Entries in the 'Q&A' Category

Hidden Kabbalists

533.02Question: You said that Kabbalists can hide themselves from one another. Can it really be that one Kabbalist cannot feel another?

Answer: If one closes himself off, then yes.

Question: What does it mean to close oneself off? How can one do that if there is a common system and common sensations?

Answer: It doesn’t matter. He closes himself off personally. It happens just like in our world. Suppose you and I are both scientists and we are talking about common topics, exchanging opinions and so on, but there are certain things that I don’t reveal. For example, I have some special developments that you are very interested in, but I delicately avoid the topic, I don’t give myself away. What can you do?

Question: So the analogy is more or less the same as in ordinary perception in this world? That is, a Kabbalist is not omnipresent, not able to feel everything through and through?

Answer: No, he feels only what he is allowed to. That is how it will be until the final correction. When all of us are fully corrected and the entire system is revealed to us, then there will be no limitations: “And they shall all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest,” absolutely everyone.
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From KabTV’s “I Got A Call. Hidden Kabbalists” 8/8/10

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Escape from the Darkness of Egyptian Exile

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: The night of the Passover Seder is a special night for the people of Israel. It is thought that on this night this people was born and began its new way. So really, in what way is this night of the exodus from Egypt so unique?

Answer: A person begins to feel that he is in the Egyptian exile, in slavery to his ego, which is called Pharaoh, and that it is necessary to depart from under its dominance, to flee; yet he cannot do this. He begins to scream internally, he is no longer prepared to endure a life like this. He invests effort in regard to the group, the environment, the teacher, and the books. He really feels that he is in prison, in darkness.

Gradually he sinks into a state that is called the “darkness of Egypt,” the night of the exodus from Egypt. This night is absolute darkness; no hope is left for him, no chance in life. He doesn’t feel that he is prepared to continue to live within his ego, since he hates everyone, and he is unable to relate well to anyone.

He strives to love the friends, to love the other as himself, but he sees the opposite, he becomes worse and worse. The Pharaoh in him, his ego, becomes stronger and more brutal. So in the end the person is broken, for he sees that he has no chance of leaving this servitude.

He passes through very difficult inner states, which ultimately are amassed together: all of his attempts to flee from his ego, to rise above it, all the victories of the ego that show a person how strongly this Pharaoh is holding him from within. He really finds himself in the middle of the struggle of two forces: On the one hand the person pushes since he yearns to go free, and on the other hand the ego hangs on to his legs not letting him flee.

Ultimately, these two forces reach the peak of the struggle between them, and the person finds himself between them, feels absolute darkness. This state is called the night of exodus, the darkness of Egypt. And so suddenly he hears a call from within this darkness: “You must leave! You are ready to do this! You can get up and flee from your ego, here and now, at midnight, that is, from the darkest state. Don’t take anything with you to the new state, except those things that you really need for bestowal, the attainment of unity, the connection, the love”.

In this case the person is ready to leave and flee from his ego; he wants to rise above it. This is called his spiritual birth.
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From KabTV’s “Kabbalists Write: The Night of Passover Seder,” 3/4/13

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A Kabbalist’s Dream

962.3Question: Sometimes you say that people are ready to hear us, but we are not yet ready to properly convey the Kabbalistic information. Are people really ready to hear us?

Answer: No, they are not ready yet. If they were, they would hear. However, it is a dual problem: both on my side and theirs. I am not yet able to convey everything in the way that is most accessible and close to them, and they are not yet capable of grasping it with their inner qualities. So we both still need to move toward each other.

That is why I say that maybe I have a few years left in my life to make the Kabbalah method closer, clearer, and easier for everyone to understand. On the other hand, humanity is gradually approaching me because it is being pushed from behind by crises.

Of course I do not wish any misfortunes upon anyone, but I hope that blows will affect people, and they will come to the goal faster. I see these crises as a manifestation of the disease that is choking and oppressing us but is still hidden inside.

What did they do with the previous wave of crisis? They suppressed it, pushed it inward with “antibiotics” like they usually treat a disease. It seems like it is gone, but it is smoldering inside, everything is already rotting, but you do not feel it yet. And then suddenly, a person gets an X-ray, is opened up, and they say: That’s it, we are sewing you up—and off to the cemetery.

But I do not want things to get to this point. That is why it would be better if humanity gains awareness of the evil of its state at the same time as we provide the method. People will realize that they have nowhere to turn, that they must correct their state, and right there beside them there will be a method showing how to correct it and attain confidence, peace, and a normal life.

We at least speak to them about that, not even about the world to come. At least in this world, they can achieve a good life, for themselves and for their children in everything.

Our task is to bring humanity to this. That will be the first stage of correction, the first stage of accepting Kabbalah as a method of correction. This is my dream.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Berg and Laitman” 8/9/10

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The Program by which We Develop

294.2Question: Do you think the audio and video lessons, lectures, and programs you’ve recorded in the past are suitable for future learning?

Answer: I think no one will come to replace me so quickly or will begin present material in an even simpler form. At least I don’t see the next person to lead. But that doesn’t matter. It doesn’t bother me.

First of all, what can I say or do? Everything is prepared from above, on the one hand. And on the other hand, it’s simply not necessary. People will have the media recorded in good quality, and they will study it, adapt it to themselves, and apply it.

That’s enough, because everything has already been explained. As long as I have the strength, the time, and the years, I may be able to simplify the material even further. At the very least, people can easily use the content from the last ten years, they can work with it and benefit from it.

And in the end, neither I nor they are the masters of our states, the Creator is. Whatever He decides, that’s how it will be. There is a program by which we are developing.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. 20000 Lessons” 8/3/10

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The Field of Love

938.02Question: I remember when I came to a congress for the first time, I had a great desire to cross the Machsom. I was overcome by a feeling of certain unification, like you just cling to others and want to feel something.

I do not know if this is psychosomatic or actually an unconscious, temporary feeling of a single whole. Is this the feeling you are talking about, or just an autosuggestion?

Answer: It is also a psychological feeling created by you along with the others but on a very small, low, animate level. This is something that can be done in any company.

The Creator does not participate in it, and therefore, it is not spiritual. A single, unique field of love has not yet been felt in it.

Love is not what we imagine in our world. Love is a quality of absolute bestowal; it is when your and other people’s desires absolutely merge into a single whole and you have only one intention left—to fill them from yourself, to give to them. That is what love is.
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From KabTV’s “I Got A Call. Field of Love” 7/4/10

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Everyone Has Their Own Reality

423.02Question: How can one explain the fact that each person sees their own reality, and at the same time, as Kabbalah says, it does not actually exist, there is only me with my perception?

Answer: Yes, there is only you and nothing else—no history, no geography, nothing at all. You exist as a certain point of desire. Besides desire there is nothing, and within this desire some perceptions or fulfillments are felt.

These fulfillments appear in exactly the form in which you currently perceive yourself. In other words, the feeling of “self” manifests within the desire in the form of your image, and the perception of the surrounding world also appears as images within the desire. That is, you feel the fulfillment in desire in this particular form.

Question: When you describe something, you speak in general terms, “a person,” without addressing anyone specifically. So do all the others actually exist?

Answer: A person, naturally, does not exist. Then how do we see others and our universe? None of it exists. The worlds? They do not exist either.

Only one state exists, which we conventionally call the “World of Infinity,” that is, creation filled with the Creator.

Question: But why do I perceive the world from such an angle, as complex, made up of other elements, people, and animals?

Answer: Because within you there is such a desire that is imperfect, shattered, unassembled, non-integral. You perceive the inner sensation of this desire as “me and something around me,” or “a lot of things around me.”

Comment: But when I say something to other people, they agree, are delighted by a thought, they seem to really exist independently.

My Response: Yes, these are your own desires, which appear to you in the form of separate people, who seemingly objectively exist independently of you and in contrast to you.
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From KabTV’s “I Got A Call. Reality of Perception” 7/20/10

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Connect to the Primary Sources

209Question: Before explaining a certain topic, you always ask to read the relevant article first. Why do you do that instead of just starting to talk about things in general?

Answer: I could speak for myself as well. But I want to teach people to be connected to the primary sources because the main thing for us is to be connected to those great Kabbalists, participants in the common system of souls, who perceive the unified field, the Creator, and exist within it.

That is why we study a book written by a Kabbalist who once lived in our world. In truth, this is a soul that felt the field of the Creator and described it: what happens in its relation to us, how it created us, developed us, and brought us to the state we exist now.

Question: But your own texts are also very deep. Don’t you transmit from your level just like other Kabbalists?

Answer: Yes, but I still do not claim the role of Baal HaSulam, my teacher Rabash, Rabbi Shimon, or the ARI. These are great Kabbalists—powerful parts of the collective soul—who are in deep, vast connection with this field, with the Creator.

They described their sensations and perceptions in a special way. And if I adhere to them through what they wrote, then I connect to their sensations as a small part of them, and in this way I can move forward. But if I do not interact with their source, how can I move forward?

After all, in our world, we also learn from others. If I try to learn by myself, it would take me twenty to thirty thousand years to become a human being. Imagine a child abandoned in the forest, what does he grow into? Nothing more than an animal. He can never become a man.

So do you want me to leave myself and my students alone in the forest? We must make use of everything the great previous generations have done for us, and they have prepared everything!
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From KabTV’s “I Got A Call. The Importance of the Sources” 7/15/10

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If We Are So Good, Why Is the World So Bad?

929Question: I look at the world and there are already eight billion of us. And I assure you that very few people can say that they are the ones who need to be educated. No, I need to educate others, that is the go-to formula. They are the bad ones, the selfish ones, not me. It is because of them we suffer.

How will a person understand that he is the one who needs to be educated?

Answer: Only through blows. How else? If they think they are so good, why is the world so bad?

Comment: Others are bad, that is why the world is so bad.

My Response: If everyone thinks that way about others, does it mean the world is bad or good?

Comment: The world is bad.

My Response: Except for me?

Comment: Except for me; yes, that is what people think.

My Response: And we will keep believing this until something falls on our heads and there is nothing left to think.

Question: Can we say that by doing this we are summoning trouble upon ourselves?

Answer: Of course. Instead of correcting ourselves or trying to do something, we calm ourselves down.

Question: We say: “Others are bad, but I am good.” Am I calling trouble on myself?

Answer: Yes.

Question: Not examining myself? Is it bad?

Answer: Very bad! This leads the world to disaster.

Question: Is genuine education when I learn to examine myself?

Answer: Yes, when I look at myself, at what I am like. When I look at what I owe to others, at being the only one uncorrected. That is, everything that is in me: a liar, a thief, a deceiver, a hater—I do not know what other epithets to come up with here—it is all me.

But everyone else is not. All others do not exist at all. All others are my various reflections that I see around me. That is, I look at a lot of people around me, and each of them portrays me negatively in this form and that and that.

There are eight billion people in the world, and each of them represents some kind of negative quality of mine. Eight billion! That is how I am depicted into the world. And that is how I see it.

Question: So what do I do when I see evil, an evil person?

Answer: If I correct myself, I begin to see the world as more united, as striving for bestowal, love, and connection. Eventually I realize this is all one system, one person called “Adam,” and this Adam is me. Because that is how I put it together with my actions, behavior, thoughts, and all sorts of corrections.

Question: Do I absorb the world into me and become this one soul, as we say, Adam?

Answer: Yes.

Question: Is this true?

Answer: It is true.

Question: And is what we see a lie?

Answer: No, we also see the truth, but it is a partial truth, torn apart by our inner egoism.

Question: Otherwise we do not pass it through our ego? Are we looking not through egoism?

Answer: Right. If I put them all together in one single image, then it is me.

Question: How can I focus on it like this?

Answer: This is our task—to gather the whole world and say, “This is me, and this world depends on me.”

Comment: Am I responsible for everyone and everything?

My Response: Absolutely everything is here.

Question: Every person?

Answer: Yes.

Question: Is the simplest, most ordinary person responsible for the world, for everything that happens in this terrible world?

Answer: To the extent that he finds himself in this world.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 4/3/25

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Enter The Book of Zohar

540Comment: You say that The Book of Zohar must be understood, but it is very difficult! Even Israelis, who in principle…

My Response: So what about Israelis? What difference does it make whether you are Israeli or not? That does not matter! What matters here is attainment. One must enter this book. For that, you need to feel the world it describes, nothing more.

Question: So it begins to work effectively only for a person who is in spirituality?

Answer: Yes, that is a natural and necessary condition.

Question: Let’s say you distribute this book throughout the world now. How will people be able to perceive it if they are not in that state?

Answer: With its help, they will begin to draw closer to the upper world and gradually enter it by drawing the upper light upon themselves.

In item 155 of the Introduction to The Study of the Ten Sefirot, it is written that a person who, even without understanding anything, reads about the upper world, its structure, connections, functioning, and draws its influence upon himself because he is already within that structure albeit in an unborn state. Yet in doing so, he tries to awaken himself, to elicit the influence of the system upon him. That is how it works.

Comment: Basically, you are speaking of someone who intentionally tries to do this. But now you are giving a lot of material from The Book of Zohar to people who are not in spirituality, for example, while holding conventions and different events.

My Response: That is exactly how it should be! After all, they also need to be influenced by it. Otherwise, how will they approach it? How will they develop?

Comment: But it is hard for people. You see that yourself.

My Response: What difference does it make if it is “hard”?

If I have a small child, I constantly present him with tasks, try to provoke him with new, unfamiliar details of this world so that he can get to know it, discover it. I try to spark his interest so that questions arise in him: “What is this? What is it for? Why?” Only in this way does a person develop.

Therefore, of course, I must show the unknown and indicate that it is the unknown. Look at it, explore it; first find the question, and only then look for the answer.
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From KabTV’s “I Got A Call. Zohar is Book №1” 7/8/10

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Darkness Drawn by Light

Dr. Michael LaitmanRabash, Shlavey HaSulam, “What Is If They Swallowed the Bitter Herbs and It Didn’t Come Out, in the Work”:

So a person who begins to follow this path and who wants his actions to be for the sake of Heaven, discovers the truth that the more he performs actions with the intention of in order to bestow, and also that he is distant from it, which means that there is a special merit in this work, that the truth is being revealed to him from Above, and that a person is far from any actions of bestowal.

Our advancement is based only on the different revelations that are unpleasant for our ego, for our desire to receive. Every time it turns out that if we are immersed in our ego, we cannot advance spiritually.

I am immersed in my ego, and the Light comes from Above and emphasizes the level of ego I am on. As a result I feel a big minus (-) that reflects the depth (H) of my desire. To the extent that I feel bad, I have to discern what I have to do in that very bad feeling. I can be grateful for the evil since by that I discover to what extent I am opposite from spirituality and bestowal. The evil is revealed in my ego, in my desire to receive in order to receive, and if this desire disappears, I will not even know that I am immersed in evil. The depth of the bad feeling is the index of truth for me; it is the right sign.

So from this state I ask for adhesion; I want to be above this, above the border of Egypt, above my ego, above the Machsom (barrier). Here I begin to build the Returning Light (RL) and implement the first restriction on the whole lower part (Tzimtzum Aleph – TA).

This is how the spiritual Partzuf is built of two parts; “a head’ and “a body.” Because I have implemented the first restriction, I already have a “body.” Later I may be able to raise part of it and to connect it to the “head” and this will already be a real Partzuf above the Machsom.

Thus, through the stages of Ibur (gestation), Yenika (suckling), and Mochin (mind), I transfer all the “shattered vessels” from the bottom upward.

We already begin to feel that this is practical work that can be performed. But we shouldn’t forget that it is done by the Light that Reforms (the Surrounding Light – Ohr Makif – OM), and that we can summon it only by the connection between us.

Actually, everything that we have learned and read about can be put together into one simple feasible picture of Ten Sefirot, and we can see that the whole world, all our states, are only meant to provide the right spiritual pattern for that at any given moment.

Let’s hope that the state we are creating will remain in each one as a clear pattern. The perception of the world, my attitude to everyone, my feelings, everything that I want to understand and to feel has to go through this pattern. Then we will be able to solve all the problems that come from the Creator, from the Light, correctly by responding correctly and supporting Him, and allowing Him to reveal the right actions.

Question: How can we actually thank the Creator for all the bad states?

Answer: It is true that lying won’t help us here; you cannot cry and honestly kiss the stick that beats you. But if you feel that the stick is beating your evil inclination, if you don’t want to identify with it but with the good inclination, then you already see the differences in a certain inclination to the Creator.

It is only thanks to the Surrounding Light that we feel that we are bad. Fifty years ago everyone still thought that a bright future and prosperity lie ahead. Then the global trend of decline became apparent and we began to sink into the dark. A person with a point in the heart (•) also begins to enter evil, the darkness that comes to him by the Light that Reforms. But at the same time the Light illuminates the point in the heart so that the evil pulls a person downward while the point rises higher and higher upward.

So we need the following inner division:

1. A point in the heart,

2. The evil in us.

Only then will I discover whom I identify with.

Question: How do you get rid of disturbing thoughts about a reward, about a gift that the Creator will give me for my work?

Answer: You will have to constantly cope with these thoughts in order to ascend without asking for anything and only identifying with the point in the heart time and time again. This “ping pong” game continues until the Light that Reforms comes through the connection in the group and takes you to the next level.

There, a stronger Light will come and will again reveal the outcomes of the shattering in you. It is because we used to be connected once and then the Creator who created the connection between us shattered it. Now we have to participate in the correction, to wake up and to summon Him. Then the Light comes and does all the work.
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From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/4/13, Writings of Rabash

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