Two questions I received on what the Creator actually created:

Question: I have heard you say, “The Creator and Nature are the same.” How can this be?  What did the Creator create, if not Nature, meaning, the world, the universe, and everything that’s in it?

My Answer: All of this is the Creator. The only thing that was created is your own self.

Question: Did the Creator create us with the intention to receive rather than to bestow so that we would have our own desire and then ask Him to change it to the intention to bestow, so we would reach equivalence of form with Him? But won’t the development of this new desire, which will emerge from nothing, out of the creation itself, lead to a recognition of being separate from the Creator?

My Answer: The correction is brought about precisely by the recognition of evil and of one’s separation from the Creator by virtue of egoism.

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: We Were Created as Parts of One Whole
Laitman.com Post: The Creator Is the Corrected You
Laitman.com Post: The Crisis Is One Way to Make Us Accept Nature’s Program and the Method of Correction
A Guide to the Hidden Wisdom of Kabbalah: “The Recognition of Evil and the Revelation of Good”

Filed under: Spirituality - No Comments →

Two questions I received on the ego and the Klipa:

Question: I am confused. Is the ego and the Klipa separate forces, or are they one?

My Answer: The ego is the desire to feel pleasure or fulfillment. If one does something for the sake of fulfillment, then this desire is called egoistic. But if one does something in order to fulfill another person, then the desire is called altruistic. The Klipa is the desire to be fulfilled with the Creator, to receive from Him instead of giving to Him.

Question: Can the Klipot deceive us by imitating the governance of the Upper Force? Can the Klipot interact with or affect my reality the same way the Upper Force does when It makes the governance obvious?

My Answer: This is exactly what the Klipot do, as they are opposite to the Creator in every way.

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: The Soul Is the Property of Bestowal, and Without It We Are Animals
Laitman.com Post: Klipot and Reshimot (Advanced)
Laitman.com Post: Adhesion with the Creator, from the Primary Source Texts
Shamati #39: “And They Sewed Fig-Leaves”

Filed under: Egoism - 3 Comments →

Announcing: A new virtual Kabbalah bookstore!

www.kabbalahbooks.info

Special thanks to Eugene Gussman and Uri Laitman
for creating the new bookstore!

Filed under: Notices - No Comments →

A question I received: A twelve year old child was stabbed yesterday by another child. How do you explain it when such young children have a desire to hurt someone?

My Answer: The cruelty in children’s relationships comes from our common nature – the desire to receive. This desire is always growing and there is nothing anyone can do about this. In the past, children were more naïve and better disciplined, so it was possible to control them. But it’s no longer possible, and therefore people aren’t even trying to control them.

While in the past teachers were able to control children by shouting at them and giving them orders, now they are afraid to enter a classroom since they don’t know what awaits them there. This isn’t a fault of the teachers or the educational institutions, because they lack the right method. They are trying to create an educational system, but man’s egoistic desires cannot provide them with the correct solution, since we are just as bad as the children.

Education happens only by example, but we lack the proper model of existence ourselves, so we can’t set an example for them. What do we show them on TV and on the Internet, and all the other places they get their information from? I think the world is already beginning to understand that it has no power over the next generation. The process is already out of control and it’s impossible to do anything about it. However, it’s a good thing that the evil is being revealed, because people will now be able to hear the right explanation. When the education crisis really breaks out, people will be ready to listen.

We must explain to people that the young generation is unable to exist within the boundaries of the old educational system. Similarly, we are unable to correct the economy, family relationships, culture, and education within the boundaries of the old systems. People must hear that the entire gamut of problems has a single solution. So what is that solution?

People have to study the Upper Governance, which comes from absolute goodness on the one hand, but strictly defines our behavior on the other. This is education: It is teaching those who are just starting their lives about the connection with the Creator or the Upper Force, because the Upper Force is the only thing that influences us. This is what we need and what we have to give our children: a plan, a program, a science, an understanding. We have to teach them about how to achieve success in the reality they are living in.

People have to be taught about the most important thing: how to live well! And they will be able to live well only under the condition that they reveal the Absolute Goodness. And this is the essence of the wisdom of Kabbalah: to enable a person in this world to speed up the revelation of the Creator.
(Excerpt from the lesson on Baal HaSulam’s article, “The Essence of Religion and its Purpose,” on 02.17.2009)

Filed under: Education - No Comments →

Questions I received about man’s relationship with the Creator:

Question: If the Creator created the universe, how can man become equal to Him? Isn’t this a delusion of grandeur?

My Answer: The Creator created Evil from Goodness, and man corrects Evil to make it Goodness. He does this by means of his desire, with help from the Creator.

Question: In Kabbalah, what does it mean to worship the Creator?

My Answer: It means to respect the quality of bestowal and love for all.

Question: Do we owe anything to the Creator because of the fact that He created us?

My Answer: No.

Question: Does the Creator experience enjoyment when we are happy?

My Answer: Yes.

Question: Does trying to make someone happy out of our love for the Creator bring us closer to the goal?

My Answer: Yes, much closer!

Question: I keep reading that the Creator has no desire to “receive,” yet I always hear statements like “to please the Creator,” “to give contentment to the Creator,” “for the sake of the Creator,” “the Creator gets pleasure from seeing his creatures enjoy,” and so on. How does He get pleasure without receiving? Can you please clear this up?

My Answer: The sole quality of the Creator is bestowal. Therefore, the Creator enjoys giving. But when the creatures do not receive from Him, He suffers.

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: The Only Commandment Is Equivalence With the Creator
Laitman.com Post: Preface to the Science of Kabbalah. Items 13-16
Laitman.com Post: On Love
Article: “Love for the Creator and Love for the Created Beings”

Filed under: Spirituality - No Comments →

A person in this world is just protein matter, enacted by the Upper Force that can change him at any given moment. There’s no point in looking at how we appear on the outside, since the externality depends only on the Light’s influence on us. The Light that influences us completely changes this creature called man from beginning to end. Therefore, if we don’t see or understand something today, that’s fine – we will begin to see and understand it tomorrow. Everything can change in an instant.

A person is a consequence of the Creator’s actions. He has no actions or understanding of his own. As soon as a change occurs within him, he immediately changes on the outside, like a hand puppet that replicates the movements of the puppeteer’s hand inside it. Therefore, we shouldn’t try to predict how much time humanity will require to change its entire attitude to the world. This can occur very quickly, instead of happening through the path of natural development and evolution, which takes thousands or millions of years.
(From the lesson on Rabash’s article, “The Activity of the Greatest of the Nation,” on 03.17.2009)

Filed under: Society - No Comments →

Two questions I received on what being a woman means in spirituality:

Question: You say that in order to advance spiritually, a woman has to help the male part of the world group, and this is how she will obtain her fulfillment. However, when a woman expresses a direct desire “to be like the Creator,” everyone laughs at this. Should a woman be ashamed of this desire if she has it?

My Answer: Don’t worry. It’s quite the contrary: all of us, men and women alike – all the souls, are the female part of the Kli. We are all the desire relative to the Creator, who is the male part, the One who fulfills us.

Question: In this life I am female. In my past lives was I always female? If I reach equivalence of form in this lifetime, will I be female in spirituality? If so, will a man also be male in spirituality, or female because he will be filled with Light in his vessel which is female?

My Answer: You were always female and you will be female up until the Final Correction.

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: On the Men and Women Inside Us
Laitman.com Post: Men, Women, and the Soul’s Correction
Laitman.com Post: In the Spiritual World, Men’s and Women’s Souls Connect Like a Husband and Wife In This World
Article: “Eve – Just a Tool in the Creator’s Hands”
Interview With the Future: Part 6 “The Face of the Future – Between A Man and a Woman”

Filed under: Women - No Comments →

Two questions I received on how religions emerged from Kabbalah:

Question: Where is the proof that all the religions developed from Kabbalah? Are there any sources confirming this, other than Kabbalistic ones?

My Answer: This is a historical fact – read any of the books comprising the Torah, The Book of Zohar, and so on. Religions emerged 2000 years ago, as a consequence of the Jews’ descent from the level of Kabbalah – the level of bestowal and love. Their fall from that level led to the destruction of the Temple and the emergence of the Jewish religion, which came to replace knowledge, attainment, a perception of the Creator and a connection with Him.

Instead, in religion, people believe in something without actually perceiving the things they believe in. Because of this, other interpretations of the same religion later emerged – since no one sees anything clearly and people just presume things! This is how the other religions came about, although they describe themselves as new religions or new revelations.

However, before all of this began, the Jews perceived the One Governing Force of Nature – the Creator. This is what they described in all their holy books, such as the Mishna, the Talmud, The Book of Zohar, the Tanakh, and others.

Question: In one of your articles, you wrote that after the Jews were exiled from Israel, Christianity, brought there by Greeks and Romans, became dominant in the whole world. You also emphasized that they are not religions. If they are not religions, what are they?

My Answer: I don’t think you understood my article correctly. The three main religions – Judaism, Christinity, and Islam – are, in fact, religions. However, Christianity did not emerge from Romans or Greeks. It emerged in Israel, among the Jews, after the destruction of the Temple, and was later dispersed throughout the world.

Related Material:
Kabbalah Today Article: Who Are You, People of Israel?

Filed under: Religion - 3 Comments →

A question I received: I have been studying Kabbalah for over a year. Since I began, I have felt mental and inner changes happening within me. On the mental level, I experience problems in coordinating my movements when I walk outside. Sometimes I don’t even feel that I am walking. I had tests done and the results are normal. On the inner level, I experience mood swings: I feel wonderful for a couple of days (and there are no words to describe this state!), and then over the next few days I don’t feel anything at all.

Tell me, did these changes occur as a consequence of studying Kabbalah? Is it possible to feel the Light while one is still below the Machsom? If not, please advise me on what I should do to advance.

My Answer: You are going through new states because a new, sixth sense is being formed inside you, which you did not have from birth. With this sense, you will eventually feel the Creator, when it will broaden enough to become capable of revealing the Creator inside. Patience, composure and endurance will enable you to achieve quick results. Look at yourself from afar and study the Creator’s work on you. Remember: these are His actions!

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: Learning to Understand the Creator Is the Key to Happiness
Laitman.com Post: It Takes Time, Effort and Experience to Reveal the Upper World
Article: “All We Need is The Revelation of The Creator”
Interview: “Who is a Kabbalist”
Baal HaSulam Article: “The Acting Mind”

Filed under: Spirituality - 1 Comment →

A question I received: The Creator created us and placed us in a vessel. In this physical world, He is not apparent. And when changes are made, it is His manipulation.

My Answer: That’s right.

Question cont’d: What the Bible teaches of the end of the world is that the Creator will destroy everyone in fire and brimstone.

My Answer: Correct.

Question cont’d: But that is an ultimate breach of everything He’s done so far.

My Answer: That’s also correct. The fire represents man’s revelation of his own ego and the desire to become free from it.

Question cont’d: He has designed these vessels with such egoism as to multiply, desire, take, destroy, and every other bad action.

My Answer: Yes.

Question cont’d: What if these bad things are happening as He planned?

My Answer: They are.

Question cont’d: What if He knew that, in their unquenchable lust for more, people would destroy themselves and the entire world?

My Answer: On the contrary, suffering is bound to correct us.

Question cont’d: He doesn’t have to destroy the world.

My Answer: This is why the final goal is our similarity to the Creator.

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: Heaven Is the Feeling of Delight from Being Similar to the Creator
Laitman.com Post: Our Desires Are Cleansed by Suffering
Talk: “Reward and Punishment”
Article: “Selected Topics in Kabbalah”

Filed under: Spirituality - No Comments →