Comment: A group of scientists from Tel Aviv University examined the correspondence of the garrison force at the 600 BC Tel Arad fortress and concluded that the Bible was written several centuries earlier than has been believed until now.

As we all know, the Torah was written after the return from the exile in Babylon because there were not enough educated Jews who could write it. Now following this discovery scientists are re-examining when the Bible was written.

Answer: The first book about the wisdom of Kabbalah was written by Adam about 5,770 years ago. During the time between Adam and Abraham, there were several other writings by different Kabbalists. Abraham, as Rambam claims, wrote many Kabbalaistic books, but only one remained until our days, The Book of Creation. Abraham, who lived in ancient Babylon 3,500 years ago, gathered a group of people who became the nation of Israel with time. All the members of the group had to learn how to read and write. They spoke Hebrew because Hebrew and Aramaic were the languages spoken in ancient Babylon.

Abraham’s group was founded in order to attain the upper world in the connection between people. On this basis, they naturally understood the origin of the letters, the roots of the words, and felt the language of the branches, the upper attributes of the world, which have no names, called roots, and are named by their consequences in our world, which are called the branches.

Many books were written in the time between Abraham and Moses because all the Jews were highly educated from Abraham’s time onward. Since the exile in Egypt onward, the Jews left Egypt on a totally different level of consciousness and attainment because during their life in slavery they got to know their work in the ego. During the 40 years of wandering in the desert they began to write the Torah for all the nations.

It says that Moses taught his students along with his assistant Joshua. Moreover he taught all the people because the Levites engaged in the general education and teaching of the nation.

Question: How long did the writing of the Torah (Pentateuch) take?

Answer: The Torah was gradually created during the 40 years of wandering in the desert. Everything the nation of Israel underwent in practice took place internally in their spiritual roots, and they expressed this in the book called Moses’ Torah.

When they lived in the land of Israel after the building of the First Temple and then after the building of the Second Temple, they wrote all the other books including the “Prophets” (Naviim), the “Holy Scriptures” (Ketuvim), and the Mishna.

From the time the two temples were destroyed and before they were exiled, the Talmud was written, and all the other books were written while they were in exile.

The Torah says that there wasn’t a child from Dan to Beer Sheba who didn’t know the Jewish laws and who didn’t know how to read and write. They knew most of the books by heart because that was the ancient method of studying; students had to learn by heart what the teacher taught them.

Question: This means that there was never a break in literacy.

Answer: Since the time of Adam, in those circles where Kabbalists lived, there was almost universal literacy. Abraham eradicated illiteracy among the ancient Babylonians who joined him.
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From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 4/14/16

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New Life 553 – Holidays: Independence Day – The National Symbols
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Yael Leshed-Harel

Why is the Menorah (the seven branched candelabrum used in the Temple) the symbol of Israel? When will there be peace between us and our neighbors? And how is our independence as a nation expressed?

The seven branches of the Menorah symbolize wholeness. 7×7=49: 49 gates of impurity and on the other hand, 49 gates of purity. The wisdom of Kabbalah will help us illuminate like the Menorah. It teaches us how to build a connected egalitarian society.

The olive branches symbolize the aspiration for peace, but it will be attained only when we reach peace between us. When our relations shine like the Menorah, we will be rewarded with peace in the world as well. This will be the outcome.

The land of Zion and Jerusalem refers to the fact that we want to leave the hatred we feel and return to brotherly love, to the state of wholeness and beauty. Man’s inclination is evil from birth. A person naturally cares only about himself. We have to develop the good inclination in us.

A yearning Jewish soul refers to the fact that we were as one man in one heart in the past and we yearn for that. True independence means independence from the evil inclination, from the narrow egoism.

To be a free nation means free from the evil in us, from unfounded hatred. Even when I want to do something good, I suddenly discover that I operate only for my own sake. A person who lives in “being a free nation” sees everything in life through the point of connection.

If we connect in love, most of the problems will disappear from the world because it is the bad relations between us that are killing us. When we connect in love, the state of Israel will improve miraculously and everyone will want to follow our example.

It is customary to have barbecue parties during this holiday, so it is a good idea to include a connection workshop that will ignite a new spirit in us.
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From KabTV’s “New Life 553 Holidays: Independence Day – The National Symbols,” 4/14/15

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On the background of a wave of anti-Semitism that is growing stronger and concern about another Holocaust, there is a solution that we have not considered. During the week when we stop to remember the millions who perished in the Holocaust, let’s understand why Jews are hated in the world.
From Rav’s film in Hebrew 5/5/16

Watch Into Truth: Cracking the Jewish Riddle

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Question: Baal HaSulam wrote in his article, “The Last Generation,” Part 1: “and they will come to the Messiah, to Jerusalem, and he will teach them this Torah.” Who is he talking about and who is the Messiah that they will come to?

Answer: All the nations of the world will turn to the upper force of nature, the force of unity and love that will pull humanity out of the original sin, of the ego. This force is called Messiah, stemming from the Hebrew root “Limshoch – to pull.”

We can summon this force only when we have a desire to ascend spiritually to the level of absolute love and bestowal that is based on complete fear of fulfilling the general commandment of the Torah, “love thy friend as thyself.” This level is called complete fear, Ira Shalem, or Jerusalem. If you wish to fulfill that, you are invited to take part in our courses.
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New Life #649 – Product Labeling And Hatred Of Israel
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Tal Mandelbaum ben Moshe

What is the reason for the boycott of products from Israel, why will the feelings of hatred of the world toward us increase in the future, and how will it be possible to transform these feelings of hatred to love and support for Israel?

Summary

Among the Israeli public, there are also those who think that product labeling is good because this will advance us in the peace process.

The more that the people develop, the differences of opinion among them grow, and we already know that the outbreak of hatred among us is destroying us. Before the destruction, disagreements were altruistic, that were how we increased connection. The dispute between right and left in Israel has already existed for more than a century, no one listens to the other.

As the world develops, everyone becomes connected to each other. And if the relationship is not good, this creates a problem. All people are parts of a single system called “Adam.” Israel, which is from the phrase “Li-Rosh” (I have a head), are the head. The world feels that we determine everything, so the world hates us. This hatred has been prominent in all of Israel’s wars.

We survive only because we are able to connect with each other and bring the power of connection to the world.

The labeling of products from Israel is only the first step; everything that is offered against us is will be welcomed by the world. If we continue to fight brother against brother here in this country, the world will rise up against us more and more.

The wisdom of Kabbalah is revealed today to teach us to connect, and then the world will feel that abundance comes from here. Even our neighbors, who are sending their children to murder us today, will relax. We determine the next news bulletin.

Nothing will help us other than connection between us. Even if we were to hand over the entire land of Israel, the hatred would continue. Only if we learn to connect above all the differences between us, will everyone connect well with us.
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From KabTV’s “New Life #649 – Product Labeling And Hatred Of Israel,” 11/12/15

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New Life #646 – The Jewish-Israeli Ideology
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Nitzah Mazoz

There are two paths of development: the path of setting goals or just rolling along and flowing through life. That is how we proceeded until ancient Babylon when Abraham gathered people around him who later became the people of Israel.

Summary

They were connected by the ideology of “And you shall love your friend as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18), connected above all the differences of opinion. This ideology comes to us from nature; all of its parts are connected harmoniously, like a single body. Where does the power to unite come from? After all, this is against our nature. It is from the force that unites all the parts of nature.

This is the ideology of the people of Israel, and in fact it is the only ideology that can be considered an ideology at all. We must develop ourselves to the kind of unity toward which nature is advancing us, whether we want it or not.

Islam has an earthly ideology, which is to bring everyone under their control. But we have a spiritual ideology. Both Christianity and Islam stem from a single source, Abraham. But neither of them change a person. Only we have the method for changing a person from an egoist to an altruist. But as of today we are not doing this. Since the destruction of the Temple there has been unfounded hatred between us and a small Light is holding onto us until we return to ourselves.

All of the power that Islam has today is only because we haven’t activated our ideology. Islam and Christianity exist only because of our weakness. If we were to become strengthened with brotherly love, everything would be okay. As of today, only connection between us can save Israel. Kabbalah teaches how to bring love into our hearts. Christianity and Islam also speak about love for others because they drew this from us. But they don’t have a method for achieving this.

The only method that can correct the evil in a person is the wisdom of Kabbalah. It teaches us about how all of reality is constructed. The connection between us will have an influence through our common root, Abraham, as well as on our cousins, and they will calm down.
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From KabTV’s “New Life #646 – The Jewish-Israeli Ideology,” 11/8/15

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When anti-Semitism is rising reaching heights we have never seen before, a call to cancel the Holocaust Memorial Day was echoed on campuses all over Europe. In the US, there are campus protests to boycott Israel, and the BDS organization is becoming increasingly more legitimate in the eyes of many. It may be time to begin asking ourselves how to prevent a second Holocaust.

I was born in 1946, about a year after WWII, in the region of Vitebsk where many Jews were killed. The atrocities our people had undergone were burned into my memory since I was a child and have been part of my life. For me, the Holocaust Remembrance Day is not just a national memorial day for a tragic event that took place in the past, but a warning sign of what might happen, especially if we consider the hatred that the nations of the world feel toward us.

It is a common mistake to believe that the hatred for the Jews was born in Nazi Germany seven decades ago. It is actually a phenomenon that is more than 3,000 years old. According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, the root for the deep hatred is at the gathering at Mt. Sinai, a special event where the feeling of hatred was revealed among the nation of Israel (the word “Sinai” stems from the root “Sina – hatred” in Hebrew), on top of which they managed to rise and unite as one man in one heart through the method of connection, the Torah.
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From the Webinar, “Why Jews?”

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Comment: On the 20^th of April, Adolf Hitler’s birthday, nine universities in Germany suddenly began printing leaflets with quotations from Hitler’s book Mein Kampf: “Wake up Europe! Hostile foreigners have flooded Europe, and the Jews are responsible for the settlement of foreign racial elements on the banks of the Rein.” This was written a long time ago, and is now being published in a new edition.

Answer: Baal HaSulam said that Nazism is not a product of Germany. Therefore, everything comes full circle to Nazism.  Any history of human begins on a small scale.

There have been seeds of Nazism in the past that have developed in the course of evolution, repeated in a spiral and reached the last explicit manifestation as Nazism in Germany. And now has come the time for the manifestation of Nazism all over the world.

And the claim that “the Jews are responsible for the settlement of foreign racial elements on the banks of the Rein” is true. We are not responsible for the foreign invasion to Germany and their settlement there. We are responsible for not bringing the world to correction, for not explaining and not setting an example of how to do it.

In fact, we sit idly because we are not drawing the Upper Light that can correct humanity. The Jews are the only force that can do so, and if we don’t, everything that will happen is natural.

Nazism is the most extreme form of mutual hatred that appears in humanity. Therefore, it is only natural that it will be aimed first at the Jews, and this time from all over the world. It will be cultivated simultaneously by everyone, starting from many serious prominent sources, which all of the others gradually will join because they will not be able to resist it.

Let’s see how it happens in America and Europe because the Jews there will be blamed instead of Israel; here we, in general, are in a similar situation now to that of the time of Masada.

Soon, we will need to fight, not on land, air, and sea, but in the spiritual dimension. This is the reason that we must quickly prepare the people of Israel and the Jews all over the world by making it clear to them that if we unite and understand our mission in the world, we will not weaken or kill our rivals, but will change and re-educate them, and then the world will reach a happy ending.

Everything depends solely on us. Let’s start doing it. We only have time left for the accurate correction, not for reflections and philosophies.
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From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 4/24/16

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New Life 720 – The Splitting Of The Red Sea
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Nitzah Mazoz

The development of humanity cannot be described without the Torah that influences it dramatically. Kabbalists don’t relate to the Torah as a description of the phenomena of nature, but as an inner description of a person according to “A person is a small world” (Midrash Tanhuma, Parshat Pekudei, Siman 3).

The truth is that there is no world outside of a person, everything that we see around us is a projection of our interior. 100 years ago we didn’t imagine that there would be television, and in the future, technology will insert the viewer into the movie realistically. When we approach a spiritual perception we understand that reality is portrayed within us. The wisdom of Kabbalah is the wisdom of perception.

The Torah describes how the upper thought, the higher program, directs all of the theater around us. A person lives within himself, yet he has the possibility of connecting to that higher thought, the upper force. Some of us believe that there is a higher power that demands that a person fulfill Mitzvot (commandments) and accordingly gives us a reward in this world and in the next world. Others say that the higher power expects us to want to become aware of it, to resemble it, to love as it does.

Those who are concerned about their privacy in this world and in the next world, remain in the ego, with Pharaoh, the king of Egypt. And those who are concerned about love of others, to be like the upper force, which is good and does good, leave Egypt. When they want to break away from the control of the ego, egoistic thoughts again “pursue” them, which are called, “He that feared the word of the LORD among the servants of Pharaoh” (Exodus 9:20), and they seem to tell a person to fulfill Mitzvot, to receive a reward and be satisfied with this.

The Exodus from Egypt reaches its conclusion with the splitting of the Red Sea (Yam Suf), detachment from the egoistic intention. It is called this because it indicates the end (Sof) of the control of Pharaoh in Egypt. The egoistic intentions in a person are not able to agree with disconnection. Therefore they sink in the sea, and this is their correction. The sea symbolizes the waters of Gevura, and they are opened only for those who are truly ready to break away from self-interest and thinking of oneself as a law of nature.

The splitting of the Red Sea describes what goes on in a person internally. The miracle happens through the power of faith when we are ready to go above our reason, and according to the force of love. The splitting of the Red Sea is detachment from the ego and association to the total system, and this is the answer to all the questions of existence.
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From KabTV’s “New Life 720 – The Splitting Of The Reed Sea,” 4/21/16

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New Life 548 – The Holocaust And The New Jewish Identity
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Nitzah Mazoz

How has the Holocaust affected our development as a nation? What should we understand from what happened and what is the Jewish identity we have to build so that we will become a model and a source of affinity for the whole world?

The world is advancing not only technologically; we also need to develop a new awareness, a positive attitude to everyone. Today it is clear that we can achieve anything technologically and there is great abundance, but the relations between people are getting worse.

This process started a hundred years ago. We were given a chance to return to our land and to re-establish the connection between us. But because we didn’t do so, the world was thrown into maelstrom of wars, revolutions, and finally the Holocaust.

After the Holocaust we were given the chance to build ourselves in the land of Israel. Today, the world is collapsing and the ego is destroying everything. Before the Holocaust we survived in exile and kept the religious customs. But because we did not advance to a new consciousness of leading the world to love, we receive a negative push.

All the afflictions we have undergone since establishing of the State of Israel stem from the delay in our advancement toward a new consciousness. The true internal Jewish identity is that we are all one bundle. We have to correct our egoism.

Our nation has been divided into two groups in Israel, religious and secular, and there are numerous factions within each group. We have to build an umbrella that will protect us from hatred, rejection, and detachment. We must awaken the connecting force. Let’s spur the positive force in the nation above the negative force of egoism and hold the two reins.

The revelation of the force of connection and love between people is called the revelation of the Creator. This is the goal of our life. When we were in exile we kept the traditional Jewish way. But in Israel, the negative force and hatred erupted. Today we have to add the positive force that will lead the nation to connection. We need people who can lead and educate the nation to this end. Then the positive force, the force of love, will spread among us and will put in every human’s heart the care for the well being of others.

The future Jewish identity is to lead humanity to love and connection, and will thus become a spiritual nation.
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From KabTV’s “New Life 548 – The Holocaust And The New Jewish Identity,” 4/7/15

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