Three questions I received on relating to others:

Question: I’m yet to understand, how is man to blame for anything if there is None Else Besides Him? He pre-determines everything, so how do you criticize issues of this world at all? In addition, on the path of trying to believe there is only Him, isn’t it harmful for a person to criticize all that is around him being that this is said to only be a reflection of himself?

My Answer: Egoism was created to be changed, while everything else was created to be used in its original form.

Question: If we were to observe without judgment and live each moment with love and compassion, would suffering in the world cease to exist?

My Answer: No, it’s not enough. We have to add similarity to the Upper Force into this, because only then will we achieve true love instead of imaginary love. That is the only way all the troubles will cease to exist.

Question: With all I have read from you about Kabbalah, I have never heard a discussion of forgiveness of another human being. I run a Jewish support group and we have been focusing on forgiveness. I feel this is very important for spiritual health. I would like to know what you believe.

My Answer: When a person is above this world, there is no need to forgive anyone because he does not take resentments into account.

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There are two forces influencing us. One is our ego, which constantly grows, separating us from one another and making us hate each other. But on the other hand, there is an external force that causes us to be interconnected and interdependent.

Even though I never chose to be globally connected with the entire world and I do not want this connection, the Creator still arranges it that way. So on one hand, there is a negative force operating in me, which is directed against everyone else, but on the other hand, all the other people surround me so closely that I have nowhere to hide.

These two forces intentionally pressure me and I don’t have any way out of the situation. Anyone in the world would gladly break all the ties between all the nations and civilizations. But we are yet to discover that we depend on some of the tiniest nations, which seems not to matter. The entire world cannot manage to deal with some pirates in Somalia as well as many other, similar terrorist groups. Why can’t we just destroy them? It’s because the Upper Force will not let us. We all depend on one another and there is nowhere to hide.

There are one hundred and eighty countries in the world, and we are yet to see the kind of problems that will arise once our dependence on one another is revealed. Imagine what happens when your leg is injured; it seems like no big deal, but your head stops working, your attention is gone, and the light pain does not let you function properly.

The reason we are unable to manage a single terrorist country is because we are not unified. If the entire world were to act together, to close their bank accounts and stop buying oil from those groups, that would spell their end. What would these terrorist countries be able to do? They would have nothing. The world could close all the frontiers around them, leaving them no entrances and no exits. We should do like our organism does when a foreign body penetrates it, such as a splinter; the organism immediately isolates it inside a capsule and starts expelling it until the infected place bursts and the foreign body comes out together with all the pus.

However, we do not do the same to the terrorists because there is no world consent. We have to learn from nature what we need to do with them. There is no need to destroy them. We just need to come to a common agreement that we are not to communicate in any way with this part of the common organism. This will make them change very quickly because social influence is the strongest influence there is.

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We shouldn’t strive to correct the world or ourselves; we just need to study the actions which the Upper Light performs on us. It’s as the Creator told Moses: “Let’s go to Pharaoh!”

Moses is small and frightened – meaning this is a very weak quality in a person. There is a creature of monstrous proportions standing opposite to him; this is all of creation, the whole world, egoism, which holds all the power, nourishment, and oxygen. I receive all of these things from Pharaoh; he is my whole reality. Meanwhile, a tiny quality or desire called Moses rises up against it wishing to escape, to come out from its control and begin to live in a different world!

We almost don’t feel this tiny opportunity within us to rise and come out of our egoism. We don’t know how to come out of this Egyptian slavery or where to run from it. However, the Creator tells us, “Let’s go to Pharaoh together!” And like a little child who takes the adult by the hand, Moses and the Creator walk together.

From the side of the human being, all that’s needed is consent, a request, a demand to the Creator for help. One does not need to battle evil on his own. However, people don’t understand this and think that they are able to do something on their own. But whoever thinks himself a hero is a fool.

All the religions and allegedly “spiritual” methods err with regard to this, teaching people to eradicate the evil inclination. Kabbalah, however, says that the left side (egoistic desires) is given to us precisely in order to help us adhere to the right side (bestowal) – after all, this constitutes the whole goal of attaining the Creator through our efforts in the middle line.

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Two questions I received on unfortunate circumstances in our world:

Question: It really does seem that even as the computer/technological age affords us the ability to be with each other across many miles, to connect with all our friends no matter where we are in the world, there is a huge lack of soul connection between us! Why is that?

Why are we feeling so much fear, needing to grab whatever power or space or whatever it is that we need at such an alarming pace? Why is there so much anger, and mistrust in the world? Why are there so many despotic leaders with power gone awry? I’m sure that influence has always existed, for there has always existed those who “have” and those who “have not.”

My Answer: It’s because we follow the principle “Let us eat and drink; for tomorrow we shall die.” Egoism forces us to close our eyes to tomorrow because people see no way out of the situation.

Question: Dear Dr. Laitman, I especially liked the way you described to us the way children should be educated in the future (but really now, as it is urgent). My question is: How long will it take for the kindergarten schools up to the universities and colleges around the world to catch up to the idea? Maybe 5 years? I am worried that it will be more than 5 years.

My Answer: I hope it won’t take longer. Otherwise, things will get worse.

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In the News (from The Wall Street Journal): “Paul Volcker: Think More Boldly” Former Federal Reserve Board Chairman Paul Volcker chastised the largely private-sector group for the timidity of its proposals:

“My overall impression is that you have not come anywhere near close enough to responding with necessary vigor or structural changes to the crisis that we have had. Every day I hear financial leaders saying that they are necessary and desirable, they are wonderful and they are God’s work. Has there been one financial leader to stand out and say that maybe this is excessive and that maybe we should get together privately to think about some restraint?

Wake up, gentlemen. I can only say that your response is inadequate. I wish that somebody would give me some shred of neutral evidence about the relationship between financial innovation recently and the growth of the economy, just one shred of information. I am getting a bit wound up here.

I found myself sitting next to one of the inventors of financial engineering. I didn’t know him, but I knew who he was and that he had won a Nobel Prize, and I nudged him and asked what all the financial engineering does for the economy and what it does for productivity. Much to my surprise, he leaned over and whispered in my ear that it does nothing—and this was from a leader in the world of financial engineering…”

My Comment: Mr. Volcker is stating the truth (a liberty he can allow himself due to being a “former” chairman). The crisis continues because it is not being corrected by the creation of improved connections in our global society.

Kabbalah forecasts further downfall until people recognize the root of the crisis – the human egoism, and until people will be forced to rise above it for the sake of survival.

The only question is: how much suffering and how many world wars will we all have to go through in order to recognize the necessity of building the right relationships in our interconnected, global world.

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We start out advancing to the goal egoistically. Because we don’t see any other way out, we unite like soldiers in the army in order to attack new frontiers. But then, as we work internally and yield to each other, we become more sensitive and find that we don’t have the property of bestowal. We realize that we would be happy to unite with our friends, but we are unable to.

In regular life, we find the strength to unite and reach the desired goal together because the goal is egoistic and we see mutual benefit. But the spiritual goal is opposite to the familiar egoistic unity. There is a contradiction between the set goal and the separation that rules among us. We gradually reveal that we are not joining together, but, on the contrary, we hate each other. That is how we reveal the evil inside us, which we did not notice before.

As a result, we are left helpless, not knowing what to do. From then on, we come to a state called “prayer,” where we begin to cry and entreat with the Creator to give us and our friends strength – the strength to unite.

Because of this, three elements come together: I, my friends and the Creator, who links us together and provides the connection between us and the Light, which starts to fills us. That is when the spiritual world opens up to us.

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The Zohar: It is known that there is World, Year, and Soul in everything. In the stony heart (Lev HaEven), too, there are World, Year, Soul. World is the primordial serpent (Nahash Kadmoni), which Samuel rode; Year—the ninth of Av; and Soul—the thigh-vein sinew (Gid HaNasheh).

The Zohar tells us that there are two ways of perceiving the reality that we feel. There is the perception “for one’s own sake,” where one feels an egoistic “year, world, and soul,” which belong to the stony heart (Lev ha-Even). There is also the altruistic “world, year, and soul,” where one’s perception of reality is directed in the opposite direction, away from oneself. One perceives through bestowal rather than reception, and therefore one perceives the Upper “World, Year, and Soul,” because it is perceived through bestowal (sanctity).

What’s the difference between the perception of reality by way of absorption and reception, when one separates the perception into world, year, and soul; and the perception of reality by way of bestowal, when one also separates the perception into world, year, and soul? This is, in fact, a big difference between these sensations, because by absorbing into oneself, one is limited and feels that he exists in rigid boundaries of time. One feels that he lives and dies; he feels suffering and problems. One constantly wishes to fill himself, but this fulfillment fades immediately. One’s whole existence in these egoistic bounds of “world, year, and soul” takes place in reception, in the stony heart (Lev ha-Even), in absorption “into oneself.” However, in spite of the suffering, one is forced to continue existing in this manner because one’s environment conditions him that this is how he has to live. The environment obliges a person to strive to be successful at this egoistic absorption, and one is compelled to listen to them and thereby to kill oneself.

However, it is possible to perceive reality different – through bestowal, by exiting out of oneself. There, “world, year, and soul” are infinite dimensions, not limited by the considerations of how a person can fulfill himself. One feels the spiritual world, eternity, and perfection.

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When reading The Book of Zohar we have to remember that “There is none else besides Him” and He Is Good and does Good. This is the only way we should approach our lives and everything that happens in the world. We have to understand that there is only one force behind everything.

There is no devil or evil spirits trying to trap us, drag us into hell and roast us on an eternal fire. When The Zohar describes various evil creatures, it is in order to show how a person feels when he reveals the egoistic forces within. He feels as if he is burning in hell and wishes to escape the control of these horrible, dark forces which control him. He sees that they prevent him from advancing towards the Creator, but he cannot fight them and is forced to follow them.

The Angel of Death comes to a person and hands him a sword whose tip is smeared with a drop of deadly poison, and the person obeys, opens his mouth and swallows the poison. The Zohar explains that the Angel of Death is our egoistic desire in its final, cruelest form. All of these qualities are inside us and they are killing us. There is nothing worse than this state, even though we don’t realize it.

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Opinon (from IPS): “ENVIRONMENT:  Rethinking Jobs for a Sustainable Economy” John Talberth, president for the Center for Sustainable Economy said, “…there’s no reason everyone should work their butts off 40 or 60 hours a week. There’s got to be more incorporation of leisure time.” Judy Wicks, founder of the Business Alliance for Local Living Economies said, “Maybe if we changed our values, you don’t need as much money, you don’t need to work as much… that’s something [good] about indigenous cultures. They spend a lot of time talking to people and making music together… we lack [this] because we’re on this treadmill of making more money to buy more stuff.”

My Comment: Egoism won’t let us relax and go back to a more primitive lifestyle, or be satisfied with the necessities, because it was created by the Creator, and its intended purpose is not to find satisfaction with life on this earth, but for our advancement to the Upper Goal. All the statements and wishes made in the news story above are nice, but they are naive. The program and the Goal of Nature is to bring us to the level of the Creator.

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The Zohar: They came out of the Land of Israel and descended into Babylon, saying, “This is the place we will stay.”

We will rise to the heavens and will fight the Creator so that He doesn’t flood the world as he did in the beginning of time.

Parsa under the World of Atzilut is a special correction that was made deliberately to prevent the Light from descending lower. This is why they said: “Let us rise to the firmament and fight with the Creator so as to remove this border and allow the Light to descend from above downwards.”

A person gradually learns and begins to understand that he has to strive towards bestowal, but he doesn’t want to stay “in the Land of Israel” where everything is done for the sake of bestowal, since he can’t see the benefit in doing so. As new egoistic desires are revealed within him, he leaves the Land of Israel and moves towards Babylon, the land of reception.

He then starts to think that the wisdom of Kabbalah can be used for egoistic purposes, for personal fulfillment. He wants to conquer the Creator and make Him serve his own egoistic purposes rather than the other way around, just like in the Grimm fairy tale about the fisherman and his wife.

He starts to look for a lower, less noticeable place where he can hide from the Upper Force in order to avoid getting rid of his egoism. Thus, he builds a “city and tower” (ZON de Klipa) and lives in it. He thinks that the Creator has to fill his egoistic desires with Light, instead of fulfilling his clean desires, since the latter would require him to ascend and attain the property of bestowal, Bina. He wants his egoism to be fulfilled and argues with the Creator.

Each one of us can find these properties within ourselves. This is described in the Torah when addressing the builders of the Tower of Babel: “Rise to the heavens and fight the Creator!” “Fight” means to demand the Light from the Creator, to ask for revelation while remaining in one’s current egoistic state. One asks, “Why hasn’t the Upper World revealed itself to me? The Creator is unfair! I have waited for so long, so why hasn’t it happened yet?”

This is what is referred to as “building a city (Zeir Anpin of Klipa) and a Tower of Babel (Malchut of Klipa), which happens to us on every level. Each time, we have to make a choice of whether to follow the path of Abraham – the path of bestowal, or the path that the whole world chooses – the path of Nimrod.

There is a rule: “The whole is equal to any of its parts.” The whole Torah is present even in our smallest and lowest states, including the states called Noah, Babylon, Egyptian slavery, wandering in the desert, construction and destruction of the Temple, and the entire path until the end of correction. It repeats itself again and again on each level.

This is why when studying The Zohar I can find everything I read within myself, in every state I go through: an Egyptian slave, the people of Israel, the High Priest of the Temple, the Pharaoh, Bilam and his donkey, and so on. They are all inside me.

Our role is to try to imagine and sense these metaphors like a child that’s studying the world around him. The most important thing is to not stop making an effort. There is no other book in the world and no other way to lift ourselves into spirituality.

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