America: The Change Of Presidents

Question: On the first day of Chanukah, Barak Obama pulled a nasty trick on Israel by allowing the UN to accept a resolution against the Israeli settlements. How do we cope with this situation? What will happen now when a new administration replaces Obama who spread chaos in the world?

Answer: We must wait a little. About six months after Obama leaves the office, the outcomes of his eight-year reign will be summed up, and we will be able to reach more accurate conclusions.

Question: Will the Israeli government be able to cope with the current situation? There were rumors that before the UN Security Council meeting Prime Minister Netanyahu had a conflict with Obama.

Answer: This is totally irrelevant. Barak Hussein Obama is an avid supporter of Islam. His mission is to spread Islam all over the world. This is the reason he did everything to allow millions of Muslims enter the US during his presidency. In addition, he sowed chaos where on the basis of such chaos, Islamists could rise to power and destroy everything.

Question: What can you say about the new administration?

Answer: I don’t know what President Trump will do, but I think that as a businessman and the boss, he will be able to impose order. On the other hand, he should realize that the world today is not based on egoism and money.

Question: If capitalism, as a system, has exhausted itself, how will Trump impose order if he is a capitalist?

Answer: Obama doubled the US debt, unemployment rates soared during his administration, his recovery plan actually got stuck on the way, and what did he do with the world? He ruined countries in the belt from Morocco to Pakistan. After all, small countries are always dominated by big countries. Trump can, at least ideologically, choose a different approach.
[199741]
From the webinar “The Year in Review” 12/26/16

Not A Lone Soldier In The Battlefield

Question: In Kabbalah, does a person have to educate himself?

Answer: No, he cannot educate himself independently. A person cannot do anything by himself. He must be connected to others. This is very explicitly explained on our sites.
[199604]
From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 7/3/16

Do We Have To Learn The Language Of Kabbalah?

Question: In which language should we read the Torah or The Book of Zohar? Do we have to learn the language of Kabbalah?

Answer: The language that we use in our lessons is very limited.

Therefore, if you listen to Hebrew in the background while listening in your mother tongue, you will gradually begin to naturally understand it. We have quite a few students who speak Hebrew very well as a result of studying the wisdom of Kabbalah.

There are words and expressions from ancient and more modern sources in Kabbalistic Hebrew which cannot be conveyed in translation. Therefore, it is better to accept the Kabbalistic terms just the way they are in Hebrew. Then you will not be confused with our world and with corporeal terminology. You will immediately apply them to objects or actions of the upper world.
[199514]
From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 7/24/16

Judge Yourself

Question: The wisdom of Kabbalah says that there is no sin, there is experience. But we always talk about redemption, about the forgiveness of sins before Yom Kippur. If sin is a lack of faith in the Creator, then it the wisdom of Kabbalah is also a religion and not a science?

Answer: The wisdom of Kabbalah doesn’t say anything about a person excusing himself.

All forgiveness of sin on Yom Kippur is related to the person himself. A person must judge himself about not being kind enough to others, about not working enough to bring everyone closer together.

This sums up a person’s judgment of himself; nobody is judging him. There is nobody before whom to give any accountability. A person judges himself and changes his behavior accordingly.
[199417]
From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 9/25/16

How Do We Ensure Order And Peace?

Question: On the one hand it is said: “And you shall love your friend as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18). On the other hand, it is said: “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth” (Exodus 21:24). On the basis of these principles, is it possible to establish order and peace?

Answer: We need to work with egoism to balance it through, “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” What this means is that balance must be equal and just, plus and minus must connect together through opposition, so “An eye for an eye,” is necessarily required to balance the system.

But we have to understand what “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth” represent, meaning that I must place to the right side or the left side the same force that exists on the other side.
[199541]
From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 10/2/16

On The Verge Of A Bright Future

Question: What kind of a future is expected for us in 2017?

Answer: A Bright Future! Humanity will finally understand that the wisdom of Kabbalah is a method for the existence of the world and its development. It tells about the goal of the forces that manage it, about ways to go to a level of managing and understanding them, and where they are leading us.

We need to see the light and become a bit more mature with an expanded method of understanding the world. I hope that the year 2017 will give us this opportunity and people will see that this is the destiny for all of us.

We need to move to a new dimension and begin to feel what astrophysicists talk about today: we are living in a world that is much more complex than what we assume.

We need to understand it, become much more diversified, and not focused every moment on getting minimal pleasure, but to rise a bit higher above our nature. This is what the wisdom of Kabbalah makes possible for us. But to do this, we must find interest and patience for it. I hope this year will help us to do that.

And we who study the wisdom of Kabbalah need to go out to the public with a more understandable, closer, softer, friendlier explanation so that people will understand us. We need to bring them the method for attaining a good and eternal life. After all, the wisdom of Kabbalah reveals a completely different scope of existence.

We are waiting for you, not only we, but all of humanity. Come, help, and see that the next year will be completely different, better.

Question: What must we strive for in 2017?

Answer: Unity, to an understanding of one another. But this is only possible after at least an elementary familiarity with the wisdom of Kabbalah. I wish this for all of us. Good luck and a good year!
[199616]
From a webinar “The Year in Review” 12/26/16

New Life #798 – Differences In Sensory Perception

New Life #798 – Differences In Sensory Perception
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Yael Leshed-Harel

Summary

There are differences in people’s perception of reality, as there are differences in tastes.

The five senses are characterized by the distance from what is perceived: sight is the sense that perceives from the greatest distance and touch is the sense that perceives from the closest distance since it involves contact.

There are waves beyond what our senses perceive. We are surrounded by infinite Light, by unlimited waves, but we perceive through the limitations of our senses.

Our instruments of perception are operated by our desire, by a sense of lack. We can develop our desire to unlimited dimensions by changing our attitude to other people. If reality becomes more important to me than myself, my perception expands, just like a mother who feels her baby. What we feel through our senses operates on our desire, and this is how an experience is created.

It is impossible to penetrate another person and to feel how he actually perceives reality since our internal nature is concealed from us; a person doesn’t even really know himself. No matter how much we try, we have no access to a person’s internality; we don’t know how and there is nothing to investigate about ourselves. We have to study the upper nature, the upper operating system, and to be like it.

Even if we could assemble all the senses of all the animals together in ourselves, we would end up with nothing more than an elaborate animal.

The method of developing our perception is called the wisdom of Kabbalah; it teaches us how to perceive unlimited waves. To perceive the unlimited reality, a person needs a new receiver to receive what is external to him, not what is inside him.
From KabTV’s “New Life #798 – Differences In Sensory Perception,” 12/6/16

Video: Play Now | Download

Audio: Play Now | Download

Just Ask More Of The Creator

Question: What does it mean to practically treat the friend or the teacher as the Creator? Do I have to implicitly justify them like the Creator who cannot be perceived or understood?

Answer: The student should absorb what the teacher says and teaches him and accordingly behave with the friends to establish a connection in which the Creator is revealed. Everything depends on the type of the connection between them. You have to melt among the friends and become an embryo, a drop of semen in the womb, in order to attain the first spiritual attribute between us, the level of Nefesh, which the smallest Light.

This is what everyone has to do with regard to others in the group of ten, which will create the precondition for the revelation of the Creator.

But it is impossible to do that on our own and so there is no need to yearn for that, since it is like wanting to fly without wings.

This is not the work we should do, and it is a problem if people wish to attain it physically. There is no need to put pressure on each other and to insist on physical actions such as hugging more, reading together, etc.

All you need to do is to ask more and more that the Creator do it for us since all our other requests and expectations are merely egoistic. When you turn to the Creator, the altruistic element is inevitably activated.
[199518]
From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 8/7/16

Ynet: “The Right In Europe—A Ticking Time Bomb”

From my weekly column in Ynet: “The Right In Europe—A Ticking Time Bomb”

The last referendum in Italy and the resignation of Prime Minister Renzi announce the strengthening of fascist movements and prove that it is time for Europeans to unite. Currently, the winds of nationalistic protests are targeted at the establishment, but they might soon be targeted against millions of immigrants, and later, as has happened in the past, against the Jews. Rav Laitman explains how to defuse the ticking nationalistic bomb that threatens the fate of the Jewish people.

In my latest articles, I have gone into great detail discussing the current global changes and have explained that it all stems from the laws of nature, which the wisdom of Kabbalah teaches. The world is changing, the economy is taking on a new form, regimes are changing before our very eyes, and the voice of the British people who chose to leave the EU and the voice of the Americans who lead Trump to the White House were echoed in the voice of the Italian people who said no to the referendum and strongly opposed reforms in the Italian constitution, a real rebellion in the faltering EU.

The winds of nationalistic protest in Italy are now targeted at the political establishment, but they may change direction and target the millions of foreign immigrants and later, as always, the Jews. This dangerous fascist, anti-Semitic trend could affect the fate of Europe, the fate of the Jewish people, and the fate of humanity as a whole.

The Collective Is Greater Than the Sum of Its Parts

Fascism is part of the Italian DNA. In 1919, about a year after WWI, fascism as a world view led to the emergence of a dictatorial regime in Italy, which replaced liberal democracy. Italian fascism attributed great significance to the idea of the eternal state and demanded the mortal individual to sacrifice himself, his aspirations, and his goals for the greater good: there are no social classes, there are no individuals, and the nation is a live and breathing body.

Through coherent nationalistic ideology emphasizing hatred of foreigners, the purported founder of fascism Benito Mussolini rallied his countrymen to extricate them from poverty, social problems, and unemployment—the same issues Italy faces today.

Mussolini himself came up with the term “fascism,” which stems from the Italian world “fascio,” meaning bundle or unity. It is an ancient Roman symbol of a bundle of wooden rods as a representation of strength through unity in contrast to the weakness of the individual. It is an egoistic and exploitative connection whose sole purpose is to gain power and control, and it eventually lead to the destruction of the “united nation.”

A hundred years after it faded away, the nationalistic parties are reawakening and indicate the real need for unity. It is perfectly clear that the unity that stems from narrow egoism is concerned only about its own nation. The question is whether there is another option. Is it possible to lead the growing need for unity onto a new track and, if so, how?

The Jewish Logo

Unlike the fascist logo, hundreds of years ago, the large Israeli force unity of the Jewish people was likened to a bundle of reeds: “If someone takes a bundle of reeds, can he break them all at once? If taking them one by one, even a baby can break them” (Tanchuma). The story of the unity of Israel goes back to ancient Babylon about 3,500 years ago. In those days, the primitive society was like one family where everyone understood each other “Now the entire earth was of one language and uniform words” (Genesis 11:1). Suddenly, man’s egoistic nature erupted. The same desire to receive pleasure which motivates us through pleasure or suffering demanded greater pleasures at the expense of others. The mutual exploitation led to a deep social crisis that split the Babylonians and led to a civil war.

The frustrated Babylonians looked for a way out of the thicket of the social crisis, and salvation appeared in the form of Abraham, the great Babylonian priest of the time who gathered them around him, taught them the wisdom of Kabblaah and how to be connected and love each other. A group of once-estranged Babylonians connected as one man in one heart and were called Israel because of their desire to resemble the Creator, “Yashar El,” to attribute everything to the one force of nature that is whole and eternal. From the moment the nation of Israel was established, it had one goal only: to serve as an example of unity for the other parts of divided humanity, to be a Light of the nations of the world.

The Jewish nation has undergone many changes. After the destruction of the Second Temple, egoism grew and unfounded hatred intensified. Brotherly love and the sublime value of unity ceased to illuminate the spiritual vision, and the nation dispersed all over the world for two thousand years of exile.

The Jews cannot wander all over the world and assimilate with the other nations forever because they have a great responsibility and an obligation to bring to the world the method of connection. Every time the Jews tried to deny their role, they soon were reminded of it in the form of anti-Semitism, which is the law of nature.

Anti-Semitism in Brief

At the beginning of the 20^th century, Henry Ford, a great anti-Semite, published a series of booklets called “The International Jew” in which he wrote, “The Jew has gotten used to thinking that he is the only proprietor of society’s humanism for too long. Society has a great demand from the Jew, that he should cease to be aloof, that he should stop his abuse of the world, that he should stop relating to Jewish groups as the goal of all his profits, and that he should start fulfilling the ancient prophecy, since it is by that that all the nations on earth will be blessed.”

Ford is one of many examples. In 1364, Polish King Casimir III said that the Jews were always scheming, wanting to harm the Christians, to exploit them, and impoverish them financially. In 1885, German philosopher Paul de Lagarde offered the German people a detailed plan as to how to get rid of the loathsome Jewish race living among them. He said that one doesn’t negotiate with “pests and parasites” and one doesn’t educate them, but they should be destroyed “as speedily and thoroughly as possible.” Adolf Hitler, the odious, wrote “For the Jewish spirit is the product of the Jewish person. Unless we expel the Jewish people soon, they will have judaized our people within a very short time.” We all know how his words were made into actions.

But even after the Holocaust that hit European Jews hard, the winds of hatred are blowing again. The French writer and diplomat Jean Giraudoux wrote “that the French racial stock was being threatened by hordes of Eastern and Central European ghetto Jews descending upon France. These Jewish barbarians inclined toward lawlessness, and their corruption undermined the native artisanal traits of precision, perfection, and trust.”

Unity Heals the Wounds of Humanity

Hitler, Ford, and many anti-Semites throughout history have subconsciously felt that the Jewish nation has a meaningful role in the world, and that it doesn’t fulfill it. When unity among the people of Israel weakens, fascism and Nazism grow stronger, so it is no wonder that in this generation all the destroyers among the nations of the world are raising their heads and mainly wanting to destroy and kill the children of Israel. As the sages said, “no calamity comes to the world unless it is for Israel since, as it says in Tikunei HaZohar, Israel are the cause of poverty, killing, robbery, and destruction all over the world” (The Writings of Baal HaSulam).

On the other hand, if we act responsibly and unite as one man in one heart, as the wisdom of Kabbalah teaches us, we use our egoistic nature correctly, spurring the positive force of connection in nature and radiating it through the network between us to the entire world. Baal HaSulam wrote, “the Israeli nation had been constructed as a sort of gateway by which the sparks of purity would shine upon the whole of the human race the world over … until they develop to such an extent that they can understand the pleasantness and tranquility that are found in the kernel of love of others” (Baal HaSulam, “The Arvut“). The unity that spreads through us to the global network softens the hearts of mankind and brings them closer to each other and defuses the evil thoughts they have as to how to harm themselves through fascist regimes and, all the more so, how to harm the Jews.

“When there is love, unity, and friendship, there is no room for any calamity” (Maor VaShemesh). In other words, the choice is ours. We only have to show the world how to properly connect. A loose connection between us will bring the rise of fascism, whereas a tight connection will lead to its fall.
[199219]
 Ynet 12/8/16

Religious Wars

Comment: Political analysts believe that if President Trump creates an alliance between the US, China, and Russia, it will be a breakthrough that will pave a new path of development.

Answer: In general, there is no reason to fight today because all that was before, happily is ending.

In the past, a person wanted to be stronger and aspired to conquer more, but not now. There is no such desire anymore. There is free markets all over the world, goods flow freely from one country to another; there is no reason for war.

Comment: Wars usually had a religious character in the past.

Answer: Religious wars may still break out, but they will be wars beyond nations. Neither President Trump nor Russia want to conquer the whole world, but fundamentalist Islam wants to conquer the world—the old fashioned way, because it is still at the level of the 15^th century. Islam is considered a young religion because it emerged about 5 to 6 centuries after Christianity.

Of course it would be nice to create a union between the US, Russia, and China. But human egoism won’t let that happen.

So representatives of these countries should study the wisdom of Kabbalah, which explains how to make the world a better place. They will not be able to become friends without the method of Kabbalah.

According to global trends, Nazism is growing, not decreasing. So today there is no room for nationalist policies but only for international policies. We either advance toward connection with everyone openly or toward division and war, even religious war, which it would seem had long passed. 

I hope the development of Kabbalah will handle all that.
[199070]
From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 12/7/16

How Should A Student Treat The Teacher?

Question: How should a student who wants to advance in spirituality relate to the teacher?

Answer: A student should relate to the teacher as to the Creator. He should also relate to the friend in the same way since they are the means for attaining the revelation of the Creator. In the spiritual world, the means is identical to the goal.
[198948]
From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 8/7/16

New Life #797 – The Lost Tribes Among Us

New Life #797 – The Lost Tribes Among Us
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Tal Mandelbaum ben Moshe

Summary

There is no connection between the division into of the people of Israel into camps today and the division into the tribes of Israel in Biblical times.

• When the children of Israel work on the connection between them, it will be revealed who belong to which tribe and how they will reunite into tribes.
• The central motive for the method of connection is “Love covereth all transgressions” (Proverbs 10:12), i.e., we connect above all differences.
• To connect, we must first learn what human nature is, what the goal of creation is, and how to implement it.
• The connection is similar to the reconciliation process in a couple, beginning with what is good and then adding the bad.
• If we want to live well, we must learn how to connect, otherwise troubles will obligate us to connect.
• Connection will summon a power from nature that will shape us into a desired form, which is unknown to us from the start.
• Nature is the upper force, the system in which we exist, and it moves us forward in our development.
• In a state of “connection,” all are very different from each other, but we seek to complement each other.
From KabTV’s “New Life #797 – The Lost Tribes Among Us,” 12/1/16

Video: Play Now | Download

Audio: Play Now | Download

Rising To A New Degree

The Torah, Deuteronomy 12:26: “However, your holy offerings which you will have, and your vows, you shall carry, and come to the place that the Lord chooses.

Holy offerings mean everything precious that I have in me: Reshimot (spiritual information records), qualities, forces, and desires. I have to uncover them, bring them to new contact with the Creator, and by doing that, gradually rise.

I have to constantly analyze my highest states and bring them to unification with the Creator. All this is for the sole purpose of discovering that what I have is suddenly transformed from the elevated states into low states. What was an achievement on the previous level becomes a transgression on the next degree.

When I establish a contact with the next degree, with the next revelation of the Creator, all of my best, wonderful inclinations toward unity, toward the love of others, toward everything, is unexpectedly revealed as evil to me. This is constant: holiness at the lower level becomes evil at the upper degree.

Everything I’ve considered unshakable in me becomes rubbish. I see how my preconceived notions, relationships, definitions, rules, and my perception of the world disappear. There is nothing in them, no truth at all, no value, and no spirituality. All of a sudden, I have discovered that everything I considered to be my contact with spirituality is just zero.

At the same time, the new degree is opened to me because I’ve advanced with faith above reason; I am ready to reject everything that used to be “me” and rise above it.

Faith above reason is a state when I accept the qualities of the Creator, bestowal and love, above what exists in me now. I am ready to accept completely opposite values in desires and intentions to my current state and work according to them. Meanwhile, the next degree is completely opposite to the previous level.

Only one law exists: to rise in bestowal above the will to receive. All past is completely erased and I am building a new degree!
[196971]
From KabTV’s, “Secrets of the Eternal Book,” 7/6/16

Do The Translations Of The Torah Match The Original?

Question: Does a translator of spiritual texts have to be a Kabbalist? After all, he inserts his perception of reality into a translation.

Answer: If you read the Torah in Russian, you must notice that the text does not match precisely the original Hebrew.

The Torah was written 3,000 years ago by Moses. Then 1,500 years ago, they began to translate its texts from Hebrew, with many additions and distortions that each one made according to what came to his mind.

If you want to read the Torah in Russian, I would recommend the Chumash (five books of Moses) that they are publishing in Israel. That is a clean and precise word-for-word translation.
[199000]
From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 7/24/16

Why Does A Man Need To Have Faith?

Question: Why does a person, unlike animals, since time immemorial need to believe in something?

Answer: Uncertainty about the next day worries man. In animals this question doesn’t arise because they have no concern about what will happen in the future. A beast obeys its instincts. Man does not have this instinct, but he has many worries, fears, and doubts about the future.

This uncertainty causes a person to need to believe in something big, so that he can at least hope for its mercy, its compassion, and its good treatment. Because a person cannot control his future, he thinks that if there is someone who can, he should be in good relations with him. This is the reason that the question about the forces of nature came up, which eventually lead to the emergence of religions.

Religion arose at the dawn of humanity. We may say that the need for faith emerged the moment the monkey evolved into man, since at that point he began to question his future. Man began to ask himself what tomorrow will bring and he sought to explain everything that happened to him.

Man is distinguished from animals in this anxiety about the future: What will happen with my life, what is its purpose? Although this question comes up subconsciously and is not formatted, this is actually what distinguishes man from a beast. Man needs faith whereas a beast has no need for it.
[199077]
From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 9/25/16

Student And Teacher, Two Levels

Question: When can a teacher become a transmitter of spiritual energy for the student?

Answer: This is when a teacher can serve as a channel through which the Upper Light will pass to a student or at least help a student connect with a group of ten that will begin to absorb the Upper Light.

Question: But, doesn’t the teacher lock the student onto himself?

Answer: In the wisdom of Kabbalah, this cannot happen!

I remember my teacher Rabash, the last giant Kabbalist. He never allowed his greatness, his immense importance, to be seen.

Today, we read his articles that were written before my eyes. I remember everything that happened then, down to the last detail, the time of year when were sitting on a bench in the park as he wrote. I remember literally everything, even the background noises and voices around us. Today, when I read his articles again, I notice that I understand them more deeply than in the past, even though so many years have passed since then.

It is not possible to appreciate a teacher immediately, even though he doesn’t hide his inner world. No one is hiding anything from us. At that time, I thought to myself: “I am going to move in next to him. I will be by his side, and then I will shake him and take out of him everything he has!”

There isn’t anything to shake out. The teacher is ready to transmit everything. It only depends on the degree to which the student can understand him. Student and teacher are two levels.

But how can a student approach a teacher to receive, absorb, and take from him—this is another matter and is not easy.
[198911]
From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 8/7/16

Italy: Fascism Is Possible

In the News (BBC): “Italian PM Matteo Renzi’s referendum defeat on Sunday has left Italy facing political and economic uncertainty.

“Mr Renzi announced he was stepping down after his constitution reform plan was rejected by voters. …

“There are concerns the instability may trigger a deeper crisis for Italy’s already vulnerable banking sector. …

“Mr Renzi staked his political future on his attempt to change Italy’s cumbersome political system. He wanted to strengthen central government and weaken the Senate, the upper house of parliament.

“His opponents – including some within his own party – had argued that the reforms would give the prime minister too much power. The electorate agreed.

“But the referendum was more than a vote on constitutional reform, it was widely regarded as a chance to reject establishment politics.”

My Comment: Agreements signed in the past were kept and honored for decades and the parties involved kept the agreements because they were economically worthwhile first and foremost for the elite. But when the elite reach a state of saturation and the lower classes cannot bear the situation anymore, problems arise between the elite and the lower classes. The official unemployment rates in Italy today are at about 30%-40% and this is why they are “getting divorced.”

Now it is the Italian Brexit, then there will be the Spanish Brexit, and so on. This is what will happen in every country since the neoliberal economy is collapsing. The economy was never truly neoliberal in the past, it was aimed only at the benefit of the elite. Now it is all over.

Question: Does this mean that the establishment of the EU was meant to fail from the start?

Answer: The EU was established only for the sake of the elite and all the slogans about a united Europe, etc., are worthless. A common market?

It is a market. So it is collapsing now. It can no longer be sustained. Karl Marx wrote correctly about the decay of capitalism, but he believed it would be followed by a socialist society.

Baal HaSulam, on the other hand, wrote that if we don’t spread the wisdom of Kabbalah and do not reveal why we are undergoing this process, Nazism would rise.

We are now witnessing the right emerging in many countries, replacing the left. This situation poses a very big problem for the world because it may lead to terrible wars.

Therefore, our option is either a fascist regime and a world war or to develop a method according to the wisdom of Kabbalah, which means educating people to understand that it is only by getting closer to each other that we can be saved from imminent death.
[198742]
From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 12/5/16

The Blood Is The Soul

The Torah, Deuteronomy 12:23 – 12:25: However, be strong not to eat the blood, for the blood is the soul; and you shall not eat the soul with flesh. You shall not eat it. You shall not eat it, in order that it be good for you, and for your children after you, when you do what is proper in the eyes of the Lord.

Blood is called the greatest, biggest glow, filling the desire—the Light of Hochma at its highest level. We are unable to obtain this Light until the final correction, about which “be strong not to eat the blood” was allegorically written.

Blood is the fourth part of the world, the fourth part of a desire that cannot be used because we are unable to feel adhesion with the Creator with the quality of bestowal, while at the same time feeling the enormous desires that are filled with the strongest Light. This is beyond our desires.

Thus, we have to cleanse everything from blood. That is why Kashrut laws are based on appropriate rules for animal slaughter and the extraction of blood from meat.

Question: It is written that “the blood is the soul.” What does this mean?

Answer: The soul has five degrees: Nefesh, Ruach, Neshama, Haya, and Yechida.

Blood is the lowest part (Nefesh) and that is why its use is prohibited. It is impossible to accept this fulfillment with the intention to bestow; we do not have the force to resist the heaviest egoism. This will continue until the final correction and only after that will we be able to shift to different laws.
[196962]
From KabTV’s, “Secrets of the Eternal Book”, 7/6/16

The Torah Speaks About Everyone

Question: According to what you say, Jews must save the world, Israel are those who yearn for the Creator, God loves Israel, and so forth. With such expressions about the specialness of the Jews, you sow contempt in the nations of the world. Aren’t you afraid that you will be accused of extremism?

Answer: Every page in the Torah says that the Jews are special. The nations of the world, the Christians, and then the Muslims were not given any source by the Creator other than the Torah, so they rewrote it and taking on the “birthright.”

Everyone’s problem—the Jews, the Christians, and the Moslems—is that no one understands exactly what the Torah says. The Torah appeals to all people of the world and calls for the fulfillment of the main law of the Torah, to “Love your neighbor as yourself,” and nothing but that.

The Torah refers to anyone who fulfills this condition of love of others as a “Jew,” “Yehudi,” from the Hebrew word “Yichud,” unity. A person who does not fulfill this condition is referred to as a Goy, which translates to “the people,” and the Jewish nation is also called Goy in the Torah.

The Torah speaks only about the unity of all of the nations as the Prophets said. Foreseeing the compelling future of humanity and that the Jews must show the way to it, is referred to as being “a Light of nations” of the world.

The problem stems from the misinterpretation of the Torah. The Torah speaks about the people of every nation. This is how Abraham turned to all of the people of ancient Babylon and founded his religion on the rule of “Love your neighbor as yourself,” as Baal HaSulam tells us in his article, “The Essence of Religion and Its Purpose.”
[199532]

Jews And The Reason For Anti-Semitism

Question from Facebook: Do you claim that anti-Semitism is a result of the actions of the Jews themselves?

Answer: Certainly, how could this not be so? The Jews awaken pressure from the anti-Semites. Whether there will be anti-Semitism in the world, whether there will be good or evil, war or suffering, in the world depends on the Jews.

In The Book of Zohar, written 2,000 years ago and considered to be the source of the wisdom of Kabbalah, it is written that, unfortunately or fortunately, everything that happens in the world takes place because of the Jews because they are the link that connects all of humanity with the upper force of nature.

So when they are directed and keep this connection correctly, it is good for the world. And if they don’t, it is bad for the world. Everything depends only on the Jews.

The Jews are a group of people who broke away from all the rest of humanity in ancient Babylon, and accepted the method of spiritual development, a connection with the higher power of the world, with what is called the Creator.

In a later stage, 2,000 years ago, this group fell from its spiritual level, and since then, they don’t even know what existed. And still, they felt as if they were a unique group in humanity, the Jews always bothered everyone somehow. This is because they don’t know what their purpose, what they must carry out with regard to the world. The wisdom of Kabbalah speaks about it.

So we Jews oppose it, but we cannot escape from it. There is a mission we must carry out, we need to lead all of humanity after us, to connect it with the upper force of nature, and then the gracious management will descend into our world. In contrast, today all of us are running around like a dog chasing its tail and are unsuccessful in holding onto success.

Let’s take ourselves by the hand and carry out our mission, becoming a “light unto the nations” (Isaiah 49:6), and this will be good for everyone. Everyone will respect and love us, which is how we will bring happiness and knowledge of the higher conduct, of the Creator, to the world. In the Torah it is written that this is our destiny.

I did not invent this; all the accusations against me are meaningless. I simply explain where this is written. Each one can check for himself. Why shut your eyes and wait for the next blow of fate?

Let’s do this so that it will be good for everyone. It depends only on us.
[198855]
From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 11/21/16

A Mutual Connection Between Two Forces

Question: What are good relationships and how are they related to spirituality?

Answer: The spiritual world is revealed when a person can build himself to be in a correct mutual connection between good and evil, not killing evil and not adhering to the good, but creating a connection in which the two forces complement each other. There is no evil without good and there is no good without evil; there is no Light without darkness and there is no darkness without Light. The central line must stabilize them correctly.

If a person acts correctly through directing himself between these two lines, his egoism will constantly grow. That is how he can produce a positive force, placing himself opposite the egoism and building himself in the middle line. This sums up the entire method of the wisdom of Kabbalah, and this is education of the self.

The moment a person begins to do this correctly between them, he begins to feel the upper world in the middle line. This is the state of nature, which consists of a precise balance between the positive force and the negative force.

On the levels of the still, vegetative, and animate, these forces cooperate mutually in a natural way, instinctively, so that they don’t require any work. But on the human level we must find that good force in nature to balance the negative force through it and develop this way. Humans, being the worst of all in our world, can also ascend higher than all.

The two forces are seemingly found outside of humans. But when we begin to examine them, we clarify the negative force within us and feel what kind of positive force we need through which to balance the negative force. All of this is possible only if we correctly cooperate mutually in a group, a group of ten.
[198633]
From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 7/3/16

A Desire For Pleasure Is Not Egoism

Question: If the Creator created us as a desire to receive and wants to give us pleasure, aren’t we basically opposing His desire by wanting to resemble Him and become bestowers?

Answer: We do not oppose His desire since we don’t refrain from using our desire. We only change its intention. All of our desires remain and begin to work on receiving even more. I only change the intention from an intention for my sake, an intention for the sake of my ego, to an intention for the sake of others in that my intention goes outside, because a desire is not itself ego.

An egoistic desire is a desire with an intention for my own sake. An altruistic desire is the same desire, but with an intention for the sake of others. It is only when I am using all of my desires and I go outside of myself that I am realizing them correctly.

A person cannot change the intention, the change only happens in a group under the influence of the Ohr Makif (Surrounding Light).

Only the right method stimulates and summons the Ohr Makif, which changes the intention from an intention for my sake to an intention for the sake of others. To that degree, we begin to feel the world that is found outside of us.
[198628]
From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 9/18/16