[Albert – KabU Instructor]

Hi Chris,

Assiyah (עשיה) means action.

See my post below for more details about the names of the spiritual worlds.

Albert @ KabU

[Albert – KabU Instructor]

Hi Rune, good question!

In general, people define idolatry as worshiping anything other than the Creator. But in Kabbalah, it has a different and more internal meaning. Idolatry in Kabbalah means that a person serves himself, his ego, instead of serving the Creator, the general force of love and bestowal.  So everything we do to serve our ego is considered idolatry.

Here’s an excerpt from Rav Laitman’s words on this topic:

“At first Abraham himself made idols, meaning he taught people to worship egoistic desires for money, honor, knowledge. All our activities in this world are called making idols, idol worship, since we work for our egoism”.

As for amulets and such things, these things are not forbidden but rather they have nothing to do with spirituality, there no spiritual forces within such things. They only benefit us in a purely psychological way, similar to how the placebo effect works.

Albert @ KabU

[Albert – KabU Instructor]

Hi Mike, good question!

On one hand, the Torah is entirely written in the language of roots and branches, meaning it uses words of our world to describe spiritual phenomena. So none of it is literal. On the other hand, there is a law that the spiritual root must touch the corporeal branch at least once. Meaning although these are spiritual phenomena, they must have a corresponding corporeal branch in our world.

For example, Egypt represents the uncorrected egoistic desire while Israel represents the corrected desire, those are the roots. But in our world these things exist as branches as well. There is actually a physical place that is called Egypt and Israel. Still, despite all the above, the Torah is not a history book, not a single word of the Torah speaks about our world.

Check out these blog posts from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2014/10/the-deluge-and-other-natural-disasters/

https://laitman.com/2016/05/dispelling-myths-about-kabbalah-part-4/

Albert @ KabU

[Albert – KabU Instructor]

Hi Paul,

“Heart” means desire. So equivalence of form in the desire, means having a true desire to bestow.

Regarding Lishma (for Her Name), her refers to the Torah (which is a female word in Hebrew).  And the Torah refers to the entire system in which we exist.

In other words, Lo Lishma (not for her name) and Lishma (for her name) is talking about our intention, the reason for why we’re studying Kabbalah. Lo Lishma means that we aspire to spirituality egoistically, for our own sake. While Lishma is when the light corrects this egoistic aspiration to operate purely in the direction of bestowal, for the sake of the entire system.

Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2011/07/lo-lishma-having-something-to-correct/

Albert @ KabU

[Albert – KabU Instructor]

Hi Miryam, great question!

Although we sometimes say that we are trying to bestow to the Creator or to bring Him contentment, but in truth it’s just a game to help us to develop. It’s just like with kids. When we spoon feed them, they see the example from us and want to pick up a spoon and feed us back. Do we really need them to feed us? Of course not. But we still accept this from them, smile, show them how happy they made us by feeding us, etc. Since we know that through this game, they grow and develop. So ultimately the Creator is not lacking anything and does not change. And all of our attempts to bestow to Him are nothing more than a type of game for our own development.

As for the changes we feel, these changes are not in Him, but in us. This follows the rule that “I have not changed my HaVaYaH”. Meaning that the Creator’s light is the same light, it never changes. We change and accordingly we feel the light differently. It’s similar to how electricity is the same electricity but based on what appliance you plug in, you have different uses and results from it. Plug in a heater and you will produce warmth, plug in an AC and you will get cool air, etc.  So the Creator does not change, we do, and every time we change, we experience this thing called the Creator in a different way.

Check out this blog post from Rav Laitman for more details: https://laitman.com/2011/12/the-holy-names-of-bestowal/

Albert @ KabU

[Albert – KabU Instructor]

Hi Danielle,

Our nature is the desire to receive pleasure. By default this desire is egoistic. Meaning that we use it to receive everything for ourselves. Through the process of correction, we convert the desire for it to operate in the direction of bestowal. But the desire always remains a desire, it still operates to receive pleasure. We just correct it with the intention in order to bestow. So it receives but in order to bestow.

Check out the Guest and Host analogy in Chapter 3 of Attaining the Worlds Beyond for more details.

As for working on becoming altruistic, this is work that we do primarily within this safe environment that we call the Kabbalistic group. In the more advanced semesters, everyone will receive their own Kabbalah group (which are called tens) with whom they can put all these things into practice. Until then, we are still in the fundamentals, where we need to learn the foundation of this wisdom, so we’ll know how to properly apply it later on.

Also keep in mind that we don’t perform any corrections over ourselves. It’s ultimately the light that makes all the changes on us. See my reply to Micha in the week 3 questions forum for more details.

Albert @ KabU

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