Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Who are the Jews today?“

Around 3,800 years ago, Abraham the Patriarch reached a perception of the oneness of nature, a perfect unity of everyone and everything as a single whole. He taught the ways of attaining the perception of nature’s oneness to anybody who was willing to learn back in ancient Babylon, and the Babylonians who advanced as a group implementing his methodology became initially known as “the people of Israel,” and later as “the Jews.” Every Jew today has a part of that perception, but it is yet to reveal itself, i.e. it exists only in potential.

Revealing the full extent of the perception that Abraham once attained would bring humanity to a state that Kabbalah calls “the end of correction,” i.e. the end of our development from perceiving in an incomplete, transient and divided manner, to perceiving a world where everyone and everything connects as one. We would then discover reality in its entirety: all worlds, created beings and various forms as one system filled with a single light, i.e. with a single force of connection. In such a state, we would perceive the true, whole and perfect reality.

Moreover, reaching such a perception is not a matter of whether a person is a Jew. Being Jewish is not about being born to a Jewish mother, as is commonly accepted in today’s world. A Jew is someone who yearns for connection (the Hebrew word for “Jew” [Yehudi] comes from the word for “united” [yihudi] [Yaarot Devash, Part 2, Drush no. 2]). Anybody who aspires to positively connect with others is on the way to becoming Jewish. The first stage toward reaching a state of unification is the condition that Hillel stated—”Don’t do to others what you hate”—and afterward we aim to reach the condition of “Love your neighbor as yourself.”

People who are born as Jews have certain remnants with exalted and powerful potential that come from a completely different perception of reality than the one we experience today. Also, humanity’s future development will lead to everybody having to reach the same perception as Abraham, where we perceive everything and everyone as one, and toward that perception, it does not matter whether someone was born a Jew or not.

Who is a Jew? A Jew is one who wishes to unite everyone, and who feels the whole of reality in addition to feeling oneself. We are Jews if we feel that everything and everyone belongs to us equally as to everyone else, and we yearn to attain the perception of our lives’ source, the discovery of everything and everyone as one.

Based on the video “Who Is a Jew Today?” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman and Oren Levi. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Question: How should we treat incidents from a human and Kabbalistic point of view? For example, something is happening, or someone is getting beaten. How should we react to this? Is intervening worthwhile?

Answer: Today we have been put in such a framework that people are afraid to interfere in anything. There are even studies on these topics. People pass by, they are afraid to get involved in conflicts: either you will get a knife in your side, or “it is not my business at all” so that they do not drag you through the courts.

We have created for ourselves such conditions of human community where it is impossible to just stand up for someone, even for simple, normal support or compassion. It is impossible to calm people down, it is impossible to break up a fight, because then they will do anything they want to you.

Humanity is very confused! It tries to compensate with laws for what is not filled with education. Men are not men, women are not women.

Look at how much humanity has changed internally and externally in 20 years, what they are becoming in their desires and aspirations, in everyone’s attempt to solve their questions and problems. It is just incredible! There are the scariest mutations! And where we will end up? We have just started this journey!

Comment: But there are old laws where one has to help the other.

My Response: Today they limit you. These are not the former laws of honor, which were clear to everyone, or the laws of chivalry, or the laws of samurai, or the laws of courtiers, which speak about the honor of a woman, justice, etc. If we are talking about a simple civil society, then we have destroyed it all.

No one respects another. There are no smart or stupid, old or young, men or women. There is some kind of unisex where there is no difference, you are afraid to interfere, you do not have any guidelines. You can be dragged through a legal fight just for some little thing! They will make a case out of it and, in general, do anything. There is no public response to this, because everything is corrupt.

Even during the Inquisition, there was relative order. The most ardent executioners and fanatics still behaved according to some canon.

Today it is very difficult for a person to promote some idea or advocate for something. This is natural. The last cry of dying humanity.

Question: Is it right to strive for honor and justice? Did we live correctly before?

Answer: It is impossible to say what is right and what is not because this is the natural development of humanity. There is no escape. If we do not correct egoism, we descend into really ugly forms.

In accordance with this, we continue to drift in the direction where it is generally unclear what awaits us. The same egoism keeps carrying us. We forget all the old forms when it was more or less balanced at the animate level, and now it is already taking mutational forms.

Children leave home, they do not want to work and do not want to study. And you cannot blame them for that! This is also our egoism, which goes through such stages of its mutational development. But this is also development, so to speak, a period of decay.

Solution is only in education.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Fight for Justice” 11/23/13

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Question: Did your teacher have a developed sense of justice?

Answer: Yes, Rabash had impulses to defend his point of view—and quite strongly. Especially when he saw arrogance on the path, he never gave in. Calmly, according to the laws, he demanded what was his. Everything should be fair. The sense of demanding justice was very deep in him. He did not give in.

Question: Is this a human quality or a principle of a Kabbalist?

Answer: I think it is a principle. Sometimes it cost him a lot of nerves and even maybe inconveniences. But he could not help but stand up for justice.

Question: What about you?

Answer: I think I have the same thing and even more. I still bully—and often—if there is such an opportunity.

It depends on how you see insolence, impudence, obvious neglect, contempt, swagger, and all other egoistic pranks. If they are a result of the natural development of a person, like a small child, then you do not focus on them because that is how he or she is, still has to develop, and nothing can be done. This is a natural manifestation of the forces that the Creator has given us.

And if this is not a natural development, if a person wants to subjugate others in this way and uses it for evil and deliberately harms people, then it is very unpleasant to see. I would be happy to stop such people.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. The Secret Powers of the Kabbalist”  10/25/13

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Question: To what extent did you feel a different perception of yourself before and after feeling the spiritual system in you? How did you perceive this?

Answer: This perception gradually turned into a sensory, explicit one that you live in, and it is extremely pleasant. It allows you to see everything. Your eyes open, your feelings open, and you begin to understand in what world, in what system you exist; there is no difference between the worlds, there is only one world everywhere.

In fact, our world, such as it appears to all people, does not exist. They seem to be in a state of a disconnection, in semi-consciousness, and even that state is practically absent. They do not know where they are, but I do. I kind of woke up, while they crawl around like blind kittens and do not understand where they are.

Question: But before that you read, for example, The Book of Zohar, The Study of the Ten Sefirot. How did you perceive them? Surely it was different.

Answer: I felt the same way as it does to you. I listened without understanding what it was talking about, and I imagined it as if it existed, nobody knows where and how. I did not feel that it was in me, that it was my sensations, my attitude, either to a person or to the Creator. The Creator is what appears between us. Now I clearly feel it.

Question: When you give directions about how to change, does a person have a chance without this perception that you have, to connect to the system?

Answer: From where? What kind of Kelim (vessels) can he do it with? What means of communication does he have? You do not have a modem, how can you do it?!

Question: Is waiting the only thing left to us?

Answer: Do not wait, but act! Solder the circuit, my friend!

Question: Were you not also preparing for this for a long period?

Answer: Of course, for many years. Nothing comes immediately, only gradually.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. How to Change Myself” 11/9/13

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Why does the Torah have so many strange prohibitions, like eating shellfish or wearing mixed fabrics?“

First, it is important to understand that the Torah does not describe our world. The Torah is called “sanctity,” which in Hebrew means something different and separate to our world. It explains spiritual laws of the higher spiritual world, and it thus explains what is permitted and forbidden for a person who is in the spiritual world, who attains and perceives it.

We live in a bubble of sorts, the laws of which we have no real understanding. We learn a bit about the laws from the sciences of our world like physics and chemistry, but we are unfamiliar with the real laws.

The Torah, or the wisdom of Kabbalah, describes the spiritual laws that become revealed as the forces of the higher nature. The higher nature is called “the force of bestowal” or an altruistic force, and the nature of our world is the force of reception, or the egoistic force. There is thus one very simple law of the higher nature: that it is forbidden to be an egoist.

In the higher spiritual nature, any action we do for our own benefit is prohibited, while any action that we to for the benefit of others is called a Mitzva (commandment).

About the prohibitions in the Torah, it is written that Hillel told the proselyte that came to him: “Don’t do to others what you hate.” In relation to the Mitzvot, the actions of correction that we do in spirituality, those who are in spiritual attainment, who have revealed the spiritual world, have a clear picture of what is permitted and prohibited. In our world, however, it is not so clear. For instance, a regular person in this world does not see what kind of transgression or harm they commit when they light a candle or a lamp on the Sabbath—nor should they.

In short, in the higher spiritual nature, it is forbidden to use the ego, and it is allowed to use the force of bestowal and love.

Based on the video “What Are the Prohibitions in the Torah?” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman. Photo by Taylor

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Question: What does a Kabbalist dream of when he sleeps?

Answer: A cat dreams of mice, Don Juan dreams of women, a hungry man dreams of a loaf of bread. What a person wants, what hurts him, what he is afraid of or aspires to is what he dreams about.

What does a Kabbalist dream about? It depends on what you go to bed with: either issues in the group, the students, or, conversely, serious preparation for the next events. In accordance with this, all sorts of thoughts slip through. I have not seen dreams in the form of images for a long time, they are in the form of thoughts.

Once it was in the form of all kinds of scenes where people argued, debated, and empathized in my dreams. But for the past 20 years or more, I wake up with thoughts of what I was thinking in my dream—thoughts mind you, not visual scenes. I don’t know why.

I think it is because I don’t pay attention to the visual scenes in life: not to appearance or to the world. I’m practically not interested in it. I don’t attach any importance to this. What difference does it make how you are dressed, what accessories you are wearing, etc. I realize that this is all just boosting our egoism, to somehow charm somebody or show who I am compared to him to put him in his place.

Question: Did Rabash tell you his dreams? Did he dream of anything?

Answer: No. I don’t think he did either.

I think visual dreams in the form of images stop happening in the early stages of a Kabbalist’s work on himself. It all goes away very quickly because you rise above this seeming theater that is being played out here, and you enter the world of forces.

For example, if there is some kind of problem on the computer screen, the one who fixes it does not look at the screen, the main thing for him is to fix it on the inside. The screen for him is just an indicator.

So does the Kabbalist. He very quickly passes the stage when the screen is even an indicator for him, and he enters directly into the world of forces. There are no images there, including dreams.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. What does a Kabbalist Dream About?” 10/12/13

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Question: You explained that in the process of studying Kabbalah, a person goes through experiences where the left line constantly opens up and it is necessary to overcome it all the time. What holds a person? What keeps him from leaving?

Answer: The level of development. Of course, you can go somewhere to the village and live an ordinary life, or become a railway caretaker—20 km there, 20 km here, check the rails, tighten the nuts on the sleepers.

Can you live this way? There you have no Internet or newspapers, only radio. You sit and listen to something. That’s all. In exchange, you have a quiet, good life.

You will develop a small vegetable garden around you plus a salary; from a passing train you will sometimes be dropped the products you ordered. You will live quietly away from everyone. What could be better? Walk through the woods with a gun, fish in the lake, listen to the birds singing. What’s wrong? Why can’t you limit yourself to this?

Comment: First, it is a separation from other people.

My Response: Why do you need other people? What do they give you? Look at what’s going on here, will you? Why do you need to sit in this “dumpster”?

You just can’t do it any other way. Not because you didn’t grow up in a gatehouse, but because according to your inner development you can no longer live in such a state. This is how nature develops you.

Look at what is being done with cities. In one century, the population of a city with a million inhabitants has grown to 20 – 30 million, and there is no limit to this.

Today, a person cannot live away from others. This is how the program of creation is specially designed to force people to connect so that they work together on their common egoism in the right connection with each other and use the method of influence of the upper light to correct themselves.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Careful, Kabbalah” 10/19/13

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What does the Sabbath mean to you?“

The Sabbath is the state of the end of correction of the ego, the peak of our development where everything functions in an ideal manner, solely in a direction of bestowal, giving, fulfilling and loving others.

The prohibitions on the Sabbath discuss actions that we were allowed to do before the end of the ego’s correction, when it was still not entirely in order to bestow. We were once in a system called “the soul of Adam HaRishon,” where we were all tightly connected with threads of bestowal and love as one. The system shattered via an action called “the sin of the Tree of Knowledge.” It was an action where we started wishing to receive egoistically for our personal benefit alone. The connections inside that system and between its parts shattered, and everything that has taken place since that time is for us to reconnect the parts of that system to a state that they were in before the shattering.

There is a confusion between the parts because they fell and mixed with one another, and we have to scrutinize each and every desire of ours, which is an outcome of that shattering: What is it related to? Is it in favor of or against connection? What kind of connection is there between these desires? What kind of constellation should they be? This is our work over a period of what we call “6,000 years.”

The Sabbath is called “the day of the end of correction” where all desires interconnect in an ideal connection. It is a perfect restoration of the soul of Adam HaRishon to its corrected form that it was in before the shattering.

The prohibitions on the Sabbath stem from that in which the Sabbath is a completely corrected state, and in a perfect state there is no room for additional work because everything is already corrected. Adding in such a state could only bring ruin, which is why there are prohibitions to conduct all kinds of works on the Sabbath, whether small or great.

Based on the video “What Is the Sabbath?” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Comment: You said that if a person did not realize his function in time, then in the future it becomes a burden for them, heaviness and inability to do anything. But there is also a kind of heaviness when he did everything possible, but he was again loaded with additional Aviut (desire).

My Response: A person is burdened, but understands why, how, and what to do next. He is like a jumper who has jumped over two meters and now he has added another two centimeters.

Question: And what is the difference?

Answer: He understands which way and why it is needed. If he correctly completed the previous task, raised himself, and developed himself, then he perfectly understands where he is going next.

Question: And what is the difference between the initially set burden and the one that is given as an excess profit?

Answer: First, he is happy with the burden. If he completed the previous state correctly, the next one is desirable for him. Like that jumper who knows that he has to overcome two meters and two centimeters.

But if he began to slack off because of the previous achievement, that is, he did not finish it, did it wrong or delayed, and so on, then for him the two and two, which in any case come to him, become negative and undesirable.

He experiences them as a huge stress, as a burden in life in the form of problems at work, at home, diseases, the environment, it doesn’t matter what, all together. After all, the integral picture begins to put pressure on him with everything he depends on. His egoism, his desire to enjoy, feels negative emotions instead of positive ones he should have achieved.

If a person moving forward with the help of an integral methodology is delayed and he does not do what he should have done at the previous stage, then all sorts of haters turn against him, harassment begins, and so on. This happened even to the greatest Kabbalists.

However, do not reassure yourself that you are big and that’s why you are being badgered, try to do everything you can.

Question: What would have happened if he had implemented everything in time?

Answer: He would move forward easier and faster.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Varieties of Suffering” 10/5/13

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What are the things that are prohibited in the Torah?“

Prohibitions in the Torah relate to our inability to use our ego—the desire for benefiting ourselves at the expense of others and nature—in the variety of ways it can be used, when we are in a spiritual connection.

The most important prohibition in the Torah is “Don’t do to others what you hate.” Likewise, the most important commandment in the Torah is “Love your neighbor as yourself.”

Based on the video “What Is the Most Important Prohibition in the Torah?” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman and Oren Levi. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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