Question: Does it make sense not to ask the Creator, but just to thank Him? Or is it a plea that is necessary?

Answer: Our appeal to the Creator consists of two parts: a plea and gratitude. It is best to start with gratitude because it prepares us for the right relationship with the upper force, then there is the plea.

Question: How do you thank correctly?

Answer: Do it from the heart. As you feel it, that is the way to thank. There are no canons or rules in this. Desire is in the heart.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/4/18, “Correct Request”

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Question: There is a very short prayer called Modeh Ani, which is a morning prayer in which a person thanks the Creator. Before getting out of bed, just as he opens his eyes, he says this prayer: “I offer thanks to You, living and eternal King, for You have mercifully restored my soul within me; Your faithfulness is great!”

Please explain why it starts with gratitude?

Answer: “Modeh ani lefanecha, I thank You.” For what? “Melech chai ve kayam”—that You fill the whole world, You control the whole world, only You.

Question: It says: “Thank You, living and eternal King,” What “eternal” means is somehow understandable. What is “living”?

Answer: “Living” means which exists in everything that exists. Without His presence in something, it would not exist.

Question: So every person should start any day with this gratitude?

Answer: With the fact that he got up to get to know the Creator. This is the beginning of the day for absolutely anyone. “Melech chai ve kayam, she he chezarta bi nishmati”—”for You have mercifully restored my soul within me; Your faithfulness is great!”

Question: Did He take the soul?

Answer: He takes it in the evening and returns it in the morning.

Question: The fact that I go to bed and go to sleep, is it called that I give my soul for this time?

Answer: The soul flies away.

Question: And how do the Kabbalists explain that the soul “leaves” for this time?

Answer: A person enters a dream, and he no longer controls himself, and therefore his obvious connection with the Creator is cut off. Only the Creator is the master over him during sleep, at night. And in the morning a person gets his soul back and thanks the Creator for it.

Question: You just said that the soul is my connection with the Creator. Is this called a soul?

Answer: Yes. And at the time of sleep, it kind of breaks off.

Question: “For You have mercifully restored my soul within me,” does this mean that it is the Creator who decides whether to return it or not?

Answer: Yes.

Question: What is night then?

Answer: This is when the soul, so to say, breaks away from the body, and a person feels only a dream or his animal state.

Question: Then here’s the question: can night come during the day? Or do I have to fall asleep?

Answer: No. Can you imagine how many people don’t wake up at all?!

Question: So these are people without a soul? The Creator took it and does not return it?

Answer: Yes.

Question: Why?

Answer: It’s quieter in the world. A man without a soul is better off. You have to work on your soul and be thankful for it.

Question: And then: “Your faithfulness is great!” Am I repeating this as a mantra: “Your faithfulness is great!”?

Answer: No. Because thanks to the fact that I believe in You, I am connected to You, thanks to this, I wake up to a new day. “Raba emunatecha”—great is the faith in You.

Question: Do I imagine it or does it live within me? Or should I repeat this as a physical exercise in order to establish a “muscle” of connection with the Creator? Your faithfulness is great! Your faithfulness is great! Your faithfulness is great!

Answer: It just forms within a person, inside him.

Question: When we analyzed the prayer for the road, you said that the road is where a person goes from state to state. This is not a way from city to city.

And here, too, is this prayer also from state to state?

Answer: Yes.

Question: So you don’t have to say it in the morning when you just opened your eyes?

Answer: No, it has nothing to do with day and night at all. In Kabbalah, a day is when I have enlightenment, when I see, feel, and have a connection with the Creator. And night is when a state descends of twilight on the soul and on the heart. And when the dawn comes next, I have to say such a prayer.

Question: Is it necessary to pronounce it in these exact words or not?

Answer: No, in principle, all this can be said differently.

Question: And what should a person say from the heart?

Answer: How good it is for me to be connected with the Creator, this is a day for me. And how bad and sad it is for me to be alone without the Creator, for me it is like night.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 6/1/23

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What is the meaning of the Tefilat HaDerech (Traveler’s Prayer or Wayfarer’s Prayer)?“

The meaning of the Tefilat HaDerech (Traveler’s Prayer or Wayfarer’s Prayer) is that we leave the place where we think we live, to another place and path.

We do not know how long we will be on the road and when we will reach our destination. Maybe we think it will take just a couple of minutes, and then we find ourselves on a path that takes several years, which could start seeming endless.

Where the prayer writes, “lead us in peace,” it means that we should bring no harm to anyone in our path forward in life, i.e., in what comes from us outwardly to others.

Likewise, “direct our steps in peace” means to let there be peace for ourselves and for everyone we encounter on our path forward.

“And cause us to reach our destination in life, joy and peace” means that ultimately, everything we do on our path should be good for everyone.

The direct literal translation of “Tefilat HaDerech” is “prayer of the path.” What is the path? It is absolutely everything, and it is endless: the prayer of our direction and our existence, i.e., how our lives should be.

“Save us from every enemy and ambush, from robbers and wild beasts on the trip, and from all kinds of punishments that rage and come to the world” means that we should observe our movements from one inner state to another. It does not discuss geographical locations. Rather, it emphasizes our peaceful progress so that we avoid problematic encounters with anyone and so that we safely reach our destination: a “place” where we connect with others with ever-greater bonds of kindness.

The path is thus the direction to more and more connection with others and nature. Why else would we wish to leave our abodes? It is so that we exit to a greater connection time and again.

The robbers are then those obstacles sent to us on the path, which help us further connect with each other in order to reach our true and final destination in life, the purpose of our lives.

We never make a prayer in order to have a smoother path, but we wish for the path to bring us to our destination, to more and more closeness among each other and with the single good and benevolent force in reality, which Kabbalists call “the Creator.” Since coming to closeness with each other and the Creator depends on us adjusting our attitude to be good and benevolent outwardly to them, then we come to discover that they are one and the same.

Then the prayer continues: “May You confer blessing upon the work of our hands and grant me grace, kindness, and mercy in Your eyes and in the eyes of all who see us.” It refers to us treating the world and everything that comes our way as best as we possibly can, i.e., trying to justify everything and staying connected to the idea that everything stems from the single good and benevolent force, the Creator. By doing so, we ourselves become benevolent conduits of goodness. This is the meaning of “May You confer blessing upon the work of our hands.”

There can only be a blessing if we strive for greater closeness. Without an effort to reach more closeness with each other and the Creator, then we would not be able to ask for such a connection, and we would accordingly receive no blessing.

The prayer then ends: “And bestow upon us abundant kindness and hearken to the voice of our prayer, for You hear the prayers of all. Blessed are You G‑d, who hearkens to prayer.” That is, the prayer ends in us thanking the Creator for hearing the prayer.

However, does the Creator really hear this prayer?

It is important to understand that the Creator is the single force of reality that acts within us, and so everything we think and say, we say practically with His desire. In general, He does it all Himself. In other words, the Creator Himself places the prayer into our mouths as He is the single force that exists in everything.

It is important to understand that this prayer is not simply a prayer for travelers who leave onto the road from one geographic location to another, but it is a prayer for the path of life. Everything that is implied in the Torah, in prayers, is all a means for our exit into life, and “life” in its fullest meaning is the eternal and perfect life that we attain when we learn to apply the same attitude of the Creator—goodness and benevolence—from ourselves outwardly.

In order for such a prayer to truly be heard, it is insufficient to simply say it with our mouths. We rather need to pronounce it in our hearts. When the prayer comes from our heart, then it is of utmost importance, and it influences the Creator.

Here is the prayer, Tefilat HaDerech:

May it be Your will, G‑d, our G‑d and the G‑d of our fathers, that You should lead us in peace and direct our steps in peace, and guide us in peace, and support us in peace, and cause us to reach our destination in life, joy, and peace. Save us from every enemy and ambush, from robbers and wild beasts on the trip, and from all kinds of punishments that rage and come to the world. May You confer blessing upon the work of our hands and grant me grace, kindness, and mercy in Your eyes and in the eyes of all who see us, and bestow upon us abundant kindness and hearken to the voice of our prayer, for You hear the prayers of all. Blessed are You G‑d, who hearkens to prayer.

Based on KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman and Semion Vinokur on May 22, 2023. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman
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Question: There is a Jewish prayer for travelers that is read when moving from city to city, leaving the settlement.

May it be Your will, G‑d, our G‑d and the G‑d of our fathers, that You should lead us in peace and direct our steps in peace, and guide us in peace, and support us in peace, and cause us to reach our destination in life, joy, and peace. Save us from every enemy and ambush, from robbers and wild beasts on the trip, and from all kinds of punishments that rage and come to the world. May You confer blessing upon the work of our hands and grant me grace, kindness, and mercy in Your eyes and in the eyes of all who see us, and bestow upon us abundant kindness and hearken to the voice of our prayer, for You hear the prayers of all. Blessed are You G‑d, who hearkens to prayer.

What does it mean by “in peace”?

Answer: We leave the place where we think we live, to some other place, to some other way.

It is unknown how long we will be on the road and when will we reach our destination. Maybe we think it will be just a couple of minutes, and suddenly it drags on for years if there is an end to this path at all.

Question: Could it even be the road of life?

Answer: Of course! A road is a road.

Question: And what does “lead us in peace” mean?

Answer: So that we do not hurt anyone.

Question: That is, the vector from me outward?

Answer: From me, absolutely. It is a prayer after all.

Question: So “leading us in peace” means I do not harm anyone?

Answer: Yes.

Question: Then it goes like this: “direct our steps in peace.” What is meant by the words “direct our steps in peace”?

Answer: So that it will be peaceful for you and for everyone else you meet on the way.

Question: Is it like an addition, a continuation?

Answer: Yes.

Comment: Further: “and cause us to reach our destination in life, joy, and peace.”

My Response: So that in the end, everything I do today on the way would be good for the whole world, for everyone.

Question: When you just said on the way, what did you imply in here? What is the way of man?

Answer: That is what it is called, Tfilat HaDerech. The prayer of the path.

Question: When you say “path,” are you saying a segment of life or what is it?

Answer: Everything! Absolutely everything! Where nothing ends. Moreover, this is called the Prayer of the Way, Tfilat HaDerech. Not on the way or something. This is the prayer of your direction, existence. Meaning, this is how your life should be.

Question: And further: “Save us from every enemy and ambush, from robbers and wild beasts on the trip, and from all kinds of punishments that rage and come to the world.” What does that mean?

Answer: A person looks at his movement from one state to another, not from one village to another,
for him to advance peacefully so that he does not have to get involved in any problems with anyone and so that he reaches his destination safely. The next place is when he would be connected to other people with even greater bonds of kindness.

This is called a path. Otherwise, why does he leave the house?

Question: So he goes out to a bigger and bigger connection all the time, is that how he advances?

Answer: Yes.

Question: And the robbers in this case, who are they? All sorts of punishments, what is on the path?

Answer: It is those who are sent to him; you can say, either the Creator Himself or the evil inclination of man. That is, the obstacles that are being sent.

Question: Are there obstacles in order to come to a good state? Are these all our mistakes, sins, all of this?

Answer: Yes, but do not think about it as if all this comes to me for whatever happened in the past. In Kabbalah it is not accepted “what was.” This is for what the Creator sends me so that I can be even more connected with Him and thus get to the true destination.

Question: You are saying that all the obstacles are being sent to us so that I get stronger on the way?

Answer: So that I would be more connected with the Creator.

Question: And if they weaken me, if I become weaker, what then?

Answer: The Creator does this. It is all done by Him anyway.

Question: Do I need to pray that the path is smoother or not?

Answer: We pray not for a smooth path, but for the path to bring us closer to the Creator.

Question: So, as a result, as you said, becoming closer with others is becoming closer with the Creator?

Answer: Yes.

Comment: Then there is a continuation: “May You confer blessing upon the work of our hands and grant me grace, kindness, and mercy in Your eyes and in the eyes of all who see us,...” 

My Response: This is for us to treat the world and everything that comes our way as best as possible, trying to justify everything and not disconnecting from the fact that everything comes from the Creator, and therefore be benevolent conduits of good. This is “May You confer blessing upon the work of our hands.”

Question: Can there be a blessing only if I strive for greater closeness? And if I do not strive, then is there no blessing for this?

Answer: Then how can you ask?

Question: That is right. And it ends: “and bestow upon us abundant kindness and hearken to the voice of our prayer, for You hear the prayers of all. Blessed are You G‑d, who hearkens to prayer.”

Does the prayer always end with this?

Answer: Yes, we thank Him for hearing the prayer.

Question: Does He hear our prayer?

Answer: He does not just hear. After all, the Creator is the force that is in us. And therefore, everything that we think and say, we say practically with His desire, with His mouth, if I may say so, and in general, He does it all Himself. The Creator puts prayer in my mouth.

Question: Then the last question. You say He is in us, and we are in Him. Is it possible to understand this dualism?

Answer: I cannot explain it. It is the one that exists in everything.

Comment: It seems to be a prayer for traveling, a simple prayer, one can say.

My Response: It is not for the road, it is for the path of life.

Question: It turns out that it is for the path of life. Can we say that almost all prayers are written like this, for the road of life?

Answer: Yes. Everything that is implied in the Torah, in prayers, it all means a person’s exit into life. This is the path.

Question: And the last question. I just said a prayer. And what if I pronounce it inside through the heart?

Answer: That is how it should be.

Question: That is, I can go out on the road just like this, with his prayer from the heart, and is it more important than a written prayer?

Answer: Of course, it is more important. After all, it comes from your heart, and it influences the Creator.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 5/22/23

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Question: What is the most important intention a person should have every day?

Answer: To be able to do what I have planned. So that today brings me one step closer to the goal of my life.

Question: Do Kabbalists plan such a step every day?

Answer: More or less, yes.

Question: Why do certain situations repeat themselves in life with accuracy to an hour and a minute? For example, some day something was stolen from a person. Or he met someone in the same place, at the same hour.

Answer: I do not know. I do not have this. I have not tracked this.
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From KabTV’s “Blitz Of Kabbalah Tips” 5/18/23

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Question: At the end of the article “The Letters of Rav Hamnuna Saba” it is written that all the letters’ questions mean raising MAN by the letters, and all the answers are the descending of MAD. What does it mean?

Answer: When a person is reading certain texts, he raises his desires, requests, and prayers to the Creator, and this is called MAN.

When a person finishes his request, his prayer, then he receives from above what is called MAD, which is a descent of the upper light, the upper force. This is how a person influences the Creator and the Creator influences a person. This is what is called MAN and MAD.

Therefore, it is said that being in the Sinai desert, the sons of Israel were fed on MAN, manna from heaven, that is, through raising their desires, their prayers to the Creator. In response, they received from above something like a white semolina, that is, a substance covering the sand in the desert. They collected this substance and ate it for 40 years.

40 years symbolizes from Malchut to Bina, that people must pass through and correct those qualities, and then they enter the palace of the Creator and reveal Him.
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From KabTV’s “Introduction of The Book of Zohar” 4/23/23

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Question: What is prayer?

Answer: Prayer is when a person judges himself, weighs himself, analyzes who he is, what he is, what he is for, and accordingly puts himself in a certain relation to the Creator, realizing that the Creator is an absolute that does not change.

Since the absolute does not change, then by measuring oneself relative to the Creator, a person sees how he can always change himself. Such revelations in what he can change relative to the Creator, that involuntarily lead him to search for changes in himself, are called prayer.

The misconception of prayer that exists all over the world came from the fact that at the time of the destruction of the Temple, people fell from the Kabbalistic degree to the earthly one and ceased to feel themselves relative to the Creator. Therefore, prayer means all kinds of appeals and cries.

Let’s say you’re shouting to feel good. But it’s not clear who you’re shouting at. The Creator originally made you like this. What for? To make you scream? Do you think He’s just stupid or someone who can hear, see, and feel?

The Creator is a law of nature to which you attribute your feelings because you are a sensual creature, a desire that is in a lack.

The appeal to the Creator came from religions. But whom should I address? You have to address yourself, how to change yourself under the influence of the positive, absolute force of nature.

Treat it as something unchangeable, as a field of gravity that you are trying to use correctly so as not to fall, but to fly, to use its qualities in some mechanisms that you invent. Relate to the Creator as something inanimate. And then such an attitude to oneself and to this absolute field of power will be called prayer.

Finding resources for the possibility of self-correction is prayer.

We raise our desire, MAN, to the system of forces, which is called Aba ve Ima, meaning, we turn to the field that exists around us. We want to use both opposite forces, positive and negative, plus and minus, Aba ve Ima, Hochma and Hassadim, in order to correct ourselves and rise to their degree.

After all, by rising to the degree of Nature, the Creator, Elokim, you are entering into absolute perfection, peace, and balance with nature.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. What Is Prayer?” 2/27/11

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Question: 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.
[311176]
From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 2/14/22

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Question: You often repeat: “Why don’t you ask?” But how should we ask? Everyone wants to, but no one understands what they want. Is it some kind of stupid state of hopelessness.

Answer: But why?! Because you do not sense whom to turn to. I understand your problems and I want to direct you correctly.

You do not know whom to turn to. If some kind of a statue were placed in front of you, you would be able to do it.

Once, when I was in Mexico, our bus stopped in a parking lot near a village. There was a statue of the Madonna at the crossroad.

There were many Mexicans among the passengers. People got off the bus. One lame Mexican with a wooden crutch, who had difficulty getting off the bus, approached the Madonna, kissed her, and began to pray. There was something for him to turn to, there was a specific image.

And there are no images in Kabbalah! To what should you turn? To your own corrected self!

Who is the Creator? The property of bestowal and love for others revealed by you.

Kabbalah turns you to yourself. It is impossible for us to understand it! In our minds, this is a terrible dualism, and we cannot do anything about it.

Therefore, Kabbalah is intended only for those who already have this dualism inside them: there is a heart and a point in the heart, i.e., a selfish desire and a germ of altruistic intention. With this, you can move forward and begin to adapt and develop it.

The heart develops, and a point in the heart grows. In other words, two opposite desires develop; there is a dipole that can exchange and grow.

And if there is only a single desire to enjoy, then we need to imagine someone from the outside, not within oneself, but one against the other, and establish one as higher and the other lower, as if this is a created being and this is the Creator.

All this is conditional; there is no creation and no Creator. There are two levels one against the other, and that is it.

And where are you? You are nobody. You exist between these two levels, what we call the middle point of Sefirat Tifferet, Klipat Noga. You exist at this point only in order to realize both levels between which you exist. This is how you develop.

But if there is only one earthly desire in a person, his life, his loved ones, and so on, then he needs some kind of external object to which he will pray, to which he will turn, and on which he will supposedly depend.

In principle, Kabbalah itself sets people up this way. It still comes from ancient Babylon, from Abraham, who gave everyone what they needed: the beginnings of all religions, the beginnings of all beliefs, and the beginnings of Kabbalah. In practice, this is a single knowledge only at different levels.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. The Most Important Prayer” 10/6/12

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Question: In our life, as long as humanity has existed, there have been wars, and their instigators have always been men. Where in the nature of a man is such an essence to constantly either fight or play at war?

Answer: Firstly, they have not grown up, they are the same boys, not adults. An adult must eventually grow up over generations. During one lifetime, maybe not, but if generations had passed on the wisdom of life to each other, then this would not have happened.

After all, war is mutual destruction. And with it, you are not advancing yourself. By destroying others, you end up hurting yourself. History confirms this. So, there’s no point!

If the old people, who understand this, would pass on their wisdom to the young, taught them correctly and formed a different understanding of the world in them, the world would be different. We would not have spent a lot of money on the military, on police, and we would have lived just fine!

But our nature does not allow us to do this. So first of all, we need to correct it and not just have a nice life.

The general law of nature, the Creator, drives us to a certain goal and forces us to be fools until we realize who we are, that He is always tripping us up so that we finally give up, turn to Him and ask Him to remake our nature, change us— that is what you need.

Don’t make me feel good, but make me good! And then I will see the world as beautiful. That’s all! To change a request, a demand, an appeal to the Creator is what is required of us.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Men’s Games” 3/31/12

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