A question I received: Do you think that the current global crisis will bring us back to a multi-polar world, the way Russia wants it to?

My Answer: We must recognize that only actions aimed at balance with the single, global nature can bring us real benefit – unity into one whole, the creation of one global government, global distribution of the natural resources and of the results of commercial production. Of course, it’s impossible to attain this instantaneously, but even small steps in this direction – due to being directed toward equivalence with Nature – will be accompanied by positive changes.

The opposition between Russia and America, their isolation from each other, and the crisis that followed, showed that it’s no longer possible for one country to prosper at the expense of another – “I’m happy when you’re sad.” Either both succeed or both fail.

Moreover, this doesn’t depend on what the politicians want or don’t want. It is an objective revelation of the global world. In the global economy there cannot be any competition between nations, because we all share the same finances – even though it still seems strange that each has its own budget, banks, and problems. If they will continue along this route, then the crisis will grow from an economic one into a systematic social one, and then – a political one.

There is only one solution: to consider the world round instead of multi-polar. To consider finances common and not personal, to view Nature as the Upper Law; to study its globality, harmony and balance – and follow it!

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A question I received: If hunger spreads all over the world, how will it affect the Earth’s population?

My Answer: The Malthusian theory says that the world’s population has always been limited by the natural fertility of the land and the development of bio-technologies:

• with natural farming – up to 10 million people;
• with extensive farming – up to 100 million;
• with intensified farming – up to 1 billion.

However, all models expressing the dependency of the earth’s population on its fertility assume that the world’s population is a natural (egoistic) system.

In the past, a process taking place in one part of the world did not have a significant influence on the other parts, and even less so on the population. But the moment the planet’s population became one collective whole, the laws of the system changed. Today, despite cultural differences and physical distances, an intrinsic phenomenon of global interdependency of all people is becoming apparent.

How will this affect the earth’s population? Our planet can even feed 100 billion people, provided that they observe the system of interconnection in which they exist. If people obey the laws of nature and consume only what is necessary for their existence, in brotherly interaction among them, as parts of a single organism, then they will never have to fear a demographic crisis. After all, the only cause of all the crises is our cruel attitudes to each other. Nature destroys us to the degree we oppose it.

Take Russia for example: There is a huge difference between its level of  economic development and how the population uses it. Cruelty, insignificance of human life,  abundant prisons and concentration camps, alcoholism, and lack of decent medical service – are all contributing factors to a short life span and high mortality rate.

In countries that are less developed than Russia, the life span is longer because the attitude to people is more merciful. In Russia it’s almost as if the government itself is interested in the destruction of its own people! How else can you explain the encouragement and proliferation of the “beer and vodka culture,” as well as drugs? However, fighting alcoholism directly is always ineffective, and only increases the number of people in prison.

The attitudes of the government and of every person to man, society, and mankind must be changed. This must become Russia’s national idea. Quit the path of trying to “force respect” and “force peace,” and instead set an example of sympathy, bestowal, and love for everyone in the world. This will elicit well-deserved respect and honor.

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A question I received: A new worldview seeking to shift the entire civilization to a new level of consciousness has been published on the site of the national movement “RUSSIA IS US,” in the section “A New Worldview,” on the discussion forum, and other places.

Your thoughts and ideas from different articles published on your Kabbalah Academy websites and the Internet at large, were used in building a foundation for the new worldview. We would greatly appreciate your comments and suggestions.

With deep respect,
Alexey Yurievich Bartunov
Leader of the national movement “RUSSIA IS US”

My Answer: Dear Alexey Yurievich,

I will be very happy to participate in an opportunity to build a better Russia. I have always said that the inner demands of the Russians are close to the Kabbalistic ideas. The search for a national idea, self-expression, self-realization in the world in the capacity of a special enlightening force that draws respect and praise – all this is possible precisely by correctly implementing the idea of unity of all the nations. Russia can come forth as the initiator of an organizational plan for the new humanity. I am completely together with you in this!

Additional Comment: Professor Dov Sadan writes in his book Spiritual Revival that during the revolutionary period in Russia, Baal HaSulam took part in Polish workers’ demonstrations and supported them by carrying a red flag! He explained that what was happening in Russia signified that the masses were coming closer to the ideas of Kabbalah.

Later, after moving to Palestine in 1921, when socialistic changes started taking place in Poland, Baal HaSulam returned to Poland again and tried to get in touch with the leaders of the Polish workers’ movement. He wanted the socialist changes to be implemented correctly.

Unfortunately, people could not hear him. After all, to do this the society should have been able to rise above its egoism and recognize that there is no path other than global unity.

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A question I received: How do you see the future of China in light of the current global crisis?

My Answer: Today China is the most dynamically developing part of the global economy. Nevertheless, although China isn’t losing capital, a slowdown in its development is inevitable.

It appears that the Chinese economy is suffering less than the other economies. After all, China is protected by a powerful political regime, a closed inner market, its own strong currency, a cheap labor force, and a weak connection with the international funds system. Compared to the international recession, China is revealing an opportunity for growth in internal real estate development and consumption.

The Prime Minister of the People’s Republic of China, Wen Jiabao, gave a speech at the closing of the Asia-Europe summit held on October 26, where he stated: “We need reforms that will aid in creating a fair and effective global financial structure.” Unlike any other country, with the exception of the USA, China cares about education in the scientific field. There are 500,000 Chinese students studying outside of China, of whom 200,000 are studying in the USA. It turns out that in the 21st century, the only countries that will be able to successfully develop a technical-scientific base are the USA and China.

However, in order to become a superpower of the 21st century in a multi-polar system of the world order, in order for the Chinese goods to find a market, considering that the country’s economy is built on direct international investments, China will have to consider the need to integrate into the single global civilization. In the future, the system of interactions will have no choice but to change under the influence of nature, and to become harmonious, interconnected, truly integral and global, like a single organism. Incidentally, the ancient Chinese philosophy also sees the world exactly this way!

Laitman.com Post: New Theories of the Financial Crisis

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Globalization is the revelation of a new level of connection between us. It should be beneficial, but as we can see, it only causes more problems.

Why is this happening? It is because we are using the integral global system backwards – aiming to suppress one another, instead of learning to work together. We keep trying to defeat each other, to put others down and be superior to them.

Even if we wanted to maintain the proper interconnection – the commerce principle of “I scratch your back, you scratch mine” – this would still bring us to a crisis today. It would happen even if we did not lie to one another and conducted honest commerce. That’s because nowadays we are all interconnected, like parts of one body. Under these conditions it is useless to be egoistically honest, just as it is useless to create a global government or a world bank – to seek a common regulator.

The world’s political and economic leaders want to arrange a joint meeting between the G20 (heads of the leading countries) to discuss a joint global government. However, this will not help us come out of the crisis, because we are in opposition to Nature and Its general law. The system must not just be based on the correct interconnection, on agreements and honesty, but must operate in accordance with the inner connection between the elements of a single system, at whose basis lies a consideration of others as yourself.

This is the root of the problem. Kabbalah warns humanity that if we continue to try building our relationships according to the corporeal, egoistic laws – even the most direct and honest ones, following the principle of “what’s yours is yours and what’s mine is mine” – then the system will not work and we will elicit an even greater explosion.

As we start to reveal that we are all part of a single global system, we must come to the conclusion that everything is collective, and everyone must take care of everyone else. The only things that are “personal” are those necessary for one’s existence, while everything else is the collective property of the whole world. This pertains to natural resources, goods and production, education, health care, and so forth. Everything must be collective, global property. Otherwise the crises will not stop, and no matter how hard we try to set things right according to our egoistic logic, we will continue experiencing one crisis after another.

Kabbalah warns us that nature has already elevated us – in terms of our development – to the level of a single integral system, which follows the law of absolute interconnection of all its parts. No one can escape this law. Essentially, this is the ancient Biblical principle of “Love thy neighbor as thyself.” And we must use our ego in order to establish the correct connection with others.

Even if we create a rational system of interaction between different countries, according to the egoistic principle, “what’s mine is mine and what’s yours is yours,” then this quality of Sodom will actually bring about an even greater crisis. That’s because in doing so we will seek to use the interconnection between people in order to raise the usage of egoism even higher, instead of correcting it. In this scenario a crisis will arise which will reflect this pseudo-correction, in order to expose the error. And it will be stronger and more acute, in order to teach us a lesson of what not to do.

What does Kabbalah suggest? To already take into account the future form, the functioning of the integral system as one body, by the principle of “the end of an action lies in the initial thought,” and actualize this end state to the best of our ability right now, even if we do it gradually and fragmentarily.

Does “actualize it right now” mean “fair distribution”? No. However, even if we initially accept the distribution of “what’s mine is mine and what’s yours is yours,” and at the same time begin to intensively teach all humanity the laws of coexistence, which are based on the discovery of our society as a single organism; if we teach people the laws of behavior and distribution – then we will already be on the right path. We will shift to the path of correction and will stop being opposite to nature. We will then feel an immediate reduction of the suffering.

Baal HaSulam has a parable that says: We have lost our way in the desert and don’t know where to go. Now that we’ve completely lost our strength, we’ve realized that it was impossible to avoid wandering in the desert. And now we are revealing the path that we must walk. At the end of the path lies a castle full of all the goodness in the world. We are desperate; we are ready to sink into depression and drugs. All of a sudden, in this situation, we receive a global positioning system (a GPS map or GPS navigator) from people who can see everything from above. If a person agrees and changes his attitude to the world, then he discovers that the whole world was created for this path, and he suddenly has the strength to reach the goal.

How can we implement this change? We can do it by revealing the goal and the method of attaining it. The method comes to us from Ancient Babylon, when this problem of civilization came to light for the first time: a closed civilization is like a single body and must function as one organism. That is also when Kabbalah was revealed, in order to change the use of egoism – to use it for the benefit of society. However, the people didn’t want to use Kabbalah, and solved the problem in another way – they scattered all over the earth and globalization receded.

Now we are faced with the same situation, but this time we must utilize it, because we can no longer “run away” from one another, just as we cannot destroy the interconnection between us. Should America, Russia and Europe decide to isolate themselves from one another, they will face the emergence of Nazism in their countries and bring the world to a Third World War – a nuclear one.

What is the most practical solution that we can offer people? They have to know about the world they are living in today. Today we must learn about how to live in an integral system, where we’re all together “in one boat.” In this boat, the salvation of all depends on each individual. This is what we must also teach our children. We are dealing with nature: a global ecology and a global human society. We must teach ourselves and our children how to be incorporated in this system, where every person must care for the others.

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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.

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News Report (translated from 7KANAL.com):“The Study of Economics in the Spirit of Judaism.”

The Jerusalem Institute of Hi-Technology, “Machon Lev” is opening a unique course, which will certify students with a Masters of Economics degree. This course includes the study of economic aspects of the Jewish Halackha based on the commandments of the Torah.

The Torah contains many commandments and instructions that regulate economic relations, such as, “Do not retain a worker’s day wage,” “Do not collect interest or lend out money on interest,” “Do not use faulty scales for measuring weight and volume,” “Do not pressure your impoverished neighbor by requiring him to pay back his debt,” and many others.

My Comment: If they were to take the real foundation of the entire Torah, its general law, “Love thy neighbor as thyself,” and make it the basis of all relationships, then all the other rules would fall right within its margins. But instead, they are just studying how to do business correctly, egoistically.

This is similar to the way people learn to “speak properly” with one another in order to avoid using “Lashon Ra” (bad language), instead of attuning their hearts to love for one’s neighbor. If they did the latter, then naturally everything they said would also be good! However, instead of correcting their hearts, they will learn to do business and communicate strictly “according to the law.” There won’t be anything to pick on, but they will still be opposite to the Torah!

This is the difference between religion and Kabbalah: Religion does not aim to correct man, since it doesn’t have the instrument of correction, the force of the Light. On the other hand, Kabbalah’s objective is precisely this: to correct man and raise him to the level of similarity to the Creator, since only Kabbalah contains this force (see item 155 of Baal HaSulam’s “Introduction to Talmud Eser Sefirot“). This is the difference between their objectives. One’s purpose in religion is to look proper in the eyes of the society, whereas one’s purpose in Kabbalah is to attain approval in the Creator’s eyes.

Appendix: Baal HaSulam. Article, “The Essence of Religion and Its Purpose“

Many are mistaken and compare our holy Torah with Ethics. This is because they have never attained the meaning of true religion through revealing the Creator. I call upon them: “Taste and see that the Lord is good.” But still ethics (Musar) is as distant from the true religion (Kabbalah) as the distance between the thought of the Creator from the thought of man. For true religion extends from the thought of the Creator, while ethics (the system of Musar) is produced by thoughts of flesh and blood and from man’s life experience. Therefore, the difference between them is obvious, both in practical aspects and in the final aim.

For the recognition of good and evil that develops in us through ethics as we use it, is relative to the success of the society. With religion (Kabbalah), however, the recognition of good and evil that develops in us as we use it is relative to the Creator alone. That is to say, from a change of form with the Creator, to equivalence of form with Him through the quality of bestowal and love, which is called adhesion.

For the purpose of Musar (ethics) is the well-being of society as it is understood by practical reason, which is taken from the events of life in this world. However, Kabbalah allows one to attain love for others, and thereby to reach similarity and adhesion with the Creator. And along with it man passes from his narrow world, full of pain and impediments, to a spacious and eternal world of the Creator.

Thus it is obvious that true religion (Kabbalah) is only for man’s correction. And the goal is attained during one’s life, while living in this world. However, if one has not attained equivalence with the Creator, one dies just as he was born, having achieved nothing in his life.

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A question I received: It follows from the articles “The Arvut (Mutual Guarantee)” and “The Future Generation” that from the economic point of view, a Kabbalistic society is one of collectivism or communism, and that this is a necessary condition for everyone to receive the Torah and reveal the Creator, since only then can people stop thinking about themselves completely. Are there plans being made regarding new economic relations within the framework of the “Virtual State of Kabbalah?” Or is it still to early for it? Maybe we can implement transitional economic schemes and incorporate them into the modern capitalistic global economy? Generally speaking, how do you think the world economy will develop toward the ideal state?

My Answer: We should not change society and its institutions artificially, but rather we should correct the connections between us from egoistic to altruistic, by means of the Upper Light. The wisdom of Kabbalah explains how we can become similar to nature. Hence, by studying it we evoke upon us the Light of correction (the Surrounding Light, Ohr Makif) from above. It changes us, giving us the desires, thoughts, and forces to change everything in us and between us.

If we won’t change under the influence of the Light, but will instead change in whichever way we want to, then we’ll create a big mess all over again, like what happened with socialism in Russia and with the Kibbutzim in Israel. America is now compelled to nationalize businesses, and thus it is becoming socialist instead of capitalist. However, this is not the kind of socialism (or communism) that Kabbalah speaks about.

We, the members of the International Kabbalah Academy (the Bnei Baruch group), must do the following:

1. Provide ourselves with the necessary level of existence;
2. Correct ourselves by studying Kabbalah in the right environment (in our environment – see the article “The Freedom,” which explains what lies in our power of action).

The rest is done by the Light.

Our objective is to create a virtual society, which will serve as an example for the entire world.

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News Report (translated from RB.ru): The global financial crisis, which has brought bankruptcies and countless job losses, has revived the European people’s interest in the ideas of Karl Marx, the founder of scientific communism. Book publishers in Berlin say that The Capital – Marx’s main work – is becoming a best-seller.

Recently the president of France, Nicolas Sarkozy, was seen reading this book. The German minister of finance, Peer Steinbrueck, said positive things about the book, and even the Pope in Rome praised it for its “deep analysis.” The longer the financial crisis continues, the more confused people become. They are asking, “Why did this happen to me?”

My Answer: I hope that they will come to the idea of Kabbalah just as fast. Universal equality, the idea that everyone deserves to receive what they need and are expected to give according to their natural skills, the idea of mutual guarantee and brotherhood – these are all good things, but only as the means and not the end. They should be a means to make us similar to the Creator, come closer to Him, and attain adhesion with Him. Otherwise these ideas – they way they are usually used – will once again lead to terror regimes and a world war.

Bringing the communist idea to life was a failure because in theory everything is nice and true, but it is impossible to transform man’s egoistic nature into altruism. (See Baal HaSulam’s newspaper “HaUma (The Nation)”). This is where the entire humanity will “stumble.” The crises and globalization will reveal to us that we are tightly interconnected, and hence we must observe the rule of “Love thy neighbor as thyself.” However, our nature won’t allow us to do this. We are ready to destroy one another and the entire world, because we can’t live in a mutual guarantee (See the article “The Arvut (Mutual Guarantee).”

Hence, only the method of correcting human nature from egoism to altruism – Kabbalah – will help us survive. That’s because Kabbalah draws the Upper Light on a person, which created us and is the only thing capable of changing us.

Kabbalah will change man, as seen in practice, and will enable us to observe the law of brotherly community within the closed global system of mankind. This is why it is natural for people to be interested in Marx, but his theory cannot be realized in practice. To do this we need the Upper Force that corrects man, and only Kabbalah can provide it for us. I hope that people will soon realize this and will desire to actualize it the good way, instead of inflicting much more suffering on themselves.

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A question I received: I read an interesting work by researcher A. D. Panov entitled, “The Crisis of the Universal History’s Planetary Cycle.” In it he uses the method of interpolating the times of civilizations’ revolutions and reaches the conclusion that the next and most significant crisis in the development of nature and man is scheduled to happen in the year 2027 (the Snooks–Panov vertical). After this crisis the entire development of human civilization will change fundamentally. What do you think about this, and that this will happen in 2027?

My Answer: There are many hypotheses about the crisis, and people’s premonitions are justified. However, do they understand the causes of the crisis, its process and its purpose? It is pointless to predict dates, because we cannot take into account our participation in becoming aware of the process and of our conscious self-correction, which will immediately introduce positive changes and accelerate the whole process.

This is because the “crisis” is the process of restoring our balance (similarity) with Nature – with the quality of love and bestowal. As soon as we reached the level of global egoism, we started being influenced by the general force of nature (the global interdependency between all of nature’s parts), which forces us to become similar to it (like parts of one body, to be in harmony all together).

If we recognize that this is what Nature demands from us and aspire to correspond to it, then to the extent we strive to become a harmonious part of the general system of nature, we will not need its negative correcting influence, which we feel as suffering (war, hunger, destruction).

Because it is impossible to calculate the degree to which we will participate in our correction, we cannot predict the flow of the entire process. The prophets – the Kabbalists of antiquity, described this process without incorporating the human constituent into it. This is why their descriptions are full of terrible suffering on the global scale. However, it is within our power to alter its flow, and this is why we’ve been given Kabbalah. This is also why it has been concealed until our time, and why it is now being revealed to everyone.

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