Entries in the 'New Publications' Category

“What the Jonah Story Tells Us about Antisemitism” (Times of Israel)

Michael Laitman, On The Times of Israel: “What the Jonah Story Tells Us about Antisemitism
Nine years ago, I published an article in The New York Times (print edition) titled, “What We Jews Owe the World.” This year, come Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement), I’d like to share it with everyone following me, as I think that the message within can have a major impact on the future of our nation.

Buying Our Way to Heaven

The holiest day of the year for the Jews is Yom Kippur, when we fast and pray. A key part of the prayer is reading the book of Jonah the Prophet. Interestingly, many observant Jews believe that buying the privilege to read the book will make them successful for the rest of the year.

Naturally, only the wealthiest in the community can afford to compete for it. The sums vary according to the affluence of the community, and in some cases the privilege is sold for well over half a million dollars.

Cracking the Code

What people are not aware of, however, is the real reason why the book of Jonah is so important. Kabbalists determined that this reading is the most important in the year because it details the code for saving humanity.

Jonah’s story is special because it speaks of a prophet who first tried to dodge his mission, but finally repented. Another special aspect of Jonah’s story is that his mission was not to admonish the people of Israel, but to save the city of Nineveh, whose residents were not Jewish. In light of today’s precarious state of the world, we should take a closer look at this story and its meaning for each of us.

Shape Up or Ship Out

In the story, God orders Jonah to tell the people of Nineveh, who became very mean to one another, to correct their relationships with one another if they want to survive. However, Jonah bailed out of his mission and took to the sea in an effort to escape God’s command.

Like Jonah, we Jews have been inadvertently avoiding our mission for the past 2,000 years. And yet, we cannot afford to keep avoiding it. We have a task that was passed down to us when Moses united us into a nation based on the tenet, Love your neighbor as yourself, and it is our duty to set an example of unity for the rest of the world. Our forefathers, Abraham and Moses, wanted to unite all of humanity, but back then the world was not ready (for more on that, see my article, Why Do People Hate Jews?).

That group, namely the people of Israel, must still become a role model to the world. Rav Kook, the first Chief Rabbi of Israel, put it poetically in his book, Orot Kodesh (Sacred Lights), Since we were ruined by unfounded hatred, and the world was ruined with us, we will be rebuilt by unfounded love, and the world will be rebuilt with us.

Sleeping through the Storm

In the story, Jonah’s escape from his mission by ship caused the sea to roar and nearly sank the vessel. At the height of the storm Jonah went to sleep detaching himself from the turmoil and leaving the sailors to fend for themselves. Gradually, they began to suspect that someone among them was the cause of the storm. They cast a lot and the lot fell on Jonah, the only Jew on board.

In many ways, today’s world is similar to Jonah’s ship. As Christine Lagarde, head of the International Monetary Fund, put it: “We are all in one boat, one global economy. Our fortunes rise together, and they fall together. …We have a collective responsibility—to bring about a more stable and more prosperous world, a world in which every person in every country can reach their full potential.” Yet, the sea around us is raging, and the sailors, who are all of humanity, are blaming the Jew on board for all their troubles.

Like Jonah, we are sound asleep. Though we are beginning to wake up to the existence of hatred toward us, we have yet to realize that not carrying out our mission is the reason for the hatred. If we do not wake up soon, the sailors will throw us overboard, as they did with Jonah. Yehuda Ashlag, author of the Sulam (Ladder) commentary on The Zohar, wrote in his essay, The Arvut (Mutual Guarantee): It is incumbent upon the Israeli nation to qualify itself and the rest of the people in the world to evolve into assuming this sublime work of love of others.

The Wake-Up Call

Jonah tells the sailors to throw him overboard, as only this will calm the sea. Reluctantly, the sailors obey and the storm calms. A whale swallows Jonah, and for three days and three nights he stays in its abdomen, introspecting his actions and decisions. He begs for his life and vows to carry out his mission.

Like Jonah, each of us carries within something that is stirring up the world. We, the people of Israel, carry a method for achieving peace through connection. Unity is the very root of our being. This DNA is what makes us a people because we were declared a nation only after we pledged to be as one man with one heart and strove to love our neighbor as ourselves. Today we must rekindle this bond because wherever we go, this untapped power is destabilizing the world around us in order to compel us to unite and reignite it.

Just as the current separation among us projects separation to the whole of humanity, unity between us will inspire the rest of the nations to unite, as well. When we unite, it will endow humanity with the energy required to achieve worldwide unity, where all people live as one man with one heart. So the only question is whether we assume our responsibility, or prefer to be thrown overboard, only to subsequently agree to carry out our task.

If we want to end our troubles, be rid of antisemitism and have a safe and happy life, we must unite and thus set an example of unity for all the nations. This is how we will bring peace and quiet to the world. Otherwise the nations hatred toward us will keep growing.

Now we see that when people pay so much for the privilege of reading the book of Jonah on Yom Kippur, they inadvertently state their support of the mission of the Jewish people toward the world: to be a light unto nations by showing an example of unity and connection. To conclude, let me quote once more the great Rav Kook: Any turmoil in the world comes only for Israel. Now we are called upon to carry out a great task willingly and mindfully: to build ourselves and the entire ruined world along with us (Igrot [Letters]).
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“Can you love an evil person?” (Quora)

Dr. Michael LaitmanMichael Laitman, On Quora: Can you love an evil person?

Yes, you can love people who perform even the most despicable of acts because within them is a point of a soul.

We have to understand that there is a difference between bodies and souls. People who do good or bad in the world have no souls.

A soul is called “a part of Divinity from above.” We are made of desires to enjoy, which are called “body,” and their base enjoyment is at a corporeal level where we aim to enjoy through pleasures for food, sex, family, money, honor, control and knowledge. Eventually within our desire to enjoy emerges a tiny point of a desire that stems from a higher spiritual degree, above corporeality.

Instead of wishing to enjoy for personal benefit alone, this tiny point of a desire is rooted in a world filled with the quality of nature itself: love and bestowal, beyond the limits of our corporeal desires. If we have such a desire, then we have a part of the soul, and if we feel no such desire to rise above our corporeal desires in a manner of love and bestowal upon others and nature, then we have no soul, not even its starting point.

We can liken this point of a desire to a seed that needs to be placed in the right conditions, such as fertile soil, with moisture, air and a certain amount of sunlight, for its development into a blossoming plant. In other words, we have to place this point of the soul into a protected place that is capable of developing it into a fully-grown soul, which can love, bestow and connect similarly to nature’s boundless quality of love and bestowal.

Kabbalists define this point of the soul as it emerges among our corporeal desires as “the point in the heart.” That is, the heart is our corporeal desires, where we feel transient pleasures and a temporary existence, and the point in the heart is the desire that is rooted in the soul, where we can feel complete harmony, peace and an eternal existence.

If we feel such a desire within us, a point that raises questions about the meaning of life, why we are here, who we are, what is reality, why there is so much suffering in the world, and other fundamental existential questions, then we can place such a desire under conditions that can develop it into its state as a soul. That is what the wisdom of Kabbalah teaches—how to develop the point in the heart, inflating it with various means up to a certain volume, and within such a volume, to grow a feeling of love, bestowal and positive connection to everyone and to nature itself. In such a state, we attain our soul.

Therefore, in relation to the soul’s development, we can add love, care and aim to give it whatever necessary in order for it to blossom into its eternal and whole state. However, in relation to the egoistic desires, there is no need to love any of them. Kabbalists call the ego, i.e., the desire to enjoy at the expense of others and nature, the “evil inclination,” and it is ultimately in a state of death. It is bound to be destroyed from its outset because it can feel no lasting pleasure and fulfillment according to its very nature.

Therefore, we can develop love not toward the egoistic part of us where all destruction and suffering are sourced, but in the part within every person called “human,” the point in the heart that can develop into a completely loving and bestowing intention that can bring life and light into the world.

The egoistic desires within us are opposite to nature’s altruistic and eternal form. They are thus not considered “human,” which is a word in Hebrew, “Adam,” that stems from the word for “similar” (“Domeh”), from the phrase, “Adameh le Elyon” (“similar to the most high”). In other words, a human being is one who develops their point in the heart in a manner that is similar to nature’s force of love and bestowal, and by doing so, we rise to the human level in similarity with nature where we discover the eternity and perfection of nature’s altruistic quality. In such a state, we can “love thy neighbor as thyself,” i.e., we discover the common force of love, bestowal and positive connection that is in our soul, and which connects our points in the hearts together into one soul.

No matter how evil any person is in their egoistic desires, it is possible to constantly aim at awakening the point in the heart—the part of Divinity from above—within every person, and try to direct its development above the egoistic desires in order to discover nature’s quality of love, bestowal and connection—the soul where we all connect equally in our common desire that is similar to nature’s.
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Based on “Ask the Kabbalist” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on July 12, 2023. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

“How do you think life on Earth would be different in the next 500 million years?” (Quora)

Dr. Michael LaitmanMichael Laitman, On Quora: How do you think life on Earth would be different in the next 500 million years?

In 500 million years, there will be nothing on Earth because our planet and our universe will be nonexistent.

This is because we perceive the world through uncorrected senses, i.e., through senses that perceive in a manner of wanting solely to enjoy egoistically, at the expense of others and nature. The moment we correct our senses so that we perceive in an opposite way—by wanting to bestow delight upon others and nature—we then rise above our world and feel a different spiritual reality.

Today, discussing such a spiritual reality above our current egoistic senses seems fantasy-like. However, when we attain such a reality, we will feel how our egoistic perception is in fact the unrealistic fantasy, and that true reality is through a mode of bestowal upon others and nature.

The correction of our senses takes place during a period that Kabbalists call “6,000 years,” starting from Adam HaRishon (Heb. The First Man), and it translates to us having just over 220 years to go in this current level of reality.

In our world, Adam HaRishon was the first man who corrected his senses from egoistic to altruistic, or in other words, from complete opposition to nature’s laws to entering into equivalence and balance with them. Before Adam HaRishon, there had been people living for several years. However, just over 5,780 years ago, a man called “Adam” discovered the spiritual reality, the true form of the universe, for the very first time. By doing so, he also discovered the program by which humanity develops and how it will appear at the end of its development. He wrote his findings in a book called “Raziel ha Malach” (“The Angel Raziel”), and he is considered the first Kabbalist.

All people are destined to undergo the transition from egoism to altruism and to discover the spiritual reality similar to what Adam HaRishon went through. When we do so, we will feel a different spiritual reality, and the corporeal reality will then become swallowed within the spiritual one—we will simply cease to feel it. We will then only sense phenomena that unfold at a higher level of existence, above our world.

The lower reality in our egoistic senses then disappears because our five bodily senses will seemingly evaporate and not be felt. We currently accept our world as it appears to us because we are made in a way where we hear, see, taste and breathe, i.e., we use senses of sight, hearing, taste, smell and touch. They provide us with a sensation of living in a certain reality. If we had different senses, then we would sense a different reality.

The evaporation and disappearance of this world does not happen in an instant, but gradually. It is because, as we start to positively connect and spiritually rise in our sensation of reality, we lose our egoistic mode of sensing reality. We can somewhat compare it to how we do not feel the inanimate and vegetative levels of nature in our own body. Take, for instance, our hair and nails, which are the vegetative level on our bodies. Do we feel them growing? We do not. They either grow, or they do not grow, and we can cut them and they continue growing. They cause us no disturbance.

It is similar to when we rise to the human level of existence, which is characterized by our developing an intention to bestow above our inborn egoistic desire to receive. We will then not feel the animate level—our desire to receive—in comparison to the new human level that we develop and identify with. When we all develop into the human level of existence, we will then cease to feel the animate level. We will stop perceiving reality as solid the way we currently do. Rather, we will increasingly perceive it as forces and qualities.
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Based on “Ask the Kabbalist” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on June 19, 2008. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

“In one sentence, what is the essence of the method of Kabbalist Yehuda Ashlag (Baal HaSulam)?” (Quora)

Dr. Michael LaitmanMichael Laitman, On Quora: In one sentence, what is the essence of the method of Kabbalist Yehuda Ashlag (Baal HaSulam)?

Through the love of others, to come closer to the system in which the Creator can become revealed and enjoy from His created beings.

Based on the Daily Kabbalah Lesson with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on September 20, 2023, “The Purpose of Society – 1.” Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

“Is life a test?” (Quora)

Dr. Michael LaitmanMichael Laitman, On Quora: Is life a test?

It is written in the Torah that we each go through tests in our lives through which the upper providene examines us. Indeed, our lives are a test.

It is most obvious in the story about the exodus from Egypt. “Egypt” represents our egoistic desires, and the more we prepare ourselves to exit our egos, the more we start feeling our ego working on, controlling and overcoming us, and we too constantly try to overcome it.

The increasing difficulty to overcome our ego is called “the burdening of the heart,” which brings us to feel that we are entirely under the ego’s rule, under Pharaoh, and we feel it as our enemy.

Why do we come to feel the ego dwelling inside us as our enemy? It is due to a tiny point of a desire in us called “Moses” that attracts us to the other side of our ego: a reality of positive connection among each other with attitudes of love and bestowal in our midst.

In this game with the upper force of love and bestowal called “the Creator,” as well as with Pharaoh, Moses, the people of Israel (i.e., those who share the common point of a desire to rise above the ego) and the Egyptians, we start discovering these forces operating inside us. We start seeing how we are lost under Pharaoh’s rule without the upper force of love and bestowal (the Creator) to pull us out.

If we go through life knowing that it is our Egypt and that we have to rise to a higher level and not remain in the ego, where our inner Pharaoh and Egyptians want to hold us, we will then learn how to use our lives in a way that brings us all to a state of total harmony, peace and happiness. We then come to see life as our aim to escape our egoistic nature and head out to what is called “redemption,” which is the sensation of the upper world, eternity and perfection.

Our lives are thus indeed a test and an opportunity. If we constantly try to see where and how we are being operated upon, and try to hold onto the thought that beyond our egoistic desires there is a higher force of love and bestowal that wishes for us to become mature beings by rising above our egos, then we can view our lives as a test—as our own test on ourselves.

We can then exercise what it means to live above the ego in a reality where the upper force of love and bestowal fills the connections between us. By doing so, we draw those loving and bestowing forces into our lives and accordingly rise to the eternal and whole spiritual life. If we do not apply such a test upon ourselves and continue letting our egoistic desires determine our every thought and movement, then we simply disappear when we die, and we then just reawait our next chance in the next lifecycle.
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Based on “Ask the Kabbalist” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on July 18, 2008. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

“What Holidays Are Celebrated During the Month of Tishrei?” (Times of Israel)

Michael Laitman, On The Times of Israel: “What Holidays Are Celebrated During the Month of Tishrei?
Before overviewing the holiday cycle during the month of Tishrei, it is important to understand that the Jewish holidays are not a celebration of specific historic events that an isolated group of people experienced, which is irrelevant to humanity and its further evolutionary development.

What are the Jewish holidays? They are spiritual states, i.e., omnipresent varying levels of our equivalence of form with nature’s form of love and bestowal, which we attain through our spiritual progress toward greater and greater states of unity among each other and with nature.

With that in mind, we can discuss the Tishrei holiday cycle as a series of spiritual states, i.e., introspections, conclusions, decisions and inner actions that we perform as we progress from the sensation of our reality locked within our egoistic desires—where we wish to enjoy ourselves for self-benefit alone—to the spiritual reality—where we wish to benefit others and nature, immensely expanding our sensation of reality.

Leading up to the Tishrei holidays is the month of Elul, which ends with the period of repentance, Selichot, where we reach the conclusion that our egoistic approach to life drives us to a state of helplessness and despair.

The introspection from the states of Selichot leads us to the first day of Tishrei, Rosh Hashanah, which means the beginning (“Rosh”) of change (“Shana” [year] from the word “Shinui” [change]). That is, we reach the decision that we want to change our egoistic attitude to life with a new attitude that does not oppose and resist nature—as we do when we remain in our inborn egoistic desires—but which is in balance with nature, i.e., in balance with an attitude of love, bestowal and connection.

After making the decision to change our egoism into altruism that characterizes Rosh Hashanah, we soon arrive at the realization that we cannot make that change on our own. This state is called “Yom Kippur” (“The Day of Atonement”).

The self-examination that takes place during the state of Yom Kippur, which reveals to us the true extent of our egoistic and altruistic intentions, brings us to a new discernment: that there is a single solution to this problem: to raise the importance of benefiting others and nature over the importance in doing so for ourselves. At such a juncture, we then proceed to activate our intention to benefit others and disengage from our egoistic desires. This shift in importance—bestowal over reception; altruism over egoism; unity over division—is the essence of Sukkot.

The Tishrei holiday cycle draws to its conclusion with Simchat Torah, the eighth and last day of Sukkot. On this holiday, we rejoice in the unified state that we acquire, which nature’s force of love and bestowal reveals to us. In other words, on Simchat Torah, we rejoice in correctly realizing the method of connection, called “Torah,” from the word “Hora’a” (“instruction”), and that we corrected our opposition to nature’s altruistic form into equivalence and balance with nature.

The attainment of equivalence of form with nature—a unified state among each other and with nature through an intention to love and bestow that is similar to the force of nature itself—is the final destination to which humanity evolves. Accordingly, the Tishrei holiday cycle represents the various states of spiritual progress from our current egoistic state, through to the opposite altruistic state of love and bestowal that is similar to nature’s force of love and bestowal, the force that created and sustains reality.
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“What is a Shana Tova?” (Times of Israel)

Michael Laitman, On The Times of Israel: “What is a Shana Tova?
A good year (Shana Tova) comes about first from understanding the previous year’s shortcomings.

We then go through a time of introspection. In general, human society is starting to realize that a good life is further and further out of reach. When we start seeing that our egoistic form of development—where we each try making a better life for ourselves at the expense of others and nature—leads to a growing entanglement of troubles and crises, then we reach a state called the “realization of evil.” Thanks to such a realization, we come to see that the egoistic way we live our lives is false, which is a very important step toward the truth.

We then have to find a solution. If we discern our egoistic modus operandi as the problem we need to fix, then the solution is in rising above our egoistic approach to life: that we shift from prioritizing self-benefit over benefiting others to its opposite—the benefit of others over self-benefit.

Therefore, in order to experience a good year, we should set as our goal a positive connection among each other, with mutual support, encouragement and care in our ties.

The more we develop an understanding and feeling of our true state as a single, global, interconnected and interdependent system, with us as the system’s key parts, then similar to how cells and organs function to uphold an organism’s health and well-being, we too would start thinking more and more about the benefit of others and the whole system of humanity and nature we live in.

The more we understand that our egoistic approach to each other and to nature destroys us, then the readier we become to rise above our egoistic goals, and place a higher goal of a harmonious and peaceful connection among all people and nature before us.

We will then start feeling the need for help from a power that is beyond our human powers, since our human powers are all self-aimed. We will find how we cannot “fight fire with fire,” so to speak, and that without the help from a higher power, intelligence and consciousness, we are doomed.

A good year is thus one in which we will invite the positive force dwelling in nature to come out from its concealment, due to our need and request for its help, and then feel that force fill the space between us. When we genuinely desire to reach positive connections of mutual support, encouragement and care among us together with feeling the impossibility to achieve it with the egoistic powers at our disposal, then we develop what is called a “vessel” for the reception of the positive loving and bestowing force of nature to enter into and upgrade our connections. Such an upgrade from egoistic to altruistic connections that are balanced with nature’s force of love and bestowal will then grant us access to a whole new harmonious and peaceful life.
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“What does the resurrection of the dead mean?” (Quora)

Dr. Michael LaitmanMichael Laitman, On Quora: What does the resurrection of the dead mean?

According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, the resurrection of the dead refers to our inner qualities, not dead people.

A body is a desire, and a dead body refers to a desire that wishes to do nothing in a spiritual direction of love, bestowal and connection. It wishes to remain content simply as it is, as an egoistic desire. Such a desire is considered dead.

On the spiritual path, we invest a lot of effort into killing our egoistic desires, i.e., reaching states of not wishing to enjoy for self-benefit alone at the expense of others and nature. However, at a more advanced stage of our spiritual path, we wish to revive these desires since they can then be used differently, for the sake of bestowal. This is called “the resurrection of the dead.”

We then make contact with our dead egoistic qualities and work out how to correct them in a direction of bestowal.

We thus need to be concerned with bringing dead bodies to life, i.e., helping each other resurrect our dead desires and raise them above ourselves.

Based on the Daily Kabbalah Lesson on the article “All My Bones Shall Say” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on August 14, 2023. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

“Why is there so much confusion in the world?” (Quora)

Dr. Michael LaitmanMichael Laitman, On Quora: Why is there so much confusion in the world?

A new desire is emerging in humanity today.

It is appearing in more and more people, but only as a seed of a desire, not a fully clarified one.

What is this desire for? It is a tiny spark of a desire for a state of absolute love, bestowal and connection.

As a result of the emergence of this new desire, confusion is rising due to people not knowing how to fulfill it.

Unlike the desires that developed within us to date, i.e., corporeal desires for food, sex, family, money, honor, control and knowledge, there are no examples in our midst of how to fulfill the new desire emerging in us. It is because this new desire is not corporeal, but spiritual, and it requires a shift in how we perceive and sense reality.

What shift in perception and sensation do we need in order to realize this new desire emerging in us?

Our natural inborn egoistic desires make us want to receive maximum benefit for ourselves alone. They constantly try to absorb fulfillments into themselves. That is our clear inner self-organization through which we currently relate to the world. Instinctively, at every moment, we try to receive the most fulfillment possible, and we act in a way that our inner system considers necessary and most beneficial for ourselves at any given moment.

In our egoism, we more or less know how to work with others by pushing for what we want to receive, to take and to give, pay and buy, and so on. We interact with each other in such a way using a wide variety of means: guile, deception and politics, to name just a few. In our world, we know how to act despite all the venality and lies that we grow up with.

Now, however, another condition, force and quality emerges, a new desire that we previously did not feel: a tiny point of a desire for love, bestowal and connection.

Such a desire is rooted in nature itself, which at its core is a desire to love and to bestow. In other words, love is the base law of nature. Likewise, the more we develop today, the more we experience nature’s rawest form drawing closer to revealing itself to us.

What is the expression of nature’s rawest form drawing closer to revealing itself to us? It is that we start finding ourselves becoming more and more complexly interconnected and interdependent globally.

That is how nature’s quality of love, bestowal and connection manifests itself in the corporeal world: in addition to the egoistic force, there is also an altruistic force, and it increasingly reveals itself to us through our becoming globally interconnected and interdependent. Likewise, until we shift our attitudes to each other from egoistic to altruistic, then we will feel more and more confusion enter our lives like a dark cloud increasingly descending upon us.
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Based on KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Internal Work” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on September 3, 2011. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.
Photo by Martin Fu on Unsplash.

“Why is the Rosh Hashanah important?” (Quora)

Dr. Michael LaitmanMichael Laitman, On Quora: Why is the Rosh Hashanah important?

Before discussing the importance of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, it is important to understand that the Jewish holidays are not the tradition of one particular nation or people. They are rather symbols of unique spiritual states where we attain a common quality of love and bestowal in higher levels of our connection among each other and with nature.

If we attain a certain level of unity that is latent in nature, then we celebrate such an event. When we rise a little further to the next level of connection among each other and with nature, then we again attain a new degree of a unified perception and sensation of nature, and celebrate such an event.

Our own decision making plays no role in determining the holidays. Instead, we celebrate the attainment of certain levels of equivalence of form that are omnipresent in nature. We thus cannot change these holidays.

Nature is an interconnected and interdependent network of altruistic forces. It is a unified system where its every part is completely interlinked. We humans, on the other hand, are the only parts of nature that oppose and resist it with our egoistic desire to benefit ourselves at the expense of others and nature.

If we—humanity or at least a critical mass within humanity—will start undergoing a process of changing our egoistic quality into an altruistic one that is similar to nature’s, then we will approach nature’s unified form.

A key step in such a process is called “recognition of evil.” It means that we need to first reach a recognition of our inborn egoistic nature holding us back from experiencing the wholeness that exists in nature. In order to then change our egoistic nature into an altruistic one that is similar to nature’s force of love and bestowal, we require a deep inner scrutiny, which is called “prayer.” In Hebrew, to pray (“Lehitpalel”) means to “incriminate” (“Lehapil”) oneself. That is, we must incriminate ourselves, and such a confession leading up to Rosh Hashanah is called “the month of Elul.”

During such a scrutiny, we view our current low egoistic state in comparison to the exalted and whole altruistic state of love, bestowal and connection, which we wish to reach. The immense chasm between those two states give rise to a prayer, where we judge ourselves and express a great desire to change our egoistic intention into an altruistic one that is similar to nature’s.

We find how our egoistic nature turns us into criminals together with the discovery of an overpowering and much greater force above our egoistic powers, the altruistic force of nature, to which we wish to advance.

That state is called “Rosh Hashanah,” the beginning (“Rosh”) of our change (“Shinui”). It is the beginning of a new cycle of states through which we progress in order to become more and more like the loving and bestowing force of nature.
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Based on “A New Life” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on September 14, 2014. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.
Photo by Igal Ness on Unsplash.