Question: Who originally owned the land of Israel? According to the Torah, seven nations used to live in it and they were subsequently captured by the Israelites who left Egypt. Earlier, it was also said that God Himself bequeathed this land to Abraham. How can you explain who owned the land?

Answer: There is nothing to explain here. Everything happened as it was everywhere, with all nations, at all times. So it was instructed by the Creator from above, and so they fulfilled their mission.

Comment: But the Creator instructs everyone in their own way. And you claim that whoever is stronger is right. If one captured the land, this is how it has to be.

My Response: So it was said by the great commentator, the medieval scholar Rashi: “The nations of the world will come and ask: ‘Why did you take away the land that belonged to us? You expelled the seven nations of the world who had lived here on this land, captured it, and since then you have considered it yours?’”

Rashi writes that there is a very simple answer to be given to this: everything belongs to the Creator, not to the nations of the world and not to Israel. And if the Creator transfers the right to some action or possession, especially since it is written in the Torah, then this is how we should accept it.
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From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 4/26/22

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The Sanhedrin existed at a time and in such a society when people were in attainment of the Creator. Therefore, trials and sentences were compensation for the fact that a person stumbled in relation to himself, and could have not stumbled.

The Sanhedrin’s decision was like a recommendation to a person about what to do to ascend spiritually. It was only about spiritual crimes. Therefore, if in the 70 years of the Sanhedrin’s existence (once in 70 years they were assessed as existing) at least one death sentence was passed, then this Sanhedrin was considered cruel, a fiend of hell.

Can you imagine? Once in 70 years! This is only in case when they came to the conclusion that nothing could be done with this person, it was impossible to somehow influence him. But in practice there were no such cases, there was always an opportunity to correct a person.

In those days, there was no death penalty, although the Torah mentions stoning, strangulation, beheading, and so on. All of this is purely theoretical. There was nothing really like that except correction in the right society.

A person should not be isolated from good society but placed there so that he has nowhere to escape. Then he will have no other choice but to pull himself up to the level of this society.
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up. Outlaw” 12/19/10

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Question: Why do the Jews not have such servility and deep reverence for each other like other peoples?

Answer: Yes, we really see it today. And if you looked into the depths of the centuries, you would see that even 100 years ago there was no such thing and could not have been. Absolutely in no way!

In the army, in enterprises, anywhere, fraternity is characteristic of Jews—everyone is the same. This is so deeply embedded within the people that even when we began to take an example from the West in the organization of the country and everything else, even then the relationship remained the same.

From time immemorial, everyone has been absolutely equal. A person has never been respected for wealth, only for knowledge. There has never been any subservience to anyone. This inner brotherhood still does not go away, since then it has been in everyone.

And although there is no strong connection anymore, equality that I am no worse than another, reigns everywhere.

There is no slave in a Jew—something that practically exists in every nation. As all other nations have passed the slave-owning period, when some were masters, others were slaves. There was no such period for the Jewish people. There was a so-called slave to his master. But it has always been said: whoever buys a slave, buys himself a master.

These are the spiritual laws. There are whole volumes in the Talmud telling how to treat a slave. The slave lived as if under communism. You were obliged to take care of him, you could not force him morally or spiritually.

He worked as if for hire, and was only considered a slave, since the owner made a contract with him that he would buy him for a certain time. For six years he worked and in the seventh year he could leave the owner. This law is called “Shemitah” when everyone returns to freedom.

According to this law, in the 50th year of the use of land, it is returned to free use and does not remain assigned to anyone forever.

We do not understand how these laws provide a completely different basis for people to connect with each other. What does it mean that you are given land for only 50 years?! This is practically a small human century.

There is the same thing in slavery: a contract for 6 years. You were obliged to give a slave the opportunity to marry, a bondwomen, to get married. And if you used her as a concubine, you had to take her as a wife, buy her clothes and jewelry, which means, give her a completely different status.

This is completely different from the system that other nations had. Therefore, today it still exists in the blood.

And now we are already at a stage where we have to understand that there is nothing valuable, nothing to save, nothing to store, nothing to buy, nothing to stock up on. The world will turn over anyway, and the earth will swallow everything up.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Who Has Longer” 11/3/09

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My new article on Linkedin “The World Waits for Israel”

A student of mine told me that thirty years ago, a sheikh from the extremist Palestinian Hamas movement predicted that in 2022, between the month of Ramadan and the month of June, Israel will be destroyed. He asked if I thought there was a chance that this could happen. I told him he can sleep quietly because it won’t, not now. However, if we continue to conduct ourselves as we have been so far, we will not exist for long. The nations voted to establish a Jewish state because deep down, they await and long for our spiritual awakening—to set an example of brotherly love and mutual responsibility. If we live up to their dream, they will rally behind us, including Hamas. If we disappoint them, they will revoke Israel.

Our internal cohesion or lack thereof determines everything that happens, not only among Jews, but in general. Everyone senses this but us. You can often hear antisemites blaming Jews for all the problems in the world. This is a testimony to the fact that they see us as responsible for the well-being of the world. And they are right, since through our own unity or disunity we make the world choose unity or division.

Since the inception of our nation, we have been obligated to serve as “a light to the nations, to open blind eyes, to bring out prisoners from the dungeon, and those who dwell in darkness from the prison” (Isaiah 42:6-7). We have never been relieved from duty, and the fact that the nations hold us to a higher standard proves that they still expect us to lead by example.

It is no coincidence that the two dominant religions—Christianity and Islam—emerged from Judaism. However, because the example we currently give is one of division and hatred, this is the treatment we get from the world. If we injected a different spirit into the world, the world would be different, and so would the way the world treats the Jews in general, and Israel in particular.

This is why it is written in The Book of Zohar (Aharei Mot) that after Israel make peace among themselves, “By your merit, there will be peace in the world.” This is also why Rav Kook wrote around the time of World War I, “If we were ruined and the world was ruined with us through unfounded hatred, we will be rebuilt and the world will be rebuilt with us through unfounded love.”

It follows that the world will not like us, or even accept us as long as we do not like one another. However, if we do accept and like one another, the world will embrace us and support us because we will be setting the example it expects to see from us.

Our internal cohesion or lack thereof determines everything that happens, not only among Jews, but in general. Everyone senses this but us. You can often hear antisemites blaming Jews for all the problems in the world. This is a testimony to the fact that they see us as responsible for the well-being of the world. And they are right, since through our own unity or disunity we make the world choose unity or division. If humanity chose unity, there would be no problems anywhere. Since it chooses division, there is no solution to any of our problems, and more of them keep piling up.

Whatever we are, shines on the world. If we are “a light to the nations,” the world shines with us. If we are “a darkness to the nations,” the world darkens with us and hates us for it.

It is all a question of our internal unity. We need not please or appease anyone; we should only try to—after two millennia of hatred and division—love one another, as one man with one heart, just as we were at the moment of the birth of our nation.

This is the solution to the problems of the world, and to the grievances that the world has against us. This is why when seeking solutions to America’s social problems, the most notorious antisemite in American history, Henry Ford, founder of the auto company, recommended looking into the ancient Jewish society, before it fell into unfounded hatred: “Modern reformers, who are constructing model social systems, … would do well to look into the social system under which the early Jews were organized.”

Indeed, the world waits for Israel.
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Question: In our world, it is believed that the freedom of a country is political independence, elections, the absence of subordination and dependence of the people on some other country. And by what criteria can a Kabbalist say this country [Israel] is independent?

Answer: If we talk about Israel, then by spiritual definition we are not a country and not a nation. So it’s too early for us to talk about it. We can only give approximate definitions to this and analyze why we still do not satisfy true spiritual concepts of what a country, a nation, a state, a family, and so on are.

There are very clear definitions here that relate specifically to us and not to the rest of the nations of the world. Baal HaSulam examines this in articles about the last generation.

In particular, in the newspaper The Nation, published in 1940, he writes: It is a shame to admit that one of the most precious merits we have lost during the exile, and the most important of them, is the loss of the awareness of the nationality, meaning that natural feeling that connects and sustains each and every nation. The threads of love that connect the nation, which are so natural and primitive in all the nations, have become degenerated and detached from our hearts, and they are gone.

The fact is that other nations have a sense of dependence, a sense of community, while the Jews practically do not. They are characterized by increased egoism, remoteness from each other, and a willingness to get closer to each other only in times of special catastrophes. And so on.

Question: And what is the national identity? What is he talking about?

Answer: If we take, for example, any nation and start looking for the spiritual roots in it, we will see that almost all nations have a craving for self-consciousness, and the Jews may have the opposite picture.

This comes from the fact that the Jews are the nation of the idea, which was gathered by Abraham from different clans on the basis of unity.
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From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 4/26/22

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Question: The Land of Israel, Eretz Yisrael,  means “a desire straight to the Creator.” What does that mean?

Answer: Just as the Creator is aimed only at nurturing and developing His creations, bringing us closer to each other and to Himself, so should we see this as the goal of our development.

The Creator is the quality of bestowal, love, connection, and everything good that can only be imagined in expansion and getting closer to each other.

Question: What is the difference between the concepts of the nation of Israel and the Land of Israel? Both the land and the nation are called Israel.

Answer: The earth, Eretz, comes from the word “Ratzon,” which means desire.

Israel (Isra-El) is from the word “Yashar-El,” (straight to the Creator).

The Land of Israel is Ratzon-Kel (desire directed to the Creator). And the nation of Israel is Am Israel (the people of Israel).

That is, at the level of development of our desires, we must achieve such a desire when all of them will be aimed at good relations with each other, at good connection.
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From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 4/26/22

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Question: For the last 2,000 years, Jews have been in exile caused by unfounded hatred. The State of Israel was founded only 74 years ago.

Throughout all this time, sages wrote thousands of books, and in all of them it is said that only the unity of the people, love for one’s neighbor, and mutual solidarity will save us. This will give us the opportunity to return to the Land of Israel. Yet, although we have not reached unity, we have returned here. For what purpose did the upper force bring us back?

Answer: We were brought back with the goal that we are obliged as a people, not yet on a spiritual basis of unity, but at least on a geographical and historical basis, to begin to unite from below upward, that is, from purely corporeal definitions to more exalted, spiritual ones.

Thus, we must reach a state where we unite spiritually, and in accordance with this, the upper force will be revealed within us.

According to Baal HaSulam, we were given this land as collateral. All this is for us to begin to return to each other, to our spiritual roots.
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From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 4/26/22

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Comment: Passover is a great celebration of getting out of Egyptian slavery. It is celebrated by almost the whole country and all the Jews in the world.

This, of course, is also a family holiday; everyone gathers for a festive meal and everyone looks forward to it.
For those who are engaged in Kabbalah, Passover means that a person understands that he is in slavery, in his egoism, and he escapes from it.

My Response: Running from it is also not exactly running, because in Egypt—there was everything!

Everything that you can imagine that communism is in this world—it was there. Basically, they had everything arranged, the best lands, and just everything you want. And ahead, a dead desert, a dead sea, everything dead, everything is full of uncertainty. Nothing good! So, where is the Egyptian captivity and where are we going? That is the question.

All the work in Egypt is in order to depict that the whole desert is paradise. And everything in Egypt—everything good, you have absolutely everything you want—is really hell. Egypt is an egoistic fulfillment, and even more, everything you want.

It is about each of us. This is our Egypt. Everything is good in it, there is everything. All the pleasures of this world in all their details, in all their variations, please, take it.

No one wants to get out of there. Everyone, in general, is enjoying it. The only one who feels bad is the one who is not like them and who wants to get people out of there.

And who wants to pull them out? Moses. So, what good did he do? Because centuries after that, we only feel bad. There is nothing better than Egypt!

Comment: But it is said that we were slaves in Egypt.

My Response: Slaves, meaning that we were in our egoism, but we completely got everything we wanted.

Question: So why does a person suddenly want to get out of this fairy tale?

Answer: That is how he is built—man.

Question: Why does he suddenly hear Moses? Instead of listening, for example, to Pharaoh, who says: “Stay, I will provide you with everything, everything will be fine.” And Moses says: “We will go into the unknown, into the desert. Follow me.” Why did they follow him?

Answer: Apparently, Moses told the Creator that something should be done with them so that they would want to leave. Moses agreed with Pharaoh and with the Creator that there would be Egyptian plagues that would sweep through the Jews and from which they would want to escape. But if they had not been there, these plagues, they would not have run anywhere. And if they did not want to run, there would be no plagues.

Question: So, after all, the egg was first? At first they wanted to escape in some way?

Answer: I think it was Moses who agreed with the Creator: “Let’s arrange it so that they would want to follow me after all.”

Question: But still, you said that it was bad for Jews there because of these ten plagues. It was not easy for the Egyptians there either. It is written that the Egyptians suffered the most.

How is there to understand that the Egyptians suffered from ten Egyptian plagues?

Answer: It is the egoism of a person who wants to be freed. That is, to be subordinate without knowing to whom and how. But the main thing is to break out of this communism that has everything. Absolutely everything is in excess.

Question: And the Egyptians, it is this communism that exists inside us—precisely this egoism? They want to keep us and ask: “Why are you running from here? You feel so good here.” Something like this?

Answer: Yes.

Question: What is this Passover holiday for the world? The Jews celebrate it corporeally, Israel celebrates it. But what is this holiday for the world?

Answer: It means liberation from Egyptian captivity, it is liberation from egoism, it is liberation of man from himself. I want to be controlled not by an egoistic quality that wants to acquire everything, to be filled with everything and only thinks about that—but to be controlled by an altruistic quality, when I want to connect with others, to fill others and not myself. That is the desire that arises. That is Moses in us.

And we become Jews when we hear Moses, when Moses is in us. And if not, then we are those same Egyptians.

Question: So we can say that there are only two nations in the world. In the spiritual world, there are two nations?

Answer: Yes. Either you are an Egyptian or you are Israeli. And there is nothing in the middle.

The Israelite is directed to the Creator, Yashar–El, straight to the Creator. And the Egyptian is directed toward himself.

Question: When you say that this celebration is for the world, the world must decide who it is today?

Answer: Yes.

Comment: And today, it is such a critical moment that this really should be resolved.

My Response: We do not even realize it yet. And the world does not realize where it is being led. It does not realize it at all!

Question: But can we say that Egyptian plagues are taking place around the world now?

Answer: Yes! Absolutely. There is such a wave all over the world.

Question: But maybe the world will still understand that it is necessary to escape?

Answer: It all depends on us how we show the world this path, the path of development, the path of connection, what lies ahead, what to strive for. Can we do it?

Comment: Do we have to present it so that it is pleasant, sweet, joyful for a person?

Answer: Sweet, pleasant, and necessary! It should not attract him because it is sweet. In Egypt as well, no one sees that it is sweet there.

But there is sweetness in freedom from egoism; that is, the feeling of slavery in Egypt is opposed to freedom from egoism outside Egypt. And a person must grow internally so much that this difference between the two states simply pulls him forward.

Question: So, today more than ever the world should hear that it is necessary to get out of egoism, out of Egypt?

Answer: Yes. We are stuck!

Question: It turns out that we got delayed a little bit in Egypt. And such things are happening now that push us out. Don’t we feel that we need to get out of it?

Answer: But we must set a course, we must understand, we must strive, we must pull everyone with us.

Question: When you say “we,” who do you mean?

Answer: I mean first of all those people who can understand and realize this, people who are striving forward, Yashar-El, Israel. And everyone else will follow them.

Question: It isn’t necessarily the Jews that are straight to the Creator?

Answer: The main mass, the initial mass are Jews, those who have already experienced, in the past, in their roots, a state of escaping egoism. And the rest will join Israel. There is absolutely no question about it. The whole point is to raise the Jews.

Question: What is your prayer today?

Answer: My prayer today is to fulfill the role of Moses. To pull out this head-part of all mankind called Israel, aspiring to the Creator, which in potential can aspire to the Creator. To pull it out of such a somnambulistic state and begin to excite them so that they themselves at least somehow make an effort, are concerned, and rise forward to the exit.

Question: In order for at least a thought to arise that it is necessary to get out of egoism? But first of all, you always say that egoism is bad. Or not?

Answer: Egoism is bad depending on how you measure it, weigh it, look at it, feel it, smell it, and taste it. But in fact, egoism is all that gives you taste, life.

And altruism, freedom, what is it? You go out into the field, and you do not know what, what for, why.

Moses, in principle, is not one person but a whole group of people who understand that the future lies in this—in getting out of egoism. How do we get out of it? We need to study this and start applying it among us. And every time we take every step, it is done again out of the darkness when we do not seem to feel any draw in egoism, we start trying to get out of it and find that it holds us by all the feelings, by everything! And you cannot escape from it anywhere.

And then just stick together and cry out.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 4/7/22

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Michael Laitman, On The Times of Israel: “The Root of Israel’s Political Chaos”

The past several years have seen a growing political chaos in Israel. Four elections in just two years are too much for any country. But even after the fourth election, there is no stable government, it is torn from within, threatened from without, and the prevailing sentiment is that everyone disagrees with everyone else and detests everyone else. There is only one solution to the impasse: stop imposing incompatible modes of government that are good for other nations, but not for Israel, and adapt the political system that suits the nature of the people.

Israel’s multiple-party political system is not the right structure for the people of Israel. We have always had multiple opinions in the nation; it is in our nature to disagree, and we laugh at ourselves that between every two Jews you will find three opinions. However, the DNA of our people is to unite above these divisions and use the tensions they create to form a bond that is stronger than any bond can form.

This mode of work is the reason behind King Solomon’s verse (Prov. 10:12), “Hate stirs up strife, and love will cover all crimes.” This approach is also behind many other texts that our sages and thinkers have written throughout history.

In Education and World, Martin Buber wrote, “We are demanded ‎not to blur the boundaries between the fellowships, but rather recognize the common ‎reality and sharing of the test of mutual responsibility. The separation of the hearts is an ‎illness that afflicts the nations of our time … there is no cure for this except for people from different circles of views ‎who need each other with a pure heart to exert together to reveal the common basis.”

In a similar spirit, the book Likutey Halachot states, “The vitality and sustenance and correction of the whole of creation is by people of ‎differing views becoming included together in love, unity, and peace.” The book Assorted Counsels elaborates even more: “The essence of peace is to connect two opposites. Hence, do not be alarmed if you see ‎a person whose opinion is completely opposite from yours and you think that you will ‎never be able to make peace with him. Or, when you see two people who are completely ‎opposite to each other, do not say it is impossible to make peace between them. On the ‎contrary, the essence of peace is to try to make peace between two opposites.”

In other words, the correct way for our people to work is to have multiple opinions within the same party, the same governing body, but at the same time understand that no single view is right, and only a decision reached when people unite after their differences have been revealed is correct because it has emerged from the point of unity that is above any personal opinion.

Only if Israel works in this way will it have a solid government and a nation that stands behind it. Moreover, when Israel governs itself in this way, it will have the world’s support, contrary to the current situation where the world can barely keep from telling us outright to get out of the land it granted us on November 29, 1947.

While it may seem impossible to find unity above our differences, we must remember that we are not doing this for ourselves, but for the world. This will be the fuel that can give us the sufficient impetus to carry out this seemingly impossible task.

Our sages have taught us that if we unite among ourselves, we unite the world. Accordingly, The Book of Zohar writes (Aharei Mot), “‘How good and how pleasant it is for brothers to also dwell together.’ These are the friends, ‎as they sit together inseparably. At first, they seem like people at war, wishing to kill one another. Then ‎they return to being in brotherly love.‎ …And you, the friends who are here, as you were in fondness and love before, you will not part henceforth … and by your merit there will be peace ‎in the world.”‎

Echoing it, Raaiah Kook wrote, “If we were ruined and the world was ruined with us through unfounded hatred, we will be rebuilt and the world will be rebuilt with us through unfounded love.”

Therefore, in times of great division and dislike, it is our duty more than ever to unite above our differences and set an example of unity. This is the only remedy to our inability to establish a solid government, a solid society, and a peaceful life.
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Filed under: Israel, Israel Today, New Publications, Unity - No Comments →

Question: People who are engaged in spiritual development are trying to move to Israel, they seem to be drawn to this land. However, we do not see that by coming here they become more spiritual. Does it mean that the land does not have an effect on them?

Answer: And it should not. After all, we must make special efforts in order to begin to rise spiritually.

Comment: I thought that the land of Israel influences a person who comes here, and he becomes better and kinder.

My Response: On the contrary! Those who come here are under the influence of certain forces that slow down their development. A person should make greater efforts. But at the same time with their help, he reaches higher spiritual degrees.
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From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 4/26/22

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