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Hi Salam,
We say that we don’t need to change the world because, as we’ll learn in the upcoming lesson on the perception of reality, the external world is a reflection of my internal world. Meaning that if I see something bad in the world, it’s a sign that there is something bad within me. So in order to fix what I see outside of me, I need to fix what is inside of me.
It’s like I have these dirty glasses through which I see the whole world as dirty. The moment I clean my own glasses, I’ll look at the same world, but now it’s clean and perfect.
Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2014/04/in-neutral-gear/
As for arranging our corporeal lives, Kabbalah does not deal with these things. Kabbalah only deals with our desire for spirituality. The rest of our desires don’t have any relation to spirituality, so each person can arrange these desires however is most comfortable for them (of course within the context of the law and without harming others).
How do we do this in practice? In practice we only work on making the desire for spirituality the most important thing. Then naturally the rest of our desires will fall into place. For example, it’s like with an artist that is so involved in his art, that he fulfills all the rest of his desires out of necessity so he can quickly return to his passion. Same with us, when spirituality is the most important desire, then we will be able to properly relate to all the rest of our corporeal desires in a balanced way.
Albert @ KabU
Hi Shana, great question!
Our nature is the desire to receive pleasure. The Creator’s nature is opposite, that of pure love and bestowal. Our work is to correct our opposite egoistic nature and make it similar to the Creator’s nature.
The soul is also a type of desire. It’s the same desire to receive pleasure after it’s been corrected to operate in the direction of bestowal. So the soul = desire to receive corrected to work in the direction of bestowal.
The desire to receive can be divided into 5 parts, 5 levels of coarseness of the desire. Corresponding to the 5 levels of the desire, there are 5 levels of the soul: Nefesh, Ruach (spirit), Neshama, Haya, Yechida.
To the extent that we correct our nature for it to operate in the direction of bestowal, to that extent we build and discover these different levels of the soul.
Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2015/06/what-happens-to-the-soul-after-death/
Albert @ KabU
Hi Andrea, great questions!
On the one hand, Kabbalah can explain everything about life, including the system of planets, stars, solar systems, etc. Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman: https://laitman.com/2015/01/all-of-the-planets-sustain-life-on-earth/
On the other hand, Kabbalists are not interested in Astrology or anything else in this world. This is because ultimately our entire world/universe is below the ladder of spiritual degrees. Kabbalists call it “the imaginary world”. Since once we correct ourselves, relative to that corrected state this life would appear as nothing more than a dream. So Kabbalists are not here to teach us more about this dream, they are here to teach us how to correct ourselves so we will wake up from this dream.
Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman: http://laitman.com/2010/11/this-life-is-a-dream/
Albert @ KabU
Hi James,
The 613 laws are the 613 commandments that the Torah speaks about in an allegorical way. Keep in mind that:
1) Although they are written in an allegorical way, it only speaks about corrections performed on our desires. So we don’t need to carry these things out physically, but only on the level of our desires.
Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2016/02/mitzvot-commandments-the-correction-of-desires/Â
2. In practice, we don’t work according to some kind of list, but simply with whatever is being awakened in the moment.
Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2015/09/compliance-with-the-613-mitzvot-commandments/
3. The 613 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 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
Hi Salam,
1. There is no prerequisite to study the Torah or Gemara. Although these are indeed Kabbalistic books and there were countless other Kabbalistic books that have been written in the past, 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 posts from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2015/11/the-great-kabbalists-and-their-works/
2. As for Judaism, if you wish to study Judaism, that’s completely up to you, but that’s also not required. This is because Kabbalah is not a religion and not connected to any religion. Kabbalah is a scientific method by which we can correct our egoistic nature and as a result of that correction, we reveal the Creator in our lives.
At the same time, Kabbalah is not against religions. In fact we have millions of students worldwide, from many different backgrounds and religions. Many of them do choose to maintain their religion or to perform certain religious customs while studying Kabbalah and there is nothing wrong with that. Just like with any other science, a person can be religious and also be a chemist or physicist. Likewise a person can be religious and also study the science of Kabbalah. Baal HaSulam writes that even after the full spiritual correction people can still keep their religions.
Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2015/12/the-wisdom-of-kabbalah-and-the-other-religions/
3. Yes, you can find the books in Hebrew. Here’s a link to the Hebrew bookstore: https://books.kab.co.il/
and a link to the Kabbalah Library in Hebrew: https://kabbalahmedia.info/he/sources.
Although if English is difficult for you, you can also try switching to the Hebrew version of this course: https://campus.kab.co.il/
Albert @ KabU
Hi Natalia,
You can say that Kabbalah is hard because it talks about correcting our nature. If we try to perform this correction by ourselves, not only is it hard, but it’s actually impossible. Just like a PC cannot change itself to run as a Mac, we too cannot just reprogram our very nature. We need outside help to perform this change. This help comes to us from the light. This is a special force that we can tap into in order to help us perform this change. We extract this force primarily from the Kabbalistic studies. Our entire work boils down to extracting more and more of the force of the light and it does all the rest. If we learn how to do that properly, then this path will not seem hard, but actually quiet simple and relatively easy to carry out.
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
