Noah, the well-known character from the Torah, represents a stage in one’s spiritual development. It’s when a person realizes that his egoism is evil, and that he cannot save himself from it because it is his entire nature. He then understands that only the Upper Force, which is outside him, can change him. This is why he builds the Ark – or in other words, in response to his appeals, the Upper Light creates the property of Bina (bestowal) in him, and he then remains inside it so that his egoistic desires and properties will no longer rule over him. When he enters the Ark, he ascends above egoism and enters the realm of bestowal, isolating himself from his egoism, his nature.

Today every one of us and the entire world as a whole are beginning to feel that we are in a threatening state – the state of Noah before the Flood. We are being threatened by the inner (individual) and outer (worldwide) Flood (egoism), which we have brought upon ourselves and cannot overcome on our own. Our only salvation is to hide in the Ark, that is – for every person and for everyone together to acquire the property of bestowal, to ascend above our egoism. Then everything will reach harmony – just like all the species of creatures that were in the Ark, and we will make the transition to renewed life.

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Questions I received on what happens after death:

Question: My name is Daniel and I am fifteen years old. Recently I had a conversation with my uncle about the wisdom of Kabbalah. He said that people who study the wisdom of Kabbalah live forever, but this doesn’t seem logical to me. I would like to know what happens to the soul after death.

My Answer: It’s true: a person who has attained the life of his soul perceives his existence as eternal. But you probably think that eternal existence is impossible because you are connecting it to your body. Of course we can’t exist forever in the body, because this kind of existence is imperfect (egoistic). It was created to be brief (opposite to the Creator), and its only purpose is for us to correct it, to make it similar to the Creator. And the corrected state is eternal. Moreover, our temporary state is actually an illusion, given to us only to realize its evil, like a bad dream, so we would get an impression of it and separate from it!

Question: I really enjoy listening to your lessons and studying with you. You have revealed a beautiful world to me. Suppose that someone has crossed the Machsom, but then died before completing his entire correction. The next time this person is born, will he immediately perceive the spiritual world?

My Answer: No, but he will quickly go through all the preliminary stages and reach the state he attained before, and then he’ll go on from there. One must keep returning to our world until he attains the full correction, because a desire can only be corrected “from outside,” that is to say, while one is in this world, which is external in relation to spirituality.

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A question I received: In Tel Aviv, Yaffo, in the district Neve-Tzedek, there is a synagogue called “Marot HaSulam” (מראות הסולם), although unfortunately, it is in ruins. Can you please explain its name? Is it related to Baal HaSulam’s Perush HaSulam (The Ladder Commentary on the Book of Zohar)? I know that some commentaries on The Book of Zohar were written in this synagogue. The synagogue was founded in 1910, and Baal HaSulam wrote his Perush HaSulam in 1940. Did he write it in this synagogue?

My Answer: Baal HaSulam was forced to move from Jerusalem to Yaffo to get away from his opponents. He lived there and attended this synagogue. Then he moved to Tel Aviv, to a neighborhood near Rothchild Street.

Just like my teacher Rabash, Baal HaSulam’s oldest son, I was never interested in history, but only in ascending from our world to the Upper World. People who are attracted to history and what happens to the body are not attracted higher – to spirituality. Personally, I don’t feel any interest in this place. However, it would be nice to turn it into a museum about Baal HaSulam, into a place that explains Kabbalah to people!

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Questions I received on movement, celebrities, the Masons, and pop music that uses prayers for lyrics:

Question: Dear Rav, I envy everything that moves. What can I do about it?

My Answer: Also move! (Meaning spiritual movement!)

Question: Why do you have conversations with celebrities, with people who are famous, instead of ordinary people? Do you really need the publicity? Do these talks with celebrities flatter your ego?

My Answer: Famous people meet different people thousands more times than ordinary people do. After my conversations with them they gain an understanding of the great value that Kabbalah has for every person and for the whole world, and they begin disseminating Kabbalah on a broad scale, or rather – they bring the Kabbalistic idea to the world. Experience proves this!

The reason I’m doing this is to accelerate man’s recognition of evil so he wouldn’t have to actually go through it in reality. As the Soviet satiric writer Zhvanetsky once said, “The difference between a clever person and a wise person is that a clever person gets out of a difficult situation with huge efforts, but a wise person never gets into that situation.” I want to be wise and I wish the same for everyone else.

Question: What is the connection between the Masons and Kabbalah, if there is any?

My Answer: There is no connection at all. Even my attempt a few years ago to give a lecture for the Masons in Jerusalem failed – they were scared. Secret brotherhoods of any type feel sick in the stomach at the thought of Kabbalah, because Kabbalah promotes wide dissemination to everyone, while the Masons aspire to maintain secrecy. However, there are no hidden forces there, but only traditions and a belief in their exclusivity.

I’m sure that the wave of world-wide change will soon overtake them, as well as all the other philosophies and religions. The only things that will remain will be man, the Creator and the connection between them, while the Masons’ protocols and religious faith “in something” will disappear.

Question: Recently we often hear the song “אנא בכוח,” with moving lyrics that go straight into the heart. Can you explain this text?

My Answer: Why does it move you so much if you don’t know the meaning of the text? Who taught you to think of this prayer in a special way? You wrote, “Recently we often hear” – but I’d like to ask you: who hears it, and where? I have never heard about it! I only know this prayer from the prayer book. In religion and in Kabbalah, no one treats it in a special way. This is just another “sensation” – someone just wants to stand out!

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Two questions I received on whether spiritual correction requires observance of physical rituals:

Question: You say that it’s possible to attain spiritual correction without physically observing the commandments of Judaism. Maybe you’re just saying this out of your concern for Kabbalah’s dissemination around the world? Or maybe what you really mean is that people can’t understand these commandments by simply reading them? If you can’t publish the answer on the blog, I would like to receive a private answer.

My Answer: The Creator created the will to receive pleasure with an intention “for one’s own sake,” and this is how we find ourselves in this world. We were created this way in order to correct our intention to “for the sake of the neighbor or the Creator,” on all of our 613 desires. This correction happens under the influence of the Upper Light, Ohr Makif, which descends during the study of Kabbalah.

This bears no relation to the observance of religious rituals. A person can attain correction and spiritual attainment without physically observing the commandments, or rather – the traditions. This is true for both Jews and the nations of the world. Moreover, every person can keep his religion, because religion is no more than a nation’s cultural framework. Kabbalah only teaches us about the intention “for the sake of the neighbor,” how to love and bestow to others – and nothing else.

Question: You’re all about spirituality and the love revolution. But what about connecting the root with the branch? After all, the still, vegetative, and animate levels are also levels of the will to receive. You always speak about the internality without any externality, and this confuses me. Baal HaSulam writes at the end of the “Introduction to the Book of Zohar” that the internality should be preferred over the externality. But it looks like Bnei Baruch gives 100% of their attention to the internality, and 0% to the externality! This is difficult and confusing. Why not make a small change and pay a little more attention to the externality? Why not combine both parts? Dedicate 90% of your attention to the internality, and 10% to the externality. This will really help everyone! What do you think?

My Answer: We at Bnei Baruch actually do this – we follow the traditions. But do you really think that all the people in the world – who are now approaching correction – have to observe the physical commandments of Judaism, even if it isn’t their tradition? In the article “The Future Generation” Baal HaSulam writes that every person can keep his religion!

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A question I received: Hello dear Rav Laitman. I tried to get my father interested in Kabbalah lessons, but he didn’t like them and two weeks later he said that I listen to the lessons too much. He found a small ad in the local newspaper that said, “We teach practical Kabbalah.” My father – who is a religious, decent and straightforward man – called them, and when the conversation was over he wanted to speak to me. He said that the man he spoke with told him that if a person studies Kabbalah alone, he will end up in the “Gates of Menashe” (a psychiatric clinic)! This made me very angry and upset, since I am studying something completely different. I started defending myself and arguing with him. He also got angry and said that this is no way for a daughter to speak to her father, and that my behavior was unacceptable. What should I do to prevent others from interfering with my “life-line” and my true development?

My Answer: You should conclude that 1. Not all the salesmen teach authentic Kabbalah – there are phoneys. 2. “Practical Kabbalah” is practical fraud. 3. There’s no sense calling random phone numbers in the local newspaper, or thinking that everyone is like us. 4. Bring your father to my lecture at “Beit Kabbalah L’Am” on Tuesday, 7:30 PM.

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Dear friends!

The International Academy of Kabbalah invites everyone to a Kabbalah Congress that will take place in Odessa, Ukraine on September 11 – 14, 2008.

The theme of the congress is: Unity Through Dissemination
The purpose of the congress is:

1. To create a common virtual space for the worldwide Kabbalistic group
2. To discuss mutual projects
3. To develop new ways to learn and teach Kabbalah

The congress location is the picturesque suburbs of Odessa, at the Kuyalnik Resort.
The program will include lessons with Dr. Michael Laitman, seminars, meals, and a cultural program.
Arrival to the congress site will begin at 12:00 PM on Thursday, September 11.
The opening ceremony will be held at 12:00 PM on Friday, September 12.
The closing ceremony will be held at 12:00 PM on Sunday, September 14.
The rooms have double occupancy.
Cost of participation: $170.
Application deadline: August 10, 2008.

Click here to register
For additional information, write to this address

We are waiting for you!
Congress Organization Committee “Odessa 2008”

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Two questions I received on whether it’s necessary to know the Torah before studying Kabbalah:

Question: I have been examining Kabbalah from every angle: science, religion, faith, spirituality, and so on. Are you sure that a person who studies Kabbalah with you and reads Baal HaSulam’s articles is able to understand what you are saying correctly? This wisdom is great and there is nothing like it in the entire world. Should it really be so easily available to every person who wants to study it? Maybe these people don’t even understand what they are reading.

I am asking this because I’ve met students who explain Kabbalah in a completely different way, and they have preconceived notions that are difficult to change. Shouldn’t they first learn about Abraham, Moses, and the stories from the Bible? Shouldn’t they first understand the simple meaning of the Torah before they start studying the spiritual part of the Torah?

My Answer: I brought many new students to my teacher, Rabash. They were secular and didn’t know anything about Torah, yet he accepted them to be his students. Rav Kook also wrote that the study of Kabbalah does not require any preliminary preparation. It doesn’t matter how a person understands the material, because this wisdom isn’t learned through common sense, but by attracting the Upper Light in order to reveal new qualities in the student. And to the degree that the student acquires the Light’s qualities, he starts understanding the Light.

On the other hand, people who “examine” this wisdom’s meaning with their corporeal qualities won’t be able to understand anything! The wisdom of Kabbalah differs from any other science, because in all other sciences, we can examine the world with the five senses that we already have, but in the wisdom of Kabbalah one first needs to acquire the sixth sense – similarity to the Light, and only after that, to the degree one is similar to the Light, he will be able to examine It.

Hence, this wisdom is much more practical, since we attain it within us, not outside of us. Using this wisdom, we reveal the Upper World, and we attain it from within, in a profound way. This attainment changes the student, since he studies everything inside himself only. This is why Kabbalah is called the wisdom of the inner, or the Inner Torah.

Question: If it’s impossible to understand the Torah without knowing Kabbalah, then why did most Kabbalists of the past say that before one can start studying Kabbalah, one has to learn the Torah in detail?

My Answer: It’s because the period from the 1st century until the 16th century (from the fall of the Second Temple until the Ari) was a period of exile from spirituality. During this time it was necessary to wait for the souls that fell from the spiritual level to intermix with the souls that have never been on that level. For example, Abraham was told ahead of time that the Egyptian exile was to last for 400 years. Similarly, Baal HaSulam predicted what would happen in our times – that beginning from 1995 on, there will be intensive, mass revelation of Kabbalah.

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Two questions I received on the differences between Rabash’s students:

Question: Your teacher Rav Baruch Ashlag (Rabash) had many students, including Rav Gotlib, Rav Brizal, and others. Every one of them understands and interprets your common teacher in his own way. In particular, there are great discrepancies about religion and dissemination of Kabbalah. How do you explain this?

My Answer: The reason several versions come from one teacher is to give every person the opportunity to find a teacher who suits his upbringing and aspiration. Check all of these versions, and then choose the one that’s right for you. I’m sure that all of these teachers teach the same basics: by studying in a group to evoke Ohr Makif, one attains the property of bestowal (the Screen and Ohr Hochma), and then one ascends by nullifying oneself before the AHP of the Upper Level.

Question: And how do you explain the fact that Rabash’s students don’t keep in touch with one another?

My Answer: Each of them is following his own path, as it is written: “There are many paths to the Creator” (Yesh Harbe Drachim Le Makom). When Rabash passed away, he left his entire archive to me, and I let all of his students make copies of all his notes, as well as giving them all of the original audio tapes to copy – over a thousand of them. And I wish them success in everything!

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I’ve received many requests to explain the correlation between a baby’s development in this world and the soul’s development in the Upper World. Here is an explanation:

The Talmud Eser Sefirot – the fundamental Kabbalistic textbook with over 2,000 pages of difficult text, has about 300 pages that talk about the soul’s intrauterine development in the womb (the AHP) of the Upper Partzuf (the mother – Ima, Bina). This development may continue for seven, nine, or twelve months – but usually it continues for nine months. It is followed by birth and then 24 months of nursing – which is also described in 200 pages of very difficult text.

What are these lengthy, complex descriptions saying in simple language? The soul begins its development with the point in the heart, when a person asks, “What is the meaning of life?” Next, the person begins developing his soul by attracting the Upper Light to this point. He first goes through preliminary stages called single concealment and double concealment, and then enters a state called conception (Ibur). In this state, he attaches to the Upper Partzuf, provided that he agrees to stay together with It regardless of all the difficulties! And the difficulties keep increasing, but by strengthening his connection with the Upper One, despite the disturbances created by egoism that keep pulling him back, he continually absorbs the qualities of the Upper One – love and bestowal. This process continues until he attains all of the Upper One’s properties by means of annulling himself. This self-annulment also prevents him from becoming a disturbance or a foreign body in the Upper One.

When he absorbs all of the Upper One’s qualities, this concludes the period of passively absorbing the Upper One’s properties – of developing in the form of an embryo. An embryo develops by passively receiving the Light, and this is why it is referred to as blood (Dam, from the word Domem – still), or a passive adoption of the Upper One’s properties.

Stated differently, the state called pregnancy ends when a person desires to go from nullifying himself to actively interacting with the Upper One. This compels the Upper One to push him away, in order to end the previous kind of interaction – similar to when an embryo remains in the mother’s womb for too long, and evokes rejection. The Upper One pushes the lower one away from Him and forces the lower one to begin interacting with Him more actively – to nurse. The Upper One does this by creating conditions that enable the lower one to receive the Light of Hassadim (milk). However, the milk still turns into blood (Dam) in the lower one.

This nursing period lasts for 24 months, and during this time the lower one gains active properties of bestowal (Bina, Galgalta Einaim). This level enables a person to exist in the complete volume of the Upper World, and to be completely independent of his egoism – to perceive the Upper One and learn from Him.

Knowledge of the laws operating in our roots and of how the Upper Forces operate, gives us an absolutely precise understanding of how to ideally and most correctly treat and raise a child, how to interact with a fetus and a newborn, as well as with a teenager and adolescent. It enables us to build the correct system of interactions, and to create the conditions for optimally realizing the opportunity we have in this life – to attain the purpose of our creation.

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