Entries in the 'Torah' Category

Our World Is a World of Spiritual Consequences

234Question: The Torah describes the laws of communication with the upper force. Do these laws manifest themselves in our world as a root and branch?

Answer: Some do because the Creator is the whole of nature around us, Elokim, in gematria is the same as Teva (nature). And if we treat it correctly, then, naturally, we will influence correctly the upper force called the Creator, and by this, it will influence us correctly.

Comment: That is what is confusing. On one hand in The Book of Zohar, which in principle comments on the Torah and decodes it, it is written that the Torah does not say a single word about our world but only about states outside of time and space.

My Response: It is about the forces that are above our world.

Question: Yes. On the other hand we see some manifestations of things in the Torah in our world also. There are some well-established traditions. How can one figure it out?

Answer: Very little is said about our world because our world is a world of consequences. If we begin to correctly impact the upper force, the Creator, according to the fact that we will become more and more correctly like Him, then naturally, His influence on our world will be positive for us.

In other words, a commandment is an action to change an intention for oneself to an intention for the sake of bestowal, for the sake of the Creator.

Such an action is possible only when a person is in direct contact with the Creator. And before that he performs simply mechanical actions in our world, which are, as it were, preparation for spiritual ones.
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From KabTV’s”Spiritual States” 11/21/23

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Through Allegorical Storytelling

527.06Question: The Torah describes the sin of Adam. We have all read those stories that, in fact, are telling about the shattering of the vessels. Why is it described in narrative form?

Answer: The Torah is written in an allegorical form because Kabbalists had to somehow describe the process of shattering close to human understanding.

That is, people in those days, 3,000 years ago, just like today, could perceive this information only through an allegorical narrative.

Question: Now we are studying the “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah”, written by Baal HaSulam in Kabbalistic language. Did they not know this language before?

Answer: They knew, of course, but they did not use it often. After all, people were closer to the description in the type of language as in The Book of Zohar.
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From KabTV’s “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah” 10/10/23

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The Biblical Serpent Is Not What We Think

115.06Timur writes: I have listened carefully several times to your explanations of what the Torah is. I realize that the Torah is instruction for correction. I realize that the serpent is in me, and it is always egging me on. I even feel that I cannot stop and therefore I spoil the relationship with my wife and friends even though I do not want to do that. My first question is: How do I crush this serpent?

Question:  He understands that it is his ego, his pride, that is spoiling his life. Can this serpent be crushed?

Answer: In general, a person himself can try to do this all his life and fail. Although a lot of people are doing this and want to be better, but it does not work out directly this way.

It will work only in one way; if we create an external environment, that is, a human society, that will put pressure on everyone, impose on everyone in the right way, in a good way, how to behave with each other, then it will work.

But so far, it has not worked anywhere. So, of course, everything is fine, but for some reason it always turns out very badly.

Comment: You just said this: it will not work individually if I just want to crush it in myself. You think this is doomed to fail. But if we want to sort this out, then you say that such an option is possible here.

My Response: “We” means the group, a society. Let’s try.

Question: Will it, this serpent, our egoism, be crushed? What will happen to it?

Answer: Such a “tapeworm” lives inside us.

Question: Will it keep living?

Answer: There is nothing we can do to it.

The only thing we can do is just agree among ourselves that we will all oppose it and thereby strangle it in ourselves.

Question: But not to death, you are saying?

Answer: No, it is impossible to strangle it to death. This is no longer our work. We just have to want it to quiet down so much that it kind of ceases to exist. So that it does not speak but huddles in a corner somewhere and stays there.

Question: Timur has a second question: “Is there something good about the serpent? After all, I know that in our world snake venom is used as medicine.”

Answer: There is a lot of good in the serpent and, in principle, there is nothing bad about it. Nothing! It is only to the extent that a person cannot fight his serpent that he discovers that the serpent is evil. But he detects this only in order to work with it correctly.

In general, the serpent is a creation of the Creator. It was created in order to correct a person and lead him to absolute goodness.

A person cannot fight the serpent; this is clear. But he can ask the Creator for this.

Question: How did humanity figure out that it is possible to use snake venom for medicine? This is some kind of reverse thought. Poison on one hand, on the other hand, medicine.

Answer: Any poison is a medicine. There is nothing bad or evil in the world. Nothing! Moreover, the venom of the snake, which seems at the first glance designed to kill everything, is precisely a great medicine.

Question: Timor’s third question is: “Is it possible to live in peace with the serpent?”

Answer: If we manage to control it, the serpent that is in us, that evil (envy, jealousy, hostility, and pride), then, of course, we will be able to use the whole serpent for good. It will be with us in an embrace, as with Adam and Eve.

Question: His fourth question is very interesting: “Why do we see the serpent in the Bible only at the beginning, in the Garden of Eden, and then nothing is said about it? After all, it exists. You said that it is in us until the very end.”

Answer: It is an eternal creature, an eternal being, an eternal nature, that will be with us all the time until we correct it at the end through our serious, long–term work.

Comment: But really, when reading the Torah (the Bible), we see that the word “serpent” ends there.

My Response: Yes, it is at the beginning, at the very beginning of the sin, at the foundation.

Question: But where is it later? Are all these, roughly speaking, evil heroes its personification?

Answer: Everything evil that happens in people and between people, all of this is the consequence of the serpent, called by other names, but this is it.

Question: Let’s finish about the serpent globally. The serpent, what is it?

Answer: It is not the serpent we imagine. It is what lives inside us and is our egoism that wants to exist only by itself, in spite of others, hates everyone and everything, and wants nothing but to rule over everyone.

This serpent is in us. There is no other serpent in principle. Its future lies in the fact that we will define it as the only evil inclination of the entire nature, which we must necessarily exterminate from ourselves.

Question: Exterminate, after all?

Answer: Yes. To exterminate it from ourselves means that we must understand where it is, in what form, and how we can deal with it. That is, the serpent is a purely spiritual substance.

Question: When you say “exterminate,” does it mean to conquer, put in a cage, or what?

Answer: Do whatever you want. Tie it into a knot and do not let it stick its head out of you.

Question: Recently you said that it is necessary to project warmth and love. When you say that we should approach each other with kindness and warmth, does it mean that we are going to conquer this serpent?

Answer: Yes.

Question: Will it at the same time become stronger?

Answer: After all, we must understand that the fight against the serpent is a work for all times until complete correction.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 10/18/23

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How Can We Be Brave these Days?

562.02Question: Now that the gates to the Creator are open as never before, we have never been closer to Him. Therefore, the state of “it is difficult next to the Creator” rises, and our “donkey” kicks with all his might. How can we be brave these days?

Answer: We should think only about mutual help, mutual support, unity, and a request to the Creator. Other than that, nothing else—mutual help, mutual unification and only with the Creator.

Question: Is there a place for joy here?

Answer: Of course there is. The fact that the Creator has placed you in such a low state from which you have no opportunity to do anything other than ask Him for correction, this should be a great joy.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/13/23, “Fighting the Evil Inclination”

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The Upper Wisdom of the Torah

526Explain to me please, how can intelligent, thinking, educated people agree that a woman is made of a man’s rib, that snakes can speak, that there are magical apples in a paradise and you can eat them and know the truth, and many, many other things like that on every page of the Bible.

Where does our reason disappear? We clearly see that there is no such thing in nature. Why do we agree? This is why I am an atheist since I cannot agree with this. How do you, an intelligent, educated person, explain this to yourself? (Oleg)

My Response: I explain it to myself very simply. I just delve into what the Bible says, sink my teeth into it, and dig into it. There I find completely different explanations, different layers that amaze me. They do not simply satisfy me, but amaze me with their explanation and depth.

I discover such continuous, consecutive findings that I see that for those who do not want to attain them, our world, even without a biblical or some other interpretation, remains a mystery and worthless anyway. But the one who digs into this text and understands its allegory, really reveals the upper world for himself.

Question: In your program “Secrets of the Eternal Book” you explain this a lot. But for those who are asking now: What is this surface layer for when they write “snake,” or when they write “a woman is made of a man’s rib”? Why confuse humanity? Can they just say, “Let’s look inside” and to describe what is inside?

Answer: People looked at the root of the action, at the root of the problem, and therefore described it this way.

Question: So, they look at the root of the problem and write “serpent.” What problem do they see?

Answer: They see that from all our world, a similarity to this action can produce an image of a serpent.

Question: What action are we talking about?

Answer: That it lies, that it thinks only of himself, slanders, and so on. The feeling of the inner forces of the world leads them to such a language. Basically, when they were writing it, they felt these inner forces and desires.

Question: Can we say that this is behind every word of the Torah?

Answer: Absolutely everything is like that! Behind every word.

Question: What is the Torah about? Let’s say people do not know. They think that this is really a body of laws, that it is such a historical book that talks about the history of the people. It actually is there.

Answer: All of it is also there, of course.

Question: The commandments are also there: what to do, what not to do, let’s say. In general, what is the Torah written about?

Answer: It is about a person, about his place in nature, about his history, and his future.

Question: When you say “about a person,” is it about every person?

Answer: Yes.

Question: So how should I look at it; is it an external text or is it about me?

Answer: It is about you.

Question: Is this how I should start reading?

Answer: Yes. In general, this book itself is a guide for you and the world in which you exist.

Question: “The world,” do you mean this world in which I live now? In which we live with you?

Answer: Of course, yes.

Question: This book that was written 3,000 years ago, is it about today’s world?

Answer: Of course.

Question: What does it say? What is it really calling me to?

Answer: It urges you not to stay in a limited vision of this world, but to try to reveal it more deeply.

Question: What will I see?

Answer: The forces that control you and the world around you. Then you will see, discover, reveal, and get acquainted with a single force that is concealed behind the manifestation of these various forces.

Question: Does it mean that this book leads me to this single force? The more I look into it, remove the layers, the closer I will come to this single force. Is that the purpose of this book?

Answer: Yes.

Question: So, are we talking about the Creator?

Answer: Of course.

Question: The last question then. Oleg asks. He looks at it, of course, the way he sees everything around. He says: “We do not see this in nature.” This is his opinion. Such a single-layered opinion so far. But still, please tell me, what is the “Garden of Eden”? What kind of force is this?

Answer: The Garden of Eden, paradise, is a state of a person when he attains all the layers of nature in depth. This is the feeling of a person. The fulfillment he receives at that time is called “Garden of Eden,” a “tree of good and evil” and so on.

Question: What does it mean that a woman is made of a man’s rib? Eve was made out of Adam’s rib.

Answer: A man and a woman here represent two parts of the universe. The woman is more lively, intelligent, and I would say insidious. But at the same time, she fulfills the program of creation. She pushes the man to be more active. Which, in principle, is true up to our day.

Now it is still difficult for us to understand where the role of a man is here and where the role of a woman is here. But, in principle, they are interconnected in such a way as to reveal in all the actions of nature, the force, role, plan, and purpose of the Creator.

Question: Then what is called a “rib”? What is it?

Answer: A rib is that part of the desire of a person, of a man, which can be combined with the desire of a woman and correctly coexist with her. That is the part in a man that can become the basis of a woman.

Question: When you say “man,” what do you mean?

Answer: The quality of bestowal. And a woman is the quality of reception.

Question: The last question is a serpent; what is a serpent?

Answer: A serpent is a cunning one, I would say, in which the Creator hides, through which He shows a man and a woman how compatible they can be only in a certain connection with each other. Therefore, such a connection of a man and a woman with the help of a serpent is the beginning of life.

Question: When you say “serpent,” is it a force, is it a desire? What is it?

Answer: It is the force of desire.

Question: Why is he whispering to a woman? Here he comes to her and whispers: “Come on, do the forbidden, tell him…” Why is he egging on if the Creator is within it, as you say?

Answer: Because you cannot do this in a direct way, but only through deception, as it were.

But deception is actually a holy deception. Not in the name of deceiving and stealing, profiting, taking possession of something else, and in someone else. Because the very nature of creation is false, and it is necessary to deceive it. It is necessary to bring a person from a state of evil to a state of good, so the serpent does a big serious work.

That is, our world directs to evil in order to come to evil, and here it directs to evil in order to come to good.

Comment: It means that the serpent performs a great function.

My Response: A serpent?! It is the basis of life.

But to this day we are experiencing these problems and cannot understand where this serpent is, how to pull it out of us, remove it, and how to get rid of it. It surrounds us and is inside us. It rubs with us all the time.

Question: What is the future for the serpent and for us? Is it going to whisper like that, are we going to follow it like that? Will everything keep happening like this?

Answer: No, we have to reveal the true picture of the world, and then we can correct the serpent.

Question: What is the true picture? What should we reveal?

Answer: We must all together grab this “serpent” that is between us and hold it until it agrees to work together with us, and act together with us. When it says: “I agree,” we will believe it. And the world will suddenly become different.

Question: You say: “So that it would work with us,” and then where would we come with it, all together?

Answer: To reveal the truth, which is in being in the serpent’s wisdom, but for the sake of others.

Question: What did you mean by “serpent’s wisdom”?

Answer: This is wisdom.

Question: Why did you call it the serpent’s one? It sounded very beautiful!

Answer: Because the serpent has it. It is located between all the elements of nature and is ready to connect everything in order to take the best that each part of the element of nature has for the sake of others.

Question: Is this the serpent? So, is it something high?

Answer: There is nothing higher than it.

Question: Can the serpent be called something else? We called it strength and desire. What else can you call a serpent?

Answer: It is the upper wisdom.

Question: Why is it said that “it should crawl on the ground”? When it sinned, whispered to Eve, it was told: “From now on you will not walk, you will crawl on the ground and eat dust,” and so on. Why?

Answer: Because it told the person what the cause of his suffering was, and showed the person the correct solution.

Comment: It should be praised for this, but instead…

My Response: The fact is that the serpent must. The Bible does not seem to say this, but it must tell and show a person, reveal the future to a person, that is, bring Adam and Eve to the Garden of Eden. To the same Garden of Eden in which they were born and developed, but in a corrected form.

Question: So, after everything that happened, and there was a fall into our world from this Garden of Eden, do we need to go through this world with all its suffering and wars and climb back into the Garden of Eden? Is this the work of the serpent?

Answer: Yes. Then the Garden of Eden will be revealed all over the earth. Forever.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 8/7/23

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Once and for All

526Question: Why hasn’t there been a deterioration of the traditions Kabbalists introduced many years ago?

Answer: Because they are all based on the laws strictly prescribed in the Tanakh (Torah, Prophets, Scriptures), Talmud, and Mishnah. They were composed by people who were in clear attainment of the upper force, the upper world. Therefore, what is written there cannot be changed in any way.

If today archaeologists find an ancient Torah, they say: “Look, it is the same Torah!” But how could it be otherwise when you cannot change a single letter, a single squiggle, because there are laws for the image of each letter?

A letter is a symbol. The way to write it, at what angle each element should appear, all this is precisely verified based on Kabbalah. Because the letters symbolize Galgalta Eynaim, AHAP, Parsa, the light of Hochma, the light of Hassadim, and various correspondences between them. All this has been established and described by Kabbalists once and for all.

Even if you are not a Kabbalist, you should know these rules by heart. Your calligraphy should be like the same font on the same typewriter. It cannot be otherwise!
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Kosher Pork?” 7/30/11

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Code of Kabbalistic Sources

137In the verse, “In the beginning God created,” God, too, elicited thirteen words to surround the Assembly of Israel and to keep her: THE, HEAVEN, AND-THE, EARTH, AND-THE EARTH, WAS, EMPTY, AND-CHAOTIC, AND-THE DARKNESS, OVER, THE FACE, OF THE ABYSS, AND-THE SPIRIT” (Introduction to The Book of Zohar, “The Rose”).

Comment: At first glance, these sentences seem completely unrelated.

My Response: The fact is that when you read the Torah, you begin to understand that all the relations between us and the Creator are summarized and encrypted in it in a short form. Basically, the Torah only talks about this.

Question: What does it mean “The Creator created the heaven and the earth”?

Answer: Heaven is the upper attitude, the quality of Rachamim, i.e., the quality of mercy to each other. Earth, on the contrary, is a quality of hardness. This way, being between two forces, positive and negative, that operate within us, we can use them to move ahead toward adhesion with the Creator.
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From KabTV’s “Introduction to The Book of Zohar” 6/4/23

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The Torah Is a Gift from the Creator to a Person

760.1The essence of the Torah is to give a person the opportunity to reach the state in which he finds the Creator. To the extent a person receives the ability to understand, agree, and make an effort, he begins to feel the true world that we exist in and that is so far concealed from all other inhabitants of this world.

The giving of the Torah is really a gift given to a person who leads an animalistic existence in this world, but who receives the opportunity to become a man. He can rise above the inanimate, vegetative, and animate levels to the level of Adam (similar to the Creator) through the changes made in him by the Creator under a certain condition.

A person must agree with this plan, accept it for himself, and implement it. The purpose of creation is to raise all the people of this world to the degree of the Creator, that is, to bring them to complete adhesion with Him.

Everyone should feel and attain that there is one central force in nature that is the Creator. He alone controls everything, moves everything, supports everything, and we are completely dependent on Him 100%. But on the other hand, we also influence our development. We cannot change the direction of development, but we determine its pace.

In the end, everyone will come to final correction, but at every step we are required to stop, examine our condition and everything that led to it, and decide how to take another step forward from this point.

The entire work of a person is to come to the final correction.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/19/23, “The Time of the Giving of the Torah”

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What Does the Wrong Interpretation of the Torah Lead To?

533.02Comment: The main problem in the development of fascism was that it is written in the Torah, “Use a non-Jew.”

My Response: If the Torah is interpreted within the framework of our world, then it will be worse than Mein Kampf because it says that non-Jews should be killed, deceived, neglected, and anything can be done with them.

If this is not interpreted as “my egoistic desires, which I have to deceive, change,” and so on, then it is quite obvious that this can be used as the basis for hatred of Jews.

But who can even think about it correctly? Those who benefit from it politically, no more than that.

Because you don’t see it anywhere in history. Do Jews earn money? That is correct. Do they know how to settle better than others? That is also correct. But, in principle, they do not harm anyone. It is invented by those who benefit from it. And this is natural.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Nazism and the Jews” 1/9/11

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“What is the meaning of Deuteronomy 5:15 where it writes, ‘Remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there’?” (Quora)

Dr. Michael LaitmanMichael Laitman, On Quora: What is the meaning of Deuteronomy 5:15 where it writes, ‘Remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there’?

According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, the state of slavery in Egypt means that we are under the complete control of the desire to enjoy for self-benefit alone, or in other words, the human ego.

From such a state, we embark on an inner journey to correct our desire so that we enjoy not egoistically, i.e. for the sake of self-benefit alone, but for the benefit of others and the Creator, which is an opposite desire to ours—to give, love and positively connect.

This inversion of our intention is considered a correction of our nature, and it is described in the Torah as us exiting Egypt and entering the Land of Israel.

This correction of our ego from prioritizing self-benefit to prioritizing the benefit of others and nature describes the spiritual path we undergo until our final eternal and perfect state, called “the end of correction” (Heb. “Gmar Tikkun”).

At every stage of this spiritual path, we need to exit our ego called “Egypt,” and gradually start revealing the force of love and bestowal in nature called “the Creator.” Doing so leads us to great joy and a major surprise that the Creator prepared for us.

Therefore, our need to remember that we were slaves in Egypt means that we were in the desire to enjoy for ourselves alone, which completely controlled us, and that the Creator brought us out from our self-aimed desire. We needed to feel that we could not exit our egoistic desire other than by connecting to one another and reaching a sincere mutual request—a prayer—to exit our ego. We were then granted access to a new nature of love, giving and positive connection with others through which we discovered a harmonious, peaceful and joyous reality.

This feeling is very special because a part of it penetrates our desire to enjoy, and another part resists our desire. With this contrast inside, we can then scrutinize the forces that operate on our egoistic nature, whether and how much we can exit the control of those forces, and how the upper force—the Creator—grants us that special ability.

Based on the Daily Kabbalah Lesson with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on March 27, 2023. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.
Photo by Viktor Forgacs on Unsplash.xt