A Pauper Who Is Rich And A Billionaire Who Is Poor

Question: I always hear that the Creator is good that does good, but in the meantime I don’t feel this. So how can I be happy?

Answer: We are used to being happy when we feel that we have gained. If the ego gains at every moment, if it is comfortable, good, warm, and pleasant for me, money drips into my account, “One penny and another penny accumulate into a great sum” (Baba Batra 9b) and I enjoy. Thank God everything is okay, soon I will take a vacation, sail on a luxury liner, on Shabbat my favorite soccer team is playing; there is something to enjoy in life!

This is what we call “pleasure,” but this is joy now or in the future within the desire to receive. That is how we live. If I don’t feel joy in the present or in the future, I am ready to die. A person is not able to exist without joy, if not now, then at least from hope for joy in the future. Otherwise, “it is better for me to die than to live” (Jonah 4:3).

Now the question is asked, how can we be happy in a situation where we really want spiritual revelation but don’t have it? If at the moment we don’t have it, then everything depends on hope for the future; am I confident that ultimately I will have it? It is clear that in the present I don’t have anything! “A judge only has what his eyes see” (Sanhedrin 6b), and I see that I have not yet discovered the spiritual world, don’t understand and don’t feel it.

But am I sure that I will discover it? If I am in a group and the group radiates confidence to me that we are going towards revelation and we will reach it, then I will be happy! The friends give me the confidence that we will succeed. Without this, I won’t succeed in advancing; rather, I will simply sleep all day so I won’t suffer, because at the moment I have no joy and also don’t expect it in the future. It is impossible to die, and what is left is just to sleep, at least not feel anything.

This is exactly what happens to a person. This is natural; there is nothing to do about it. The question is how do we deal with this? How is it possible to stimulate the environment so that it will influence us and we will be happy and full of energy? For this it is up to us to appreciate the friends and to be connected with them. And in addition to this, we must awaken the Light that Reforms together so that it will stimulate us all the time and provide excitement. And then I will not only be excited by the words of the people, but I will receive illumination from above through them.

This illumination is called “faith.” Faith is power that I invest without getting anything in return. It seems that this is impossible, but the Light will influence me and will give me the possibility of doing it. This is called, “faith above reason.” According to my nature, I am not ready to bestow without receiving anything in exchange! But if the Light will give me a characteristic like this, then I can. And then my happiness will not be connected to fulfillment within my Kelim. As it is said: “Who is rich? It is the one who is happy with his lot” (Pirkei Avot 4:1).

And what is his lot? He doesn’t have anything! But he is happy. Maybe he is crazy or stupid? No, he is truly the richest and happiest person! The rich don’t feel happy because they are pursuing even greater wealth all the time, and they are not “the one who is happy with his lot.” This is called feeling rich and happy. He doesn’t need anything more; imagine what a wonderful feeling this is. Even billionaires don’t feel this way because they want more and more money. They are the poorest people of all! If an ordinary person doesn’t have a thousand dollars, they don’t have millions, billions. So which of us is poorer, who needs more? It means that everything depends on the environment and the illumination of the Ohr Makif (Surrounding Light).
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From the 3d part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/5/14, Writhing of Baal HaSulam

The Secret From Which Everything Begins

Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to the Book, Panim Meirot uMasbirot,” Section 1: It is the opposite of the argument of the negligent in attaining the interior, who say to themselves: “We settle for attaining the Peshat. If we attain that, we will be content.” Their words can be compared to one who wishes to step on the fourth step without first stepping on the first three steps.

May God grant us the understanding of the simple meaning, the knowledge of which they attribute to themselves. After all,  on the way to it we must pass through the way of the Sod (secret), Drush (interpretation) and Remez (hint). And as long as we haven’t completed the previous steps, what simple meaning can there be? A person attains the Peshat on the fourth level of the corrected desire; how can that happen if we haven’t yet corrected the first, second, and third levels?

When I correct the first level of the desire to receive, I discover that the entire Torah is a big secret for me. And this is already an attainment. Until now I didn’t even know this, and now I understand my lack of knowledge. As a result of this, a connection is made between me and something that is hidden from me, but for now I cannot discover this secret. And after this the Drush appears, I already penetrate into things and see the connections between them, but still don’t understand the principles by which they operate.

After this I discover the Remez; I still don’t recognize the causes and the results, don’t get the exact purpose, but I can already see how the Creator operates and I can cooperate with Him. And only on the fourth level do I gradually attain His goal, and this is already adhesion. And then the Peshat is revealed to me because between me and the Creator there is no longer any concealing clothing, no screens, or partitions.

So if a person already studies Torah, he must relate to it with great seriousness. This is because it is called Kedusha (Sanctity) and Kedusha is bestowal. Am I advancing correctly towards bestowal through learning the Torah?

By learning the wisdom of Kabbalah I gradually discover that I am immersed in darkness, I don’t understand and don’t feel that something exists that is concealed from me, inaccessible to me. This feeling is the discovery of Sod, a very important feeling in the present stage. For this desire, the deficiency that dominates in me, will help me to reach Peshat.

And yet how is it possible to remain indifferent when I see that I don’t even have a drop of understanding? This is worse than death, for the dead don’t feel anything and I feel a spiritual deficiency. I am most unfortunate. So, as a result of studying, we discover darkness….

Question: How can this be? I thought that after we discover the Sod, we solve all the problems.

Answer: In this way I solve the biggest problem; I finally understand that all of my problems are derived from my attitude towards the Creator. In other words, it is up to me to build the right relationship.

Until now I didn’t know this. It seemed to me that it was about other causes and circumstances. And now, after I attain the Sod, I see that I have no connection with the Creator and that I depend only on Him. This is already not bad, for it is the truth. Finally I am locked in, connected to something true, real.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/5/14, Writhing of Baal HaSulam

Formula For A Happy Life

Question: What does Putin want from Israel?

Answer: It doesn’t matter what he wants. It is said: “The hearts of ministers and kings are in the Creator’s hands.” Do not think of politicians as an independent power. Not one of them understands exactly what is going on in the world, neither Putin, nor Obama, nor anybody else.

Unfortunately, the same can be said about the Israeli government. Everything is in the Creator’s hands, not Obama’s, Putin’s, or Netanyahu’s. Thank God! Otherwise, the world would have already collapsed.

The world needs to be balanced; it has to attain a state where people clearly see what the system of relations among them really looks like. Only when our relations will be revealed to us, will we learn how to correct them. Only unity can lead us to correction. Politics, economics, industry, all kinds of international trade liaisons are useless. The only thing that can really help is a new type of education that will lead humanity to global unity.

Until now, the world connected through trade, economy, military, and security,but now we see that the connecting threads are temporary; they come and go. The prior world was built on the foundation of egoism. Now, it vanishes.

Question: What kind of unity does Israel have to offer to the world?

Answer: Israel will have to offer unity among and inside the nations. It’s the kind of unity that emerges above our egos. Our selfishness will teach us to rise above it and unite.

Israel is obligated to transfer the methodology of unity to the world since there is no other force that can do it rather than us. If Israel fulfills its mission, it will be the major country in the world; it will govern over and bring benevolence to other nations. It will spread the methodology of correction, unity, and love.

Our world is egoistic since all of us are born with a selfish nature. We have to implement a special methodology, a formula, that allows us to connect beyond the egoism that burns in every individual, each country, and among nations.

The people of Israel possess the methodology. The Jewish people used it three and a half thousand years ago. They still retain “records,” the internal data of the state of unity they have been through.

At some point, the Jewish people managed to implement unity. They constituted a single unity whose major value was connectedness. The Jewish people lived in unity for about fifteen hundred years, starting with Abraham until the destruction of the Temple.

Thousands of years ago, we fell from this height, from the state of unity that connected us above our egoism. Inside every person there is an ego, but there also is a force that helps us rise above it, beyond a constantly growing and renewing personal and overall egoism.

All of us make efforts to rise above our egoism and connect with each other beyond it. Should we succeed, we will reveal a new reality called the Upper world.
The common state we are trying to build together is called Adam (Man). Inside Adam, we will disclose a new spirit called the soul, the Upper Light, or the Creator. The world advances towards the state for which it was created.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 8/6/15

One Law Of Love For The Whole World

Question: Why would we start fighting with and killing each other if every country will be able to produce everything it needs and no longer needs foreign lands and workers?

Answer: Why do you fight with your wife? Usually it’s because of some silly thing that has no significance. Countries will fight with each other the same way, because our egoism, the hatred that lives within a person, will not allow us to live in peace and friendship.

A person is built with an evil and egoistic nature. Therefore, we will see that although we no longer depend on each other on one hand, we will want to destroy each other nonetheless. And the only solution is to unite above all the personality differences, so that “love covers all transgressions.”

Question: So what will happen to 2,000 nations, which the world will be divided into?

Answer: All these 2,000 nations will accept one law that will force us to unite above all national differences. And only a special education will make this possible because it will raise people above our egoism.

Question: How will a person living in one of these 2,000 countries feel?

Answer: A person will feel that there are two parts in him. One part is his natural evil inclination, the blazing egoism inside him, which he despises. And in the other part, he wishes to be above the egoism, above his instinctive egoistic tendencies, and above them to unite with others.

In this manner we will achieve a peaceful, happy, and prosperous life. We will feel that we are in the “Garden of Eden,” where an infernal fire blazes underneath the earth. One cannot be without the other.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 8/6/15

The Way I Am Is The Way I See Others

Question: Society in Israel today is very divided and full of hatred. It is split into many communities and factions according to a thousand different factors, and each one hates the others. You say that the holiday of Lag BaOmer is the turning point from hatred to unity between people?

Answer: Love is inseparable from unification. It is impossible to unite without love and it is impossible to love without uniting. Unity is an expression of love.

The counting of days of Omer is the correction from hatred to love. We came out of Egypt, revealed the kind of egoism that dwells in us, and we are beginning to correct it. This correction consists of 49 stages—the 49 days of counting the Omer, during which we fix our relationships with everyone else, starting with the easiest and progressing to more and more complex ones.

The 33^rd day of Omer is the so-called “Lag BaOmer”—it is a milestone, and when we reach it we can be certain that we will correct all of our hatred, regardless of its power. When we reach this day, we receive such strength that allows us to correct everything else.

Hatred is corrected only with the force of the Light. With every day of the Omer comes a new portion of Light, a total of 49 portions, like an infusion. The Light is the force that is hidden in nature. Now we feel only a force of evil, egoism. In the whole word that surrounds us: the inanimate, vegetative, animals, people, and in ourselves we see only the force of receiving, consuming, and self-love.

The fact is that I am an egoist, and therefore I reveal only the egoistic part in every person, animal, and any creature, according to the principle of “one judges according to his own flaws.” The way I am is how I see others.

Thus, we feel that all of nature is a force of evil, egoism, which forces us to think only about ourselves and receive pleasure from the suffering of others. However, there is another force in nature: in addition to a minus, there is also a plus, a positive force. However, this force is hidden and we don’t feel it.

We have to extract this positive force from nature so that it can correct us and balance the evil force in us.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 4/30/15

Who Determines The Appearance Of The World?

A very egoistic perception of the world is typical in humanity, according to which we think that the world revolves according to the way that we manage it. That is what governments, powerful people, the rich, and the successful think. Even the simplest person thinks that his entire life is the result of what he does.

Everyone blames someone for anything that happens, and all of us think that we are the masters in this world. We acknowledge that the nature of humanity is evil and egoistic, but what can be done if we are like that? That is how we are and that is how we live and run the world. Certainly we could manage it better, not with such barbarity, but more thoughtfully and humanely. But nothing can be done about our being like that.

We construct all kinds of systems and try to be involved in this world as much as possible. We agree that it is imperfect, but that is how it is. People suppose that the world is the result of our management, our behavior, the connection between us, culture, education, politics, economics, commerce, etc.

All of this determines how the world appears. We hope that through our actions we can improve our lives somehow, and we cannot accept that the picture of the world that we perceive and see is not at all the result of our activities.

But the Creator, the Higher Power, draws this picture for us at each and every moment according to the Reshimot (spiritual genes). And a picture of the world is portrayed within us according to these Reshimot, and we cannot influence it in any way, but only determine the right attitude towards this picture, meaning an awareness that it comes to us entirely from the Creator. This applies to the past, the present, and the future. The Creator arranges our perception according to such a timeline.

What is important is not how we relate to the world, but how we relate to the Creator! The moment that we turn our attention toward the director, the origin, the Creator of the world, we immediately acquire the right perspective. And then it becomes clear that the whole world is concealed, evasive, a temporary image that is drawn within our mind with all of its nations, countries, and the entire terrible mess that is happening on the face of our small planet and within each and every individual person.

This picture becomes clearer to us at every moment in all kinds of different forms, in all of the various international and private quarrels, all of the different types of internal and external problems. All this is only so that when faced by all these troubles, we learn to justify the Creator, the source. All of these forms are clarified within our ego, within the desire to receive, which is the opposite of the Creator. And so we see our inner malfunctioning and perceive it as an external reality.

So we don’t need to regret the difficult situations that we went through in the past or that we are going through now in the present and to lose all hope for a good future. Rather we need to rise up and adhere to our root, which is only good that does good. And everything that we feel in this reality, ourselves, and this world is intended only so that above all of this we connect with the absolute good source and abandon our desire to receive in which we feel such a distorted and inferior picture of this world.
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From the preparation for the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/7/14

The Immense Potential Of The “Speaking”

From an article by Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to the Book, Panim Meirot uMasbirot”: Section 3: Let me explain the matter. We distinguish four divisions in the speaking species, arranged in gradations one atop the other. Those are the masses, the strong, the wealthy, and the sagacious. They are equal to the four degrees in the whole of reality, called:
a. Still,
b. Vegetative,
c. Animate,
d. “peaking.

…Atop them is the speaking, consisting of an emotional force and an intellectual force together. For this reason, its power is unlimited by time and space in attracting what is good for it and rejecting what is harmful, like the animate.

This is so because of its science, which is a spiritual matter, unlimited by time and place. One can teach others wherever they are in the whole of reality, and in the past and the future throughout the generations.

It follows that the value of one person from the speaking equalizes with the value of all the forces in the vegetative and the animate in the whole of reality at that time, and in all the past generations. This is so because its power encompasses them and contains them within its own self, along with all their forces.

After the desire to receive was created, it began to develop not quantitatively, as if its weight was one kilogram and it developed into ten kilograms. In no place in nature is quantitative development considered to be development. If a child were to grow, increasing only his weight, he would be called mentally undeveloped.

This means that we always associate development with a new quality. First of all there is the gathering of wisdom, the recognition of evil, inquiries and observations. And if we require more power for this, then we get it accordingly.

Apparently, only qualitative changes are considered to be developmental in nature. Quantitative development is not considered. What would the benefit be from adding one more, a million more or even a billion more of the same? But it is important that an addition changes the quality, like a change in the number of electrons, protons, and additional particles within the atom, and accordingly there is development.

The atoms connect into molecules; the molecules become more and more complex and connect into cells. The nucleus of the cell appears within the center of the cell and is ready to manage the processes within the cell. The cells gain the possibility of connecting, specializing in different activities. This is not talking about the number of cells here, but about their quality. Different types of cells begin to be formed from stem cells from which the human body is built.

This means that development is always qualitative. Baal HaSulam doesn’t talk about quantities either. There are four levels of development that exist in the world: still, vegetative, animate, and speaking; they are levels of development and are qualitative. The qualitative development is that the desire to receive begins to understand what it wants more and more.

And this is right, from where could it know what it wants? If I am a desire to receive, in order to know what my desire is, I must know what the Creator wants from me. I am not conscious of this on the levels of the still, vegetative, and animate. And on the level of the speaking, I already begin to understand that my intellect is a copy of the intellect of the Creator who implanted it in me because it was specifically His desire that I would understand and think and would be conscious of Him in a form like this.

This is called development. Thanks to development like this, I can control myself and the various processes. But it is up to me to understand that all of the systems that are found in me, all of my intellect and emotion, all of the results of development are a gradual copying within me of the characteristics of the Creator. He leaves only one thing in me,freedom of choice within these systems, meaning to resemble Him or not!

That is how we developed according to these levels, shaping more and more complex systems on the levels of the still, vegetative, animate and speaking. And this makes it possible for us to approach the understanding of our nature more and more on the level of the speaking and control the levels of the still, vegetative, and animate. We add more and more desire to receive to ourselves, and together with this, we add to our ability to use it.

On the level of Adam this is no longer talking about a greater ability to use the desire to receive, but about the ability to understand the desire itself. The level of the Animate realizes itself maximally. The Adam is constructed differently from a qualitative aspect and for him the main thing is not to realize his desire, but the purpose for which he is doing this. The level of Adam (Man) begins specifically from it. Otherwise, we would be a continuation of the animate level. For an Adam, what is important is the reason he wants to realize himself.

Here begins the recognition of evil. We run after different goals that only cause trouble for us, until the Adam—by the way of Beito (in its time), by the way of suffering— reaches the question: What is the reason for living? This means that he searches for a suitable purpose to which it does not bother him to dedicate his life. The development of desire is done gradually and systematically and ultimately brings us to the right result.
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From the 3d part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/6/14, Writings of Baal HaSulam

A Specific Replica Of The Creator In My Heart

Question: What inside me resembles the Creator exactly?

Answer: The Creator gives us a very small desire. It isn’t even considered a replica of the Creator because our world is simply a fleeting shadow. It is just like being allowed to smell a bowl of soup instead of being able to eat the soup.

It is practically nothing, but still this is where we start.

The Creator only gives us the stimulus, the awakening towards Him and that’s all. Everything we receive later in addition to the initial stimulus comes from the group and the teacher. Without the group and the teacher a person has no chance of reaching any contact with the Creator and of fulfilling the connection with Him properly. The group is his spiritual vessel and the teacher is the upper level, and then there is the Creator.

The Creator only gives you the initial awakening: He brings a person to the right environment and says, “Take it!” But in order to take it we need to connect to the group, to the teachers, and to the books, and through them to the Creator. Before that we only have a point in the heart, a spark that the Creator awakens in us that forces us to search for Him.

Everything else in us belongs to the level of the animate and is not a replica of the Creator’s attributes but simply a developed desire to enjoy. A human being is only the point that yearns for the Creator. This is the point of the desire to enjoy that is connected to Bina, to the desire to bestow.

If there is no such connection between the desire to enjoy and the desire to bestow, ifMalchut and Bina are not connected, the created being is not called a human being,Adam, who resembles the Creator. Such a connection can only be in phase four and actually not in all of phase four but only in its special part that is later clarified. Only the human level in our desire is designated to ascend towards the Creator.

Question: Why do we need the inanimate, vegetative, and the animate levels of nature in the first place?

Answer: The desire to enjoy has to develop through all these levels because otherwise it cannot be independent. On the first three levels there is the same desire to enjoy, but it operates itself according to the internal software embedded in it, while in phase four, the desire begins to ask “why do I have to operate this software?”

We need all the four phases for the desire to develop, since on the one hand, it has to totally disconnect from the Creator, and, on the other hand, it has to reach an equivalence of form with Him. Therefore, the Creator and the created being, which are the root phase and phase four, have to draw away from one another in all the other phases. An accurate calculation takes place on these levels as to which discernments are necessary for the created being in order to be opposite but at the same time similar to the Creator, in what exactly he is opposite from Him and in what way he is similar.

There must be an opposite part in the desire to enjoy that doesn’t change, but it has to be similar in his desire to bestow that is built above his desire to enjoy. These two forms exist in him simultaneously.
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From the 3d part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/6/14, Writings of Baal HaSulam

The Foundation Of Independence Is Detachment From The Creator

The “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah” is a very important introduction that Baal HaSulam wrote to prepare a person for studying from The Book of Zohar with the Sulam commentary.With its help, a person can approach The Book of Zohar to a particular degree while without the Sulam commentary The Book of Zohar is not understandable to us at all. The “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah” includes within it the entire wisdom of Kabbalah relevant to the descent of the worlds from above to below and what the ARI revealed in his book, Etz HaChaim (The Tree of Life).

Abraham was the one who revealed the progression of the worlds, and, after him, Moses described it in the Torah, but in a concealed, encrypted form, and now we are learning to realize the progression of the worlds in practice. So, we must discover it in an understandable and appropriate way for realization and usage.

Because of this, Baal HaSulam explained all of the wisdom of Kabbalah from its beginning, from the source from which the thought of creation is derived and how the creation was created and materialized according to this thought. The Creator, the higher power of bestowal and love, creates outside of Himself something that is His opposite. If the Creator is the force of bestowal, He had to create the force of reception. But after the force of reception was created, it disappeared within the force of bestowal, meaning that it was managed by it one hundred percent. So it is as if the creature doesn’t exist, for substance is not what is important. Rather, what is important is whether it is independent from the Creator or not.

One could ask, how could it be independent? How is it possible to create something that later will be completely independent if it comes out of the Creator? After all, everything that the creature has is derived from the Creator, and it is impossible to sever this connection. It cannot be that there is anything new with a creature because everything that is new in him is also derived from the Creator. Nothing exists in the world other than the Creator.

So, how is it possible to bring the creature to independence? It is as if he were to negate and conceal the unity of the Creator in the world contrary to logic because if there is one source from which everything is derived and other than that nothing exists at all, how could it be that a creature would be independent at all so much so that he could be against his Creator and not artificially, but actually, according to his desire?

A very great profundity is concealed here that is not understood by us. We attain this independence only after we finish the entire correction. However, in the meantime, we need to learn all the stages according to which the Creator created the creature to make it possible for it to have freedom of choice.

Independence is detachment of the creature from the Creator. It is only when the creature has its own power, emotion, and intellect—everything that is required to be independent—and this is not merely to exist, but to determine his deeds on his own, independently, to rise to the level of the Creator. This process and its results seem impossible to us. So, the desire to receive that was created by the Creator as His opposite and is managed by Him must go through a progression of changes as a result of which he will acquire independence, the power to determine his independence according to his intellect and emotion.

For this, the desire for pleasure becomes detached from the Creator and connects to Him numerous times, which means that it goes through ascents and descents. Thanks to this, we begin to compare states and learn from them. In the beginning, we compare every descent and every ascent, and then we examine the ascents and descents in comparison to each other.

As a result of the experience that is gathered from the comparison between the ascents and descents and the examination of the future states in comparison to previous states, we develop our intellect and feelings. From the comparison between countless ascents and descents and the various connections between them, we build the sensations and intellect that are developed, and we construct the various stages between them.

Ultimately, the study of the Creator brings the creature to independence, for, as it is written, “By Your actions we know You.” The creature learns how the Creator behaves with him so that he builds himself in regard to the Creator according to this. Apparently, the foundation of independence is detachment from the Creator!

From the “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah”, item 4: Hence, when they are bound together, the will to receive is annulled in the Light within it, and can determine its form only once the Light has departed thence once. This is so because following the departure of the Light from it, it begins to crave it, and this craving properly determines and sets the shape of the will to receive.

Subsequently, when the Light dresses in it once more, it is regarded as two separate matters: Kli and Light, or Guf and Life. Observe closely, for this is most profound.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/2/14, Writings of Baal HaSulam

Meditation And Mirages

Question: I have heard that some people who meditate feel elevated and enlightened. They sense a whole gratefulness, which fills the entire world connected into whole one. What causes such a feeling within a person?

Answer: This sensation comes because people suppress their egoism with the help of the Eastern meditation and they start feeling one system. After all, they annulled their egoism, which was tearing this system into many parts. However, this is still not an elevation above the material world, above egoism.

They see the structure of reality, but they cannot govern it and exist inside it. This is only anticipation, a mirage, and a sensation of the wholeness of the world. In our world there are a lot of people who without any meditation feel that the nature is whole and everything is interconnected within it.

Scientists and all ordinary egoists come to the same conclusions. They also understand that the world is one system and therefore we have to protect animals, the ecology,  and follow the law of balance in nature. A person feels all of this in his ordinary egoistic desires and he does not demand to rise above his egoism.

The force that elevates one above his egoism is a completely different force. It can be attracted from nature only through unique exercises according to the method of Kabbalah. This force in reality gives us an opportunity to rise above our egoism and enter the next level of existence.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 1/25/15

Illusory Values, Mass Media, And The Wisdom Of Kabbalah

Question: The media is very successfully in using a person’s appearance in their advertisements to lure in customers with beauty. Why does such distinction exist between a beautiful and an ugly appearance?

Answer: It is a completely wrong approach, a very big misconception. Unfortunately, we are specially brought up to look at a person’s exterior and not at their inner world.

If we were pursuing a correct upbringing of a person, then by the time of puberty he or she would find a partner not based on their external characteristics, but on a sense of how much a particular person is close to him for proper procreation and the right coexistence.

And since we are constantly chasing illusory and false paradigms, it results in hook-ups and break-ups, without ever finding anything. Everything depends only on the upbringing.

This is yet another proof of how destructive our mass media are!

Question: Why don’t people feel that it is destroying them?

Answer: They feel it, but cannot do anything. They have not yet reached the point of recognition of evil in all the systems that they themselves created under the governance of the power-holders.

The masses are followers, like a docile flock, and they do everything in order to give profit to those who lead them. Though the leaders generally do not have anything either, they are simply chasing such illusory achievements as wealth, power, and fame.

Question: But I still cannot find that point in which all of this can be connected together. Or is it that 90% of humanity don’t even need to understand that we have to come to loveand bestowal?

Answer: You are not able find to it yet, you have to be taught this. This is why I am saying that the youth need to be connected with the older generations, i.e., with the learned Kabbalists who understand the meaning of life, who attained it, and are connected to it and can bring the growing generation to the right goal.

Today young people are being driven forward like a herd so they would appease those who are driving them. They need to realize this and not go along with the media that are brainwashing them.

Question: How can we help one another?

Answer: Only by studying Kabbalah, which gives us an understanding of what our nature is, what the means are for achieving the purpose for which we need to live, and so on.

By engaging in Kabbalah we begin to understand the structure of the world, paying no attention to whatever is happening around us. We need to study the system of creation, its operation and functioning, and then we will gradually understand how to move from the present reality to the reality that should be.
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From KabTV’s “Conversations with Michael Laitman” 10/8/14

How To Uncover The Future

Question: What does it mean to reveal the higher force, to uncover its intention, to reveal where it is leading me, and to uncover what it wants?

Answer: Ramchal (Moshe Chaim Luzzatto, a great Kabbalist who lived in the 18^th century in Italy), wrote that the wisdom of Kabbalahis intended only in order to learn the governance and purpose of the higher desire: why the Creator made all of these creations, what He wants from them, and what will be the end of all the incarnations of the world.

You shall know everything in terms of what happens in your body, in your thoughts, desires, in the mind and in the heart, everything that is happening in the world and where it leads. I am talking about a high attainment when you are on the same level as the upper force, as it is written in Hosea 3:5: “Afterwards shall the children of Israel return and seek the Lord their God… .”

You reveal the entire program of creation, all the forces that activate it, and you begin to receive the right to enter this program and control it, instead of the Creator. It is like with a child who grows up, and a father hands over his business so that the child will continue running it instead of him.

This is what it means to become a human being, man, since “man” (in Hebrew “Adam,” from the word “Edomeh,” similar) means similar to the Creator, similar to the upper. This is what we need to reach.

Question: Does this revelation affect the everyday life of a person?

Answer: Of course! First of all, you become the master of everything that is happening. You know what you are living for and how to arrange your life in order to extract from it the greatest benefit.

Baal HaSulam writes in the article “The Teaching of Kabbalah and Its Essence” that the wisdom of Kabbalah is the revelation of the higher governing force in all its properties and manifestations unfolding in the worlds and subject to the revelation by man in the future, until the end of all generations.

In other words, you see all the prospects ahead, until the end of the existence of our world at 6,000 years counting from the first revelation of the Creator to Adam HaRishon5775 years ago. You will reveal the future.
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From the Israeli Radio Program 103FM, 8/8/15

Let’s Disseminate!

Question: How does our dissemination qualitatively develop our desire?

Answer: It is thanks to the dissemination that I become one who bestows. There is no other action in our world that can make me resemble the Creator except dissemination.

I go somewhere in the evening and have a workshop there, a lecture, talk to people and gradually bring them closer to one another, encouraging them to think about the meaning of life, and telling them how we can improve our corporeal life.

Our corporeal life is only an excuse to participate in mutual bestowal. After all, the whole world is just an excuse, the internal motive to start building the right relationships above it. I tell people how we will be able to get rid of all our troubles and problems thanks to the right relations between us.

They care about what will happen to them in this world. They want me to draw a picture of the wonderful tomorrow for them and I have to draw for them the wonderful future we will have if we are more connected to one another. Having no other choice, it is a compromise for people, and the means to improve their corporeal future, while for me the corporeal life is temporary and only the stimulus, the excuse, the reason, to ascend to spiritual states.

This means that our goals and means are opposite from those of the public, but this is the difference between the levels: for me this is the state on the upper level and for them it is different on the lower level. But I perceive their corporeal desires and in order to fulfill them I suggest that they establish better relations between us and people already begin to think about improving the relations between them since without this our corporeal life will not improve.

I use their desire to correct the relations between everyone and actually raise them to my level. From my level, I already raise these desires to the level of the relations between people that belongs to the thought of creation and ask the Creator to give us the power to overcome the obstacles so that the connection between us will heal the painful wounds of humanity. After all, the fact that they feel blows is a sign of the lack of connection between us. Thus everyone reaches a state of harmony. An ordinary person reaches a certain level of connection with others and a corporeal filling. I get a chance to bestow unto them and thus to bestow unto the Creator, and the Creator enjoys! This means that all these three levels have advanced in the right direction. Thus I intensify the glory of the Creator in the world.

So let’s disseminate! But before we subdue ourselves before this action and delve into clarifications in order to understand exactly:

• Why we do it,
• What people want,
• Why we have to absorb their desires,
• How we can make sure that we will provide them with a good life only if we are connected,
• How I begin to feel that I have to bring people the right filling,
• Why I need the group in order to do that, since otherwise I will not be able to fulfill my role in dissemination,
• How we need the Creator in this matter.

I actually go out to ordinary people who complain about their corporeal problems and finally I feel that without the Creator’s help I am totally lost. The people format this deficiency in me—the need for the Creator! After all, I see that I cannot give them anything by myself if the Creator doesn’t help me.

Thus we actually connect to the upper force by the people, and therefore, we have to really appreciate our work in dissemination since it actually gives us an opportunity for a spiritual ascent.
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From the 3d part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3.6/14, Writings of Baal HaSulam

Not To Hurt The Group

Question:  How is it possible to attain such a big sensation of importance of the group that a real fear not to harm it will awaken? How can I develop this sensation so that it will not leave me?  Or is this also “above reason”?

Answer: The concern not to harm the group comes gradually under the influence of the Surrounding Light (Ohr Makif) and not in any other form.

The fear for the group, that it will be able to hold itself and work for the Creator, and the movement to the Creator, the sensation of responsibility that it depends on me—all this awakens under the influence of the Upper Light.

I cannot build it in me in an artificial manner. I can try to do certain actions towards it, but not more.

Our efforts will bring us gradually to it, but man needs to search constantly inside himself if this state already awakens in him.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/17/14

A Kabbalist Can Stop A War

Question: If a person has become a Kabbalist, has revealed the upper world, and senses the forces that are concealed from everyone else, how does that affect his daily life?

Answer: He, like everyone else, goes to work, takes care of his family, and raises his children. Nothing changes in his life except that from the moment that he becomes a Kabbalist, he can make our world better through his actions.

After all, he brings a positive force into the world against all the negative forces that are coming from everyone else.

All the others are egoists, and he is an altruist. So, he begins to make good changes in the world. He stops bad progressions of events, wars, disasters, and terrorist acts. He engages his forces of bestowal and thus tips the balance of forces to the side of good.

Question: How can a Kabbalist stop a war?

Answer: Everything that is happening in our world is a result of the interaction between the forces of good and evil. Only these two forces are acting in our world, divided into many particular forces, positive and negative: 613 desires, 613 forces, 613 Lights.

However, a Kabbalist is able to balance, as if on a weighing scale, the influence that comes from above and make it good. He can put a weight onto the pan of good, which will shift the arrow on the scale from the negative side and bring it to the center of equilibrium. As it is written, “If the soul so merits, it sentences itself and the entire world to the scale of merit.”

Question: Then, why don’t we set up a squadron of Kabbalists in the military to have them stop terrorist attacks and wars?

Answer: It is true! But for that, we first need to raise many Kabbalists. Unfortunately, for the time being, there are none in the world. We really hope that soon we can bring up many such Kabbalists in our organization who can teach it to everyone, reaching out to more and more people.

However, today, the world is short of Kabbalists, and it is evident by what is happening with the people of Israel, within the borders of Israel and beyond, by the negative attitude of the entire world toward it. All of this is the result of the fact that we cannot tip the world to a scale of merit, not ourselves, not the people of Israel, and all the more so, not the entire world.

Only the people of Israel are capable of doing this. Only we are given the freedom of choice, and if we are not able to shift the scale for the entire world, toward the side of merit, and ourselves, then we will receive the negative reaction that we are seeing today.
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From the Israeli Radio Program 103FM, 8/16/15

Where Can We Find A Safe Place?

Question: Why do you think that feudalism, capitalism, and communism are the same level of development?

Answer: Because it is an egoistic development that gradually transformed from one paradigm to another but always aspired for the same goal, for maximum egoistic filling.

If we don’t focus our life on the one pleasure of being filled, on knowledge, on respect, wealth, or power, but rather, begin to connect and to unite like nature in order to build anintegral society, this society will be able to find totally new forms of the right and safe existence.

When we correct our nature from a linear to an integral one, from an egoistic to an altruistic one, when each of us feels that he is an integral part of humanity, we will also feel humanity and all of nature differently. Our sensory perception will be totally different, and we will feel that we exist on another level, in another dimension.

Although our efforts seem insufficient for all of humanity, we hope that they will be successful a little before conflicts break out between all parts of humanity, as the crisiscan be very deep, including world wars, natural disasters and ecological problems. We live on very small and fragile planet and it can be fatal for us.

This is the reason that we try to explain to people that there is a totally different method of relating to life.
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From KabTV’s “The Last Generation” 8/12/15

The Daily Kabbalah Lesson And Spiritual Development

Question: Can you please tell me how the daily morning lesson at 3:00 am in Israel affects a person?

Answer: New spiritual attributes are developed in a person when he systematically participates in the lessons, which he then needs to develop in the group of friends parallel to the study of the wisdom of Kabbalah. It is impossible to grow spiritually without the daily participation in the lessons.
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