Entries in the 'Spiritual Work' Category

Kabbalah Is A System Of Laws of Nature

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: According to what I have understood, every person must reach the wisdom of Kabbalah. But if, for example, he falls into another stream when searching for the spiritual way, does God punish him for this? And when a person enters into the spiritual way, why do events even worse than before happen to him?

Answer: Different things happen to a person all the time in order to push him towards the right goal. If he behaves correctly, he goes forward according to the laws of nature; so things are good for him. If not, then this system of forces influences him negatively.

The wisdom of Kabbalah talks about how nature is built, not about a God who supposedly sits and thinks about how to punish someone. Only the laws of nature exist (call them God the Creator, it makes no difference)! So there is no reward and there is no punishment.

Kabbalah is not a religion; it speaks only about the force that develops us, that we should get to know and comprehend. If we attain it, then we develop quickly and easily and reach the correct goal that was determined before this force.

But this does not mean that if I open a Kabbalah book today things will immediately be better for me. What are you talking about? Do I know how to behave correctly, how to use the laws of nature correctly?

It is is like it is in physics, like in any science! If I know how to use the laws correctly, then I benefit from it. But if I opened a book but still don’t know how to use the laws that are recorded there, I cannot claim that I won’t make a mistake. There is nothing miraculous here. There is a system of laws we are learning to be able to use correctly.

So it is impossible to relate to the wisdom of Kabbalah as to some religion or magic or sorcery, where I apparently began to learn it and in spite of it all, things are bad for me. The idea is that you still don’t know how to use it. And when you learn, then to that degree, things will be good for you. This is as it is in every enterprise. This is clear materialistic knowledge.
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From the International Summer Camp In Bulgaria “Day Two” 7/12/14, Lesson 4

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Convey The Truth To The People Immediately!

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Yesterday there was a stormy debate in the nation about the possibility of a ceasefire.  Even though it didn’t occur, what do you think about this?

Answer: First of all, of course, it is necessary to prevent our enemies from acting like this in the future, and in this sense, a cease-fire won’t help. An action is required here that will make it possible for us to live normally.

On the other hand, in my opinion, a cease-fire can bring benefit if the people of Israel understand that it is up to them to carry out a correction and it has no other choice. There is no other way of reaching a quiet life, there won’t be a calm life as long as the people don’t correct themselves as required, meaning, until they become “like one person with one heart,” as the people of Israel must be according to the sources.

And so “the territory upon which we dwell” will become the true land of Israel. The people must relate to their place exactly as the land of Israel, that is, yearning straight to the Creator – Yashar-El. This must be the worldview of the people, and this is not a religious, but a spiritual view.

And then, of course, nobody in the world will have a reason to say that this land doesn’t belong to us. On the contrary, everyone will want us to live here; everyone will feel that the presence of the people of Israel in Zion will make it possible to provide the source of life, spiritual fulfillment for the whole world. And this is what all nations are missing. So there will be peace (Shalom) and also wholeness (Shlemut) throughout the world, and it will extend from here.

If the people of Israel use the ceasefire to return to their normal life, then it won’t help anything and in another few months we will see that the situation will only become more severe. In fact, our enemies are right in not agreeing to a ceasefire. Indeed, based on our present approach, the ceasefire won’t be beneficial. It is clear that if we don’t carry out a spiritual correction, everything will be much worse.

So ultimately what is there to do? The group called Bnei Baruch, which understands that a correction is ultimately required here, and it is shown to us that there is no alternative, must turn to the whole world now, and in particular the people of Israel, and openly explain what is happening and what must be done.

Otherwise we will have no possibility of remaining here. In the meantime, the missiles of the enemy are like plastic pipes with explosive material, but next time it could be much worse. They will begin to throw advanced bombs at us and even atomic, chemical, and biological bombs. And this will be not only from one direction but from all four directions. Anything is possible.

And so if we understand that there is alternative but only spiritual correction, then let’s implement it. This doesn’t mean that we must give up on armaments, on the “Iron Dome.” No. But it must be understood that true correction is carried out on a higher level.

First of all, it is up to us to understand that we are the active heart. It is up to us to go out to the people and explain to them what is happening, even compulsively. Now is the “time for action” (Psalm 119:126). Everything is happening for us so that we will explain to the people of Israel about their mission with all of our strength and by all means.

The people must know this. The idea is not so that they will know us and recognize that we are right, but so that they will know that their fate depends upon it. This is what Baal HaSulam told us: If we carry out this mission, we will remain in our land, and if not, we will be forced to leave it. And so, the time has arrived for aggressive dissemination.
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From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/16/14, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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A Painful Wound On The Body Of Humanity

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How can it be explained rationally to an educated secular Israeli that the people of Israel have a role and he must be connected to it?

Answer: We begin from this, that we are unique. We cannot solve the problem of our relationship with the world. Since the days of the destruction of the temple, the Jews were like a “corn,” like a wound on the body of humanity. This wound is constantly smarting; so what is to be done with it? It isn’t clear. It is impossible to get rid of it or eliminate it.

Everyone hates the Jews; they all feel they are special, and they feel this way themselves. However, neither the world nor the Jews themselves know why this is so. The biggest anti-Semites understand this problem partially and so do the Kabbalists. The Kabbalists revealed the source of what is happening, and the anti-Semites, as in the example of Henry Ford, are truly affected by an immense spiritual need. And so, in the world is a constant, enduring phenomenon, conspicuous, very strange, and inherently paradoxical. Think about the role of the people of Israel, its activities, etc.

Interestingly everyone that takes up arms against the Jews, that caused them problems and destroyed them, has ultimately suffered defeat and was unable to cope with them. In other words, it is the destiny of the people and they cannot be eliminated until their task has been fulfilled.

But on the other hand, at the end of history it will disappear, will dissolve among everyone and everyone will be as it is; everyone will connect to the higher power. And besides that, the Jews are not a people, not a nation in the conventional sense. For example, any Frenchman can become a Jew and cease being French. But on the other hand, if a German receives French citizenship, he will remain German.

So Jewishness is not determined according to the origin of a person, rather according to his attitude towards the goal of creation. As Baal HaSulam writes, “Every person of ‘Israel’ has a point in the heart inside,” meaning a belonging to the characteristic of bestowal. The person in whom this point has been awakened is joined to the people of Israel.

Question: What is the connection between hatred towards Israel and its role?

Answer: The people of Israel are not carrying out their role so people subconsciously feel that they have stopped the Upper Light that must fill the receptive Kelim. The people of Israel have the Masach (screen); they are the “head.” It is not by chance that the letters of the word “Israel” (ישראל) form the word “Li Rosh” (ראש לי) – I have a head. They must attract the Light to correct all of the Kelim. They are responsible for the entire correction and all fulfillments.

But there is no tangible evidence of this. Anyway, there are a lot of things in the world that are not revealed before our eyes. So there will always be people who deny this approach. They will accept the approach only if they receive “blows.” In general, troubles make us wiser. After all, when a person is thrown into trouble, the desire to receive becomes greater and he sees a connection between things he never noticed before.

In the meantime, even if he doesn’t agree with the explanations that he receives, they still “soften” him and bring him closer to the truth. If after the explanations a person is still not convinced, then after a number of problems he will change his opinion.

So we must disseminate among the people the information about their role. Indeed we also must hear something many times until we absorb it, and then it is still difficult for us to implement what we have heard.
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From the 2nd part of Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7.06/14, Lesson on the Topic: “Unity of the Nation”

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What The Study Of The Ten Sefirot Is Talking About

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Right now we are studying The Study of the Ten Sefirot (TES), Part 2, “The Connection Between Ability and Intention.” I cannot concentrate and relate this to myself and understand it.

Answer: We are a desire to receive pleasure, and the intellect is developed only to serve desire. So as long as you haven’t begun to feel within you what is described, you cannot use these parameters of desire. Will it be possible to use it and with what intention?

But there are people who have the ability to learn, not inside themselves, within the desire, but by constructing a model in the mind. They learn the Talmud “theoretically” without using it on themselves. Unfortunately, that is how everyone is learning today!

But the Torah specifically requires “practical” learning (sensory, within the desire), i.e., on ourselves, on our desire. And as long as it isn’t, as long as you cannot go through this state in sensation, you don’t understand what the Talmud is saying.
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Look For A Solution On A Different Level

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: It is said you should do everything in your power,” and then it says that we should expect help from Above, what kind of help could it be from Above if it said ,”He gave a law that cannot be broken,” which means that everything is already predetermined?

Answer: We are given great help from Above because we are in a new era. Everyone finds themselves in a state feeling that there is no solution or to be more accurate that there is no solution on the current level. But this is a positive revelation since it will force us to stop looking for the solution on the old level and to ascend to the next level where the solution actually is.

The solution is not to solve the old problem but to see the state from a new perspective. We will see a new goal, a new state, and a totally different encounter: not between one another but between us and the Creator.

Question: So it turns out that “He gave a law that cannot be broken,” has changed now.

Answer: The law has changed since the leadership that descends all the way to our world has changed, we find ourselves on a new, more revealed level.

Question: Can we expect mercy from Above then?

Answer: We will receive according to the way we act, but mercy from Above means that even if I don’t deserve anything on my current level but I ask for it and develop a new desire by the influence of the environment, by self annulment, by subduing myself, then the Light that Reforms comes and fulfills my request.

The mercy from Above is in accordance to my efforts, which means that I have earned it, but I don’t necessarily ask for what I receive since I don’t know what to ask for and what to focus on, and therefore it is called mercy.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/17/14, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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All Of The Work Is Within

Dr. Michael LaitmanIn fact, we are found in the world of Infinity; there is no other state. However, in our minds, in our senses, as a result of our desires being egoistic and damaged, we feel a state called “our world” instead of the world of Infinity, and so, in principle, the only thing that we are doing is correcting our senses, correcting ourselves.

Question: If I want to feel the Creator, is it enough for me to sit in a circle and be integrated with the friends?

Answer: Theoretically, if you were in a circle all the time and were to work on your connection with them all the time, then you would have no more need for anything in life, nothing!

This is the ideal physical, mental, and emotional form within which it is possible to work on all of the nuances of our connections, all the way to the spiritual ones, without exception.

Question: And nothing additional is needed?

Answer: Not exactly. We must go out to the world and take all kinds of problems from them. However, again, this is to increase the connection between us even more.

Suppose that we completed some mass of work among us, some egoistic density, and we connect. However, this is not enough to reveal the Upper Light. From where can we receive an addition? We begin from within our circle to go out to disseminate, attaching an egoistic mass to ourselves, an even greater density, and this helps us to come closer between us because we are working above it.

We must go out to people in this manner. However, in principle, all of our work is within, in our circle.
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From the International Summer Camp In Bulgaria “Day One” 7/11/14, Lesson 1

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Beyond The Negativity

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How must one work optimally with the negativity every person and every group of people gathers?

Answer: We don’t work with the negativity in us. I don’t want to know or hear about it, I don’t want it to burrow into me.

First of all, this is very unpleasant, and second this is called eating oneself, as it is written, “The fool folds his hands and eats his own flesh” (Ecclesiastes 4:5). “Look, I am like this! And why did I do this at all!? In my past there are things like these! … And in general, all my life …” So, all of this is incorrect, absolutely erroneous.

Our attitude toward our correction must be positive; I am going only toward the good, only toward the good!

This is because if I think about something bad, I am not connected to the Creator, not aimed in His direction. If there is already something wrong, this is a sign that the Creator is to blame, and, if I am bad, this is also a sign that the Creator is to blame, and if there will be something bad in the future, then it is certain that He is to blame.

This means that I don’t have to think about this at all. I only need to invest effort to connect with others. This is what I need, and it depends upon me!

All the rest doesn’t depend upon me. So, why do I need to think about this? All the rest will be absolutely ideal if only I constantly concentrate my attention on maximal, optimal connection with others in a circle, because a circle is the image of the Creator.

Question: Does negativity belong only to one person or can it belong to a group of people?

Answer: Certainly a group has its common ego, and we need to rise above it. We hold onto only positive thoughts. We don’t criticize ourselves or others in any way. We try to rise above our ego all the time and connect there.

So, in principle, a person cannot be in such a state where he is not in excitement and elation, where he feels negative emotions, and,if he has states like these, this means that he is not in contact with others and especially with God.
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From the International Summer Camp In Bulgaria “Day One” 7/11/14, Lesson 1

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A People Or A Bunch Of Refugees?

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: What is to be done in this situation where missiles are flying and a siren is blaring all the time? How must I act so that a rocket will not hit me?

Answer: In order for missiles not to hit us, it is necessary to influence it somehow, and, first of all, it is necessary to scrutinize what kind of a force is sending it. Certainly, everything is sent by the upper force. The wisdom of Kabbalah explains that only one system operates in the world, that is directing us toward correction.

From the days of ancient Babylon, from the days of our father Abraham who began this process, until our day, we are advancing toward correction, and the correction is to connect into a single whole.

Abraham began this correction from a small group of people who called themselves “Israel,” Yashar-El. He taught them how to reach unity, bestowal, and love. For some time, the people of Israel maintained a state of unity like this—during the Egyptian exile, the wandering in the wilderness, the First and Second Temples, until hatred toward each other was discovered in us.

From the level of brotherly love, we fell to unfounded hatred, and since then, we have been living within this hatred, separated in mutual loathing. This state is called “exile,” and we have lived in this state until today.

Close to a hundred years ago, we got the opportunity to return to the land of Israel and to begin living in it again as the people of Israel in its own nation. However, the people of Israel can exist in the land of Israel only on condition that love of others as yourself permeates there: All of Israel are friends connected with mutual guarantee, and it is impossible to do to another what is hateful to you.

However, we are not carrying out these conditions, and so we are not approaching a state in which it is possible to call us the people of Israel living in the land of Israel. In the meantime, this is just a gathering of exiles and refugees who settled in this place thanks to temporary conditions given to us by nature.

We have no merit to be living in this land like this. The Kabbalists wrote about this in every generation, and today we must understand that everything that was written by them truly is being realized in us in our day. Either we accept the conditions upon ourselves according to which the people of Israel must live in the land of Israel—in other words, connected and unified—or we will have no place, not only on the soil of Israel, but no place in the world at all.

For the nations of the world, suppose that, existing like this, we are causing damage to the entire world. We want missiles not to fall on us, that we should be respected all over the world and related to as all other peoples. However, it won’t happen this way, and it will never happen.

We cannot be like everyone else because we must be greater than everyone else because this is how nature is built, that specifically through us, the higher power reaches this world and calms it down, gives it fulfillment. If we become a Light to all the other peoples, the matchmaker that connects the upper force with the whole world, then we can be high and respected. However, if we don’t behave like this, then all kinds of unpleasantness can be expected for us which, in the end, will oblige us to carry out our mission.

Do you want a ceasefire? We have one solution: to be a conduit between the upper force, which is good and benevolent, and the whole world. The wisdom of Kabbalah explains how to implement this. We must actively transform to become “a kingdom of priests and a holy nation”; in other words, to educate ourselves and teach the world how to be bestowers, connectors, loving each other.

No one is to blame, no person in the world, including our most terrible haters who blame us from all directions. We have no one to blame, except ourselves, for our negligence, our laziness, our delay in the correction that we must bring to the world. This is because, beginning from the time of the Ari and on, we are in an era of correction, and it is specifically we who must bring it to the world.

All of the Kabbalists, beginning from the Ari, wrote about our generation, about our day, as being about the revelation of the upper force in the world, and this revelation is done through a simple action: the unification of the people of Israel.
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From KabTV’s “The Mission of the People of Israel” 7/8/14

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The Creator Doesn’t Feel Individuals

Dr. Michael LaitmanWritings of Rabash, “Shlavei HaSulam“, 1986, Article 15, “A Prayer of Many”: Therefore, he prays for the collective. This means that if there are a few people in the collective who can reach the goal of Dvekut with the Creator, and this will bring the Creator more contentment than if he himself were rewarded with nearing the Creator, he waives himself. Instead, he wishes for the Creator to help them because this will bring more contentment above than from his own work.

If a person doesn’t join the collective, he has nothing to turn to the Creator with. After all, the Creator doesn’t feel individuals, He only feels the collective.

This is why we have to go out to the public and why we have to connect. Everything belongs to one system, and it is impossible for one part to work when other parts do not.

During human evolution, our work was performed parallel to our waiting. Kabbalists who wrote The Book of Zohar concealed it for two thousand years until our days. All the parts of the Bible they wrote about, the Torah, the Prophets, and Scripture still had to be developed.

But we are a special generation, as Kabbalists say, and we have to perform a practical correction both inside the group and outside the group, among the public. The relationship between the members of the group, the group and society in general, between the individual and the collective, is the only framework where we can raise our request.

Even if every member in the group asks for it, we cannot advance unless our request is incorporated into society’s desires. This is the only way the Creator will listen and feel us. After all, the Creator is the general force, the Upper Light that has created the whole desire to receive. Therefore, it only feels all of its parts together. If we regard Him that way, as a whole desire, then we will be able to convey our deficiency to Him and ask Him for correction or for revelation. Only through the collective can we formulate the correct request that He connects.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/13/14, Writings of Rabash

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A Sweet Medicine

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How can I work with myself if I feel tired from the effort to remain with the right intention because I don’t get any pleasure or results from this?

Answer: Of course, a person is not ready to do this. The group must support him. It is up to us to find an action that on the one hand we are ready to carry out, meaning that our desire to receive makes it possible for us to do it because it sees some kind of benefit in it. On the other hand, as a result of the benefit that we get within the desire to receive, there must be something that will change us.

For example, I bring some medicine for my sick child. For him this is candy and for me this is a medicine. For him this is “yummy” and for me it is a cure. Why? Within his desire to receive he swallows and enjoys it for he has the strength to swallow. He gets pleasure within his desire to receive, and together with this, he gets a medicine.

So, the Torah is called an “elixir of life,” “health to all their flesh,” a medicine that we take in this form. This is called the “clothing of the Torah.” So it is up to us to be creative and wise, not opposing our nature, but understanding it and recognizing how it is possible to fool it so that on one hand our ego will see the purposefulness in a particular activity. On the other hand, if I act with joy, I also get a portion of the Light that changes me. So the next time I will already want to perform an activity that is a little closer to bestowal.
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From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 6/23/14, The Zohar

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