Question: You explained that we never see people in their true form; that is, our egoism hides who they really are from us. In turn, others also seem to see you not in the form that you are, but in a form they put on you that is comfortable for their egoism.

Where is the truth then?

Answer: There is no truth. There is no real truth; it is always relative. And the absolute truth will be only with the complete correction of all states of humanity when it reaches complete correction.

Right now, we cannot define it. But we know that truth manifests itself only in the property of bestowal and love, that is, in absolute goodness. What is absolute goodness, I do not know.

I can say that in some ways I define it for myself. But it is above me, above my nature; it is when I can put myself in the most objective position, that is, when I am not taking any of my own desires and motives into account, but instead rising above myself, accepting the desire of another, and acting only in his name.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Whom to Believe?” 11/16/13

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Question: Let’s say two people are butting heads. The first reaction of one is to hit the other, to overpower him, and thereby win; it is not like “turn your cheek” at all. How does Kabbalah relate to this?

Answer: Kabbalah teaches that if I am threatened and about to be punched, then I can punch first. And why not? Why should I turn the other cheek? This is not Kabbalah or Judaism at all.

In Judaism it is said: “Kill the one who rises against you, kill him first.” That is, “Eye for an eye; tooth for a tooth.”

Question: It is interesting that in Israel when two people clash, there is almost never a fight. There is no such quality in people here to immediately hit the other in the face.

Answer: It depends on the level of development in people. Greater development suggests that they will deal with it by logical methods and not by force.

I would not say that there are no fights at all. They happen among young people but very rarely. Fighting doesn’t solve anything. You have to convince or defeat your opponent by logic and argument.

In our world, physical strength is not a guarantee of superiority over others. Anyone can carry a gun or use mace or something else in their pocket. Anyone can have more money to show off, say their Porsche or something else.

Convincing others! That is, the use of logic where you kill an opponent with a word; that is strength. And we see this both in the Talmud and in other primary sources. There is no mention of showdowns anywhere, and everything is solved only logically.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Showdown Israeli Style” 10/19/13

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Is God physical, metaphysical, abstract, conceptual, material or immaterial?“

In the wisdom of Kabbalah, we study God in a practical fashion, in relation to us and how we attain it: as an upper force that creates us, the universe within and surrounding us, which rules over, sustains and guides it to a predetermined goal.

Similarly to how we refer to our parents as “mother and father” due to their specific relationship to us, when we attain a connection with the upper force, we attain a specific relationship that this force has toward us, and we cannot say anything about other possible attributes or relationships that this force might have. This is why we say in Kabbalah that we do not engage in the essence or the “self” of God, because we have no attainment in that aspect.

Therefore, with the methodology of Kabbalah, which is a practical and experimental research of ourselves and the surrounding reality, we undergo various changes upon ourselves until we can clearly perceive and sense God as an upper force that creates and sustains us, and which guides our development to a defined goal: our entering into balance—or in Kabbalistic language, “adhesion” (Heb. “Dvekut”)—with the Creator. We say “the Creator” because in Hebrew, the word for “Creator” (“Boreh”) stems from two words “come” (“Bo”) and “see” (“Reh”), i.e. we can only discuss what the Creator is once we attain this force through changes that we invite to ourselves using the Kabbalah method.

Therefore, we only characterize the upper force (the Creator, God) in relation to us people who attain it, as we can only analyze, sense and measure something that enters into our perception and sensation of reality. In the language of Kabbalah, such attainment is expressed as the reaction of the Kli (vessel/receptacle) to the light (the Creator’s quality) that fills it, while the light in and of itself is unattainable.

Therefore, by undergoing certain changes in ourselves and developing this Kli, we measure our reactions to it, and give definitions not to its qualities, but to our own reactions and perceptions. This is why Kabbalah is best defined as a science, that through applying its time-tested methodology upon ourselves, we attain results that past Kabbalists wrote about, which we can measure, repeat and reproduce. The knowledge of this science includes only what has been empirically verified.

Based on the article “Comparative Analysis of Kabbalah and Philosophy” by Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Question: Can you predict what will happen in five years? What will the world group look like?

Answer: I do not even think about it because I’m not interested in what will happen in five years. I am completely uninterested in the future. I have to learn from the past and realize the present so that there is no future and everything is realized now.

At every moment, the future is the end of this second and the beginning of the next; it is the end of this whole world, i.e., our egoistic state and complete correction.

Based on past knowledge and achievements, you do as much as possible so that this moment becomes the last before the complete correction of humanity. Then you are moving in a straight line. Where to? To the end of the correction. When? In the next moment.

This is the only way you can act if there is no concept of time.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. What Will Happen in Five Years?” 11/26/13

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Why do some people like martial arts?“

The human ego develops through competition, envy and desires for respect, control and power. When we see bigger, higher, stronger and more successful people than us, our egos feel defeated. That is why so many people are drawn to martial arts or to any kind of fight.

It is due to our very makeup, the way we were created as egoists from the very beginning. If we do not aim to correct our egoistic nature, then we evaluate others in comparison with ourselves.

We have an inner urge to evaluate people and things in order to be able to place them into inner categories that make sense to us, to work out what is better or worse, what we like or do not like, what we find pleasant or unpleasant, and so on. Everything we perceive passes through an egoistic filter: “Is this good or bad for me, and how?”

Our key perceptual apparatus is the desire to enjoy. We feel the world in relation to whether or not we enjoy from what we feel. It could be colors, sounds, or anything, and even objects or phenomena that we could be completely indifferent to. We distinguish everything in relation to our desire to enjoy, on a scale of how much better or worse someone or something is to me.

Based on KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Fortitude” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on November 11, 2013.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Will the world end?“

According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, there is no end of the world, but a transition to a new, higher and integral perception of the material realm that reveals itself to the degree in which we correct our nature: from our inborn nature of wishing solely to enjoy for our own benefit alone, to its polar opposite—wishing to benefit others and nature.

By correcting our nature in such a way, we discover new organs of perception, ones through which we perceive other omnipresent layers of reality that are concealed from our inborn level of perception.

Moreover, according to Kabbalah, the shift to this new perception is the defining characteristic of our current era. More and more people are feeling the incompleteness and narrowness of our current level of perception, and an inner calling to rise above it and enter a new broader and whole level of perception.

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Question: Why is there such a difference between your spiritual education and the spiritual education of current students? Why did Rabash lay everything upon you?

Answer: It depends on the quality of the soul. There is nothing you can do here. There are some souls this is given to (even outside the group) because they have to fulfill a certain mission. I do not like to talk about this but it is so; it is granted, there are such people.

I cannot say they are better, worse, higher, or lower. Just as one person is born with some inclination toward art, another to science, a third for working with his hands, and so on, it is the same here. We do not get to choose anything here. It is about the quality of the soul.

Therefore, Rabash took me in and started educating me. What is the difference? If someone else were in my place, he would have done the same thing. Throughout all the years, until the end of his life, he constantly kept me by his side although I did not understand much regarding what or why in terms of what could have been understood and attained from it all! That is how it was arranged.

Question: How did this magnet work then since you did not understand much?

Answer: Precisely because I understood so little, he could invest so much in me. I could neither resist nor know while he was working on me. He constantly invested more and more in me, but I did not know about it. What manifests in me today is what he instilled in me.

Question: What does it mean if someone else were in your place?

Answer: What is the difference? Does it depend on my appearance? This relates to the energy states between souls. I turned out to be the charge he had to work on. And he did. So, now I am the charge that he created—I do it to others.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. The Fate of the Kabbalist” 11/02/09

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Question: Why is there an illusion that I can influence any external factor that is in front of me?

Answer: Because you still exist only in one plane. You are like a bug that is just crawling without understanding that there is also height. In the same way, we do not understand that the universe is arranged in a completely different, non-egoistic way.

We run into all kinds of troubles all the time and live trying to dodge them. Such is the world, and such is our state.

To show us how to get out of it, there is the wisdom of Kabbalah. Otherwise, a person will come out of these states by a method of trial and error and hitting sharp corners all the time, which is very, very painful. It will take a long time for a person to learn from this.

We see how people do not want to learn. You tell them what the problem is and why they are experiencing such a crisis, but they do not want to accept this method. Why? Because it is against their will to receive, although small and petty, but it is against it. That is why they keep suffering, but no one wants to hear you.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Turn an Enemy Into a Friend” 11/18/13

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What do you think is really the cause of the crisis in the world today?“

We are all parts of an interconnected and interdependent system of nature. In our world today, this system manifests as interdependent relations among all people in the world, and between humanity and nature.

Egoistic human nature, however, which makes us enjoy at the expense of other people and nature, resists our interdependence. That is why we behave contrarily to the interconnectedness and interdependence that reveals itself more and more today.

The cause of the crisis in the world today is due to the contradiction between the interconnected and interdependent system of nature and the overblown human egoism that opposes connection.

Likewise, the comprehensive solution to the global crisis is to correct human egoism, to develop an intention that inverts egoism to its opposite, making it as interconnected and interdependent as nature itself. Doing so is possible through connection-enriching education, which includes learning about how our nature and nature in general works, how we develop by becoming increasingly opposite to nature until we eventually click into balance with it, and how we can use our social, cultural and media influences to help inspire our transformation to a harmonious and peaceful world. I have discussed this topic at length in several books, talks and other materials, and here is a good page to find out more about it.

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Question: We have to make many decisions every day. The Romans, for example, tossed a coin. They even had a saying: either a ship or a head. In other words, all or nothing. In 1845, the coin solved the question of the name of the city of Portland, Oregon, which was originally meant to be called Boston, but the coin showed otherwise and it instead became Portland.

Scientists conducted a study. People who needed to make a vital decision were told to “toss a coin.” They tossed a coin and when they checked them after six months, they saw that people felt good about their decision about tossing a coin.

Scientists believe that this is the choice of the golden mean. How do you think we should make decisions: with a coin or in another way?

Answer: I believe that if we are talking about serious things, for example, the choice of the name of the city, then we need to conduct a general survey. If this is some kind of private problem, but you still have a family and so on, then solve it in connection with others.

Question: Does it mean that I do not make the decision myself, but I need to take into account everything and everyone?

Answer: Of course. You cannot decide everything.

Question: What if I have such a character that I make decisions myself?

Answer: It means that you have not received enough blows yet, from family, children, parents, surrounding people, country, from anything at all. You still have to take everyone into account.

Question: What should happen when the head of the country, the leader, makes a decision?

Answer: If he makes a decision alone, then he is not a leader. He must understand how he needs to make decisions so that they are approved by the majority of the people, and that they may speak well of him.

This suggests that he made the right decision, not in order to respect himself, but to confirm that he made the right decision.

Comment: That is, when people say: “What a blessing that we had such a leader. We really felt good under his rule.”

My Response: Yes, that is the way he has to make his decision so that people talk about him like that. Not because he wants people to talk about him like that in order to be proud and so on, but because he is pleased that he has made the decision in agreement with the people. It is very important.

Question: What does it mean to make a decision in accordance with the Creator?

Answer: It means to be among such sages who would help you understand the thought of the Creator and make a decision in accordance with it and with the Creator.

Question: What decision does a sage who is in connection with the Creator make?

Answer: How to move people to the Creator, there is nothing else.

Question: That is, when we say “fateful decisions,” for the sage are they only those which involve bringing people to the Creator?

Answer: Only in this. After all, there is nothing else in the world. Everything else is just covered with all sorts of different words, but practically it is the same desire.

Comment: That is, if for example the leaders of our world are deciding how to carry out economic reform, how to build something…

My Response: It is always the same question: “How to take a step closer to the Creator?” It can be the economy or healthcare, or whatever!

Question: They just do not feel it, right?

Answer: They do not feel it, but the sage does. The solution is always in this: to be closer to the Creator.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 8/4/22

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