Question: Israeli children are very noisy and energetic, one could say hyperactive. Is this related to a particular Jewish mentality?

Answer: Jews originate from Ancient Babylon, from a single civilization of earth’s inhabitants who once rose to a spiritual level and then fell from it. Therefore, that ascent and descent have been preserved in their genes. There’s nothing to be done; they are the most active part of humanity in everything: science, culture, everywhere.

They make up literally about 0.01% of humanity, and suddenly 50% of Nobel laureates, 20 to 30% of musicians, 30% of artists, and so on. And all because they were once on a spiritual level, fell from it, and are now engaged in earthly affairs. They should have given this up altogether and devoted themselves exclusively to spiritual work. I hope that eventually this is how it will be. We don’t need “Einsteins” or revolutionaries. We need to engage in spiritual revolutions, not earthly ones.

I think everything is moving in that direction now. The general crisis and everything happening in the world will lead humanity to spiritual elevation, and then this hyperactivity will be realized in spiritual actions.

It manifests in Jews because they fell from a spiritual level to an earthly one, lost the spiritual component, and it turned into something earthly. What remained in them from the spiritual charge at the fall is precisely this hyperactive part.

Therefore, if you see a revolutionary or a transformer in our world, in science, art, or anything at all, then by digging into their lineage you will find that their roots come from a tribe that once stood on a spiritual level. This is the quality of Bina, the quality of bestowal, which alone can enliven humanity.

I am not a nationalist, and I advocate for the correction of the entire world. Therefore, the method of Kabbalah, which emerged from Ancient Babylon, must be realized everywhere. The fact is that the whole world is Malchut. And part of it, which once was on the level of Bina, fell back into Malchut. But only from that part, which is the former people of Israel, once on a spiritual level, does progress in our world originate.

Thus, if you see truly serious activists, it cannot be that they lack a spark originating from the attainment of the upper world that fell to our level. The people who come to Kabbalah today, no matter from where, somehow, somewhere, have received this spiritual virus.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Children of Israel, Part 2” 10/1/10

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Question: When you speak about people who have received a spiritual “virus” and advanced in the corporeal world in some way, do you mean outstanding people?

Answer: Yes, this is a consequence of Bina. Bina is expansion, bestowal, a quality opposite to Malchut. When two qualities join together, egoism and some small germs of altruism that have fallen from the spiritual level, egoism receives direction and greater strength because it contains a spark of the upper light.

Therefore, such egoism is more fortunate, more successful, and this is expressed in results.

Today the Kabbalistic method is open to everyone. Once, in Ancient Babylon, only a small part of humanity used it. By the way, throughout history many people, the so-called “Gerim” from different nations (converts), joined it.

If we look at ancient history from the exodus from Egypt through the existence of the Kingdom of Israel until the destruction of the Second Temple, this was a period when huge masses of different tribes came and joined the spiritual elevation. Among them there were many great Kabbalists.

Comment: But when they joined, they did not become Jews.

My Response: What does it mean that people “join”? It means they take this method and begin to realize it within themselves, just like in Ancient Babylon. Abraham, the ancient Babylonian priest, gathered a couple of thousand people around himself, created a group from them, and from this group a people was formed, so to speak.

What does “a people” mean? It is a group of individuals united by a single goal of spiritual ascent. Whoever wants it joins. On the level of our world, there is actually no such concept as “the Jewish people.”

Comment: But in Israel it is a nation.

My Response: No, it is not a nation. Even today it is not a nation, but a gathering. When will the Jews become a nation? When they begin to unite among themselves with the force of mutual love. Only this force can unite them into a nation. There is no other force that can bond them together.

In any other nation there is a natural force from below that bonds people together. But above this group, there must be a force from above.

Therefore, today, for example, an Italian can become a Jew.

“But you are Italian!”

“I am no longer Italian, I am a Jew.”

“How is that? What about your father and mother?”

“My father and mother are no longer ‘mine’.”

I am Jewish, and I cannot become an Italian because I was not born to Italian parents. But an Italian can become a Jew of full value if he takes upon himself the method of spiritual ascent. The laws of conversion to Judaism are based only on this. And he can no longer go back and become Italian again.

This is a very irrational model but it exists in our world, although no one really understands it because it is built on spiritual laws that we are trying to squeeze into our world like into a Procrustean bed. But it does not work.

People do not understand this. It all sounds very strange. But gradually we are approaching a time when clarification will begin to take place in humanity regarding the entire historical picture: why it happened this way, what it brings, and why it must be this way.

But for now, people only have questions, and there are no answers.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Children of Israel, Part 2” 10/1/10

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Question: I grew up in Israel, and for me Hanukkah is a very childlike holiday with doughnuts and the dreidel. And suddenly I hear from you that Hanukkah has a spiritual meaning. How should I relate to the lighting of the candles so that this action is not merely external?

Answer: This is a spiritual action. There is nothing in the Israeli holidays that is not connected to the spiritual. After all, we exist only in order to attain our soul,  what is called the future world, the upper world, the higher dimension, that we must reach.

At present we see the picture of this world: houses, sky, sea, people, everything around me. Behind this picture we need to find a crack into the upper world, widen it, open up the horizons, and see that we are located only in a very small sphere, in a tiny part of a much greater, more spacious, infinite world.

Our entire universe is also within our current world. But we must reveal the world beyond it as well. This is what we human beings are meant for. For we do not belong to the still, vegetative, and animate levels that are bound to nature, but to the human level.

A “human being” in Hebrew is “Adam,” from the word “domeh,” similar to the Creator. We are not only capable of reaching such a state, but are simply obliged to attain it, to reveal the entire true reality that lies beyond what now appears to us as this world.

Then we will reveal not only infinite spaces, but also ourselves as existing in an infinite, perfect form, within this vast, expansive, light-filled reality that is revealed to us.

The wisdom of Kabbalah is intended for this. All the holidays speak to us about this, including Hanukkah, about how we begin to open the upper world for ourselves, expand our organs of perception and reality, and then emerge from all these narrow, bitter limitations.

All this lies before us. But everything depends on the unity between us, because unity is precisely the action that begins to open the boundaries of the present reality. And the pressures we feel today are meant to push us to accelerate and reveal the true world.

Therefore when lighting the Hanukkah candles—together with Hanukkah songs, games with children using the dreidel, and tasty doughnuts—let us think that the true Hanukkah is like a housewarming, for we are opening a new world for ourselves through uniting with one another.
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From Radio Station 103FM 12/6/15

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Comment: Kabbalah says that one should not be afraid of external factors and that what is happening around us does not really influence us, but merely creates a kind of picture of pressure or tension around us.

My Response: What does “does not influence” mean? We see how much influence Hitler had, or Bohdan Khmelnytsky, or the persecutions in western Europe when Jews were gathered from cities or small towns into synagogues and burned alive.

We see what serious reasons there were that affected the people’s attitude toward life, toward the world, and toward themselves.

Question: And why did everyone have the desire to take it out on the Jews?

Answer: Who else could they take it out on? And all those pogroms? That was the only way they “vented” it. The population was deliberately educated and directed so that they would take it out on them.

Question: But why weren’t there some other nation toward which the hatred of the others would have been directed?

Answer: In general, there is only one reason for hatred: the Jews’ failure to fulfill their mission.
Within the Jewish people there exists an inner point of light, and it cannot be explained. It is of a mystical nature and cannot be correctly understood or perceived by anyone else.

A person feels that there is something in them that is different from me. Moreover, something that I subconsciously feel is not just about oppressed people; no, they are special. They have something.

On the one hand, they gave me religion. All of their ancestors are my gods. I worship all of their ancestors. For example, in the center of St. Petersburg there stands St. Isaac’s Cathedral. I call all my priests by their ancient names. I took their entire religion from them.

And yet they still cling to it and do not want to accept what I made from it. By their very existence, they prove that they are the ones who are right, not me.

And I cannot destroy it if they do not accept me as their successor. They must accept it, not just agree out of hopelessness or simply stay away.

If they do not accept this, then my religion is worth nothing, my world is worth nothing, and the future world that I have drawn for myself is also worth nothing. That is, their mere existence confirms that everything that I have invented for myself about the future world is incorrect.

Question: The nations of the world say: “We hate the Jews.” But Jesus Christ, was he not a Jew?

Answer: It does not matter. All of this has to be justified somehow. I do not think that anyone really understands it at all. In all religions it is so convoluted. What can you do? We are already at the end of all this; there will still be surges. All of this will lead to another huge war, perhaps not only a spiritual one, but also a physical one. There is nothing that can be done about it.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. External Factors, or Why Does Everyone Hate Jews?” 9/14/10

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Question: Baal HaSulam writes that as long as the nation of Israel does not come to the fulfillment of the Torah and commandments Lishma, the troubles in the world will not cease.

Over these years, we have had different appeals to the public, both to Jews and to the nations of the world. How do you see who this nation of Israel is, and to whom we must address ourselves?

Answer: It is those who are now attending our lessons and who wish, with our help, to attain the goal of creation.

Question: You said that we do not have the strength to influence all of humanity. Should we ask for this strength, or is it better for now to focus on the work in the ten?

Answer: We need to focus on the ten so that all your forces are inside it and you are ready to invest yourselves completely in its strengthening.
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From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/26/25, Writings of Baal HaSulam “Introduction to The Study of the Ten Sefirot“

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Back to the Way Things Were

Question: There was a time when an ordinary Israeli cultivated the land and dedicated him or herself entirely to the revival of the country. Today, such terminology is simply irrelevant. The land is worked by a Filipino worker or agricultural machinery.

We have plenty of clothing and food; in high-tech we are ahead of the entire world, and particularly successful Israelis secure themselves financially for life by the age of thirty.

Of course, any generalization is conditional, yet, in our days, self-sacrifice for the sake of the homeland and society is, to put it mildly, barely relevant. We remember it during military operations and on holidays, but it has no connection to our daily motivations.

The image of Israel as the fulfillment of the eternal dream of the Jewish people has faded. The older generation still remembers the times when people would sit in a circle and sing songs in the evening. But now, when the good old Sabra is a thing of the past, what lies ahead? What will Israelis become in the future?

Answer: They will once again sit in a circle. At home, on lawns, in courtyards, and in parks. People will need connection, even if through the Internet. They will feel that through unity they receive strength, the spirit of life, and this feeling will fill them.

Today they joke around while gathering at a barbecue on Independence Day, but tomorrow they will need precisely that spirit, and that is what they will search for.

To tell the truth, the whole world is searching for it. And the futility of this search leads to drug addiction, depression, emotional explosions, violence, and terror. They are all from inner dissatisfaction and emptiness.

The current generation of Israelis is already shedding its protective shell of untouchability; it no longer hides behind the armor of indifference. It is searching for fulfillment. Although people are still captured by the newer, constantly changing corporeal temptations, nonetheless, in their hearts the seed of a true inner ideal is already beginning to sprout.

A New Hero

Question: What will be the new hero of our time? Describe the features of the Israeli of tomorrow.

Answer: The Israeli of tomorrow is a person who understands that through unity with others he will achieve the highest prosperity and perfection. This is more than lifelong financial security by the age of 30; more than a high position that allows one to twist the world around their finger, more than fame, success in the eyes of the public, and so on.

He strives for unity because only through it can he succeed in anything. He feels that this is the most important thing in life, because through the point of unity he can attain everything: health, money, well-being, love, a strong family…

In good mutual connection with others, worries vanish; the whole world becomes yours. It is as if you live in paradise. This is exactly how we feel life when we unite with one another. Because in this, a symbiosis of two forces is created: the positive and the negative. On one side is egoism, and on the other is the positive force that comes from unity, which balances the negativity of our nature.

Then we feel goodness and peace, and we become capable of everything. Like plus and minus in an electrical circuit, the two opposite forces within us connect to the “engine,” to society, to the people of Israel, or even to a small group of people, and the “engine” begins to operate correctly, giving us unprecedented possibilities.

A Universal Specialization

Question: So is the key to future success, not a university degree in a trending field, but specialization in unity?

Answer: Yes, above all. And afterward, through this unity, a person will succeed as a high-tech specialist, an engineer, an accountant, whatever they become. The main point is that inner fulfillment and satisfaction will come from kind interaction with others.

This is how we will build a new society, a new industry, a new world. A person in it is sensitive to unity with others and immediately sees how this unity elevates his life to a new level, a level of freedom, independence, warmth, safety—everything that cannot be found anywhere else.
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From KabTV’s “New Life 554 – Holidays And Festivals: The New Israeli,” 4/14/15

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Question: Do you believe that the Jews of Israel will eventually bring about the correction of all of humanity?

Answer: It is precisely the circumstances in which they find themselves that will compel them to do so. Why does the world around them bristle against them?

This is eternal antisemitism; the perpetual feeling that you are hated and that you must defend yourself and justify your existence in the world. When all this passes over a person from generation to generation, it is transmitted through the genes; it leaves behavioral layers in one’s character, in one’s perception of the world, in one’s attitude toward everything. There is nothing like this in any other nation.

The Jews are not like the Gypsies, who are simply despised, nor like people who impose their culture, manners, way of life, or religion on other nations. In those cases, it all stems from a sense of superiority. But here, on the contrary, it comes from a sense of inferiority, smallness, and worthlessness.

This complex has developed very strongly over the last 2,000 years. It has already produced secondary and tertiary consequences, which gradually evolve and merge with all other philosophies of life.

All this has left a deep imprint on their attitude toward everything and has generated enormous internal stress within the people, especially among the European branch of the Jews who were forced to develop in order to elevate themselves above the surrounding nations in some way, to protect themselves.

We see, in the Middle Ages, how they suddenly experienced a leap in special character traits and intellectual abilities; it is not even clear why. Previously, nothing like this existed anywhere, not even among other branches of Jews in other countries where they lived more or less peacefully.

There is a great deal of research on this topic. And indeed, we see how many scientists, artists, and thinkers they produce. All this is the result of their defensive reaction.
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From KabTV’s “I Got A Call, The Jews of Israel,” 9/13/10

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Comment: I have noticed that the Jews in Israel seem to be the most indifferent. They do not care about anything, and walk around arrogantly, as if nothing interests them.

My Response: I do not think they are like that on the inside. It is more of a protective reaction of the organism.

Why are they called “Sabras”? Sabra is the fruit of the cactus—prickly on the outside but soft and tender within. It is edible.

The Jews of Israel are the same: outwardly prickly, as if they do not care about anything, but inside, they are very sensitive and gentle.

The thing is, our country is still young, and people must learn to adjust to one another. Moreover, for decades, practically until the 1950s, people were founding settlements and were constantly forced to fight, much like the first American settlers once did. All of this leaves a mark that is not easy to erase.

The problems of David and Goliath and the besieged fortress of Masada still exist today. The country is surrounded on all sides by enemies who are constantly arming themselves and preparing for new wars. People live through one war after another, and that is why they are the way we see them.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. The Jews of Israel” 9/13/10

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Therefore, once all the members of the nation agreed, they were immediately given the Torah, for now they were capable of observing it. But before they grew into a complete nation, and certainly during the time of the fathers, who were unique in the land, they were not truly qualified to observe the Torah in its desirable form, since with a small number of people it is impossible to even begin with engagement in Mitzvot between man and man to the extent of “Love your friend as yourself,” …. This is why they were not given the Torah (Baal HaSulam, “Matan Torah [The Giving of the Torah]”).

A distinction must be made between the Torah of the forefathers and the Torah of the era of Egyptian exile. In Egypt egoism grew to the degree of Pharaoh, and it had to be corrected by the light that returns to the source. But the desires revealed in the times of the forefathers were very pure and did not require this light.

Even afterward, for almost a thousand years until the era of the sages of the Talmud, one had to humble one’s desires through asceticism and labor in the Torah. Only thanks to the corrections carried out by the sages of the Talmud is it sufficient for us to engage in joint study, which brings the light that returns to the source (the reforming light).

In any case, the form of correction of the forefathers differed from ours. In the present stage of development, we must attain love for one’s neighbor as for oneself, and from this it is clear how the Torah, that is, the Kabbalistic method, must be applied. At the end of the Preface to The Book of Zohar, Baal HaSulam explains that first of all it must be realized within the people of Israel, and afterward—in the entire world.

The application of the Kabbalistic method is possible among a great number of people who support one another and become guarantors for one another. Each is obliged to care for everyone else, and then a person has no worries about himself. For even his basic needs he receives because others care for him. As a result, a person completely disconnects from his egoistic desire and performs a restriction upon it.

This restriction is not based on forceful methods, not on self-coercion. It does not mean restraining myself from eating a tasty piece of cake. That would be a diet, not a restriction. What we are speaking of is the action of the light, which raises in my eyes, bestowal above reception, and then I simply cannot receive anything egoistically. Within me there remains the desire to receive, but above it reigns the desire to bestow.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/11/11, Writings of Baal HaSulam “Matan Torah [The Giving of the Torah]”

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Question: How can the revelation of evil on the 9^th of Av be corrected on the 15^th of Av, on the holiday of love? After all, the holiday of love refers to a couple in love, while the 9^th of Av is the day of the destruction of the Temples, meaning it relates to the entire people of Israel.

Answer: Both of these days relate to a couple in love, only we do not see it. The couple in love is the people of Israel and the Creator. All creations, all the desire to enjoy created by the Creator, is like a woman, Malchut, Shechina, in relation to which the Creator acts as a man, a bestower.

If there is no unification between us, then we cannot be a vessel, a place, for the revelation of the
Creator so that He may reign in us and we can merge in an embrace, a kiss, in spiritual unity. There are three levels of spiritual merging with the Creator: “embrace,” as it is said: “His left hand is under my head, and His right hand embraces me,” then “kiss,” and then “union.”

Therefore, the actions of the same name in the material world also symbolize the connection between those who love each other. And in the spiritual world, these concepts signify a very sublime connection between man and the Creator.

That is why the 9^th of Av symbolizes the terrible breakage, which is the cause of all troubles and misfortunes. After all, good and evil are determined only by how much we draw closer or distance from the upper light, from the upper force, the Creator.

The 9^th Av is the source of all destruction, and the 15^th Av is the source of all goodness. But since we have not yet reached this goodness, we do not feel the true power of this day and we perceive it as a holiday of ordinary lovers.

In the same way we underestimate Purim and perceive it as a children’s holiday. Unfortunately we are still in exile and do not see obvious symptoms of redemption. Redemption is already near, but we have not yet reached it, and therefore we do not know what spiritual “embrace,” “kiss,” and “union” are.

The whole Torah speaks only about the relationship of this couple: humanity and the Creator, and not about earthly young women dressing up in white garments and going to dance in the vineyards on the day of love, the 15^th of Av.
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From the conversation 7/30/15, “New Life 600 – The 15th Of Av – The Holiday Of Love”

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