News Report (from Science Daily): “Our Unconscious Brain Makes The Best Decisions Possible” Neuroscientists Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky received a 2002 Nobel Prize for their 1979 research that argued humans rarely make rational decisions. Contrary to Kahnneman and Tversky’s research, Alex Pouget, associate professor of brain and cognitive sciences at the University of Rochester, has shown that people do indeed make optimal decisions – but only when their unconscious brain makes the choice.

My Comment: No doubt, our earthly mind does not feel the goal which the Creator sets for us at every instant, whereas the unconscious is closer to the truth because it is led by the by the instinct rather than the corporeal circumstances. When one’s consciousness isn’t bound by egoism, which desires and calculates everything to make a profit, then one sees the truth!

Hence, we must first rise above egoism and see the world truly objectively, outside of ourselves, of our “I.” Only then can we use our egoism to attain “outside.” This attainment will indeed be called the “Upper World” – a world that’s above egoism, above our nature.

Related Material:
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Kabbalah Today Article: Rising Above the Ego to a New Level of Consciousness
Article: “Kabbalah – The Key to Perceiving Reality”
Kabbalah for Beginners: “Stage One”

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News Report (from PloS One): New Japanese research concludes that greater interpersonal trust is strongly associated with a better quality of life, including physical, psychological, social, and environmental quality of life.

My Comment: Small egoism or an artificial suppression of egoism creates a sense of comfort, because “One who increases his knowledge, increases his grief.” This is why an animal’s life is easier than a human’s. But of course, reducing one’s egoism is no solution to a problem because you can’t fool nature. According to the Creator’s plan, egoism must continue growing until it demonstrates its own incompetence to its possessor, or in other words, until it shows us that it is the source of evil.

This is egoism’s primary mission, as it says in the Torah, “I created a helper against you” (Ezer Ke Negdo). One way or another, the growing egoism will force “its master” (as man thinks at first) or more correctly – “its slave” (as man later realizes) to use it. There is just one solution: comfort can only be achieved by correcting egoism. This not only enables a person to rise above egoism, but because one uses it to bestow, one senses the life of the general soul (Adam). In other words, one perceives his next level – beyond the existence of his animate body, the state of Adam, an existence that’s equivalent to the Creator. He reveals the Creator inside him.

There is so little separating us from happiness!

Related Material:
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From Chaos to Harmony: Part 1, Chapter 2 “The Boundaries of Joy”

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News Report (from CommodityOnline): “World is hit by hyperinflation & monetary collapse” The most probable sequence of events resulting in hyperinflation and monetary collapse is as follows:

1. A broad based shortage of goods that are thought essential develops and this is not relieved in time to satisfy demand.

2. Consumers trying to acquire essential goods that they believe are in short supply become fearful and are prepared to pay increasingly higher prices and stockpile these goods further increasing shortages and accelerating prices as a sellers market develops.

3. Prices rise for essential goods in short supply as an increasing proportion of the money supply circulates in these goods, also with increasing velocity and as most of these goods are consumables with high turnover upward re pricing quickly occurs.

4. The proportion of available money circulating in goods that are perceived as essential increases and the demand for less essential goods diminishes i.e essentials become disproportionately more expensive than the norm against non essential goods displacing money towards the goods most in demand further fueling inflation,

5. The shortage of essential goods accelerates as manufacturers increasingly focus on short term survival, longer term risk is avoided and investment in the production cycle is reduced accelerating 1.

6. The normal balance of demand for all goods increasingly prefers those goods required to satisfy primary needs and people engaged in making and supplying less immediately essential or non essential goods become unemployed who then pressures governments accelerating condition 9.

7. Eventually goods not immediately required but non the less essential are needed and rapidly increase in price as they also become in short supply.

8. Consumers with least money first find it increasingly difficult to secure essential goods, become frightened and are forced to allocate greater proportions of their money on essential goods and demand greater income.

9. The demand for money forced by need and fear becomes irresistible so governments feel insecure and provide increasing amounts of fiat new money.

10. Consumers first to spend the new money see some value but soon as this new money is distributed and its value is lost, the velocity of money also accelerates as people rapidly exchange money for goods, wealth is seen as best protected when stored as goods rather than cash further increasing price and reinforcing condition 9.

My Comment: This is a perfectly logical scenario, although it may drag out over years and hence seem unrealistic to us right now. But more importantly, the solution to the economic crisis must be a moral one, because it’s the next level of human development. The solution must be fundamentally different, bringing us to the new, following level.

The universal interdependence (the global nature of our “small village”) shows us that in order to come out of the crisis, we must change our current relationships to the opposite ones. We have always sought to separate from one another, but today, in order to survive, we will have to start caring for one another. We cannot wait for instructions to come from the authorities or the government. It is man who must change (correct himself), and hence, it’s up to him to create this change (via education).

The new social relationships of mutual care will gradually produce a new system of government – a council of people who are great with respect to their vision of Nature and Society (the Creator).

Related Material:
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News Report by economics expertReinhard Göweil (translated from the Austrian newspaper KURIER): In the USA, the holiday season sales decreased by 8%. The Japanese industry declined by 16% this year. Economists call this situation, “freefall.” In many European countries, economic leaders tried to hush up the situation at first. But now it’s time to put the cards on the table: the world is entering a financial crisis that will bring so much destruction of property and jobs that anything comparable has only been known to happen after a war.

The capitalism of Reagan and Thatcher that was set free in the 80’s has brought its own demise. We now need a complete transformation of our economic and social behavior. The economy must start providing people with the necessities and stop being an end in itself.

My Comment: Whether it will happen through this crisis or the following ones (it’s up to us how many crises will be necessary), we will be cleansed. In some countries, hundreds of types and brands of goods and products will vanish from the counters, because some people aren’t content with just making money – they have to line their pockets as well. Meanwhile, necessary products will appear in other countries. In a unified, global world, everything must be arranged differently: everything in the world, all the things existing in nature and on the earth (all the natural resources), is common property and belongs to everyone. Everything that is produced must be distributed among everyone by one global authority, according to each person’s needs, like in one family.

Until we establish this system of interactions, we will continue to oppose the closed system of Nature in which we exist. For the time being we are like cancerous cells in a body. Therefore, our freefall is not an ordinary freefall, like jumping off a plane with a parachute. However, if we open up the safety canopy of Kabbalah above us, we will be saved! (In the image above, the word “Kabbalah” is written on the parachute.)

Related Material:
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Two questions I received on conversion to Judaism:

Question: Why would you say that Rabbi Akiva was not Jewish? How carried away can you get? He was 100% Jewish! I guess tomorrow Rav Ashlag will also be called non-Jewish!

My Answer: First of all, this doesn’t matter at all in relation to the Torah. We are all Babylonians by origin. The Jews started calling themselves differently because they differed from other people in that they based their lives on the law, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” This is what is now required from the whole of humanity, including the Jews, who have fallen from the level of following this rule.

I heard my teacher explain Rabbi Akiva’s origin. You can also go to Google.com, type in the words “Akiva proselyte” and read what it says. Please verify your knowledge. And you shouldn’t get so offended: it’s an honor to be a proselyte! After all, it’s an indication that a person went through correction. I wish for all of us to become proselytes as defined in the Torah! The Torah repeatedly states, “Love a proselyte.”

Question: Upon reading the text, “The Last Generation,” I came once again upon the reference to Jews and Gentiles. I am the latter in the physical sense and have at times felt exclusion from Kabbalah because of this fact. But I have read with much interest other texts where the dynamic has been clearly explained in the spiritual realm: the term “Jew” pertaining to an individual with the point in the heart. However, I still seem to feel that there are two definitions in various texts, some referring to the physical and others referring to the non-physical. Any clarity would be greatly appreciated on what is the correct way to view these two terms.

My Answer: There is no such nationality or people as “Jews”! It’s because this “nation” emerged from Abraham’s students, according to their spiritual quality. Kabbalah explains that there are 70 spiritual roots of the nations of the world, but there is no separate spiritual root for the nation of Isra-El! And that’s because anyone who aspires to the Creator can become Israel. Here is what we have today:

• A genetic Jew must study and disseminate Kabbalah (see item 70 of the “Introduction to the Book of Zohar”).
• A spiritual Jew (Isra-El) is any person who aspires to reveal the Creator.

Related Material:
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Shamati #72: “Confidence Is the Clothing for the Light”
Baal HaSulam Article: “The Love for the Creator & Love for the Created Beings”

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News Report (from The Daily Galaxy): “DNA Found to Have ‘Impossible’ Telepathic Properties” Scientists are reporting evidence that contrary to our current beliefs about what is possible, intact double-stranded DNA has the “amazing” ability to recognize similarities in other DNA strands from a distance. Somehow they are able to identify one another, and the tiny bits of genetic material tend to congregate with similar DNA.

The recognition of similar sequences in DNA’s chemical subunits, occurs in a way unrecognized by science. There is no known reason why the DNA is able to combine the way it does, and from a current theoretical standpoint this feat should be chemically impossible.

My Comment: The forces of unity (bestowal, love, and mutual responsibility) come from the next, higher “intellectual” level than the level of the egoistic elements that unite. For example, every cell and organ in our bodies is egoistic, but by uniting together, each one annuls its egoism and they acquire the quality of complete bestowal and mutual interaction. This way they rise to the next degree of existence: a living and developing body.

The nature of attraction lies in recognizing those who are similar to you, according to the law of balance (homeostasis), or the law of similarity. Two opposite elements – whether cells or other structures – are drawn to each other according to the program of creating a higher mutual existence. This is the connection between all parts of the universe, including all the spiritual worlds. Any connection leads to the assimilation of the following level of existence.

Related Material:
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News Report (from Commodity Online): “Food crisis leaves over 1 billion hungry!” The FAO’s hunger report, the State of Food Insecurity in the World 2008, found that the overwhelming majority of the hungry live in the developing world, 65% of them in just seven countries: India, China, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Pakistan and Ethiopia.

My Comment: With our globally egoistic attitude (mutual hatred) toward one another and the surrounding nature, we will not be able to sustain more than one fifth of humanity. Everyone else will have to die. However, if we correct our egoistic relationships to those of “Love thy neighbor as thyself,” the planet will be able to feed scores more people than are now living.

“Unite or perish” – is the condition of “Mutual Guarantee,” proclaimed by Moses at (against) Mount Sinai (in Hebrew “Sinai” comes from the word “hatred”) to his people: “Either you will unite and be guarantors for one another, as a single whole, or this place, beneath the mountain of your egoism, will be the place of your burial.” Kabbalah explains that everything written in the Torah is meant for us, for our generation. We will have to actualize the whole Biblical tale ourselves!

Question: Several years ago the European countries united into one economic zone. The Latin American countries now want to form a similar union. Under the current conditions, do these unions strengthen these countries or weaken them?

My Comment: If the union is not done at others’ expense, and moreover, if it is done in order to pave the way for future universal unification, then it strengthens them. However, if the unification is private, done in order to set them against others – then it will destroy the people who do it!

In the future, the world will not have to become one country; there may be many countries and nations, each with its respective culture. However, the relationships between them will have to be harmonious and amicable. It’s just as in a body, where all the parts are different, but each one is exactly what the others need.

Related Material:
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News Report (translated from Spiegel Online): The director of the UN World Food Program, Ralf Südhoff criticizes Western politics for being shortsighted: “The financial crisis hasn’t even turned into an economic crisis yet, but already everyone has forgotten about the starving people and the victims of HIV in third-world countries. But a billion hungry people are a real threat!”

My Comment: The authorities are afraid of having hungry people turn up at their own homes! Chances are that Africa will be completely forgotten during the crisis. After all, only an awareness of the common “body” (or system) and a vision of our clear interdependency with each other, can force humanity to think about the third world.

A question I received: What will happen to agriculture during the current global crisis?

My Answer: It will also experience a crisis.

News Report (from European Commission): The European Commission and the World Bank have released a new map of Travel Time to Major Cities, showing that:

• the global urban population is over 50%

• 95% of the people live on just 10% of the land

My Comment: Unlike the previous times of hunger, it’s no longer possible to survive by having your own parcel of land.

Related Material:
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Questions I received on questions and answers:

Question: I am confused about how you can give one answer to many questions asked by different people. You treat them as if they are robots, and you give everyone the same answer: that they have got it all wrong and that their path will clear up with time. I agree that there is a lot of confusion along the way, but how can you assume this kind of authority? After all, every soul is different from the others, and their paths are also different. Just as there cannot be two identical people, there can’t be one answer for everyone. I think that you have to open up to people a bit more.

My Answer: Man is the desire to enjoy. Everything is determined only by the size and quality (type) of the desire. Generally speaking, everyone develops in the same way – just like it happens with children’s physical development. There is only one Law. And just like with children, the differences are insignificant. The method is the same for everyone, and I was not the one who created it. The Teacher (me) explains the method and the rules of spiritual development; he gives answers and advice, and the student applies them to himself. Through the searching and the confusion, called “the Creator’s concealment,” one seeks the opportunity to reveal the Creator by changing himself.

I understand your complaints about me and about the path, but you will have to accept the conditions of spiritual development – “from darkness to the Light.” Continue reading and you will see why it cannot be different.

Question: Sometimes people ask you simple questions on the blog, but your answers are so complicated that it seems as if you’re not answering the questions directly. Instead the answers always come with broad, lengthy and complicated explanations. Is there a reason for this? I sincerely hope that you will have the courage to post this question.

My Answer: It’s because I’m either unable to give a simpler answer, though I do try, or you don’t understand the depth of the question and the answer.

Question: When I have questions, should I look for the answers only through my study? Or should I ask them and make them public? Or can I combine these two alternatives?

My Answer: By making efforts, you evoke the influence of the Correcting Light (Ohr Makif) upon you. As a result of Its influence, you will start understanding and seeing through the matter of our world.

Related Material:
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Three questions I received on various spiritual practices:

Question: These days we hear many things about secret societies and their influence in our society – societies like the Knights Templar, Rosicrucians and the Freemasons. What does Kabbalah say about these brotherhoods? Are their teachings in accordance with Kabbalah? Are they a good thing to join? Or are they agents who only follow their ego ?

My Answer: I think of them as childish games. All of the secrecy is just for blowing up their importance.

There is a possibility to influence the Creator and thus to govern the world, and it is available to everyone – to the degree one becomes corrected so as to be good toward everyone.

Question: Is there only one school of Kabbalah or several?

My Answer: There are other groups that study Kabbalah. You can probably find them on the Internet.

Question: I am interested in the issue about the red strings. Some say that they have no relation to Kabbalah. Others say that they protect people from “the evil eye.” I understand that this could be explained as a psychological effect, but I heard that the red strings give one a connection with protective energy (due to being produced in a special ritual setting).

My Answer: They are no more than a psychological effect. Kabbalah forbids this because it is a deceit and distracts a person from the goal for which he and this world were created.

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: The Illuminati’s Coming to Get You… NOT!
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Kabbalah Today Article –  Kabbalah: User Manual
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