Entries in the 'Q&A' Category

The Limits Of Clairvoyance

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How can you identify a Kabbalist? Even though the spiritual work is concealed, can the fact that a person speaks about correcting our desire be some indication of that?

Answer: I don’t know. He may have read Kabbalah books many times and describes their content to you. Well, what of that? Is he a Kabbalist according to this? Or is it enough that his blessing makes your body tremble?

And what if a person says something and it happens a couple of days later? There are quite a few people in the world that can foretell the future, but a fortuneteller is not a Kabbalist. He tells you what will happen to you in this world, but it has nothing to do with Kabbalah and nothing to do with spirituality.

A well-known fortuneteller, Wolf Messing, accurately foresaw the events that were to happen in the future including world wars and peoples’ fates. He even predicted the day and the hour of his own death. During the crisis with Cuba, he actually revealed all the cards, describing the concerns of the two sides and the consequences of any move. As a result, the two sides reached an agreement and eliminated the threat of war.

A person can feel what is about to happen in the world, since everything already exists, but is concealed from our perception. For us it is a secret, but in fact there is no time and it is about the levels that are revealed one following the other, so there are people who can see “through” this order.

Imagine that I am short-sighted and it would take me five minutes to get close enough to you to recognize you. On the other hand, if I put on my glasses, I will be “closer” to you without having to wait five minutes and will immediately identify you. Time and distance are the same thing, the same essence, it all depends on the “glasses”…

One way or the other, such abilities have nothing to do with Kabbalah. Different secret agencies use such techniques, but clairvoyants are not Kabbalists.

A Kabbalist is a person who identifies with the Creator and is already on the spiritual ladder. What is more, it is a person who can already receive in order to bestow on the third level of the first Sefirot.
[92698]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/12/12, “The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah”

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Constant Care

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: I live in Saint Petersburg. What can I give to the Georgian group while physically present at this congress?

Answer: This is a very good question.

First of all you can give your warmth and physical participation. You can leave them with the impression that many people from all over the world are with them, that they are not alone in the mountains, they are our big family and together we are advancing toward the goal; we can’t do it without each other, otherwise we won’t this goal. If the Creator aroused all of us that means we have to work accordingly, we cannot separate any part of ourselves and say that “we’ll deal with them later.” This can’t be done.

It’s like children in the family: Can one be taken care of at the expense of the other? You have to do something with each child and the same thing applies here.

The most important thing for them to understand is that we see them, we feel them, we’re watching them, and we want to see them growing stronger.

On one hand, we have to offer our help and support and on the other, show them that we expect them to become big and successful. This is the kind of impression we must leave them with and afterward we must constantly keep in touch with them.

This is really a good, serious group and these are good states. Georgia is a very important region. As strange as it may seem, it influences everyone else. There are a few places in the world such as the Baltic states and Georgia where the population is only a few million, but they are very sensitive.

This is why we must help the Georgian group and show great concern.

We have to understand that Georgia in relation to great forces such as Russia, Europe, and America is a rather delicate point. Thus, it’s here in particular that our fine work can give results in many distant places.
[92561]
From the Georgia Convention 11/6/12, Lesson 2

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Introductory Lecture “From Hate To Love” – 11.13.12

Kabbalah for the Nation Introductory Series,” ” From Hate to Love”

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We Are Not Afraid Of Any Dates

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Currently the entire Internet is buzzing with prognoses that some unpleasant events will take place in December of 2012. What does Kabbalah say about this? Please reassure the world!

Answer: How can I calm you down?

I think it all depends on us, including you. I am not going to calm you down, but completely the opposite because we indeed exist in a very sharp freedom of will and December and the entire next year depend on us. In addition, these states, which we will have to go through, are completely determined only by our world group and by no one else.

Thus, I will not be calming down anyone of you. On contrary, you have to feel very clearly that the entire world depends on you. You have to consciously realize this, meaning that you need to have a serious attitude toward our task, a constant mutual aspiration in your hearts.

Do you feel how our hearts are gathering more and more into one ball? Only this will save our situation and will make it wonderful. It will be wonderful in the sense that we will remember that we have to be closer and more united until we get all of our one heart together. Then we will not be fearful of any calendar.
[92669]
From the Georgia Convention 11/6/12, Lesson 3

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Envy That Helps Us Advance

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: You say that envy helps us advance. I don’t understand what we need envy for.

Answer: I envy everyone. Yesterday when people sang during the meal, I really envied them: Why can’t I sing like that? Or when someone quickly grasps the material that we study, I also envy him: Why can he do so and I can’t? Is this envy bad?

Imagine that there are people here that seem on a much higher level than you; it is very good that they have attained something. But I haven’t? How can that be? How can they and not I?

You may say: “So do you want them not to attain this level either?” No, I want them to advance even more, but I want to advance with them, which means that it is positive envy that pulls me forward. I don’t want to bring them down, I want to follow them forward; it is a very important point.

Envy usually means that I don’t want the other to have what I envy in him, but for us envy is different—it means that I want the same thing that I envy.

Question: I have never envied anyone. How can I envy a friend when I know that the Creator has given him a certain attribute? Suppose there is a good computer and a bad computer that cannot be good, this is how the Creator has made it.

Answer: No you are calming yourself by that, because you are lazy. Now you have to feel sorry that you are lazy.

Question: Yes, I am lazy. I understand that this is my attribute and there is nothing I can do about it, so I say to the Creator: “That’s the way we are, the way You have created us, so what do you want of us?!”

Answer: First of all, all the questions a person asks are legitimate and right, since they stem from the desire in him; there is nothing we can do about it. But the whole group should evoke everyone else, otherwise they will continue to sleep. Here we have to play.

Why do we organize different games now? Because I have to show the friends that I am on a higher level than they are, and that there is something else in me: “What, you don’t know yet? I already know this,” etc. We have to tease one another and to hint that there is something great in spirituality, since otherwise we will not move. The Creator will remain concealed until we discover Him by our equivalence of form, so there is nothing we can do. We have to envy one another.

Envy is an essential attribute. Everything is created for a reason. Under no circumstances should you suppress anything in you. You should feel envy.
[92503]
From the Georgia Convention 11/06/12, Lesson 2

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What Do We Lack?

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Suppose a person sits and watches himself: “I want some water, then I want something else, and I don’t know what else I want.” Will a simple experiment help him understand that the essence of his desire is to enjoy?

Answer: A person will see that each time new desires emerge in him. He doesn’t know where they come from; first he wants one thing and suddenly another and then something else.

On the other hand, he can program himself, which means to focus himself on certain desires and to remember something that brought him pleasure. In this case such a great desire for that pleasure develops in him that he begins to yearn for it again: “What do I want? Oh, I forgot, there is some ice cream in the fridge,” and he takes out the ice cream or he may remember that he wanted to go somewhere interesting or meet someone interesting, or read some interesting book or see a movie that he prepared to see and so on.

This means that we evoke ourselves when we don’t feel pleasure. We don’t feel the pleasure when we fill ourselves. I am full, which seemingly means that everything is fine, but my life is tasteless. Even when we seemingly have everything, we lack that addition of excitement. We invent new sources of pleasure and incentives, but in fact it is the same ego.
[92030]    
From KabTV’s “Talks with Michael Laitman,” 11/03/12

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The Mystery Of Our Freedom

Dr. Michael LaitmanA human being (Adam) is a new action, new creation developing according to the internal program, inherent in the primary “drop of semen.” To this program, this form, given by the father, the mother’s material is added. Then the program begins to be realized, manifest itself, and the material takes the form of a human being.

A person is born from a mother like an animal. However, we talk about our inner structure, how we give birth to ourselves spiritually. And here is a special condition before us: We have to create our form ourselves.

Question: But is an animal not capable of this?

Answer: An animal remains an animal. It cannot become a human being. It is the foundation above which he is formed. In general, the still, vegetative, and animate nature is the platform above which we build the human form.

Question: Who can build it?

Answer: The “drop of semen” that lies above the animal degree. It contains everything, except the material. But when the material is added to it, the necessary form does not appear automatically like in the animal world; we have to find it ourselves. In the spiritual world, a person creates himself with the Creator’s help.

Initially, I do not know my future spiritual form. I should want it, look for it and try, going in faith above reason as much as I can. I act, striving for something that seems like bestowal to me, and these efforts suddenly bring me to a “discovery,” a new form. Yes, I was thinking about it all that time, but still could not imagine what it would be in reality. Now, when the form of bestowal is dressed in me, I attain it.

How did I get it, not knowing where to go exactly? That is why it is called a “discovery”—it is a surprise for me, not an expected result.

Question: So, what is my free choice?

Answer: Your free choice is to seek this form with the help of the environment, by all possible means. Namely the environment builds my future state, creating its form according to the principle of a matrix that puts pressure on a tin ingot from both sides, giving it the desired form. I am that ingot, the initial material, lying between the two parts of the press: The group is one side and the teacher and studies are the other.

And the fact is that I put myself under this press. I am ready to accept various forms and just want to annul myself, like an ingot that could be given any shape. Thus I acquire the human form.

Question: Where is freedom here?

Answer: It is impossible to be just free, if you are free, it means from something. In reality, you can be independent only from the evil inclination. That is why the Creator created the evil inclination first: pride, self-importance, and other egoistic qualities, relative to which we can check ourselves: How much you can cancel them, sacrifice them in order to take any form that the teacher, studies, and group require from you? If you accept their “pressure,” the Creator fills this new form with the spirit of life. And if not, then not.

When you would like to leave the group, but still decide to stay, then you go toward free choice. The choice means to rise above the evil inclination. Then, you will really feel free.

But now the time has not come yet: Is it possible to let a baby who barely learned to walk choose? He will break something. It is impossible to create a reality of freedom immediately when you have all the qualities opposed to the Creator and you have the opportunity to agree or disagree with Him.

However, today it is not required. Gradually, you realize that you do not have choice for the time being while you are under the dominion of the egoistic desire. Only it acts in you, and you have nothing else, no other force in resisting egoism in something and putting up with it in something else. You still need to go forward, study, and draw a lot of Reforming Light in order to acquire the second force.

In the end, finding yourself between two forces, you obtain the whole world, completely different values, a new understanding. Then, we will talk about free choice.

It is no coincidence that the right to vote is given at 18 and not before. Imagine if 10-year-old children could vote. Then candidates would state from the screen without any constraint: “I will give you candies! I will provide everyone under the age of 18 with the latest generation of smartphones!”

In general, we see that everyday life does not offer a person freedom. And there is no such desire. Today, you do not think that you need choice because you feel you are free. You do not feel that the Creator fully controls you.

And that is why He teaches you: First, He gives you the egoistic desire and then puts obstacles on the path to its realization, as if someone prevents you. You do not understand yet that everything comes from one source, and that is what you are taught.

Question: How can we accelerate this process?

Answer: Through playing with the correct environment, with the group. Replace a vague relationship with the Creator with a real relationship with the group. You can do this. If you want with the help of environment to change how the Creator treats you, you have the opportunity. Instead of the Creator, accept the group as a factor of influence and you can control your life freely.

We hear this, but do not yet feel it. No problem, awareness will come soon…
[92593]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 11/11/12, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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Humanity Is One Group

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Is it possible to perceive humanity and society as a group once you begin to gradually feel spirituality?

Answer: On the whole, that’s the way it should be. In the future this is what will happen.

When we speak about global humanity, about its integrality, we mean that it is one integral whole. Only from the general whole can we differentiate the 99% of the people who are in the group, but don’t understand why and for what purpose; they came to the group because they were brought there, meaning they were born to this world and are there willy-nilly.

We have to gradually awaken them to participate more actively; this means that actually all of humanity is one group.
[92465]
From the Georgia Convention 11/06/12, Lesson 2

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A Dissolving Mirage

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Sometimes there is a feeling in the group that we all understand and feel a certain phenomenon, but suddenly we feel fogginess in our minds and thoughts, a kind of stupor, and there is the feeling that we develop very slowly. Why is that?

Answer: Why do we constantly forget our goal while in the group, why do we connect and then it all disappears, why do the pictures of the world conceal the real picture in which we should see that everything around us is our desire and that we have to connect in order to discover the Creator in it? Why do we detach ourselves from the true picture of the world and the mirage and imaginary picture that we see conceal spirituality from us? Why is our world stronger than the spiritual world?

It is all because you haven’t focused yourself together with the group on connection.

If you make efforts by yourself, you cannot attain anything by that, you can only succeed when we mutually help one another so that the picture of connection will become a spiritual picture, that it will acquire life, acquire Light in it, and will show us that it is the only true picture of the world.

The external picture that you now see will suddenly lose its intensity and its influence on you and will gradually fade. You would feel that everything that is happening here is like a dream. I drive somewhere, go to sleep, wake up, go to work, go somewhere, all this suddenly begins to fade. You suddenly begin to see that it all stems from your attributes and it stops being so real, clear, and alive and becomes blurry and foggy.

The same picture that is focused on connection, which you imagined before, now becomes real and in it you discover new states. It is this picture that becomes the important one, which means that you begin to feel where the signals are coming from, the Providence, the higher level.

Thus you gradually change one attribute for another.
[92462]
From the Georgia Convention 11/06/12, Lesson 2

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What Is A “Group?”

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Under what conditions can we see that a group exists and that is headed towards the goal?

Answer: A group that is headed towards the goal is a collection of people for whom there is only one goal. They know what it is, they perceive it among them, and feel it. They study together from Kabbalistic sources; they check themselves according to these sources, and work on the connection of their points in the heart, which means that the main thing for them is the connection as they ignore all the other attributes. If a person yearns for unity in order to reveal the Creator, it is enough for him to be my friend even if he can be an unpleasant person in every other aspect; it makes no difference. Gradually we all understand how to adjust ourselves to one another and to get closer.

A group is a collection of people who understand that in order to attain the Creator they have to work on themselves, to study, and to lead a certain lifestyle. They have to meet on a regular basis and to be so strongly connected that it will constantly lead to connection and unity.

If they just rent a place and gather there, it doesn’t mean that they are a group yet, they meet physically, read together, and then go their own way, does that make them a group? According to the wisdom of Kabbalah everything is determined by the internal awakening and not by the physical bodies.

A group refers to the yearning of the points in the heart to become one whole. Only then it is called a “group.” So we still need to work a lot on this.

But when all the people yearn together for one goal, understanding that only by that will they connect above all the differences, they bring out the Creator’s attribute and by that, overcome the shattering—then they become a group.

So it turns out that all our contrasting attributes are in one egoistic desire. It is as if all the egoistic desires that are opposite from ours, that are in contrast to one another, are now in one sack. We restrict our desires, place a Masach (screen) above these attributes and focus our points at the Creator, at equivalence and bestowal.

It turns out that our connected egoistic desires are left below while our intentions to connect and the yearning for the Creator, to resemble Him and to become equal to Him are above them. This is how the soul, which means the one collective Partzuf is created.

The soul is one. There aren’t many souls. There is only one vessel for everyone. If we create it, we suddenly discover that is has already been created! We only try to discover it and by our attempts we suddenly discover that we already exist in it. This is because that one whole creation already exists while the shattering occurred only with regard to our consciousness. When we yearn to advance we ascend above our current feeling.
[92445]
From the Georgia Convention 11/06/12, Lesson 2

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