“You Shall Not Cross This Jordan”

Midrash Rabbah, Chapter “Vayelech”: The Celestial Voice revealed to Moses the day of his death, “You have only one day to live.” Hearing this, Moses went from the camp of Levites (where his tent stood) to the camp of Israelites to say goodbye to the Jews and calm them, because they were alarmed by his imminent demise.

Torah, Deuteronomy 31:01 – 31:02: And Moses went, and he spoke the following words to all Israel. He said to them, “Today I am one hundred and twenty years old. I can no longer go or come, and the Lord said to me, “You shall not cross this Jordan.”

In the spiritual world, there are 125 degrees of its attainment. Moses passed 120 of them. Therefore, it is said that he lived 120 years.

Moses is an example of the highest degree that a soul can attain until its final correction. After all, there are five more degrees left that will be corrected only after absolutely all the souls existing in our world are pulled to the degree of Moses. Then the very last degree will be completed—the last five parts.

It is written: “You have only one day to live.” This ends the personal correction of Moses; he cannot advance further. After this, there will be the correction of absolutely all of Israel and then of the entire world aspiring to the Creator. This will happen at the end of days.

Question: Moses says: “The Lord said to me, ‘You shall not cross this Jordan.’” Is there still some kind of bitterness in him?

Answer: Indeed, how can this be?! The rest can cross the Jordan and Moses cannot? He is above all others! And he was not honored with entering the land of Israel, and women, old people, and children were honored! Moses is the highest quality of the common organism called “the people.” Therefore, he must stay.

The rest must enter the land of Israel and work on themselves: to build the First Temple, go into exile, build the Second Temple, and go into exile again. They must spread their desires like sparks among all the nations, meaning the huge common desire that is made up of all the peoples. Therefore, they enter there.

Moses remains just beyond the Jordan because his qualities cannot be broken. They are waiting for the moment when all the nations of the world will gather and reach the level of 120th degree, and then, together with Moses, they will reach the 125th degree, which is the world of Infinity.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 1/23/17

Why Did The Creator Create Such A World?

Question: Why did the Creator create a world in which the law of equivalence of form exists? Couldn’t He create a world with other characteristics and laws?

Answer: No, He could not because according to the law of equivalence of form, He wants a person to become similar and equal to Him. It is up to us to attain this state during the 6,000 years of our existence. We have about 220 years left.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 3/12/17

Thirteen Corrections of Dikna

Question: What are the “thirteen corrections of Dikna”?

Answer: This is the Light that descends from the head of the soul into its body through thirteen channels. Anyone below who wants to receive this Light must make these corrections in order to connect to these channels as if to pipes that pour on him the upper Light of correction and fulfillment.

The streams pour down along both sides of the head of the soul to the body. That’s why religious Jews leave peyos (sidelocks) that they curl and maintain in a particular way. The Light descends from the upper part, which we do not attain. We attain only that which descends from it, and therefore, these two streams are called Peyos (peot or edge).

Further, the Light pours onto the chin along the sideburns and mustache. Under the nose, there is a particular point that is relatively free of hair. The beard is divided into upper and lower parts. The upper part goes to the chest, and the lower part to the navel. All of this is very clearly described in the original sources.

Naturally, our body is created in complete accordance with the flows of the streams of upper rays. But, we do not talk about the physical body in describing the upper Partzuf. I only mention this so that the students can remember a little material or somehow orient themselves.

If I speak about a correction such as the mustache or parts of the beard, I do not mean a part of a person’s face, but a quality. In other words, it is a particular spiritual force with a particular quality that is interacting with the upper Light. The Light is absolute, infinite, and amorphous. And this force separates from this infinite simple Light its specific content.

Question: Since we are talking about secretions, what are tears?

Answer: Tears are an overflow of Light that cannot be dressed in the Light of mercy (the Light of Hassadim). Therefore, it seems to be pouring over the edge.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 1/23/17

The Secrets Of A Glorious Wisdom

Baal HaSulam, The Writings of the Last Generation: This concept is clarified over nearly 2,000 pages that explain all the secrets of Torah that the human eye cannot see. It will make every person believe in its truthfulness, as they will see that they are the words of the Lord, for secrets of a glorious wisdom attributed to prophecy testifies to their truthfulness.

The wisdom of Kabbalah is a great knowledge about the system of governance, the upper force, and how we can be included in this governance, how we can influence it, and how it can influence us. That is, a person rises to the level of the Creator. It is written: “Rise up to me.”

I think that humanity will not go through terrible sufferings in order to recognize this wonderful opportunity and will begin to climb this ladder.

Question: When Baal HaSulam speaks about “the secrets of Torah that the human eye cannot see,” does he mean the Light that Reforms that “will make every person believe in its truthfulness” by gradually awakening a person to this? That is, one way or another, is this a passage to the point in the heart?

Answer: Yes. Only through gradual sensations.
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From KabTV’s “The Last Generation” 7/10/17

Not By Bread Alone

From “The Crisis and Its Solution” (Forum in Arosa, 2006):

Although at first, everyone will work for the benefit of society under the compulsion and influence of his environment, the support and recognition of his actions by society will fill him with such complete satisfaction that a person will begin to perceive bestowal to society as the ultimate, special value even without receiving a moral reward from his environment in concrete cases.

In other words, the point is not in how much we receive today and how much later. Fulfillment depends on how we receive, in what form, for what, and why. It is possible to eat a few ounces of food and be satisfied as if you ate several pounds. It all depends on internal, spiritual satisfaction.

Spiritual significance in food, clothing, in any fulfillment received by a person, gives him pleasure and the desire to preserve and be satisfied with less. And this will not be a result of coercion; society will come to this as a result of integral education. It is written that a “man does not live by bread alone” because spiritual fulfillment is more important.

And even now, we are not fulfilling ourselves with the food itself; we are trying to extract pleasure from it. But pleasure from a piece of meat cannot be compared with that which can lay beyond it: how we are receiving it and for what reason we eat.

Question: It is obvious that what is most important in a job is not the salary, but the fulfillment it gives a person, the interactions. Why then is the necessity to work for the benefit of society perceived by the ego as a bitter duty?

Answer: Because today a person doesn’t receive a pleasurable sensation from giving to society., but the opposite! This is the result of “liberalism” and “democracy,” which have been touted in the last forty years. The entire approach received a wrong slant because everyone prides himself on his own dismissive relationship to others, his separateness from society, like a thief who hasn’t been caught.

Society values exactly these kinds of people—strong personalities. That’s why all of society has rotted thoroughly. If this “liberalism” is not stopped now, then it will bring us to war. At the end of Obama’s tenure an ultimate war was already spoken about openly because the world was actually moving toward it. I hope that now there will be changes.

A slant to the right is also not allowed; there needs to be a balance. This will be the real “pluralism” that was dreamt of at one time, and not the kind that came to be when democrats support democracy only while they are in power. And as soon as someone else is elected, they come out to protest and try to bring him down. How can people, calling themselves democrats and liberals, not agree with the results of an election?
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 2/5/17,“Mismah Arosa (Arosa Document),” “The Desirable Result”

The World At The Crossroads, Part 6

Question: Why does Nazism and fascism inevitably lead to war, as we see from history?

Answer: It cannot be any other way! One can ask why can’t Nazism stay within its own country? However, if this unity is based on egoism, it inspires its leaders to subordinate someone else. Egoism laid the foundation of the fascist system and obliges people to fight. It is like a mafia!

Question: Democracy based on egoism also causes negative consequences, but why exactly does Nazism lead to war?

Answer: Nazism unites people and democracy does not. Liberalism lets each one do whatever he wants. Although this is also temporary at its final stage democracy leads to unity and in an egoistic form. Then egoism + unity creates a big force that requires its realization and wants to subordinate and conquer others.

This is a natural sequence of development of egoism: feudalism → capitalism → pseudo-socialism (democracy, liberalism) → Nazism. It cannot be in a different way because we must come to unification.

Suppose that in ten years most countries in the world are bound to achieve unification, each within itself. The development of egoism is such that it demands unification either by a natural way, which is Nazism, or by the way of the Light, which means building the society of the future based on mutual bestowal.

One way or another, there must be unification. On the axis of development of humanity, marks have already been set, and of course[v10] , they are different for each country and each nation. However, if this is about developed (egoistically) countries, then they are given a certain period during which they must achieve internal cohesion—either through egoism or above it.

The basis of any society is egoism, around which, like around a fruit’s stone, an external social order is dressed: feudalism, capitalism, socialism, or Nazism. The external form is the result of the internal development of egoism and it changes together with it.

In the beginning, it corresponds to its core, but egoism continues to ripen. Therefore, at some point in time, the external form must change in order to correspond to the new form of the inner core.

We do not feel how the egoism hidden within us changes and what forms it undergoes. We notice only the external manifestations in society, like a child who suddenly learns to talk or to do something new because he has developed internally.

Common inner egoism develops, and therefore, the external form of society must change in accordance with it. Any social system is a direct consequence of the form of egoism concealed within it. If we correct the egoism, then obviously, the external form of society will change along with it. Having received the method of correction, society itself will build new social relations due to the changes in the egoism.

Therefore, it is useless to try to build socialism, communism, Nazism, capitalism, and so on. Instead, it is necessary to work on correcting the egoism inherent in people and then they themselves will build a society that is suitable for their internal qualities.

In the meantime, while the external form does not correspond to the inner core, wars and revolutions will continue. This is how it works; the inner egoism of society determines its external form and its social order.
[212750]From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/21/17, Lesson on the Topic: “Europe at a Crossroad”

The Land Of Israel: Both Life And Death

Torah, Deuteronomy 30:17 – 30:18: But if your heart deviates and you do not listen, and you will be drawn astray, and you will prostrate yourself to other deities and serve them, I declare to you this day, that you will surely perish, and that you will not live long days on the land, to which you are crossing the Jordan, to come and take possession thereof.

Naturally, when entering the land of Israel, there are a lot of obstacles because it is at this point that you begin to arouse egoism, which needs to be directed toward the qualities of love and bestowal, meaning, to receive for the sake of the Giver. This is much more difficult than to not receive anything at all and to refuse to receive altogether.

This is very complex, internal, and deep work inside of oneself. If you cannot cope with it, then you will feel hell where you do not correct yourself. If you do correct yourself, on the other hand, you will feel paradise.

These are the two states that now appear before you and they both exist in the land of Israel. You enter and work with them. And there, in the land of Israel, you reach either a huge ascent or a huge descent. Both life and death are there for you.

Question: You keep saying that first humanity has to be educated. Does this mean that humanity should start trying to rise above the ego?

Answer: Of course, but not in the same way Kabbalists went through it or need to go through it. Humanity will pass through everything in a much easier way. Humanity must accept the ready-made method and simply go through these states, repeating them to some extent. This will not be scary for humanity since it will simply be included in something that was prepared beforehand.

And Kabbalists go through these states in order to prepare them for humanity. In other words, they have to experience all of this inside themselves and then offer it to the world as a finished product.

Question: Will new instructions be written for humanity or will they be the same?

Answer: No. These instructions are only for those individuals who have a point in the heart, those who are going to conquer the land of Israel directly.

They must experience all of the egoistic qualities inside themselves and rise above them. The point in the heart in a person is demonstrated by the fact that he aspires toward the fulfillment and realization first of the qualities of the desert, and then the qualities of the land of Israel, which were both created in him so that he could change them to be for the sake of love and bestowal, thereby achieving the revelation of the Creator, the quality of bestowal and love, in all his desires.

The Creator appears to us egoistically as the greatest gift. In fact, it is a gift that is revealed only in our efforts of love and bestowal toward our neighbor. Therefore, if we strive for the benefit of our neighbor in this way, inside this effort, we find the Creator.

If a person is thinking only about the commandments and is committed only to them, he does not need anything else; they are enough and all the other commandments are included in this one. In this case, all the other egoistic qualities of a person are corrected along the way.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 1/18/17

New Life #885 – The Root Of All Difficulties In Life

New Life #885 – The Root Of All Difficulties In Life
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Yael Leshed-Harel

Summary

Every moment a person receives new difficulties—difficulties and opportunities to deepen the connection with the Creator. There is one force that operates in reality and it sends difficulties to every human being and humanity in order to develop. The difficulties are given not to overcome them but to teach them to call the Creator, so that we will turn the difficulties into relationships. There is nothing random about the natural system and our private lives.
From KabTV’s “New Life #885 – The Root Of All Difficulties In Life,” 8/8/17

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Two Incarnations Of A Great Soul

Baal HaSulam is the greatest Kabbalist of our time. It is very difficult to speak of such a tremendous force because we do not really understand what it means to be a Kabbalist. He lives alongside us and at the same time in a different world. A Kabbalist actually lives in two worlds.

For a Kabbalist there is no confusion. He sees the upper world and the lower world. But what interests him most is their interdependence: how it is possible to make corrections in the upper world from the lower world such that it again influences the lower world and our world rises to the level of the upper. This is the task of every Kabbalist.

A Kabbalist is coming from that desire which characterizes him in the general system of the soul called “Adam.” Each of us has a different root. It is called “point of reference” or “point in the heart.” And that’s why each reveals the upper world in their own unique way.

However, all points in the heart reveal this system in a relatively similar fashion. Nonetheless, all those who wrote prior to Baal HaSulam, for example, had a very difficult time writing a commentary to The Book of Zohar.

And prior to the appearance of The Book of Zohar, no one was able to write anything even resembling it, despite the fact that many Kabbalists knew more than Rabbi Shimon. They just couldn’t describe it the way he could.

That is, in Kabbalah there are many such conditions: you can be great, a spiritual genius, but cannot describe anything, you simply don’t have the ability.

But Baal HaSulam had both of these qualities. It’s amazing! In the entire history of Kabbalah there was practically no Kabbalist with such ability.

Moses was the greatest Kabbalist, and still the Five Books written by him are written in such a way and in such language that everyone can interpret them in any way they want.

And what was written by the Ari in his work The Tree of Life cannot be understood at all; here, a clear attainment of the spiritual world is necessary for one to even begin to understand what he is talking about. In this book, purely physical data are laid out, just as in any physics textbook.

That’s why when the Ari started to teach, the only one who was able to appreciate him was a great Kabbalist of his own time, the Ramak. He sent all the other students to the Ari as well, emphasizing that this material is something new. But neither they, nor he, were able to understand the system of the Ari, not even to the day he died. And that’s because the Ramak belonged to the previous generation of souls, those who came into this world prior to the Ari.

That’s why Baal HaSulam openly says: “All that I attained, I attained following the Ari’s soul incarnating in me,” in other words, he was the Ari’s next incarnation. What is meant here is not the physical body, since it doesn’t exist and neither does our world. The only thing that exists is the shattered, scattered desire in a tremendous egoistic space.

In this space there are drops, like raisins in a cake that have inclinations toward unity, toward adhesion with the Creator. But we don’t feel these inclinations because we exist in an ocean of egoism, we sit in this dough, that’s why we don’t even sense our ego. Each “raisin,” each point in the heart, constantly undergoes all types of corrections.

Baal HaSulam happens to have been the outcome of that same “raisin,” which was the Ari, that same soul who was the Ari, who continued his work. This is called an “incarnation.” In other words, this is not a separate soul, but that same soul continuing its work, only under different conditions, in a different generation.

And what does a “generation” mean? It is not what happens to us in our world. When many points in the heart, embryos of a soul, even though they are changing constantly, while they still exist in a wrong kind of connection between them, they imagine themselves ostensibly experiencing our world.

That’s why it is most important that we think not of this world, presenting itself to us through our five animal sensory systems, but instead about that which is happening through the point in the heart.

Question: When a soul reincarnates, is the individuality preserved?

Answer: The soul engages through various external conditions. The Ari brought into our world The Tree of Life. The next time that same Ari came, he was called Baal HaSulam and brought into our lives Talmud Eser Sefirot.

Question: In other words, he held the same spiritual level of attainment as the Ari?

Answer: Even greater.
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From the Lesson in Russian, 10/16/16

The Prophecy Of Moses

On the last day of his life, Moshe continued to speak with the assembled Jews. He began with reassuring affirmations.

“I know that you were alarmed when you heard 98 curses from me. However, I want to assure you that despite all adversity, the Jewish people will not perish. In the end, these curses will serve your good.” (“Commentary on the Midrash Rabba, Chapter, Nitzavim”).

Moses says that after all the terrible blows that the people of Israel must experience, every curse will come true. The prophet clearly speaks of every step that the people must make, go through, understand what the problem is, and correct themselves.

All this is a “stick to happiness” system. Without the recognition of evil, a person does not understand what he must do.

Question: Why, after instructions, the second part of the phrase always says, “If you do not do this, I shall destroy you”?

Answer: This refers to those egoistic qualities of a person that will wither away in the process of correction. First is recognition, then correction, and only after that is mastering the correct desire.

Question: That is, it is like a rocket that drops its stages and flies forward. But these stages return and will it be necessary to process these desires?

Answer: Yes, but they return in a different form—in the form of attainment and revelation.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 1/9/17

Abraham’s Discovery

The Creator is the quality of bestowal and love. He is absolute. And only in this way does He manifest to us. In order to be revealed to His creatures and to make them similar to Him, He created them opposite to His nature, as it is written: “I created the evil inclination.”

However, although He created us as evil creatures that become more and more egoistic every day, at the same time, He gave us an instrument for correction. The only problem is that all this happens gradually according to the laws of nature.

Nature develops according to the laws of inanimate, vegetative, animate, and human organisms. According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, a person differs from an animal not by walking on two legs with an uplifted head (after all, an ostrich also walks on two legs) and not by the ability to think. He has an aspiration toward the purpose of life that distinguishes him from animals.

This is a clear desire to know the purpose of life, the question about its meaning: “Why and for what do I live? What is defined in nature as the purpose of my creation and existence?” These questions really worry some people. However, while they ask these questions, they do not know how to answer them.

The first person who attempted to answer this question 5,777 years ago was a man called Adam, who through his thoughts, feelings, inner aspirations, and deep scrutiny penetrated the secrets of the universe and wrote a small book about it called The Secret Angel, which has survived until our time.

Thanks to this discovery and work on himself, he began to correctly use the forces of nature for his development and he was called Adam. “Adam” from the word “Domeh” (like) the Creator.

Many people in different generations after Adam used his method. It went through 20 generations of his disciples and then reached Abraham, who lived in Ancient Babylon and at first was a preacher of the not-quite-correct approach to nature. He believed that spirituality is divided into many gods that should be worshipped.

However, later he discovered that all these many opposite forces of nature that act independently and even have some positive and negative interactions between them, like various ancient Greek gods, in fact, come from one single mind and force.

This mind we must explore, reveal, and approach, and then a person will know and understand what the meaning of life is. Abraham believed that otherwise all the centuries that had passed since Adam were unremarkable and useless.

In principle, we explore different forces that really do exist. However, they do not have a common base (source) and it is necessary to reveal it. This is what Abraham did.

He discovered the unified force of nature above its other disparate forces, which at that time all the people worshipped, including himself until he discovered this single force.

When he explored it, it turned out that it is absolutely good and unified. This is exactly what Abraham started to explain to the Babylonians.

It seems to us that there is no difference between polytheism and monotheism. However, monotheism means not worshipping one force, but becoming similar to it. The fact is that when a person, in fulfilling his destiny, strives to become like it, at the same time, he changes himself, his behaviour, his view of life, and builds social relations in accordance.

By changing himself, he changes the world, society, and his family. He creates everything according to one single pattern that he receives from above by attaining, explaining, embracing, and exploring the upper force.

In principle, this is what Abraham did. He tried to explain everything to his students and they followed his path. Thus, a group of people was organized called the people of Israel, from the word “Isra-El” (Isra – straight, El – the Creator), who were directed straight to the Creator. In other words, this is a group that is directed to the exploration of the good, unified force—the Creator.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 6/4/17

The World At The Crossroads, Part 5

Baal HaSulam, The Writings of the Last Generation: It turns out that the world erroneously considers Nazism a particular offshoot of Germany. In truth, it is the offshoot of a democracy and socialism that were left without religion, manners, and justice. Thus, all the nations are equal in that; there is no hope at all that Nazism will perish with the victory of the allies, for tomorrow the Anglo-Saxons will adopt Nazism, since they, too, live in a world of democracy and Nazism.

The continuous development of egoism, which is fundamental in nature, leads us to unity, which is called “democracy.” We see that sooner or later, a “democratic” system will be established in all countries and nations.

Democracy means that the majority decides. But no matter how paradoxical it may seem, following democracy, fascism comes. We have already seen such examples in all possible forms, and this is not an accident, but a logical development. Democracy and socialism breed fascism and Nazism. We must understand that this is a natural development that will happen everywhere.

Calls for democracy, socialism, ultra-liberalism, universal equality, to the rule of the majority establish equality in a society that is no longer divided into aristocrats and common people, rich masters and poor slaves. Everyone starts to mix up and there is supposed to be equality for all. This means that people begin to come together and unite.

But their connection turns out to be egoistic, and therefore, it first leads them to liberalism, democracy, and socialism, which then naturally turns into Nazism and fascism. These are the stages in the development of egoism. And there is only one solution that can actually work: unification that is not based on egoism, but is above it, what is called “faith above reason.”

It turns out that all nations in the course of their development that do not adopt the method of Abraham, that is, Kabbalah’s method, will certainly come to Nazism, whether they want it or not. There is definitely a very big difference between India and China if we compare them with Europe and America. But in the places with the most democracy and socialism, Nazism will be established much faster.

The fascists will take many years to come to power in India or China because dictatorship is the form of power and they do not try to establish equality. But this will happen very quickly in Europe and America. And it will be a natural development. Baal HaSulam wrote about the Nazis in America back in the 20s of the last century. And it was not a prophecy, he simply knew the laws of nature and its development.

The United States is a very rapidly developing country, and it cannot be that it will not come to fascism and Nazism after Germany. And humanity must realize that it stands at the crossroads.

Either humanity will come to fascism or it will accept Kabbalah’s method. Then we will begin to understand where we are. This knowledge itself already heals human society because it awakens great surrounding Light that will certainly correct humanity.

There is no other way: our duty is to disseminate the method of unification. That is why we received a desire to study the wisdom of Kabbalah. This is our mission. And of course, interest in Kabbalah is not given to us so that we look indifferently at how the world is moving toward the abyss.
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From the 1st part of the  Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/21/17, Lesson on the Topic: “Europe at a Crossroad”

New Life #894 – Overcoming Difficulties

New Life #894 – Overcoming Difficulties
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Yael Leshed-Harel

Summary

Why does life place difficulties before us? What is the right way to contend with them and how can we be in connection with the upper force through them? Real communication with the upper force requires correction of egoism and acceptance of the power of love and giving to others.
From KabTV’s “New Life #894 – Overcoming Difficulties,” 8/8/17

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Tragedy In Las Vegas

Question: What are your thoughts about the terrifying events that shook American society as yesterday’s shooting rampage in Las Vegas? A CBS news executive wasn’t embarrassed to write on her Facebook page that she was not “sympathetic” to the victims of the mass shooting in Las Vegas. 

“I’m actually not even sympathetic [because] country music fans often are Republican gun toters,” former executive Hayley Geftman-Gold wrote (The Hill).

Answer: It’s telling that such examples of behavior are coming specifically from the side of the so-called “liberals.” This shows what an upside-down world we are living in, according to definitions.

The so-called “liberals,” “democrats,” and “socialists” are in reality the biggest Nazis and people-haters who are not concerned with anything other than the celebration of their own ideas. In the past this wasn’t called liberalism, it was called something completely different.

I grieve for all the victims of this horrible crime and empathize with the pain of their families and friends. Unfortunately, I can only repeat that everything depends on our unity, only this can bring peace to American society, a society which today represents modern Babylon and consists of representatives of all the nations of the world.

As at one time Abraham wanted to unite all of ancient Babylon on the basis of love that would cover all transgressions, so it is in modern America—unity is the only answer. In essence, this is exactly what Trump was talking about, promising to make of Americans one united nation. But, unfortunately, this promise is, as yet, only words.
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From the Lesson “Mutual Guarantee,” 10/3/2017

Each Soul Is Individual

Question: Will I lose my individuality after uniting with other souls?

Answer: Each soul is absolutely individual. When we talk about uniting with other souls, we mean in a general movement, a common effort.

But by this, each individual soul does not dissolve into other souls; even if we speak in these terms, the emphasis is on the united effort toward a single goal.
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From the Lesson in Russian 5/14/17

Holidays—Stages Of Correction

Torah, Deuteronomy 31:10 – 31:11: Then, Moses commanded them, saying, “At the end of [every] seven years, at an appointed time, in the Festival of Succoth, [after] the year of release, when all Israel comes to appear before the Lord, your God, in the place He will choose, you shall read this Torah before all Israel, in their ears.

Self-examination, examination of your own negative, egoistic desires occurs prior to the New Year (Rosh HaShana).
Rosh HaShana is the beginning of correction; Judgement Day (Yom Kippur) is the next stage.

And the final correction occurs on Sukkot. This is “hibuk smol” (embrace from the left side) and “hibuk yamin” (embrace from the right side),in other words, the drawing together of the Creator and the created being. Their complete union is symbolized by the last day of the holiday of Sukkot called Simchat Torah (Rejoicing of the Torah).
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From KabTV’s Secrets of the Eternal Book, 1/23/17

The World At The Crossroads, Part 4

Today the world is returning to the dark times of fascism, which will bring great suffering not only to the Jews, but to absolutely everyone. On one hand, unification based on egoism, called Nazism, unites nations and states, but each within itself.

It cannot last long and ultimately collapses because it connects people only in the common hatred of someone else and does not build an internal unity. It is like the mafia, which is strong by its unity, because it allows it to beat everyone else. But this unity is based only on hatred, not love. This is precisely how the path of light differs from the path of suffering: unity is based on love.

Therefore, Nazism cannot last long and eventually ends in crisis. However, today it is developing in Europe and the USA. And then they will be followed by Latin America: Venezuela, Brazil, Argentina, as well as Canada, which also came very close to it.

Question: What is the difference between Nazism in the United States and what happened in Europe?

Answer: The US will continue Nazism, which was in Europe, in a more developed, aggressive, and cohesive form. America has the forces and foundations necessary for it. Nature has long been preparing this bomb, which will certainly explode.

Many white Americans feel discriminated against since the 1950s, when the talk about equality between all races and communities in America began. They will serve as gunpowder for a big explosion.

Baal HaSulam gives a very precise definition of our egoism in the article, “Peace In The World”: “All the creations of the world are similar in that everyone seeks to use all others for their own benefit, applying all the means at his disposal and completely not considering that they are building their own well-being on neighbor’s property destruction.”

Therefore, when egoism grows to a certain level, we need to take care of its correction. Either it will lead us to collapse, or we will bring it to correction, one of two. Before Abraham’s time, egoism developed latently, “in a latent period.” But at some point the disease suddenly spreads, and we need to neutralize it very quickly. This is what occurred in the time of Abraham.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/21/17, Lesson on the Topic: “Europe at a Crossroad”

What Is The Soul And How Does It Develop?

Question: What is the soul and how does it develop?

Answer: The soul is the quality of bestowal and the body is the desire to receive. There are many nuances between these two qualities and that is why a person who is not aware of them usually gets confused.

The fact is that the Creator created the desire to receive pleasure, which is the substance of all nature. The nature of the Creator is the desire to bestow and only the Creator possesses this quality.

Therefore, when we say that a person can change his desire from the desire to receive to the desire to bestow, we do not mean that we can change the desire itself but only how we can use this desire with the intention to bestow. Nevertheless, we still always only want to receive.

Usually, we just say that one person gives to another, but in fact, no one gives anything to anyone; such a state does not exist in our nature.

Even if I give you something, I get something in return. The state when a person gives of himself does not exist because a person is not a source. Therefore, any bestowal on the material level has a hidden reward.

But how can a person achieve similarity to the Creator, after all? In other words, how can a person find his or her soul? How can the desire become similar to Him if it is, in fact, the desire to receive? Receiving becomes identical to bestowal only when it has the intention to receive for the purpose of bestowal.

How do we do that? If someone loves me and wants to give me something, then I really can receive it with the intention of pleasing him. By doing him a favor in receiving from him, I perform an action that is equivalent to bestowal.

There are many such instances in our lives. We are talking about the relationship between an important person who is revered by all and an ordinary one. For instance, when an ordinary person gives a gift to an important one and the important one accepts it, he gives pleasure to the ordinary person.

At the same time, there must be absolute understanding of what happens: the important person receives in order to please the ordinary one and the ordinary person gives because for him the action itself is a pleasure since he is giving to the important person.

Here, we can see that the actions are opposite to the intentions, but this does not matter because the most important thing is the intention; it determines the value of the action or its essence.

The Creator’s desire to give and to delight is constant. The desire of the creature, on all levels, inanimate, vegetative, animate, and human, is only to receive.

The inanimate, vegetative, and animate desires are called “nature” and they exist in all people.

The desire to enjoy at the expense of others is called egoism. Moreover, we enjoy, not because it is necessary for our survival on the animate level, but because the “evil man” in each of us enjoys humiliating others.

Thus, egoism is not something that we have to have because nature forces us to use it but only to suppress and rise above others. This is the evil nature, which is characteristic only in humans.

If I rise above the desires to rule and use others, transform them into bestowal, and do not exploit others for my vanity, but, on the contrary, I lower myself toward them in order to really give back, delight, and fulfill them, then these desires have been corrected from evil to good and are called the soul.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 5/21/17

New Life #893 – The Right Attitude Toward Ego

New Life #893 – The Right Attitude Toward The Ego
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Tal Mandelbaum ben Moshe

Summary

Why does the ego shackle us with fears? Why is it important to provide it with the right environment for development and how is it possible to control it through communication with the higher power?
From KabTV’s “New Life #893 – The Right Attitude Towards Ego,” 8/3/17

Video: Play Now | Download

Audio: Play Now | Download

Newsmax: “GOP And Dems Can Share ATent Without Calling Police“

The largest portal Newsmax published my new article “GOP and Dems Can Share a Tent Without Calling Police“

Setting up an Empathy Tent amidst the chaos that took place between political protesters in the University of California at Berkeley last week seemed like a thoughtful idea—a calm area where protesters from both sides could have a peaceful discussion, free of aggressions.

However, it failed miserably, when a shouting argument led to a violent quarrel which ended with four people being arrested.

Among those arrested for violent behavior was school teacher-turned-Antifa leader, Yvonne Felarca, who had been arrested before for similar behavior. This certainly makes you ponder about the violent ways in which those who consider themselves the guardians of free speech choose to operate. While this is worthy of scrutiny in its own right, I believe it is more urgent to answer: How can we put Republicans and Democrats in the same place without generating violence, and perhaps even produce mutual understanding?

Understanding Human Nature is Key

First things first. We have to acknowledge human nature. Not the nature of Republicans or the nature of Democrats, but the nature of how all people operate. We are inherently driven by our ego, and that’s especially evident when it comes to our political views.
Our ego vehemently fights to self-justify, to the point that it blinds us from seeing anything else and blocks our capacity to understand any opinion that is not similar to or supportive of our own.

Therefore, it’s naïve to think that amidst the sweltering pot of egoistic urges from both left and right, setting up a tent will magically allow people to rise above their differences and find empathy, even temporarily.

In order to produce empathy in the Empathy Tent, participants need proper guidance and preparation. They need a method of deliberation that can produce equality in the discussions and a professional moderator who doesn’t take sides and whose only role is to maintain a “circular” discussion.

“The Circle,” a Safe and Positivie Discussion Platform

To conduct a safe and positive discussion, it’s recommended that participants sit a in a circle, and not just because it helps everyone see and hear each other. This seating arrangement also places them in an equal distance from the center of the circle, which symbolizes a common place between them, where each has a bird’s eye view of all opinions in the circle, without cancelling their own. Only that higher perspective from “the center of the circle” can bring about mutual understanding.

How can such a common place be created? It’s the result of a successful round of discussion. And the starting point is to agree on two simple rules, which will be stated and kept by the circle moderator.

Rule number one: Equality in the discussion. Every participant is given the same amount of time to express themselves freely and safely. Freedom of speech at its best. Each speaker takes his or her turn following the order of the circle, so no one needs to spend their energies in fighting for their time to be heard.

The second rule is listening to every input. This means that when someone speaks in the circle, the role of the other participants is simply to listen. This does not mean they need to agree with what they hear, nor do they need to start thinking like the speaker. Rather, they listen in order to understand what motivates the speakers, what they aspire for, what is their view.

A professional circle moderator will make it clear that there is no attempt to decide on a winning view, and we also don’t want to blur out our differences. The circle encourages opening one’s ears without shutting one’s mouth. This brings us back to understanding human nature – when a person is certain that he will have the time to express himself and that his message will be heard, he also becomes more capable of listening.

American Society Needs to Focus on Collective Intelligence

These two simple principles, equality in the discussion and listening to each other, are like much needed oxygen in today’s society. But there’s more. These principles have been empirically proven by MIT researchers to drive the collective intelligence of any group of people. This means that if a group of people is faced with a collective challenge, their success is determined not by how sharp or talented the individuals in the group are, but rather how well they follow these principles in coming to a solution.

The relevance for the socio-political rifts in America is straight forward: with each side focusing on its righteousness, we are collectively incompetent in finding solutions to common challenges. We have to recognize the urgent need to foster our “collective intelligence” and establish effective practices to achieve it. Otherwise, what we witnessed in Berkeley last week is only the beginning. Social rifts will widen, the inability to communicate will become fixed, and violence will spread exponentially.

Fostering a New Social Mindset

Let’s face it. The change that’s needed in America will not happen by an occasional Empathy Tent even if it’s conducted according to the above guidelines.

Americans need to consistently experience the benefits of safe and positive deliberation, week by week, circle after circle.

Sounds far from reality? Of course it does. This is because we have come to accept a reality where constructive deliberations and mutual understanding between different views are not expected to occur. Instead, violence is an expected result when people of clashing views occupy the same space.

However, it is precisely this deadlock and these extreme disparities that bring about the dire need to implement a connection method that elevates us above our differences and enables us to find the “center of the circle.”

My experience has shown that such a method can be applied to all types of people and in all settings. This is because it relies on our natural wiring for human connection. It’s not about using pretty words and being polite to each other and has nothing to do with ethics.

Rather, we have to unearth the natural fountain of wisdom, resilience and efficiency that exists in the correct connection between people. In fact, it is a natural resource for prosperity in every aspect of human life.

But at the very least, it can prevent violence. Even for this reason alone, we should put it into practice as soon as possible. Otherwise, today it’s a flare-up at Berkeley, tomorrow it’s a wildfire everywhere.
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