Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What is most important in life, love or money?“

FTX cofounder Sam Bankman-Fried has become known as a generous billionaire. Before reaching 30 years of age, he made $22.5 billion dollars, but he lives and dresses modestly, and donates a lot of money to charities. Such an example raises the question: Does giving money and donating to various charities actually help the world?

No matter how many dollars a person throws at the world today, the world does not enjoy a penny of it. The world has no need for money. What the world needs today is love.

We live in a world of materialistic abundance, yet when it comes to love, the same world is a desert.

I very much hope that in the near future, people will discover a different attitude to what is important in life. We no longer live in times where we need to struggle our entire lives just to survive, or even to become rich. Today, we have different conditions that present us with an opportunity to discover a deeper and more internal fulfillment. Moreover, genuine happiness depends on discovering such fulfillment.

And that fulfillment is love. Love is much stronger than money because its fulfillment is inclusive and completely fills us when we attain it. Thus, what we truly need is love.

Based on the video “Does Donating Billions of Dollars to Charities Actually Help the World?” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman and Oren Levi. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Why do we lose control all of a sudden?“

There was an unfortunate case recently of a 20-year-old calling the police multiple times in severe mental distress. Eventually, the officer on duty who took her calls lost patience, telling her: “Kill yourself quietly already.” Weeks later, she committed suicide. The officer who took her calls claimed that he felt deeply ashamed, and became immediately removed from his position. Each of us seemingly has a certain limit before we totally lose it and no longer are in control of our actions. Why are we made that way?

We are made with a certain limit beyond which we lose control in order for us to be able to eventually change our nature from the desire to receive to the desire to bestow.

When we relate to others out of an attitude of bestowal, where we purely wish to benefit them without any self-interest intertwined, then we understand them and their pains. Then, instead of losing our patience with them, we discover opportunities to help, support, praise and elevate them.

We should thus focus on increasing our sensitivity to each other, which is achieved first and foremost by listening to explanations of how interconnected and interdependent we are. By increasing our inclination to positively connect throughout human society, then we attract upon ourselves the positive force of connection that dwells in nature, and by doing so, we eventually start feeling that we live in a single system.

Such is the shift from the corporeal animate level of existence that we currently live on, to an awakening into a whole new human level of existence, where we feel ourselves as parts of a single whole. In such a state, we would feel close to each other, and we would have no sensation of others stressing us out or pushing us out of balance. Instead, we would seek opportunities to help, support and encourage others.

We would then view people who approach us with requests for help as doing us favors. It would no longer be difficult for us to connect with others, to feel and serve them. The more people would call us and nag us, then the more we would feel that such people help us rise from the animate level of existence to the human level—where we are in a mode of constant giving without a shred of selfish interest intertwined—and we would thus realize the purpose of our lives through this egoistic-to-altruistic transformation of our attitudes and relations.

Based on the video “Why Do We Lose Control All of a Sudden?” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman and Oren Levi. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Question: The ideologists of education, such as the philosophers Rousseau and Diderot raised the question of the structure of society to achieve peace, with the cornerstone of political freedom, equal rights, and civil equality.

Can equality of all be the foundation for peace?

Answer: There can be no equality of all because if there are two people, then it is already implied that they are not the same, somewhere in some ways they are not equal.

The concept of equality implies that there is still a contradiction inside that can be balanced. However, this equilibrium will exist in a dynamic state of inequality, which must be constantly addressed and corrected.

That is, equality cannot be reached in such a way that I achieved it once and that’s it. It must be reached and then constantly maintained and developed. There can be no such a thing as done and gone in the world at all.

Question: Is it possible that there is one point at which everyone can be equal?

Answer: No everyone cannot be equal. Then it will be just one person.
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From KabTV’s “Kabbalah Express” 3/4/22

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What should we learn from the Ukraine and Russia War?“

We need to learn that the reason for war is the hatred that dwells among us all. Also, we need to wage war on this hatred, to push ourselves into the fight against our own ego—the force within us that constantly makes us consider self-benefit over benefiting others—in order to rise above our egos and positively connect to each other. By doing so, we will win and reach a state where there is no war.

At the moment, we see that each side points out the other side as the egoists, the fascists, and it is snowballing. We see repeats of scenes that we thought belonged 100 or so years in the past: from refugee children and elderly people standing outside in the freezing cold, to horrific scenes of the aftermath of battle. However, our ego will show us scenes from even a thousand years ago until we reach the decision that we need to let go of it.

While our ego is our nature, and it is natural to think about ourselves over others, what we miss in such a picture is that we need to reach the recognition of evil. “Recognition of evil” means becoming aware of the inherent evil of our egoistic nature; that our ego lets us feel only ourselves, and instead of ourselves, we need to feel others, i.e. to transition from “me to we.”

Such a transition is called “correction.” Until we undergo such a correction, our sense of self—our ego—will continue making us suffer. We should thus seek how we can make the monumental shift from “me to we” as quickly as possible, and focus our prayers also for this most significant correction to happen.
Based on the video “What Should We Learn from the Russia-Ukraine War?” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman and Oren Levi. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Comment: Irina asks: “Are there really wars in spirituality too? I always thought there was only love there.”

My Response: From the beginning of the world to the end, the entire universe, except for the sole Creator, the only upper force of love, everything else is built on the battle of opposites, which means, on war.

And the Creator is attained by us when we achieve love in the form of the absolute annulment of hatred, war, and confrontation, i.e., in the complete annulment of everyone in front of others. In this way we form the image of the Creator in ourselves, we create Him. As it is said, “You have made Me.”

Question: Are you talking about a war inside every person right now? Is this a spiritual warfare?

Answer: Yes, and the external is only at the animal level.

Question: You once said that external wars occur because we have not conducted our internal wars properly, and therefore external wars appear. Can you explain this a little more? I did not finish my war?

Answer: I had to fight, I had to resist, and I had to stand, act at the head of the forces of light against the dark forces within myself, and thus see how by this I am moving the world toward a state of connection, rapprochement, and love in all its opposite pieces. And in this way I bring the state of war to the state of real peace.

The word is “Shalom,” “Shlemut,” complete connection (“Ashlama“).

Somehow, I still didn’t finish something somewhere, and therefore I gave it the opportunity to manifest itself in the lowest form, in this physical world.

Question: So now, in order to stop this external war, I have to go back to my internal wars again?

Answer: I have to do it, and everyone has to do it. Because the war is external, it exists only to move us toward an internal connection.

Question: So the resolution of the war by external forces where someone won and someone lost is not the solution of the war?

Answer: Of course not.

Question: And then there will be the next war?

Answer: Of course! We solve nothing by this. This is resolved on the road, on the way: how to continue the next page of the war.

Question: So the next page of the war, one way or another, will be? And maybe even scarier?

Answer: Of course it will be scarier. The most important thing is to quickly determine at the beginning of the conflict what it is and to extinguish it by connecting and complementing the conflicting parties so that they reveal the Creator.

Question: Let’s say there are two conflicting parties who hate each other. How can they suddenly stop at the beginning of a conflict?

Answer: Rise among themselves, rise above yourself, imagine what the world should be like if they were united together so much that they cannot distinguish between each other, but can only feel the connection between them.
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From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 3/7/22

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Amnesty International are stating that Israel’s policy against Palestine is the equivalent to apartheid. Is this a gross distortion or an accurate reflection of the situation? What do you think?“

Instead of arguing whether the report is a gross distortion or accurate reflection of the situation, there are deeper factors at work in the “Israel as an apartheid state” narrative. While the report describes Israel as conducting apartheid policies toward Palestinians and also toward Israeli-Arabs, the negative views about Israel are in fact sourced in the egoistic relations among the Jewish people themselves.

Overtly, we find no reports about negative connections between Jews, but covertly, there is a deep-seeded feeling in the nations of the world that the Jewish people owe the world a method of correction of human relations up to a point of “love your neighbor as yourself,” and that the Jews are failing to provide this method. The feeling of the Jewish people failing to provide the world with a method for rising above divisive drives is then what ultimately forms as negative views that the nations of the world hold toward the people of Israel, and the “Israel as an apartheid state” narrative is one such consequence. It is as Kabbalist Yehuda Ashlag (Baal HaSulam) writes in his “Writings of the Last Generation”:“It is a fact that Israel is hated by all the nations, whether for religious, racial, capitalist, communist, or for cosmopolitan reasons, etc. It is so because the hatred precedes all reasons, but each merely resolves its loathing according to its own psychology.”

In short, connection is a law of nature and the people of Israel were established as a conduit through which to pass the connection in nature’s deeper levels to humanity. The solution to the increasing negative views about the people of Israel is thus for them to realize their role in the world, i.e. to implement the method that leads to “love your neighbor as yourself.” As such, they become “a light unto the nations,” i.e. a conduit for the tendency of “love your neighbor as yourself” to spread worldwide. On the contrary, their failure to realize this method holds back such a tendency from spreading around the world, and the world increasingly feels that the people of Israel are a source of darkness, up to a point where the world would feel that there is no right for this nation’s existence.

We thus have no choice but to start increasing our positive connections to each other up to a peak of love. By doing so, we would invert evil to good, and see peace and harmony throughout the world. Likewise, we would find that the world would invert its attitude to us from negative to positive.

Based on the video “Why Does the ‘Israel as an Apartheid State’ Narrative Gain Increasing Attention?” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman and Oren Levi.
Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Are the Arab nations and Israel going to ever have peace?“

An editorial published by the Kuwaiti daily Arab Times called for the Gulf states to normalize relations with Israel. Arab Times Editor-in-Chief Ahmed al-Jarallah urged that “All the Gulf states should normalize relations with Israel due to the fact that peace with this most advanced country is the right thing to do” and also condemned the Gulf states’ support for Palestine, mentioning that Palestinians’ negative attitude to the Gulf states in return is an “insult.”

In general, normalization between Israel and Arab countries is a positive phenomenon, but it depends on our attitude toward reality, humanity and our cousins. In relation to reality, we need to consider how we bring about peace and harmony in the world. In relation to humanity, we need to seek how to bring about education that can guide humanity on how to positively connect above its differences and divisions, and by doing so, realize a whole new life of goodness and happiness. And our attitude toward our Arab cousins should be that we wish to bring them closer to us than even the rest of humanity.

The Arab world will understand that it is beneficial to make peace with Israel when we, the Jews, will soften our hearts and positively connect to each other. By making peace among ourselves, then to the same extent and even more so, we will see how peace emerges between us and the Arabs, the Palestinians and everyone else. By implementing positive connections among each other, the world would also receive the drive to do so.

As a principle, if there is Jewish unity, then unity and its myriad positive effects would ripple throughout the world. Likewise, if division and hatred reign supreme among Jews, then so too such negative qualities expand throughout the world.

We would thus be wise to imagine that the relations we implement among each other—even just in Israel, among everyone living within its borders—influences the whole of reality, all of the nations, and literally every person. I understand that it is hard to grasp, depict, and agree with such a concept, but it is nevertheless the truth.

Based on the video “Arab Times Editor Calls for Normalization between Israel and the Gulf States – A Kabbalist’s Response” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman and Oren Levi.
Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What does the Hebrew name ‘Zohar‘ mean?“

In the wisdom of Kabbalah, “Zohar” refers to the upper radiance, which is also called “upper light,” or the light of illumination, understanding, love and participation, which is whole. When this light descends upon us, it gives us a sense of the general force of nature, also called “the Creator,” which guides our development, and which leads us to the final purpose of creation—a state of eternity and perfection.

By drawing the upper radiance upon us, we fill our lives with a sense that we are within and belong to a great force, the Creator. This force gives us a feeling of living on a whole different level, one that is absolutely harmonious and tranquil.

The Book of Zohar serves as an instruction manual on how to connect with and reveal the general force of nature, the Creator. The more we incorporate with and draw its radiance into our lives, the closer we come to the revelation of the Creator while we are alive in this world, up to a point where we reveal the Creator and reciprocate with the upper radiance.

Based on the show “Spiritual States” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman and Michael Sanilevich on February 15, 2022. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Is war natural?“

Until we reach the complete correction of the world, a state when we will experience balance and harmony with the laws of nature, then war is the most natural of states.

Nature consists of two opposite forces—giving and receiving, plus and minus, day and night, light and darkness, and so on—and these forces exist in a certain equilibrium. However, such equilibrium undergoes a process of constant disturbances and partial restorations. This is called “life.”

Over millions of years, positive and negative forces alternately dominated each other until they reached a certain balance, forming the planet Earth as we know it. Kabbalist Yehuda Ashlag (Baal HaSulam) describes this process in his article “The Solution”:

First, [the Earth] was but a ball of fog-like gas. Through the gravity inside it, it concentrated the atoms in it, over a period of time, into a closer circle. As a result, the ball of gas was turned into a liquid ball of fire.

Over eons of terrible wars between the two forces in Earth, the positive and the negative, the chilling force in it was finally triumphant over the force of liquid fire, and cooled a thin crust around the Earth and hardened there.

However, the planet had not yet grown still from the war between the forces, and after some time the liquid force of fire overpowered and erupted in a great noise from the bowels of the Earth, rising and shattering the cold hard crust to pieces, turning the planet into a liquid ball of fire once again. Then an era of new wars began until the cool force overpowered the force of fire once more, and a second crust was chilled around the ball, harder, thicker and more durable against the outbreak of the fluids from amidst the ball.

This time it lasted longer, but at last, the liquid forces overpowered once again and erupted from the bowels of the Earth, breaking the crust in pieces. Once more, everything was ruined and became a liquid ball.

Thus, the eons interchanged, and every time the cooling force was victorious, the crust it made was thicker. Finally, the positive forces overpowered the negative forces and they came into complete harmony: the liquids took their place in the abdomen of the Earth, and the cold crust became thick enough around them to enable the creation of organic life as it is today.

All organic bodies develop by the same order. From the moment they are planted to the end of the ripening, they undergo several hundred situations due to the two forces, the positive and the negative, and their war against each other, as described regarding the Earth.

War is thus indeed absolutely natural, and peace is actually unnatural. Peace is nonexistent while we develop through a constant push-and-pull of opposing forces. We can achieve peace only by reaching balance, mutual connection and complementarity between the two opposing forces.

Based on “Spiritual States” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman and Michael Sanilevich on March 1, 2022. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Why do some people suffer a lot more than others?“

We each belong to a single collective system, and we each have an inner foundation within this system. According to this inner foundation, our lives and the extent of suffering in our lives, is determined.

It is important to note that as parts of a collective system, the system as a whole does not take individual parts into account. Rather, it considers their inclusion, i.e. how they combine together in order to function as a single system.

As such, nobody lives alone similar to how a single cell cannot exist by itself within the human body. If a cell serves itself alone, then it becomes cancerous, and it brings about about disease and destruction to the body. Therefore, in order for the body to function healthily, there is a condition set in nature where each cell receives its needs for its sustenance, and gives its surplus for the benefit of the whole body. It thus has no self-considerations, but only takes the interests of the whole body into account, and as a result, it receives the life of the whole body.

Like the single cell in the human body, likewise with its organs: the heart, lungs, liver and several other organs all work not out of self-interest, but in order to serve the whole body. All cells and organs thus work together to create balance and harmony for the body. If, even for a moment, one part of this system considers self-benefit over the benefit of the whole body, then the system collapses.

We live in a similar system. Humanity is a single “body” and we are its parts. Suffering propagates throughout the system—humanity—as a response to us prioritizing self-benefit over benefiting the system as a whole. It comes as a sign that we are not functioning correctly, and we need correction. At our current level of existence, we cannot see why some people suffer more than others, but if we had a bird’s-eye view of the complete system, then we would see how suffering prods the system to undergo a major transition: from its parts feeling and living only for themselves alone, to the parts inverting their intention and living for the benefit of the whole system. Therefore, if we shifted our focus to implement relations of mutual consideration, support and encouragement throughout humanity, we would undergo our fateful transition in a way that alleviates the need for any further suffering.

Based on KabTV’s “Close-Up. Partnership Agreement” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on July 4, 2010. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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