Three questions I received on fitting ourselves into the the spiritual puzzle

Question: I am a bisexual man, and I always play the men’s role in my relationships with men. But in general, since I became interested in Kabbalah, I’ve lost almost all interest in both men and women. Can I study in a group?

My Answer: Please write to us describing how you view men in general when you are next to them for an extended period of time, when you study together, work together, travel together, drink together and hug each other, sing and dance together with men. What do you feel when men look at you and hug you? Once you respond, we will examine your situation further.

Question: I’ve never felt as bad as I do now. I want to change for the better, but the state I’ve been in for three days already is unbearable and horrible, ranging from the question “What’s all this for? Why do I live?” to “I don’t want to go on living.” I have Kabbalistic books, music, and lessons, and without them I wouldn’t be able to continue. But I don’t want my life to be based on the feeling that I’m being lowered into an abyss of my own dirt, and I’m trying to break out of it!

My Answer: There is nothing besides a person and the Creator – so turn to Him. Your appeal to the Creator will be more effective if you make actions of studying in a group and disseminating.

Question: Every soul is a piece of the general puzzle. Men collect their pieces together to form a Kli. When one person loses the connection and falls out of the general system, then there’s a “hole in the boat,” there’s no Light. This seems clear enough. But how does the female soul fit into this puzzle? I feel like I just don’t belong.

My Answer: This female feeling of being defective (not according to Freud, but according to Kabbalah) will accompany you (as well as all the men who are correcting their Malchut) throughout the entire path until the end of correction. You receive the Light from above through the global men’s group, the same way every man does. And just like the men, you insert your piece of the puzzle, your soul, into the common soul of Adam! You are the same as the men in every way, except for the fact that they attract the Light. The men (the male parts of the common soul) unwillingly accept your desires, and they go out to hunt and to work, in order to attract the Upper Light for everyone.

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A question I received: My whole life is like putting out one fire after the next! Bad things just keep happening to me, and I feel like all I’m doing in my life is trying to live through them and keep surviving. Why is this happening to me? And what should I do with these situations? I want to point out that I’m not really interested in the question “What’s the meaning of my life?,” that I’m more interested in the question, “Why is this happening to me?”

My Answer: They are the same question. It’s as Baal HaSulam writes, in item 2 of the “Introduction to Talmud Eser Sefirot“: “What’s the meaning of this suffering?” and “Who needs it?” Studying Kabbalah will help you understand everything. Why precisely Kabbalah? It’s because Kabbalah is the only wisdom that explains the one source of everything in existence. At the moment, you are experiencing this source in its negative, but you can change the way it treats you.

Again, the Creator is the one and only source of everything happening to you, because He governs everything in existence. By studying Kabbalah, you can discover the reason why He treats you the way He does at every single moment. Your question about the meaning and source of suffering is a Kabbalistic one: it marks the beginning of one’s discernment of oneself as a human being, i.e. as one who begins their relationship with the Creator.

Related Material:
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Lesson: Introduction to Talmud Eser Sefirot (12-10-2007)
Lesson: Introduction to Talmud Eser Sefirot (12-10-2007)

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A question I received: I’ve heard you say something like no civilizations of the past are seen in the “revealed.” Does it mean that everything scientists are now finding (in support of a theory of the earlier civilizations) appears in our senses as a reality that we ourselves are demanding? In other words, the external forces react to our demands by creating more new “decorations.”

My Answer: You’re absolutely right! As a result of the descent from spirituality, when the desire created by the Creator reached its lowest level, it perceived within itself what we feel as “me” and the world surrounding us (as external to “me”). The processes and the internal changes started being perceived as time, space and movement (again, external to “me”). This is how a person perceives that something had already existed before he appeared. But who actually sensed it? Without senses, nothing exists. Everything exists in our imagination, in our senses. Read the article “Preface to the Book of Zohar,” item 34.

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A question I received: You say that Kabbalah is a science. That’s fair. The two forces of nature, bestowal and receiving. All of nature is nothing but bestowal, and man is the only element in nature that disrupts the balance, he creates disbalance, and this is why we suffer.

Everything is fine until we get to this point. But finally, when we get to the point where we need to fix the balance, you say: Ohr Makif. Hmm… Some light comes out of nowhere and corrects me. And what confuses me the most is that this light comes from a book. Could you please explain or define what “light” is in a practical and clear manner? I thought that Kabbalah was a science about forces, nature, desires, etc. In my perception Upper Light is not a scientific term and directly refers to something esoteric. Maybe you could make this notion more reasonable and comprehensible? What is this force that corrects us? Is this the force of bestowal? Then why is it called Ohr Makif? How can this “light” able to help prevent suffering on our path of development? Is it in any way related to the corporeal light?

My Answer: If I were you with your love for sciences, I would study “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah” (Pticha) or maybe I would even start studying Talmud Eser Sefirot! These texts explain several spiritual notions in a scientific language: 1. desire, 2. correction of intention from “for one’s own sake” to “for the sake of the Creator,” 3. fulfillment by the Light, pleasure, the Creator, to the extent of the corrected intention. There is nothing else in Kabbalah.

Ohr Makif is a force that influences us from a more corrected state, which we aspire toward. It responds to your aspiration in the following way: it pulls you to a higher, more altruistic state to the same extent you aspire for it. This is an interaction of two vectors of desires. The same mutual influence of forces also exists in our world, when a person aspires for any new thing. The difference is that when it comes to spiritual aspiration, this force that pulls you to a new state is referred to as Light, because it doesn’t just pull you through its influence upon you, but it also changes you, making you become like the new state, one that is spiritual and altruistic. The difference between this force of Light, and the force that pulls you toward a new state in our world is that, the force in our world doesn’t need to change you to pull you to something. Check it out for yourself to eliminate any doubts.

Related Material:
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A question I received: In Mesilat Yasharim (The Path of the Righteous), the Ramchal writes about correcting one’s qualities: Even though correcting the qualities of one’s animate soul bears no relation to the levels of the holy soul, nevertheless it’s unrealistic for a Kabbalist to be irritable, quick-tempered, use bad words (Lashon Ra) and have qualities that can harm others around him.

My Answer: The Ramchal says that it’s impossible to correct the qualities of one’s animate soul. Any attempt to correct our animate soul ends in failure, because it relates to the inanimate part of a person, which was given to us so we would grow our spiritual soul out of it.

The only thing we can and should change is the holy, spiritual soul: the part of the Creator in us. This part begins as what is called a “point in the heart,” expressed in a person as the question “What is the meaning of life?” – the question that brings a person to Kabbalah. It is this point that we need to develop.

As we develop it, we change, and such a change also has an effect on our earthly behavior. We can no longer harm others intentionally, because we have acquired qualities that won’t allow us to do so.

However, at the same time, our external expressions of anger, abruptness, and impatience may remain, because we perceive the harm caused by specific actions and phenomena more than others do. Moreover, one who ascends always slides back before taking a step forward, and when this happens, this person is just like everyone else. In fact, he is even worse than everyone else in such a state. This continues until the end of the ladder, as it is written, “Every person who is greater than another, has more egoism than him.” Moreover, it’s written about Rabbi Shimon that when he found himself in the deepest possible descent, as “Shimon from the market,” he understood that he was facing the final level of ascent! (It is written in The Book of Zohar that when Rabbi Shimon came out of the cave, where he spent thirteen years writing The Book of Zohar, he saw a peasant working the land, an act so distant from spirituality, that when he saw him, he burned him with his mere glance. However, these are secrets of the Torah…)

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Two questions I received on directions other than Kabbalah

Question: Dear Rav Laitman, I’m simply in shock. I listen to your lectures and I’d really like to know: What right do you have to deny a person’s personal understanding of G-d, on the one hand, and on the other hand, what right do you have to assert that no other path is correct!? It’s clearly written that “A person studies where his heart leads him” – you are not the only one who teaches Kabbalah, so what are you trying to do – is this your way of ruling over the world!? My mother was righteous, and she always devoted herself to society, but she didn’t spend a day of her life studying Kabbalah. So what’s all this wisdom worth if, in the end, there are pure people without it? And if it’s not intended to make this world better, then is there really anything good about it!?

My Answer: I have the right to assert my opinion, and you have the right to do disagree with it. I have no complaints against you. Kabbalah has its assertions, and you have yours. As long as you haven’t discovered what Kabbalah is talking about, then what it asserts is nonexistent for you, and thus, you are absolutely correct to reject its assertions. However, when the necessity to reveal what Kabbalah is talking about comes to you, and when you’ll discover what it talks about, then you’ll change your opinion. There’s a time for everything.

Question: I can’t attain anything without a teacher, but where can I get him if I live in Baltimore? And why can’t I get answers, hints, and explanations from Blavatsky, Levi, Yung, Plato and Pythagoras?

My Answer: Go ahead and get answers from them, if you’re able to be satisfied by their teachings. A person should study wherever his heart feels drawn, and he should study that which fulfills his heart.

Related Material:
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Two questions I received on “love thy neighbor”

Question: When you discussed the article “The Revelation of Godliness,” you explained that there is no rule of “love thy neighbor” in religions. You have given examples of religious wars and caste among Hindus. How am I to understand the wars against the “seven nations” and Amalek through the prism of love for one’s neighbor?

My Answer: These are internal wars that take place within the person, wars against one’s egoism. They aren’t wars where people are killed physically! Kabbalah only engages in correcting human egoism.

Question: I get the impression that there is purification through complete destruction (for example, idol worshiping cities), and that this is present even in the Torah. I am trying to understand how such actions can be properly carried out in accordance with “love for one’s neighbor.” It seems to me that even if these actions are sincerely performed out of love for one’s neighbor, they will still bring the following generations to wrong conclusions, and cruelty and destruction will result.

My Answer: Once again, these questions support the following conclusions: the Torah does not discuss externality; it only discusses the person’s inner correction. It is impossible to change or correct anything in egoism with physical actions. We only need to correct our egoistic nature. This is why the Torah only speaks about our inner correction.

Baal HaSulam writes with sorrow about the fact that Kabbalah books and The Zohar are full of “descriptions of our world,” and how this confuses people studying Kabbalah. For this reason, it is of utmost importance to free Kabbalah from that style, so that it would become clear to each and everyone studying Kabbalah that it only discusses spirituality. Spirituality does not clothe into materiality, and it has no connection to it whatsoever; it is only a force outside of matter. The entirety of Kabbalah needs to be rewritten in this style, so that nobody will be confused, and everybody will perceive its methodology correctly. This is what we still have to do!

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Two questions I received on our perception of reality

Question: If everything in our world is built from ten Sefirot, why are there such great differences and so many species and forms? And why is there a picture that emerges simultaneously at every moment, created out of so many objects?

My Answer: Every picture consists of ten Sefirot: from the force of the Creator (Keter), through our perceptions, to Malchut, which perceives and summarizes the results of the Creator’s influence. See materials on the attainment of reality.

Question: When one starts to follow the path of Kabbalah, what changes in the general framework of all the degrees of advancement toward the root: Does the chain of specific states one goes through in the material world change, or only one’s inner attitude to them?

My Answer: Everything changes, because a person and the whole universe are one whole.

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Two questions I received on this perfect system we live in:

Question: How is it possible that we perform actions that don’t exist in the Creator? That is to say, He doesn’t have to change His nature, but we do. Is this like sacrificing oneself for one’s new “I,” which is real and perfect?”

My Answer: I will slightly correct you: We were created perfect by the Creator, and as a consequence, we don’t perceive this perfection. Hence, He took us out of that state and put us in the opposite state, so we would find the best state on our own – and become convinced that this is exactly what He gave us from the beginning.

Question: I recently began studying Kabbalah, and have reached the conclusion that the diversity or “division” of human (corporeal) desires begets the retardation or as you have said, “the feeling of a dead end” in the development of science, technology, and humanity in general. Is this really so? Have I reached the right conclusion?

My Answer: Obviously, the more harmoniously this single organism of Nature works (in which only man adds disorder, because only he has the freedom of action), the higher is our state, until we reach the point where we perceive the world’s harmony. This is perceived on spiritual levels, degrees of unity with the Creator, the general force of Nature, to the degree that we are equal to him through bestowal and love.

Related Material:
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A question I received: It’s been around the news lately, that in Ethiopia, in the city of Aksum, archeologists have found the palace of Queen Sheba. Inside, the researchers found an altar and Judaism’s most valuable treasure – the Arc of the Covenant. According to legend, the Arc contained Moses’s stone tablets with the Ten Commandments, and it was brought to Ethiopia by Menelik – the son of Queen Sheba and King Solomon. The scientists believe that Menelik changed his faith and began worshiping Sirius, but he kept the Arc – a chest made of acacia and covered with gold plates. ITAR-TASS notes that there were evident traces of calf sacrifices around the Arc.” In your opinion, could this be true, or is it just another piece of gossip?

My Answer: I don’t know whether it’s true and I don’t care. With the fall of the Second Temple, when people fell from “love thy neighbor” to “unfounded hatred,” holiness left Israel, as well as all of the Temple’s paraphernalia, because it’s the people who make these objects holy, and not the objects themselves. Rather than striving for material objects, which don’t contain any spirituality, we should strive to obtain the property of bestowal and love for all people, since this is holiness and the property of the Creator. However, as it seems, we are willing to do everything but this!

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