Entries in the 'News' Category

Israel’s Independence Day

268.01Comment: We are used to the phrase “Israel’s Independence Day.” We are used to this holiday, and we celebrate it. In today’s world, the word “independence” is heard everywhere: independent countries, independent republics, independent press, independent experts… All sides of conflicts, all parties, speak about it, the rights, the lefts, individuals, everyone!

Besides, it is not just a word, but a very important concept in Kabbalah.

My Response: In Kabbalah, this concept is absolutely the opposite of what people, the world, society, countries, and nations understand.

What does independence mean? Independence from what?

Comment: This is the independence of my borders, independence from someone else. I want to live by myself, with my national independence, republican, state, and so on. If no one gets to me, this means that I am independent; I will build my own world. This is called independence.

My Response: But this is impossible because, in today’s world, everyone depends on each other. So how can we be independent? If you are going to be independent, you should go into the woods and provide yourself with what you can. You are condemning yourself to terrible conditions.

Question: You can say it in another way: “So that no one dictates to me how to live.” Is it also impossible?

Answer: This is the same thing. No one will dictate anything to you, but how will you provide for yourself? How will you create and preserve this independence? It is completely unclear how this is possible.

Today, a developing country in the world should be connected to all the countries by good mutual ties. Only in this case, can it feel comfortable for everyone; otherwise, it will feel crushed, limited, humiliated, and so on.

Question: If it will be on its own?

Answer: Yes, but no one will give it such an opportunity. After all, all countries surround each other and want, like wolves in the forest, to snatch from others as much as they can. This is our normal, egoistic world. It cannot be any different. It was always like that, only we covered ourselves up a little. We did not reveal it enough in our egoism.

Question: Do you think there is no point in demanding independence in this world? It does not exist and will not exist?

Answer: We can demand, but at the same time, we must demand from ourselves! This is the most important thing. If we observe such conditions then there are good neighborly relations, peace, and mutual assistance between us, which are contrary to our inherent, natural quality to receive, conquer, and force peace.

Comment: If we have a connection, then it is against someone. All this is vicious.

My Response: Of course. Therefore, everything we create is only supposedly for the benefit of ourselves and to the detriment of others. There cannot be one instead of the other.

Kabbalah speaks of independence where we rise above our egoism. Independence from our personal egoism. This is what real independence is, and then I only think about others. It is among the others, in good relations with others, which I create with all my capabilities, there I feel independent.

Question: Are you saying, “only about others”? Do I not think about myself at all?

Answer: I do not, I am a consequence. I exist even today as a consequence of the attitude of everyone else toward me.

Question: Does it mean that I can only think about others, and then the consequence will be how they treat me, how I am, and so on?

Answer: Yes.

Question: Should my first thought not be: “Will they treat me well if I treat others well?”

Answer: I do not think this is the nature of a person and our society. Therefore, to say such beautiful phrases as: “Do not hit others, and they will not hit you,” and so on does not work.

Question: Does what you say work? How is it possible in our world that I do not think about myself, but think about others? Publicly, for example.

Answer: The fact is that, of course, it does not work anyway. If I treat others well, I will only give them an additional reason to grab me and bite off all sorts of pieces of me. Thus, the whole problem in human society is for it to transform itself from a pack of predators into an organized, mutual, voluntary, and kind community.

Question: Do you believe in this fiction?

Answer: No, I do not believe it by any means, but I say it because in principle this is the only solution. Exactly when we realize that this is the only solution, albeit a fantastic and impossible one, then we suddenly can implement it.

Question: From where?

Answer: From above. We will be able to receive such a force from nature that will lift us above our egoism, and then it will be implemented. I will be above my nature, I will be above my thoughts, I will be above my decisions. How will it work out? It will work out because the second force of nature will be revealed—the quality of bestowal, connection, and love.

Question: Can you guarantee this to me? For example, I am a politician or an ordinary person, and I hear you. Can you guarantee me that?

Answer: I can only tell you again in more detail so that you understand that there is no other way. Or we are going to perish and die in every generation. And in the future generation, the same fate is prepared for our descendants. Nothing is changing, except that the sufferings are becoming greater, and the possibility of solving them with the help of wars and deaths is becoming more and more terrible.

Question: Will I come to what you say through understanding this and feeling this?

Answer: Yes, in the end, we will understand. Moreover, this is a very scary decision because we will feel like we are being skinned. Because this is the opposite of me.

But there is an opportunity to resolve this issue in a kind, peaceful way. It means to study our nature and study the force of nature that can help us change ourselves. Then we will be able to place ourselves under the influence of this good force of nature, and it will change us from little evil predators to big kind creatures.

Question: Do you think we are getting closer to this understanding that we are little evil predators?

Answer: We are getting closer. However, so far we are also approaching it in a bad way.

But according to the way all kinds of positive and negative forces are being revealed more and more, especially in our generation, and we are given the opportunity to talk about it and somehow implement them; that is, there is hope that we will be able to formalize for ourselves, for our understanding, and for our knowledge of this system of nature’s forces, and to understand how we can balance it and express the good force from it.

I think we can do it. Otherwise, we will still come to this, but in a very long way, a terrible way of suffering.

Question: It is said that the Messiah will come when the face of humanity will be like the muzzle of a dog. Does this apply to us, to our time?

Answer: Yes, it is people’s awareness of their terrible, bestial nature. We are getting closer to this now. But we can see it from afar, and that is enough. We do not necessarily have to get right into the dog’s den. It is enough just to see it and be scared.

Comment: God grant that it will be so.
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From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 5/3/22

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Israel—75 Years of War and Peace

421.01Question: We have reached a milestone date: 75 years of Israel’s independence. It has been 75 years since the Jews found their home, 75 years of wars, 75 years of proving that this is our place, that we want to live here, and so on. These have not been easy years.

How would you sum up this 75th anniversary?

Answer: I would like us to understand that time is not working for us. We must admit that in the eyes of the world, despite all our attempts to present ourselves as the best, we still look like the worst.

Comment: This is a paradox. We have huge achievements in medicine, in progress, in everything.

My Response: Absolutely no one needs this from us. On the contrary, if we suffered, then maybe a certain number of non-Jews would love us. Or rather, they would feel sorry for us. But not in this way.

Comment: The great Kabbalist Baal HaSulam welcomed the creation of the State of Israel.

My Response: He hoped that this state of Israel would be the right one.

Comment: What do you consider right?

My Response: It is when the people who will inhabit it will try to show the entire world what the purpose of a person’s life on Earth is.

Question: You take it globally. What about the fact that a home was created for Jews who were persecuted and exterminated?

Answer: What for?

Question: To live at home, so that no one touches you. Is that not an idea?

Answer: This is impossible for the Jews. We were kicked out of our home. We have never had our own home in general. The fact that we lived for several hundred years, even less, in the land of Israel in the past, says nothing.

Question: How about the fact that Temples were built here?

Answer: So, what? We took the land from other nations and built them. Were there no nations here before that?

Rashi wrote that the nations of the world would come and ask: “Why did you take the land away from the nations who lived here?” And the Jews will have to answer. He asks, what can we answer?  “The entire earth belongs to the Creator. He gave it to other nations, and then took it from them and gave it to us.”

But this is correct if we follow His instructions, will, and desire. Yet, we do not do that. Therefore, there is no life for us here and there will not be. Will not be! I say this to everyone and always.

Comment: We started by saying that this is a holiday, but what you are saying does not sound festive.

My Response: This is a holiday because the people received the opportunity, as Baal HaSulam says, to exist on their land and fulfill their mission before all of humanity. So, if we fulfill it, because this opportunity still exists, then everything will turn out right and everyone in the world will understand why Jews exist and what we should do.

Question: What is the mission of the Jews, and why do they exist on this earth?

Answer: The Jews exist in order to live on this earth in unity with each other, in such a unity that will be called absolute unity. When they will be able to show all other nations an example of how to actually live without wars, without violence, without mutual hatred.

This is what we must show to the whole world. Then we will have the right to exist. Everyone will understand why we exist at all. And everyone will be happy to see that we exist on our own piece of land in order to translate all this into action and example.

Question: Then will everyone want this piece of land to exist, for Jews to live here, and for them to prosper?

Answer: Yes. In particular, our cousins the Arabs.

Question: In that case, what is independence in light of what you are saying?

Answer: Independence is independence from our egoism, when we can rise above it and show this example to all the nations of the world how to live in connection, in friendship, and in mutuality. Everyone will want to follow it.

This is our mission from above. Therefore, we are a special nation in this sense, and we cannot escape anywhere from fulfilling this mission. But it may take several thousand more years until we come to this.

Question: Thousands of years?!

Answer: Thousands. Has it been 2,000 years? Another 2,000 years will pass. It does not matter how long it takes, but we still will not be able to run away from fulfilling our mission.

We can hope that over the next 2,000 years, we will understand something after all.

Question: Is there such a layer in us that it cannot be penetrated?

Answer: The egoistic layer is such that maybe the next 2,000 years will do something to us.

Question: But anyway, one way or another, this is not our work, this is the work of the Creator. He might as well do it tomorrow. Why do we have to wait 2,000 years?

Answer: We are obliged, we have to agree to this job. We must wait for such a revolution in ourselves when we want to be not competing with each other but loving each other, to “love your neighbor as yourself” and be able to convey this as an example to all other nations of the world.

Comment: You have always said that a good businessman is a strategist, he looks forward to many years. A bad businessman wants to quickly grab something right now and that is it. You are such a businessman that you are looking forward to 2,000 years. You are engaged in this, you are disseminating this, and at the same time, you are saying that this is…

My Response: I live in this every day with the hope that after some time, I am not saying 2,000 years, but as we understand, not yet today, the people will begin to change.

Comment: And for this, you are ready to keep saying it today and repeating it.

My Response: In order for this to begin to be implemented in a few thousand years.

Question: But are you still an optimist?

Answer: I am not an optimist. I say that this is the law of nature, and we will still be obliged to implement it.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 4/20/23

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We Are All Lonely Whales

961.2In the News (New Scientist): “In 1989, the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts detected an unknown sonic presence at 52 hertz. It was initially thought to be from a submarine, but marine biologist William Watkins later determined that it was the sonar signature of a whale, which he gave the nickname “52”.

“It is an unusually high frequency for whale vocalisations, and Watkins was intrigued enough to search for 52 until his death in 2004. But despite picking up 52’s call every year, Watkins never found the mysterious whale. …

“Why 52 calls at this frequency is also a mystery – the whale’s species hasn’t been confirmed, and it is possible that it is the only one of its kind in the ocean. The one thing we do know is that 52 is almost certainly a he: male whales do the singing.

“The reason for 52’s presumed loneliness has nothing to do with the fact that he has always been detected swimming alone. Instead, it is because the unique frequency of his call means that other whales can’t understand to respond. …

“In our increasingly connected world where contact and interaction is only the click of a button away, the fact that so many people still report feeling lonely makes it easy to identify with 52’s situation. There is something deeply affecting about a creature as intelligent and social as we know whales to be, swimming the vast ocean, year after year, never having any proper contact with another of its kind.”

My Response: In place of humanity, I would still start to get in some kind of contact with it. If the frequency at which it talks or wants to talk is known, then we have no problem creating such a device.

Question: Do you think it wants to communicate?

Answer: Undoubtedly. But it scares other whales away with its higher frequency.

Question: And what should we, such lonely whales that live in this world and exist in this loneliness, do? Now a lot of people have gone to live in huts in the forest somewhere in the Taiga and have been living there for 20 to 30 years. This is how people live.

Answer: It is their choice, and I would not say that it is bad. They still find themselves there. Through communication with themselves, they communicate with nature. Perhaps even with the Creator. It is better than communicating with people.

Question: Especially in our time?

Answer: Of course. If they do not feel that they have a special goal, a mission, that obligates them to be in the world among people, then they feel very good. I think that, in principle, they find themselves there.

Question: And if you had a choice, would you go somewhere?

Answer: Undoubtedly.

Question: Would you lock yourself in a room?

Answer: Undoubtedly! I am trying to do that anyway, although this is all unsuccessful. But I still move away from people, from the world, as much as I can.

Question: Is it possible to create a world in solitude? Is it possible to love loneliness? Is it possible to be in it all the time?

Answer: If a person rises, really rises, then he feels he is alone; he is lonely. This is a wonderful state, but at the same time he feels himself in connection with the Creator.

Question: Still a person advances to this?

Answer: Yes. This is the lone whale.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 6/16/22

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What Is the Most Important Thing in Marriage?

725Question: There are many couples in our Kabbalistic group who really want to build their relationships on a new level of connection. They work in their own groups and watch the program “New Life” about family life together.

They want to build the family of the future that you talk about all the time. How can they check that they are moving in the right direction? What is the family of the future?

Answer: It is when a husband and wife are very close companions to each other. They don’t impose themselves on each other. They understand that they have a long life.

Comment: Together.

My Response: Together is relatively together. Together is impossible. We must accept our mutual states so that they are not double-edged, so that they complement each other.

Where we feel that we are doing something pleasant, we get closer. Where we feel that there may be some problems, we move away. We behave selectively. And then we will be fine.

Question: But we do not run away? Is this what it means to build a family?

Answer: We don’t think about building all the time. We just feel where we can help the partner, and where it is not necessary to interfere.

Comment: And this, you say, is called “partners.”

My Response: Yes. This is the most important thing in marriage.

Question: And everything else: love…?

Answer: There is love between a mother and a child. And there is love between man and the Creator. There is no love between people. There is a possibility of creating a very kind, close, mutual connection, but it is still not love.

Love appears, manifests, is created, and is born where there is a connection from nature, from nature itself, like a mother with a child, and as a person arises with the Creator.

It is a natural connection. This can be called love. But just between a man and a woman, even if they understand the importance of each other and try to somehow complement each other, it is not love, it is still mates. And this is the family of the future.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 2/14/22

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A Couple’s Marriage Vow

627.2Question: What should a couple write in a marriage contract so that it strengthens their bond, does not break it, and does not separate them?

Answer: It should be written in the marriage contract that in fact, no matter what happens between us we will always think about making the other feel good, that it cannot be that one wishes something bad for the other or would do something bad. This is the oath.

Question: What if I suddenly do wish bad for the other? What if this suddenly pops up in me?

Answer: This all needs immediate correction. That is, there are things that should be above our desires, above our egoistic calculations, and above everything else. Like say with children, no matter what happens, you still think about making them feel good.

That is all. And it is the same here.

Question: Should we just write this in the contract, this simple phrase?

Answer: Yes.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 2/14/22

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The Creator Is Waiting for Us to Turn On the Light

239Question: Mikhail asks: “What is the ultimate goal of a person? Is it to dissolve into the Creator, as you say, to merge with Him? Will we lose our identity or not?”

Answer: I would say it is much higher—to complement the Creator. Except that it is said “You create Me.” So says the Creator. But at least if we do not create, we complement Him.

Question: So, is there some flaw in Him if we complement Him?

Answer: Of course, there is a lack because He is suffering very, very much without us. He has the desire to bestow, to saturate, and to emanate, and there is no one, no one wants to.

Question: But we want to be satisfied, to receive, right?

Answer: We do not want to be fed from Him and not by Him! Therefore, here, I would say, it looks like a war of nerves, who will be the first to give in and say: “I love you!” This is a game of exhaustion, of course, really.

Question: Mikhail asks: “Will we lose our identity or not?”

Answer: We will find it then. What kind of identity do we have now? There is absolutely none.

Identity is acquired by the fact that we become necessary for the Creator in action. We are already necessary, but in action, in the fact that we get closer to Him, unite, and merge with Him; in the fact that we complement the universe, we cause filling in the whole universe, the upper light that fills the whole creation. Without us, it would be empty, cold, and dark.

Question: What kind of additional help does the Creator expect from us?

Answer: So that we turn on the light, turn on the light in fact in this world, so that the universe would be filled with the light of the Creator, love, goodness, unity, and perfection in all possible forms.

Comment: At the same time, you say this today when one does not know where to run. With these crazy wars.

My Response: Nothing needs to be done. We just must wait calmly, with confidence that this should happen, to want, to ask, to quietly ask the Creator.

Question: Is that all that is required of us?

Answer: Yes. Without unnecessary noise, statements, disputes, without anything.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 2/14/22

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If You Are Lonely

294.3Question: In one of your clips there was a story about a lonely whale that exists in its own frequency and makes its own sounds. The others don’t see or hear him. He wanders all by himself.

Martha writes to you: “Tell me, what should I do? I am such a lonely whale. I am surrounded by a lot of people, but I am all alone. I really want to communicate with people, but I cannot find sincere contact, I am afraid of people. What should I do?”

Answer: Tune in to the fact that there are no sincere contacts. Exist the way you exist. It is not called being a lonely whale. The whale also does not exist alone, but among many, many others, similar to and including him. So are we.

Comment: But it was said that the whale wanders around alone, that none hear it or see it. Martha thinks she is the same.

My Response: So, what? What Is wrong with that? I do not feel like a lonely whale. I do my own thing, communicate with a certain number of people, and so on. That is, it is not loneliness.

Question: Not loneliness. And if she has this loneliness?

Answer: This is how she feels.

Question: If she writes: “I’m afraid of people”? How can she overcome such a problem if it is not at the medical level? Fear of people, fear of contacts, there are the people who do not want this connection; they are afraid of it. What should be the result of their efforts?

Answer: The result is that they eventually find company in which they feel free.

Question: But we need to look from easy to difficult, with whom can I? Do not force yourself.

Answer: No! But you can join some clubs and chat with one or two women or men there.

Question: Please explain why you insist on contact. Why not tell a person: “Well, just exist the way you are”?

Answer: But she is complaining!

Comment: She complains, that is right. “I really want to communicate with people, but I cannot find a sincere contact.”

My Response: Sincere! She herself is not ready for sincere contact.

Question: Is that what you feel?

Answer: Of course.

Question: What kind of contact is sincere for you? For her, it is clear to me that she is looking for something like this for herself.

Answer: For me, a sincere contact is to find a book that would capture me. That is all.

Question: In general, what would you call a sincere contact?

Answer: When they understand you. But that is hardly good either. At the same time, a person has very little of himself left. It is true, we do not really want to open up.

Question: Yes, we are closed, of course. So, after all, what is sincere contact?

Answer: I do not know. This is when you feel comfortable with a person. But with whom can you be constantly calm?

Comment: This is also a problem.

My Response: Of course.

Question: A real contact, what is it?

Answer: Real contact is obviously when you love a person and want to make him feel good all the time.

Comment: You took it and suddenly turned everything around just like that. Instead of being good for me, you say: “So that it would be good for the other. And this is called contact.”

My Response: Yes when I feel that I want it to be good for him, create a pleasant atmosphere for him, a feeling.

Question: And if we are talking about the upper, about the Creator, what is a real contact?

Answer: This is already an equivalence of form. This is so that I can affect the Creator in the same way that He affects me. To do this, I need to change my nature, which, by the way, He made for me. So, I must ask Him to change it. This request is the contact.

Question: Can such a request be sincere?

Answer: Partly, until I really ask sincerely.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 3/23/23

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When Family Becomes a Family

627.2Question: An elderly couple that lived together for more than fifty years was asked how they managed to live together for so long? They answered that it must be because they were born and raised in the times when you fixed what was broken and did not throw them away.

Basically we are throwing away broken things today. Replacements come—no problem. If the relationship is completely broken, how can you fix it? People write to you all the time, and you insist on holding on to the end. But how do you hold on when everything has been broken and there is nothing left?

Answer: Have you lived together? Do you have children? Have your children given birth to grandchildren?

So you have to stay glued together somehow. For the sake of the children and grandchildren because they are your descendants, your consequence. Therefore, you must stay together for their sake. If only officially; it doesn’t matter how.

It means that you can live officially together. For them, you are together. You create this theater for grandchildren and children.

Question: And what does it give? Why are you so insistent on this?

Answer: This is called “family.”

Question: So family is grandchildren, children, and their parents? Is this a family?

Answer: Yes. All those alive and united with each other after all.

Question: Is there a root to this?

Answer: We have to keep this structure. It doesn’t matter whether you like it or not.

Comment: So this remains, even if it breaks me; if everything is already broken and I cannot tolerate the other…

Answer: Don’t pay attention. What’s the difference? What does “breaks” mean? You go on with your life, your wife goes on with her life, the children have their lives, the grandchildren have their lives, and so on. But you’re not breaking anything.

Question: So in a bad relationship, your advice is to act?

Answer: In any condition. You don’t even have to act; just don’t separate officially, don’t get divorced.

Comment: You are now obliging a person: “This is how you must live.”

Answer: If you are aimed at the family existing and at your descendants living within this framework, then you can uphold it. I think we must maintain this connection.

Question: What do you base this on? That this is a bad example for children and grandchildren? Now we are talking about elderly couples. Suddenly they decide to divorce, or suddenly they are in a bad relationship. Should they stick to it because it’s a bad example for children and grandchildren, and it may continue on?

Answer: That too. People should know that if they get married and have children, they should live, in a way, for the sake of the children.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 3/23/23

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Point of Connection Between Husband and Wife

243.01Question: You have reiterated that a man and a woman are by nature completely opposite to each other. They are two different perceptions of the world. Then how do they communicate with each other?

Where is the point of connection?

Answer: It is above them, in the Creator. Between husband and wife, the point of connection is the Creator. “Husband and wife, Divinity between them.”

Question: When you say the Creator, can you simplify it a little?

Answer: This is a common property of reciprocity, mutual support, love, and connection, created by a man and a woman. It goes particularly in this combination—a man and a woman.

Question: Do they have to understand this in advance before they start their relationship?

Answer: In general, yes. This must be the purpose for which they bond together.

Question: What is the purpose of these two different, polar people—a man and a woman?

Answer: The purpose is that through mutual assistance between them, they reach such a state, such a connection when they will “revolve” around each other and at the same time create a special form of existence—”I am for you, you are for me, and both of us are for the Creator between us.” As it is said: “Husband and wife, Divinity between them.”

Question: So that the Creator becomes the highest property of love, bestowal? And it grows, and grows, and grows?

Answer: Yes.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 2/14/22

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What Should Spouses Think About?

565.02Question: If we talk about the family of the future, what kind of agreement do they make when they get married?

Answer: An agreement that he or she should, first of all, think about the children, then about the spouse, and then about himself or herself. In general, this is very simple. I do not see any problems.

When they think in such a state and are guided by such thoughts, they will have no problems. Even if they will not live relatively closely together, because everything happens in life. I have seen many families who are happy and at the same time do not have close contact with each other.

Comment: So, they follow this formula if there are children.

My Response: They are good friends.

When we first of all demand love and devotion, it is wrong, it quickly leads to defeat. We even see in our lives that it does not work out.

Question: How does the Creator then make all these turns?

Answer: Because there is a difference between the level of an animal and the human level. We definitely should be ascending to it.

Question: What is the human level in this?

Answer: The human level is when I think of my spouse as a friend.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 2/14/22

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