Entries in the 'Kabbalah Study' Category

Speculations Around Kabbalah

49.01Question: The word ”Kabbalah” is perceived by many as something mystical. All the people shouting that they are engaged in Kabbalah from Madonna to who knows who, are they really engaged in Kabbalah or in show business?

Answer: Of course it is show business. Kabbalah is a teaching about the revelation of the Creator to a man in this world. Anyone can practice Kabbalah. But in order to actually achieve results, one must get into it very seriously.

Question: If this is so, then why don’t all Jews without exception study Kabbalah?

Answer: Firstly, it was once forbidden to engage in it because people were not sufficiently developed. But starting from the 14th to 15th centuries, Kabbalah had already been allowed to be practiced. Great Kabbalists such as Rambam and Ari wrote about this. And in the 20th century Kabbalah was revealed to everyone so today anyone can study it.

But the fact is that there are many impostors who created show business around Kabbalah and made a lot of cheats: Kabbalah and medicine, Kabbalah and spells, Kabbalah and the pulse of de-nur, or whatever. This is nonsense! They are fairy tales for the people to keep them in line.

Question: So the people invented it for themselves?

Answer: It was not the people who invented it, but their leaders.
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From Kab TVs “Encounters with Kabbalah” 1/5/22

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What Does Kabbalah Engage In?

243.01Question: How can we connect and annul in front of friends who do not adhere to our method?

Answer: There is no need to connect with them or annul before them. What will you annul and connect? You must have a common goal and a common methodology to achieve this goal.

Rabash writes: “We have gathered here to establish a society for all who wish to follow the path and method of Baal HaSulam, the way by which to climb the degrees of man and not remain as a beast…”

That is, we take upon ourselves the condition that we are going to approach the Creator according to the method that Baal HaSulam and Rabash describe to us. You can say: “It is possible to do it through other techniques.” Please, you can be with them, but not with us. You cannot combine one with the other! With anything! No way!

The science of Kabbalah is not philosophy and not any other science or methodology! You cannot come in here and start figuring out how to diet, how to do some exercise or whatever!

There is nothing in Kabbalah that concerns the earthly body. And there is nothing in it to do with your spirit! Because it does not exist either. It deals only with attainment of the Creator and that’s it! Discard everything else. You can do it, of course, but know that it is at the corporeal level, which is at the level of your body and nothing more! Not a spiritual body but an animal.

Question: Is there a difference between partnership and spiritual connection?

Answer: Of course there is!

But partnership is like a company. And spiritual connection is inner unification that can occur only under the influence of the upper light over which I do not have control. At the same time, my friends and I ask the Creator to unite us.
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From the International Convention “Rising Above Ourselves” 1/6/22, “Approaching the Creator Through the Network of Connections Between Us” Lesson 1

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Reaching The Status Of The Creator

284The Philosopher’s stone, in Western alchemy, an unknown substance, also called “the tincture” or “the powder,” sought by alchemists for its supposed ability to transform base metals into precious ones, especially gold and silver. 

Alchemists also believed that an elixir of life could be derived from it. Inasmuch as alchemy was concerned with the perfection of the human soul, the philosopher’s stone was thought to cure illnesses, prolong life, and bring about spiritual revitalization. (Encyclopaedia Britannica)

Comment: But this is only symbolism because in this transformation lies the ability to subjugate the world. According to their assertion and ideas, if I subjugate the world, I approach God.

My Response: Of course. If I transform any element into anything even physically, then I become the Creator to some extent. But the fact is that alchemists tried to do this on the still level. In principle, it is possible to do the reshuffling of electrons, neutrons, and protons in the atomic nucleus and remake them.

Let’s say I have electrons in one box, protons in another, neutrons in the third, and so on. And so I make precious metals out of them. Do you need gold? Please, I will assemble gold, silver, iron, bronze, no problem, any item. And what will we achieve by this?

This is a purely technological problem, and if it is solved, the person will not be happier from that. He will not achieve the meaning of life, he will not become omnipotent. Everyone will have several tons of gold at home. What will he do with it?

Comment: The symbolism lies precisely in the fact that by subjugating others, dominating others, I achieve the status of the Creator.

My Response: No. Not at all, because the Creator’s objective was to create man so that he would reach His level. Myself!

And the level of the Creator is not in creating all sorts of golden spillikins, but in being similar to the Creator in His status, in His properties of bestowal and love.

The Creator created us with His light. This light consists of 613 properties of bestowal and love, 613 types of emanation of good.

We are created as their imprint. And therefore, we have 613 egoistic desires to be filled with these lights. We must transform our desires so that they work as 613 properties of bestowal and love in each one of us.
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up. Anamnesis” 2/19/10

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Pride Is The Best Helper

294.1Question: Psychologists, religions, and spiritual movements often tag pride as the greatest evil. Pride is behind insults, diseases, wars, and all kinds of sufferings. Author Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth contends that there are 41 evidences of pride, which include: self-infallibility, a patronizing attitude to others, a sense of self exclusivity, feeling like a victim, bragging, the ability to put an opponent in his place, and so on. All these evidence pride within us, but in disguise.

Why is pride given to a person?

Answer: This is our main quality!

This is precisely our egoism, which supposedly wants to raise a person above others. Pride is given in order for me to realize how sinful, vicious, insignificant, stupid, weak, etc. I am. It is in order for me to understand in all my actions and thoughts, that is, in my mind and desires, that if I want to do the right thing, I must act only by the force of connection with the Creator.

Question: Does it mean that it is not evil, but rather good?

Answer: Of course! It was created to show us how insignificant we are if we are under the control of pride.

Comment: Psychology and religions say that it is the greatest evil. Yet you, after all, say that this is the greatest good.

My Response: Evil leads us to absolute good. It is what the Creator created: “I created evil and gave the Torah, the upper light, to correct it.” So, go and correct yourself.

The Creator created pride so that we would realize our insignificance in it, and would want by all means to get rid of it, and therefore, to find strength, to find the mind to turn to the Creator so that He would do it. Thus, pride leads us to the Creator, helps us find a connection with Him, and allows us to reach the height of the Creator.

Question: What does pride turn into in this case?

Answer: Into complete agreement with the Creator. There is nothing left of it but joy in obtaining the greatness of the Creator.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 11/4/21

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How Do Kabbalists Define Love?

237Question: Neurophysiologists say that a person is just a confused animal, and that feeling love is a result of a cocktail of pheromones, dopamine, and oxytocin.

Psychologists do not agree with this. They say that feeling love is something more than the sum of its components: mental, social, and so on.

Philosophers do not argue with anyone. They say that love confuses a person and is the cause of all the stupidity and all the discoveries humanity has made.

How do Kabbalists define love?

Answer: Kabbalists define love as the highest connection of a person with everything outside of him and makes him similar to the Creator.

Love is a means to become like the Creator. Love is something that exists outside of us. There is no love in an individual. And therefore, no physiologists and no psychologists can know anything about it. They think about everything only on the basis of pheromones and the like.

Love is the exclusive property of the Creator given to us, and with its help we can raise ourselves from the animate to human level. Man is Adam. “Adam” from the word “Edomeh”—similar to the Creator.
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From KabTV’s “Kabbalah Express” 12/6/21

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What Can’t Be Repeated In The World?

610.2 Only the possibility to make a copy is the true criterion of originality. Only authentic truth can be the object of imitation or parody (attributed to Jacques Derrida).

Question: Is there anything in the world that cannot be repeated?

Answer: The only thing that cannot be repeated in the world is the creation of something from nothing. This is the prerogative of the Creator. Everything else can be repeated because you will already be making from what was created out of nothing.

Question: Is there an inner point from this in a person?

Answer: Each person has his own point that breaks away from his egoism and gives him the opportunity to create out of himself a likeness to the Creator. To the extent of this similarity, he will be called man – Adam. “Adam” – from the word “Domeh” (similar).
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From KabTV’s “Kabbalah Express” 12/6/21

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Is It Worth To Lower Your Ego?

963.6In the News (Times of India): “Low stress and anxiety levels are observed among people who experience … in the decreased activity in frontal lobes, attained during meditation. 24/7 working frontal lobes, processing complex information and events all the time, when experience lower to none activity during meditation practice or prayer, delve into the realm of enlightenment where there is no stress, hassle or worry. Lower activity in frontal lobe is linked with the ‘feelings of surrendering one’s will completely’, states Andrew Newberg, a neuroscientist, and the author of The Metaphysical Mind: Probing the Biology of Philosophical Thought. When our egoistic mind submits itself completely to something infinite and larger than itself, it experiences enlightenment.”

My Response: Certainly, because a person erases everything within himself in general. He greatly reduces his ego and sort of dissolves.

This is an incorrect state because at the same time he annuls his “I,” his personality, he wants to be in a passive state of merging with the surroundings in the form of an inanimate element.

Comment: Scientists, however, call this moment balance and proximity to nature.

My Response: Of course if I turn into a stone, then I am close to nature. On the contrary, if I am an egoist who wants to know, discover, feel, and try, then this is already an “I” existing in nature in its individual form.

It is wrong to lower your ego because it is against progress, against development, against evolution, and against nature itself. This brings us closer to the inanimate level. We simply have no way out, this way we come to a state of balance, peace, an undisturbed state.

Yet, in principle, it is necessary to advance to the point where we clearly use all our egoism, everything that can possibly appear should be revealed and developed in us, and at such a huge egoistic peak of feelings and mind, we are in balance with nature.

Question: Does it mean that it is the desire that affects the work of the brain? The more you develop the desire, the more actively the brain begins to work and serve the desire?

Answer: The brain exists only to pursue the desire. If the desire has a task to achieve, the brain helps us to be filled with what we desire.
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up. Anamnesis” 2/19/10

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When Egoism Outgrows The Outer Framework

962.2Comment: When certain physical or moral deviations are revealed in a secular environment, this does not cause much shock as long as these people do not distinguish themselves from others, do not pretend to be chosen by God, and do not dictate to others how to behave.

When such a phenomenon is revealed in Orthodox circles, it is shocking.

My Response: The fact that religious people want to show that they are special is not important. Biologically they are absolutely the same as others, they do not have any special attitude and internal urge to be different. But all the same, in this environment there are very good relationships, communication, mutual aid funds, and a certain amount of support.

Their society is built in such a way, purely selfishly, that it has systems of mutual assistance. This is ordinary, earthly Judaism, which helps people in many ways and gives them certain moral and physical protection although at the same time it preserves our development.

Religion is not meant to correct man. Religion is just like house-building, a conventional practice. Just like a habit that a person has from his father’s home, his mother’s food, that way of life, religion gives him a certain environment, a shell for existence: do such and such actions, organize your life in such a way, it will help you in life.

And when egoism begins to develop, it outgrows this framework, and only the observance of external rituals remains from the whole religion while there are no moral attitudes left internally.
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up. Return” 2/19/10

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Why Is The Demarcation Of the Jews Taking Place?

559Question: Jerusalem has always been considered the heart of Israel and the whole world in general. How did it happen that Jerusalem today became the center of hatred among the Israeli people? The most negative events flare up there: hatred between the religious and secular, hatred of religious movements among themselves. What is the reason?

Answer: Since the Jews are the group of people who left ancient Babylon with Abraham, who preferred spiritual development to material development, over hundreds of years they developed spiritually, achieved becoming one with the Creator, and were at the level of the Temple. This is when a person becomes one with the Creator in his heart and begins to feel as existing eternally.

Therefore, upon leaving Egypt (egoism), they realized the call “to become like one man with one heart,” that is, to unite with each other in such a way as to completely overcome all kinds of selfish differences and mutual repulsion.

And then they achieved not only mutual rapprochement, but also mutual love. Therefore, Rabbi Akiva, although he was not born a Jew, was the greatest sage at the time of the destruction of the Second Temple, and he urged: “Do not forget that love your neighbor as yourself is our most important commandment.”

Nevertheless, unfounded hatred broke out among his twenty-four thousand disciples. They fell from the spiritual level and ceased to feel their community. And the spiritual world, the Creator, is felt only in community, in a single integral desire. Therefore, after falling to an egotistical fragmented level, they lost the feeling of the Creator, the feeling of the upper world.

Since then, mutual hatred, mutual repulsion, among the Jews is much greater than among the rest of the nations of the world. However, from the outside, it is perceived as mutual assistance of Jews to each other, but only because there is a mutual hatred of all nations toward the Jews, which keeps them together.

Mutual aid between Jews is manifested when there is a common external trouble. But as soon as it disappears, then immediately there is mutual hatred and mutual rejection. This is what we see everywhere, and especially here in Israel.

This is not particularly felt abroad because there is nothing for the Jews to share; there is no state pie, there are no big points of contact with each other. Jews live among other nations, and therefore, everything is diluted. They need to feel that there is someone who can help them, sympathize, that he hopes for you and you count on him. It works there.

And in Israel where there is no such reason, a terrible, mutual hatred appears, especially in the religious part of it, so much that it leads to very unpleasant manifestations.

In this respect, a religious person today does not differ from a secular person because he does not pursue the goal of improving himself. A person is not brought up knowing that he has to love another individual, help him, take care of him, merge with others into one whole, and merge with the whole world.

Religion is not Kabbalah, not human correction. People built their usual life out of it. It teaches them the mechanical fulfillment of the commandments for which they will allegedly receive a reward in the next world. That is, it is addressed purely to human egoism.

Believers will continue to demonstrate themselves like everyone else, they just have it in a closed society, veiled. Therefore when suddenly something happens, special cases appear that cannot be hidden. In fact, absolutely the same vices exist there as in the non-religious part of society.

I hope that all this will lead us to remember our main commandment “love your neighbor as yourself,” that we should be a light for all the nations of the world.

We were favored by God to set an example in uniting with each other, like at Mount Sinai, and to attract the whole world to this. In this case, we will truly become the element in the world that we must be.
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up. Return” 2/19/10

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The Upper Light Is The Medicine For Everyone

570Today we are in the very last moment of our exile from the spiritual when all the evil that can only be in humanity is manifested. As it is said in Prophets, terrible events are still possible. Let’s try for them not to happen. Let’s begin to correct ourselves before they force us to go to correction with great suffering.

At the same time, there is no need to blame anyone. We just need to tell people about what our mission is and not make a special calculation of who is right here or who is to blame. We are all in a state of isolation from the spiritual. We are all egoists, we are all uncorrected, we are all terribly sick with egoism. We are a cancerous tumor because we are completely disconnected from each other.

Therefore, we must come to connection, to mutual love at the level of souls, and call on the upper light to correct us. This is called the Torah.

It is said: “I’ve created the evil inclination, I’ve created Torah as a spice.” You need to see that you are an egoist. And religious education hides this from a person, encourages them to consider themselves perfect, righteous. Only by revealing egoism will a person understand that he is obliged to correct it and attract the upper light, because the light corrects. That’s when he will feel the correction.

I hope that Kabbalah will be revealed to all the people of Israel and also to the whole world. We will mutually help each other in general correction and come to a perfect state. And there is no point in starting to figure out who is better, who is worse. We are all sick and we all need the same medicine—the upper light.
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up. Coming Back” 3/22/10

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