Question: Is there any connection between Kabbalah and religion? Is Kabbalah a religion?

Answer: Kabbalah is not a religion; it is a science. Kabbalah is about the part of reality that is hidden from us but with which we have an opportunity to work, like in science. Therefore, Kabbalah is called a science.

Through special actions that we perform on ourselves, we can reveal our senses for perceiving a higher level. We have five corporeal senses—vision, hearing, taste, smell, and touch—through which we perceive this world, but in a very limited form. Yet we perceive it to some extent and live accordingly.

We cannot even imagine that in this world around us there are so many other phenomena because our senses do not reveal them in a manner similar to that we cannot see what happens far away without binoculars, or without a radar we don’t see what exists in the air except the sound waves that are in our voice diapason, and so on.

We have so many instruments that we created in order to broaden the range of our senses. But they can only expand them while the science of Kabbalah creates an additional sense, “the sixth sense,” through which we can reveal the rest of reality, which is hidden from us. Then we know what we live for and how to live correctly. This is precisely what a person needs to attain.

Question: What kind of additional sense is it?

Answer: This sense works like our corporeal senses, only our five senses act in the form of receiving, consuming, attracting within all the data that is outside. And this additional sense, which we develop through Kabbalah, operates according to the desire to give, bestow, and love.

We come outside of and rise above ourselves, and thus we are not limited by our body with its five senses. Our spiritual sense exists outside of our corporeal body. It is like we deploy this sense onto all of reality. Then we can perceive everything. In fact, this sense is the soul.
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From the Israeli Radio Program 103FM, 8/9/15

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Question: I have heard that some people who meditate feel elevated and enlightened. They sense a whole gratefulness, which fills the entire world connected into whole one. What causes such a feeling within a person?

Answer: This sensation comes because people suppress their egoism with the help of the Eastern meditation and they start feeling one system. After all, they annulled their egoism, which was tearing this system into many parts. However, this is still not an elevation above the material world, above egoism.

They see the structure of reality, but they cannot govern it and exist inside it. This is only anticipation, a mirage, and a sensation of the wholeness of the world. In our world there are a lot of people who without any meditation feel that the nature is whole and everything is interconnected within it.

Scientists and all ordinary egoists come to the same conclusions. They also understand that the world is one system and therefore we have to protect animals, the ecology,  and follow the law of balance in nature. A person feels all of this in his ordinary egoistic desires and he does not demand to rise above his egoism.

The force that elevates one above his egoism is a completely different force. It can be attracted from nature only through unique exercises according to the method of Kabbalah. This force in reality gives us an opportunity to rise above our egoism and enter the next level of existence.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 1/25/15

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Question: There is a Japanese proverb that says: “Troubles will transform you into a precious stone.” How do you relate to this?

Answer: This is Samurai philosophy and speaks about the way of suffering. I think that we have no need for this at all, since we go our own way. Why do we need to go towards happiness through the way of suffering? We can leap above it immediately, as the Jews very well know.

In the meantime, we haven’t succeeded in doing this because we don’t want to listen to the method that we received thousands of years ago, the wisdom of Kabbalah, but it can lead us to happiness in a single leap.

Comment: But nevertheless, when you had health problems, your teacher said that he was envious of you because he saw this as a sign of advancement.

Answer: Certainly thanks to suffering a person improves because suffering works against the ego that wants pleasure all the time. So another system of study and understanding appeared that was opposed to the ego. But this is not the right way!

Christianity says: “If they slap you on one cheek, give them the other cheek also.” This is not right. We must go another way. The wisdom of Kabbalah explains everything in a very simple way. The Creator created life and death, so choose life. With all our might we must yearn for good, for love, for ease, and not burrow into suffering. We have no need for it. To go willingly into exile, suffer there, and this will be better for all people is absolutely the wrong way! The ego intentionally attracts us there and this is not the Kabbalistic approach towards the world, our history, our mission.

The Creator blesses us with peace, happiness, Light, and warmth, but in no way with suffering. For in suffering, the person is not prepared to bless the Creator. He cannot cry and say: “How good it is for me to be with you!” After all, this is a lie. So it is forbidden for us to develop our own suffering. Christianity is based upon this. But from the point of view of the wisdom of Kabbalah, this is absolutely incorrect.

Question: So what does “Rejoice when the wicked are revealed to you” mean?

Answer: It means to rejoice when your defects are discovered within you. You are happy about this and don’t suffer. This is happiness because your personal characteristics are now being revealed, and you see that you can correct them. If they are revealed to you from above, it means that you will surely correct them.
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From KabTV’s “Conversations with Michael Laitman” 8/5/15

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Question: Are omens, amulets, Feng Shui and other methods important in the process of our spiritual growth in any way?

Answer: Spirituality means love and bestowal above and in contrast to our egoism. This property appears in us only as a result of the influence of the Upper Light (Surrounding Light) on us.

We can awaken and summon the Surrounding Light (Ohr Makif) by mutual efforts in the group. This actually sums up the whole Kabbalistic method. Everything else refers to how by increasing the mutual love and bestowal among us, we use our new common attribute to attain the upper world that operates only according to this principle.
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We know how much suffering people who were involved with the dissemination of the wisdom of Kabbalah went through since the time that the method of the Ari began to be introduced in this world. And this is not because of someone’s evil will but because we exist in a broken system.

And the moment that you begin to go out with your spiritual idea that is directed towards connection between people, you immediately put yourself under fire from all directions.

Someone who was neutral and even supported you also comes out against you. After all, you are arousing anti-egoistic forces and egoism is the nature of the whole world. So we see that there aren’t any people in whom anti-Semitism isn’t hiding, after all, it comes from nature. It is possible to ignite the fire of this hatred in everyone.

Correspondingly, anyone who hears about the wisdom of Kabbalah hates it because he is in the nature of the broken desires. And if he is attracted to the wisdom of Kabbalah, it is only out of curiosity. But in fact, he hates it, and to the degree that he gets closer to it, he hates it more and more, until he abandons it.

There has to be great help from above and work in this world, so that together they will influence a person, and he will cross the potential Machsom (barrier) standing before him, leap above it, and rise to his first spiritual level.

We know how the first Hasidim suffered; they were arrested and put in prison in Russia and in the Ukraine. Against them was the Mitnagdim (the movement against Hasidism). Those religious Jews hated the Hassids who wanted to disseminate the wisdom of Kabbalah so much that they made efforts to imprison them and condemn them to death. The fire of hatred burn in the religious Jews regarding those who tried to open the wisdom of Kabbalah and spoke about connecting people and revealing the hearts that this hatred is felt to this day, even though modern Hassidism is no longer the ideology it once was, and therefore, there is not as much opposition to it.

We know how much Baal HaSulam suffered. When he published the newspaper, The Nation it was immediately shut it down. He planned to write 50 articles continuing with “Matan Torah (The Giving of the Torah),” “The Arvut (Mutual Guarantee),” and “Peace in the World.” But instead of 50 articles, he only published four as he was forced to stop because the newspaper was shut down. He said: “If so, then the generation is not ready for this, and there is nobody to write for!” How many new ideas would we have gotten if he hadn’t stopped?

Even during my life with Rabash I saw how much it was difficult to be involved with studying Kabbalah. Today there are many such groups, and if you sit in your corner and don’t go out, everything is okay, there will not be opposition. But the moment that you go out, you will get blows. Like the Jews who lived in exile in the closed ghettos, the Kabbalists lived among the Jews.

But the time has come when we must come out of hiding not for the sake of some abstract idea, but because the correction in our generation is possible only with the inclusion of masses of people. The connection between them is the only condition necessary for revelation. It follows that if I don’t connect to others, I don’t create the conditions, the means, the basis, the bearer in which the Light can be revealed.

And then all of my studying would be in vain; it would bring no added value that would allow me to realize myself and truly merit the discovery of the Light, the revelation of the Creator, raising myself to the first spiritual level. This is possible only if thousands more will connect with this. Even though the power of each is minimal, together they are strong in quantity that works together with the qualitative force that worked in previous generations.

And so we have received the opportunity to fill the desire that is burning in us. It burns a bit in each one, like a thin candle. But if we connect many candles together, a gigantic blaze is created that is prepared to illuminate with spiritual Light.
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From the Talk about the Importance of Dissemination 3/19/14

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Question: What is the difference between the religious and secular approach to life? For example, I consider myself a secular person, but I always have an internal conflict, and it is difficult to figure out where in me the secular person ends and the religious one begins. The same division exists in the entire Israeli society.

According to the latest poll: 50% of the [Israeli] population are completely secular, 17% observe the traditions but do not consider themselves religious, 13% observe traditions and consider themselves religious, 12% are religious and 8% are Orthodox religious.

Answer: Secular people believe that the world is governed by laws of nature and there is nothing else except what we see and discover through science. The secular approach to life means that the world should be taken such as it is, according to one’s feelings, without relying on any upper forces, destiny, life after death. Any unsolved phenomena are no more than a figment of our imagination and fantasy.

The secular approach is the real approach. Inside it are many varieties that define man’s relationship to himself and society, but they are not to the level of the difference between the religious and secular approach.

The religious approach is based on the belief in the upper force that created the world and puts us in the conditions that we have to perform. If we fulfill all the wishes of the upper force, we deserve the award, if we do not fulfill them, we will be punished.

There are different kinds of relationships with the upper force, of attitudes to reward and punishment, to a person’s participation in this and one’s freedom of choice. But the point is that religious people take into account the existence of the upper force, a higher design, program, the purpose of creation. Thus, the center of creation is no longer the human being, but the Upper Force, the Creator.

Because people believe that the Creator arranges and organizes everything in response to one’s behavior, they have to continuously relate their lives to the Upper Force. That is, they think that one is dependent not on the laws of blind nature, but on the Upper will. Therefore, it is necessary to pray to the Upper, ask, be ashamed, repent for one’s past actions.

Many different religions and beliefs once existed and vanished or are still existing today Religion has a great influence on the world and on humanity. During the past two thousand years, humanity has evolved under the influence of religion, first after the destruction of the Second Temple Judaism arose, and then from it came Christianity and Islam.

All these religions are fighting among themselves, and there are very complex relationships between them. Each religion has many movements: Catholics, Protestants, and Orthodox Christianity, Shiite and Sunni in Islam, and many streams of Judaism.

Every synagogue in Israel is somehow different from the rest. Not to mention the conflict between the secular and religious who are not able to organize their lives so as not to interfere with each other but want to impose their own view on others.

I do not want to judge who is right and who is wrong. But such a conflict exists only in Israel. For example, in the US or in Europe there is no conflict between religious and secular people. If you are a Jew, no one cares whether you attend the synagogue on Saturdays or only on major holidays.

The Jews abroad feel they belong to one nation. In Israel, there is a conflict, because religion is not separated from the state and is involved in a power struggle. Thus, it appears into the area of general interest, where our desires clash. Over the years, this conflict increases because everyone believes that the opposite side wants to grab a piece from it.

This confrontation in society is gaining strength, leading to such hatred and division, which had never existed among the people of Israel. And I do not think that it is the result of a different approach to the world. It’s just a struggle for power in our lives—desires of some to control others and the state so that it serves their interests, be that of the secular or religious community.

The struggle is for the state, for power, for the state treasury, and using it for their own benefit.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 5/21/15

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Question: Why did the first settlers in Israel lose their main internal essence of the mutual relations between them and just accepted socialism with all its implications and mistakes?

Answer: The fact is that in Israel there was mutual exclusion between Kabbalists and traditional Judaism, between Rav Kook and the religious people. Rav Kook called for unity, for the Light that is reflected in his writings, while the other Jewish leaders continued to educate their followers according to the principles laid down in exile.

They didn’t welcome the spiritual revival of the nation according to the principle of “love thy neighbor as thyself.” So far this condition has not been met because they are awaiting the arrival of the Messiah, that is, some force, some special circumstances, that will reveal the love of others in us. They don’t realize that this is only possible due to our own internal work, as the wisdom of Kabbalah tells us. From the Kabbalistic perspective it is totally wrong to tie the fulfillment of the law of “love thy neighbor as thyself” to some upper illumination or to a certain person or leader.

After the first wave of settlers in Israel, there was a delimitation between Kabbalah and Judaism. After all, the masses that came to Israel totally rejected religion, or clung to its ordinary corporeal frameworks. The number of Kabbalists among them, was very small and no one listened to them. Moreover, they were afraid to speak in public, afraid they would create a situation that would force them to leave the country.

It soon became clear who belonged to which camp among the settlers that caused the division among society according to political, economic, spiritual, and physical principles. This led to great problems. None of the famous Kabbalists who lived here were able to speak openly about spiritual correction. Rav Kook for example, used a language that could not be understood; therefore, everyone regarded him as an ordinary ideologue, not a Kabbalist.

The great Kabbalist, Baal HaSulam tried to publish a paper to reach the people, but he wasn’t able to achieve anything; the paper was shut down under the accusation of pro-communist ideas. After all, if you pursue the principle of love thy neighbor as thyself, it is perceived as a communistic principle.

Thus a quarter of a century after the first Zionist congress in Basel, the situation in Israel is that we have to revive everything all over again today. There are many people and movements opposed to the Kabbalistic approach of creating one nation since each one is trying to grab a “piece” for himself to become a tiny king in his own community.

We see how divided and torn apart modern Judaism is; a huge confrontation exists between the religious and non-religious factions of society. The entire nation is divided into many sectors.

I think that today we can speak openly about the wisdom of Kabbalah and with an appeal for the love of others, as a consequence of the deep frustration people are now beginning to feel and realize as a result of the cumulative experience gained over 150 years of development.

Therefore, we have the opportunity to stand on the shoulders of the first settlers and the founders of the country to call for practical actions based on our internal constitution of love thy neighbor as thyself.
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From KabTV’s “About Our Life” 5/7/15

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Question: How is it that the three world religions that have so many disagreements with each other agree that Jerusalem is the holy city?

Answer: All three religions of the world are connected with Abraham and with the fact that the wisdom of Kabbalah went into concealment. About two thousand years ago, after the destruction of the Second Temple, the people of Israel fell from the spiritual degree they were previously on, from brotherly love, and fell into unfounded hatred.

All that the Jews had taken from the holy Kabbalistic books turned into the Judaism of exile. Thus, Judaism developed followed by Christianity and then Islam. All of these religions emerged because the people of Israel lost their spirituality.

Both Christianity and Islam borrowed their symbols from Judaism, and that is why Jerusalem became a holy city for them. Everyone feels that this city has something special—Jews, Muslims, and Christians—because such an attitude is instilled in a person from his childhood.

But it is one thing to attribute sanctity to stones and another thing to build Jerusalem in one’s heart. Jerusalem is a “perfect city”; it is the properties in which a person reveals the Creator. The upper force of bestowal and love is revealed in the land of Israel, in Jerusalem.

The heart is all the human desires. To reveal the Creator means to achieve these corrected properties that allow me to bestow to everyone. If I come out of my egoism and begin to love the other like myself, then in this aspiration I reveal the land of Israel (Yashar El – straight to God), the perfect city Jerusalem, my corrected properties of bestowal, and the Temple, and the Creator in them, and unite with Him.

Everyone eventually strives to achieve this true concept of Jerusalem, but does not know what is hidden behind it. All the people must go through this process of internal creation of oneself, regardless of the religion they profess.

Indeed, we all came out of Babylon. Some joined Abraham and went with him, and some of the Babylonians were not yet ready for this. But in the end, everyone should come to this, as it is written, “…for they shall all know Me from their smallest to their greatest” and “…my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples.”

Therefore, Jerusalem is at the center of general attention because all the peoples should gather in it—not physically, but in a spiritual sense. Religions only prepare humanity to the stage where we are now, to come to the revelation of the Creator.

Question: How will our world look when every person builds Jerusalem inside himself?

Answer: All the people will become brothers. The concept of Jerusalem means that we all are connected to each other and become brothers, as one man in one heart. This state is called the “perfect city.”

Question: In this case, it does not matter which religion one professes, correct?

Answer: Then, there will be no religion. They all will disappear, as they are replaced by the knowledge of the Creator, as it is written, “Know your Creator.”
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 5/7/15

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Question: How do you react to the fact that sometimes your organization is called a sect? A sect is something that stands outside of the generally accepted outlook. In other words, Judaism presents certain things one way, whereas you explain them in a completely different way. Those representing the Orthodox Judaism are very frustrated by this fact.

Answer: Naturally, those who are engaged in Kabbalah stay under the watchful eye of traditional Judaism. After all, until the Jews were expelled, there was no such thing as Judaism per se, since our people observed the major law of existence: “Love thy neighbor as thyself.” And now we must return to it. But it contradicts conventional religion because religion forgot that loving our neighbors is its foundation..

Three and a half thousand years ago in ancient Babylon, Abraham, the founder of all world religions, revealed the purpose of human evolution: harmonizing everyone with nature (the Creator – Elokim), the numeric value of which in Gematria is identical to the word “Tèva” (nature).

Having disclosed this issue, Abraham wrote his first book on Kabbalah Sefer Yetzira (The Book of Creation). Even today it is sold in bookstores even though it was written many centuries ago.

According to Abraham’s understanding, humanity faces the challenge of altering our self-centered nature and replacing it with an authentic, altruistic nature, i.e., attaining the condition of loving our neighbors as ourselves.

We are not a people in the conventional sense of the word. Rather, we are a group who three-and-a-half thousand years ago banded together under an ideological principle.

Therefore, you can call all the Jews a sect, although most of them still don’t know where they come from or why they are here.

For one-and-a-half thousand years before year zero year of our era, we lived above our egos and observed the law of loving our neighbors as ourselves. They are not just  words but an indication of the need to change human nature.

Later, we fell to the level called “the destruction of the Temple” or “the exile.” The last two thousand years we have lived in exile.

That is why religion appeared instead of Kabbalah. Religion claimed that if one mechanically fulfills all commandments, then one will stay healthy and happy, and after death will receive a place in paradise.

Until the 16^th century, the wisdom of Kabbalah was hidden from humanity, and in the 16^th century it was re-discovered for us by the great Kabbalist the ARI who lived in Tzfat. Later, the famous Kabbalist Baal Shem Tov began disseminating Kabbalah in Russia, Belarus, and the Ukraine.

The writings of Baal Shem Tov’s disciples are not just Hassidism! It is authentic and true Kabbalah! So, since ARI’s time and on, Kabbalah was revived once again in the form of loving thy neighbor as thyself, because by observing this law we attain similarity with nature that is absolutely closed, and inside is at the level of synergy, perfection, and harmony.

Later, the great Kabbalist of the 20^th century Baal HaSulam wrote commentaries on ARI’s works and on The Book of Zohar. He simplified the language and made these sources available to us.

We believe that the law of “loving our neighbors as ourselves” is the core of our existence. Today it is essential to revive this law because the world has reached a general, overall crisis. The science of Kabbalah says that this is not just a minor, transient crisis; rather, it is a transition point to the next existential level.

We are facing a transformational challenge: either we’ll reach similarity with nature, i.e., build a homogeneous, common, inclusive society with the help of Kabbalah that explains to us how to once again become one people and teaches us the ways of leading humanity to oneness or…  . The important thing is that we must do so voluntarily, consciously, knowingly, having a deep understanding of what is happening and what we are doing.

Otherwise we’ll be forced to pursue this path by nature, which we become even more opposite to.

And here we might face a severe problem, a huge upsurge of anti-Semitism is on the way. It is not a temporary phenomenon. It’s a profound, permanent condition that might make the nations of the world hate the people of Israel. It will be the greatest animosity ever; it will lead the whole world to tremendous hardships, even to the next world war.

This explains why we just cannot stay calm or indifferent. It is essential to explain to everybody that the message “love thy neighbor as thyself” are not just beautiful words that we use to calm down our children when telling them “Don’t fight! Be nice to your friends.” It in fact is the general law of integrity and global interconnectedness of nature, whereas humanity acts as a cancerous tumor that devours itself.

Therefore, according to the natural law of development, we must bring ourselves to conformity with the basic law, the law of homeostasis.
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From the Press Conference 3/11/15

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Question: All three religions consider Jerusalem as a holy city. Why is there a very special attitude to this city as if it connects a person with the upper force?

Answer: “Jerusalem” means “perfect city.” It is a spiritual concept that does not add holiness to the material city and its stones.

While the human being is made very complex, he is strongly influenced by the force of simple human faith, the power of placebo, his beliefs. Thus, arriving in Jerusalem, people feel that this is a special place.

But this is a special holy place created by people themselves by their attitude to this city, but the material city has no holiness. All the differences between geographic locations are in their spiritual roots.

It is written in the book of the great Kabbalist Ari, The Tree of Life, that the whole land is divided into areas according to special spiritual powers that affect them: Jerusalem, the land of Israel, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Babylon, and all other countries of the world.

This refers to the spiritual roots, but there is no difference in physical stones. But people who live in this world are impressed by each other and thus give these these stones, air, and geographical location special designations.

We need to understand that only by rising above these material human experiences will we be able to achieve a true, correct impression that will come from the spiritual property called Jerusalem, the Temple Mount, the Temple, Israel, the nations of the world.

All these are inner properties of the human being; the upper forces that we need to reveal. Then the spiritual Jerusalem will be revealed to us and inside of it the spiritual Temple, which is the “holy of holies,” where we will meet with the upper force.

So, everyone has to come to the reevaluation of the upper force and adhesion to the Creator.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 5/7/15

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