Two questions I received on Kabbalah as a science:

Question: On one hand it says that Kabbalah only talks about the Upper Worlds, but on the other hand it says that Kabbalah is a science about all of reality. If Kabbalah speaks only about spirituality and not about electrons and other such things, then it would be pointless to hold discussions with scientists, such as Dr. Jeffrey Satinover! After all, Kabbalah talks about the reality that is above matter, before it’s perceived within our senses.

My Answer: Kabbalah talks about the Upper World and the descent of the forces into our world. This is why it is the foundation of the sciences of our world. Recently scientists have begun to understand issues that border the two worlds. When these people – such as Dr. Jeffrey Satinover – receive a positive impression of Kabbalah, they then help us to popularize it.

Question: You are certain that Kabbalah is a science and that a Kabbalist attains it by conducting an inner research of the world. Is it possible that this research is actually the subjective science of a specific individual, who revealed it as a result of a specific path? Would it be correct to say that Kabbalah isn’t a science in and of itself, but only when a person realizes it in practice? What do you think of those who constantly study but don’t advance toward the truth in action? How does Kabbalah regard this?

My Answer: You lack the basic knowledge from the articles: “The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah,” Kabbalah as a Root of All Sciences,” and “Preface to The Book of Zohar”. It’s impossible to explain all of this here. If you really want to know rather than to just negate, you’ll find the answers there.

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: We Are In the Center of All the Worlds
Laitman.com Post: Kabbalah and the Earthly Sciences
Quantum Physics Meets Kabbalah

Filed under: Science - 1 Comment →

Questions I received on the spiritual path:

Question: I have been studying Kabbalah for a pretty long time (4+ years) and have been doing dissemination from the very beginning. From my first lesson and to this day, whenever I am especially impressed by something in the lesson (or by news of some great dissemination going on), I feel a clear physical sensation that is unique and that I never feel in any other situation. It feels like a wave of energy (like electricity) is going through my body, and is sort of a nice feeling. However, it always leaves me puzzled – I don’t know if this is normal, what it means, and how to relate to it. I know that spirituality is not supposed to be reflected in corporeality and shouldn’t be confused with it, but I’ve wanted to ask you this for a long time. What does it mean, and how should I relate to it?

My Answer: Gradually, everything will reach balance. You just need to alternate studying with dissemination.

Question: Would you please elaborate on how to measure one’s efforts? I may think that I am exerting a lot of effort where others might look at me and say that I’m not. And in which area should the efforts be made: dissemination or study?

My Answer: If you are always thinking about spiritual advancement, this means that you are making the necessary efforts.

Question: How do you explain it when a person who wasn’t sleepy at all before the lesson starts falling asleep during the lesson?

My Answer: This happens because the material you study does not coincide with your spiritual or physical interests and desires.

Question: I am on the path of suffering, but I never part with the book Shamati in English. What else should I do to make sure that everything I’m going through won’t be a waste?

My Answer: Study, connect to others, and disseminate. In particular, during the period of suffering, or in other words, while you still haven’t evoked the Upper Light upon you, you should focus most of all on dissemination together with the friends.

Question: I have been studying Kabbalah for two years and I have already had several descents. Right now I am in a state of a descent, which started a week and a half ago. It brought me to an environment of people who are not interested in spirituality. Now my depression is telling me that I need to go back to studying. How can I live with this?

My Answer: This is the Creator’s way of pushing you towards Him, because the descents also come from Him. You need a group, a thorough reading of the Shamati materials, and constant studies with us. Otherwise you won’t make it!

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: The Rate of One’s Spiritual Development Depends On One’s Efforts
Laitman.com Post: We Raise the Entire Universe Up to the Creator
Laitman.com Post: The Source of All the World’s Problems
April 2005 Congress Intention Book – section, “Intention of the Group”

Filed under: Spirituality - 1 Comment →

A question I received: What exactly is the Machsom? I wanted to find a precise definition in Talmud Eser Sefirot and other technical studies, but couldn’t manage to find it. In fact, this concept doesn’t seem to exist in any article or book by Baal HaSulam or Rabash. So, my questions are:

1. Is it a technical Kabbalistic term (like Masach, for instance)?
2. If it is, why don’t the greatest Kabbalists of our generation mention it?
3. If it is not, why do you use it, and can the Machsom be explained by another non-technical term?

My Answer: The Machsom is a word that Rabash often used during our private conversations. In his public talks he used it rarely, because he never talked about the practical crossing of the Machsom. There are rare instances when it is mentioned in the text. Here’s one such instance:

תשמ”ה – מאמר כ’ 1984/85 – מאמר 20

אנו צריכים לדעת, שיש שני מפריעים, שעומדים נגד האדם ולא נותנים לעבור את המחסום, להגיע לאהבת ה’, היות שהאדם נולד עם רצון לקבל לעצמו…

Rabash’s 20th article from 1984-1985:

We have to know that there are two obstructions standing before man, preventing him from crossing the Machsom and attaining love for the Creator, because man is born with the will to receive for himself…

I advise you to look for it in the texts on your own. I’m sure that there are other instances, although they are rare.

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: The Machsom Is the Same Everywhere – Even In Japan
Laitman.com Post: The Machsom Can Be Crossed Individually and As a Group
Kabbalah Today Article: The Spiritual Gardener
Baal HaSulam: “Introduction to The Study of the Ten Sefirot,” Item 1
Baal HaSulam Article: “The Bond,” Item 18

Filed under: Spirituality - 3 Comments →

A question I received: I’m trying to reconcile the contradiction between the notion of “faith above reason” and your recurring claim that Kabbalah isn’t built on faith, but on sensations and accurate knowledge.

Is the meaning of “faith above reason” that instead of blindly believing something I an told, I take the path that allows me to see for myself whether the things I’m being told are right or wrong?

My Answer: The first man who felt the Creator was Adam (see Baal HaSulam’s article, “The Secret of Attaining the Wisdom” in the book Fruits of Wisdom). The Jewish calendar starts on that day – the first day of the month of Tishrey of the year 0 (5768 years ago).

In the generations following Adam there were others who attained the Creator, but Kabbalah became what it is now only twenty generations later, in Ancient Babylon (4000 years ago). A Babylonian priest named Abraham discovered Kabbalah and described its basic laws in The Book of Creation. He also gathered students and formed the first Kabbalistic group. His followers – his physical and spiritual sons (in those times people were named by the leader of the clan or tribe) continued to develop spiritually. This continued until the people fell from the sensation of the Creator to the sensation of just our world (and as a result, the Second Temple was destroyed 2000 years ago).

After this fall from the sensation of the spiritual world into our world, all of the definitions and names they used before, and their language in general (Hebrew) fell from the spiritual level to the corporeal level. The same words began to signify the things that they started to see, hear and understand. That is to say, the words acquired a corporeal meaning, instead of the things they used to signify in the past. Ever since, the Kabbalistic texts were written with the same letters and words, but everything depends on who reads them – whether it’s someone who’s on the spiritual level like the author, or only on the corporeal level.

“Faith above reason,” for instance, denotes the following condition: the desire (quality) to bestow (Bina, Hafetz Hessed, the Light of Hassadim) is above the desire to receive, called “knowledge,” because in it one receives the Light of Hochma, the Light of Wisdom.

For those who do not perceive the Upper World, the word “faith” means belief in something that may or may not exist, something people only talk about but cannot sense. Kabbalah never talks about this kind of faith, because by definition it engages only in the revelation of the Creator to man in this world! (See Baal HaSulam’s article, “The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah.”)

So if you want to understand the truth, when reading the Kabbalistic texts you must “translate” what you read from the corporeal level to the spiritual level. Then you won’t err like all the religious people who read Kabbalistic texts (the Torah, the Talmud, the prayer book, and so on), interpreting them on the corporeal level. This is actually the source of mankind’s misunderstanding of the Creator.

In the article, “The Secret of Attaining the Wisdom,” Baal HaSulam writes: “The attainment of the whole universe in its absolute depth and interconnections of its parts was revealed in its entirety by Adam.” This is why we call him “The First Man” – because he was the first to achieve the level of “Human” – Adam (in Hebrew), which means “similar to the Creator.”

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: Religion Is a Cultural Tradition, Kabblah Is the Method of Correction
Talk – Disclosure of the Wisdom of Kabbalah, 1
Chapter 6.2 from the book The Path of Kabblah – “Abraham the Patriarch”
Chapter 24 from the book Attaining the World’s Beyond – “Faith”

Filed under: History - Comments Off on The Foundation Of The Wisdom Of Kabbalah

Two questions I received on the Messiah:

Question: The Book of Zohar says that before the arrival of the Mashiach Ben David (Messiah Son of David), the Mashiach Ben Yoseph (Messiah Son of Joseph) will come. There will be a preparation before arrival of the Mashiach. Is the world’s current condition (the crisis) this preparation? And what kind of force is the Mashiach Ben Yoseph?

My Answer: The Mashiach Ben Yoseph is the revelation of the modern method of correction by the Ari in the 16th century. The world’s present condition is the beginning of the revelation of the Creator, or the preparation for His revelation. The speed of this process depends on us.

Question: Is the Messiah the name of the Light that’s powerful enough to raise both the righteous and the wicked to the Creator – everyone together, in response to mankind’s prayer after recognizing that it’s impossible to keep living in this world? Or is it a person sent to this world with the power to attract the Light called the Messiah?

My Answer: The Messiah is the revelation of the Creator. This action (revelation) of the Upper Light takes place together with the revelation of knowledge about the nature of creation, its plan, process and purpose. This is achieved through disseminating this knowledge (“the call of Messiah”) by those who aspire toward the goal of creation. To the degree people resist this process, their intentions and actions – the forces of resistance – will elicit suffering.

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: The Third Temple and the Coming of the Messiah
Laitman.com Post: The Messiah – the Force that will Correct the World
Kabbalah Today Article: Echoes of the Future
Chapter 10 from the Book The Kabbalah Experience – “The Messiah and the End of Days”

Filed under: World - 1 Comment →

Two questions I received on failed “wisdoms”:

Question: Why are all the “wise people” in crisis?

My Answer: Because it has become clear that their “wisdom” is in crisis! After all, it is human and earthly, not “Upper.” Only the wisdom of Kabbalah alone will become revealed to everyone – proudly alone, on the throne of the highest value.

Question: Lenin was driven by the desire to make more people (the proletariat) happy with the help of a better society. In essence – though not in form – this desire coincides with the Creator’s desire to make the creatures happy. Then why do you still feel “sick” about his “speech on the armored car?”

My Answer: Half of the world are still sick in the stomach just thinking of him! Today they still can’t recover from this mistake of forcefully imposing the condition of unity, mutual guarantee, brotherhood, communal property, and mutual means of production, as well as the consequences of this.

All of these must occur by means of man’s self-correction, voluntarily, and through education, instead of through the overbearing “education” of the KGB, when they were annihilating their own people. Baal HaSulam writes about it in his newspaper “HaUma” (The Nation) and in the article “The Future Generation.”

Related Material:
Lesson on the article: “Peace In the World”
Introduction to the Book of Zohar. Items 19-25

Filed under: Politics - No Comments →

News Report (translated from news.ru): Between the years 2000 and 2007, 3,500 people per year returned to Israel. In 2008, however, the number of people who have returned jumped to 7,000, and another 15,000 have submitted their applications to the ministry of absorption. In the last two months alone, as many as 2000 people returned to Israel.

My Comment: The return of the “lost children” marks the end of their wanderings in search of a heaven on earth, and the beginning of their search for the real heaven – the revelation of the Upper World. The Book of Zohar says that this precedes the return of the truly lost sons – the return of the ten tribes that were lost 3000 years ago. Today there are hundreds of millions of them in the world…

Related Material:
Laitman.com: Israel Are Those Who Aspire Straight to the Creator
Laitman.com Post: The Jewish Nation Can Only Be Revived By Restoring “Love for One’s Neighbor”
Part 5 from the book Interview With the Future: Spiritual Exile

Filed under: Israel - No Comments →

The ARI Online Learning Center
The ARI Online Learning Center reports that several thousand people from many different countries have already signed up for the new semester, “Fall 2008.” Presently the top ten participating countries are: America, Mexico, Columbia, Argentina, Romania, Canada, England, South America, Australia, and various countries in Europe.

International Book Fair in Frankfurt
The world’s largest international book fair was held in Frankfurt on October 15-19. This year marked the 60th anniversary of this famous book fair, and visitors had an opportunity to acquaint themselves with the book industries from one hundred countries.

A book stand with Kabbalah books was organized by our friends Daniel Lange, Martin Wieczorek, Urlik Hammer, Mark Daniels, Eddie Yusupov, and Uri Laitman. It elicited great interest from the visitors of the exhibit. Over thirty publishers from the most diverse countries have already started negotiations about translating and publishing Kabbalah books.

Among them are publishers from Brazil, Switzerland, Israel, Hungary, Italy, Germany, China, Croatia, Korea, Holland, Turkey, Sweden, and even Saudi Arabia.

New Publications in Mexico
The editorial staff of the Mexican magazine “Medicable,” with a circulation of 70,000, has decided to start printing our Kabbalah articles. The magazine comes out once every two months and is distributed in cities such as Mexico City, Guadalajara, and Monterrey.

Kabbalah in Finnish
Finland isn’t lagging behind either. The first issue of the newspaper Kabala Tanaan, (Kabbalah Today in Finnish) has been published. The newspaper’s publication was timed to coincide with two large annual exhibits held in in Helsinki in October of 2008. Our newspapers, brochures, and books in seven languages will be presented at the stands of both exhibits.

Online Education in Moscow
An international conference dedicated to online education was held in the “President Hotel.” Representatives of the Moscow branch of the Kabbalah Academy were in attendance. They gave a presentation on the online learning classes that the International Kabbalah Academy has been successfully teaching for several years. To date over 20,000 students have taken part in the classes.

This presentation was of great interest to the conference participants. During the discussion, the participants exchanged opinions on methods of increasing the efficiency of online learning, and the role of online education in the conditions of modern globalization.

Book Fair in Zaporozhye
A book fair was held in Zaporozhye, Ukraine, called Khortotzki Djerela – 2008. Visitors showed a lot of interest in the books, brochures, CDs, and newspapers about the wisdom of Kabbalah that were on display. The book Kabbalah – It’s Very Simple sold out on the first day of the fair. Many visitors became acquainted with Kabbalah during last year’s fair and came back to learn more this year.

Filed under: News - 1 Comment →

A question I received: I have a question regarding the society of the future. I came from a state that was a part of former Yugoslavia, which was an artificially established “communist” state. I can still remember the good feelings that everybody had in that society. However, it fell apart and all sorts of nationalistic, ethnic and religious hatred emerged, escalating in a terrible war.

Now, after reading a portion of the material on your website, I find it difficult to understand one of the principles stated in the text of “Building the Future Society,” which contradicts some things from other texts. In “Building the Future Society” it is clearly stated that it is the Jews who should be members of the future altruistic-communistic government, because they suffered most in history and thus are the most experienced and knowledgeable about the best ways of ruling.

In other texts it is also clearly stated that the Creator invites all nations to unite, that the word Israel means “directly to God” rather than current Israeli citizens or Jews. I wonder if there is a sound explanation to this. Can you please clarify this for me as well as for others who are firm believers in the so called “Jewish conspiracy”?

My Answer: Historically it happened that a part of the people from Ancient Babylon have already gone through correction, reached the level of the Temple, and then fell from the spiritual level of “Love thy neighbor as thyself” into our world of “Unfounded hatred.” These people are the carriers of the inner spiritual potential – and you are admitting this very fact with your prejudice to them! They are heading the dissemination of the method of correcting all humanity. This is why they have already gone through this path.

Everyone who joins them are also Israel (Isra–El – those who aspire toward the Creator), and later everyone else will also gradually join the process of correction. This is how the full correction of the common soul of Adam is attained. For more on this, see items 61-71 of the “Introduction to the Book of Zohar.”

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: The Solution – Excerpts from the Writings of the Last Generation by Baal HaSulam
Laitman.com Post: Being “Chosen” Means Having the Responsibility to Spiritually Serve the World

Filed under: History - No Comments →

USA. The largest publishing company in the country, Penguin Publishing, reports that the first edition of The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Kabbalah in English is completely sold out, and they are urgently printing the second edition.

The Spanish speaking world is interested in Kabbalah. In response to increasing demand, Random House – the second largest publisher in Latin America, bought the rights to The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Kabbalah in Spanish. The title of the book speaks for itself: it explains simply and accessibly what is Kabbalah and why it is necessary to the modern person.

Noticias, a Mexican newspaper, has printed the article “The Butterfly Effect and Kabbalah,” which explains the solution to the economic problems.

My blog in Spanish is now on the web. It is called “Kabbalah, Science and the Meaning of Life.” Previously my blog was translated into four languages; Spanish is the fifth.

The Spanish composer Nino Diaz (author of over fifty musical compositions, winner of the prize of the Canadian Academy of Arts and the competition of creative radio compositions Classic Radio 2008) has written a new composition called “El Muro” (“The Wall”) that includes a poem by the great 16th century Kabbalist, the Ari. The premier of this unique composition took place on September 9th at a festival in Alicante, Spain, and was very successful.

Norway. Visjon, a popular magazine, has requested an analytical article from the Kabbalah Academy, which will present Kabbalah’s views on the ecological problems. The article will be published in the next issue of the magazine, and it will be called “Ecology and Us.”

Israel. A holiday issue of the publication Kabbalah Today in Hebrew and Russian was issued on the eve of Rosh Hashanah (the Jewish New Year). It is a compilation of materials about the holiday, as well as articles on current events. The number of copies printed is about one million.

Brazil. Imago, one of the most popular publishers in Brazil, has published the book Kabbalah Revealed in Portuguese. The book is on sale in all book stores in the country.

Internet. The BOBs (Best of the Blogs) is holding an international blog competition, and reports that tens of thousands of people have submitted my blog as the best and most original blog.

The Ari Online Learning Center has announced the beginning of a new virtual Kabbalah class in English. All the information about the opportunity to study Kabbalah in English on the internet is available at this website.

Over the past month, websites of the Kabbalah Academy have been visited by over 2,000,000 people.

The Arabic world. The first Kabbalah book in Arabic has been published, called From Chaos to Harmony. The book explains the fundamental principles of the wisdom of Kabbalah as well as its attitude toward modern scientific research.

Iran. It’s been less than a month since we have aired our website in Farsi, and it has already been visited by 1,300 people who reside in Iran. In addition, the Kabbalah Today publication is now being published in Persian. Presently 2,000 Iranians residing in the US receive this newspaper.

The Black Sea – 2008. Final Summary. The three month long dissemination event on the Black Sea coast of Russia and Ukraine, spanning from Sochi to Crimea, has come to en end. Over a million vacationers and local residents received the publications Kabbalah Segodnya (Kabbalah Today) and Moi Mir (My World).

Over time, other countries joined in on the dissemination event: newspapers were also disseminated in Lithuania on the Baltic Sea beaches, in Israel on the Red Sea, in Poland, the Czech Republic, France, and other European countries, as well as the Eastern and Western coasts of America.

In December a newspaper dissemination event is being planned in Mexico and Chile.

Filed under: News - Comments Off on Kabbalah News Around the World