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When I signed up for this course, there was some time before Week 1 started, and there were several chapters in Rav Laitman’s three basic books that was adviced that we took some time with reading until Week 1 began.
I followed this advice, but something strange happened. When Week 1 became accessible to me, most of the week had already gone by.
I’m a very slow reader, especially with material like what we study here, so I really had to spend most of my time only reading. However, I can’t do that because I also struggle with PTSD, and it has a way of starting a monologue in my mind, like a record being played over and over, and I constantly find myself having lost 15 minutes here, 40 minutes there, and so on. Also, I need time to process what I read, I can’t hurry from one chapter to the next.
But I really did my best.
When I found Week 2 had begun, there was only 2 days left. 2 days, and I had read maybe 25% of the preparation material, 20% of Week 1’s material, and none of Week 3’s material.
So my question is this:
If you do happen to fall behind with some of the reading material, is it acceptable if you, instead of trying to hurry through it all and ending up not really having read anything thoroughly, take the time you have to take if you want to read, process, and learn in a way that allows you to remember, even if it means there are bits or chapters of text you don’t manage to read during the week you were assigned that material?
– What I mean is, will the above be accepted if I am able to keep up in every other way, answering the check and knowledge questions correctly, and so on?
I apologize for being so late with this question.
Thank you in advance.
In the lesson soul root was mentioned a few times and I might be wrong but there was no mentioning that those roots are different for each as the root of lets say left shoulder of Adam can’t be equal or the same as the root of Adam’s knee or toe . The question – are we going to study a bit more in depth things like ” how do I understand the root of my soul and my place and role in the correction of the world depending on that ?” Thank you very much in advance .
Hi Andrey,
These things are relative to each person. So each person will need to discover it for himself throughout his spiritual development.
Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2010/03/returning-to-the-root-of-ones-soul/
Albert @ KabU
As I come to terms with thought that I cannot develop without the revelation of evil, and from the light exposing the difference in my inner condition, how can i know that I am genuinely overcoming all the obstacles, above reason. Is it the fact that I find myself able to observe Torah and Mitzvot, or is it, that the revelation of evil is not so intense?
Hi Robert,
The revelation of evil means that our nature is completely egoistic and does not allow us to perform ANY actions of bestowal. If we reveal such a thing, then how can we overcome it? It’s impossible. Only the light can give us such strength. So immediately after the revelation of evil comes the time of prayer, of extracting more light to help us to overcome our nature.
We’ll learn these things in depth in the upcoming lessons. In the meantime, check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2013/02/sunbathing-in-the-rays-of-the-reforming-light/
Albert @ KabU
I have a few questions:
1. On page 114 of the Attaining the Worlds Beyond, it ways that we must avoid contact with other people, except when it becomes necessary for work or for study, without deliberately shunning them. But what about family and friends, and all the other people in the world to whom we are supposed to feel connected?
2. What are the Mitzvot that Kabbalah refers to? Are they the same 613 Mitzvot that we are supposed to learn through Torah and observe?
3. The books tell us to refrain from other sources of wisdom because the are harmful. Who determines what sources are harmful and how do we know it?
Hi Lana, great questions!
1. Taking care of our family is a necessity, we must continue to do so. As for our connection to the world, that is also very important. After all, we learn from the shattering of the common soul of Adam HaRishon that our entire work is in fixing the broken connections between people. So eventually we will reach a state where we feel ourselves connected to the whole world. But this is a gradual process. Just like a body builder cannot just go straight to lifting a thousand pounds, we too cannot go straight to trying to connect to the world, we need to build up to it.
We do this by focusing all of our spiritual work on connecting with other points in the heart in the Kabbalistic group. It’s like we’re building here a certain nucleus. Once we build that nucleus, we will be able to add to it wider and wider circles of the world, until we’ll come to include the whole world in that connection. But this is gradual work. And until we build that nucleus, we have nothing with which to do any spiritual work towards the world. So until then, how do we behave towards the rest of the world? We behave there normally, just like everyone else.
2. Kabbalah is a method by which we can correct our egoistic nature. As a result of this correction, we become similar to the Creator and reveal Him in practice. The process of correcting our nature to make it resemble Him is called Torah & Mitzvot.
Torah comes from the Hebrew word Ohr (Hebrew for “light”). So when Kabbalists use the word Torah, they are not referring to the physical book, but rather to the light. This is a special force that we can extract, especially through the Kabbalistic studies, in order to correct our egoistic nature.
As for the Mitzvot, when Kabbalists use the word Mitzvot (plural of Mitzvah) they are not referring to the corporeal commandments that a religious person performs with his hands and feet. But rather the Mitzvot are the internal processes by which we draw the light and correct the egoistic desires.
Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2010/11/spice-up-your-desire/
3. Harmful meaning that it can deviate us from the spiritual goal. If we want to succeed in Kabbalah (or in any spiritual practice really) we should practice it without mixing other things into it. Otherwise it’s like following two different GPS systems. One leads you to the goal through the west highway, while the other through the east highway. If you follow both, you’ll just wind up going in circles.
As for choosing which sources to read, in our days, we mainly study from the writings of Baal HaSulam and Rabash. This is because egoism grows from generation to generation, so Kabbalah, the method for its correction, needs to get adapted in each generation for that level of egoism. For example it’s like in medicine, if a person has a headache he can just drink a tylenol and that’s enough to fix him. But if it’s not just a little headache but something cancerous, then that tylenol won’t do anything for him but he needs a completely different regime to heal himself.
This is why Kabbalah gets adapted in each generation to the level of egoism that is currently found in that generation. So although there were many different Kabbalists and Kabbalistic books throughout the generations, nowadays we mainly learn from the writings of Baal HaSulam and Rabash, since their writings contains the light that is most suitable to correct the egoism that is found in our generation.
Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2015/11/the-great-kabbalists-and-their-works/
Albert @ KabU
Hi, so everything Kabbalah is speaking to is at the level of internal feelings and thoughts? As things open up, that’s where attainment is perceived unmistakably? In terms of a root, this is a sort of feeling?
Hi Ilya,
Yes, you can say that. Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2010/01/the-four-stages-of-attainment/
Albert @ KabU
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