Question: Is there a difference in the spiritual development of women and men, and what constitutes this difference?

Answer: If we look at the historical process, we see that as soon as Abraham began to reveal the wisdom of Kabbalah, he received an order to adhere with his female part: “Listen to what Sarah tells you.” Everything is determined by the female part. What a man reveals is revealed by him in the woman, meaning the male part of the soul in the inner female part of the soul and the man in the woman. Rabash wrote and spoke repeatedly about the fact that in the corrected society, in a corrected family with a man and a woman, the husband and a wife are in the process of revealing the Creator between them. The husband perceives the wife through the Creator and the wife relates to the husband in the same manner. They constantly feel that the Creator dwells between them. That is, I know that I received her from the Creator. And if I perceive her as a part that can help me reach the Creator, then I am truly realizing myself.

Question cont.: In other words, my wife is my partner on the spiritual path?

Answer: She is not just a partner. I see her as a companion chosen for me by the Creator. And if I treat her this way, I don’t just address her. I address her and the Creator at the same time and feel that she relates to me in the same manner. It seems like an unnatural contrast, but it is very natural because it is very goal-oriented. It turns out that at every moment of my life, from the most intimate to the most common situations in the family, and even more so in public and in the world, we begin to treat each other like the Creator dwells between us. We feel that this Force needs to bind us together, fill the voids between us, and correct the rejection and hatred that rises up between us. The Creator Himself comes to fill this space and unite us with each other. We can begin to realize this in the family, the closest place for every person, and continue it throughout the whole world.
[24132]
From Kabbalah For Beginners, "Men and Women" 10/14/10

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The only thing that can help a family stay together is a strong society that keeps both spouses together and directs them toward spiritual growth. Because they both go through different states, ascents and descents, they have to be a part of this society and to understand that spiritual advancement is impossible without each other. Then they will understand that they need a partner. The society of the future will take great care of marriages, but to do that we need a powerful influence from our environment.

We have already received enough blows from Nature to make us understand that it is essential for us to achieve balance. We have to establish good relationships between all of us. Only this will revive harmony and normalize Nature so that heat, cold, magnetic fields, and a thousand other parameters will come into balance. This world will feel like paradise, even on the material level. To feel this way, it is extremely important to achieve equilibrium. We have to observe a very simple condition where everything stays in mutual connection on all levels (inanimate, vegetative, animate, and human).

One of the prerequisites to achieving equilibrium is the establishment of the right types of connections within a family. Kabbalists rejected unmarried men as their disciples because a man without a wife is only “half a body.” It’s impossible to correct “half a body.” Previously, this requirement was very strict. Nowadays, everything is simplified. Everybody is permitted to study since we are undergoing a transition period and cannot obligate people to marry; it’s beyond our power. However, I hope the time will come soon when the next generation will realize that we have to observe material order and have a family in order to achieve balance with Nature.

Only by aspiring toward one spiritual goal can we preserve a family. Our egoism has grown so much that the usual material connections with children, family, and household cannot connect people to each other any longer. Everybody has a job, can afford a place to live, and be completely independent. A person feels relatively self-sufficient and doesn’t need his wife’s or children’s support. It is different from the past when no one could survive without a family. Now a person has the supermarket, modern-day household appliances, and health insurance.

Therefore, only a higher goal can elevate a person above the animate level and bring him to a “human” level (“Adam” is a derivative of the word “similar”). It is the only thing that makes a person similar to the Creator, reveals eternity, and raises us above life and death. It is the only thing that can ensure internal spiritual connection in a family. However, it is not accessible for everybody yet.

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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/10/10, A Lesson On Current Events

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Marriage - 3 Comments →

In the News (from The Daily Mail): “Live together before marrying and you’re more likely to divorce” Couples who set up home before getting hitched are more likely to divorce than those who wait until after the big day… A survey of more than 1,000 married men and women in the U.S. found those who moved in with a lover before engagement or marriage reported significantly lower-quality marriages and a greater potential for splitting up… Psychologist Dr. Galena Rhoades said: “There might be a subset of people who live together before they got engaged who might have decided to get married really based on other things in their relationship – because they were already living together and less because they really wanted and had decided they wanted a future together.”

My Comment: If a person wants to have a lasting relationship with someone, he shouldn’t try to go and change the type of relationship they have. If what you want is to create a family with someone, then that’s exactly what you should do. People should regard familial relationships just as nature had determined them to be.

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Two questions I received regarding relationships and the spiritual path:

Question: I got married in Peru. After a few years of marriage, my husband left me and our two daughters. Out of despair, I left to go work in Korea. There, I met a good man and we’ve been together 12 years, and have a son who is 9. Is it necessary for me to get an official divorce in order to form a Kabbalistic family?

My Answer: No. No method of registering a person’s marital status invented and performed in this world has any influence on your spiritual development.

Question: I have been studying Kabbalah for almost two years and have been actively involved in dissemination. My partner has also been doing the same. Since I started studying Kabbalah, I’ve come to understand that I want our relationship to be formalized through marriage and that I want to have children. However, he doesn’t feel the same, although he wants to continue living with me. Is my desire proper?

My Answer: You are right to demand marriage and children. Pass my opinion on to him. A person who is working on his spiritual correction has to do everything that regular people do in this world. It is said: “I dwell among my people,” (Be toch ami anochi echevet).

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A question I received: How can people determine what is a necessity today?

My Answer: The level of necessity of today is a medium level of well-being in the place where a person is living. There are many methods of verifying the actual mean level. Baal HaSulam covers that in detail in the article The Future Generation. He refers to creation of all kinds of committees that would check the actual needs of every person, and fulfill them.

All of that is measured according to the needs of an average person. Let’s say that each family must have a room for each of its members. Each person must have a job. The family must have a car to get to and from work and for other needs. All of that is determined in accordance with changes that occur in the world. Notwithstanding, a family must have everything it needs to exit normally.

As a matter of fact, the problem is not what you have, but your attitude towards it. After all, the Creator doesn’t want you to suffer. The purpose of creation is to delight the creatures. Therefore, you confine your earthly life to the needs of your physical body – no more and no less.

You have to fill your desires for food, sex, family, wealth, honor, power and knowledge. You should feel no lack in those desires, and they should be filled to the measure that is an essential necessity for the life of your animal body. Anything that is beyond a necessity should be used to bestow to your fellow man.

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A question I received: In old times, a man could buy a wife and marriages were arranged by parents. But love can only happen in relation to a specific individual.

In today’s world, marriages aren’t always created for the sake of love. Sometimes it’s because the woman gets pregnant in order to force the man to marry her. Other times, a marriage is required in order to be able to move from one place to another. There are other examples. So you have created a family and now you must protect it. What if feelings arise toward another person when you are already a “cell in the society”? Then, what is a family and what is love?

My Answer: Throughout history, humanity has treated the family as a cell within a society that must be created and developed. In any nation or culture, love was never the motivation for starting a family. The purpose behind family was to be able to exist within the framework of this world.

Today, we are on the brink of realizing another goal: the purpose of the family living for the sake of reaching the Upper World. But while we are still on the threshold, we must free ourselves from the old relationships within the family and realize the purpose of the new, higher goal. At this transition point, we are still analyzing our nature and studying ourselves. We do this in order to come to the realization that our nature is evil and that we must rise above it

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Imagine that you’re an egoist in your own family and that you treat your family members the same way you treat the rest of the world: “maximum reception and minimum bestowal.” You lie to your son in order to get something from him, all the while feeling great as you do it! You steal your children’s food from the refrigerator and you try to con and swindle them. This is just as your attitude toward the whole world is: “work less, earn more.”

If the whole world today is interdependent and we’re all one family, whether or not we want it to be this way, our behavior towards the world is like using our children for personal benefit. 

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A question I received: My husband and I are both students of Kabbalah. We have created a family together; my husband has a practical profession that affords us a “normal” position in this world. We are happy! However, our extended family (parents and siblings) that desire to remain inside their egoism, insist that we must make greater efforts to gather excess. How should we respond to them and restrain their aim to disconnect us?

My Answer: Gently but firmly, tell them that you and your husband are a separate family and they have no right to tell you how to live your life. Let them see who’s right and who’s wrong in the developing conditions of crisis.

However, you also have to understand them, as they were raised with the principle, “you have to work hard in order to provide a good future for you and your children.”

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In the News (translated from Lenta.ru): A hotline offering emergency psychological help for people affected by the global financial crisis is now operating in Moscow. People can receive free consultation from a certified psychiatrist over the phone. The phone calls will be answered by specialists from the national center of social and forensic psychiatry.

My Comment: In addition, there should be a “hotline” that will disseminate the global (anti-crisis) education for the whole world. Instead of just offering people consolation, it will explain that this problem is shared by all humanity, and that the transition from disconnection to unity is embedded in the foundation of Nature. We must go through it, either under Nature’s pressure (via the path of suffering) or consciously (by using Kabbalah). Moreover, we have to come out of the problem together. Then it will be easy, because it will happen in harmony with Nature’s movement, rather than by isolating ourselves and being opposed to each other.

You can start doing this on your own, without waiting for it to happen: just by thinking about everyone and about our common connection, while studying our materials (available free of charge online), you will not only feel more relaxed, but also cause an improvement in the world, as this will bring us closer to balance with Nature. As a result, it will improve people’s health and well-being.

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In the News (from Global Issues): “Us-Cuba: Obama Urged to Take Bold Steps Toward Normalisation” A broad spectrum of groups and individuals is urging President Barack Obama to lift curbs on travel and remittances to their homeland by Cuban Americans and launch a much broader process of normalisation with Havana.

In Tuesday’s testimony, Secretary of State-designate Hillary Clinton said, ‘The President is committed to lifting family travel restrictions and the remittance restriction.’ Clinton also disclosed that the incoming administration planned to conduct a ‘review’ of U.S. policy toward Havana that, among other issues, would include consideration of increasing U.S. agricultural sales to the island, bilateral cooperation on energy and the environment, and whether or not Cuba should be dropped from the State Department’s State Sponsors of Terrorism List.

My Comment: Any steps toward cooperation are consistent with Nature and will merit good results, even if the motives are selfish – and for the time being, how could they not be? For now the discussion is about mutual help and a drawing closer, but later America will understand that it’s better to give than to take (go from Lo Lishma to Lishma).

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