New Life 705 – Jewish Culture: The Synagogue
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Tal Mandelbaum ben Moshe

The internal essence of the synagogue is a place where people connect and ask for the power to love one another. Today the attitude to the synagogue is very far from the attitude to a place that the synagogue is supposed to represent.

When Abraham and Sarah gathered people in their tents they taught them to connect and to reveal the upper force in the connection between them. When the Temple was destroyed we drew away from the upper force, from love of others, and the synagogues became formal rituals.

Unfortunately there is no warmth or love in the synagogue today and so people are not attracted to it. They only come to pray and then hurry back home. There is no soul in the synagogue, no spirit of life, and this is a state called exile. In order to come out of exile we need the force of the Messiah, the force that can draw us from exile, from the separation between us to connection, to the revelation of the soul. The Temple and the Ark of the Covenant, and nowadays the synagogue and the Holy Ark, are symbols of spiritual roots.

There is no holiness in stones if there is no holiness in the heart, and holiness is love. We have to pray for the love to be restored between us.

A Minyan, a prayer, reading the Torah, etc. are all symbols of the right connection in which the Creator is revealed. There is no trace of the inner essence of spirituality in all the rituals held in the synagogue these days. One can be psychologically moved by these rituals, but this isn’t the necessary correction of the heart. In the synagogue, all the hearts should melt into one heart in which the force of love is revealed, and the real Torah is the force that can connect all the hearts despite the evil inclination that is revealed.

A Minyan, a group of ten people who come to the synagogue wishing to connect, can reveal the Creator, the force of love between them. The revelation of the force of love in the world is the purpose of development, as it is written, “My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations.”
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From KabTV’s “New Life 705 – Jewish Culture: The Synagogue,” 3/17/16

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Question: What is the wisdom of Kabbalah about?

Answer: The wisdom of Kabbalah tells us how we all have to rise above our egoism by the good force in nature, the Light, and how to become good and connect with everyone into one whole desire. The positive attribute of love and bestowal that is revealed among us is called the upper force because it is above our egoism. It is called the Creator because He created us with an attribute that is opposite from Him, as it is written, “I have created the evil inclination.”

Question: Who is the wisdom of Kabbalah intended for?

Answer: For anyone who feels a desire to discover the secret of his birth, his destiny, and the meaning in of life. According to all our sources there are no limitations in studying the wisdom of Kabbalah.

Question: Why do religious people object to the study of the wisdom of Kabbalah?

Answer: Only religious people who do not understand the goal of the wisdom of Kabbalah object to it, as do many non-religious people. The wisdom of Kabbalah does not refer to religion in any way because religion does not have the goal of changing a person’s attribute from egoistic to altruistic but only to keep him in frameworks where he can live according to corporeal customs. Baal HaSulam describes this in great detail in the article “The Essence of Religion and Its Purpose.”
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Torah, “Deuteronomy,” 9:1 – 9:2: Hear, O Israel: Today, you are crossing the Jordan to come in to possess nations greater and stronger than you, great cities, fortified up to the heavens. A great and tall people, the children of the ‘Anakim, whom you know and of whom you have heard said, “Who can stand against the children of ‘Anak?!”

When a person advances in his Kabbalah studies and tries to get closer to his friends on the spiritual path in order to reach unity where the Creator will be revealed, he sees huge external and internal obstacles in front of him.

Internal obstacles appear between the participants who try to get closer to each other because such an egoism erupts between them that, as The Book of Zohar tells us, they literally want to kill and burn each other.

On the other hand, they are subjected to adverse external influences because everyone who doesn’t participate in the movement to establish a common heart are their adversaries.

These are the nations of the world, people of Israel that aren’t connected to their movement yet, and the so-called mixed multitude (Erev Rav – workers of Pharaoh). It means all of the adversaries of Kabbalah, all adversaries of the method of connecting people into one whole, are currently enemies of the spiritual path.

We see this for ourselves and cannot do anything. This is a natural product of our advancement. After all, it is written, “Who can stand against the children of ‘Anak?”

Our adversaries seem to us very strong, wise, sure of themselves, and logical. They understand what they are living for and are convincing because there is an egoistic world in front of them where they exist and navigate perfectly.

From their point of view, you are an unreal person full of unrealistic fantasies and just lead people away from a normal life. It is exactly like Pharaoh who said to Moses, “Why do you and Aaron distract people from my work? Let them work for me, I will pay them, and everything will be fine.”

Pharaoh commanded his servants, “Give them more work so that they won’t listen to these two. What is it that they suddenly decided to deal with some kind of love?!”

Today, the same thing happens. The ideological Kabbalah haters, the mixed multitude (Erev Rav), are trying to succeed especially in this. In all times, there is a war waged with them.

Question: But the people of Israel are entering the land of Israel and beginning to develop it.

Answer: The people of Israel gradually are joining the handful of Kabbalists under the leadership of Moses and Aaron, which includes their disciples and the ancestors of the tribes. In this way, they gradually lead people to a state of connection between them that is called the land of Israel.

Question: Then, do the children of ‘Anak cease to be giants?

Answer: Actually, there are no more giants in the land of Israel. They appear there only when another shattering happens.

For example, before the destruction of the First and the Second Temples egoistic societies appeared that stated that they knew how to serve the Creator, destroying through this the level of bestowal and love that was achieved between people. It was they who brought the Romans and Greeks to Israel that banished its people from it. Since then, we have existed in this state for 2,000 years.

Even now, they don’t let us to assemble together to reach integrity, bestowal, love, and unity between us. They feel that it undermines the foundation of their power over the people, and therefore, they are strongly against the wisdom of Kabbalah.

Question: How do we not see giants in them, that is, knowledgeable and logical people?

Answer: It is said very simply, “Turn your gaze to them, and they will turn into a mountain of bones.” We need to unite between us, attract the force of the Creator to us, and direct our energy to the connection of the people.

By this, we will destroy the giants because they exist only in order to shatter people to pieces, small currents, to not let them assemble and make them work only in egoism.

Therefore, even though they sometimes talk about the principle of “Love your neighbor as yourself,” they haven’t realized it themselves.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 5/4/16

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The spiritual knowledge lost by the people of Israel after destruction of the Temple gave a special impetus to the development of the European civilization. It gave Europeans an exceptional strength of spirit, the desire to conquer, explore new lands, and to develop.

Pilgrims travelled the roads and spread the Christian religion everywhere and taught people to pray. It brought science, knowledge, and faith to the residents of Europe that were complete barbarians at that time. This religion supports people until today.

Ancient Greeks received all their wisdom from the Jews. Initially, there were quite primitive beliefs in many gods in ancient Greece. The legends of ancient Greece are so naive that can attract only young children. Science and conception of the human soul that, allegedly, develops from a deep breathing, were also primitive.

Ancient Greece rose due to borrowing ideas from the wisdom of Kabbalah that was alive in the people of Israel. Although the Greeks learned from it only external ideas in a distorted form, that is exactly what developed European civilization and gave Europe the form it is in today.

Thanks to this influence, Europe received a special spirit that it was striving to pass to the whole world. Therefore, Europeans went to discover new lands and continents, but their main motive was religious and missionary.

From religion science developed, alchemy and geography that were necessary in order to prove to everyone that the Christian religion was the truest  that conquers the world. It was very important for the Europeans. The colonial wars and conquests initially had exclusively religious purposes. It was only later that they realized that they could receive economic benefit from them.

Closer to our time, ships began to bring goods from China and India to England and a need for the Suez Canal arose.

There was a transition from the Christian religion to science. Europe shifted the focus from God to man, the human spirit, and the human values. It is possible to say that this change began with the French Revolution that was followed by revolutions in other countries. Science began to develop rapidly in addition to religion.

There was no other continent where so many different nations lived in close proximity and had a common religion and philosophy received from Rome and Greece. Besides, the people of Israel, who came out into exile, were living among the European nations. They moved from one country to another and were contacting other nations, passing to them the spirit that lived inside them. Therefore, Europe has developed as no other country.

It is possible to say that the place where the people of Israel came from began to flourish. And as soon as they were expelled from there, these countries fell immediately. It means that we can see two ways of development in Europe. The first one is the development of the Christian religion, and the second is the development of the Jewish spirit. These two directions, influencing each other, have built the European civilization.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 8/18/16

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Question: Europe is going through difficult times: an economic crisis, refugees problem, the spread of Islam, and resurgence of fascism and Nazism; all these problems are snowballing very rapidly.

Yet Europe made a great contribution to the development of humanity, probably greater than all other continents. What is the reason that such a high civilization developed in Europe?

Answer: Ancient civilization emerged in the Middle East, in ancient Babylon, Persia. But then it all moved to Europe, to ancient Greece and Rome, which built European civilization.

From Greece to Europe came science and philosophy that Greek scientists received from the Jews during the period from the First Temple until the destruction of the Second Temple, a thousand years before our era. European scientists and philosophers write about it themselves.

The Romans gave the social system that developed Europe. After all, when the Roman Empire was at the height of its prosperity and power, Europe was totally barbaric. If the Romans didn’t conquer Europe, crossing it all up to the northern borders and down, it’s hard to say what would have happened to the European civilization.

The Romans gave Europe a state system; they laid and paved the roads. The Talmud writes that when Judea fell, the Roman Empire took over its power and wisdom and rose upon them. Eventually everything came out of Israel, from the destruction experienced by the Jewish people. The spiritual knowledge of the people of Israel, their spiritual attainment and strength, were exhausted, and only pitiful crumbs were left from them.

The people of Israel didn’t know how to use them because they were not created to build something in this material world, but only for the spiritual work. The Romans adopted this knowledge and used it to build the material life in European countries.

The campaigns of Alexander the Great really contributed to it who stated that he sought to convey this modern, scientific, developed public method of existence to the entire world. This was the purpose of his conquests.

In addition, Christianity was a great help in spreading the Roman influence over Europe. It was adopted from the Jews and grew on the basis of those remains that were left after destruction of the Second Temple. The first Christians were Jews that turned Christianity into a new religion, after the destruction of the Second Temple.

Christianity obliged its followers to develop this religion, to spread it further and to add new souls to it. This is what inspired ancient Rome to conquer Europe, bringing science, philosophy, and religion there.

Prior to it, barbarians that worshiped spirits inhabited Europe. Christianity gave them a system and books. Art began to develop since people were illiterate and drawings were required in order to explain this idea to them.

Religions and philosophies blossomed on the ruins of the Jewish Temple due to the impossibility of continuing the spiritual idea that fell and shattered. The entire European civilization grew from the few crumbs that were left from the hidden wisdom that the Jews had.
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From KabTV’s “New Life #762 8/18/16

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Question: You often have said that Eastern doctrines are based on the suppression of the ego. One of the basic principles of Zen Buddhism is that truth cannot be expressed in words and that the only criterion is personal experience.

The Zen Koan system (questions and answers) is based on the principle that it is impossible to answer the teacher’s question by using formal logic.

The method is meant to spur the student on, helping to transcend the limits of logical thinking to reach a level where he has no rational support.

It seems that you often use a similar method, whether consciously or unconsciously. Is that really so?

Answer: To some extent this is also one of the techniques used in studying the wisdom of Kabbalah, but it doesn’t mean that the methods are similar, not in development nor purpose.
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Question: At the gathering of the 18^th Knesset, a compulsory education law was passed regarding essential subjects (mathematics, physics, and others) for the ultra-Orthodox schools. However, the ultra-Orthodox are introducing another bill to nullify this reform.

How do you feel about the proposal of teaching essential subjects for a general education in all schools?

Answer: I don’t understand the ultra-Orthodox’s fear. This doesn’t include history, social sciences, culture, or art. These are subjects that are essential today for every person to apply for any job.

Maybe they are afraid of being left without their electorate or that people will become more secular, will begin to work and leave their communities in which children grow up without a profession;  they don’t have degrees and must study in a kollel [institute for advanced Talmud and rabbinical literature study] for a poor people’s scholarship. The problem is compounded by the fact that they receive very large benefits from the state according to the number of children in the family.

If you consider the situation from the perspective of the future, on the one hand, in any case everything is going toward a reduction in the number of places to work because robots and automated machines will enter our lives so much that we will simply not be able to find work for everyone. On the other hand, in spite of everything, it is necessary to give a person a minimal job besides studying Torah. At least, that is what the Americans did. But it could be that to a particular degree this caused them to begin to become distanced from religion, from Jewish communities and to gradually spread all over America. The problem is serious and as far as it seems, the Orthodox are considering this issue.

They must stand guard in relation to their community and they are doing this magnificently. They use whatever they can get from the nation and from local self-management organizations. They are good politicians who can see everything correctly, predict developments, and come to agreements. They understand what they must do. There is a thorough understanding of their internal problems, but externally they always present themselves as one single monolithic force.

Comment: In principle, this is a type of preservation….

Answer: This preservation is correct because in their perception there is nothing new in the world, “If we wait 30 years, nothing will happen.”

Preservation like this is justified. So I think that they know what they are doing and all of our secular views about their behavior, in which we immediately denounce and judge them, is derived from a point of view in which everything must be changed immediately and be constantly clothed in another form.

While they assume that changes can wait, the main thing is to hold their community together, under one roof, behind one fence and not allow it any way to dissolve or to disperse anywhere.

Comment: According to Kabbalistic theory, the ego is growing and one way or another it will always win, meaning that the barriers will be breached….

Answer: This will only be in the end of days. First everything will come from the secular strata of the population through the moderate religious Jewish communities. And only at the end, when all the rest will already be close to correction and unity, then the Light of correction, by way of the external strata, will it gradually manifest in them.

Until then, they will be against any changes; they will hate the wisdom of Kabbalah and this will continue until the end of days.
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From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 7/24/16

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Question: The question about the meaning of life interests me so much that in addition to lectures on the wisdom of Kabbalah, I also listen to lectures by other teachers from various sources and doctrines. Is this “garbage” for my spiritual life?

Answer: I wouldn’t advise you to connect the wisdom of Kabbalah with other teachings. It is better for you to engage in other methods and leave the study of Kabbalah.

It is better for your spiritual health. For example, engage with Yoga or Tarot cards, anything you want, just not everything together. You think you can understand it all? But you can’t! Personal and spiritual “garbage” will really appear that you will have a hard time getting rid of.

A person is unable to get along with and profoundly understand what he hears from everyone. It only seems to him that he can “sort the wheat from the chaff.”
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 4/10/16

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New Life 741 – A True Blessing
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Tal Mandelbaum ben Moshe

Jewish customs stem from Kabbalists who discovered the system of leadership through which the Creator, the upper force, operates us. The blessings mean that I have revealed the upper force as good and benevolent, and therefore I bless it.

The Creator created an evil inclination in us, the ego, and He “created a Torah spice for it,” a positive force that can balance the ego. We have to reach a state in which we say the blessings not simply as words from our mouth but in thought and desire. This happens as a result of the correction of the ego.

The wisdom of Kabbalah teaches us that it is possible to correct the ego through a special connection of mutual guarantee between people. Thus from the love of the created beings we come to the love of the Creator. The effort to connect summons a positive force upon us that balances the ego. Blessings between a person and his friend are meant to be the outcome of our request, asking the Creator for the power to love others. The Creator wants everyone to reach His level, and so a person’s true healing can be only as a result of correcting himself.

In spirituality a person discovers that he is a small world, which means that everything is inside him. Thus when he corrects himself, he corrects the world, and when he sees that someone suffers, he understands that he has to correct himself. Turning to the Creator is a request for the power to see reality correctly. “There is none else besides Him, the good and the benevolent.” At first there is nothing in us but the evil inclination. All the good that we seemingly do stems from our egoism. When we bless, we bless the appearance of the good force that we have been rewarded to actually reveal.

All of reality exists between two forces: the force of receiving and the force of giving, which we have to acquire. We have to ascend to a state in which we will feel the others just as we feel ourselves; the bodies will not separate us. The blessings people bless one another with symbolize the level we have to reach with the help of our efforts to connect. Eventually a person discovers that there are no other people before him but the Creator, which means that only he and the Creator exist in reality.
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From KabTV’s “New Life 741 – A True Blessing,” 7/5/16

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New Life 740 – Morning Blessings 
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Tal Mandelbaum ben Moshe

What is the origin of all the blessings? After all, no book fell from the sky? Kabbalists discovered that there is an inner more concealed part of nature that manages us, the Creator of the operating system. Feeling this system is called day. Drawing away from this feeling is called evening, and being disconnected from it is called night. Returning to it is called morning and so on.

Kabbalists also discovered that unpleasant events are also in our favor and this is from where the blessings stem. The heart of Kabbalists blesses everything by itself. They wrote the blessings for other people in order to guide them to the Creator, to be in contact with Him, connected to Him. Washing hands, for example, is an action that stems from the same Hebrew root as taking. When I wash my hands, I want to keep them away from egoistic actions.

To be in contact with the upper force means, that we feel the Creator’s presence every moment in our life. Kabbalists tell us what we should do in order to raise ourselves to the recognition of the Creator. We are actually inside the upper force although we are not aware of it, but we should be aware of it and not detach ourselves from Him. We have to reach a state in which we feel how the Creator manages every thought, every desire, me managing myself.

In the past people performed the rituals that Kabbalists determined in order to reach the revelation of the Creator. The revelation of the Creator raises a person above time, motion and place. When a person discovers the Creator he connects to eternity and to wholeness, and the internal meaning of the blessings recited upon arising in the morning are meant to help us hasten the revelation of the Creator in practice.
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From KabTV’s “New Life 740 – Morning Blessings,” 7/5/16

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