Why Should We Not Use Plastic? (Quora)

Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Why should we not use plastic?“

This evening, I was approached by a newer student who stated that perhaps we would be a better example of a positive force in society if we wouldn’t use plastic, since plastic is considered as bad for the environment.

I explained to him simply that Kabbalah doesn’t relate to the topic of plastic. Kabbalah deals with pinpointing the base cause of all evil phenomena in nature—our egoistic desire to enjoy—and correcting this desire, i.e., inverting its intention from “for my own benefit” to “for the benefit of others.” As a result of the work at the level of desire, the causal point of any phenomena in our world, nature corrects all man-made distortions.

Therefore, if we correct the plastic in our hearts—the desire to benefit ourselves alone—it will all work out, I promise you.

The Meaning Of Kabbalistic Books, Part 2

The Torah Is a Secret Code.

From the point of view of Kabbalah, the Torah is a completely secret code. Moreover, it is classified such that each person can understand it in one way or another depending on the extent of his correction or corruption.

Question: The secret is not in that I have to understand the meaning of some word?

Answer: No. You cannot extort its code from someone, open this book with a special key, or see what is hidden between the pages. It is impossible.

But if you have a certain quality—bestowal, love, exiting yourself, i.e., the quality of the upper world—then while reading the Torah, you begin to see that the book describes not our world, but a completely different, reverse upper world.

If a person can acquire such qualities that are contrary to one’s current properties, then one reads this book correctly, as it was written by its author. And if one does not possess these qualities, then one reads it like everybody else in this world.

Question: I have heard that if one picks a letter after every ten words while reading the Torah, it is possible to reveal some information in this way.

Answer: No. You can read it as you like: front to back, back to front, after every ten or twenty words—nothing will help.

Question: Can the future be predicted by this book? They say that it contains all the information.

Answer: It contains information about everything. Not only about our world, but about all the worlds, about everything that exists, about each and every one of us and all of us together, regardless of time and any possible states. But the fact is that this cannot be revealed.

Question: Is it really possible to find information about a person who will be born, suppose, in 20 years, and about what will happen to him in 50 years?

Answer: To the smallest detail. Moreover, all his external and internal properties are described there, everything that will happen to him every moment, with all the billions of people, animals, and plants, every grain of sand, all the worlds, and their mutual representations.

Question: Can Kabbalists decipher this?

Answer: Yes, to the extent of their development. They read it in the same way as we read a plain text.
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From KabTV’s “Fundamentals of Kabbalah” 12/18/18

Why Are Some Souls Lucky And Others Are Not?

Question from Facebook: What have the souls done in order to be born as your children and grandchildren? Why are some lucky and others are not?

Answer: I assure you that it is not a great gift to be my children and grandchildren. They carry a certain weight of my life. In fact, their life is different, but it is in no way easier or better.

They are in no way luckier with their souls than others. They have more opportunities to correct themselves, but at the same time, they receive a massive extra addition of egoism.

My son lives in Canada. He is a publisher. My eldest daughter is a doctor of biological sciences, a famous person in the world, dreams of defeating cancer of the female glands. My second daughter is a philosopher who graduated from the faculty of philosophy (Kabbalah) and works in our organization. Whether they are happy or not, lucky or not, I do not know.

The fact is that in all cases of life, a person has everything he or she needs to achieve an absolutely complete spiritual state. Therefore, no one can complain. Even the smallest, lowest, poorest, most narrow-minded person sees what conditions he or she was given from above will come to understand that these conditions, no matter how incredible it may seem to us, are the most suitable for achieving perfection.
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From KabTV’s “Answers to Questions from Facebook”, 3/10/19

The Beginning Of Serious Spiritual Work

It is said by Kabbalists, “There is none else besides Him.” We must reveal this in order to attain in the connection with each other one single source—the one Creator.

To the extent that we connect, by being very different and very far away from each other, we begin to create a new quality, a sense of unity within ourselves, attained by a combination of opposites. Without destroying our egoistic desires (it is impossible to destroy them), without abolishing them, we try to create one single whole from everything within us.

Usually, before coming to a convention, we think that we will gather together and begin investing all our strengths in connection, in annulling ourselves. Yet, when we arrive at the place, it suddenly turns out that our thoughts and desires are not the same as before, and we already want something else.

This is the beginning of our serious work on ourselves. We begin to receive all kinds of disturbances, and it is these that should alert us to create a connection above them.

But we do not try to reveal disturbances, we are simply trying to connect, and as we do so, we reveal more and more disturbances. This gives us an opportunity to rise above them and create a single desire, a single system.
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From the Convention in Moldova, 9/5/19 Lesson 0

What Would It Take For Israel To Get Involved In Syria? (Quora)

Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What would it take for Israel to get involved in Syria?“

Israel should not get involved in Syria. It makes no sense for Israel to get involved in such conflict zones.

Israel is not a superpower. It’s a small nation, and it’s finding it hard enough to survive as it is.

Against Turkey, the current attacking force against the Kurds in Syria, Israel is powerless. Turkey is very powerful, boasting an extraordinary population of over 79 million people.

For the time being, Israel needs to be neutral. The world needs to understand that Israel is in a situation where it needs to be concerned about itself. It has no need to show itself off to other nations as “holy,” i.e. involving itself in different places to try and portray a positive image of itself to the world.

Just as every individual has the right to exist, every nation also has the right to exist. We can say it openly, that every nation has the right to exist, but it does not mean that we need to enter into war with everyone in the process.

If Israel would really like to offer its help to the Kurds, the Syrians or any other nation, it needs to realize the role it assumed when it was given the name, “the nation of Israel”: a role of a people who aim Yashar Kel, i.e., straight to the higher force of unity and love.

By uniting above differences (“love will cover all transgressions”), the nation of Israel’s unity would have a positive rippling effect throughout humanity as a whole, softening conflicts and calming the world by inviting nature’s unifying force in between the multitude of people and nations (i.e. to be “a light unto nations”).

Is There A Need To Explore Our Negative Qualities?

Question: What is the process for exploring negative qualities?

Answer: There is no need to explore any negative qualities, ever. If they arise, then let them arise. And if not, it is strictly forbidden to poke around in ourselves and look for something negative. Only positive—the connection between us and nothing else.

I do not want to hear about anything negative. Only if it is revealed by itself as a result of my positive actions.
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From KabTVs “Fundamentals of Kabbalah,”  7/14/19

What Is The Meaning Of Sukkot?

Posted on October 13th, 2019 at 11:18 am

From My Facebook Page Michael Laitman 10/13/19

On Sukkot, we are commanded to dwell in temporary dwelling.
Temporary dwelling means that it is built from things we consider unimportant.
The things our ego cannot appreciate are the things that build our inner thatch. The inner thatch covers and protects us from our own ego.

“Sukkot 2019: How To Reconstruct Our Jewish Home” (Times of Israel)

The Times of Israel published my new article “Sukkot 2019: How to Reconstruct Our Jewish Home”

Synagogues across the globe are shutting down their doors for good. Demographic changes, financial problems, assimilation, and lack of interest in Jewish life among younger people, as well as the feeling of insecurity due to anti-Semitic attacks, are among the major factors that contribute to this phenomena. But there is a deeper cause to the declining membership and its consequences for communities: the lack of cohesion and sense of a common home among the Jewish people as a whole. The festival of Sukkot, during which we celebrate unity and hospitality with those closest to us is an invitation to reshape our destiny and reflect on building a common sukkah where all Jews can be united as one and with them the entire world.

The Jewish festivities this year face a new reality. Once vibrant Jewish communities around the world have seen their membership significantly reduced. For instance, the community in Nice, once the fourth largest in France with around 20,000 members, has decreased to a mere 3,000. Similar situations can be found in Jewish congregations in Boston, New York and the Midwest, all due to dwindling membership.

“Jews exhibit lower levels of religious commitment than the U.S. general public” among whom, only 26% said religion is “very important,” in comparison to 56% of non-Jews, according to American research organizations. The studies also show a gap between Jewish attendance at synagogue services compared with other denominations: “Jews report attending religious services at much lower rates than do other religious groups. 6-in-10 Christians (62%) say they attend religious services at least once or twice a month (compared with 29% of Jews),” revealed the survey.

I am not surprised. After WWII, the sense of belonging and the need for communal association thrived among Jews, but nowadays there is basically nothing to hold a community together. In a generation where everything is disposable and anything can be acquired, independence has become more highly valued than ever before and calculations for community trail accordingly. One may ask, “Why should we be part of a community and identify as being Jewish? What do I get out of it?” “Nothing, and perhaps the opposite,” would be the probable response. In fact, Jewish life essentially has little or no meaning if we do not ask life’s most significant questions, such as “Why do I exist?” and “What does it mean to be Jewish?”

The word “Jew”—“Yehudi” in Hebrew—stems from the word “unity”—“Yichud.” Our purpose as Jews is to reach a state of unity among each other and to share it with the nations of the world, i.e. to be “a light unto the nations.” However, in order to attain such a lofty goal, we need to first rise above our egoistic nature, that is, to transform our attributes of self-concern and self-indulgence into concern and care for others.

How does this relate to the Sukkot holiday? This festival is precisely a call to exit our comfortable egoistic “home,” meaning our self-love, and to build a new structure, a sukkah, the symbol of the new world that we can create if we acquire the quality of bestowal, the quality of love for others.

Sukkot symbolizes the beautiful process of inner change where we take the “waste of barn and winery,” items that, according to the wisdom of Kabbalah, represent the quality of love for others that are now mingled and immersed within our egoistic thoughts of self-concern, and raise such attributes like a roof, high above our heads. We construct a cover for the ego and, day by day, during the week of Sukkot, perform additional clarifications about the qualities that contribute to altruism and ask for our correction. Then, symbolically, the light that sifts through through the thatch roof transforms our previous egoistic qualities into a new state where we recognize love and connection with others as life’s most important values.

The true meaning of Sukkot is to build a new reality of mutual understanding and support—a sukkah of peace, so that the entire Jewish people and the whole world can gather beneath that big thatch of covering and be united as one. When this comes to pass, the temporary home of the sukkah will be transformed into a temple, a common place in our hearts, and not merely a physical structure.

I wish you all a joyful and peaceful holiday!

The Meaning Of The Holiday Of Sukkot

Posted on October 13th, 2019 at 10:07 am

The true meaning of the holiday of Sukkot is to build a “Sukkah of Peace” so that the entire world will gather beneath this big thatch covering, where we will be united as one.

Rosh Hashanah: If We Unite, We Cover All Crimes With Love

Happy New Year!

The period from the beginning of the year (Rosh Hashanah) to the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur) is called “terrible days.” Yet, in fact, it all depends on our perception. Even the most mournful days such as Tisha B’Av, which symbolizes the historical tragic events that happened to the Jewish people in the past, will in the future become the best days.

Therefore, everything depends on a person’s perception. If one lives in the past, as many people do because they know nothing about the future, then these are terrible days for him or her. However, the wisdom of Kabbalah, which is completely oriented toward the future, tells about these days as the most beautiful and good ones. The new year (Rosh Hashanah) is the beginning of good changes.

The period of repentance that precedes the beginning of the new year is necessary to recognize our evil nature, which we must correct. The most suitable time for correction is approaching, thanks to which we come to good.

Rosh Hashanah is followed by the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur) when a person judges himself, clarifying how he can reach the degree of the Creator, the state of the upper force, the best state possible. He checks what he must correct in order to reach this corrected and elevated state.

As a result, the holiday of Sukkot comes. After all the clarifications and requests for correction, we begin to build a soul. The Sukkah symbolizes the common soul of Adam HaRishon we all are parts of. If we gather together under the roof of the Sukkah, under one cover, covering all crimes with love, then we reveal the joy of the Torah (Simchat Torah). We are so united together that the upper light, called the Torah, fills us and brings us to correction.

These days are called “terrible,” but their menace comes from their greatness. As it is written about the Creator that He is “great, mighty, and awesome,” but this is not from a threat but from worshiping His greatness.

Before Rosh Hashanah it is customary to wish each other a happy new year and a good entry in the nook of life. However, of utmost importance is the understanding that if we unite, covering all crimes with love, this year will indeed be good for us. We should reach such a connection not just once a year before the holiday, but every day, day by day becoming spiritually closer to each other until we feel such a heartfelt connection as if we were one man with one heart.

Then we will feel the upper force, the common nature that fills our common heart. This is what really will be a good new year.
From KabTV’s “The World. Jewish holidays” 9/26/19

So The Views Would Not Perish From The World

Baal HaSulam, “The Freedom”: Therefore, the collective is obliged to meticulously guard all the views of the few, so they will not perish from the world. This is because they must know for certain, in complete confidence, that the truer and more developed views are never in the hands of the collective in authority, but rather in the hands of the weakest, that is, in the hands of the indistinguishable minority.

Question: Why should everyone express their opinion when we sit in circles?

Answer: Until everyone fully realizes themselves in the connection between us, we cannot reach similarity with the Creator and build a group where the Creator will be revealed.

The group is a tool. We must calibrate it. As we turn the knob on a radio, tuning it to a certain wave, we must in the same way turn all the members of the group so they would connect with one another, and in their unity, the mutual, common integral force will manifest. This will be the Creator. Therefore, everyone’s participation is very important. Each one individually is very important as well.
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From KabTV’s “Fundamentals of Kabbalah” 12/25/18

How Can You Tell What Is Good, What Is Evil?

Good and evil is an eternal topic, but in the article “Peace in the World,” Baal HaSulam writes that good and evil are evaluated by the actions of the individual toward society.

That is, he immediately takes a completely different direction, and so our actions are evaluated in a totally different way. Although the actions of any person can be so personal and individual that it seems impossible to attribute them to society; nevertheless, they are evaluated only in relation to society.

Question: Can I say: “I did a good deed”?

Answer: No. No matter how good or how bad you treat a plant, an animal, a person, or even yourself, you influence the environment, the society, with your thoughts and actions. Therefore, everything is evaluated in relation to society: how will it change, what will happen to it.

This is how you measure whether your actions are good or bad and to what extent.

How can I know whether my natural actions are good or bad in relation to society? I stroke a child’s head, so this is a good action. How does it affect society? How can I evaluate it?

All my actions, whatever they are, bring some consequences to the environment. How can I feel this?

Remark: But we usually say that a person performed a good deed or that he harmed someone.

My Comment: But how do you know? Let’s say you beat someone. Did you correct him through that?

The fact is that until we feel the entire system of nature we exist in, how we affect it, and what reactions we receive from it, we will not be able to behave correctly and correctly assess our behavior.

We have no indicator, evaluator, or a measuring device, something that I can look at and say: “This was positive and now it is negative” and to what extent.

If I felt this, then I could demand something from myself, and I would see on others, they would be my device, like the arrow on a dial that moves toward good, plus, or toward evil, minus. Then I could go around everyone and be proud that I have everything in plus.

Remark: But there are generally accepted laws of human society that we must comply with.

My Comment: Of course, in nature there are laws, but in human society they are totally distorted. This is the problem. We do not know how we behave. Is our behavior good or bad, and what consequences our actions have? Of course, this is terrible.

Question: How does a Kabbalist weigh his actions to determine if they are correct or not?

Answer: If I do not control myself and I act instinctively, my actions are completely wrong, evil, and they harm society and the world.

If I want to act correctly, I must connect with the society around me, unite with it, feel how close I am to it, exist in it, feel it, control my actions, and feel their consequences in the society around me, in the intention of bestowal and love, independently of myself. This is when I can say that I am acting correctly.

However, this requires practice, a methodology for how to exit myself, enter others, and begin to feel in the connection with them. In this case, you will begin to feel yourself in a different world.
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From KabTVs “Fundamentals of Kabbalah,”  7/21/19

New Life #286 – Envy

New Life #286 – Envy
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Nitzah Mazoz

At its highest levels, envy can help us attain the unlimited feeling of eternal life. Although we can experience jealousy when it comes to food, family, and sex, these are more like drives that are necessary for the body, as with any animal. Men tend to envy the freedom to go out into the world and play with various toys. Women tend to feel jealous regarding beauty and fashion and compare themselves to other women. Like a bull chasing a red cloth, these types of corporeal jealousies form an effective engine for the development of the human ego. We balance the mind with the feeling of jealousy in order to self-realize and achieve what is desired. These types of jealousy based on anything limited and tangible that money can buy reflect what I have rather than what is inside of me. True, spiritual envy occurs when we move into the realm of control. People who ascend to eternal acquisitions are buying an internal, whole, perfect, and unlimited feeling that exists in nature, outside of their bodies, above time and space. They long to change the world with their idea or knowledge. They are like God in that they want to acquire wisdom and attain new horizons. This envy advances us into the beginning of a new life in the Garden of Eden.

Hebrew Is A Way To Express Kabbalistic Knowledge

Question: Was there another language in Kabbalah before Hebrew?

Answer: No. From the very beginning, Hebrew has been the only way of expressing Kabbalistic knowledge. It appeared out of a necessity to express spiritual roots, words, and actions. It exists for this sole purpose.

Conversational Hebrew should not have been used in our world at all. The fact that in Israel today Hebrew is used for writing, reading, and communication is incorrect. It never used to be like this. Kabbalistic texts have always been those written in Hebrew. Other languages were used for everything else, such as Aramaic or ancient Greek, but not Hebrew.

Hebrew is purely a language of branches that is used only for describing the spiritual forces, qualities, and actions.
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From KabTVs “Fundamentals of Kabbalah,” 6/23/19

New Life #285 – Overcoming Despair

New Life #285 – Overcoming Despair
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Nitzah Mazoz

The epidemic levels of anxiety and despair that we see in society today are helping humanity to evolve to the level of Adam. People are less concerned for the well-being of their animalistic bodies today. The anxieties they are experiencing pertain more to an unknown future and questions regarding the meaning of life. What is life for? What am I living for? These are the questions that, when left unanswered, lead people, including children, into despair. We turn to antidepressants and other drugs, but remain unfulfilled. Humanity will reach unprecedented sorrow and will need to be educated in order to address this. They will need to be taught how to connect to the global, integral world. They will need to learn about nature’s plan and the force of wisdom that operates all of us. They will need to understand the thought of creation in order to realize their true human potential and calm all their existential deficiencies.
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From Kab TV’s “New Life #285 – Overcoming Despair,” 1/9/14

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What We Can Learn From The Deadly Attack Outside The Halle Synagogue (Times Of Israel)

The Times of Israel published my new article “What We Can Learn from the Deadly Attack Outside the Halle Synagogue”

The shooting attack near a synagogue in Halle, Germany was yet another dreadful act of anti-Semitism on the holiest day of the Jewish calendar. However, it could have been much worse if the 27-year-old attacker, who identified with the far-right, had broken the synagogue’s doors and slaughtered the 80 worshipers who were conducting the Yom Kippur prayers.

In a video he shot leading up to the shooting, the attacker denied the Holocaust, denounced feminists and immigrants and stated outright that “the root of all these problems is the Jew.”

Upon news of the two people who were shot to death, condemnations came one after another, from German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas tweeting that “shots being fired at a synagogue on Yom Kippur, the festival of reconciliation, hits us in the heart,” and “we must all act against anti-Semitism in our country,” through Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu commenting for a “call on the German authorities to continue taking determined action against anti-Semitism.”

Among all the cries, prayers and warmth for the victims’ families, there is a clear demand for a significant shift to take place against the anti-Semitism that has rapidly spread worldwide. However, other than desperate words, there is an air of helplessness in the face of the growing phenomenon.

Helplessness. Desperation. They sound like very undesirable feelings. But could it be that such sensations are actually a positive outcome of the exponentially rising anti-Semitic crimes and threats?

Perhaps when we are repeatedly stunned by an irrational phenomenon that has haunted our people for generations—one which makes no differentiation between genders, between Yom Kippur and a weekday, and between synagogues in Berlin and Pittsburgh—then maybe this is what will goad us to look into what the Kabbalists have been trying to tell us for generations?

Whether in The Book of Zohar or other Kabbalistic texts, what have the Kabbalists been trying to communicate to the Jewish people? Simply put, if we Jews unite with one another, we invite a positive force dwelling in nature to spread not only among each other, but among all humanity. By awakening nature’s positive, unifying force through our unity, we can bring peace to the world. On the contrary, if divided, where every Jew remains within him- or herself in his or her own prayers, then we provoke the opposite: hatred and conflict. As Kabbalist Rabbi Yitzhak Isaac Haver wrote, “Creation and choice, correction and destruction of the world—all depends on Israel” (Siach Yitzhak. Part 2, Likutim 1).

Hours after the deadly shooting attack, German chancellor Angela Merkel attended a vigil to identify with the victims at a historic synagogue in central Berlin. She stood with the Jewish community as they together sang, “Ose shalom be Meromav” (“make peace in His heaven”). Ironically, sometimes the answer to our toughest questions can be found right under our noses. Sometimes we need only open our ears and listen to the words we’re singing…

• “Ose shalom be Meromav” (“make peace in His heaven”). It means that in our unity and our common prayer, we can make the upper force bring peace above;
• “Hu yaase shalom aleinu” (“He will bring peace upon us”), i.e. the upper force will bring peace to the whole of humanity;
• “Ve al kol Yisrael” (“and upon all of Israel”), i.e. where the role of the people of Israel is to unite;
• “Ve al kol yoshvei tevel” (“and for all the people in the world”), i.e. our role is not to receive the light of unity for ourselves, but to be a conduit for the light to spread to the world, i.e. to be “a light unto the nations.”
• “Ve imru amen” (“and say Amen”), i.e. then we will all—Jews and the nations of the world—be truly grateful for reaching the long-awaited peace.

Amen.

“Jewish Post-Trauma: The Cause, Diagnosis And Cure” (Times Of Israel)

The Times of Israel published my new article “Jewish Post-Trauma: The Cause, Diagnosis and Cure”

Post-trauma from recurring anti-Semitic incidents, the Holocaust and the pogroms has permeated entire generations of Jews. In Israel, anxiety and traumatic events are part of the daily reality affecting children, adolescents and the population in general. The average Israeli has experienced or knows someone victim of terror or war. Drugs may numb symptoms of this phenomenon, but the real cure can only come from our unique capacity to build a safety net when we connect as a Jewish nation.

Israel has the strongest army in the world, yet it provides no immunity from the trauma of losing a friend in combat, or the constant gray cloud of threats from enemies inside and outside the country. Loads of combatants at various levels are exposed to anxiety, from adults and seniors who have participated in Israeli wars in the past, to young men who have completed combat service.

The phenomenon, however, is much broader than merely the Israeli army. It includes all of us. We are a nation living in trauma on a daily basis. It is not only due to the permanent threat that has engulfed the State of Israel since its establishment, and not just because of the hidden fear of occasional violence and terror. We are constantly traumatized for being Jewish.

The trauma that grips us—from the threatening future, the hostile present or the haunting past—permeates all avenues of the nation. Children attend kindergarten in areas attacked by rockets, breathe hidden panic in the atmosphere, quickly drop everything and run to shelters whenever warning sirens sound nearby, and shiver whenever the alarms sound on their phones that another rocket has penetrated a more remote part of the country. The trauma is already within us, whether or not we’re conscious of it.

We tend to take pride in our Israeli roughness, the outward toughness. But those who feel safe do not need such armor. They can afford to be outwardly sensitive as well. This is another symptom of Jewish trauma: the need to defend, fortify and play tough so as to not get hurt.

Why is this happening to us? Who are we Jews? Where did we come from and where are we headed? What is it all for? What is the purpose of this world? What is our role toward the world?

We must answer these questions distinctly, and reach the realization of our important role in humanity, even if it seems like a heavy weight on our shoulders. On the contrary, the implementation of our role will make our current difficult reality become lighter and more pleasant.

The prophet Jonah, whose story we read on Yom Kippur, also suffered from trauma. His story, which describes our experiences, began with the mission he received from God: to warn the people of Nineveh to turn away from their evil ways and begin to act as reality requires—with mutual affection.

Jonah tried to flee from his destiny. He boarded a ship that sailed far into the sea, and his escape caused a storm. The sailors on board realized that the cause of the storm, which created much hardship, was the “Jew” on their ship. Thus, they threw him out to sea. A whale swallowed Jonah. While in the whale’s stomach, Jonah underwent an arduous self-scrutiny until he agreed to carry out the role assigned to him. Afterward, the whale brought him to safety, to the city of Nineveh.

The story of Jonah is the story of the people of Israel.

We have a role that has always accompanied us: to establish unity among us, and serve as an example to the world. However, we try to avoid this role. Therefore, every time the world suffers from a given crisis, minor or major, it marks us Jews as guilty for the trouble. Also, every accusation we face becomes a trauma that accumulates over and over in our Jewish experience, whether or not we feel it.

Our destiny is inevitable. It is the result of rigorous laws of nature written in the Kabbalah books. We must learn them in order to understand what we have to do, otherwise we will continue experiencing amassing blows from the nations of the world.

It is correct to treat the entire Jewish nation as suffering from trauma. We should not blur the problem, but accelerate the understanding that healing such trauma depends on developing an upgraded, unified approach to each other and reality as a whole.

Yom Kippur is a time of introspection, both for individuals and for the Jewish nation as a whole. We can use the time for self-examination at Yom Kippur to positively affect our destiny if we also agree to realize our role, unite and become “a light unto the nations.”

By raising awareness and working on uniting among each other, we will satisfy humanity’s demands upon us and radiate a positive light to the world, as it is written, “for they are life to those who find them and health to all their flesh” (Proverbs 4:22).

Take Correction Into Our Own Hands

Thus, if Israel are rewarded and take the law of development that their bad attributes must go through in order to invert them into good ones, they will bring it under their own government. In other words, they will set their minds and hearts to correct all the bad attributes in them and turn them into good ones by themselves. Then, “I will hasten it,” meaning they will be completely freed from the chains of time. And from now on, this end depends on their own will, meaning only by the greatness of the deed and the mindfulness. Thus, they hasten the end. (Baal HaSulam, “Peace in the World”)

Our advancement depends only on the connection between us, on how close we get to each other. The further we advance to the purpose of creation, the closer we must get to each other. At the final point of our path, we all, without exception, will merge into one single whole, into one single Kli (vessel). This means that every time we must accelerate our rapprochement, trying to rise above ever-increasing disagreements, and thus, gradually we will come to the state of equivalence between ourselves and the Creator.

But if they are not rewarded with developing their bad attributes under their own authority, but leave it under the Authority of Heaven, they, too, are certain to attain the end of their redemption and the end of their correction. This is because there is complete certainty in the Government of Heaven, which operates by the law of gradual development, degree by degree, until it turns any evil and harmful to good and beneficial as the fruit on a tree. (Baal HaSulam, “Peace in the World”)

Even if we leave this work and do not study Kabbalah anymore, let everything take its own course, go with the flow, live as long as we live, and die if it is time to die, it will in no way help to shorten or lengthen the period of our development.

Whereas, if we advance by the path of light, we will accelerate our development, and, at the same time, we will make it good and kind. However, this is only possible if we constantly establish relationships in the group above our egoism.

Without doing so, we advance by the path of suffering, where we will receive all kinds of slaps, kicks, and diseases on every inch of it, not to mention the approaching massive catastrophes.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 7/14/19

New Life #284 – The Evolution Of Emotions

New Life #284 – The Evolution Of Emotions
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Nitzah Mazoz

Emotions are a part of our desire to experience pleasure and evolve from the level of animal to the level of human or Adam. The mind or brain helps us fulfill our evolving emotional desires. We desire food, sex, and family within our animalistic bodies and money, honor, and knowledge in a more abstract way. The development of knowledge brings pain rather than pleasure as the masses begin to question what they are living for and can no longer find fulfillment. A growing sense of emptiness and depression pushes us toward the attainment of the upper degree. We experience the greatest pleasure when we rise above our own lives and attain the root or source of all life.
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From Kab TV’s “New Life #284 – The Evolution Of Emotions,” 1/7/14

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Baal HaSulam

From My Facebook Page Michael Laitman 10/10/19

Yehuda Leib HaLevi Ashlag is known as Baal HaSulam (Owner of the Ladder) for his Sulam (ladder) commentary on The Book of Zohar. Baal HaSulam dedicated his life to interpretations and innovations in the wisdom of Kabbalah, disseminating it in Israel and throughout the world. He developed a unique method to the study of Kabbalah, by which any person can delve into the depth of reality and reveal its roots and purpose of existence.

Baal HaSulam was born in Warsaw, Poland on Sep 24, 1884. At the age of nineteen he was ordained as a rabbi by the greatest rabbis of Warsaw, and for sixteen years he served as a Dayan (Jewish orthodox judge) and a teacher in Warsaw.

Baal HaSulam’s teacher was Rabbi Yehoshua of Porsov. In 1921, Baal HaSulam immigrated to Israel and settled in the Old City of Jerusalem. The word of his coming quickly spread among Jews who emigrated from Poland, and he soon became known as an authority in Kabbalah. Gradually, a group of students formed around him, attending Kabbalah lessons in the wee hours. Later on Baal HaSulam moved from the Old City and settled in Givat Shaul, which was then a new neighborhood in Jerusalem, where for several years he served as the neighborhood rabbi.

Baal HaSulam spent the years 1926-1928 in London. During his time in London he wrote the commentary to the Aris Tree Of Life Panim Meirot uMasbirot, which he printed in 1927. Throughout his stay in London, Baal HaSulam conducted extensive correspondence with his students in Israel, which were assembled in 1985 in a book titled Igrot Kodesh (Letters of Sanctity).

In 1933, Baal HaSulam published the tractates Matan Torah (The Giving of the Torah), HaArvut (The Bond), and HaShalom (The Peace).

Baal HaSulams two major works, the result of many years of labor, are Talmud Eser Sefirot (The Study of the Ten Sefirot), a commentary on the writings of the Ari, and Perush HaSulam (The Sulam Commentary)on The Book of Zohar. The publications of the 16 parts (in six volumes) of Talmud Eser Sefirot began in 1937. In 1940 he published Beit Shaar HaKavanot (The Gatehouse of Intentions),with commentaries to selected writings of the Ari. Persuh HaSulam on the Zohar was printed in 18 volumes in the years 1945-1953. Later on Baal HaSulam wrote three additional volumes containing commentaries on The New Zohar, whose printing was completed in 1955, after his demise.

In his Introduction to the Book of Zohar, Baal HaSulam writes as follows (item 58): And I have named that commentary The Sulam (ladder), to show that the purpose of it is, as with every ladder, that if you have an attic full of goods, then all you need is a ladder to reach it, and then all the bounty of the world is in your hands.

Baal HaSulam wrote a series of introductions that prepare the student for proper study of Kabbalistic texts. Some of these introductions are Preface to the Book of Zohar, Introduction to the Book of Zohar, Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah, Preface to the Sulam Commentary, General Preface to the Tree of Life, and Introduction to Talmud Eser Sefirot.

In 1940, Baal HaSulam published the first and, as it turned out, the last issue of the journal HaUma (The Nation). The journal was shut down by the British Mandate authorities after having received malicious information that the journal propagated communism.

Baal HaSulam encountered enormous difficulties printing his books. We can learn of the importance he ascribed to printing and disseminating Kabbalah from the 2003 Israel Award laureate Prof. Shlomo Giora Shohams description of his meeting with Baal HaSulam in the early 1950s.

“I found him standing in a dilapidated building, almost a shack, which housed an old printing press. He couldn’t afford to pay a typesetter and was doing the typesetting himself, letter by letter, standing over the printing press for hours at a time, despite the fact that he was in his late sixties. Ashlag was clearly a tzaddik (righteous man) – a humble man, with a radiant face. But he was an absolutely marginal figure and terribly impoverished. I later heard that he spent so many hours setting type that the lead used in the printing process damaged his health.”

This excerpt was published on Dec 17, 2004 in Haaretz newspaper, in a story by Micha Odenheimer.

Baal HaSulam did not merely put his ideas on paper; he acted vigorously to promote them. He met with many leaders of the Jewish settlement in Israel of the time, leaders of the Labor movement and many public figures. Among these figures are David Ben-Gurion, Zalman Shazar, Moshe Sadeh, Chaim Arlozorov, Moshe Aram, Meir Yaari, Yaakov Hazan, Dov Sadan and the great poet Haim Nahman Bialik.

According to Ben-Gurion, he met with Yehuda Ashlag several times, and was apparently surprised:

“I wanted to talk to him about Kabbalah, and he wanted to talk about Socialism.”

(Ben-Gurion Archive, Diaries, Aug 11, 1958).
In his essay Three Meetings and In Between (Amot, Tel-Aviv, 1963, p.49), Dov Sadan writes:

“Rabbi Yehuda Leib Ashlag, among the greatest Kabbalists of the time, aimed at turning the fundamentals of Kabbalah into a historic engine of our generation. Through his socialistic perception, which is based on the above, he sought contact with the Kibbutz Movement.”

It might be surprising to think that Baal HaSulam sought connection with the Hebrew Labor Movement and its leaders, considering the mental and educational chasm between them. However, deep study of his writings reveals a fascinating and intriguing figure of an erudite who was very much involved in the events of his time, both in Israel and the world over, a figure whose ideas are considered revolutionary and daring even to this day.