How can we achieve eternity and perfection? It’s achieved according to the law of equivalence of form. If the Light and the desire are opposite to one another, then the Light annuls the desire. However, if they’re equal, they support one another, and we feel that they both exist. That’s what we call eternal life. Achieving it is precisely the purpose of the science of Kabbalah.

In order to bring us to the state similar to that of the Creator, to the ability to live forever and perceive our true reality, we must undergo a process of corrections. All these corrections come down to making the desire to receive pleasure similar to the Light and to begin observing the law of equivalence of form.

Herein lies the entire correction. Either we are opposite to the Creator as we were originally created, or we gradually achieve equivalence with Him. We correct ourselves until the Light and the desire join together. At that moment, we are born into the spiritual world.

This method of correction is called the science of Kabbalah (in Hebrew, the word “Kabbalah” means reception). It’s the science of receiving the Light into the desire so that it won’t disappear and we would feel true, everlasting reality. Indeed, this wisdom is great and not at all simple. We really don’t understand how this can be achieved. Yet, although we don’t realize it, this is our innermost desire and the purpose of our existence. Subconsciously, we’re always searching for it.

There’s a phase when we first make contact with the Light and perceive it in our desire. The Light remains within us, and we begin to feel life as eternal, and don’t part with the Light within us. This phase or spiritual birth is called the exodus from Egypt.

Before then, we must remain in Egyptian exile, in the preparatory phase to the spiritual birth or redemption. That’s why we devote so much attention to studying the phases which we must undergo while in the Egyptian exile. We want to realize our exodus as soon as possible using all the means prepared for us by Kabbalists throughout history.

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: Building An Instrument To Tune Into The Light
Laitman.com Post: The Miracle Of Exiting Egypt
The Law of Equivalence of Form [04:09]

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Holidays - No Comments →

The Zohar: It is known that there is World, Year, and Soul in everything. In the stony heart (Lev HaEven), too, there are World, Year, Soul. World is the primordial serpent (Nahash Kadmoni), which Samuel rode; Year—the ninth of Av; and Soul—the thigh-vein sinew (Gid HaNasheh).

The Zohar tells us that there are two ways of perceiving the reality that we feel. There is the perception “for one’s own sake,” where one feels an egoistic “year, world, and soul,” which belong to the stony heart (Lev ha-Even). There is also the altruistic “world, year, and soul,” where one’s perception of reality is directed in the opposite direction, away from oneself. One perceives through bestowal rather than reception, and therefore one perceives the Upper “World, Year, and Soul,” because it is perceived through bestowal (sanctity).

What’s the difference between the perception of reality by way of absorption and reception, when one separates the perception into world, year, and soul; and the perception of reality by way of bestowal, when one also separates the perception into world, year, and soul? This is, in fact, a big difference between these sensations, because by absorbing into oneself, one is limited and feels that he exists in rigid boundaries of time. One feels that he lives and dies; he feels suffering and problems. One constantly wishes to fill himself, but this fulfillment fades immediately. One’s whole existence in these egoistic bounds of “world, year, and soul” takes place in reception, in the stony heart (Lev ha-Even), in absorption “into oneself.” However, in spite of the suffering, one is forced to continue existing in this manner because one’s environment conditions him that this is how he has to live. The environment obliges a person to strive to be successful at this egoistic absorption, and one is compelled to listen to them and thereby to kill oneself.

However, it is possible to perceive reality different – through bestowal, by exiting out of oneself. There, “world, year, and soul” are infinite dimensions, not limited by the considerations of how a person can fulfill himself. One feels the spiritual world, eternity, and perfection.

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Zohar - No Comments →

The Zohar: They came out of the Land of Israel and descended into Babylon, saying, “This is the place we will stay.”

We will rise to the heavens and will fight the Creator so that He doesn’t flood the world as he did in the beginning of time.

Parsa under the World of Atzilut is a special correction that was made deliberately to prevent the Light from descending lower. This is why they said: “Let us rise to the firmament and fight with the Creator so as to remove this border and allow the Light to descend from above downwards.”

A person gradually learns and begins to understand that he has to strive towards bestowal, but he doesn’t want to stay “in the Land of Israel” where everything is done for the sake of bestowal, since he can’t see the benefit in doing so. As new egoistic desires are revealed within him, he leaves the Land of Israel and moves towards Babylon, the land of reception.

He then starts to think that the wisdom of Kabbalah can be used for egoistic purposes, for personal fulfillment. He wants to conquer the Creator and make Him serve his own egoistic purposes rather than the other way around, just like in the Grimm fairy tale about the fisherman and his wife.

He starts to look for a lower, less noticeable place where he can hide from the Upper Force in order to avoid getting rid of his egoism. Thus, he builds a “city and tower” (ZON de Klipa) and lives in it. He thinks that the Creator has to fill his egoistic desires with Light, instead of fulfilling his clean desires, since the latter would require him to ascend and attain the property of bestowal, Bina. He wants his egoism to be fulfilled and argues with the Creator.

Each one of us can find these properties within ourselves. This is described in the Torah when addressing the builders of the Tower of Babel: “Rise to the heavens and fight the Creator!” “Fight” means to demand the Light from the Creator, to ask for revelation while remaining in one’s current egoistic state. One asks, “Why hasn’t the Upper World revealed itself to me? The Creator is unfair! I have waited for so long, so why hasn’t it happened yet?”

This is what is referred to as “building a city (Zeir Anpin of Klipa) and a Tower of Babel (Malchut of Klipa), which happens to us on every level. Each time, we have to make a choice of whether to follow the path of Abraham – the path of bestowal, or the path that the whole world chooses – the path of Nimrod.

There is a rule: “The whole is equal to any of its parts.” The whole Torah is present even in our smallest and lowest states, including the states called Noah, Babylon, Egyptian slavery, wandering in the desert, construction and destruction of the Temple, and the entire path until the end of correction. It repeats itself again and again on each level.

This is why when studying The Zohar I can find everything I read within myself, in every state I go through: an Egyptian slave, the people of Israel, the High Priest of the Temple, the Pharaoh, Bilam and his donkey, and so on. They are all inside me.

Our role is to try to imagine and sense these metaphors like a child that’s studying the world around him. The most important thing is to not stop making an effort. There is no other book in the world and no other way to lift ourselves into spirituality.

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Zohar - No Comments →

We are all made of the desire to enjoy – a material that cannot do anything on its own and is entirely dependent on the Light that created it. All the changes that happen to the desire to enjoy are performed by the Light.

Our development starts with the initial stage, where the Light influences the will to enjoy and causes it to mature. From the state of maturity onwards, the Light ceases developing the desire and waits for it to want this of its own accord, and then to ask the Light for it.

Today we are at the transition phase leading to our independent development. The Light no longer develops us, but waits for us to ask It to develop us further. However, our request has to correspond to the program of the Light’s future actions over us. On every stage, we have to ask the Light to do Its work.

If we desire for the Light to perform a specific action to us – to correct us from reception to bestowal, and if our desire is an exact match to the Light’s program, then the Light immediately performs this action. Thus we advance forward, traversing 1/125th of the path of our development.

Therefore, our entire work lies in understanding what exactly should we be asking for, what is our future state, and what do we have to attain on every stage? Then our desire will become the same as the desire of the Light, the Creator.

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson - No Comments →

When reading a Kabbalistic text, it’s important to understand that it is only talking about spiritual processes that take place inside a person, rather than about different characters and external actions. Everything that is described in a Kabbalistic text is inside a person.

For instance, the entire Torah talks only about how a person discerns different desires and qualities within: which ones belong to bestowal and which – to reception, which are fit for correction and which are unfit for it; and how a person experiences an inner world through these qualities, which is the only world that actually exists. A person then discovers that he perceives our world inside him as well, and there is never anything on the outside.

The way to enter the new world is by expanding your perception of your internal desires and qualities and by taking care to use all of them for the sake of bestowal. This is how one realizes oneself to the fullest.

A person contains all the characters of the Torah – the whole world to the fullest is within him. Kabbalah explains how a person can arrange the entire sum of all his desires within, and thereby reveal a new world.

Filed under: Daily Kabbalah Lesson - No Comments →

In the News (from MSNBC News): “Antidepressant use doubles in U.S., study finds” Use of antidepressant drugs in the United States doubled between 1996 and 2005, probably because of a mix of factors, researchers reported on Monday. “Significant increases in antidepressant use were evident across all sociodemographic groups examined, except African Americans,” Dr. Mark Olfson of Columbia University in New York and Steven Marcus of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia wrote in the Archives of General Psychiatry.

My Comment: Because people are feeling a new, unearthly desire, which is impossible to fulfill in this world, they are experiencing an incurable state of depression and melancholy that they are trying to suppress with drugs or other addictive substances. However, this desire can instead be fulfilled with the desired pleasure by revealing the Upper World, using the method of fulfilling this new desire, the soul. This method is called the “Wisdom of Kabbalah.” Kabbalah is translated from Hebrew as “reception or fulfillment.”

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: We Must Rise To A Higher Level Of Consciousness To Solve Our Problems
Laitman.com Post: Crisis And Resolution
Laitman.com Post: Comments About Depression, Seeming Egoistic To Others, And Parenting
Attaining the Worlds Beyond: “Suffering Sent As Absolute Kindness”
Kabbalah Revealed: “The Dark Before the Dawn”

Filed under: Depression - 1 Comment →

In the News (from The Independent): “Just 96 months to save world, says Prince Charles” Capitalism and consumerism have brought the world to the brink of economic and environmental collapse, the Prince of Wales has warned in a grandstand speech… Charles’s speech was described as his first attempt to present a coherent philosophy in which he placed the threat to the environment in the context of a failing economic system…

Charles said that without “coherent financial incentives and disincentives” we have just 96 months to avert “irretrievable climate and ecosystem collapse, and all that goes with it … If we don’t face up to this, then Nature, the biggest bank of all, could go bust…”

My Comment: The ecosystem doesn’t depend on us, but the economic system does. However, the way to change it for the better is not by trying to influence it directly, but by correcting our intentions from “reception” to “bestowal.” How can this be done? It is only possible by drawing a spiritual force from above, the force that created our egoism and that can change it, turning it into the opposite quality, that of bestowal and love. The wisdom of Kabbalah tells us how to draw this force of correction.

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: True Bestowal Is When We Come Out Of Ourselves
Laitman.com Post: Can The World’s Problems Be Solved Without Kabbalah?
Kabbalah, Science and the Meaning of Life: “The Giving Force and the Receiving Force”

 Giving and Receiving [04:48m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download
 

Filed under: World - 1 Comment →

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. 

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: How To Correct An Egoist
Laitman.com Post: In A Family Everyone Is Dependent On Everyone Else
Kabbalah Today Article: What Lies Ahead: Conflict or a Peaceful Transition?

Filed under: Egoism - No Comments →

Questions I received concerning freedom, balance and the meaning of the Egyptian plagues.

Question: What does a free person feel?

Answer: Man’s freedom lies in being able to maintain the equilibrium in all of creation, to sustain it and balance it “standing on one foot.” On the right side of the scale is the Creator’s force of bestowal. On the left side of the scale is the Creator’s force of reception. These are direct and opposite sides; the holy and evil forces. And if a person can balance himself in between them, he is given the freedom of will from the influence of both and can thereby express his free choice.

Question: How is it possible to balance on the tip of a needle?

Answer: You have to glue yourself to the Creator, draw Him to yourself with all your might and get close to Him, as a baby to his mother. The baby loves to feel himself under her protection, and from there can boldly look onto the whole world. Or, while sitting in her arms, he can point his finger  to where he wants to go – thereby expressing his will!

This is the correct way in which a baby develops. He knows that with his mother he is safe, and that she will use all her strength and every opportunity to fulfill his desires.  This is the correct way for us to work with the Creator!

Question: What do the Egyptian plagues refer to?

Answer: This is how the Creator teaches a person to battle with his nature, while hardening it and warning man against it. He provides examples of how we can fight our egoism.

This is the Creator, saying: “Go to Pharaoh! This is what you have to do. Take Me by the hand and hold onto Me. I will also hold you, but you have to learn how to cling to Me, so that you can resist the monster, which is revealed within you through his 10 primary unclean forces. All that is required of you is to sit in My arms and desire for this monster to be vanquished. I will appease the monster according to your instructions only if you glue yourself to Me.”

If a person performs this work, it means that he has freedom of will, since in this state, he has all the conditions needed.

Related Material:
Laitman.com Post: The Path Of Light Versus The Path Of Suffering
Laitman.com Post: We Reveal The Creator Through Escaping Our Egoism – Pharaoh
A Glimpse of Radiance
From Chaos to Harmony: “Obeying Nature’s Law. Life’s Purpose”
Baal HaSulam Article: “A Speech for the Completion of The Zohar”

 Lesson on Shamati #159: "And It Came to Pass in the Course of Those Many Days" [01:11:17m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download
 

Filed under: Free Will - 1 Comment →

In the News (from Contrarian Investors’ Journal): “Baltic Dry Index indicates a collapse in global trade” In May 2008, the BDI [price of moving the major raw materials by sea] fell from a record high of 11,793 to a low of 663 since 1986. It has been said that such low reading means that shipping costs is very close to the “combined operating costs of vessels, fuel and crew.”

My Comment: What else do you need when you receive a higher reward for these actions, when your soul is fulfilled, when you feel perfection and eternity, the Upper Harmony that’s above this temporal and imperfect life? People should only change (correct themselves) from reception to bestowal. This is merely a psychological problem, because people will receive billions times more than they do now, and they will receive it forever.

Filed under: Crisis - No Comments →