A question I received: How is the diversity of our world connected with the uniform goal of love towards the neighbor?

My Answer: The elements of our world comprise the common Kli. Let’s take for example, an ant that spends its entire short life crawling in the woods in search of food. Really, how is this ant connected with my soul and its final correction?

All levels below the human level are represented as external manifestations of human properties. The “ant” first exists in your desires and then manifests in a human form. Without the external form, you would not be ready for the inner correction.

Every detail of the still, vegetative and animate levels is necessary because they are included in the human being. By leading their natural existence, they help our desires develop to the human level.

During the development of our desires, we go through the stages that have already taken place. First we do it in the nature of our world, then in the “human” level of desire, and finally, we approach and enter the spiritual world. Our inner desires would not be formed without all these external details.

In the beginning, these desires have to start developing from the smallest, most insignificant desires. Therefore, initially a still level is formed, followed by vegetative, and then animate, in all their diversity. In this process, some species become extinct while others suddenly appear.  Everything changes, but all of it is a projection of our inner changes.

The whole of creation is embedded in man and constitutes a harmonious, perfect picture. Therefore, people should know how to correctly use all the elements of reality existing in front of them. There are different laws acting here, but their main purpose is to show us how to relate to everything in the context of the goal of creation. We have to use the entire world in such a way that it will advance us towards the goal.

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What is a human being? A human being is a mountain of egoism and hatred towards everyone. If the Light influences this mountain of hatred (the mountain of Sinai),  it raises a person onto the mountain.

Precisely due to the egoism, a person has something to rise above, then under the influence of the Light, the egoism is ready to receive pleasure, using itself for the sake of bestowal.

The Light does everything. One can be the most righteous person, who has ascended high into the degrees of the worlds, but if the Light stops affecting him, he will immediately fall into his initial egoism. There are no other alternatives – either we are controlled by our egoistic nature or we are controlled by the Light.

This will never end, since while I am in any spiritual state, I must always hold onto the Light in order for it to influence me. If I let go of it, I will fall immediately.

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All of human history shows that man’s entreaties to the Creator do not merit a clear response from Him. This raises a question: If the Creator exists at all, then can we communicate with Him in some way? Will this question remain a mystery forever, like UFOs and life on other planets, where we’re forever left in the dark as to the existence of other civilizations outside of earth, which may exist but not desire to be in contact with us?

In order to attain contact with the Creator, we have to establish a connection with the people who are already in contact with Him. We have to cleave to those who are connected with the Upper System. We will then be like a child who cleaves to an adult and thus receives everything the adult has. This is how we can advance toward spirituality.

If we want our thoughts and desires to be the same as those of the great Kabbalists (Baal HaSulam and Rabash), then we will be influenced by the same Light that fulfills them. This will remedy all our problems, including all the illness of our bodies and souls. The Light knows what has to be corrected and it arranges everything in the best possible way.

The truth is that we don’t know what is really good for us. We only have to desire to come closer to the Light, and It will do everything. Therefore, our entire work is to come as close as we can to what Kabbalists wrote. We should just cleave to them with our hearts.

That is how we can take one step forward after another. No matter what happens to us, despite all the problems, mistakes and confusion, we have to aspire to draw closer to the Light.

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A question I received: What is the fundamental difference between humans and other creatures?

My Answer: Unlike animals, we humans have the opportunity to attain a connection higher than our bodies. There are two forces or desires at my disposal: I feel my “self” or my life, and I also feel the need to find the source of my life – the Creator.

In the physiological sense, humans do not differ from animals in any fundamental way. Man originated from the animate level. At some point in the past, we used to be apes, and we later developed into “modern apes.” Everything happened due to the development of the Reshimot in us. For more on this, see Part 3 of Talmud Eser Sefirot.

So, there is no difference between humans and animals, except for the spiritual desire that is instilled in us. This desire is a part of the Creator, and it is above and beyond our lives. If this desire awakens in me, then I become a human being. Meanwhile, in every other respect, I still remain an “ape.”

Granted, it’s an ”ape of the best sort” – one that’s more complex and more adapted to carrying out the human function: to attain the Creator through its desire. Our bodies are smarter and more sensitive than animals’. Yet, whatever a person in this world has that is above and beyond the animate level, he needs it for only one thing: to develop and understand what his soul desires.

You have received a point of spirituality that bears absolutely no relation to the body. It will remain even if you were to replace all parts of the body. It would still want to advance forward!
(From Part 2 of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson, on Baal HaSulam’s “Introduction to the Book, ‘From the Mouth of a Sage’”)

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A question I received: Why do we need so much time – 6,000 years – to reach the Final Correction?

My Answer: The whole world is structured like a pyramid that divides into the inanimate, vegetative, animate, and human levels. The inanimate level is our entire universe, which was created about 15 billion years ago. The terrestrial globe with, vegetative life on it, was created 4 billion years ago. The first living organisms emerged about a half a billion years ago. The first human being emerged about 50,000 years ago (depending on who you consider to be a human being). Do you see the proportion of how all of these levels correlate?

The same applies to humans, who also develop through the inanimate, vegetative, animate, and human levels within. On the inanimate level of development, human beings developed for several thousand years, and during that period, there was nothing differentiating humans from animals. Then the period of the “vegetative” level of human development began. And we have continued to exist on the animate level of development until this very day. Our entire inner development occurs due to our growing egoism.

Egoism that is individual or personal is a quality pertaining to the animate levels. In other words, on the inanimate level, everyone was the same. On the vegetative level, egoism began to flourish in people, but they developed as one integral mass, similar to plants that turn toward the sun together, or bend down together due to the wind, or open up together because of rain.

On the animate degree, individual egoistic desires begin to appear in a person, just as they are present in all animals. But when does a person reach the human degree? This is only starting to happen now, in the 21st century! So, just look at how many billions of years it took for the universe to develop, compared to the development of the human being.

You are asking: “We have been suffering for 5,000 years. How much longer do we need to suffer!?” But why don’t you ask about the past 15 billion years? Because you have a narrow, subjective view, which does not grasp the whole process.
(From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson on Shamati #13)

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A question I received: The science of Kabbalah explains the law of roots and branches. Knowing the laws of this world helps us in our everyday lives. But how can knowledge of spiritual laws help us? I am referring specifically to the law of roots and branches.

My Answer: The law of roots and branches is the main and most important law in the entire science of Kabbalah. According to this law, everything that happens in our world comes down from above in a unilateral, absolute order.

It is written: “There is not a blade of grass that has not an angel above it that strikes it and tells it to grow.” Angels are forces, and any action, thought, desire, event or occurrence, from the most elemental particle to the biggest stars and entire galaxies, is managed by an Upper Force.

This force divides and within it, is included a number of forces on the various levels of the inanimate, vegetative, animate and human. These are physical and biological forces that influence all levels, with all of them coming from Above.

This is why the law of roots and branches is very important. With the science of Kabbalah, and learning the law of roots and branches, we can rise from the branches of our world toward the roots. We will begin to see our world as transparent and behind every object, we will see the force which manages it and brings it to action.

A person will begin to sense where his thoughts and desires come from and why things happen to him and to others. He will begin to see how a net of forces acts on this world and how it playfully and through various wavelike movements, organizes everything that occurs here for us. In this way, a person begins a dialogue with this Upper Force, with the root through which its own force operates everything in our world.

A person begins to understand where he can step in and have a dialogue with the Creator who is behind these forces, in order to respond, participate, change and consciously intervene. This is the only place in this entire net of forces that acts on him from the inside and out and where he can actively participate.

Although we are not conscious of it, we are inside of a picture prepared and formed for us by these forces. I have to come to understand how I can actively take part in this picture. In other words, how I can control my fate.

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Shamati #92: “Explaining the Discernment of Luck”- Lesson

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Preparation to the Lesson
By uniting, we create a common desire, within which we can reveal the quality of bestowal.
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Part 1, on Shamati #18, Shamati #18, “What Is, My Soul Shall Weep in Secret in the Work”
You should see yourself as a laboratory, where you perform experiments based on the Kabbalists’ instructions.
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Part 2, on “Inner Observation” in Talmud Eser Sefirot
No matter what kind of changes are happening around us, they are all happening inside us.
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Listen >>

Part 3, on “Introduction to the book From the Mouth of a Sage”
Everyone has to study the science of Kabbalah. After all, this is what man is born for: to correct himself.
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Listen >>

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A question I received: What is prayer (MAN)? Is it our desires that we raise to the Upper Level? How do our desires develop until they become ripe for the Upper Level to hear them?

My Answer: We develop our sensitivity and internal recognition of our desires. The spiritual world is not quantitative, but strictly qualitative. It only seems to us that in order to rise from one level to the next, we have to become stronger, but in reality, what has to become stronger is our scrutiny and sensitivity.

We have to become more perceptive and work on ourselves with “fine tweezers.” Real strength lies in being able to go ever deeper inside yourself in order to distinguish and classify more and more qualities within. This is how you grow: by developing your sensations and your analysis of them.

In our world, a baby grows in size according the number of pounds he gains. However, we do not evaluate his intellect according to the number of pounds he weighs, but according to the skills and qualities he has acquired. We evaluate how smart he is by what he is able to understand and do.

The spiritual world is built inside us by the Light. The Light descends upon us during the study of the Upper World and builds new qualities inside us. In the place where you felt nothing before, you now begin to perceive various new qualities and phenomena. When we read descriptions of the spiritual world, we don’t understand anything, similar to a cat that hears classical music and perceives it as mere noise. At times, we listen to the lesson while hardly being able to keep our eyes open.

But it is precisely in such semi-conscious states that the Surrounding Light (Ohr Makif) influences us.

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Recently, while in Madrid, I had a meeting with a reporter, and he asked me, “Can you tell me, where is my soul now?” I felt uncomfortable letting him down, but I had to tell him, “What soul? What are you talking about?” He didn’t get it: how can there be a person without a soul? Yet it doesn’t surprise him that a cow has no soul. But why should he have one? Right now he may be eating a steak that was made from that cow, but he doesn’t ask what happened to its soul. So how does the cow’s body differ from his own?

The soul is one’s connection with the Creator, with the Upper Light, and it only appears to the degree one is similar to Him. A soul appears in a person once he is above the Machsom, but prior to the Machsom, a person does not have a soul. All our other desires do not constitute a soul – at least not yet, while they’re not corrected.

When a person receives a point in the heart and develops it, then a soul appears within him, which is called “human.” But our animate bodies are not called human. Their only purpose is for us to raise a soul within the body, which will be called our “I.”
(From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson)

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The society supplies a person with artificial behavioral models, playing off his ego. And it never asks the person whether he wants to live by these models or not. He is born in a certain location on earth, and this determines the general cultural values he will receive from childhood. This determines his upbringing and the kind of person he has to become. Whether he wants to or not, he absorbs these values and then continues to follow them for the rest of his life. In addition to this, society supplies him with promises of reward in the world to come, but this is done in order to use the person even more. In this regard, a person has no freedom of choice, no freedom.

But one day, a person’s “point in the heart” awakens and he starts feeling disillusioned with all of his previous life. It’s as if he begins life from a fresh, clean page. All of his previous values come tumbling down and disappear from the horizon, losing all their importance. His previous behavioral models become canceled because they no longer hold any reward or punishment for the person. The only things that remain are those necessary for one’s survival, the things without he cannot exist.

If a person is religious, then he also starts to have doubts about the world to come. Thus, the circumstances bring him to the group and the Kabbalah books, and then he has to make a choice: how much does he want to become part of this society and this path? He is not free to choose the path, but he is free to choose the speed at which he will advance, how much energy he will put into it, and how quickly he will absorb the right examples from this environment, in order to adopt the new behavioral models and the new values.

So, one’s only choice is in how much to become a part of the common process: to advance quicker or slower. In this regard, a person does have free choice: the choice to quickly absorb the new examples and models that are provided for him by the new society.

And even though he is only free to choose the speed with which he adopts these new examples, this is nevertheless true freedom. That’s because it is above his egoistic desire to enjoy. And in this way, he already begins to build a “human being” within.
(From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson)

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