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.

[Eugene Sokol]

One of my main questions about the world we live in is, “why is there suffering, pain, & death?” I was born with Cerebral Palsy, & when I matured enough to start questioning “why,” my search began down a path of studying religion. I even earned a degree in religion from college. But the more I searched for answers, the more questions arose. Now, since starting this course in Kabbalah, I am beginning to understand some things on my quest. This video on “Force of Development” has helped me begin to understand the contrast between the Creator’s will vs. my will. I am grateful for this course & the teachers who are shining the light of Kabbalah.

[Eugene Sokol]

Regarding the shattering into 600,000 pieces, does every human have a piece of that? If so, there is about 8 million people on earth. How does the math work where everyone has a piece of the 600,000 shards/sparks when there’s 8 mil. people. Also, are you considered a Noahide (gentile desiring to become Jewish) according to Kabbalah or does it not matter?

[Albert – KabU Instructor]

Hi Eugene,

600,000 is less of a quantitative number and more of a qualitative number. It represents the strength of the spiritual desire after it’s been fully corrected. So essentially all of humanity is included in this number.

Check out this blog post to see how this number is derived: https://laitman.com/2010/09/love-and-hatred-of-600000-souls/

As for being Jewish or a gentile, in the Wisdom of Kabbalah, these things are not determined by our nationality but only according to our desires. If a person has a desire to reveal the Creator, that person is called Israel (from the Hebrew words Yashar-El, straight to God). If a person has a desire only to fulfill one’s stomach, then that person is called an animal. In other words, these things are not fixed at our birth, but rather as our desires change, these labels change as well.

Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2013/05/roles-that-come-along-our-way/

Albert @ KabU

[Eugene Sokol]

Thank you, Albert. Happy Hanukkah!

[saps]

Thank you for the above video, but my question about the nature of suffering still remains. The fact that we need a contrast to understand something, in this case suffering & pain vs. love, is clear. However, considering the premise that the creator is all able, the fact the suffering was ‘chosen’ as the optimal way by which we can go through our correction and understand the creator’s nature best, is confusing me. If I was given the choice of allowing my AI agent a process by which they can become conscious and independent, I would choose suffering as my very last resort. Ethically, I should choose to stop development until there is a better way. Once again, considering God is all good and all able, why did they opt for the option that requires pain? surely the creator could invent some other emotion/way by which the creature could get to the same outcome without suffering?

[Albert – KabU Instructor]

Hi Sapir,

Suffering is not the optimal path. The path of light is actually the optimal way. Suffering is indeed a last resort.

Furthermore, although we say that there are two paths towards the goal (path of light vs path of suffering), in truth we don’t really advance on the path of suffering. It’s like a child that needs to go to school. Pressuring and punishing him is not the same as educating him. So after all of the pressures and punishments we put on him, he will still have to go to school and get his education. In other words, the path of suffering is only there to pressure us to return to the path of light.

Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2015/05/we-wont-follow-the-path-of-suffering-forever/

Albert @ KabU

[John Caton]

I had a question, but couldn’t really form it in my head and certainly couldn’t articulate it, but it had to do with facing up to and opposing evil (selfish actions detrimental to me and others) around us in the material world. So I found my question in Tom’s question and the answer in Albert’s response. Starting to see the benefit of sharing.

[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 !

[Author]

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