KabNet published my new article: “Benefits of the Coronavirus”

What kinds of benefits could a virus that has killed people and that has offset the world into panic possibly have?

The coronavirus is helping us come to terms with our smallness and weakness as human beings in the face of nature.

Whether it’s a virus, a natural disaster, or countless other blows, we get regular examples of how nature pays no attention to our differences the way that we do.

“Becoming aware of the detriment of the human ego is one major stage in our future development.”

The Main Benefit of the Coronavirus: Global Awakening to Humanity’s Interdependence

We are gradually being led to the conclusion that we are a single humanity, like one big family living on the same planet. Ultimately, all borders and walls we build to fence ourselves off from each other will fall short in the presence of the tightening form of globalization that nature is urging us to realize.

Nature sends us blows to show us how interdependent and interconnected it is, and how we are inescapable parts of its integrality.

The coronavirus can thus be viewed as yet another lesson that nature is trying to teach us: no matter how much we see differences among each other, there is an enveloping nature paying no attention to our labels.

“We have already come to such a degree that the whole world is considered one collective and one society.”

– Kabbalist Yehuda Ashlag (Baal HaSulam), “Peace in the World.”

The coronavirus’ benefit is to humanity as a whole gaining awareness of its oneness. It serves to destabilize our egoistic infrastructure, so that we see the need to work out how to operate within our increasingly interdependent global conditions. Once again, nature shows how it penetrates through all kinds of partitions we set for ourselves around the world.

Where Do the Partitions We Set Between Each Other Come From?

They extend from the human ego that wishes to benefit itself at the expense of others.

The human ego shatters the perception of the whole reality into small pieces. The coronavirus corners our egoistic selves, showing how they function oppositely to the altruistically-fueled supreme force of nature, while nature itself gradually urges us to reach awareness of our interdependence and interconnectedness among each other and with nature in its wholeness.

Toward the realization of our total interconnectedness and interdependence with nature, we will have to become aware of our egoistic nature as a negative disturbance. We will have to see how the ego cuts us off from each other and from nature as a whole, and by doing so, the ego prepares us for myriad future blows, whether a new virus outbreak, or other problems on personal, social and global scales.

Becoming aware of the detriment of the human ego is one major stage in our future development.

Either through suffering or through connection-enriching education and influence, we need to reveal the wickedness of the human ego.

The revelation can be a pleasant one if we aim to attract nature’s positive force, which connects perfectly between all elements of nature, on the still, vegetative, animate and speaking levels, and then between the revelation of the positive and negative forces, humanity will be able to work in the middle, clearly observing what it is going through, and acting with clarity in response to nature’s influences.

How Can We Awaken the Positive Force of Connection into Our Lives?

Very simply, our connection evokes nature’s positive connecting force. Then, by attracting the positive force in nature, we reveal the negative egoistic force opposite it, and the awakening of both forces gives rise to a higher and more supreme force, a new level of connection where perfection and balance is sensed.

It is as it is written in the song, “Ose shalom be Meromav, Hu yaase shalom aleinu” (“make peace in His heaven, He will bring peace upon us”): Peace is integrity in our relations, between inverse forces of nature.

We are facing a period of having to learn how to connect with each other, holding positive and negative forces of nature in our reins.

When we start working with these forces, we will see how every finest detail in reality, as well as the world’s major events, all link into a single picture.

The wisdom of Kabbalah guides our discovery of these forces. It provides us with a method to experience harmonious connection, attracting nature’s positive force, revealing the negative egoistic force opposite it, and learning the ways to walk the balancing rope between them.
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KabNet published my new article: “How to Respond to Questions about Death in the Coronavirus Era”

As the Coronavirus continues its world tour, and panic penetrates populations of people, some are facing the ultimate question about death.
How should we respond to death? What is death? What happens after we die?

The nature surrounding us is wise and great. We are birthed within, and develop in, nature. Many systems function on a moment-by-moment basis to sustain our bodies for 70, 80, and even 100-plus years.

“And part and parcel with our global-scale problems is a global awakening of life’s deeper questions.”

But why? Are we supposed to just be born, live then die?

We endure difficult and painful years between our births and deaths. How much pleasure do we actually squeeze out of them? We care for our bodies in a Sisyphean way, and we feel less and less energy to keep going.

It is as if we’re shifting from living-and-breathing organisms into a biodegradable stage, after which we completely disintegrate.

Is there any benefit to such an existence? Or are we just supposed to struggle for years to make our way in life as best as we can until we eventually perish?

Evaluating the Purpose of Life through Four Levels of Nature

Each and every finest detail of nature holds benefit and continuity.

There are three distinct levels in nature: still, vegetative and animate. The person, in his current developmental stage, belongs to the animate world. Humanity, however, differentiates itself as the “speaking” level, which is higher than the animate.

What, then, makes humans different to animals?

We are fundamentally a two-legged breathing mammal that fulfills its basic animal needs to eat, drink, sleep and reproduce. However, we have additional mental and emotional capacity, letting us absorb knowledge and wisdom. We raise children, pass knowledge from one generation to the next, and develop tools and our society with the aim of making us feel better and more comfortable.

In other words, we have basic survival needs for food, shelter, sex and family, and then we have social needs where we compare ourselves to others, and we thus fence ourselves off from each other, clothing ourselves, housing ourselves and filling our houses and bodies with countless products that we advertise to each other.

So are we just “smart animals” that have worked out how to make ourselves more comfortable in the world?

The Key Difference between Humans and Animals

The key difference between humans and animals is that we humans have a deeper aspiration seeded within us that aspires beyond the boundaries of our temporary protein bodies.

We also have the ability to pinpoint this aspiration. Like animals, we’re afraid of death and want to live. But in addition to animals, only we humans ask about why we live.

Not all humans ask about the meaning of life. Around a tenth of the adult population asks about the meaning of life, and all children ask about it, but soon forget.

Therefore, the coronavirus, conflicts between different countries and factions, falls of markets, and fierce social division: the harm that society’s cells do to themselves spread like a disease throughout the body of humanity.

And part and parcel with our global-scale problems is a global awakening of life’s deeper questions.

The Journey to the Ultimate Sensation of Our Common Origin

I hope that people with such questions will seek their answers, disallowing the billions of materialistic influences to distract our journey to the sublime perception and sensation of our common origin, and learning and implementing the laws of that perfect reality on the way.

By actively seeking to uncover the answers to our inquiries, like peeling layers of an onion, we delve deeper into the understanding of the need to connect positively to others. Through our positive connection, we enter reality’s control room, balancing our attitude with nature’s attitude of mutual love and bestowal in an interconnected and interdependent wholeness.

When we reach such equivalence of form with nature, we become healthy and beneficial parts in the system of our existence, entering into direct contact with nature’s fundamental quality—love and bestowal—and experiencing a new and perfect life, free of fears, mistakes and problems.
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The Times of Israel published my new article “Why Sanders’ Lead in the Democratic Race Should Concern American Jews”

I met a chief psychiatrist in New York during a joint conference years ago who said he was of Jewish descent. When we started a conversation about Jewish traditions, the only connection he recalled was his grandfather’s name, Chaim, a Hebrew name. This kind of episode is common in people who have distanced themselves from their Jewish roots. Some decide to revive connection with their roots only for personal gain and to make their anti-Semitic views appear kosher. Bernie Sanders is a case in point.

Why should this worry American Jews?

In the last few weeks, particularly after winning New Hampshire’s primary and Nevada caucuses, Sanders appears to be the Democratic frontrunner in four out of five polls designed to determine who is the preferred candidate to challenge Donald Trump in the next election. Since his presidential ambition has been recently invigorated, Sanders has conveniently shifted his political strategy from indifference about his Jewish background—as highlighted by multiple American publications, including The New York Times—to embracing and highlighting his heritage, portraying himself as potentially the first Jewish president in US history.

His new image as a liberal Jew sympathetic toward minorities, and as an old-but-skilled politician, is helping him gain popularity among the Democratic party’s left-leaning base, many of whom still think socialism is the solution to American inequalities. The Jewish card is also useful for advancing his anti-Israel agenda more freely in a similar manner to George Soros, who is accused of being behind multiple organizations against Israel.

Among his other anti-Israel positions, Sanders stated that he would condition military aid to Israel upon Israeli changes in policy toward the Palestinians. But the future of the US relationship with the Jewish nation is not of primary concern if Sanders is selected as the Democratic presidential candidate since, in the end, Israel’s future should depend on no one other than the people of Israel.

The problem that I foresee, should Sanders be elected, will be for American Jews. Undoubtedly, Jews will take the heat—as always happens when economic crises occur—for the certain failure of his populistic approach based on socialistic principles.

As history has shown, when populist socialist regimes fail to fulfill people’s expectations, National Socialism—Nazism—emerges. This certainly could happen again and the atrocities we thought were gone for good could resurface—a nightmare for American Jews.

At the outset, socialism appears to have the solutions Americans seek. The government lightens the load on the people’s shoulders, taking care of their basic needs. However, socialism falls short because it fails to take the egoistic quality of human nature into account: the fundamental need to fulfill oneself before any other person.

People innately lack motivation to truly benefit one another. As explained by Kabbalist Yehuda Ashlag (Baal HaSulam) in his article “The Peace,” written in the 1930s, but just as relevant today as in the past: “Where would the worker or the farmer find sufficient motivation to work?’ For his daily bread will not increase or decrease by his efforts, and there are no goals or rewards before him.”

The Trump administration might not be the final panacea for all American problems, but its pragmatic economic approach of boosting the financial and industrial sectors is aimed in the right direction for today’s world. This is because, while we are still egoistic beings each aiming to benefit ourselves at the expense of others, and currently make no strides to correct the human ego so that a sincere desire to benefit others would become a leading value in society, then a pragmatic economic approach to grow financially and industrially provides a clear measurable foundation by which a country can sustain itself, both from within, and in connection with other countries.

In contrast, the socialistic view, which depends on ideas of equality and kindness being upheld by society and the government, might be pleasant to agree with in theory, but in practice, personal benefit at the expense of others will remain as top priority, eventually shattering such a setup. The government could never impose on people a true motivation to contribute to society with an earnest desire to see everyone fulfilled and secure. A prosocial and altruistic desire to benefit others among society can be achieved entirely via regular engagement in connection-enriching education. The basis for such a form of education can be found in the wisdom of Kabbalah, a methodology that provides in-depth understanding of how nature operates, including the egoistic human nature, and how to rise above the human ego in order to attain a genuine desire to benefit others.

Jews, who long ago received this method at the foot of Mount Sinai, can spark such a learning process in society by first refreshing their knowledge of the principles of connection, and then implementing positive connection among themselves by rising above internal differences. By so doing, Jews would become a positive example of how to build relations of mutual support, consideration and altruism as a launch pad for a better world. Such an elevation above the ego of a critical mass of people within humanity will hold the power to unify society above its myriad differences, thus erasing any totalitarian threats. Moreover, this forward-looking shift is independent of any politician or regime. It depends on our desire for positive change and our commitment to apply ourselves to educational programs aiming to unifying us above our differences.

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The Times of Israel published my new article “Panic Over the Coronavirus Reaches Israel. Here’s What We Can Learn from It”

The coronavirus made Aliyah to Israel. Israelis are now panicking over the virus filling its media headlines. Nobody knows how the virus spreads, whether through water or air, migratory birds or a group of South Korean tourists. Until the root of the virus is found, any and all answers are “right.”

However, some of the responsibility is with us, i.e., humanity. We are all under special pressure requiring that we somewhat contribute to the toil with this phenomenon. Therefore, in addition to the Ministry of Health’s guidelines and recommendations, we must balance judgment, and look to diagnose the root cause behind the spread of the threatening virus, the general cause of all our troubles.

According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, human nature is a desire to enjoy. This desire grows and requires maximum enjoyment for minimum investment. The more it grows unrestrained, the more it wants to enjoy at the expense of others. Thus, the egoistic desire, where we each want to enjoy at others’ expense, counters nature’s general desire: the desire to give pleasure.

When we exit balance with the harmonious nature, which operates altruistically, we receive feedback signaling that we need to revise our direction and realign ourselves with nature. Such feedback can appear as a viral outbreak, a protest in society, a mass shooting, a hurricane, a terror attack, i.e., any number of forms on personal, social and ecological scales.

All the ups and downs that humanity has experienced, including market turbulence, crises between individuals and countries, and even the breakdown of the family unit, occur as a result of an imbalance between the desire to receive, the individual nature, and the desire to give, the global nature.

It could be argued that pains soften us and make us more adept to come closer to nature, but nobody desires suffering, and there is no commandment to suffer.

Therefore, until we learn to how to positively connect in society above each person’s desire to enjoy for self-benefit alone, we will continue to fall, time and again, in myriad different ways.

The ego’s most powerful expression is in rejecting our connection to each other.

Nature operates in order to bring us closer to each other, and if we fortify ourselves inside our ego, then nature strikes twice as hard.

Blows from nature could increase to a point where humans will have no choice but to understand that only together can we deal with the blows, otherwise we will die.

Nature gradually develops us to a state of perfect connection, and on our way there, we need to deal with the ego that resists connection with others. Eventually, we will reach a state where if we fail to connect, then everyone will fall, and if we succeed in our connection, then we will all rise to a higher level of consciousness.

If we saw the complete system of nature, we would be surprised at how even the tiniest amount of connection or disconnection between us influences nature’s collective system for better or for worse.

Why is nature’s complete system concealed from us, then?

It is because, if it were revealed, we would have no consciousness: we would be like rocks, plants and animals, which all act in an instinctive balance with nature, lacking free choice.

Since the bonds connecting between us are invisible, we need to regularly listen to explanations of how we are connected and how we can discover those connection, to discuss the complete system of nature and our role in it, to acknowledge our egoistic desire to enjoy that is opposite to nature’s altruistic quality, and to amplify our need to come together.

Moreover, we need not wait for crises to connect us forcefully. Instead, we can awaken ourselves to connect simply because we can feel much better by connecting than by being divided. In other words, there is a positive force dwelling in nature that reveals when we connect, and by discovering that force, we experience much higher states of happiness, confidence, love, freedom and peace than we could ever experience if we failed to make any motion to connect.
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The Times of Israel published my new article “Syrian Father Who Went Viral Teaching His Daughter to Laugh at Falling Rockets”

Boom! Peels of belly laughter roll from a little girl in her father’s arms. Boom!

Now zoom out on the scene to place the radiant moment of joy in its heartbreaking context:

Abdullah Al-Mohammad teaches his 3-year-old daughter Salwa to laugh at the sound of every shell that falls and explodes nearby.

As a Syrian trying to survive war and with no place to run, what is left for him to do? In order to reduce or eliminate the trauma of rockets falling, he teaches little Salwa that the sound of falling rockets is funny and that the noise of the shelling is merely a game. Life is beautiful (almost).

Abdullah’s poignant video went viral on social media and made him an instant Internet hero, earning him more than two million likes and positive comments, including proposals to adopt the method to help the children in Gaza.

In the chaotic reality of war-torn Syria, this father’s desperate tactics are an understandable attempt to provide his child with psychological protection against the onslaughts of traumatizing bombardment. He hasn’t the time or luxury to research the optimal educational intervention to take when shells fall in the yard. Clearly, there is no good solution or best practice model to calm the terror, only first aid.

What form of teaching would be most helpful for such tragic situations?

The education needs to be directed toward every member of society, parents and children alike, and must be designed to target the root cause of problems in order to provide a lasting cure.

Every member of society needs to understand, according to their level of maturity, that if we want to stop the wars once and for all, we need to try and connect to each other according to the unifying laws of nature.

While teaching children to laugh at threats and danger might help them get through immediate frightening situations more comfortably, it holds no long-term benefit because such learning can cause psychoneurotic maladjustments and misperceptions of reality. Such an out-of-place connection between peril and reaction sets up an incorrect relationship in the brain between threat and response. Thus, at times when vigilance is warranted, the amount of concern and caution is inappropriately reduced leaving them vulnerable to harm.

Medically and scientifically, crying and laughing cause the same shock response in the nervous system. So, while the emotion associated with laughter might feel more pleasant, the effect on the body is no healthier than that of crying.

Both crying and laughing are a reaction of excitement that exceeds the extent of a person’s ability to absorb at a given moment. Therefore, we do need to calm reactions to fears, and only afterward clearly explain the situation and why it is happening.

Step by step over time, children need to understand that wars and destruction take place because society has received no education to develop positive relations, and that there is no concern in society to learn how to positively connect above each person’s innate divisive drives.

They need to know that in order to stop the wars once and for all, we need to try and connect to each other correctly, and in accordance with the unifying laws of nature.

If children understood this principle, they would not laugh, and not even smirk. On the contrary, they would tell us straight to our faces, in their naïve style: Parents, fix your thoughts and behaviors, and improve your relationships with each other!

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The Times of Israel published my new article “The world of academia: an anti-Semitic stronghold”

Hatred against Jews and Israel is no longer marginal but mainstream on college campuses. In the US, for example, a group of Jewish Harvard students formed an anti-Zionist coalition that included support for BDS, while a Jewish student, Adela Cojab, sued NYU alleging her alma mater does not do enough to combat anti-Semitism. Such polarized environments prevail on campuses today, where anti-Semitic incidents have risen dramatically in recent years.

Anti-Zionist sentiments are also evident across the ocean. In Germany, 20% of academics support the right to reject the existence of the state of Israel as part of free speech on campus, revealed a recent study commissioned by the Christian Democratic Union’s think tank.

Why has academia become such a bastion of anti-Israel hatred?

Freedom to Attack

According to monitoring groups, in America, there were 201 anti-Semitic incidents on US university and college campuses in 2018 alone, involving harassment, vandalism and physical assault. Many more cases go unreported because of the inaction of faculties to combat discrimination against Jewish students, especially when prejudice and anti-Israeli initiatives come from Jews themselves—Jewish Voice for Peace being the most vociferous group, active with numerous chapters on campuses across America.

President Trump signed an executive order to combat anti-Semitism on campuses conditioning governmental funding upon whether or not universities fail to reject anti-Jewish bias. But even those in favor of the initiative question whether its enforcement is realistic since fighting bigotry might contradict freedom of speech.

What Built the Bastion of Hatred?

Academia, the stronghold of the learned and educated, has become a fertile hothouse of bigotry and discrimination for various reasons. First, because among students there will always be people proficient in the art of rhetoric who can formulate their ideas assertively to justify such motions as boycotts, using logic difficult to disagree with. These opinionated people also understand how to propagandize and spread their hatred to reach the media and wide audiences. After all, academia is society’s source of education, from where society’s leaders and presidents have emerged. Academia is known for its diversity and permissive libertarianism, an arena that tolerates the expression of whatever comes to mind, even if it might hurt someone else.

Secondly, the roots of modern anti-Semitism were laid decades ago and have been nurtured patiently and cunningly. Its complex rationalizations did not suddenly spring out of thin air to become what they are today: mature and strong hatred. Anti-Semitism is so strong that it is almost impossible to tackle.

What Money Can Buy

It is suspected that radical Muslim elements penetrated and politicized universities many years ago to secure their place of influence with the help of generous financial support, as is currently being investigated by the US Dept. of Education. He who pays has tacit permission to establish courses, programs and departments, according to his views and ideas, even at the expense of erasing other points of view and people. By quietly and steadily employing subversive operatives in key positions it becomes increasingly impossible to close the door to further infiltration.

Pluralism, Not Anarchy

Jews can no longer ignore what is happening right in front of their eyes and continue with a business-as-usual attitude, as if this is a small and passing discomfort. The animosity will not vanish until people realize that freedom should not be confused with anarchy, bigotry, discrimination and even physical attack to threaten or attempt annihilation. And Jews—a people with a vast history of pluralistic debate among their sages to reach truth and wisdom—can and should play a crucial role in fostering an understanding of true freedom for society.

Dialog should be encouraged with the intended end result of bringing about unity and brotherhood. Kabbalist Rav Yehuda Ashlag wrote in his essay “The Freedom” about the importance of the fundamental human value of freedom:

“Just as people’s faces differ, so their views differ. Therefore, society is cautioned to preserve the freedom of expression of the individual. Each individual should maintain his integrity, and the contradiction and oppositeness between people should remain forever, to forever secure the progress of the free society.”

But, as the wisdom of Kabbalah explains, freedom can work only if it is accompanied by the principle, “love covers all crimes” (Prov 10:12) as a basis to reach unity and brotherhood above our differences.

A plethora of ideas and thoughts based on selfish egoistic interests only result in conflicts and wars. On the other hand, when we rise above human egoism, covering it with love, a myriad of ideas and thoughts develop and enrich all kinds of means of communication and connection.

The Jewish people with their long tradition of pluralistic discourse are uniquely situated to play a crucial role in fostering the understanding of true freedom by first implementing among themselves the method of connection above differences and then passing on to humanity the positive force that is generated. It will calm down anti-Semitism and pave the path to a bright future of mutual understanding and harmonious relations. Attaining such an elevated state is the ultimate role of Jews, i.e., to be “light unto the nations.”
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The Times of Israel published my new article “Coronavirus Ship Is a Lesson in the Need for Mutual Responsibility in Israel”

Three of the 15 Israelis aboard the quarantined Diamond Princess cruise liner have been diagnosed with the coronavirus and hospitalized in Japan, while extensive efforts are underway to evacuate the others home to Israel.

The help they demanded from Israel during their crisis and predicament raises the questions about the kind of support that the state of Israel should provide its citizens when they encounter certain extreme problems abroad.

While it is usual for the state to be concerned about its citizens’ welfare abroad, hard experience demonstrates that intervention procedures could be arranged in a much more beneficial way, both for citizens and for the country in general.

I completely support the state’s responsibility toward Israel’s citizens, provided it has the necessary infrastructure of mutual responsibility among the citizens themselves and an officially acknowledged governmental organization that would be engaged in handling such matters.

Such an institution could be called “The Office for Mutual Responsibility.”

On behalf of the state, the Office for Mutual Responsibility would be responsible for rescuing every citizen in Israel and around the world in desperate circumstances and finding solutions to the variety of problems that emerge. Every entreaty for help would be satisfied by the force of a potent social atmosphere, orchestrated by the work of this office, to generate positive connection among all citizens.

Currently, there is no such official body in Israel dealing primarily with positive social connection and developing mutual responsibility among the nation’s citizens.

For the most part, Israeli citizens today neglect their relationship with the state, feeling that they owe it nothing—dodging payments wherever possible, and fleeing far away to a distant land if an opportunity presents itself. The general atmosphere is a society of individuals each trying not to be suckers, in a common effort to get the upper hand on others and the state wherever possible. In other words, each person’s sole concern is about himself and how to use others in order to stay one step ahead.

We need to realize as a society that this atmosphere suffocates us.

We have had the highly publicized examples of a soldier getting caught behind enemy lines and a young woman being imprisoned overseas after getting caught with marijuana. In both cases, the parents had to scream loud and long through the media until they garnered enough support to achieve their success.

However, these are the isolated success stories.

Mutual responsibility must become a way of life for everyone, a constant concern for others, and not just a hurried, stop-gap embrace when someone’s need suddenly catches our attention.

Mutual responsibility is a shared sensation of closeness, where we feel committed and belonging to one another—neighbors, colleagues and people on the street—just like we feel toward our own family. I am speaking of responsibility toward all people, society and the state. It is written in our sources that, “Love your neighbor as yourself—it is a great rule in the Torah.” This is the law that should be at the foundation of our society.

As suggested by its name, “The Office for Mutual Responsibility,” this institution not only gives to people when they are in need, it also requires from people when they are capable of contributing.

Members of such a social framework would need to pay their dues in order to sustain it. Therefore, it would require financial contributions, volunteers, and a general atmosphere of giving, wherever and however a person could.

The Office for Mutual Responsibility would function almost like an educational institution whose duty is to make us all feel that we are one big family. Anyone contributing within such a framework would also be worthy of receiving help from it whenever needed.

It is not enough to expect that by paying our taxes and contributing military service, we are entitled to receive help from the state if we are in trouble. Mutual responsibility requires regular learning and contributing with the aim of building a warm network of the quality of relationships that feel similar to a mother’s constant, loving manner toward her children.

Once we establish such a setup within Israel and provide an example of a well-oiled society operating upon the principle of mutual responsibility, a positive rippling effect would spread such a unique form of connection to the rest of the world.

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The Times of Israel published my new article “Coronavirus and the Virus of Hatred Against Jews”

It was just a matter of time until the coronavirus virus would be linked to anti-Semitic conspiracy theories. It is well known that when things go wrong, Jews are to blame, and this global threat is no exception.

Once again, the Jewish people are accused of deliberately causing the epidemic for self-gain as with other plagues throughout history, prompting online haters to call for their extermination. “Finally! Science has discovered a cure for the most insidious disease of our time…Jewishness,” reads a recent post on social media.Blood Libels Spread As a Virus

Hundreds of years ago, another epidemic broke out in China. In the middle of the 14th century, the bubonic plague, known as the “Black Death,” emerged in Asia. From Mongolia, it spread to China, and from there to the Middle East, Africa and Europe. In five years, the devastating epidemic killed almost 50 million people worldwide, wiping out over half of Europe’s residents.

Back then, the global catastrophe was attributed to the poisoning of wells by Jews who allegedly aimed at establishing a worldwide Jewish government. Medieval European Christians demonized the Jews and eventually massacred them. As a result, more than 200 Jewish communities in European cities were victims of pogroms and destruction between 1348 and 1351.

The “proof” that the Jews were to blame was the massive numbers of casualties among the general population compared to the handful of infected Jews. However, the reason for the low mortality rate among Jews is explained by the good hygiene habits among Jews proscribed as part of Jewish tradition—habits such as washing hands before meals, immersion in the mikveh (ritual bath) before and after personal relations, and treating meats with salt before cooking. Another factor which lowered mortality among Jews was the setting apart of Jewish communities within closed ghettos and isolated villages.

This week, the ancient medieval blood libel adopted a new form: the coronavirus epidemic.

Extremists have taken to the web to spread their anti-Semitic agenda, accusing the Jews for creating the virus on purpose to control the world. The Arab media has also joined in the conspiratorial trend against the US and Israel, claiming that the absence of cases in both countries is no coincidence, and that the disease is spread as part of an economic and political plot to overpower China.

The Cure to All Diseases

The people of Israel indeed hold a miracle vaccine deeply rooted within Jewish “DNA”: the power of connection to the upper force through a common prayer. In the days of the Temple, Jews lived united by threads of love, and by virtue of their positive connection, they grasped the goal of creation and were able to draw the force that guides humanity to goodness. However, as a result of unfounded hatred, the Temple was destroyed, and since then, Jews need to reconnect and build the foundation for unity among all the countries and peoples in the world.

Humanity is linked through invisible connections as in a network. Subconsciously, humanity feels that the Jewish people have a role to maintain the balance in this network since they have a special relationship with the upper force, the force that controls everything in nature on all levels: inanimate, vegetative, animate and human. In other words, the discriminatory attitude toward Jews, for good or for bad, results from the mission that only they can fulfill, which the world is demanding more and more.

The mission of the Jewish people is to reunite “as one man with one heart” and through such unity, activate the force that will help the world achieve love, peace and unity above the growing divisions. The special bond of the Jews to the upper force opens the pipeline of abundance and light to humanity. That is precisely the task of the Jewish people: to be “a light unto the nations.”

The hatred as a result of the coronavirus epidemic is merely another expression of the lack of connection between Jews. When Jews fail to fulfill their role, hatred is revealed, forcing them to raise a common prayer. Such a prayer is no ritual, but a shared desire from the bottom of our hearts for unification.

A person who prays is a person who tries to connect with others and who then judges himself in relation to his extent of connection, and his efforts to connect. This is brought about through the realization that everyone is blessed only when all are united. When we come to terms with this principle, we understand that we need to ask for help from the upper force: to change our egoistic attitude from focus on ourselves and turn it into care for others.

At this point, the prayer will be answered and unity will be possible. In such a harmonious state, humanity as a whole will be healthy and safe.
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The Times of Israel published my new article “Unlocking the Ancient Book of Zohar to Understand Today’s Anti-Semitism”

Certain things do not vanish over time. They just change their shape, motion and means to penetrate people’s minds. Prejudice against Jews is one of those cases. With the surge in new means of communication, prejudice has also adopted new ways to spread. But actual answers to the eternal dilemma of how to eradicate anti-Semitism will be found by looking back to ancient scriptures.

The light of The Zohar is like a gate to a truer reality that is currently hidden from our view. Let’s look at anti-Semitism afresh in this new light that The Zohar sheds.

If 200 years ago, you would have arrived at some forsaken Siberian village, and declared that you were Jewish, the locals would have reacted in astonishment, “We do not believe you!” And if you were to ask why, they would have answered, “It’s because you have no horns on your head.” As primitive as that sounds, blood libels against Jews and grotesque images of greedy merchants with hooked noses are still prevalent in social media and cultural manifestations in American and European societies to this day.

Furthermore, belief in the myth that Jews killed Jesus and the misconception of Jewish double-loyalty continues with disturbing frequency. Anti-Semitism stands as ugly and forceful as ever. It has always existed, and the question is only to what extent it floats to the surface or remains submerged.

It should be declared straightaway: the struggle against anti-Semitic stereotypes will be fruitless. The hatred toward the Jewish people will only strengthen because it has spiritual roots.

The wisdom of Kabbalah explains that the source of this phenomenon exists within the structure of the spiritual world itself, which is divided into what Kabbalah terms “Rosh” (“head”) and “Guf” (“body”), i.e., “Israel” and the” nations of the world.” This allegorical thought is also sometimes expressed as the “heart” and the “bodily organs” that dangle and manifest themselves in our material world.

According to the seminal ancient book in Kabbalah, The Book of Zohar, which explains the secrets of the Torah: “Israel is the heart of the whole world, just as the organs of the body could not exist in the world even for a moment without the heart, so all the nations cannot exist in the world without Israel.”

Just as the role of the heart in the human body is to provide the power to pump blood to all the organs, so the role of Israel is to provide humanity with the power to connect, to supply spiritual abundance to the nations of the world. In other words, Israel is to be “light unto the nations.”

The people of Israel and the nations of the world are not merely groupings of people on the face of the earth. The wisdom of Kabbalah explains that the terms refer to the two forces that act within each and every person, forces that are called “Israel” and “the nations of the world.”

The desires within us that are sensitive to the force of connection among people are called “Israel,” and the opposite desires we possess that demand to receive and enjoy the abundance that flows from such connection without consideration of others are called “nations of the world.” Both forces reside and interact within a person and within humanity as a whole. When one force rises, the other falls, and vice versa. Thus, the flames of hatred toward the Jewish people can be lowered, or alternatively, strengthened according to the balance between these desires.

How can we reinforce the “Israel” within us over the “nations of the world”? How can we increase our sensitivity toward connection over our other desires for self-indulgence at the expense of others?

We can achieve it through the study of Kabbalah—the method of connection—and particularly, The Book of Zohar. The Zohar has a great positive influence on us even if we are unable to grasp its full dimensions and benefit. Our sages elucidated the process as follows:

“To explain how The Zohar purifies the soul even when the reader doesn’t understand what he says, we have the example of he who enters a perfume store, even if he doesn’t buy any perfume, when he leaves the store, he has the smell attached to him.” (Rabbi Moshe Chaim Ephraim of Sadilkov)

The light of The Zohar is like a gate to the true reality that at present is hidden from our senses. It has tremendous power, but for us to be able to use its force of revelation efficiently, we need to read the stories narrated in The Zohar as a practical guide to discover a deeper reality through unity beyond the boundaries of the material world.

How does this process work?

When we aspire for unity, we awaken the force of connection among us, and sharpen our sensitivity to positive relations between us based on rapport, elevating “Israel” within us and bestowing abundance to the world. In such a state, no one in the world would deal anymore with anti-Semitic depictions or prejudice against Jews, but instead with the warm and considerate heart that should depict the Jewish people and its great contribution to the world’s betterment.

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