A question I received: You said that the students of Rabbi Akiva wrote The Zohar and Talmud. Could you specify who precisely?

My Answer: I said it to emphasize that the Torah came to us from Rabbi Akiva in that his students presented it to us in the form of the revealed Torah, Talmud, and the concealed Torah, Kabbalah.

Rabbi Akiva had five great students (out of 24,000): Rabbi Meir, Rabbi Yehuda Bar Ilai, Rabbi Yossi, Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai (Rashbi), and Rabbi Elazar Ben Shamoa. Rabbi Yehuda Bar Ilai is the most prominent scholar of the Mishnah. Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi (a student of Rabbi Akiva’s five great students) finished the Mishnah. Rabbi Shimon Bar Yohai (Rashbi) wrote The Zohar.

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A question I received: In our material lives we are in a dead-end situation where it’s impossible to attain pleasure. But what does the science of Kabbalah promise us?

My Answer: When I sit and study The Book of Zohar, it is called Lo Lishma – an egoistic action. I deceive myself because I plan on fulfilling my egoism through this action, but in return I receive the quality of bestowal.

Why does this action end up bringing us success, unlike any other? It’s because by making these actions, I desire to do everything I can to attain bestowal. I look for signs of bestowal along the path, consciously deceiving myself, and I use the Light that brings me correction and draws me closer to itself.

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A question I received: After the Zohar 2010 Convention, I received a desire to help people. How do I check whether I am doing the most that I can in this regard?

My Answer: The ultimate help is when a person spends all the hours of his existence trying to think about correcting himself and the world.

After all, a breaking first occurred in the worlds and then in the common soul, and now the broken souls exist in a broken world. Correction is possible only by the method of Kabbalah, which helps us draw the Upper Light, which alters our intention from an egoistic one to a giving one. The same force, the same Light, which created the whole universe, needs to affect us and correct everything.

Therefore, we can help others only by disseminating the science of Kabbalah until we reach complete redemption. However, while the world still needs correction, we need to try to bring the correction to the world. During the Convention we received a great force from our mutual unification because, together, we attained greater understanding and sensation.

And now we need to perform immense actions for the sake of the general correction of ourselves and the world. We received advancement precisely for this purpose and no other. None of us would have received what we received (an opportunity to participate in this gathering, an understanding of something, or feelings) if we were unable to affect the world through our correction.

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A question I received: Since attending the Zohar Convention 2010, I have been unable to concentrate on the daily Kabbalah lessons. I forget the meaning of the words and am able to grasp just some of the sentences. What should I do?

My Answer: A person who studies Kabbalah is always advancing. At every moment, a new depth of desire (Aviut), new desires, and new Reshimot are revealed in him. This pertains to everyone, especially to those who participated in the Zohar Convention 2010. They achieved great advancement. And I feel sorry for those who did not participate.

What you are now feeling are the forces that are pushing you to advance further ahead. Because you participated in the Convention, you received a great force from other people, as well as from the lectures, the songs, the dancing, and from everything else that took place there. You devoted three whole days to spirituality and disconnected from everything else in the world. Thus, you put yourself under the influence of a tremendous force that was present there. As a result, your desire is now being increased and you need to work with it.

What should you do? The only way you will be able to handle the power you received while connecting to others at the Convention is if you use everything you received there for the sake of dissemination, instead of simply studying. Studies alone will not help you advance. During the Convention, you received additional forces from outside, and now you, too, must bring them outside. You have received a great force, but unless you use it correctly, it will turn to poison and harm you. This force needs to go through you to others, but if you try to hold on to it, it will turn into poison.

A human being is like a cell in the body where all the substances need to keep flowing through in order to help spread everything further. Thus, in addition to studying, we need to disseminate the materials and the explanations of the wisdom of Kabbalah. You, too, received this awakening from the outside, and therefore, it is not enough to just sit and listen to the lessons. Studying alone is not enough; you have to bestow to others as well.

The science of Kabbalah has been revealed and there is no longer any need to hide this wisdom. You are receiving it together with masses of people and you must continue to spread it in the same manner. In order for a spiritual body to be healthy, you are required to return the enormous forces that you have received.

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New York, May 7th – 9th

You’re invited to join friends from all around the world to discover a new reality together. The World Zohar Convention 2010 is an intensive 3 days of studies and workshops on The Zohar with Dr. Michael Laitman and the Bnei Baruch Kabbalah Education and Research Institute, open for all who wish to sense the eternal, complete reality.

The Zohar holds the key to discovering the complete, eternal reality, where humanity is united in perfect harmony as one soul, in the shortest time possible. The World Zohar Convention is aimed at giving its participants a taste of this reality, and by doing so, accelerating everyone’s advancement toward it.

The World Zohar Convention 2010 is for anyone with a desire to change oneself and better the world we live in. Students currently studying with Bnei Baruch via Bnei Baruch Kabbalah Learning Center on their own or through Kabbalah TV or the Kabbalah Academy are especially welcome.

If one is new to The Zohar or the wisdom of Kabbalah, then we recommend going through the free introductory course we have available at the Bnei Baruch Kabbalah Learning Center. Sign Up For A Free Introductory Course

REGISTER

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The Zohar, Chapter “BeHaalotcha (When You Mount the Candles),” Item 118: …After he explained the first two banners, which are the middle line and the right line, he now explains the third banner, which is the left line, called “the face of an ox” in the animals, and “Gabriel” in the four angels. It is known that after the middle line decided and united the right line and the left line with each other, only the light of Malchut remained in the left line, which is the illumination of Hochma from below upwards, meaning VAK, while the GAR disappeared.

Two full lines, the right and the left (Hassadim and Hochma), come to us from Above. The breaking of the vessels occurred because the creature tried to fully unite Hassadim and Hochma, to receive all the Light of Hochma clothed into the Light of Hassadim for the sake of bestowal. However, it was unable to do so due to the absence of such a big screen. Therefore, the intention for bestowal (Kli) broke and the screen vanished.

Now we need to correct this breaking. By correcting it, we also begin to understand what happens within the creature, why the Creator created it this way, and what He wished for when doing so. The breaking isn’t something negative; it’s a way to prepare for putting our world together into one whole with understanding, realization, and sensation. After all, if we existed in a world that was ready for us, we wouldn’t understand it.

However, since the Creator created the World of Infinity and then broke it, He gave us an opportunity to gather the World of Infinity once again as one; to tune into the Act of Creation (Maase Merkava) and the Primary Act (Maase Beresheet) ourselves, thereby to understand Him, feel Him, and become like Him.

We certainly aren’t building all this from scratch, or from nothing, since we ourselves are created “from nothing.” However, the parts that we gather into one whole give us a full understanding and sensation of what we need in order to become similar to the Creator. That is, they give us all the information about all the parts, elements, and the depth of the universe.

Therefore, the entire Book of Zohar, all the commentaries, and the entire science of Kabbalah, tell us how to correct the broken desires (Kelim), how to connect them properly to each other, and bring them back to one whole desire (a spiritual vessel or Kli), the whole Light that previously filled the World of Infinity.

But the creature needs to carry this out with its own effort. Thereby, it achieves an understanding, sensation, perception, and power over the whole universe.

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A year or two down the line we won’t even remember how we used to exist any differently and how the wide public did not share our opinion. People will soon begin to clearly understand that the science of Kabbalah reveals the hidden part of reality to them, and that it is necessary to reveal this part of reality in order to attain a healthy and correct life. In addition, it will become clear that this revelation takes place by virtue of a miraculous force, rather than pure knowledge.

Using a purely scientific approach, we can only reveal nature on our level of perception, where our mind and feelings are operating. On the other hand, the science of Kabbalah miraculously reveals new levels of desire within us, in which we perceive a new reality. I expect that in the near future, we will witness this understanding and sensation being revealed in the masses. We will see this happen very soon.

Anyone that participated in the Zohar Convention 2010 went through tremendous changes, overcame many inner levels, and reduced the time of their development. Some people did not take part in the Convention physically, but they joined us virtually and thereby received the same ascent. Some people were distant from us (in their desire), but they were also influenced by the Convention. Even those who were not connected to us at all and didn’t want anything still received an influence because we are all part of one common system.

No one can avoid participating in this event because we all live in one, single reality. Therefore, when we hold such an event, it affects the whole world, even the people who hate us and are far away from us, as well as those who are close to us. It affects every person without exception, and it has an even greater affect on those who hate us than on those who are indifferent. Therefore, we will soon witness great changes in all layers of society.

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A question I received: Should the wisdom of Kabbalah be disseminated to those without a point in the heart yet?

My Answer: We have entered a new period, a stage of general correction. Today the spiritual calculation isn’t made for us as individuals. Rather, what is important is the degree to which we trigger general changes, turning ourselves into conductors of the Light to pass to other souls.

This is why Baal HaSulam and other Kabbalists write about the necessity of wide dissemination. We have to correct the entire common Kli. Therefore, the calculation isn’t based on a single individual, but should account for the whole body.

Prior to the period of the Ari, the stage of general correction wasn’t revealed yet. However, the new laws are already in effect during the last phase. We have discovered that we are one soul and this soul has to cure itself, whereas in the past everyone evolved individually.

Individual calculations have ended, paving the way to the common interests of the united whole. The individual profit is in the success of the wide dissemination. Thus, general advancement is more important than taking care of oneself.

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Because the science of Kabbalah only talks about what exists inside of us, it is called the inner Torah, an inner wisdom. In reality, our bodies and all of this matter do not exist. Therefore, this world is called an imaginary world. As soon as we begin to perceive reality correctly, we begin to feel that all this exists only in desire. Our desire gives us various levels of sensation that exist as the inanimate nature, plants, animals, and human beings. However, all this is actually different phenomena within the desire.

We need to realize that we live within a matrix of sensation in which everything exists exclusively in our sensation. This means that there is the desire to receive pleasure which perceives the phenomena that occur in it. Therefore, it is important for us not to forget this since this approach to the perception of reality, that “everything depends on me, rather than on what is outside,” directs us to our inner correction.

We perceive ourselves in our desires on the background of white Upper Light. Everything is on the background of the Upper Light. The World of Infinity is merely the white Upper Light. We don’t see ourselves there because we reach the same state, perception, reality, and qualities as the Light.

Meanwhile, the 125 degrees by which we descended from this state are the degrees of greater and greater distancing from the white Light, on the background of which we see ourselves. Therefore, everything we see around us is our desire which includes the inanimate, vegetative, animate, and human levels. These are the 4 levels of Aviut (coarseness of desire) in all its various inner forms, and which are the measures of our difference from the white Light.

These pictures are in fact our reality which presents itself to us in the form of this world. Thus our constant effort to reveal true reality, to unite with the true picture of reality, forces us to correct and perfect ourselves; and in doing so to see that we are all connected together.

The more we unite with each other and tune into the white Light, we advance toward our eternal and perfect life in the World of Infinity. And all these phenomena which we see and perceive to be outside pass like a dream. In actuality, we live only inside white Light.

This fundamental point in the science of Kabbalah is extremely important, since it separates the science of Kabbalah from all the philosophical teachings, religions, faiths, and different methods. The science of Kabbalah tells a person that he needs to correct only his desire, to make it similar to the white Light. No physical external actions have anything to do with it.

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The science of Kabbalah tells me that reality does not exist outside of me. All of reality exists inside the person who observes and feels it. Outside of me there is nothing. The problem is that we’re not accustomed to this perception of reality.

I was born perceiving reality through my body’s five senses. This is very limiting, and it’s hard to relate to the world differently. When I begin to realize that my reality depends on the qualities inside me, then it forces me to examine them and determine what they should be. I realize that I must correct them in order to create a true, unchanging, eternal reality inside myself. This is a true reality, but I must live in different states, different levels of false reality, before I can reach it.

Kabbalists tell us how to achieve a true perception of reality. They tell me that I am the one who determines my own life. If I start to look at life according to the perception that “everything exists within me,” then I can place the whole outside world inside me. Then, I will never die because the whole world will remain within me and I will continue to exist inside it.

So the perception of reality, which at first seems to us an abstract philosophy, something virtual and unreal, becomes a matter of “our life and death.” If I am able to change my qualities, my perception, everything that I presently see and sense as existing outside of me, then I begin to perceive and sense the world as my inner phenomena, my unchanging, eternal, perfect existence, and nothing will have changed, disappeared, or perished. By changing my perception of reality from external to internal, by placing it inside me, I ascend 125 degrees of the perception of reality, and reach a state of complete connection with eternity because I perceive it all within me.

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