Ask anything about week 3 lesson and materials and get an answer from a senior Kabbalah instructor.

[Tony Kosinec- KabU Instructor]

Ask anything about week 3 lesson and materials and get an answer from a senior Kabbalah instructor.

[Tom]

Hi, As I think I understand it, the opposition between the desire to receive and the intention in the incoming light allows for contrast such that we can feel the creator. What is brought by the intention in the incoming light may be perceived as bad/evil since we are only looking from the perspective of our desire to receive. What role does our response to these bad/evil things play? For example on an individual level, if we are attacked physically is self defense an appropriate response? It would seem to be since it might be the only response that allows us to later reflect on the intention? I suppose my question comes down to trying to understand how our decisions in the material world connect with trying to understand the intention.

[Albert – KabU Instructor]

Hi Tom,

There is a saying that “if someone comes to kill you, you need to kill them first”. Meaning that on the level of this world, we need to live our lives in the normal way, according to what is customary in our society. So if someone is trying to harm me, I need to stop them, defend myself, call the cops, sue them, etc. We deal with all these things in the normal way that our society deals with them. Likewise if I’m sick, I need to go to the doctor. If I lose my job, I need to send out my resume and go job hunting, etc. Externally all of these things remain.

So what changes as a result of us studying Kabbalah? Our internality. Internally we need to ascribe everything that is happening to us as coming to us from the Creator. So internally we begin to relate to all of these things differently. But this is our internal work and it does not cancel out any of the normal actions that we need to take externally.

We’ll learn more about this in the upcoming lessons, in the meantime, check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: http://laitman.com/2017/12/there-is-none-else-besides-him/

Albert @ KabU

[Francis Carrier]

Hello,

I’ve read and heard (in the suggested videos and books here) that there is 613 steps/desires and also 620 organs in the human body that are relevent to a quality that we have to correct. Are those two numbers connected or not ? Are we talking about the same 613 or 620 corrections ? And are we gonna study how to correct them ?

Thank you !

[Albert – KabU Instructor]

Hi Francis,

620 is the number of corrections that need to be placed over the spiritual desire. This number is further divided into 248 desires of bestowing in order to bestow, 365 desires that operate on receiving in order to bestow, and 7 additional desires that are corrected only in the final correction.

So yes the numbers 613 and 620 are connected. Depending on the context, sometimes Kabbalists include those additional 7 desires and sometimes they omit them.

As for correcting these desires, in order to correct them, we first need to discover them. The 613/620 desires are spiritual desires that we don’t yet have. Similar to how a single cell in a body only has some basic desires. But when that cell is part of a greater body, it reveals there higher desires which are impossible for the individual cell to have: desires for money, honor, power, etc. Same with us, until we integrate with the general body of Adam HaRishon, we don’t reveal or understand these 613/620 spiritual desires.

Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2008/12/all-you-need-to-know-about-the-613-desires/

Albert @ KabU

[Francis Carrier]

Thank you Albert !

[Rae]

I feel I’m experiencing these concepts and growing in gratitude for understanding that brings knowing. I have no questions here but I am so grateful for Kab U! Thank you to he teacher’s and Kabbalists of Attainment.

[saps]

1. Why did the shuttering need to happen, considering we were in a perfect state before it? What is the reason for essentially breaking something just so it can go through a correction process to come back to the same exact state? It may seem counterproductive.

 

1. It seems we had no choice on the path of pain until now as we only had our awakening in the year of 2000, which means up until then the path of pain was enforced on us. Why did we get no choice in this matter, providing so much suffering occurred throughout history?

 

1. Is there a possible ‘fail’ outcome of no tikkun? For instance, if there is a deadline by which we must complete our tikkun, but we did not because many people choose evil over good? What happens then?

 

1. Following all 613 Mitzvot can be very difficult for people, arguably, even impossible. Can we pick a few and focus on those?

Thank you in advance,

S

[Albert – KabU Instructor]

Hi Sapir, great questions!

1. We were indeed created in the state of perfection (Baal HaSulam describes this in the article Introduction to the book of Zohar https://kabbalahmedia.info/sources/ALlyoveA), but this was an unconscious state, like a baby in its mother’s womb. So we necessarily had to come to the complete opposite state, to lose that state of perfection, in order to once again reach it, but this time consciously.

And the fact that we had to lose this state is not something bad, but it’s a necessary part of our development. It’s just like with kids. We don’t just give them a completed jigsaw puzzle. On the contrary we take it and break it down into many pieces. Then in the process of them putting it together, they grow and develop. Same with us, this process of losing that state is a necessary part of our further growth and development.

This process also adds to us a certain level of freedom, without which, we would be no different than machines, or robots, that were programmed to act a certain way and they just carry out this inner script. Instead, we were programmed one way, and we rise above this inner programming, become independent of it, and then develop our own desire to advance towards this goal.

Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2014/01/from-perfection-to-perfection/

2. The method of Kabbalah is one by which we correct our egoistic nature. But if we don’t feel our egoistic nature as something bad, then we have no need to correct it, we have no need for this method. Just like we don’t take any medicine if we don’t feel sick, likewise humanity could not discover the method to correct egoism until it truly felt itself sick with egoism.

In the prior years of development, egoism was seen as something positive, as something that pushed humanity forward. Only in the past 20 or 30 years, did we begin to feel how much our egoism is actually causing us harm, like something cancerous within us. This is why Kabbalah was only revealed in recent years, when humanity began to feel a real need for it. This follows the rule that “there is no light without a kli (vessel)”. Meaning that you cannot reveal something spiritual without feeling a true need for it. Which is essentially what those thousands of years of development gave us.

3. From the three states model (referenced in the article & blog post in answer #1) we see that the end goal is set. There is no escaping it. Every single moment in our lives is designed to help bring us all towards that goal. Our only choice in the matter is to go consciously towards that goal or wait for the sufferings to build up and push us.

Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2011/01/lets-go-with-the-light/

4. When Kabbalists are talking about the 613 Mitzvot, they are not referring to corporeal Mitzvot 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 these blog posts from Rav Laitman for more details:

https://laitman.com/2010/11/spice-up-your-desire/

https://laitman.com/2015/09/compliance-with-the-613-mitzvot-commandments/

Albert @ KabU

[jill]

Is it possibly that we are stuck in the duality of our thinking. So that things are either bad or good? Isn’t it rather that on another level beyond duality there is a synthesis that subsumes both good and bad? Not one or another but a third that is not possible for us because of the way our animal consciousness is constructed?

jill

[Albert – KabU Instructor]

Hi Jill,

Philosophically speaking, we can argue one way or another. But Kabbalah is not a philosophy, it’s a science based on the research of the Kabbalist. From their research, we see that we were purposefully created in such a way that we can only grasp reality in this form of duality. Perhaps after we complete the process of correction, new forms of perception will open up for us. But these are speculations, we’ll need to get there and see for ourselves.

Check out these blog posts from Rav Laitman for more details:

https://laitman.com/2019/04/the-purpose-of-creation/

https://laitman.com/2010/10/what-happens-after-the-final-correction/

Albert @ KabU

[jill]

Thank you for your help…I was surprised to get an answer.

[Jovan Gorman-Carter]

Pretty much all of my desires are for my own benefit. Does the process of correcting these desires happen through a change of intention behind the desire? The desire itself is not meant to change but my perspective and intention changes?

[Albert – KabU Instructor]

Hi Jovan,

Yes, you can say that.

Check out the Guest & Host Allegory in Chapter 3 of Attaining the Worlds Beyond for more details:

http://www.kabbalah.info/eng/content/view/frame/4180?/eng/content/view/full/4180&main

Albert @ KabU

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