A question I received: I’m studying the videos and texts on the site and I’ve been learning a lot! I’m a teacher of philosophy in Brazil and my focus of study is the thinker Baruch Spinoza, a cherem Jew of the seventeenth century. Spinoza spoke about a God like Nature, a God not external, but internal and equal to Nature (where Nature is not seen only as trees, clouds, and so on, but the superior Nature that includes all of thing and energies). How does Kabbalah see God? And what does Kabbalah think about Spinoza’s philosophy?

My Answer: There is a huge difference between the definition of “God as Nature” in Kabbalah and in Spinoza’s philosophy. For example, there are differences in how they see the Upper Force as having a mind and a will, to make decisions, its goal and program, its separate, superior position over Nature, its causality and primacy, and so on. It would be best for you to sort all of this out for yourself.

To do so, it will suffice to browse through several articles by Baal HaSulam: “The Wisdom of Kabbalah and Philosophy,” “The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah,” Part 1 of “Talmud Eser Sefirot” – Histaklut Pnimit (Inner Reflection).” Once you read them, I will be happy to speak with you on the subject. I will be in Argentina from August 26 until September 2.

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A question I received: You have said that the crisis can cause people to ask questions about the meaning of life. But can’t a regular person, who has absolutely everything but still feels restless, ask the same questions?

My Answer: “The Creator’s ways” are unknown to us. Today’s crisis is only a minor scare. The real crisis is still ahead. It is yet to manifest in all sorts of ways that have no connection to money. The problem with money is no more than a minor inconvenience. After all, it doesn’t pose an actual, deadly threat, but merely an absence of security and food, which may possibly be overcome. This is not the kind of thing that looms over you like a terrible monster, ready to devour you whole.

So far, the state that is being revealed to us is not apparently the Upper Force, against which we cannot do anything. We still think that we can rectify our life. After all, the financial system is artificial, and so we think that we are capable of handling its collapse. So, you can’t really call this a blow.

The blow that will come will be “the finger of God,” as the Pharaoh’s sages once said. That is when people will feel that what’s happening is not accidental, that all the blows are purposeful. And this will be the beginning of the Creator’s revelation to the people of all the nations. People will then begin to perceive everything as part of the natural process, which cannot be solved through artificial means.

Therefore, today’s crisis isn’t real. However, we at Bnei Baruch still try to use it as an example to help explain that humanity has entered a new period of evolution.

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A question I received: If the world reaches a point where everyone will have the average living standard and no one will live beyond this standard, then what will drive people to develop further? What will cause people to move forward in their development?

My Answer: If a person feels pleasure from bestowing to others, if he feels that by uniting with others they create a single vessel, inside of which he senses the Upper Force (the Creator), then the ever-increasing attainment of the Creator that he feels will be his goal and reward. When a person builds the “human” level within by bestowing to others, he corrects his attitude toward them, and this makes him similar to the Creator. Thus, he ascends along 125 spiritual steps to the Final Correction.

When he ascends spiritually, he feels satisfaction and fulfillment, and thus comes closer to the Creator. The fulfillment he feels from this is perfect. It is not temporary and transient, but eternal. It fulfills a person completely, leaving no voids. Moreover, one continuously gains new possibilities for even greater types of fulfillment.

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Today, all of humanity is operating in a global system. If we correct the ties between us in that system, it means we correct the souls to reveal the Creator here within that bond, in this world and in our lifetime.

The science of Kabbalah states that the breaking of the souls happened in their descent from one of the exalted spiritual degrees. Before that descent, all of the souls represented one common soul, called Adam.

Adam split into many separate parts, and absolutely all of them fell into this world, giving rise to all of humanity. There is no difference between the common soul and any person in this world. All we need to understand is that we are inside a closed system, where everyone is stuck in his ego. Thus, there are now seven billion separate parts. Each of them has been growing, influenced by their own unique ego until this time, a special time when the broken connection between us is being revealed: billions and billions of connections – linking each person.

People say that each person knows everyone else in the world through no more than five or six degrees of separation. However, we have yet to reveal that everyone of us is literally connected to everyone, since the link is corrupted and each one relates to the others based on his ego. It’s not our fault that ego is inside us – we had it to begin with. However, the fact that it has become revealed means that we must correct it. Besides this one task there is nothing of greater importance or meaning that we must do in our lifetime. For if we correct the ties between us, we discover the World of Infinity itself.

To the extent that a person reveals the true bond with others by his correct attitude towards them, he begins to feel the Upper Force – the force of bestowal and love. He then transcends the boundaries of his perception of the world and begins to see the world around him as it really is outside of him, and in this way, he reveals the Creator.

That is precisely what we must achieve in this generation. All the conditions are laid out before us; Kabbalists wrote about it and outlined the entire method for us, and all we are left to do is to realize it. We have been given every opportunity to do just that.

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A question I received: How does a woman’s spiritual development depend on a man? I am a man, and the study of Kabbalah is my entire life. However, my wife watches sitcoms and thinks mostly about how to make more money. For the sake of saving our marriage she sometimes watches Channel 66 (“The Kabbalah Channel”) together with me, and even reads your blog. But nothing goes in. Can I “pull” her onto my level? I need her and we have two very young children, but on the other hand I want to devote myself completely to Kabbalah.

My Answer: Each person receives an aspiration to reveal the Upper World (a point in the heart) individually from above. You have no right to force your wife to be interested in Kabbalah.

If she allows you to study Kabbalah in your free time, then you must agree to all of her other conditions. In addition, you should show her how grateful you are to her for this. This will help you in your spiritual development and in working with your egoism.

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A question I received: How can one reveal the whole system of reality and make the right calculation? After all, even physicists with the most up-to-date computers at their disposal cannot determine the exact location of an electron at the next given millisecond. And what does it mean to completely reveal the universe?

My Answer: Of course, physicists acting within matter cannot know what will happen in the next moment. This is especially true if they delve so deeply into their studies that the borderline between matter, waves, and other forms of existence fades; and they start to be confused with the concepts of time, motion, and space. At this borderline our senses stop perceiving phenomena.

True reality is revealed in the form of forces that control Nature. These positive and negative forces unite at their source, which is called the Upper Force. Knowledge of it provides the basis for us to make the correct calculation.

Our world is a consequence of the forces that descend into it from above. Therefore, if we do not rise to a higher degree, we will forever remain here in the dark. We will never know why anything happens as it does, and we will always make mistakes! And with these mistakes, we will not even understand in what direction we are erring.

However, if we wish to exist correctly in this world, as compelled by nature, then we are able to do this only by rising to the next degree. This means revealing the general force that acts in nature and discovering the mechanism of its influence on all parts of the universe. This will allow us to make our every action in balance with the all-encompassing force of nature and live more positively.

This general force (called the Upper Force, Nature or the Creator) shows us through its blows that we have made an incorrect calculation and have gotten off track. In this manner, it forces us to rise to its own degree. But if we fail to rise to the level of the Upper Force, we will have horrible suffering ahead.

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In the News: (from The Alinga Consulting Group): “Crisis To Cleanse Russian Society, Says Country’s Chief Auditor” The Current economic and financial crisis will cleanse Russian society and will help create “an economy of happiness,” Sergei Stepashin, the chairman of the Audit Chamber says in an interview published by the Moscow-based Nezavissimaya Gazeta daily Wednesday. “I’m sure we’ll create an economy of the future, an economy of happiness for our people after we go through the cleansing with the aid of this crisis,” Stepashin says. He sees “a loss of connection” between business and morality as a major root-cause of the crisis. “We’ll get out of the crisis when we tie up economic activity to morals and business, to morality,” Stepashin says.

My Comment: Overall, he is right. But what do we have to do in order to attain the bright future about which he speaks? Kabbalah says that the only thing we have to do is to change man’s nature, which is something that can only be done by means of the force that created man.

The force that reforms human nature can only be attracted using a special method – Kabbalah. This is why the science of Kabbalah is known as “The work of God” – because it gives us the opportunity to draw the force of the Creator (Nature’s Upper Force) that will correct us. This is the only way we can succeed!

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In order to reach the purpose of creation, we need a special force – one that is external, existing outside of us. Without its help, all our efforts to reach the Upper World (or in other words, to perform acts of love and bestowal) will be futile. It is because our entire nature is the will to receive. Therefore, every action we make is done in order to fulfill ourselves. Even if we weigh in the needs of others, we do it out of fear or because the person we give to is so close to us that we feel he is a part of us.

The engine of all our actions is self-love. Therefore, we cannot truly care for others and bestow to them. We have a desire to fulfill ourselves at the expense of others, which is called “egoism.” This desire is what differentiates the human level from the animate one.

When man is uncorrected, he is worse than an animal, but when he attains correction, he becomes equal to the Creator. Every person in the world feels unique and exceptional, but when this feeling is coupled with egoism, it turns into the worst, most destructive force in Nature.

However, this too has a purpose: we have to discover the utter lowliness of this state in order to single out the corrupted form of the feeling of being unique, exclusive and exceptional. We will then be able to truly plead with the Creator, asking Him to change the way we use this feeling. It will then transform into goodness and love for all, where every person’s love for everyone will be unique and special.

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Because our egoistic desire constantly develops, we also perceive the world as becoming more developed, as the world is our internal, subjective perception. As our desire grows, we feel that we become more developed, yet we also feel emptier.

As each individual egoistic desire (each person) develops, it starts to feel its dependence on the other egoistic desires (other people). At the same time, it perceives them as alien and strange to it. This kind of perception was created inside us on purpose, so we would collect all the other desires and make them our own.

It is in order to make us do this that the circumstances make each of us feel our dependence on the environment, whether our country or town, our relatives, the world, or all humanity. We later discover that our connection to the world is not simply necessary for our existence in this life, but in order to create the Upper World and our future existence.

This is why a new law is being revealed to us in this world: the law of mutual participation, or the law of mutual guarantee, altruism, and unity.

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Two questions I received about crossing the Machsom:

Question: How does one know the very moment he crosses the Machsom? Is this something he just instinctively knows?

My Answer: It is when he reveals a connection with the whole universe, the Upper Force and all the worlds.

Question: How does a person know if he has crossed the Machsom?

My Answer: He knows it because he attains the quality of bestowal, the perception that the world is his and that it is one whole. And through the quality of of bestowal, he perceives the Governing Force.

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