Entries in the 'Science' Category

Study Kabbalah And It Will Explain Everything To You

Dr. Michael LaitmanKabbalah is a system of knowledge and a method of revelation of the upper force in all of its manifestations, in all generations until the end of our existence in this world. It not only explains to us the purpose of creation, what is happening, and what will happen; it elevates us!

No other science changes us in any way, they only explain how we can benefit ourselves with their help, to somehow improve the world around us; whereas, the wisdom of Kabbalah is a method of raising a person from our world into the upper one.

By studying Kabbalah, you begin to ascend, to change your inner shape, and to alter your essence. You begin to open your eyes to yourself and the entire world, and truly ascend to your next level. It is no ordinary science where you stay on the “outside” detached from it; it is a method of self-transformation, ascension. This is perhaps the most fundamental part of it.

Let’s hope that, eventually, through our circulation, we will reach a state when people will know what kind of a method it is, and all of science will once again re-unite. How clearly and concisely Paracelsus expressed this in his treatise “Paragranum” [Das Buch Paragranum]: “Study Kabbalah (artem cabbalisticam), it will explain everything to you!”

Today each science exists in its narrow scope, and in each there are thousands of different niches occupied by scientists who don’t how to talk to each other. Kabbalah, however, is intended to re-unite all of these sciences together, to serve as a common basis for them, and to elevate everything to the single purpose and one common knowledge. That’s what makes it so special.

Ultimately, a person understands that the world he or she is living in is unified, whole, global, and integral, which is what all of us should be aspiring for today.
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From Lesson 3 Berlin Convention 1/28/2011

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Now I Get It!

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: You have said on numerous occasions that the ideas of Kabbalah should be brought into psychology and to scientific minds. I teach psychology in a university and I noticed that like all other scientists, even psychologists have very narrow opinions. So how can we approach psychologists? How can we bring elements of Kabbalah into psychology?

Answer: In principle, I myself came from the scientific world. But I left it. Yet, I respect people who nevertheless try to find something out about nature, themselves, and the surroundings. Of course, they are driven by egoistic qualities, but that’s how man is and you cannot do anything about it.

Psychologists, philosophers, and other people who study what seems like man’s inner world and the theory of knowledge, as well as scientists in the field of various closed systems—all of their research is based on our nature and the previous developments in all of science. Science develops in our five senses and is built out of these sensations.

Naturally, this entire science is absolutely egoistic because it comes from the sensation inside egoism, our main quality. And naturally, psychologists, psychiatrists, and philosophers are unable to understand Kabbalah because it works with opposite qualities. These people are no closer to attaining Kabbalah than all others.

That’s because in order to attain Kabbalah, one must have a point in the heart. If it is present, if a person has a need to know “Why do I exist?” that is not coming from smart philosophic reckoning, but from his personal, inner necessity, then he reaches the sensation and understanding of what Kabbalah talks about. This does not happen immediately, but over the course of a great amount of serious study.

At first he does not understand what it is talking about at all. He sits at the lessons for many months, listening and nodding his head, but he still does not have the inner sensations that emerge under the influence of the Light, which are adequate to the realm that the science of Kabbalah talks about. However, gradually this happens. We have to wait.

That is how children grow. Over the course of 20 years a person is brought up and grows, and only later does he become suitable for living in our world. Even though he was born in this world and his entire environment is also in this world, it still takes him 20 years to become more or less independent. And even then he is next to his mom all the time…. Still, suppose this is so. However, in our case we are talking about the spiritual world, a completely unexplored territory. How can I prepare for it if I am not in it? How can I adapt to it if I don’t feel it? I am told about this in these books and I don’t understand what they are talking about. So everything comes down only to the influence of the Surrounding Light.

We simply have to take these people and place them under the influence of the Surrounding Light if they agree to it. Meaning, we have to place them in the right environment, evoke the Surrounding Light through the study, and over the course of several months or years, we will see the result. This is the only thing we can do. If a person agrees to it, this will happen to him, and if he doesn’t agree to it, it won’t happen.

How much knowledge he has acquired in this world does not have any relation to Kabbalah because the knowledge he has acquired is about our world, this realm, “inside the aquarium.” So how will this help him find out what is outside? After all, everything is structured in a completely different way over there.

Even if he is a great scientist in our world, even if he is Einstein himself, he will suddenly find himself completely imperceptive to what is being said here. It is written that it is not the smart person who will master the spiritual world. That is never a criterion! It can only be done by a person with a point in the heart, who properly places himself under the external influence of the group and the inner influence of the Light. From inside the point in the heart is influenced by the Light, and from outside it is influenced by the group.

Under the influence of these two sides, this point swells up and a person begins to feel the first ten Sefirot inside of it as he rises from one degree to the next. And suddenly—Kabang! This sensation becomes revealed inside of him. Then he begins to understand what he heard about, what he read, and what others talked about. “Oh, now I get it!”
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From the 1st lesson at the Berlin Convention on 1/28/11

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From A Cell Of Thought To An Unlimited Mind

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How can we balance our feelings with our mind?

Answer: But why do that? Being balanced is not a good thing. Even though this is our purpose, to reach balance and harmony, nevertheless as long as we are on the path, we don’t need this to stop us.

We learn that the Creator created the will to receive which is the creation, matter, and the only thing that exists. This desire develops with the help of the Light that created it. Stated differently, there exists a special force called “Light,” “the force of bestowal,” or “the root” that created the will to receive, the force of reception.

When the will to receive begins developing with the help of the Light, it goes through four phases, each of which gives rise to the following stage and fills it, and then that phase continues its development. When this desire reaches the fourth phase of development, it begins asking questions: Who am I? What am I living for? Where did I come from?

In essence these questions are asking about “the root.” And because the desire asks about this, a mind begins developing within it. The Light influences our will to receive in such a way that the need for fulfillment makes the desire begin searching for a way to attain what it desires.

We see this based on how we are structured. What do we include inside of us? Positive particles and negative ones: positrons and electrons, atoms that make us up and unite into molecules. These, in turn, connect together according to their valency. So after all is said and done, there are two forces: the force of reception and the force of bestowal.

But when they begin to unite, they form cells of thought. That is why every atom and every molecule begins to feel the need to perceive itself. And when they try to unite together, they are looking for a way to complete themselves according to the number of free electrons. Then it turns out that by virtue of these processes, a mind forms.

After that the particles begin to unite in a way that seems mechanical. Our brain is also mechanical and contains nothing from Above. But it looks for the most rational, short, and best way to reach what it desires. This is called the birth of the mind inside the desire. A great desire gives birth to a great mind according to the fact that it has to attain great things, while a small desire produces a small mind.

This is similar to a child’s development. A small child has small desires and a small mind, but the more we develop his desires in order for him to know how to take something apart and put it back together, the more his mind develops. The same happens on the still, vegetative, and animate levels.

However, the will to bestow has a completely different brain. There we come out of ourselves to the common memory that is outside of us. I begin to acquire an external feeling, the feeling of bestowal, with the help of my desire to attain “the root” and by beginning to connect to the desire that is outside of me.

External desires are located between people and they are the common desire that each of them acquires. In the same way a person also acquires the external mind outside of each one of us. In that case, our desires and our mind are unlimited. Then, I do not limit the mind by the boundaries of my personality, but on the contrary, I come out into a dimension where there are no limitations. This state is called the world of Infinity.
From the lecture in “Kabbalah L’Am” Hall on 1/25/11

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Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Can you please explain what the right way to work with the Light is?

Answer: The right way to work with the Light is very simple. The difference between Kabbalah and religion (and all other methods) is that religion asks the Creator for Him to change and to become better, while Kabbalah says, “The Creator is absolute and only you can change.”

The Creator is Light, meaning the only force in the universe inside of which we exist. This force is unchanging and absolute. Therefore, the only way to work with the Creator is very simple: The more similar you are to this force, the more it influences you, and the less similar you are to it, the less it influences you.

This works by a very simple formula. If you studied physics in school then you have to know it: The influence of any source upon an object that is placed in the field of its influence is inversely proportional to the distance between them squared. When I come twice as close to the object that influences me, then its impact on me is four times greater. That is how things work in the physical world and it is the same in the spiritual world.

Therefore, if you come at least a little bit closer, you will see that the Light’s influence on you is squared. That is how we work with the upper Light.
From the 3rd lesson of the Berlin Convention on 1/28/11

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The Future Society Amidst The Ancient World

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Why did Kabbalists keep Kabbalah hidden from the people of Israel for thousands of years, while they did reveal its secrets to the Greek philosophers?

Answer: It had occurred long before, hundreds of years before the fall of the Second Temple. At that time, many scientists and philosophers of the nations of the world (not only the Greeks) used to come to study with Kabbalists. They were studying the people of Israel, attempting to understand them.

As an example, Alexander the Great, who started with the goal of expanding civilization throughout the world, used to surround himself with scientists and philosophers who studied the life of the people of Israel at that time. That is why he treated them so benevolently.

Scientists strived to comprehend the wisdom practiced among the ancient people of Israel who lived according to spiritual laws. This wisdom was visible to the naked eye, and based on how the government and society were arranged, it was evident that these people’s lives were founded on unique traditions.

There was an enormous difference in how the people of Israel lived compared to other nations, considering we are speaking about barbaric times. In Israel, the system of social relations was perfect in that a person was completely secured, more than by today’s medical insurance or unemployment benefits.

The Talmud describes those times in the following way: There was no child who didn’t know how to read and write or how the world was arranged. The educational system (Levites) included every person. This was first established by Moses while in the desert after the exodus from Egypt.

There was no lawlessness since it is written, “Anyone who buys a Hebrew slave, it is as though he buys a master for himself.” There was no division into upper and lower classes in the society. Never were people recognized for their wealth, unlike in the other nations. Rather, it was the sages who were honored.

People who came to visit from other places were surprised and couldn’t understand how it was done. It might work if such rules were established in a small community, but to have such laws govern the whole nation? After all, no less than three million people departed from Egypt, who later multiplied. In those times, it was a large nation.

There was such a bond between people, such a system of justice, special events and holidays, and an accurate calendar that the people followed so that everything was organized like in a fine clock mechanism in sync with the upper clock. This clock ruled over the entire public life since it was an absolutely perfect system, identical to the spiritual one.

Everybody knew what he or she was supposed to do; they knew it internally! There was no need for a ruler who would have to enforce order by military force and police that would control and punish. Every person innately felt how they should act, and this was a society of integral equality.

A king would serve the people, rather than abuse his power. It was a totally reversed pyramid. The one who had a more exalted position felt even greater responsibility for the others.

It was radically different from how other peoples lived, and this is why their sages came to study. It was an era of prophets from whom many scientists of other nations gained their knowledge. Naturally, just like Abraham wished to transform all of Ancient Babylon, the prophets never rejected those who desired to learn the laws of the universe.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/10/2011, “The Wisdom of Kabbalah and Philosophy”

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An Eternal Desire

Dr. Michael LaitmanThe condition for receiving the Torah is the need to become as one man with one heart, to enter mutual guarantee. This is talking about a spiritual Kli.

Until we understand this, the states will keep ruling over us because we do not use the group to accelerate them. Every state has to be desirable as a preparation phase for the next state. All the stages are necessary and we shouldn’t focus on the states as such, but only on the aspiration forward.

The Kli is evaluated by its desire, where a desire is an aspiration forward, and never for what I already have now. A spiritual vessel is evaluated by its pull to the next state. As soon as that pull disappears, there is no vessel.

Thus, a spiritual vessel exists only in the aspiration and yearning forward. If a person stops, loses this vector, and turns to what he has, then the spiritual world disappears for him. That’s because spirituality is not generated by the actual desire, but by its coefficient; not by the speed, but the acceleration.

It’s the same in Einstein’s theory: A body moving with constant speed is like it is at absolute rest. Only increasing the speed is taken into consideration and felt as a spiritual desire.

This desire can only be common for everyone and it only comes to a person as a result of everyone’s influence. Therefore, we have to leave the old approach according to which I exist, I receive inside, and I feel, and realize that my “I” is actually outside of me or above me, by the principle of the screen and Reflected Light.

Only inside of this interconnected net will I reveal the Upper World. All of its 125 levels are degrees of connection and unification of the parts of the common Kli, the pressure of the common field, which is what determines the power of the vessel.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/25/11, Writings of Rabash

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Dr. Michael LaitmanKabbalah is everything. There is nothing beyond its boundaries. It includes man and his entire world, no matter where he is. All of this exists none other than in man’s perception, whereas our study of plants and animals through zoology, biology, and botany is only a study of how man perceives them. In fact, these are all certain forces which are expressed this way in relation to me.

Even the Creator, I study only the way He becomes revealed in relation to me. Through all reality I reveal Him as the root. The attainment of this root is the goal of the entire research. The entire universe developed precisely in order for man to reveal the Root. All of reality is the means to establish a connection between man and the Root, the Creator.

The Creator is not some religious symbol, but the root of everything, the One who controls everything, the primary cause and source of everything that exists, as well as the goal. It is written, “I am the first and I am the last.”

The root means that everything begins from Him and He determines how every event will occur. And everything will eventually conclude with Him as well. It is written about Him, “The One, Single, and Singular” and “There is none else besides Him,” who is good and does good.

But it is impossible to research reality with the help of the science of Kabbalah without first changing oneself. Only a Kabbalist can be a researcher in this science because he reveals it upon himself. It is impossible to research it as an external observer, the way other sciences do.

For example, I once studied metallurgy where we used to take metal samples. We would heat a sample, cool it, test it under pressure, and check the influence of different additions and alloys. Yet I remained the same person who researches the metal. And I would throw out the sample and take a different one the next day.

However, in Kabbalah you have to be inside of the test sample yourself! You have to take on its qualities. You don’t just learn to understand them a little and feel them from outside, the way we usually experience the things we research. In Kabbalah you have to be inside matter itself, take on the same form, and according to this correspondence you will be able to understand it.

When you build its full model inside yourself, only then will you be able to check and research it. You research yourself! The Creator (Boreh) means “Come and See” (Bo – Reh). I do not see anything on the outside. The Creator is inside of me. To the degree of our equivalence, which I have attained, I say, “This is the Creator! This is my God.”

Every person has to come to know Him, “From the smallest of them to the greatest.” But to do that, one must be willing to change his nature and replace it with the Creator’s nature.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/23/11, “The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah”

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The Void Where The Supreme Thought Dwells

Dr. Michael LaitmanThanks to quantum physics, the deeper we penetrate into matter which, in and of itself, is inanimate and can be researched using a purely deterministic approach and mechanical discovery, the more we suddenly discover reason and feeling there. Although it’s we who endow matter with these properties, we find thought, a plan, there. We understand that we encounter someone’s thought.

Astronomers also claim that they feel as if behind the stars and the entire cosmos there stands a certain thought. If a person is developed enough, he comes to feel that way.

At my recent lecture in Moscow, I mentioned that if we were to magnify an atom, we would find a void between its nucleus and electrons. I’ve already received objections from my friend, a physicist, who denies that emptiness can exist inside an atom because all the entire space there is full.

Today, we understand that the electron is not a particle which is local, but a certain blurred cloud that fills the entire space of its orbit. That seemingly contradicts the way I presented it, but who knows what will happen and what physics will tell us in another twenty years? It’s clear that the entire theory will become even more abstract because as we advance, we find that our universe is not an assembly of solid particles and can’t be explained by ordinary mechanics; rather, the universe is approaching the spiritual form.

When I said that there are empty spaces in an atom, I meant the qualitative voids that are inside it. No matter how loudly our research claims that the entire space of the atom is full and that one electron fills the entire volume, together with that, we discover a void which hints at something with this emptiness. That’s the thought that’s hidden there.

It’s the same with states between the spiritual degrees. When we are passing from one degree to another, we get into the same kind of empty gaps. We fall there and become renewed. Therefore, each next degree is an entirely new structure.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/20/2011,  “The Quality of the Hidden Wisdom – in General”

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How To Recognize A True Kabbalist

Dr. Michael LaitmanBaal HaSulam, “The Wisdom of Kabbalah and Philosophy”: And as King Solomon could not prevent Asmodeus from sitting on his throne, pretending to be him until he arrived in Jerusalem, sages of Kabbalah observe philosophic theology and complain that they have stolen the upper shell of their wisdom, which Plato and his Greek predecessors had acquired while studying with the disciples of the prophets in Israel. They have stolen basic elements from the wisdom of Israel and wore a cloak that is not their own. To this day, philosophic theology sits on the throne of Kabbalah, being heir under her mistress.

Greek philosophers studied from the prophets since Kabbalah was open for everyone from the time of Abraham. However, they could not ascend to the height of spiritual attainment because this demanded huge efforts. That is why philosophers only took the external part of this wisdom; that is, their aim was not to correct human nature, but only to acquire knowledge.

The first sign by which you can distinguish a Kabbalist is to see whose student he is. It is impossible to receive spiritual attainment without being a devoted, close student of a true Kabbalist. Although being a student of a genuine Kabbalist does not yet guarantee spiritual success, at least it is the first necessary condition in order to reach it.

The second sign of a Kabbalist is that the methodology which he is offering must be directed only toward correcting man’s egoism. This is precisely what sets Kabbalah apart from the ancient Greek philosophers (religions, beliefs, spiritual methodologies, and so on). They stole the external shell from Kabbalah (discourses on the upper worlds, the world to come, reward and punishment, and so on) and started to use and develop it egoistically, in order to manipulate rather than correct human nature.

These are the two main signs that differentiate a Kabbalist from a non-Kabbalist. Furthermore, not just philosophy but all methodologies in general, including the scientific ones, employed by man in hopes to correct the world and attain a better, corrected, and more or less bearable life eventually demonstrate their falsity.

It may not manifest in the scientific conclusions themselves, but in the assertion that in this way, it is possible to correct the world and bring happiness to humanity. Until it is as clear as day, regular people in whom a special urge toward spirituality (the point in the heart) has not yet awakened will not treat Kabbalah seriously.

Thus, only a person who studied from a recognized Kabbalist can be one himself. A true Kabbalist also offers a method for correction of egoism, not all kinds of “miracles” or physical actions with the help of which one supposedly receives reward or punishment from Above.

In other words, this is neither religion nor a belief system, neither philosophy nor theology, and not even the natural sciences of our world, but a method for correcting our egoism with the purpose of attaining unity and love. This method can become revealed to the masses only after humanity becomes convinced that all other methods cannot lead it to salvation.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/11/2011, “The Wisdom of Kabbalah and Philosophy”

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Dr. Michael LaitmanThe Kabbalistic method is built on group work, on the connection between us, on the aspiration for all of us to gather together, to collect all the common forces, and with our mutual efforts to help every person come out of himself to others. In reality the method is very realistic and simple. In order to perceive the upper world, we have to stop paying attention to the “atoms” of our bodies and switch our attention to the emptiness in the “interatomic space.” We can do this in human society or in a small group that allows us to change ourselves.

We have to get together, mutually helping each other, and start shifting our attention from ourselves to what is between us. The work is unpleasant, unclear, and very unnatural for us. But that is why Kabbalists wrote an enormous amount of materials. By applying the Kabbalistic method to ourselves, we add to it, complete it, and materialize it. We begin to accept and feel it inside. As a whole we adapt it to us and to real time, and implement it in the present.

Therefore, we carry it out and research it, as well as develop the phase of the practical realization of all of Nature. Today the method is applied on us, those who desire to complement our sensation of the universe with an additional, external part. Moreover, this is not simply an additional part, but the most important part. We begin feeling forces, phenomena, and actions in interatomic space, meaning in 99% of reality. First and foremost this enormous volume is filled by a thought, a plan, forces, and their interactions, and everything that activates us, who are tiny, microscopic parts.

This attainment of the root leads us out of the state of time, lack of vision, and submission, in essence a state of non-being, to a state of clarity, eternity, and perfection. That is what the right realization of the science of Kabbalah gives us.

All of this is realized in the group, where we begin to feel how to come to the outside, to the perception of others. We go from the sensation of “the world inside me” to the sensation of “the world in the world.” If there are billions of people or souls instead of me, then by coming out of myself I begin perceiving the forces that act between us, and I feel all the souls as one whole, as one closed system.

Today even on the material level something is already telling us that the world is global and integral, and everything in it is interconnected. Thus, I begin to perceive everything on the outside as myself. I thereby acquire a great desire, force, and fulfillment, which is at my disposal. All of this becomes my “self.” These are no longer people, but simply forces that exist in this form.

That is how a person starts to reveal the true volume and vision of the world.
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From the lesson in Moscow on 1/16/11, Writings of Rabash

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