A person lives in his own reality and suddenly begins to understand that this entire reality simply unfolds in front of him and that he has absolutely no freedom of choice. It is as if he sits in a theater and watches a movie that shows him sitting in a theater, watching a movie, and so on into infinity.

Where then is true reality? With this question, the internal search begins. This search brings one to the point where he starts to see that there is nothing external to him: everything happens inside of him. As long as he has a body and emotions, he receives some internal picture which he perceives as his reality.

Rabash describes this in the story of the coachman. The coachman had a house, a wife, children, a horse and a carriage and was very happy with his life. All of a sudden, he loses everything: his family, his wife, children, and even the horse died. In the end, grief-stricken, he also dies.

He arrives in Paradise and because of all his suffering, it is decided that he will be granted a gift. He receives that which he most desires: the sensation that he has a house, a wife, children, a carriage and several horses! So he imagines that he is riding in his carriage led by strong horses, is successful with work; all in all, he is enjoying life!

Maybe we also are in such a state? How can we determine this? How can we exit ourselves and see what is really happening? It could be that we are sleep-walking. Or perhaps we are being controlled by aliens who placed us in formaldehyde and are showing us a movie, while in reality we exist in glass bottles and have been sleeping for millions of years. And this we consider to be our world…?

But there is a method which allows us to rise above this entire reality and see it from the perspective of the Upper Force, the Creator. It’s like fish that suddenly start to wonder: “Who changes the aquarium water?”

And thus begins a different path that leads a person toward his Creator. This happens when one attains this system and by using it, ascends toward Him.

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Two questions I received on love and relationships:

Question (from a woman): Why is it that before we find our match, we have to go through so much pain and disappointment?

My Answer: It is because you use the wrong criteria to look for a partner. Your spouse should be someone you understand, someone similar to you, with a similar upbringing and childhood, and you should remind him of his mother. Everything else will fall into place throughout the process of living together. Mostly it will happen when you forgive one another and compromise with each other.

Question: There is a couple starting out their relationship. Both study Kabbalah. They now have the opportunity to create the right connection between them. How should this occur? How can they aim their relationship toward the goal?

My Answer: Tune into the studies together, discuss them, and read articles together. This is what Rabash advised for couples.

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Questions I received on the will to receive, roots and branches, and Ramchal:

Question: What is the will to receive based on? What is the will to receive made of?

My Answer: Of the shadow of the Upper Light.

Question: Are the roots and branches in Kabbalah something like a reflection of a tree in water? Everything is “reflective opposite” exactly like the source, but made from a different “material”?

My Answer: That’s exactly right. The difference is the material – whether it’s the will to receive or to give.

Question: What do you think of Ramchal? There is no mention of him on the site.

My Answer: I have mentioned him more than once. I studied his works alone and with my teacher Rabash.

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Baal HaSulam Article: “The Teaching of Kabbalah and Its Essence”

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Two questions I received about studying other spiritual writings while also studying Kabbalah:

Question: In your book Leben aus der Kabbalah (in German), you write, “One should not read other authors who write about Kabbalah, because they can influence the reader.” This statement scares me. I’ve had a craving for spirituality and for knowledge ever since I was a child. However, my soul also wishes to compare different methods and to search for the only real truth behind all the wonderful sources. For example, Buddhism also says that life must be used for spiritual development. So who is right?

My Answer: Rabash and Baal HaSulam write in their articles about the group and freedom of will that when a person is brought to Kabbalah, he should doubt and check everything. However, once he has made his choice – for example, if he chooses Kabbalah, he should then enter the study of Kabbalah completely and avoid confusing it with other methods, as otherwise he will not succeed in anything.

Question: I have read the Old Testament with Gnostic knowledge, as well as Dhammapada, Buddha’s quotations, and the Bhagavad Gita. They all talk about a single, unique God and the soul. I have also read the Upanishads. I don’t associate myself with any religion. Does this contradict Kabbalah?

My Answer: Only you can figure out everything for yourself, including whether you need a teacher, and if so – who that teacher should be. When I asked my Teacher about how could I be sure that I was in the right place for me, he said, “Search, check, and choose quickly, and then delve only into what you choose.”

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We are living in a generation when our interconnection is being revealed, although we don’t understand this yet. In previous generations, this connection was not openly expressed. But today we are connected through the Internet and the international radio and television networks. We exchange information through these channels and are aware of all the news in the world.

The events taking place in one part of the world affect the other parts because of the speed with which information and rumors are spread through the various networks. There are also different networks of power. When something happens in one part of the world, someone either gains or loses, whether in sales and money, industry, commerce or economics.

We depend on each other. We are bound together by a common net, which is now being revealed as an obvious fact. Humanity is making this discovery today. We are revealing our connection on the level of thoughts and desires, and we are finding ourselves in a situation we cannot escape or ignore. Every day will reveal more things in the world which will be completely new. We will see how when people in South America are thinking about something, then the next day people in Europe will think about the same thing, and the next day – in Asia.

First it reaches you as a strange, obscure thought, and then it becomes your own thought. Your former desire fades and a new desire emerges. Great changes will occur literally from one day to the next, or even quicker. And that’s because the world is completely intermixed, which was not the case before.

This makes progress happen at a completely different speed. The speed of our development is not linear or even exponential, but is rocketing upward. It grows exponentially because it is multiplied by the number of people in the world and the number of connections between them. And each person in turn multiplies it again by his connection and dependence on others. Hence, this multiplication, which happens over and over again, makes our development happen faster by seven billion to the seven billionth power.

(From the lesson on Rabash’s article, “The Activity of the Greatest of the Nation” on 03.17.09)

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Something is happening to us that has never happened before: we are developing in a completely new way. In the past, each person developed individually, but today the development is general, occurring as a result of our mutual influence on one another. This is why we are unable to control it in any way! Our egoism, which acts as a barrier between us, does not have any instruments that we can use to sustain it within a system that is absolutely integral.

This would be like forcing an animal to participate in the work of an intelligent system. An animal is incapable of perceiving the higher level of development that suddenly appears before it.

We, too, are looking at the network of connections between people today and we still don’t realize that it is a system of a higher dimension, situated above us. This system belongs to divinity, and everyone within it is absolutely connected to everyone else. Meanwhile, you are unable to understand it, participate in it, and act according to its laws. Therefore, you are left wandering, like a wooden chip in a stormy sea, feeling that you are being thrown from side to side, from one situation to another, and you lack the power to understand what is happening. You are unable to go with the flow of this system, which is a system of forces and universal, mutual connections.

In a few months or half a year, the whole world will look like a stormy sea of thoughts and desires which explodes in one place and then another. However, in reality nothing explodes. It’s as though you bring someone to a factory and he sees all kinds of gears spinning around in confusion and making a rumble. But if a professional comes into the factory, he immediately understands that everything is working perfectly, according to the right program. This is because he understands the system and its laws.

It’s the same with us. However, even the simplest person today has a method that allows him to become part of the system. This is the method of Kabbalah, which reveals the Creator to the creatures.

The network of forces that acts amongst us is now being revealed to us in a negative form, from the opposite side. But using our attitude to it, we can turn it around to face us. This depends on us. This does not mean that we should turn the Creator around. Instead, we should turn ourselves around, from reception to bestowal. Then we will sail wonderfully along the current.

(From the lesson on Rabash’s article,“The Activity of the Greatest of the Nation” on 03.17.2009)

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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)

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Two questions I received on studying Kabbalah in Hebrew:

Question: I constantly listen to your lessons in English, and I recently started wanting to learn Hebrew. Does this mean that I am realizing my Reshimot, or is it just an altruistic desire to know the language of someone close to me? Later, when our points in the heart will fully develop, will we want to speak the same language as everyone around us, as we did before the Tower of Babel?

My Answer: Hebrew and Aramaic came to us from the times of ancient Babylon, and I believe we’ll be using them in the future as well. It’s worthwhile to study them, at least to the extent they are necessary for understanding our lessons and discussions.

Question: Why are some texts translated, while others – very important ones, in my opinion – aren’t? Maybe you do have them, but you only make them available to your closest students? For example, there is no official translation of some of Rabash’s articles, which are studied in the first part of the lesson. So I am forced to listen to the simultaneous translation while you are reading the text, but simultaneous translation is not always precise.

My Answer: Everything we have is available to everyone, free of charge. We translate what we can, and when we have the means, we will translate all the lessons.

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A question I received: In the article, “What Is Half a Shekel In the Work,” Rabash states, “If a person prays, even without understanding the meaning of the words, simply pronouncing what is written in the prayer book established by the Sages, saying these words while drawing nearer to the Creator, it is irrelevant if he knows what he is saying or not…”

Also, Baal HaSulam says in Item 155 of the “Introduction to Talmud Eser Sefirot,” “…even if a person does not understand what he learns, his yearning to understand draws upon him the Light of Correction.”

It follows that praying using the Prayer Book has great spiritual value, and what some say, that it is just words and tradition, is not really the case. What is your opinion about this?

My Answer: By “some,” you mean me. Yes, I do say so. Here’s why: The result of the reading depends on the reader, not on the text or its author.

Baal HaSulam says in Item 147 of the “Introduction to Talmud Eser Sefirot,” “There is no difference between the Torah of the world of Atzilut and the Torah of this world, meaning, between the wisdom of Kabbalah and the revealed Torah. Instead, the only difference is in the person who engages in the study of the Torah. Two may study the Torah, the same text and the same words, but one will perceive it as the wisdom of Kabbalah and the Torah of Atzilut, while for the other it will be the revealed Torah [of Assiya].”

Of course, the Prayer Book was compiled by the Members of the Great Assembly – the Great Kabbalists who lived 2000 years ago. If you read it in order to connect with the Creator, then you will draw the Light from the Source, of which the Prayer Book speaks. The same occurs when you study the Talmud Eser Sefirot. However, if one does not think about this because one does not have a desire to reveal the Creator, then regardless of what one reads – whether the Talmud Eser Sefirot or the Prayer Book, will give him any result.

If you want to understand what the Prayer Book is talking about, then you should use the Prayer Book of Rashash. There you will find the meaning of the prayers presented in the Kabbalistic symbols – as adherence of the corrected desire (soul) to the Creator through the system of the spiritual worlds. The same thing is discussed in Tamud Eser Sefirot and, generally, in all the Holy Books. They all speak about one’s connection with the Creator, His revelation to a person.

To pray means to reveal the Creator, the quality of bestowal and love inside you. All other prayers are egoistic and therefore, do not attract the Upper Light. They only have a psychological effect on the person who prays.

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The Book of Zohar: “The Intention in the Prayer”

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A question I received: When I ask people for their opinion of you, some say that you are a fraud because the only people allowed to study Kabbalah are men who are Jewish, married, and over 40 years old. They say that anyone who teaches Kabbalah to women, youngsters, and non-Jews is a fraud, a layman, and an ignoramus. Please comment on this!

My Comment: My knowledge of Kabbalah can be tested, though I doubt there’s anyone qualified to do this. My daily lessons are an indication of the level of my teaching. In addition, everyone knows that I was Rabash’s student.

As for the prohibitions on teaching Kabbalah, such as teaching it to people under 40 years old, women, gentiles, and so on, see the commentaries of Kabbalists on this. And don’t worry about what people say about me; just follow my example. What they say comes from their current level. Give them time to grow up.

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