Entries in the 'Spiritual Teacher' Category

Imperative Link in the Chain

962.5Without Rabash’s articles, we would not know how to properly attune ourselves to the goal and to connect with Baal HaSulam who gives us academic advice from a great spiritual height.

We are not able to extract the details for our connection from there in order to take even one step in practically implementing it. Rabash starts right from the beginning and explains every step to us. After that we can better understand and implement Baal HaSulam’s methodology.

When we come to the direct realization of Kabbalah, the practice of revealing the Creator, the articles of Rabash and The Book of Zohar become essential for us.

Rabash’s articles help us form the right intention and The Book of Zohar helps us attract the light that reveals the spiritual world to this intention. Rabash did something that no Kabbalist had done before him; he described all the stages of a person’s inner work, the practical implementation of the Torah.

He was the only one in the entire chain of Kabbalists starting from Adam HaRishon who gave a concrete step-by-step explanation of the work of a person and a group, which is so necessary today.

Before him, Kabbalists wrote about their individual attainments because this was the spiritual progress in the era of 2,000 years of concealment and exile from the spiritual.

Before going into exile, people were in spiritual attainment and there was no need to talk about something that each child mastered as he grew.

But today, in order to rise from concealment, we need materials that would orient us to enter the spiritual world and it is possible only by studying Rabash’s articles.

Without Rabash’s articles, we would not have been able to correctly understand other Kabbalistic sources.

Therefore, our work is divided into two parts.

1. Study of Rabash’s articles.

2. If we attune ourselves correctly, then we turn to The Book of Zohar or The Study of the Ten Sefirot and can already work with them correctly as we attract the correcting light.

Rabash was very discreet and modest and always kept in the shadow of his great father. All his strength and might were hidden deep inside, so it was impossible to see anything from the outside.

He was the first to teach Kabbalah to non-religious people without any distinction in origin and he considered it very important to disseminate Kabbalah widely.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson, 9/11/10

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Following the Spiritual Line of the Teacher

115Baal HaSulam had students whom he was holding at a spiritual degree. When he died, they fell from it. The same can be true for our students. Now they are at a certain degree, but when I will cease to exist…I do not even want to think how this can continue.

Naturally, the force that holds them will fall and they will not be able to maintain contact with me in the spiritual space. They will fall. This is the case with all Kabbalists and their students.

Comment: But you have students who have been studying with you for fifteen or twenty years.

My Response: It does not depend on time. To do this, one must be infinitely devoted to the teacher. Therefore, people prefer the son to take the place of his father. After all, a son, as a rule, does not go against the father. He follows him, and does not want to harm his father because from the point of view of egoism, this is also his possession.

Any other person, however, envies, thinks about himself, instinctively wants to exalt himself at your expense. This is what we need to overcome. This is how we are created, nothing can be done about this. But at the same time, therein lies the problem. It takes a lot of time and effort, until the student overcomes his “I” and merges with the teacher inside the teacher, only a few are capable of this.

The rest, however, are also advancing, it does not matter, each person performs his own function. But someone manages to follow the spiritual line after the teacher, someone else does not.

Rabash did it with Baal HaSulam. Nobody else succeeded in that. Nobody! I spoke with eyewitnesses, they said: “After Baal HaSulam died, all his disciples, except for Rabash…” Of course, they did something: they met, studied, taught others, but it was clear that all this was, what is called, ordinary courses for the general population.

The same is true about times after Rabash. I stepped aside, I did not want to deal with anyone. Then I was pulled into one group, there were only five or six people who forcibly made me their teacher, I did not want this. It is not that I did not know how, but I had to give up what I had and would ruin myself.

In general, everything is arranged from heaven. Then it turned out that gradually students began to gather who wanted me to teach them at least once a week. It probably was just the fact that the time had come.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Dr. Laitman’s Prophecy” 6/25/13

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Under The Shield of the Creator?

961.2Question: How are you able to perform your function and at the same time rely on the Creator, meaning, advance as if by yourself and in parallel with the Creator?

Answer: And how can I perform my function if I don’t rely on the Creator? Where does my strength, knowledge, and opportunities come from? Where do I get the confidence that what I am doing will work? This is only to the extent that I am connected with Him.

Comment: Once you gave an example that Rabash, without relying on anyone went into a bomb shelter during a bombing.

My Response: But this is not because he did not rely on the Creator, but because it is necessary to act as all the people do

Comment: Often there is a feeling as if you are under the shield of the Creator, that there is some kind of protection.

My Response: You don’t have any protection. It can only be to the extent that you are connected with the Creator. And even with this protection, you can’t rely on it anyway. You should only be tied to Him. And what will happen to you, you should not think about it.

No matter what state you are in, think not about protection, but about how to be more tied to Him. Because bombs falling on you  are made to help you get even more correctly attached to the Creator, not out of fear!

And constantly thank the Creator for sending to you all these states because they help you get closer to Him by giving an example that you need to be in this form in both your best states and in the worst.

Question: But Rabash could not have climbed down to the bomb shelter. Could he observe and think about the Creator?

Answer: It cannot be understood. And yes and no. He had to act like everyone else. This is not a game. Actually, this also shows the quality of bestowal. I can’t express it in words.

The ordinary human mind cannot combine two opposite forces, opposite qualities, and states and see them as one.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Rely on the Creator?” 6/28/13

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Who Will Take Us Across the Machsom (Barrier)?

962.3Question: If a student did not cross the Machsom (Barrier) during the teacher’s lifetime, what are the chances of crossing it later? Should he do it during the teacher’s lifetime?

Answer: Of course it is desirable. But this can be done only through similarity of qualities, which means dedication to the path, “adhesion” to the teacher, following all his advice, and on how much the teacher is more important in his eyes than he is himself. In other words, it is just a training relative to the Creator.

There are many students who are very capable, very eager to attain spirituality, but for them the importance of something of their own prevails over the importance of what the teacher requires or what would be necessary for the teacher.

Let’s say if someone wrote something unpleasant about you and about the teacher, what will you perceive with more pain? Will you defend his honor or yours? How will you perform, with what diligence?

Comment: But it depends on the different stages of a person’s development.

My Response: Undoubtedly, of course! But you are asking if it is possible to cross the Machsom before the death of the teacher. I do not know. This is a student’s problem. In any case, after death it takes much longer.

Question: But then who will take him across the Machsom if not the teacher?

Answer: The same teacher, only in a different form. If the student could not take advantage of his immediate presence next to him, he will have to look for him in a different form around him. Just as he looks for the Creator.

Question: Can there be anyone else besides the teacher?

Answer: No, nobody! Not something that is materialized. The same teacher, only in a different form, and not a person.

Comment: But if there is, as you say, a chain, you go after Rabash…

My Response: Then it must be a person who has already passed the upper path. How can you put someone who is at the same level as the students? To put one of them above them? On what basis?

Question: You are the degree we have to hold on to. But if you are gone, in what form can we do it?

Answer: If you do not discover this form, then, of course, it is bad. Then you will move forward in a very long way, using the “trial and error” method.

If a student has not entered the spiritual world for fifteen or twenty years while being with me, then he will need the same number of years more in order to enter it without me.

Question: How was it with you and Rabash?

Answer: I took everything I needed from Rabash. I was relying only on the fact that I was next to him. Then there was a lengthy method of going deeper into the same mutual connections that we had established before his death.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Spirituality During the Lifetime of the Teacher” 7/8/13

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Teacher’s Memorial Day

961.2The departure from this world of a great sage, teacher, and spiritual mentor is a special day. After all, he rises another degree higher and shows us that we should follow him.

We see that each of the great Kabbalists has taken a step forward in his own special way and brought the science of Kabbalah, the revelation of the Creator, the methodology, understanding, feeling, merging with the Creator and unity closer to people.

I think Rabash took the last step after everyone. He stands on the shoulders of all Kabbalists who lived before him, from Rabbi Akiva onwards, to Ari, Ramhal, and Baal Shem Tov. Rabash summed up everything they discovered for humanity, and he gave us this methodology in a ready, sorted form, which we can use and implement.

We need to hold on to the instructions for spiritual work he left as stated in his articles. Rabash did not want to go beyond the inner work of man in his explanations. He does not engage in philosophical or historical clarification and does not discuss the general development of mankind. He was very wary of presenting himself as a great Kabbalist, like Baal HaSulam, Ari, and Ramhal, and he tried modestly to keep a low profile. And so it went on throughout his life.

We have yet to reveal the essence of his contribution and his true height, and to see who our teacher really was.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/30/22, “Rabash Memorial Day (Yahrzeit)”

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Poison or Medicine

281.02Question: In one of the articles we studied, it was said that it is safest to be in a society that has nothing to do with your views at all. But from the point of view of Kabbalah, we can receive the importance of the goal most of all from people who are close in spirit, and at the same time, you can get more harm from them, you can literally move a millimeter away and that is it. You said that a person could learn from Baal HaSulam, but at the same time he could literally harm a new student.

Here, we have two sides at once: both the importance of the goal and the poison that can turn everything upside down. How can one protect oneself from the poison?

Answer: I think that today my students are definitely not in danger. On the contrary, I see that those students who used to be quite dangerous because they could go astray and even drag some more friends along with them are different today.

We have organized a serious, strong group, a spiritual association that already holds them together, and they represent a single structure. I do not think that, at least for now, it can be destroyed. I hope that after me it will not collapse and the world will have a need for them.

We are moving at a very fast pace to a state where the world will no longer have any ability to lead and the ability to somehow keep itself at least at some level. Yet this group will be able to show it how to go forward. In a state of absolute lack of understanding, helplessness, and confusion of humanity, it will firmly set an example, and this will be very necessary for the world.

Question: You stress all the time that we need to show each other the importance of the goal and not in any case show a sour face. But what if someone says something kind of nasty that goes through the network inside the system itself?

Answer: I think that there are many departments for this, working with the masses and so on. In general, the system will hold itself. It is all in the hands of upper forces. I am doing my job, I have nothing to worry about. I build what I can, and then…

We are all parts of the system that leads us to the goal. My task is to teach people to go to it faster and easier for the correct connection with the upper force, and to enjoy the fact that you bring contentment to It.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Poison or Medicine” 6/28/13

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“Always with Me” (Times of Israel)

Michael Laitman, On The Times of Israel: “Always with Me”

Thirty-one years ago today, my teacher and mentor RABASH passed away. This post is dedicated to him because everything I know, everything I understand, everything I teach, and everything I do I learned from him, and my life’s goal is to continue his legacy to the best of my ability.

RABASH was the last in the line of spiritual giants that began thousands of years ago. From his time onward, the line does not continue because now is the time for the knowledge that was privy to a chosen few for so many centuries to spread around the world.

RABASH was unlike any of his predecessors. As the last in the line, his concern was with the realization of the knowledge, with implementing it in real life. Accordingly, he focused his teaching on one principle: The complete perception of the world is achieved only through connection with other people. And how do you connect with other people? You love them. How do you come to love other people? This is what the teachings of RABASH reveal through his writings and through the thousands of oral lessons he had given throughout his life.

By the time RABASH passed away, he had installed in me a clear and complete method for developing love for other people, who are not related to you biologically, culturally, or in any other way. He did not come up with the method out of thin air, of course. It is the same method that the people of Israel had implemented among them since the inception of the nation nearly forty centuries ago. However, like other spiritual leaders in their time, RABASH adapted the method for developing love for others to our time, to the people who live in the 20th and 21st centuries, and in his adaptation lies his greatness.

I received from RABASH and learned from him more than I can express in words. However, if I had to choose the most important lesson that I took from him, it would be this: Stick to your goal and never look aside. Even if the goal seems distant, often unachievable, never look aside. Whether you achieve your goal or not is unimportant. If the goal is worth striving for, stick with it and never look away.

I know our dreams often seem unrealistic, but we have no idea what tomorrow will bring. Therefore, I always advise my students and anyone who asks to pursue their dreams.

As for me, I will continue to work for the rest of my life to realize my teacher’s dream: that all the people in the world will come to love one another as one man with one heart.

—

For more of the many things I had learned from RABASH, read my book, Always with Me.
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Humor, Satire, and Cynicism

962.1Question: What is the difference between cynicism and humor where someone mocks others and goads them?

Answer: Humor, satire, cynicism, and sarcasm are various manifestations of a person’s attitude to his own or to the common existence.

Humor, as a rule, does not indicate personality. Humor is good. It speaks about the general structure of the world, humanity, and people, which must be perceived as given to us from above. That is, such is nature and that is it. Humor does not aim to eradicate some phenomenon in character or in anything. It simply states: this is what we live with.

And satire is aimed at eradicating shortcomings. In addition to it, there are also exaggerations: sarcasm, criticism, and all kinds of ambiguity.

Question: But sometimes you tease some students, even bring them to tears. Do you somehow measure when it needs to be done?

Answer: I feel that this is necessary, and often I do this in order, on the contrary, to remove something negative, to soften it, to turn it around a little.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Humor Will Save the World” 5/20/13

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Problems of Spiritual Growth

962.2Comment: Sometimes what you said yesterday seemed like it was the most important to us. But then soon after, you are already attaching importance to another process, then the next one, and so non-stop. Then it seems: “Where do we go”?

My Response: This is because a person who is at the beginning of the path is confused by this.

Let’s say we are walking along the road with you and I give you all sorts of instructions: “Think about the goal, take a wider step, take a deeper breath, swing your arms wider.” For you it looks like they cancel one another, but in my mind it does not.

A person feels and hears what he is able to perceive from all the information. This is how we are arranged, otherwise we simply would not be able to do anything. In this way at least we do what we hear.

Comment: Many of those who come to Kabbalah think in a standard way. Let’s say we have chosen a direction, as in business and we are going toward the goal, then we begin to face a process in which it’s not the final profit that is important, but the process itself. A person begins to get confused and thinks that they themselves do not understand what they are doing, meaning there is no clear corporeal framework.

My Response: Yes. This is why a person chooses something narrow for himself and holds onto it, like a little child to his toy or doll, and thus continues to go. This is natural for beginners.

I see it and wait for the person to develop. There is nothing you can do, as this is how we grow.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Contradiction” 3/20/13

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Going Beyond the Limits of Egoism

600.01Question: Your blog says that a Klipa is a simulator for studying truth and lie. It shows us all kinds of errors and inaccuracies. Can you explain with an example how to receive spiritual knowledge from one’s mistakes?

Answer: If we really want to reach knowledge of the inner nature, to find out how it works and how we interact with it, then we are approaching a state where all our thoughts and feelings are against ourselves.

That is, we begin to feel and understand that our earthly egoistic qualities hinder us. We are locked in them and cannot break out of them.

What can we do in order to rise above them and not feel the world around us distorted in our egoistic qualities, but rather to feel it in the form in which it exists by itself?

We try to somehow break the shell we are in and go beyond its limits. This is the task of a Kabbalist.
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From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 8/21/22

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