The System Of Our Spiritual Development

Question: What is a punishment in spirituality?

Answer: There is no actual punishment in the wisdom of Kabbalahbecause we don’t deal with a human being who seems to get tired of something, angry, or regret something, but only with the system of providence. If we don’t perform a certain role, the system operates in an alternative manner and takes care of us accordingly.

If I drive my car in fourth gear and something suddenly breaks, I change to third gear. Now the engine works much harder and I drive more slowly and feel less comfortable, but I still keep driving. Then another part breaks and I switch to another state, which means that everything depends on our participation. The greater it is, the faster we advance, of course, in greater comfort, above time, overcoming everything by small efforts on our part, along the path of goodness and not the path of sufferings.

Therefore it isn’t about any punishments, although we use this term in everyday language. There are no punishments in our world either. If you behave properly, you advance along this path; if you don’t, you are corrected. We call this correction punishment. It isn’t a punishment but a correction.

As for the system of correction. it is absolutely unemotional. We only attribute human qualities to it, like the good and the benevolent.

I can also say that when I play the piano, for example, I regard it emotionally as if it is my partner or a friend. A person applies his feelings to objects he works with no matter what he engages in, like a computer, for example, although it is just a piece of metal. This is also how we relate to the Creator, although it is an unemotional system, as it is written: “He has given a law that cannot be broken.” The Creator is the law of nature!
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 4/15/15