inapoi la SURSE Michael Laitman – link
INTRODUCTION
“Besides its achievements in the development of culture and science, each generation also passes on to the following generation the common human experience it has accumulated. This memory passes from generation to generation in the same way energy is passed from a rotted grain to a newly emerged sprout. The only thing that exists is the passage of memory, energy or Reshimo. On the other hand, all matter rots in the same way a human body rots and all information passes to the rising soul. Afterwards this soul inhabits new bodies and realizes this memory or Reshimo.
What is the difference between the passage of information through a seed during the birth of a young couple’s offspring and the passage of information that takes place when the soul of a deceased person incarnates into a new body? After all, the parents are still alive in our world and their children live together with them! What souls inhabit their offspring?
Over the course of all centuries all nations inherently possess an immense desire to pass their knowledge on to their offspring in inheritance. They want to pass onto them the very best and most valuable things. The best way to realize this is not through upbringing or teaching, or through the means employed by “Domem de-Kdusha” or regular society.
The passage from one generation to another takes place precisely by way of a spiritual “package”. Therefore in order for a person to pass the very best things on to his offspring the most correct action for a person to do is to correct himself and therefore to improve his seed or his soul. The person’s concern should be for his soul to leave his body in its most corrected form.
This way we see that a person passes his soul on to his offspring, as well as what his soul contains. In addition, he does not pass anything on by way of systems of upbringing, community and anything else existing on earth. The passage takes place only by way of the spiritual level rather than material forms.”
Michael Laitman, excerpt from the book Spiritual Search
THE PURPOSE OF CREATION
There is nothing birthed by the upper governing force without a purpose. Therefore this force itself undoubtedly has a goal for the creation unraveled before us. The reality birthed by the upper governing force is very multifarious. From all this variety, the intelligent perception is of special importance. This perception has been given exclusively to man and it allows him to perceive the suffering of others around him. Therefore, if the upper governing force has a goal of creation then its object is man and everything was created only in order for man to reach his predestination, meaning for him to achieve the state of perceiving the upper force that governs him. He should perceive it in the same way he perceives everything around him.
As a result of becoming close to the upper force or achieving equivalence to it with regard to the attributes of bestowal and love, an immense pleasure emerges in a person. This pleasure can reach the wonderful perception of complete mutual contact with the upper governing force.
All creation is the desire to receive. That is, it is the feminine origin relative to the Creator, Who is the masculine origin or the desire to bestow. In turn, creation is also divided into the masculine and feminine parts. If creation becomes equivalent to the light and becomes the same as the light then it is called the masculine part. On the other hand, if it remains without the light and receives then it is called the feminine part. This is all from the point of view of creation’s correction. Besides correction there also exists a natural division in which the masculine part is the first ten Sefirot (Keter, Hochma, Bina, Hesed, Gvura, Tifferet, Netzah, Hod, Yesod) and the feminine part is Malchut.
In our world everything occurs as a result of the division of Adam’s soul into 600,000 souls. These parts differ in their degree of correction and they must alternatively play either masculine or feminine roles. That is, they must sometimes go along the right line (the bestowing or masculine part) and sometimes along the left line (the receiving or feminine part). All Names of the Torah (the Bible) are spiritual attainments along the ladder of ascent. However, in order to achieve each Name it is necessary to alternatively play the masculine role at times and the feminine role at other times, which symbolize the right and left lines. For example, there exist both masculine and feminine sides on the levels of Pharaoh, Moshe, Israel and the nations of the world, but each specific name is achieved only one time and on a specific level.
Man and woman are the embodiment of the relationships between Zeir Anpin and Malchut of the world of Atzilut. Their connection’s essence and level give a specific name to a level. Masculine and feminine states are constant states on all 125 spiritual levels.
The common Kli is divided into two parts. One of these parts originally aspires forward. This is Galglata ve–Einaim. The other part does not aspire forward; this is the AHP of the common soul. Beside this, AHP is also divided into 70 parts and all these parts are divided into masculine and feminine parts. What takes place is division into a huge amount of various groups and attributes. The common soul’s division into these two parts, the masculine and feminine, is very precise.
The feminine soul, in contrast to the masculine, is a soul that performs a more common correction. Over the course of our existence we go through reincarnations (Gilgulim) and we return to this life many times. Each time we choose and accumulate Reshimot or bitter experience from this life. All the blows we accumulate make us more sensitive to perceiving the spiritual.
In the current reincarnation we have reached such a point that we have begun to understand the way in which we should aspire toward the spiritual. This is the result of many dozens and hundreds of reincarnations. There is common correction and there is particular correction. During the period of incarnation when we are located in our world, before we pass the Machsom (the boundary separating our world from the spiritual) and leave the perceptions of our world, what type of body (male or female) our soul inhabits is significant.
Afterwards, when souls pass the Machsom and enter the perceptions of the Upper world, it is no longer significant who is a man and who is a woman. We will all be Kabbalists – the soul does not have a gender. Of course, there are differences between souls, but they are not purely based on gender. The differences regard what part of the common soul each of the souls relates to.
Question: Will all people, nations and individuals reach the goal of creation? Or is there a distinction according to race, nationality, gender, age, etc.?
The Creator created His creations in the form of still, vegetative, animal and human natures. The still nature is the lowest and the human is the highest. Besides this all nature is vertically (from up down) divided into two genders.
Man differs from the rest of nature because his task is to reach the goal of creation independently. The other parts of nature ascend to the goal of creation, to eternity and perfection, along with man. That is, they depend on man. However, everyone will achieve the goal of creation. Among people there is also a division according to levels as well as into outer and inner parts. (For more detail about this, see Introduction to the book of Zohar in The Book of Zohar by Rav Laitman.)
The male and female parts of creation divide the whole universe from up-down and they are correspondingly parallel and opposite of each other. They complement each other, but never duplicate each other’s functions. However, women usually lay a claim to male functions. What are the feminine functions in creation?
Before our time only chosen men were admitted to study Kabbalah. In our time, as Kabbalists of the past have said long ago, and as our great contemporary Rabbi Yehuda Ashlag writes, everyone can study Kabbalah; everyone without any exceptions. Of course, this includes women. The distinction is only that the gender differences in our world come from the difference in the spiritual roots. Therefore the methodology of studying and applying Kabbalistic knowledge is different for men and women and they must be taught separately. All our classes are translated over the Internet and over our telephone system. The entrance is free as well as all our services. A woman enters Kabbalah and the upper world in the same way a man does.
Question: How can the world exist if everything constantly changes?
The world will continue to exist in the same way it exists right now. Even right now every one of us, and the world as a whole change their opinions, perceptions, doubts and decisions. The world will only advance, working out all its intermediate states faster, and arrive at the Goal.
Today a person changes his profession several times during his life. In the future the concept of “profession” will no longer exist. That which you learned yesterday is no longer suitable today. Such a great renewal in the sciences and technology will take place that you will constantly have to learn new things. You will easily change one thing for another. The notion of a “profession” will no longer exist, as in “I finished a university, so it means I am already in a specific profession”. No, this notion will no longer operate since change will occur so rapidly.
How did things operate in the past? “I was born in my village and I lived there my entire life.” Today we see that everything falls apart. The family falls apart, people remarry two or three times, they raise children in a different family or in a third or fourth family, they change their profession, move, and so on. The whole world in general is moving somewhere! Can we not see this today?
Why is it taking place? It is the result of the development of egoism, pushing us towards increasingly faster changes. In reality this is for the best. Although it may seem to you that all these changes can cause instability in the world, in reality it is just the opposite. They will bring us to realize why the world is unstable.
“Let’s not go so fast, slower. Let’s do away with cars and trains. We’ll stop moving, and return to the previous century – everything was so good then.”
Look at the movies of the previous century, the 20th. How slowly everyone strolls around and thinks. Can you even look at them? You do not even have enough patience to watch those movies. Can someone today read the novels of those times? Can the young generation read novels written 200 years ago? It cannot. Those novels were designed for a completely different person. Over the course of their entire lives people experienced that which a person today experiences in two days. To today’s person, their experiences are humorous.
Therefore all these changes match our developing egoism. Otherwise, without these immense changes, we would not be able to realize our current egoism. Today egoism develops in a person qualitatively much faster every minute. It develops within him according to a parabola. For example, 10 pounds of egoism is added to me every minute. In the past, in the previous century, 10 pounds of egoism was added to me over the course of a year, and now it is added over the course of a day. In this case, what should I do? I must change my opinion 20 times over the course of a day, change all my activities and do something else. I must do this in order to realize the egoism that grows in me. It causes these changes in me unwillingly, whether I want it or not. We are not saying that I wind myself up on purpose or that I do anything in order for this to occur. We can see how nature itself compels humanity. With every year this will become more and more intense, or faster and faster.
In this way, today’s acceleration takes place as a year for a thousand years compared to the past. As a result we will observe a completely different world in several years. We cannot look at a year as being the same time period it was in the previous century or the century before that. Today, a year is a completely different measurement.
It is incorrect to say, “…until humanity ripens, until something happens to it…” We cannot even suppose what will happen to it in a year. Life exceeds all fantasies. This is rhythm.
We can see how many people change their profession, their family and place of residence. Look at what is happening in the world. People are dropping everything and leaving to start a new life, as if they were born anew.
Why does this occur? A person’s inner desire changes so much that he does not want to take anything from his previous life with him. He moves to a totally different country and begins a totally different life.
Once upon a time, two hundred years ago, could we think such a thing about a person? If you were born in this village then you would live in it. If your father was a blacksmith then you would be one as well, as was the case in everything. Today a person cannot remain the same even in his own life. And it will continue to increase. This way the world will reach the correct existence faster. We cannot be afraid of development and everything the egoistic desire compels us to do. Let it compel us to do anything, if this will cause us to realize its evil faster.
MAN AND WOMAN
Everything occurring in our world is the result of the Upper forces’ influence that descends to our world. In order to really understand what is happening, it is necessary to study the Upper forces, their attributes, predestination and purpose.
All the worlds are “parallel” to each other. That is, anything occurring in an upper world then takes place in the world beneath it, but it takes place in a specific change of form as a result of the difference in the “materials” of which the worlds are made. Spiritual worlds are made of spiritual material or altruistic desire, and our world is made of egoistic desire.
The entire universe consists of two components: the Creator and the creation He created. The Creator is the One Who Creates, the Bestowing One, the Upper and Determining One. Creation is the receiver, the lower and the subordinate. However, this understanding of creation is incomplete and even mistaken. The reason for this is that the Creator is perfect and absolutely all–mighty. He never thought to create a creation that submits to Him and He does not want to submit it to His desire as a slave. Rather, when He created creation he gave it every opportunity to rise to the highest level and to become equal to the Creator.
The Creator is not afraid of partnership or competition because He is absolutely perfect. To the degree that creation or man becomes perfect he acquires forces equal to the Creator, becoming equally mighty and creating in the same way the Creator does.
These possibilities for creation are not yet manifested in our world and we are toys in the hands of nature and the laws of creation because we ourselves are not yet able to direct the path of correction. Therefore it seems to us that creation differs from the Creator and that creation (the receiver) is lower than the giver!
However, even in our world the relationships between the sexes whereas the male part is “bestowing” and the female part is “receiving” are ambiguous. Even psychologists assert that everything men accomplish in this world, they accomplish only in order to ultimately assert themselves in the eyes of women. This way, with its seeming external weakness the women’s part compels the men’s part to work hard in order to win and throw what it has won to the woman’s feet.
Even in the animal world we see that males have to win the females or fight for them. The lion is much more beautiful than the lioness and the peacock’s tail is more voluptuous than his female. This is true for almost all creatures to such a degree that in many instances the male pays with his life to win the female’s favor.
It is necessary to ponder about the relationship between the sexes in order to fully understand that one has absolutely no advantage over the other, that they both achieve perfection only by completing each other. They accomplish this by satisfying the condition that each one fulfills its own function.
The Creator designed things this way precisely in order to give man the opportunity to transform himself into a bestower from a receiver, to equate his original level to the Creator’s level.
It may seem to us that the difference between the sexes is merely external and hormonal and that we can make a man into a woman in a purely medicinal way by using surgery and hormone replacement. However, the difference is much deeper and it lies in the very root of the universe, in our souls’ roots. The difference comes from there and precisely we, men and women, have different types of souls.
Men and women’s souls come from different spiritual sources and therefore they incarnate into our world in such different creatures. All the differences between the sexes are caused precisely by souls, as well as differences in types and sub-types, classes and sub-classes of all creations.
A spiritual root clothes into a form of our world and it determines all attributes of that form, meaning all the attributes of our body and personality, everything that can possibly be said about each of us. Precisely the root of his soul determines each person’s differentiating signs from everyone else.
The difference in spiritual responsibilities, meaning the paths of men and women’s correction, comes precisely from the difference of their spiritual roots. It does not come from the fact that in our world we are slightly different from each other in our animal bodies according to our hormones and external features. Therefore feminists think that in principle there is no difference between man and woman and the sexes must be equal in everything.
However, everyone receives the same reward. It does not depend on whether a person was born a man or woman. It depends only on whether he or she has used all the opportunities given to him or her from above.
We can see that even in our world, despite everything, men and women have naturally different functions. Is there anything higher than the act of birth? It is an act equivalent to creation or equivalence to the Creator! Despite the fact that a man is valued for his ability to acquire things and bring them home and a woman for her ability to take care of the household, this division of functions does not interfere with our enjoyment due to mutual efforts. A man’s entire pride consists in the fact that he is able to bring something to a woman and give to her. He thinks that he wins her heart by doing this.
In order for a man of our world to correct himself he must achieve equivalence to the Partzuf Zeir Anpin of the World of Atzilut. In order for a woman in our world to correct herself she must only achieve equivalence to Malchut of the world of Atzilut. However, when they achieve their full correction, they both receive an equally full revelation of the Creator and the same attainment. The reason for this is that in the state of Full Correction, Zeir Anpin and Malchut are in the state of total union and they share the same light and the same attributes. They are unified together to the point of total dissolution in each other.
These states are described in “Song of Songs” and they reflect the full and eternal love between the Creator and His creation.
We are unquestionably witnessing progress in development of both the male and female souls, but it does not change their relationships with each other as well as the path of each part. The development of Zeir Anpin (the embodiment of the male part of creation) occurs from the spiritual object or the Partzuf Ima. The development of Malchut takes place from Ima but it does so through Zeir Anpin. Over the course of all history a woman has felt undeservingly belittled. This comes from the upper root. Zeir Anpin was created before Malchut as Adam before Hava (Eve). Zeir Anpin corrects Malchut. Only it can receive light from above and pass it on to her. In principle, women’s blame of men and the Creator comes from “Kitrug Ayareyah” or “The Moon’s Complaints” on the 4th day of creation, when the moon complained to the Creator that it cannot be equal to the sun. In reply the Creator said: “Go and make yourself smaller”. In this case, by acquiring this state you will receive from Zeir Anpin. All of this is described in the Talmud of the Ten Sefirot. Hava was also told that her desire is for her husband and he will rule over you, and so on. We must understand all these upper roots and follow them, because they are optimally good. Hence, the only way we will find mutual balance and union with the Creator is by scrupulously following them, which is men and women’s Goal.
Question: Why does a woman expect care, love, stability and status from a man, while a man wants the satisfaction of animal necessities from a woman?
We can understand the attributes of the objects of our world and the essence of what is happening only by studying their inner natural attributes that come from their roots in the Upper world. Men’s root is the Partzuf Zeir Anpin of the World of Atzilut. Women’s root is the point in his Hazeh (chest). Without having learned the root the only thing we are able to do is endlessly generalize various data of these objects by investigating our world. According to the conclusions we make from this we will create general conclusions and theories and base our knowledge on them until we acquire such data about the studied objects that it will annihilate our current theory.
By accumulating new data we will create a newer theory. In the future, under the weight of new facts, the newer theory will also turn out to be incorrect. The reason for all this is that we are studying the data of our world, meaning the branches; and from this we want make conclusions about their root. This is what all sciences of our world do, thus they are all inauthentic in the upper world. Even in our world they constantly change their laws. We do not reveal the genuine laws of nature. We attribute laws to nature that supposedly exist in it according to our research and the generalization of acquired data. However, nature’s genuine laws act in it. Therefore I call on all of you, as the poet Choser wrote: “Drop your investigations and empty theories, and give us straight answers to the damn questions!” Let’s study the root and think about the branch last of all.
Question: How does the feminine part’s search in Kabbalah differ from the masculine part?
Malchut itself or creation is reflected in the woman. The attributes of Zeir Anpin or the Creator are manifested in the man relative to her. Therefore a woman’s main desire “to find a man that would be only mine, which would understand me, provide me with everything, and answer all my inner questions” comes from the spiritual root of Malchut. She does not want anything else.
Therefore if a woman receives the above, she perceives this as the greatest fulfillment or in other words – happiness. However, if the Creator wants to advance her forward, since she is also creation, then correspondingly she perceives an even greater emptiness with regard to these natural issues. Therefore it turns out that women in our world suffer from men, who do not want to give them the fulfillments they desire so much. That is, women are corrected, led and developed through men.
A man must become equivalent to the Creator in his development and spiritual work; that is, he must bestow. Therefore he is independent of women and searches on a higher level. At first he searches in development around him such as technology, business, art and science, and then Kabbalah. However, it is precisely Kabbalah that is more difficult for him to accept than for a woman, because for him it is much more difficult to clarify the fact that his fulfillment can come only from above. To him it seems to be located in everything in this world.
Man embodies bestowal or the Creator, and woman embodies the vessel that is planning to become corrected, that desires correction. This way, something from a woman’s animal nature as well as something that comes from spiritual nature participates here. In the Talmud, section Sota, it is said that a woman prefers one degree of fulfillment under her husband’s rule to nine degrees of fulfillment in solidarity.
All souls in turn consist of the male and female parts because “the particular and general are equal. That which is present in the general is also present in each particular thing.” The difference is that the women’s soul includes the male part (as a part) and the male part includes the female part (as a part). The path of correction or methodology depends on this.
Why is the preliminary work different for women and men? Because for a woman’s soul, much less work is necessary in order to become corrected compared to a man’s soul. In order for a woman to enter the spiritual world she does not need to do the great amount of work a man must do. She does not have to study the Talmud of the Ten Sefirot and she does not have to study at 3 AM. If she studies on her own once a week or teaches someone else, then this is sufficient for her to enter the Upper world.
The difference between the effort men must make compared to what women must do is simply astounding. The result will be the same, because corresponding accumulations took place in previous incarnations in male and female souls. Moreover, their paths are also different afterwards. The souls begin to unify and reconnect only in the spiritual.
A woman’s soul is more corrected than a man’s. All problems come from men rather than from women. A man as well as a woman can be a Kabbalist. This depends only on a person’s desire. Everything is determined by the size of the effort one makes or the size of one’s desire.
Female souls come to this world in order to help male souls overcome this path and come closer to the spiritual. Therefore the correction of a woman’s soul consists in providing help. This is also true from a purely practical point of view. Women fulfill their role in this world even if they do not study Kabbalah, but the same is not true for men.
As a rule, women’s souls fulfill positive functions in any case, in contrast to men. If a man does not study Kabbalah then he advances only along the path of suffering. It does not matter whether a woman is married or not. Both a single and a married woman are able to pass the Machsom. A man, however, needs to be married because otherwise he will be unable to carry out many of his corrections. However, this does not matter for a woman.
A WOMAN’S NATURE
In reality, a woman’s nature is a very good one. After all, a woman’s ultimate necessity is to be given the opportunity to express love. She wants to have a man that will be able to apprehend the self-expression of her love and her desire to be loved.
A man does not even need to express very much. She only needs to know that he exists. In this case she is able to live by developing her image of love in relation to him. I understand a woman’s character and can only empathize and feel bad together with you. Men are not ready for this; it is part of being uncorrected. If they knew a woman needs only to be given the opportunity to express her feelings and her devotion then they would acquire very much. That which a woman must receive from a man is such a triviality, yet she is unable to receive it.
The reason for this comes from the spiritual root. Therefore women in our world suffer more than men. This will become corrected only in the Final Correction as a consequence, or as branch directly from its root. Nothing can be done about this problem until that takes place.
This problem originates in the first tragedy that took place between a man and woman and it will exist this way until the last couple before the End of Correction. Men will not understand women and they will not be able to give them the necessary small drop of correct relation towards them. They will not understand that a woman is able to build her relation, union and absolutely everything on this drop. This has to come as a consequence of spiritual correction.
This can never become corrected in this world. It is possible only through the point of union with the Creator.
Question: In the beginning the Creator created man, and then He understood that he is capable of more and created a woman?
That’s a nice way to put it. I agree. There must be complete interaction between man and woman. The false opposition between them comes only from lack of understanding of the degree to which we depend on each other. We can ascend to the level of the Creator only if we connect with each other spiritually. Therefore a man who attains correction begins to understand the necessity and importance of a spiritual connection with a woman.
Question: Can the root of a woman’s soul be higher than the root of a man’s soul?
Of course. I always bring as an example the fact that we have had women-prophetesses. In those times, if there was a prophet in a generation, everyone else had to listen to him. All the men carried out everything those prophetesses said regarding all questions, and they led the whole nation. These women are Dvora, Sarah, Hulda and Leah. The level of a prophet is the highest level. Therefore in this case a woman’s soul is not lower than a man’s. Believe me you will not have any reason to complain to the Creator about the fact that you are a woman.
Question: How should a woman live in this world?
Firstly, a person should live in this world in the same way as everyone else, as much as he or she is able to do this. That is, if possible a woman should have a family, children, a husband, work, and fully participate in the life of the surrounding society (it is also created on purpose, in order for us to grow spiritually within it).
If a woman has a family then she is obligated to fulfill all responsibilities that are allotted to her as a woman. That is, she must serve her husband and children, feed them, do the laundry and clean. Of course, you may complain about a “woman’s fate”, but it is this way. If she wants to study Kabbalah, she can study it after completing all of those things.
Question: How can we create correct conditions in order to correct the soul of a single woman?
This is not important. Whether a person is single or not, the soul is always the same. She always works alone, together with the Creator. Therefore a person always feels alone when he is working on his correction. The intention comes as a result of methodological work.
Question: Why is nationality determined by the mother?
In the Introduction to the Science of Kabbalah Yehuda Ashlag writes that every following Partzuf is not birthed on the Reshimo (memory) of the light, meaning the masculine part that remains from the previous Partzuf. Rather, it is born on the Reshimo from the desires, which is the female part that determines all its attributes. Therefore a Partzuf is named according to its beginning Reshimo or its “mother”, from which it was born. Consequently it gives birth to the entire process of the intra-uteral development and birth inside of the mother. This occurs when Partzufim become divided into pairs in the world of Atzilut and they give birth to lower Partzufim or children. Correspondingly in our world we accept this as the basis for naming and defining an object according to its origin.
FAMILY
Even now in our world we can see that everything is leading to the fact that a person remains alone. The family is completely disappearing. Soon there will no longer be a family as such. This is taking place because egoism is increasing. The increasing egoism does not allow people to be together. Egoism becomes bigger and a person first leaves his tribe, then his family and then he begins to feel bad even with his own self. Then he begins to search for the Creator. This is a gradual process.
Question: I see many couples around me who seem to be living together but somehow separately. There is nothing connecting them besides a primitive household. How does Kabbalah explain the connection between a man and woman?
Kabbalah says that love between people can exist only through the Creator. It is said, “Husband and wife – the Shehinah (perception of the Creator) is between them.” This is the same as “Love your neighbor as yourself”. It is possible only if it is bound by the Creator’s existence and His governance from above. Otherwise there is nothing binding and nothing that evokes any feeling of bestowal.
Therefore on the primitive level in our world, family can exist only when there is a necessity to survive. However, as soon as this necessity disappears, we begin to have homes for the elderly, pensions, a woman begins to work and become equal to her husband and so on. The need for family disappears. Family will become reestablished only when man becomes commonly corrected.
Question: What is marriage?
Marriage is the interaction of two absolutely different and opposite parts of creation.
Generally, marriage is the connection of the Creator and creation, in which the Creator is the male part and creation is the female part. Although creation is initially absolutely opposite to the Creator, it must enter into full union with the Creator by gradually becoming closer to Him. This absolutely complete final union, or the state when creation fully unifies with the Upper force, is called “marriage.”
With correspondence to what we must spiritually do with our souls, the same thing occurs with us on Earth between man and woman as a result of our historical development. It takes place as an imprint or copy of spiritual events or actions.
If we knew the spiritual roots and the rules of behavior between these roots, meaning the attributes of these roots, then we would be able to really take pleasure in the earthly marriage in our world or create a perfect connection and unbound happiness.
Since people do not know the upper root, we are drowning in constant suffering. Marriage is losing its necessity in general, because people are discovering the impossibility of any connection within marriage.
However, if people knew how to create their relationships in equivalence to spiritual roots then any man and woman would have a perfect connection in the same way this exists in the upper world. They would be happy, honest and would complement each other, based on knowledge of their own spiritual root and the spiritual root of their spouse. In this case marriage would be ideal. Over the course of their lives, spouses would achieve their spiritual roots and carry out their predestination.
Question: There are not simply physical marriages?
We descend to our world in order to correctly combine in marriage and we return to this world because we find an incorrect partner for ourselves. Since humanity is close to the goal, marriages fall apart quickly in order for us to have time to become disappointed several times in one lifetime and to perceive the necessity of a higher means that will allow connection.
This means is called the attainment of our souls, because bodies do not play any role in the match of two people. If a person knows his spiritual root as well as his spouse’s, he understands how he can create a perfect match in order to completely complement each other from full opposition to each other. Kabbalah studies precisely the attainment of this state between a person and the Creator, and this is precisely what a Kabbalist aspires to accomplish.
Question: Does the opposite exist – purely spiritual marriages?
One cannot exist without the other. Perfection is possible only in equivalence to the Creator, that is, in simultaneous union with Him and others. Only the Creator’s attributes in you guarantee your union eternity, constant renewal and perfection on all levels of man – spiritual, material, psychological and physical.
In perspective, each person’s egoism and all humanity’s egoism as a whole will increase and we will not be able to find any satisfaction in marriage. Huge problems will emerge between people with regard to the connection between them. A person will find fulfillment in turning off the connection with others.
However, the pressure of the upper law of nature pushes us towards equivalence to the Creator and it will cause such suffering that man will realize his egoism to be evil.
- To the degree he realizes this he will want to correct himself.
- To the degree of his correction he will desire a connection with the Creator
- To the degree he desires a connection with the Creator, he will also desire a genuine connection with his spouse in this world.
This way, from the opposite a person will once again come to the ancient institute of marriage. However, he will no longer do this out of instinct, but rather from the realization of upper equivalence.
Question: Does a Kabbalist have to work?
A Kabbalist must be completely involved in this world (unless he receives a personal direction from the Creator to do otherwise). That is, he must work, have a wife and kids, a home, and take care of everything in the same way a regular person does. At the same time he must relate to everything around him from his spiritual level. In this case he corrects himself and the world around him. However, if he does not have a “Nukva” (female half) he does not have that for which to work. Therefore Kabbalists directed men to get married in order for them to have responsibilities with regard to family etc.
The inner changes in a person will become the basis for relating to his friends at work, his place of work and the corporation. Naturally, he becomes more closed and less social, but brief and compliant. However, it is visible that his soul and thoughts are concerned with something else, that he is inside of himself and the surrounding world is uninteresting for him. More accurately, he feels pleasure many times greater and more completely, but he derives this pleasure from a different source than others.
A person who wants to come closer to the spiritual must be like everyone else. He must work like everyone and have a family and children. The important thing is what a person does in the two-three hours he has free after work and responsibilities at home. Does he spend them in front of the television or in a restaurant, or does he make efforts in order to achieve the spiritual goal?
The difference between man and woman in our world is the consequence of the relationship between the male and female parts of the soul. In our world we can see that men and women perceive the world around them differently and they have different responsibilities and tasks. In the spiritual world the male and female parts of the Partzuf or soul complement each other. The female part gives her desires and the male part gives his screens. Ultimately there emerges a mutual revelation of the light or Creator, meaning attainment. Together they comprise perfection.
One person’s corrections do not occur on someone else’s account. It is the same in our egoistic relationships. Every person has his own path because while in the spiritual, various parts exist within one body or Partzuf, in our world they exist in different bodies. In the spiritual each part can exist only if one part completes another in order to perform common work. Therefore from Kabbalah it is clear that genuine relationships between the sexes and genuine family will emerge only with the appearance of corrected souls. According to their correction, egoistic relationships will become replaced by altruistic ones, and this will take place within the family as well.
In this case however, a husband and wife will have a different kind of interaction. It develops gradually, since the spiritual is each person’s personal matter. One cannot talk about this to another person. Rather, one should thoroughly conceal that which he feels in relation to the Creator. This is done in order to avoid ruining another person’s personal path. Every person has a different path. Everything will become revealed to everyone only upon reaching full correction, because there will be no place for problems of egoistic envy.
Question: Why does a child have to separate from his parents?
Children have to “reject” their parents or else they will not grow. Otherwise the new generation’s level will not differ from the older generation. After all, the difference between generations is their spiritual accumulation with which the souls descend down into our world. Bodies are not important; they have no significance. They are all the same, thus there is no difference between the bodies of a single living generation. However, the souls differ greatly.
In every new generation the souls enter with a new potential or new Reshimot (memories or recordings). These new Reshimot or new egoism is more apparent and coarser, compelling people to achieve greater things. Therefore, they naturally reject the past generation and are correct to do this. It is the way things should be; the new generation must look ahead. Parents who force their children to listen to them simply “preserve” them as in a jar.
Question: But why are parents unable to refrain from teaching their children?
This is regular human egoism or simply the desire to be in power. A person cannot have power over himself therefore he punishes his children. Parents do not agree with 90% of what you do.
You marry without asking them, despite the fact that they do not agree. You choose a profession, the place of marriage and you move somewhere. It is a different generation. It is always this way. The problem of fathers and sons has existed for a long time. Such is nature. Generally, a person cannot live according to his parents’ directive.
In addition, this is in accord with the nation’s laws and the laws of the world. If you have grown up, from this moment on you must act independently. You must marry and you must live your life. You have to respect your parents, but not by living according to their program. You must respect them, help them and support them exclusively in the animal form. They gave you life on the animal level rather than the human level. On the human level every generation adds to the previous.
Parents are the previous level. Therefore a person should respect them on their level, in everything that regards the animal life. The Torah obligates a person to do the same thing.
Question: Why were previous generations dynasties and people who lived with their parents?
These generations developed slowly. Look at what is happening during our century. In previous centuries the changes were literally very small from one generation to the next. We are yet to see what will happen in the next generation. Every week and every day there will be huge changes in the whole world. Right now we can see how this tempo is accelerating. Therefore a very fast acceleration is occurring towards the end of days of correction. The tempo and quality of life will be dictated by such a condition that in the evening a person will not remember what he did in the morning because he will have gone through so many inner changes over the course of a day.
UPBRINGING
Every person asks himself: “Why do I live?” In essence this question is about the person’s origin, about the source of life, that is, about the Creator.
Humanity’s curiosity was always aroused by the way in which history progressed, what took place on Earth millions and billions of years ago and where we came from. In essence, however, the question about our origin is not about how our bodies emerged in the process of evolution. Rather, it is about the Creator or the force that created us. When people ask for what sake we exist, in essence they touch on the question about the future or the final goal of our existence.
Questions about the meaning of life awaken in a person as early as in childhood. This is a sign that by his nature a person is already ready to hear the answer to these questions and to discover their solutions. To the degree a child is ready for it, parents and the environment are obligated to fulfill his readiness or satisfy his curiosity. In the worst case his whole life will pass by in a completely automatic way, monotonously, without any sort of change or elevation above the animal level.
His life will roll by – kindergarten, school, possibly university, some sort of job, wife, kids, etc. One person will become interested in football, another in studying the Torah, a third science, and so on until his very death. Ultimately a person does not achieve anything special in his life and, merely depending on what generation and what epoch he lives in, correspondingly he somehow fills the years he has lived.
How can we help a person rise above his life in order for him not to live it within the same plane for all 70 years of his earthly existence?
Precisely by giving a person an answer to the question asked as early as childhood, “What is the meaning of our lives?”, we slightly elevate him above this world. We are obligated to provide people with this knowledge. Every person, a child as well as an adult, will absorb this knowledge according to his sensitivity, according to his structure and ability to absorb spiritual information at the given moment. After all, a person constantly perfects himself from year to year and from incarnation to incarnation. We can see how much humanity is developing and what progress it has achieved. How does this occur?
People’s desires constantly become stronger; their passion increases, yearnings for money, fame, and knowledge. As a result, the question “What is the meaning of my life?”, also constantly develops in a person. Therefore people who ask this question today are totally different than those who asked it 200 or 2000 years ago. These are the same souls, but they are already asking about the meaning of life on an entirely different level. Their question comes from the states of being stupefied and suppressed and it is the result of previous development or previous experience.
As Baal HaSulam says, the problem is that we dull the question about the meaning of life in a person with religious as well as social upbringing. It is not important what environment a person is in. With both kinds of upbringing we program a person’s whole life in this world in such a way that this question ceases to exist for him.
A person suppresses it instead of delving into it, living it, increasing and developing it. The religious answer is, ‘you know, the Creator wants things this way, therefore you are obligated to carry out the commandments and later you will receive a reward for it’. The secular or social answer is, ‘such is life, and we have to live here in order to get along with each other more or less’.
Only the Kabbalistic upbringing is oriented in such a way that a person will again and again ask the question about the meaning of life every moment over the course of his entire life, each time finding a broader and more complete answer to it. This way a person will come to the question that is called his entire soul, the unified Kli of the soul, “Hisaron” or a formulated desire, and he will fulfill this question with an answer called the light of the soul. A person will define the Creator’s relation to him as a question, and the Creator’s revelation to him as an answer.
Question: But this takes many years, since parents do not ask about the meaning of existence. And even if they ask about it, they do not have an answer. What, then, can they tell their children?
You are saying that this will take thousands more years. This process has already been going on for thousands of years and I do not know how much more time it will take. We are talking about the problem itself and about how to resolve it. In all languages, with the help of books, using media systems and the Internet, we are trying to explain to humanity in the whole world that, in essence, all our suffering and pain and our miserable new generation – all of this is screaming and calling to us to change the system of upbringing. Undoubtedly, the changes should begin with the young generation.
The current crisis in the system of upbringing, education, legislation, social boundaries, the decrease of morale, and so on – all this will finally prove to us that humanity does not have a choice and any way out of the situation. In reality, the problem of upbringing is the most important problem, which ultimately determines all other life and social processes.
This is in essence the only question that awakens in us in childhood years and it is also an adult’s question, since everything else is trivial. Look, we are asking this question as early as 6, 7, 8… 10 years of age! How is this possible? It clearly indicates that it is the most important thing. I would say that our culpability or worse crime we commit is the fact that we suppress and foster children’s upbringing to suppress the question about the meaning of their existence in them. Our entire life is built in such a way that we, the adults, have muffled this question in ourselves. Everything that flashes before our eyes, television, advertisements, etc, completely annihilates it. We are doing the same thing to the young generation.
The new generation needs spiritual upbringing. Social/secular or religious environments do not matter here. Whether it is Judaism, Christianity, or Islam does not have any relation to anything at all. The question about the meaning of life awakens in every person, in everyone who was born of a woman. The Creator is universal for everyone.
If we want our children to continue the same completely meaningless existence as previous generations then of course we should leave them alone and not give them a Kabbalistic upbringing. Kabbalah says that we should not only give children the development of this question: “Who am I, what do I exist for?”, but also the way to realize this question. The question needs to be realized not by the sciences or the arts or the acquisition of some sort of profession, that is, not by religions and various methodologies that compensate this question and somehow calm us down.
Instead, the question needs to be developed until it is the most important thing: “Who am I, what am I, and what do I exist for?”, in order for this to compel a person to reveal the entire universe, in order for him to enter the Upper world and see the entire universe in which he lives. When I reveal the entire universe and see where I am, who I am, then my purpose for existence will become clear to me. If I will find the answer to this question on my own, then I will be able to realize it correctly. Kabbalah calls on us to do this.
In other words, until we enter the spiritual world and until we see everything that is happening and how it is happening, this question will remain in us and continue to awaken us. Let it awaken us; let it arouse us to reveal it. Without the question there is no correct advancement towards the Goal of creation.
Therefore it is necessary to reveal it in such a way that the entire universe will become revealed before you (otherwise you will not understand this question). Then you should realize it based on what you see. This does not mean in such a way that someone would explain it to you, tell you about it and calm you down. Rather, it must be done in such a way that you yourself will see all the worlds in which you exist. Based on this, you should realize this question and answer it on your own and to yourself. This is Kabbalah’s task.
Therefore, not giving children this kind of upbringing is simply to rob them and to once again compel them to lead a useless animal existence for all the years of their lives. Gradually priorities will change in society and this idea will become included in university textbooks and then grade school textbooks. Remember only one thing: if a person does not begin to study a science from early age (from three years old as the Torah says) and if he does not begin to study it at least from 5-6 years of age, then it will remain a totally removed science for him. We see this especially on the example of studying a foreign language as well as in everything else.
We have to introduce this system into school education literally from beginning grades. It is not important how the little children will apprehend it. It must be done in such a way that at least a micro-portion of spiritual light will become evoked in them. Then in reality it will be a real system of upbringing, and we will gradually be able to come to what we are talking about right now in broad social circles. However, this is a very lengthy and gradual path.
I hope we will live to the time when we will be able to see the new methodology in a more modern and appropriate form for our generation. Because right now generations differ so much from each other that whatever was written only 20 years ago does not say anything to a person today. A year is like 20 years; it goes by very quickly. Therefore I hope we will see even newer general Kabbalistic methodology, speaking directly, clearly, and closely to each of our contemporaries. In addition, these books will be comprehensible for younger ages as well.
Question: Is it good for kids to hear about Kabbalah even in kindergarten?
As Baal HaSulam writes in the Introduction to the Talmud of the Ten Sefirot, we can teach a person about Kabbalah only to the degree he asks: “What is the meaning of my life?” If this question is not yet present in him, then there is no one to teach. We all felt this inner question within ourselves in childhood. As soon as a person begins to perceive it, we can begin to explain the construction of the world to him and the essence and goal of life, and only to the degree he asks about it. As soon as he is fulfilled by the answer we have to stop. That is, we should teach a person only to the degree of his inner readiness, which increases in each of us from one life to the next in our reincarnations.
Each person can remember when the first question about the Creator and the meaning of life emerged in him. This happened sometime between 6-10 years old. It is already necessary to give them the following answer: “He is the force that created you, and right now it is next to you, it takes care of you, it desires contact with you and you must find it. That is, find the same contact you have with your father and mother, and it is your family. After all, it is said that a person is created by the father, mother and the Creator”. Try it on children and become convinced how naturally they accept this idea.
Question: You are saying that we should not force children to listen to us. This is of course true, but doesn’t the Talmud write about a relatively harsh upbringing?
It is written well: whoever does not beat his children hates them. However, in principle we cannot understand this literally. That is, we must explain why this is written and what comprises this method.
The only method of upbringing is by example and never suppression. Baal HaSulam writes about this, that if you push a person, meaning a small child, then you do not allow him to develop his own attributes.
He is completely different than you. There is no spiritual connection between the biological father and son.
Question: How would you like to see your child?
I would like to see my child and all children maximal in everything, meaning perfect. However, if only I myself knew what this is! And “haughty” parents must bring up their children! Why did such an intelligent and all-foreseeing nature construct things in such a way? That is, in such a way that each generation is mistaken about the most important thing. Let it be even by the way of suffering, but to be able to prepare the next generation better than the previous. Ultimately, however, the following generation, as a rule, is even worse (after all, egoism increases in each generation).
Nature has foreseen that man will reach the realization that he only harms himself with his reason and this will compel man to study the genuine laws of nature in order to educate his offspring correspondingly to this.
The laws of all nature, including morality and thinking, are called “Kabbalah”. Only by studying this science it is possible for a person to correctly exist himself and to prepare his offspring to exist correctly, in order for everyone to feel good from man’s actions.
Question: Is there any sense in your students to participate in working in government of modern society?
Only in the educational system! By introducing Kabbalah as a subject into all systems of education we would be able to change the entire future generation. Although you may rebuke me by saying: “It is said that people come to Kabbalah with the question about the meaning of life.” Forceful upbringing is unacceptable in the spiritual.
We do not give Kabbalah, the method of spiritual ascent, but only a person who desires this is able to really study it and he can do it only to the degree of his desire. We are planing to provide information about the structure of the universe, about the Goal of creation, about the structure of the soul, meaning everything that relates to the descent of the light from up-down. However, the rest of the material, such as articles about a person’s spiritual (inner or individual) work – this is given only to a person who wants it. Information about the universe will give a person understanding about the construction of the world; reveal the goal of the world around him and the meaning of all that exists. This will allow him to simply know more about the world in which he lives. It will lead him out of depression and guard him from a bad action. I see this on examples of people who come to me.
DRUGS
Question: Doctors cure people, psychics encode, the government puts people in jail and legislators debate. What does Kabbalah suggest? To replace an opium for the masses with another one?
Kabbalah offers knowledge about the laws according to which one’s own egoism develops. All the social diseases you describe are diseases of growth, meaning the growth of egoism in a person and in humanity. At the dawn of civilization humanity was at the lowest level and it did not desire anything besides the bread needed for survival. Only egoism and its growth in man led to the change of socio-economic formations and the emergence of culture and new technologies, and this enabled people to satisfy their egoistic desires. However, the more we receive – the more we want. Every following generation is much more egoistic than the previous generation. The development of culture, science and technology does not lead to egoism’s fulfillment. The technological revolution of the previous century caused only disappointment and today we perceive a much greater emptiness than 100, 200 or 300 years ago.
This emptiness leads to the fact that people are searching for artificial replacements, and they want them more with the passage of time. A person today is no longer able to satisfy himself with food, money, fame or power. Egoism demands a connection to higher sources of pleasure, and we will not be able to find substitutes for them in our world. Kabbalists who lived as much as thousands of years ago predicted the appearance of this new form of egoism. They predicted that, beginning with the year 1995, the so-called “egoistic boom” would begin, which will lead to the harshest negative consequences. Today we are observing some of these consequences: the falling apart of the family, the loss of social connections and individualism. Egoism has become so great that it isolates each person within himself. Even a science that studies egoism has emerged – ‘ego logy’.
Question: Does Kabbalah also study egoism?
Kabbalah does not need to study egoism because it knows everything about it. It knows about the causes that give rise to it as well as the consequences of its development. Kabbalah is the science about how to fulfill egoism without resorting to artificial methods such as alcohol or drugs. We offer a person the sources of spiritual pleasure, which are much stronger than banal vodka or heroin.
Question: But you do not deny that vodka and heroin are also sources of pleasure?
They are nothing of the sort. Look deeper. Vodka and heroin are merely a strongly acting means of cutting oneself off from the perception of emptiness. You do not receive pleasure with the help of a pill or injection. Rather, you dull the perception of pain.
Question: OK, but what should we do with people who are already dependent on the physiological level?
This is not a problem. I had many people like this among beginning students. Today they are no longer alcoholics or drug-addicts.
Question: This becomes cured so easily?
Over the course of half a year a person replaces one source of pleasure with another. He does not need to force himself by using surgical methods. He does not need to turn off his desire as psychics attempt to do, and he does not need to attempt to dull it as yogis do. Kabbalah does not kill the desire for pleasure. Rather, it changes its use to a more perfect and permanent one.
Question: Why are you so sure that you can defeat drugs with Kabbalah?
It is said that the Upper light is at absolute rest. “Rest” in the spiritual world refers to the absence of change in desires.
All actions and movements in the spiritual (altruistic) world and in our (egoistic) spiritual inner world within each of us can be summed up as the change of a previous desire to a new one. If the desire has not changed then nothing new has occurred, or no movement took place.
This is true despite the fact that a constant desire may be very bright and it may not allow a person to rest. Nevertheless, if the desire is constant and unchanging, this means that there is no movement.
Therefore, when people say that the upper light is at rest, they refer to the Creator’s constant and unchanging desire to please us. This light penetrates us, but since the point within us we call our “I” is bound within egoism’s shell we do not perceive pleasure by the light in which we are “swimming”.
The pleasures of our world can be divided into several types: those that society accepts as prestigious (wealth, popularity), natural (family-related), criminal (pleasures at the expense of others’ lives or at the expense of others’ property), romantic, etc. They are all accepted by society, although a part of them is frowned upon and punished. However, there is one kind of pleasure that is unacceptable in any society and that causes protest. People do not spare great means in the battle against it, although directly it probably causes the most insignificant harm to society.
Drug-addicts as a rule are unassuming people, they do not get in anyone’s way and they are concerned with their own inner pleasures. Why, then, do we not allow people who are the same as us to receive pleasures that are not dangerous to society? As a rule drug-addicts do not work. We are not able to offer them work, just as we are unable to do so for a great amount of other members of our society. Why does society not give out a free drug along with welfare and free lunches to those who do not work, in order for these people to avoid having to sell everything they own, to leave their kids without bread and to steal and kill due to the fact that they are slaves of the drug-addict’s hunger? Why do we not allow people to take pleasure in their unassuming peaceful type of pleasure? After all, they do not derive this pleasure at the expense of our suffering in the way criminals do. In addition, the price of drugs is insignificant compared to the huge means society spends in order to battle against drugs.
Are all other objects that attract us not the same false carriers of pleasure? After all, they too distract us from the real goal. We lose ourselves in the chase after them and we spend our entire lives as in a dream. We search for real pleasure and when we do not find it we do not turn to the spiritual. Instead we search for satisfaction by constantly changing the fashion and standards and producing more consumer goods in order for the carriers of new pleasures to avoid running out. Otherwise we will feel a life that does not give us any pleasures. After all, as soon as a person has achieved that which he yearned for, he must suddenly see the following goal in front of him. That which he has achieved immediately loses it value, and without hope for a new pleasure, without the search and chase after it, a person loses the desire to exist. Are all our fashions, standards and everything we constantly chase after not the same drug? Why does drug-related pleasure differ from the pleasures of the objects of our world?
Why is the Creator, the Upper governance opposed to drug-related pleasure and therefore we, here below, accept these laws while we do not accept the same laws to counteract against material pleasures in the form of objects of our world?
Drugs in our world are forbidden precisely because they lead a person away from life and they place him in a state of inability to perceive all the blows of our life – blows that are the result of the lack of egoism’s fulfillment with pleasure. These blows are the means of our correction. Only a small amount of people from the common mass comes to religion and to Kabbalah. As strange as it may seem, if we think about it we will find that a person turns to the Creator when he is in a bad situation such as a disaster. Sorrow shakes a person up. On the other hand, it may seem more likely that a person should have done just the opposite in this situation, meaning he should have turned away from the Creator Who sends him suffering.
Drugs are a false carrier of pleasure and therefore they are forbidden. A person is in a state of false pleasure or the illusion of pleasure. This removes his opportunity to advance towards genuine spiritual pleasures. Therefore society subconsciously accepts drugs to be the most dangerous activity, despite the fact that they are completely not dangerous to others and they might have become a good method for social work with the greater part of the unproductive population.
We are created in such a way that each person has everything he needs. Precisely because we are trying to concern ourselves with the material rather than the spiritual, we receive greater and greater necessities and the perception that we lack something in this world.
With the use of drugs a person is in the state of false pleasure. However, the Goal of creation is for man to feel pleasure from perfection, and therefore the use of drugs totally throws a person off the path towards the Goal of Creation because it seems to give him pleasure. He does not perceive the blows of fate or the Creator’s governance; therefore he is not on the path towards the Goal of Creation. On the other hand, the remainder of humanity and all forms of nature go through this path consciously or unconsciously – it does not matter how. Drugs themselves are completely not dangerous. Just the opposite, they might have served as a very good medicine for various unwanted problems if they were used in purely medicinal ways.
If society’s goal was to somehow neutralize egoism and to make it not dangerous, then it could easily do this. It would be possible to give out very interesting things for free and people who were born with bad inclinations and character traits would simply turn themselves off. However, the Upper nature, Upper governance, does not agree to this because this way a person really becomes totally separated from his predestination. Humanity will never agree to this, even with regard to absolute socially harmless, completely unproductive and useless elements.
Therefore drugs are a purely negative phenomenon. Regardless of what unwanted and extreme problems we would be able to resolve with their help, nevertheless they are not the way to solve the problem.
Question: You do not consider psychics or yoga effective?
Yogis try to extinguish pain by way of meditation. They decrease egoism and bring themselves to the state of an animal or plant. Naturally, a person lessens his suffering by training himself to desire less. However, this is only true up until a certain point. When egoism passes a certain threshold, a person is no longer able to follow these methodologies; he outgrows them. Interest in yoga and other eastern techniques today is cultivated in fashionable social circles rather than really existing and working. At the current development of egoism, we have already passed this stage.
Question: What about social means of battle such as communal and labor organizations?
No social system is able to satisfy the growing egoism. You cannot jail or cure everyone. The problem must be fixed at its root. What can we give a person when he has such emptiness inside? A person is an egoist. Only one analysis is at work within him: bitter – bad and sweet – good, instead of evil – false and truth – good. A person does not care whether something is true or false. The most important thing to him is whether something is sweet; this tunes him to the category of truth – good. If a person feels bitter or bad then he looks for a justification that will enable him call the source of this feeling “falseness” or “evil”. Just look at how politicians juggle these notions.
Question: The drug business today is an international system that undermines young people, and fashion works together with this system. There also exists ERJ. The vodka business in Russia seems to be second in profit after oil. We can talk a lot and for a long time about spiritual development and inner ways to satisfy egoism, but the drug dealers have a more powerful resource.
Opium has been known to people for two to three thousand years. In the East this has been a culture for many centuries. Simply there was no need for this before, but now egoism has increased and it no longer receives fulfillment. Therefore it resorts to being shut off from the perception of emptiness.
In order to avoid having to fear for our children, we must give them the correct upbringing, and this should begin at 6 years of age rather than 16. Look at your kids, who study Kabbalah. Look at how they react to all those fashionable trivialities and how they are protected from all these problems, which are small to them. A person first asks the question about the meaning of life at 6 or 7 years of age. If we do not give him an answer then he begins to look for it everywhere, including in drugs. He automatically follows his peers, thinking that they know what is right, and he becomes influenced by his environment. On the other hand, if we create a clear understanding about the world in him in order to reach this goal, then we will give his egoism the opportunity to develop and to become fulfilled. Then things such as drugs will not concern him.
Generally, all human attempts to cure social illnesses (that are caused by the growth of egoism) with social methods will not bring about any results. They will only lengthen the amount of time it will take people to realize their inability to go against nature. Only the Upper force that descends onto a person who studies the Zohar will create the correct use of egoism in him, and the person will feel pleasure from it to the full degree by perceiving the Upper world, eternity and boundlessness.
Question: About donated blood: does it influence the person who gives blood and the one who receives it?
Blood is checked with regular medical indexes, and if the two match according to their animalistic indexes then the blood is suitable for a person’s body. This has no relation to the soul. You can sew an arm onto a person, or a head, heart, liver or anything else. This may even be a body part of someone who is your enemy, but nevertheless you will remain with the same attributes as you had before.
A person’s desires are his purely spiritual attributes or his spiritual fulfillment. This can be compared to a spiritual CD, as in a computer, which is placed into our flesh and expresses itself through our body.
The physiological body does not have any spiritual attributes. It must simply be healthy according to its physiological index. Based on these indexes we can mutually change the parts; we can change some or all parts of the body, and nothing will change. I apologize for a slightly coarse example: we take a person, divide him into parts and replace all of them with parts of different people. Naturally, the soul will remain the same, even though all body parts will be new.
We have to take a part of the previous body and say that this little part of the previous body is the most important one. All the other parts are attached to this body, meaning they are an addition. Now the question arises: what should I take from the previous body in order for it to be the most important thing relative to the additional parts?
Maybe the other parts will be the most important and that which remains will be the addition? Thirty to forty years ago everyone was convinced that the heart is a person’s soul, his feelings, or his “I”. Now we understand that the heart can be replaced, but not the head. Maybe we will live to the day when people will do the same thing to the head.
The head is a calculating mechanism or a “computer”. It remembers, learns and accumulates experience, but in reality it is simply a machine that computes the most comfortable way to achieve what the soul wants. It is nothing more than this. That is, the head is merely a “computer”. Naturally, if we replace the computer then a person will acquire another one that is more productive, that has a greater memory, faster speed and other characteristics. However, everything depends only on the program that acts in the computer. This program is determined by the soul. The computer only brings this program to action with whatever speed it is capable of doing so. That is, if I am unable to run after I have been in a car accident, then nothing can be done about this. The soul is running not the body. The same thing is true for a computer. If I am sick with a fever, or if I feel bad and my blood pressure increases, then naturally the concentration of spiritual forces is different. Nevertheless, I work through the body since I am located within it. Naturally my work and its efficiency decrease.
Therefore a person should take care of his donkey or animal, since it helps him to do the work. You must take care of it to the degree necessary to maintain its health, in order for you to do spiritual work. That is, you must clean it and pet it, meaning fulfill it with what it needs. If you do this for the sake of spiritual work, then this is all-positive and becomes attached to the same work and the same Goal.
Question: On one hand you said that we should not reject the pleasures of this world. On the other hand there is the so-called “necessity”. These things intersect in some way?
I have to relate to the pleasures of this world and to everything I do in this world as necessity.
The level of necessities varies. Rabbi Akiva had a friend who lost all his property and became bankrupt. Hoping to provide necessities for him, Rabbi Akiva bought a palanquin in order for four people to carry his friend who was accustomed to this way of moving around, and Rabbi Akiva himself ran ahead of the palanquin. In Gmara it is highlighted that this was not something special for his friend, rather it was a necessary factor. To him this was the same as giving another person a piece of bread. He did not perceive anything less than this to be life.
In other words, you cannot evaluate what is necessary and what is not necessary. You can receive the whole world, but you must relate to this as necessity. You do not need this, but your demands change and they come from your material, which is not formulated by you and not brought to action by you. For example, my body wants to eat and drink and I give it what it wants. Why? The Creator created it this way therefore it wants this. Let it want a million times more things, but if I relate to its desires precisely this way, it is called necessity.
Thus, necessity does not require a person to measure 1000 calories a day, 6 hours of sleep a day and so on. Necessity is your relation, when you yourself are not related to it. The body needs it so give it what it needs. Moreover, we are saying the following: if you have various inclinations, possibly you should realize them in order not to end up dumbfounded, since thoughts of committing a crime are more difficult than the crime itself. They overtake a person for hours and days.
CONCERNING LOVE
Question: Can you give a Kabbalistic explanation of the feeling of love?
Love is the perception of union and is achieved by equivalence or sameness of attributes. The law of equivalence of form is the only law according to which the entire universe moves and brings everything that exists to the Creator. Kabbalah says that the greatest pleasure in the world is the perception of union with the Creator. Our earthly love is merely a weak reflection of this higher love. We do not perceive what it means to be filled by the Creator. However believe me, this is above all other perceptions!
Genuine love can be only boundless! However, if it has no bounds then it causes dislike from the receiver and even hate. We can see this in children’s relation towards their boundlessly devoted parents. This also happens in romantic relationships between men and women. This system of relationships does not occur by coincidence. Therefore in order to give man the opportunity to attain genuine love and preserve it, in order for love not to turn into dislike or even hate, the Creator created such a system of interaction in which the Creator and His love are originally concealed from man and they become revealed only to the degree of a person’s fear of losing this love.
Therefore the first commandment of the Torah is fear and the second is love. In addition, fear does not refer to the egoistic fear of losing love. Rather, this is fear of “have I done everything I could for my beloved?” Only to the degree a person attains this kind of fear, the Creator becomes revealed to him and reveals His love for him. When we fully correct our egoism we come to deserve the Creator’s full, boundless, eternal love. This way, by revealing love we attain the manifestation of mutuality.
Obviously in our world, meaning in the eyes of an uncorrected person, it is impossible to achieve this kind of feeling. Therefore on the earthly level we should aspire to become corrected. To the degree we become equivalent to the common echelon, the Creator, we are able to love each other as parts of one whole, or the single common Soul. We acquire the ability to see our true companion, both the spiritual companion and the physical or earthly one. Together we will really be able to perceive the full union to the degree of our spiritual ascent.
Nothing brings a man and woman closer than mutual study of Kabbalah. There is a reason for the saying, “Husband and wife – the Shehina is between them”. The Shehina is the Divine presence. According to my teacher’s advice, I encourage couples to mutually study at home. We have accepted this as a constant practice. Therefore many of our families can brag about having the perception of love. We wish you to have the same.
Question: What are the objective reasons for the emergence of this feeling – love?
Love in our world and in the Kabbalistic world is a specific reaction to pleasures. That is, feelings that emerge in us in response to received pleasure. Our most regular love for anything emerges as a result of the fact that the object we love contains pleasure, some kind of light or even a micro-dose of light. This is the only reason we like this object. It attracts us and this feeling for it emerges in us. This object may be kids, the opposite sex or delicious food. This is subjective for every person, meaning it is relative to the attributes of each person’s soul.
A Kabbalist, or a person who continues to study Kabbalah, will understand, see and perceive that this feeling – love – is more abstract. It emerges in him towards light, or towards that which clothes into objects of our world and causes love towards these objects in a person. He will feel the feeling of love not simply for the object or the shell, but for the light itself, which is absolutely separate from the shell.
Therefore this love emerges and gradually transforms into love for the Source of the entire universe or towards the Source of one’s soul. Practically speaking, all of our songs about love, our poetry and all our emotions; all this is our longing for the micro-dose of light that is in our world and that shines on us from various forms of our world.
Question: Are you saying that love for a woman is a shell?
In Kabbalah the highest level a person can have is “love your Creator”. That is, love the Source, which is precisely the source for all other pleasures.
Question: Can a Kabbalist love a woman, or only the Creator?
The attributes of a person who studies Kabbalah greatly develop and deepen. He feels the entire universe in all its details and he feels the female part of himself so much that it is precisely he who is capable of arriving at the perception of a woman (who is completely opposite to him in her soul’s structure) through the perception of the Creator. Without attaining the Upper world a man is not able to do this; he is physically incapable of it. He does not have the appropriate abilities, he is unable to exit out of himself, and he simply cannot understand what a woman wants from him. This is impossible for him, and he should not be reproached for this. If you want your husband to love you, then make a Kabbalist out of him.
Question: What is the root of fashion, jewelry and make up?
A person’s efforts to cover himself in beautiful things come from an inner desire, in the same way all of our actions do. Kabbalah says that all clothing is corrections. After his sin, Adam discovered that he lacks clothing; therefore a fault became revealed to him – nudity – or the lack of correction in his egoism. Before this occurred he did not perceive shame became egoism was not revealed. As a child, he did not feel shame before the Creator.
In our world the yearning to cover oneself comes from a different egoism because it does not come from perceiving the Creator. Rather, it comes from a person’s yearning for fame and power. That is, clothing and decoration do not come from the desire to become corrected. Instead, these are desires of the Klipot (the impure forces or uncorrected desires). They aspire for the external rather than the inner and they add more external objects to themselves. This happens to everyone who is connected to the external.
Those who aspire for the inner do just the opposite; they are ready to take off everything. That is, they do not take into consideration any external signs, medals or special symbols. They can walk around in rags since the most important thing for them is the inner. This is because they constantly reveal greater and greater inner depth in themselves. In this case, the inner things of yesterday become the external things of today, and these people get rid of them.
Question: How do you personally relate to poetry and love?
I like all expression of a person’s good feelings, because even when they talk about animal manifestations, I see praise of the Creator in this. All our songs, poems and generally perceptions, are the perception of His light, the fulfillment of our desires. It is He, although not in the revealed and desirable form. Attaining the Upper gives us the ability to attain pleasures that are billions of times greater and to do this constantly, eternally and perfectly. Kabbalah develops our perception (increases the Kli) to infinity, meaning boundlessly or as much as you want! Love is the pinnacle of all attainment; it is the highest perception, when a person is unified with the entire universe.
Question: What is happiness?
Happiness is the perception of the realization of a person’s inner abilities. This is fully revealed only when a person precisely understands what he should realize and how he should come to this. Moreover, he understands what his goal is, how eternal the goal is, and that it does not depend on anything; that the main and only thing in the world is realized by him right now. That is, happiness is the perception of closeness with the Creator because this is the Goal of Creation. It is the perception of movement towards eternal perfection.
How does fulfillment happen? I will tell you what it consists of. Kabbalah talks about only one person. The whole world is inside of him, meaning the husband, wide, kids, home, the Creator, the Universe, and all the nations of the world. All of this is located inside of one person, but in the form of various forces and various attributes in us.
When it says that a person must find his other half and must connect himself with something, this refers to the fact that he must find his corrected Kli. He must find it and work with it. It does not mean that he must find a partner in the kitchen or in bed.
If we describe how Kabbalah explains all of this in a pure form, then it does not refer to family and home. Rather, it refers to the creation of an inner Kli in a person, or a prepared soul, which the Creator will be able to fill. We always perceive the Creator inside of ourselves. Even this world, meaning the world we perceive around ourselves today; it is the perception of the Creator, but on the level or degree of concealment that we call “our world.”
As soon as a person begins to change himself inside and to prepare his perception more for the spiritual, for a finer perception, he begins to see forces that stand behind this world and that control our world. He already begins to see everything taking place in our world as a result of these forces. That is, greater and greater heights become revealed to him, or a greater volume of the universe.
This depends only on how a person reveals his soul. The method of purification and preparing the soul for this genuine perception is called “Kabbalah” or “reception.” This means to receive the genuine perception of the universe. When the universe becomes completely revealed to a person, he feels the one and only force that always works on him and he calls this force “the Creator”.
Baal HaSulam writes: “If we ask ourselves the question about the meaning of life, about the purpose of all our suffering, about why our lives are so difficult, etc., we will find that no one provides an answer to this question. Over the course of thousands of years, philosophers, sages, and many other people tried but did not find an answer. Therefore today, just as a thousand years ago, we stand before life with the same question and we are unable to answer it”.
He says that the answer can be found only in attaining the Creator: “Taste and see how good the Creator is.” You have to try to reveal the Creator to yourself. After He becomes revealed, you will perceive ecstasy, perfection, knowledge and eternity. Before that – you will not. Therefore if a person feels the futility of his state (and it does not matter in what form the Creator sent this feeling to him because our bitter state also comes from the Creator), he must understand this as the Creator’s call for him to go towards Him.
inapoi la SURSE Michael Laitman – link