the creatures, to other people. If we establish good relationships between us and provide the Creator with the place for revelation, then this will be our appeal to Him and our plea for forgiveness.

We are not required to make any other repentance before the Creator than what we implement in the relationships with each other. Otherwise it would be just hypocrisy.

Why would I ask the Creator for forgiveness if I could build a corrected place where He could be revealed and I didn’t do so? After all, this is my entire work, and instead of that, I cry and appeal to Him for help. Why does He need to save me if I myself did nothing for it?
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 9/27/16

Related Material:
Repentance
Repentance Before Rosh HaShanah
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New Life 441 – The Tishrei Holidays: Searching For The Creator
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Nitzah Mazoz

What are the stages that a person passes through on the way to searching for the Creator, how can the connection between us contribute to discovering Him and why specifically in the holiday season do we have the opportunity to approach Him?

In the beginning of creation, we were in contact with the force that created us. We were like an embryo in the womb of his mother. The concealment was made to make it possible for us to grow, to understand who and what the Creator is and to be like Him. So a person doesn’t see the Creator. And one must try to locate Him, like in hide-and-seek, within and around himself. The partition that separates a person and the Creator is composed of five worlds (Olamot), concealments (Ha’alamot), 125 levels.

On every level we transform lack of understanding and feeling into understanding and feeling. We acquire the characteristics of the Creator. The concealment is found within my heart and mind. I expand and transform the characteristics of my heart and mind. Everything that I think and want comes from Him. There is none else beside Him. And I am only a point that discerns this. Discovering the Creator is the role of a person in the world.

Kabbalists who have already discovered this exist to help him. In every generation there are those in whom an urge is awakened to discover the Creator. Some of them have left writings for us.

Today is a unique time in which there are many people who want to discover the Creator. Searching together is much easier. In the levels of attaining the Creator, the level of difficulty always increases, but the Kabbalists help.

The futility and emptiness that is felt today is designed to bring the person closer to a search for the Creator. The Sukkot Holiday is when those who search for the Creator begin to feel waves of warmth and embraces from Him.
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From KabTV’s “New Life 441 – The Tishrei Holidays: Searching For The Creator,” 10/5/14

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New Life 627 – Yom Kippur: Spiritual Ascent
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Tal Mandelbaum ben Moshe

What influence does society have on a person complying with the customs of Yom Kippur; what is the essence of the covenant that we must make with the upper force, and about which transgressions must we atone for on this holiday? Yom Kippur has a special power In Israel and it influences everyone. Yom Kippur is an opportunity for introspection, thinking about why am I alive and what the essence of my life is.

Transgressions between a person and other people are basically about a change in human nature, the ego. Your attitude toward your entire environment must be like your attitude toward yourself. A transgression is using your ego to take advantage of others. Transgressions between man and God mean that you don’t relate to all of reality as if it is you.

“Yom Kippur” means you need to correct yourself until you connect with all of creation with a single heart.
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From KabTV’s “New Life 627 – Yom Kippur: Spiritual Ascent,” 9/17/15

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New Life 626 – Yom Kippur:  Self And Social Realization
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Tal Mandelbaum ben Moshe

What is the source of that special feeling in Israel during the Tishrei holidays? How can we go back and again be a cohesive nation in its land and what is the role of Yom HaKippurim for the people of Israel?

Yom Kippur is a special day because people in Israel make it like this here. It is felt differently abroad, for example. On Yom Kippur one should take stock personally, but this cannot be done alone; it can only be done together.

Rosh HaShanah is a day to recognize that there is a king, an upper force, the total power of nature that takes care of everything. The wisdom of Kabbalah teaches us how to expand the boundaries of our world and discover this force. To do this, a person must transcend his narrow egoism, abolishing the boundaries between himself and others.

Abraham spoke about this principle, “And you shall love your friend as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18), which was the basis for making us the people of Israel. When we nullify the boundaries between us, we are truly the people of Israel and are worthy of the land of Israel. After 2,000 years of exile we have returned here to rebuild. This is only an opportunity.

We must do some introspection. This is represented for us on Yom Kippur in the story of the prophet Jonah. Jonah represents the nation of Israel and its role in the world: teaching people to connect with each other better. It is known that people pay a lot for the right to read the “Maftir Yonah.” This is a remedy for success. Indeed, if we understand what our mission is and realize it both within Israel and in the world, everything will be good.

After all, Europe is collapsing, the Middle East is burning, and the entire world is shocked and blames us, as always. And this year within Israel, we are beinning to understand that there is no link between us except when there are external troubles. It is up to us to find a way to connect, and there is a clear and precise method for this that comes from the wisdom of Kabbalah.
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From KabTV’s “New Life 626 – Yom Kippur: Self And Social Realization,” 9/17/15

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New Life 773 – Rosh HaShanah Customs
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Tal Mandelbaum ben Moshe

The root of Rosh HaShanah (Head of the Year, New Year) is the spiritual birth of the first man who discovered the general force of nature. This is a hidden force that includes all the laws and forces of nature that can be discovered if we become equal to it. Rosh HaShanah is considered to be the day when Adam HaRishon (the first man) discovered the Creator, Bore, from the Hebrew words “Bo-Reh” “come and see.”

We were created with an egoistic desire to receive and we must recognize the evil in it, to keep ways from it and to turn to goodness. Rosh HaShanah is a phase on the way to correction in which we want to crown the good force on top of the evil in us. All our customs are a replica of the internal spiritual actions of correcting the evil in us.

Blowing the Shofar symbolizes sublime spiritual actions, which are very hard to explain in plain language. The greeting “a good and sweet year” symbolizes the need to sweeten the evil inclination, to peel the desire to receive from the egoistic intention, and to cover our raw desire to enjoy with a good intention of in order to bestow. This is the good inclination. The key to a sweet year is how we use the desire to enjoy and whether it is for my own sake or for the sake of others.

The saying “may we be the head and not the tail” means that we should not follow our egoistic thoughts but that the Creator should control us, that by the power of love, bestowal, and connection, He should reign over us and guide every action in our life.

“That our rights (Zchuyot) should be many as a pomegranate” stem from the root “Zachut,” which means “purity” and refers to the purification of our ego, to bleaching it, to performing as many actions for the sake of others, and on the way, also for the sake of the Creator. Good actions are actions that come after the correction of the evil inclination and before that everything is ego.

Rosh HaShanah is in fact the time for the recognition of evil, the desire to change our head and to crown the Creator instead of having the force of receiving, which we were created with, manage us, we want the force of bestowal to manage us.
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From KabTV’s “New Life 773 – Rosh HaShanah Customs,” 9/27/16

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New Life 772 – Selichot (Forgiveness) Between A Person And The Place
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Tal Mandelbaum ben Moshe

God, the Creator, HaVaYaH, the place, all these names refer to the upper force that created the desire to receive. The Creator fills the desire to receive to the degree that the desire to receive resembles the Creator who bestows. The Creator resides in the ties of bestowal between people who connect to each other. This is the place.

It says that it is useless to ask the Creator for forgiveness if you have not corrected your relations with others. Therefore, Selichot (prayers of forgiveness) should come from the connection between people into one group. This is where the Creator is revealed. The personal reckoning is to what degree I am connected to everyone in good relations. There is no account of myself.

The detachment from the Creator during the 2,000 years of exile distorted our true perception of soul searching. Everything a person does is written in the book; we are all closed in one network and every motion we make is recorded in the network. You affect the network, so you have to constantly make sure that the network is connected and not disconnected. Not knowing your duty doesn’t exclude you from punishment. If you haven’t tightened the connections in the network, it is as if you caused disconnection.

Forgiveness, remorse for the past, and receiving in the future are all included in a person’s soul searching, and thus he corrects his attitude toward the network; no one can perform this correction for him. Forgiveness between a person and his friend is turning to someone at a certain point, clarifying, and correcting the attitude toward him.

Forgiveness between a person and the place is a person’s attitude to the whole integral system; clarifying and correcting his general attitude to the system. Asking the Creator for forgiveness is asking everyone together for forgiveness. “I reside among my people.”
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From KabTV’s “New Life 772 – Selichot (Forgiveness) Between A Person And The Place,” 9/27/16

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New Life 771 – Selichot (Forgiveness) Between A Person And His Friend
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Nitzah Mazoz

Human nature is egoistic, its inclination is evil, so from the start he causes evil to others. The question is only whether he acknowledges this, does he feel that his nature is evil, and does he regret it? Even if a person recognizes that he is exploiting others and wants to correct that, the question can be asked, what motivates him? When a person exploits someone, he becomes disconnected from the system because being part of the system means that he is concerned about the welfare of the system.

The sin is not about identifying the evil that we can identify, and therefore we didn’t relate well with others. The main thing is to examine yourself and understand what new attitude you must strive for regarding everything outside of you. The result of this examination is a true correction in which one’s mouth and heart are equal. When a person identifies the evil, he abstains from it and develops a good relationship with others.

This is already “repentance.” After a process of internal correction, you need to provide others with a good example. If there is no proper response from the other side, sometimes you must close yourself off and wait. To contend with the trampling of your dignity, you must build a higher dignity for yourself. Dignify the system. Dignify building yourself as a person who is corrected.
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From KabTV’s “New Life 771 – Selichot (Forgiveness) Between A Person And His Friend,” 9/20/16

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