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Hi Yana,
This is done to help us to grow and develop. It’s just like when we teach our kids to walk. We place them on their feet and wait for them to take a step towards us. When they do, we move back a little to give them space to take another step and another. From the process of us going further and further from them, they develop and learn how to walk.
It’s the same with us and the Creator. When we start to aspire for Him, we begin to feel Him get more distant. Like with the above walking example, this too is for our development. It’s thanks to this process that we build a true desire for Him, for spirituality.
Check out the article Shamati 1: There is none else besides Him, for more details: https://kabbalahmedia.info/sources/hFeGidcS?language=en
Albert @ KabU
Hi Asher,
We don’t disappear. If anything, the whole process that we’re undergoing is the process by which we clarify further and further who we are. We learn this from the 3 phases that Baal HaSulam describes in the article Introduction to the book of Zohar. That we were created in the state of perfection 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.
So even though we return to that initial state of being in complete adhesion with the Creator, thanks to the process we underwent, we remain as two separate things. Baal HaSulam describes this with the candle and torch analogy in the Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah. Here’s an excerpt:
“The reason why the will to receive must cascade by the four above-mentioned discernments in ABYA [Atzilut, Beria, Yetzira, Assiya] is that there is a great rule concerning the Kelim [pl. of Kli]: The expansion of the light and its departure make the Kli fit for its task. This means that as long as the Kli has not been separated from its light, it is included in the light and is annulled within it like a candle before a torch.
This annulment is because they are completely opposite from one another, on opposite ends. This is so because the light extends from His self, existence from existence. From the perspective of the thought of creation in Ein Sof [infinity], it is all toward bestowal and there is no trace of a will to receive in it. Its opposite is the Kli, the great will to receive that abundance, and is the root of the initiated creature, in which there is no bestowal whatsoever.
Hence, when they are bound together, the will to receive is annulled in the light within it, and can determine its form only once the light has departed from it once. Following the departure of the light from it, it begins to crave it, and this craving properly determines and sets the shape of the will to receive. Subsequently, when the light dresses in it once more, it is regarded as two separate matters: Kli and light, or Guf and life. Observe closely, for this is most profound.”
Feel free to check out these articles directly here:
Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah: https://kabbalahmedia.info/sources/kB3eD83I?language=en
Introduction to the book of Zohar: https://kabbalahmedia.info/sources/ALlyoveA?language=en
Albert @ KabU
Hi Joseph,
Our points in the heart are relatively fixed. The only way to qualitatively increase this point is by connecting it with other points in the heart. We’ll learn how to do this practically in the more advanced semesters.
Albert @ KabU
Hi Taylor,
The number 125 comes from the structure of the upper worlds. This structure is just a division of the spiritual desire that we need to correct into sefirot, partzufim, and worlds.
The most basic division of the desire is 1 Sefira. 5 Sefirot compose 1 partzuf. 5 Partzufim compose 1 world. There are 5 worlds in total. So 5 worlds each with 5 partzufim each with 5 sefirot equals 125 (5x5x5) steps on the spiritual ladder, or in other words corrections that need to be performed on the desire.
In the book Kabbalah for the Student, there’s an article called Foreword to the Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah (http://www.kabbalah.info/eng/content/view/full/64187) which lists these 125 steps in the language of sefirot/partzufim/olamot(worlds). For now, these are just technical terms for us, but in the future lessons we’ll dive deeper into these things and learn how to feel and experience them.
In simpler words, the 125 steps represents the difference between us and the Creator. The Creator is a desire to bestow and we are the desire to receive. Adapting our desire to receive to work in order to bestow takes 125 steps. So to the extent that we correct our nature, make it similar to the Creator’s nature, to that extent we’re “climbing” this ladder.
In other words, ascending or descending this ladder is not a physical action, but rather depends on how much we’re similar to the Creator’s quality of bestowal (ascending) or less similar to it and more egoistic (descending).
All of this operates according to the law of equivalence of form. Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2013/04/everything-is-attained-by-the-equivalence-of-form/
Albert @ KabU
Hi Sam,
I’m not an expert in religions or any other spiritual method, so I cannot comment on what they do or teach there. As for Kabbalah, Kabbalah is the method by which we correct our egoistic nature. As a result of this correction, we reach equivalence of form with the Creator, with spirituality. As a result of that, we reveal these things in practice, in our lives.
Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2011/06/kabbalah-without-a-trace-of-mysticism/
Albert @ KabU
Hi Yana,
I agree, it’s a tough article. I think it’s a bit beyond what we can grasp in the fundamentals, but you can check out this blog post from Rav Laitman which explains the main takeaway from this article: http://laitman.com/2012/02/checking-the-aims-precision/
Albert @ KabU
