Entries in the 'Spirituality' Category

The Most Dangerous Stage On The Path

Dr. Michael LaitmanI have to change myself in conformity with the upper world. To do this I attract forces from that world through the group and change by means of those forces. Thus I ascend up 125 degrees and reveal the upper world. That is how it opens up to me, becoming more and more apparent.

In the process I am not working on something external, but on what is inside of me. I attract the forces of change to myself rather than applying my forces to something on the outside, the way we do in our world.

This determines my interactions with the environment: I do not want to change it, eliminate anything in it, or conquer it the way I conquer the people around me in this world, controlling them, submitting them to my power, and using them to achieve my own goals. This is especially vivid in our world among politicians.

In spirituality, however, everything is opposite: I work in the environment of friends quietly, often even without having any special discussions. If they were all chosen by the upper force to attain the spiritual world, then by bending down before them, I absorb their forces. These forces accumulate in me and join the point in my heart, and then I change.

This way, my criterion of progress is not the external conquests, but inner changes that manifest as new qualities and sensations, new understanding in relation to the study and the objects described in the science of Kabbalah. It isn’t simple to re-orient yourself and shift to the approach that accords with the spiritual world. It takes a lot of time for a person to reach despair and to discover that there is no other way, to understand that he has to act differently, to begin hearing and realizing what he hears, and to build everything in the right order, placing himself under the influence of the environment.

In essence, this is the most important thing. Whoever has taken these steps and formed the right attitude to the group, has already gone through the first and most dangerous stage of the path without falling prey to his own egoism. It is extremely important to place yourself in front of the environment the right way. Rabash particularly underlines this in his articles.

We can even say that the subsequent steps are easier to make because I already have the right approach and focus. I understand that the Light is primary, that it is the only thing that operates in reality, and we have to give it the opportunity to do so instead of getting in the way with our egoism, as if we have the strength and reason to do anything ourselves. In fact, the only opportunity we have is to naturally bend down our head before the environment and then to receive the forces for change and correction.
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/28/11, Writings of Rabash

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A Moment Of Weakness For The Great Conqueror

Dr. Michael LaitmanIn our world we are used to acting independently. I use all of my strength, knowledge, energy, potential of being connected with my environment, my inborn abilities, as well as habits ingrained by upbringing and education. I am the source; I am the center. Coming from myself I act and pave my path in the world.

At every step of the way we see how effective this approach is. After all, we were born by the power of egoism, the will to enjoy. And since we are already using that desire to “succeed” and attain self-profit, we therefore use everything we have, both our inner capabilities and the external means.

I have strength, reason, drive, and audacity—all the things that are inherent to me, and I use them outwardly, in the direction of going from within me to the outside. But that’s not what happens during the soul’s correction. If my set goal is not to succeed in this world, but in the spiritual world, if I want to break through into that world and acquire it, then I discover that I am not fit for it from the onset. I do not have the forces, understanding, or qualities that enable me to come closer on my own and to attack, break through, and conquer the upper world.

It takes time to realize this. But afterward, seeing that my regular “instruments” are powerless here, I experience weakness, give up, and don’t know what to do. Usually this brings a person to a great descent. After all, he does not have any means to attain what he desires. So what should he do?

There are two things concealed here that one must realize:

1. I do not belong or correspond to the spiritual world in any way, shape, or form. Now this is completely clear to me. And this moment of weakness is a good beginning. After all, in essence this is talking about the realization of my own nature, which is detached from the spiritual nature and will not help me in any way. I do not have any inclinations, means, tools, or possibilities of finding my way to the place where I want to be. I cannot make heads or tails of it. I am spiritually immobile and inaccessible.

2. I am able to obtain a force that will help me and a mind that will direct me at acquiring the upper world through the environment. After all, the environment is the means of attaining the upper world, and it is present right beside me. It is the group to which I am brought from Above and through which I can receive upper forces in order for them to influence me.

I do not acquire the spiritual world by aspiring to go from within myself outward to it. I do not buy it, absorb it, or break into it. Rather, in order to conquer the upper world, I must only adapt myself to it. Then I will discover that I am in it.

This way, the approach to the work and its result, as well as the reconciliation of myself and the upper world are completely opposite to what we work with in our world. Here I must attain, acquire, or conquer what I desire, while the spiritual world, to the contrary, is ready for me initially. I am already in it and all I have to do is change in order for this to become apparent.
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/28/11, Writings of Rabash

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Leave It To The Creator – Laitman Unplugged

An Internet Link To The Creator

Dr. Michael LaitmanIn truth, the Internet has a hidden force, the Creator! This means that within the virtual connection between people (if it evolves and increases in gaining a benevolent form) the upper force becomes revealed.

The Internet emerged specifically in order to connect people and demonstrate that a connection based on our egoistic nature can bring only evil and harm, while unification with the upper nature is good. The upper nature elevates us to another dimension, to eternal life, and liberates us from all problems. That is what the Internet will reveal to us, and I am certain that it will occur very soon judging by how quickly it is developing.

It’s impossible to stop it now, and no one will be able to unplug people from the Internet. In some places of the world they are trying to do just that, but they won’t succeed. People will feel that they are willing to destroy those who remove them from the Internet, as if they are being cut off from life itself.

We will not be able to return to the previous life that didn’t connect us all via the Internet. If anyone attempts to do so, he will become the greatest foe of humanity, and he will be annihilated just because he unplugged the Internet.

After all, it is the instrument of connection between people. By now a person has come to realize that the Internet allows him to step into another realm of existence where the entire world is before his eyes! But when this world discovers how empty it actually is, that will become a springboard to make a leap into the future world.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/23/2011, “Introduction to the Book, Panim Meirot uMasbirot

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Everyone Is Equal In Spirituality

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How can a little person bring many people to the unification on which his correction depends? Does he really have the necessary instruments to accomplish that?

Answer: There are no little or big people. We reside in the world of Infinity, a complete, integral system. However, if there is some flaw in what is whole, it is not complete any longer, and its wholeness is broken. Therefore, everyone is as important as all the others.

Imagine that this system has an input and an output, but the path through it leads through all its elements without exception, which are linked into one chain. In this case, does it matter how many internal elements are flawed and are tearing the chain apart, a thousand or just one?

Obviously, the fewer flawed elements that remain, the easier it is to fix them, and from this point of view, one flawed link is preferable to a thousand. However, if we examine the output of a flawed, fragmentary system, we see that one flawed element is sufficient to break the system.

Therefore, every one of us is important, and there are no little or big men. All of us are needed, and we must think about all. From the Creator’s point of view, there is no difference between people, between the souls, whatsoever.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/18/2011, “The Freedom”

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Name Your Price

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How can I measure how important the goal is to me?

Answer: The goal is as important to the same degree that you value the environment as the means to attain it.

For example, suppose I want to be healthy and to achieve that I have to take medicine. How much am I willing to pay for it? Exactly as much as my desire to be healthy will allow. No matter what I pay for, the price is determined by the degree of the importance.

Question: Money is a precise yardstick. But how can I know how much I am paying on the spiritual path?

Answer: You can measure this in relation to the environment. To the extent it is more important to you than yourself, that is how much more important the spiritual goal is for you than the material goal. To what degree are you included in the group, how much are you willing to invest in it, how much higher than you are the friends, how much do you value them in order to invest time and energy to acquire them? This is what is written, “Buy yourself a friend.”

This is the yardstick: The aspiration to put everything you have into the group, which is like a treasured purchase. For example, you want to buy some stocks at the market or an auction piece at Sotheby’s. How much are you willing to pay? That is how we make the measurement, except that our competition is held between egoism and the spiritual goal. Give it a try sometime.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/22/11, Writings of Rabash

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The Virtual Space For The Inner Connection

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: We see that people of the new generation do not want to come closer to one another. That is why the Internet has developed so much, enabling a person to act from afar without being physically present in society. That way he makes contacts without really connecting. How, then, can we offer people a method that is entirely based on unification and social influence?

Answer: This is a very good sign. It means that there is already realization of evil taking place. A person does not want to come close to anyone or to touch anyone. He feels individual, not connected to anyone, and does not need anyone—not even his parents, wife, or children. He wants to be left one on one with himself.

Today every person needs a separate apartment. In the previous generation every person needed a separate room. But earlier, this problem didn’t even exist. People lived in one room and did not bother each other.

Rabash told me that when he got married, he moved to live in his wife’s house. Her family was well-known in Jerusalem and had a two room apartment. But all of them, the parents and the children, lived in one big room, while renting out the second room because they did not think they needed it. At night, when it was time to sleep, they would lay out mattresses on the floor and in the morning they would roll them back up and lay them in a pile in the corner. Besides these mattresses and a small table for food, there was nothing in the room. That is how people lived in Jerusalem in the beginning of the 20th century.

But today a person cannot stand even his own wife next to him in the same room. That is how much our nature has changed, which is why we want to shift to a virtual connection. The virtual connection is a search for a higher level of communication. It is not just replacing one kind of connection with another, but a connection on a more internal level. We are starting to aspire to connect with a person’s inner world, on the level of his psychology.

However, people will soon grow disillusioned with the Internet and will understand that it cannot satisfy their need for a real inner connection. All of these SMS text messages, e-mails, and social networks will not provide the answer to the demand that is now being revealed in us, which we do not even understand ourselves yet. We just feel that we have to unite, attain nature and the world, and feel and understand everything on a higher level than today.

The young generation does not realize this inner demand it has yet, but the fact is that this need is not for the virtual connection that exists today. It is a yearning for a more internal, sensuous connection. And that is something that can only be attained if we go from the virtual connection to the use of the science of Kabbalah. This will soon be revealed to us.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/21/11, “Introduction to the Book, Panim Meirot uMasbirot”

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Learning To Speak Two Languages

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: If Kabbalah is the basis of all the sciences, then should we first give a child knowledge of this science and only then start teaching him all the other sciences?

Answer: At first a child has to get acquainted with his world. However, from a young age, from about six years or even earlier, it is possible to start explaining the notions of the science of Kabbalah to him.

Children can perceive this wisdom parallel to the sciences of our world just as naturally as they are easily able to remember several languages. In the same way, we can explain these two languages of perception of reality to them: inner and outer. They will easily learn this and it will become part of the foundation of their perception like a habit ingrained from childhood.

The explanation has to be that there are two forces in the world. And everything we see with our material eyes are pictures emerging inside our senses as a result of the interaction between these two forces. Then the child will be able to understand the inner essence of every phenomenon he observes.

Every object, such as a table, chair, a person, a car, or a plane can ultimately be laid out as a combination of these two forces: reception and bestowal, and it is possible to discern why this special combination of these two forces creates precisely this image of the material object inside of us. Then he will understand what he can receive from it and how he can use it in order to attain certain material or spiritual acquisitions. That’s because he will know that object’s place in all of reality, and that is very important.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/21/11, “Introduction to the Book, Panim Meirot uMasbirot”

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Build Without Ruining The Foundation

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: What is the essence of our realization of free will?

Answer: It is lowering oneself before the group in order to receive from it the importance of the spiritual goal, the Creator, bestowal. That is, my free will is exercised in my choice to lower myself before the group so that everything they have may settle in me as the most important thing in life and that their thought about the Creator may rule over everything I have within me. And then, I will think only about that.

I don’t act blindly, as if I am hypnotized; rather, I intentionally work in my egoism against it. I link into the friends, yield to them, and view them as the leaders of our generation, all in order to adopt their importance of achieving the spiritual goal.

Should I then view this world with its desires for wealth, power, and honor as something low and unworthy? No, I shouldn’t since if I do, it means that the Creator is hardly any greater than this lowness, while I must achieve a different kind of status.

Therefore, I have to highly value wealth, power, honor, and this entire world, but I have to place spirituality even higher. In other words, I must not reduce the value of this world as religions and belief systems suggest; on the contrary, I should appreciate everything it offers, but use it solely for the goal of reaching spirituality. And that’s the essence.

If instead of despising this world, we will exalt the spiritual one, then as spirituality grows, this world will become important ever more. So, don’t ruin and devaluate it, but elevate spirituality even higher over it! And in this way, you will be ascending from the level of this world to that of the next one time after time.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/20/2011, “Introduction to the Book, Panim Meirot uMasbirot

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The Degree Of “Virginity”

Dr. Michael LaitmanWritings of Rabash, Article 29, “Marrying a Virgin”: Every time a person receives a wife, he will receive a virgin who has never had a husband. In other words, he has never used this Malchut and she must always be a new wife. In spiritual work Malchut is called “the kingdom of heaven” which a person must take upon himself every day anew. He has to imagine that he is now starting spiritual work and does not care about anything that came before.

The Creator created creation and exists in adhesion and unity with it. We call this the first state or the world of Infinity. However, creation does not perceive itself in this state. It was simply created this way, but it is not permeated by any details of perception besides one sensation. Therefore, it is like the still degree, a drop of semen which does not have any self-perception.

The Creator’s desire is to bring creation to the realization of who He is so it would become similar and equal to Him. Therefore the true state is concealed from creation and it instead begins to perceive itself in the opposite state. This phase, in turn, divides into several: creation perceives itself as existing at the still, vegetative, animate, and speaking levels.

You and I feel our existence on the human degree of this world. Yet we don’t feel that we developed from the still level. We do not feel our past life cycles on the human level, but simply experience ourselves as existing here and now.

The matter is that every analysis has to happen by itself. A person in this world discerns adhesion, connection with the Creator, and develops to a level where he begins to express his part in creation, his attitude to the Creator.

The Creator brings him to this, giving him the sensation of emptiness in life, but on the other hand motivating him to connect to Him and become similar to Him. Thereby the Creator awakens a person’s desire in the first spiritual point. If a person properly realizes this desire by means of the method of correction, meaning the science of Kabbalah, if he increases his small desire with the help of the group, raising the importance of becoming similar to the Creator and uniting with Him, if he eventually makes his desire similar to the Creator, then he acquires a new degree. The initial point in him grows to become Malchut.

In Hebrew Malchut means kingdom. It is also called “the kingdom of heaven” because a person makes it similar to Bina, the heavens. That is how the first connection between Malchut and Bina, between creation and the Creator, is made.

Then, in order to give a person the opportunity to develop further, everything he had before becomes erased and he receives the next part of the egoistic desire that has to be corrected and made similar to the Creator. This part has to be brought to adhesion so he would become a person on a higher degree. Then no trace of the previous state is left.

Thus, if a person works correctly, then he continuously receives “a virgin for a wife.” Then he once against corrects his desire for the sake of bestowal, making it similar to the Creator and acquiring greater equivalence and closeness with Him. When he completes this phase, the adhesion once again disappears in him and a person again receives a new, corrupted desire that he once again has to work with by means of the group, raising the importance of the goal, increasing his desire, and uniting it with other souls. That is how a person advances.

He continuously receives a new part of Malchut, a “new wife.” If he works for the sake of bestowal, wishing to become similar to the Creator, then in the new state everything that occurred before becomes erased completely and he does not have anything to rely on from past experience. This is indeed a new degree, “virginity.”
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/20/11, Writings of Rabash

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