Baal HaSulam, “Peace in the World”: And in our subject, the benefit of each and every person within his collective is evaluated not according to his own goodness, but according to his service to the public. And vice-versa, we appreciate the attribute of evil of each and every individual only according to the harm one inflicts upon the public in general, and not by one’s own individual value.

These things are crystal clear both from the perspective of the truth in them, and from the perspective of the good in them. This is because what is found in the collective is only what is found in the individual. And the benefit of the collective is the benefit of each and every individual: who harms the collective takes his share in the harm, and who benefits the collective takes his share in the benefit, since individuals are part of the whole, and the whole is not worth in anyway more than the sum of its individuals.

Egoism does not allow us to understand and accept this; it distorts the picture. However, looking at things impartially, objectively, we will have to accept that everything is as it is. If you follow the simple normal logic, it is clear that this is how it should be. Nature is a unified integral mechanism, and obviously every part in it depends on everyone else, and the system as a whole depends on all its parts. In this case, of course, the collective and individual benefit is the same.

Question: But the individual cogwheel in this mechanism has no freedom of choice. Then what is the point of saying whether it is good or bad?

Answer: Indeed, the cogwheel itself has no free will. It cannot decide whether it should or should not rotate to the benefit of community. Everyone does what he or she is predestined to do from above.

However, this system has a mechanism similar to a clutch: the thing is the extent to which I am engaged internally with the “engine” to rotate with it without any questions asked.

Question: So, do we have free will?

Answer: It is to want to rotate or to rotate unwillingly. My freedom is in agreement. But I will be working in any case, either “under duress,” under the pressure of the “roller of development,” or of our own accord, with pleasure.

In general, the system is perfect and acts with absolute efficiency, but I feel and perceive it according to the measure of my consent to its work. In addition, others view it in the same way, and so in the end, we all feel the personal or collective flaw of disagreement—of the individual or of the system.

But nevertheless, our perception does not affect the system itself.

Question: How can we hasten correction?

Answer: To want to agree with the work of the system, with the movement of its parts. This will change everything in my feelings. I add and take away nothing in the true reality; the difference is only in how much its picture is distorted by the “distorting mirror” of my egoism.

My whole life is unfolding on this canvas as I “paint” myself relative to the true system, disagreeing with it in one way or another. And I call this picture “my world.” In essence, this is a snapshot, an impression of my disagreement with the original nature, with absolute love. My whole being is the projection on some “screen,” outlining this “discrepancy of opinion.” I do not see the real system; I see nothing, but my own internal flaws.

Question: Is there such a thing that’s detached from the wholeness of perception, my personal “corner”?

Answer: Yes. I can feel my desires to the extent of their oppositeness to the system. Thus, my world, like the spiritual reality, also consists of 613 parts, but each of them appears to me as opposite to the whole.

This oppositeness is divided into 125 degrees or stages of equivalence or non-equivalence. Now, I am sort of behind the last, the 125^th degree, in complete detachment, in absolute lack of understanding. Then, as I rise on each degree, I will discover the discrepancy between me and the system in greater resolution, and by correcting these flaws, I get closer to agreement, to “complete faith,” complete adhesion.

Thus, for the time being I see and feel only myself relative to the state that they want to show me. Of course, for comparison, I am not immediately offered the world of Infinity, the ideal system of nature, the Creator. It is impossible because now I can distinguish only a tiny discrepancy, like a child, who is encouraged to study well in class, and if he succeeds, he is praised as an “A” student.

At the same time, we must remember: Now I see myself, and nothing more.
[110682]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/24/13, Writings of Baal HaSulam “Peace in the World”

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Question: What is the prerequisite for a desire to unite, is it my desire to understand and to feel everything within me?

Answer: During the process of spiritual work, our desire to understand and to feel everything within us does not contract; on the contrary, it goes and grows more and more.  And it must expand because it is becoming more and more integral.  I already begin to understand how my image of reality changes and that my body, by occupying a particular volume in physical space, gives me a feeling of distance, isolation from others, even opposition and difference from others.

I need to bring myself to a state where I feel myself freed from the body.  The body doesn’t exist.  Above my body, which is to say beyond the ego, there exists connection between me and others.  And the body doesn’t exist, it is some kind of egoistic image in my imagination, in our consciousness.  This is how I need to learn to describe my future state to myself.  What interests me is only the spiritual unity between us.  There is no significance to bodies.  Later we will see how they disappear.

In the wisdom of Kabbalah we learn about the birth of the spiritual Kli, about its growth and about changes of state.  The same thing takes place with us in our world, the birth and growth of our beastly body, which in principle is that ego.  Our body is what exists in our imagination, in fact, it is formed within our ego.  After that it melts, disappears, dies, and in its place another body appears, and another, and so forth until we go out to the level of the completed correction.  We return into the bodies all the time because they are imperative for us for our independent attainment of every spiritual level.

Between every spiritual level there is a disconnect, a split.  In order to attain a particular level you need to fall from it to the level of this world.  At least for a moment you must feel that you exist only in this beastly state, and after this you will begin to attain the next higher spiritual level.  You fall to this level all the time, and then again you carry out an energetic leap to the next higher level.

And only with the completion of all the corrections when you carry out an action called (Shmuel II 23:20) “…a valiant man from Kabtziel who had done many acts” (which is to say, “I will gather together”), when you gather all of these levels and connect them integrally then the last state of the full completion of the correction appears.  And until then, we correct every value in a discrete (isolated) form, just as an electron leaps within the atom to the next levels.  But in general when it leaps it emits photons, whereas, we do the opposite because we are ascending spiritually; therefore, we apparently absorb energy from the surrounding energetic field called “Creator” or “Light,” and this obligates our ascent to a higher and higher orbit.
[110003]
From the 2^nd Preparation for the Convention in Krasnoyarsk 6/13/13

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The Torah, Exodus, 20:14: “Thou shall not covet thy neighbor’s house, thou shall not covet thy neighbor’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbor’s.”

A house, a wife, a servant, an ox, or an ass are all a person’s major desires that gradually connect in him, starting from the external vessels to the most inner desires.

“Thou shall not covet,” means that you have to work with your desires in order to bestow and not for yourself.

If until now it was about what you have and how you should work with it, now it is about what the other has and what you cannot use.

To use means to “want.” It isn’t just “thou shall not covet” in the sense of “don’t take” but actually not to covet, so that you will not feel the slightest envy towards the other. Then you begin to understand that if you relate to him you will not even see his image.

Usually you see some good and some bad in a person and envy him a little, etc. You cannot see him as he actually is; you see him in relation to you, whether better or worse one way or the other. If you don’t look at him through the prism of envy etc., you will not see his image.

He will never be depicted to you, since our sub-base is like a compact disc that is sensitive to light, that is behind the camera lens that catches the picture, changes it into electric signals and transmits it to the control so our sub-base perceives everything only in relation to us: to what extent it seems better or worse with regards to my ego.

If I get rid of it in relation to myself, then I don’t see you, you disappear from my sight. What happens? It turns out that the world doesn’t exist. I only see an absolute vacuum.

This means that the corrected state implies lack of envy in me and all the other states with regard to other people and humanity. In that case, I begin to understand that there is no one and that everything disappears. Then I have to find a totally new attribute that will allow me to see what does exist.

It turns out that if my ego is nullified, then the whole picture of the world is nullified and the world does not exist. So what does exist? There is nothing but the attribute of bestowal. But how can I perceive it? I begin to change myself according to this attribute of bestowal and to the same extent I am not compatible with it, I begin to see the differences and vice versa; to the extent that I am compatible with it, I begin to feel this attribute since a contrast has been created. It turns out that the part of the world in which I am not compatible with the attribute of bestowal is still me for the time being and the part of the world in which I am compatible with the attribute of bestowal is the Creator. Then, I and the Creator appear and there is no one but us.

When I gradually attain full correction, it is as if I disappear and only my feeling of the one unique Creator remains. Thus, I reach the recognition that “there is none else besides Him”
[109815]
From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 3/04/13

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Question: How can I feel the others if the heart doesn’t feel that they are close yet?

Answer: You have to think that the others are part of your soul and that only by the connection with others can you build the vessel for receiving the Light, the revelation of the Creator, the revelation of the true state, which means bestowal. The world of truth is the world of bestowal. We, however, are under the domination of a lie, in some fantasy that this world seemingly exists by the force of receiving. We have to think about this as much as we can, until it’s clear that everything exists according to the force of bestowal.

Our fictitious and distorted perception that forces us to think and feel differently is only in us. So because of it we don’t see the real world, and we are like blind people walking in the dark, feeling our way by holding on to a wall. We don’t understand where we are!

Thus, all of humanity is wandering blindfolded in the dark. We have to make our greatest efforts in order to remove this concealment, and then we will see that all of reality exists only by the force of bestowal and love. We will see reality as some kind of an enchanted fantasy world in which everything operates by the laws of total bestowal. We wander around this enchanted city and we have the chance to constantly correct and improve ourselves, by acquiring additional power of bestowal each time.

Thus we increasingly assimilate in this city and can use everything and understand and feel more. This is called ascending the spiritual ladder.

But the moment the spiritual ladder is revealed to us, it becomes clear that all of reality is bestowal and love alone. Besides, there is a small bubble in this reality in which we sleep, like in a coma, not regaining consciousness. This sick fantasy is only in our heads like in a mind of a person who has lost consciousness and different fluid, chaotic thoughts, flow in his mind. This is what is happening to us now…

The reality of our world does not exist! It’s only a kind of fantasy, but it’s very important since only from it can we ascend to the truth.
[109182]
From the 2^nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/04/13, The Zohar

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Question: Will the communication between people change in the integral society? Will they move on to some kind of deeply sensitive system of communication?

Answer: By their complementing each other, people will create such devices and mechanisms for measurement that they will feel the next level, the world, that in the meantime they don’t feel today since we aren’t connected to each other.

The thing is, despite the presence of the relative repulsion, there is no attraction between us which means there aren’t two forces which work to build the picture of this creation.

A person has to have a new sense organ called the “soul.” By uniting in integral groups, people find contact with their soul and then start communicating with each other on the level of the general soul—the unified information field to which they have to connect.

Therefore, there is the appearance of a large group of sensitive children because humanity is now more prepared to have contact with this information field.

Question: Can we expect some evolution on the level of biological bodies?

Answer: No. The biological body exists only within our feelings. To the extent that our feelings will begin to change into being higher, then the body will gradually lose its importance within our feelings until such a state that the whole world will begin to disappear like in a fog. Already physicists and psychologists are speaking about this. These are purely scientific statements.
[109308]
From KabTV’s “Through Time” 3/20/13

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Question: You and I are the same age. Today we see different flaws in the young generation that were taboo in our times, how can we find the power to love these people? Suppose a person behind the wheel runs over a boy before his mother’s eyes, can she love the killer afterward?

Answer: It isn’t about loving the killer. You are bringing an extreme example, but I will try to explain. The mother has to rise to the level where she sees what actually happens: That nothing in this world is done by people, but that everything is fulfilled by the system of cooperation between all the people and the one upper force that leads us towards the goal.

What does “her son” mean?  The boy that was killed is her son on the corporeal level, but on the next level, on the human level, it is part of a system that appears and disappears. When I discover the whole system, I don’t see any flaws in it; I see that everything is managed by only one force.

But in this case I am not on the same level the mother is, where we see, God forbid, how her son is killed. I feel all this differently. I am not the mother anymore, and he is not the child, we are all mutually connected and I already understand that both life and death are perceived in a totally different way. It is an endless change of states. What is the difference between feeling ourselves in our body and feeling ourselves outside the body? These are different levels of perception. We learn all this in the perception of reality.

So there is no answer to your question as you ask it. It is impossible to explain to a mother who is on the corporeal level of her development what has happened to her son. But a person who attains spirituality certainly perceives everything differently.

I also saw it with my teacher. Several months after I came to study with him, the mother of one of his students passed away. According to Jewish custom the relatives of the deceased sit Shiva at home and mourn. I came to express my condolences and what do you think I saw there? They were having small talk as if nothing had happened. I was shocked. It really affected me at the time.

This means that I began to realize that people see life and death in a totally different manner; it isn’t a tragedy for them, not the loss of life. When you begin to feel the whole network of forces, you see that nothing disappears, and no one goes anywhere, but simply disappears from your perception and not more than that. But it is hard to explain that at the moment.  We have to advance towards revelation and then a person will discover the answer to all the questions by himself.
[109887]
From the 1^st Preparation for the Convention in Krasnoyarsk 6/13/13

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Baal HaSulam “Peace in the World”: Everything is evaluated not by its appearance at a given moment, but according to its measure of development. Everything in reality, good and bad, and even the most harmful in the world, has a right to exist and should not be eradicated from the world and destroyed. We must only mend and reform it because any observation of the work of Creation is enough to teach us about the greatness and perfection of its operator and Creator.

From here clear and far-reaching conclusions can be made. Everything that happens in the world at every moment comes from the single source, from the Creator. I correct only my own perception, my own vision. Moreover, I correct it in only one direction: to achieve bestowal fully. Thus I discover the world, which is less distorted by my nature, more complete; I see that this is its true, immutable form.

Question: If we correct only our perception of the world, then why do we need to disseminate among other people?

Answer: I want to bring them closer to the goal through dissemination. In fact, they are parts of my soul. The whole world is parts of my soul, and I work with them twofold: on the one hand, I carry the Light to them, and on the other hand, I create the condition for them to get closer to me. The main thing is that thanks to these two actions, directly and “through the back door,” alternating them we unite, and eventually I return all the parts of my soul.

This is the way I have to look at the world, including the still, vegetative, and animate nature. All reality is the essence of my soul, a unified desire. It’s revealed to me now because by definition, I cannot feel anything but it. The desire is my “sensitive material,” and I need only to reveal its reality correctly. I work on that, on correcting my own perception.

How? According to the principle of “love thy neighbor as thyself.” Why? I do so because now parts of my ego, which distort the picture of the world, seem remote to me, often disgusting, opposite, and I have to correct my perception.

Thus, in the end, I correct only myself. That is why Baal HaSulam writes that even bad things should be not destroyed, but corrected. Now they are bad, hateful in my eyes, and when I correct my vision, my attitude, they will become good and useful for me.

It’s impossible to correct anything in the world, but oneself. We already see that this brings only harm. And hence it’s necessary to understand that all the corrections, all the positive changes, are realized precisely in our attitude.

Even if I see the most evil person in front of me, I need to correct myself so that he ceases to do harm. You can destroy someone only if he wants to stop my action of correction, meaning to kill me. Thus, he leaves me no choice, and in this case it will also be a correction. However, while I have a different solution, I must act, work on correction, so that evil is eliminated from the world.

Question: Still, why do we tell people about the integral methodology as if we want to convince them of something?

Answer: Because in this manner we assure the correction of ourselves. To whom do I explain the method? I explain to the parts of my soul. However, I do not correct them, but just give them a tool to correct themselves. And for me, this is self-correction.

We must imagine a system where my parts are outside of me, and that is why I can correct them in this way. I do not destroy or suppress them, but pass the method of correction by gentle explanations. I care about them to the extent of how much they are able to use it, and to the extent of their inability, I create the conditions for them to get closer to me. However, I do not pull them by force, do not demand obedience. After all, we are separated by the evil inclination and I have to correct it. In other words, I do so and they approach me, in spite of mutual rejection. And thus, I return them to the source.

We have to think about this picture. An evil motive penetrated the unified desire, broke it into pieces and scattered them in different directions. Now, when instead of belonging to one whole, we experience oppositeness, hatred; we need to understand how we transform this separation into unity; in the new power of our unity, we need to understand why we start correction in this way, preserving everyone’s uniqueness. I have to protect the egoistic desire. It’s like the “Angel of Death” that will turn into the “Pure Angel.” Without it, the whole creation is worthless.
[109564]
From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/9/13, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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Our sages said: “All of Israel is responsible for each other.” This is clear even from the days of Abraham who discovered the method of correction and gathered people who understood that it is possible to change the world only by changing man. In addition to that, by changing man we don’t simply change the world but also change our perception of reality and then instead of this world we feel the upper world. These are the people that Abraham taught how to connect, so that they would be able to establish the attribute of mutual bestowal in the connection between them, which is the vessel for the revelation of the upper world, the upper state.

The state of the egoistic connection and of what is felt within it is called “this world.” The new state in which we are connected and love one another is called “the upper world.” Besides, in this new state, in the mutual connection between us, we feel the general force of nature. We have not designed ourselves by ourselves in mutual bestowal, but there is a force above us that stems from nature which is in equivalence of form with us and is now being revealed in us. This is called the “revelation of the Creator to the created being.”

So, a “created being” is those who managed to connect as “one man in one heart,” in mutual bestowal. Thus, according to the equivalence of form, we reach the upper state. So, the principle of “all of Israel is responsible for each other” can be understood in two directions, straight and opposite:

·         If you belong to the category of “Israel,” you are responsible for everyone.

·         If people connect and want to belong to the category of “Israel,” they have to be responsible for each other.
[109198]
From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/05/13, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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Question: How can we acquire the integral approach with regard to the whole world to all of reality?

Answer: Imagine that you tell someone about your work place, about the place where you live, and about the world in general. You are not required to make any special efforts since it’s your life, and you feel that the world is yours. You “breathe” it and so you can wander around in this inner picture mentally and describe it in words.

We should also see the inner picture of the integral world in which we discern all the details and the connection between them. The same rules operate here too. There are states in which I can follow the general connection between certain phenomena, but the details of the mutual cooperation are still unclear since I have not yet entered this area. I see certain parts in general lines and they are relatively understood, but when it comes to individual parts, there are problems and I am not sure about what is going on.

This is the process in which I gradually penetrate more deeply and discover more subtleties. It’s as if I fly in a spaceship towards earth or check the scale of a map on the Internet until I “land” in a certain part.

But there are also exceptions: In our world we see bigger areas but fewer details, and when we get closer, we see more details but a smaller area. In spirituality, however, it’s not so, there both the characteristics of quantity and of quality of the picture of the world gradually increase. I encompass the whole system at the same time including its separate attributes; it’s because in this system every detail includes all the other details.

By this wonderful spiritual “patent” I see the general picture and each of its details as one, exactly the same.

Question: How can I become more integral? How can I increase the sensitivity of this perception in me?

Answer: Ask for it. There is no other means. No matter what you do, add a request to it that is as clear as possible and you will see how it works.
[109190]
From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/05/13, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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We must yearn to actually see the friend as the greatest in our generation, to actually feel it “within reason” as if it were the truth and not as it seems to a person’s desire to receive. The desire to receive always wants to feel good and comfortable and so it instinctively diminishes everything around it so as to be “on top.” The most important thing for it is to rule.

So accepting the thought about the need to connect with the friends as a means for reaching connection with the Creator is only possible in “faith above reason” since we certainly don’t see things as they really are. It’s only according to this minor external condition—that a person yearns for the same goal and is ready to accept all the necessary conditions to advance towards it—that we begin to relate to the other as a friend as a means of connecting to the Creator.

According to these external signs, we decide to start working on our attitude towards that person. If he is ready to work together we dismiss all the other demands of our ego and we get closer to that person and connect with him in order to actually discover the connection between us, not only in “faith above reason.”

To the extent that we actually communicate, we approach the building of the spiritual vessel in which the Creator is revealed. The connection can be “‘above reason” when I don’t see that the friend is “worth it,” but I still connect to him. I use it as a means, which is called the time of preparation when I respect the friends not because I see that they are great. According to my senses I feel that I am greater than them, but I work above my senses and don’t agree with them and imagine that the friends are greater.

In order to transcend from a state of “faith above reason” to the state of “within reason,” which means to truly respect the friends, I have to correct the vessels, my perception. The correction of the vessels is when we begin to work on the connection between us, despite the fact that we know the opposite. We establish a society in which everyone impresses the others with the feeling of the greatness of the group and the goal.

By working together, we draw the Light that Reforms, and eventually we move from “faith above reason to “within reason,” and thus we continue to rise. The next levels are more difficult, of course. First the friends seemed quite average, having some good sides and some bad sides. When I had to work “above reason,” I could easily do it and accept them as equal, as partners along the spiritual path and even as the greatest in our generation. Their goal seemed important, and they seemed great.

But then came the hardening of the heart and I began to see different flaws in them, it became difficult to accept them as great and to see the Creator behind them, to warm myself by the fact that I don’t pay attention to anyone except the friends who become the most precious of all for me. Thus, each time becomes more difficult until I manage to overcome these interruptions and fill my measure.

Then all my efforts of working “above reason” turn to “within reason” and become the right vessel in which the first revelation of the attribute of bestowal takes place, which means that a person is filled with the feeling of the Creator inside him. Thus “faith above reason” is a gradual process, as we ascend from one level to the next, but when we build our vessel we have to yearn to have it within reason as much as we can.
[109091]
From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 06/03/13, Writings of Rabash

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