I feel very honored about your invitation, and the trust that you put that way inside me in the name of my 10#2!
My intention for being here is the tenification of the World Wide Web and provide the seekers of truth and the purpose of their lifes with an answer.
The spirit of the method is contained within the picture that i created with Jack Holden. If you look at it, it looks like strange kabbalistic poetry. The way we created it is unique to the wisdom of kabbalah but i haven't found anyone propagating and practicing it. And this is what i want to give to you and also to my ten. Our ten already holds a tiny grasp of what is going to unfold out of this, and i wish that the whole world can play this funny game of wisdom.
It goes like this:
One starts a post in the form of an image like this:
Then everyone of the workshop (ten) continues the sentence in a manner that the sentence is not grammatically closed (no enforced full stop), until everybody of the workshop contributed his part. We nullify to the existing train of thought, add our own part, and leave space for the next friend to continue it, and we support him by wanting to see a certain continuation. If he doesn't continue as expected we trust, that in the end a meaningful thought is expressed. In our example 1 o 1 workshop it turned out to be like this:
I already created a Facebook Page "Integral Education 10 2 02" (https://www.facebook.com/eliyahu10202/) on facebook where anyone who wants to play that game is invited to do so. Please feel free to reach out to me for cooperation.
Recently, this group of friends has been reflecting on the nature of our relationships between us and between people in general. Our teacher Dr. Laitman has an interesting point of view to share with us. In the following video, he is answering the following question: "How should we perceive reality?"
Ok, ok. All the events of my life happen inside of me. Then who are the people around me? Thankfully, a smart student has asked this question already. This is the answer from Dr. Laitman:
What mirror?
Our teacher tells us that our reality reflects inner states that we experience. In that sense, we can say that one's environment - mainly people around - are one's mirror as it paints one's inner state. Yes, I realize this can sometimes be a bitter pill to swallow. Hopefully, this video can help:
Discrimination
While we are learning to take responsibility for our inner states, media is filled with horrific stories and power struggles that are founded on the premise that a certain category of the population is responsible for all the problems of the world. Countries against countries, generational, gender and racial issues... where does it all end?
Anti-semistism
We will all agree, I hope, that any form of racism in year 2016 is socially unacceptable. Perhaps, then, some people don't believe anti-Semitism is racism? The reason I ask is that according to serious pollings conducted by ADL Global 100, no less than 1.09 billion people globally have anti-Semitic attitudes and one person out of three believe that the holocaust - which is well-documented - is a myth!
I hope to live long enough to look at anti-Semitism in the rear-view mirror.
I had a group of friends, instead of drawing divisions in the sand we drew circles around the heart, and that's where all creation starts. Can't you see?
I love I love my ten 3. I love I love my ten 3.
All the other friends in town were jealous, can't you see? Well we said "friends, there's no room for jealousy - so lets all form on big Ten 3".
How Can We Make The Creator Happy? | Laitman.com: Question: How can we make the Creator happy if the Creator is a system? It is like trying to make the law of gravity happy. Answer: Everything depends on our attitude to the Creator because we bring our feelings into this system. When we work on a computer, we sometimes get angry at it, curse it, and even want to break it. Why? This happens because we transfer our emotions to those objects that deal with the forces we are interacting with. It is the same with the Creator. The Creator is absolute! The absolute cannot be changed. He is not influenced by our requests and cannot interact with us because He is absolute! Question: So how can we make the Creator happy? Answer: We make Him happy in our sensations. Therefore, the Creator is called Bore (come and see). I come and see and discover Him inside me. Question: Does this mean that we only feel that we make Him happy? Answer: Yes. The Creator is something that applies to me, in our corrected feelings...
I am continually blown away by the power of connection in a group of ten, and the reality that is revealed within and among us. We experience ups and downs, love and hatred, confusion and clarity, and so much more. This is not glamorous work! It does not show any kind of outward appeal. Especially to the novelty junkie of 2016. Even so, the work done between us to reveal the "Creator" in a group of ten proves itself. How? Is there evidence? Something to finally put away all doubt? These are difficult questions, because although we use a rigorous Kabbalistic method, the 'answer' does not come in the same form, seemingly. The results of our experiment are the essence of reality itself. Therefore our habitual way of scrutinizing cannot apply here, as the form of the answer it seeks is transcended in the very connection! Thus, our tools(perception) must be continually upgraded, as the work demands of us, and we cannot participate as a bystander or as a comfortably uninvolved yet curious persona. No, we ourselves, our very identity and the feelings that play into creating our "residual self image"(to quote the Matrix), are the substance that is operated on by the very real power of connection. Contact with reality, through others, certainly changes everything about us, and has the potential to inform the mind as well.
This article might as well have been titled How to attract cynicism to an article 101. Think about it: a solution that would put an end to any war, poverty, crisis, power struggle, divorce, fear, illness, abuse, etc. One can hardly imagine the kind of utopia we would live in... but what if that solution really existed?
As you know by now, this blog is brought together by a bunch of friends who study the wisdom of authentic Kabbalah as students of Dr. Michael Laitman. As per the above video, our teacher explains that everything in the world is interconnected. So if the one thing that is common to everything is connection and we are looking for a single remedy to all the problems, what is the one thing we need to heal?
You get 10 points if you answered "connection".
The right connection between us will influence human society and the environment - nature. Through our balanced relationships we can balance the whole of nature that's below us. That is our only weapon and the right solution.
We learn a very practical way of achieving this: roundtable workshops. This is a simple method aimed at discussing issues in a group through questions that every member responds following the "rules of the workshop":
You may wonder: how can a roundtable workshop settle all the problems in the world?
The rules of the workshop are designed in such a way that one brings down one's ego to the benefit of the group. When every member of the group achieves this, the members bond and become as one, thereby balancing relationships between themselves and with nature which is below them. This balance is the remedy to all the problems in the world.
There is a force behind everything that occurs in the universe. This force is to the universe like an operating program is to a computer. I cannot affect this program personally but only by correcting my attitude toward others. The goal of our development is connection, love of others like ourselves, and do not do unto others what is hateful to us. The nation of Israel has to perform this self-examination since this nation has to lead the whole world to correction.
Where does one begin a journey to find meaning and fulfillment? One does not begin, one first finds oneself at the mercy of a blind desire that seeks something it does not know. Beginnings and endings are contained within the self-devouring circle, or ourobouros, of life. If we were to speak of knowledge this could be an examination of philosophy, science, or even religion. There are many varieties of knowledge, yet all are contained in the general premise of knowing-ness(a pejorative term, a mere shell of desire). To know, we must transcend knowing, just as the same principle applies universally - as Einstein has said, to jump on the table, we first must jump above the table. The question becomes, not one of knowledge, or even what knowledge, but why. What goal have we set before us? A teleological question then. What is telos? It is more than a goal or end. It is the desire for transcendence of purpose as well. Perhaps Telos is most truly, self-transcendent. ["Alone of the shells is the serpent Nogah found in holiness..."] But before we can transcend purpose, we must attain purpose. So in the case of purpose, the principle is actually opposite as mentioned above. Why? Because we seek the why, that is why! Why what? Why anything? No, that will not do, the question must be refined, honed, sharpened, trained, and even attained. For this journey, no help will come from a wiser or more attained source. This journey begins with the end, the delicious apple of Eden, and with the seeker turning back upon himself to once again find the beginning and also his eternality and victorious joy. And in doing so he not only attains the purpose that inevitably lies within every mythical beginning, he, in actuality, reality, objectively, attains the why behind the why - which is, "Why even ask why?" To quote Emmanuel Levinas from "Difficult Freedom":
"The numinous or the Sacred envelops and transports man beyond his powers and wishes, but a true liberty takes offence at this uncontrollable surplus. The numinous annuls the links between persons by making beings participate, albeit ecstatically, in a drama not brought about willingly by them, an order in which they founder. This somehow sacramental power of the Divine seems to Judaism to offend human freedom and to be contrary to the education of man, which remains, action on a free being. Not that liberty is an end in itself, but it does remain the condition for any value man may attain. The Sacred that envelops and transports me is a form of violence." So then this blind drive that awakens within one, is a form of absolute ontological liberty. Freedom to not merely attain Being, but the being within Being of Heidegger's metaphysics.[see: Fundamental Concepts of Metaphysics]. That which is held out over the Abyss... This is the mythical "small self", ego, "Created Creature" that contains within it, the seed of Unity which one liberates from the dross of numinous experience, that is, in so far as he has created a new beginning in his revolutions around the Sun(the Ego which the soul houses). Why? First, because "it is good"(Ki Tov). Secondly because what he seeks cannot be found, but only created. And yet this is not an action taken upon ex nihilo nihil fit, rather, this is uncovering the Something that truly came before Nothing. (The Upper Force behind the Void) Yet, the uncovering, the aletheia, the unconcealment, is not the revelation of Truth. It is the surrender of Truth, and the revelation of Unity, or, "the revelation of the Creator's godliness to the creatures"). One's act of creation, depicting an image of one's desire, to bestow upon it a vision of itself - can only be done in communion with Truth. And, in order to be in communion with Truth, as we have already laid down, one must surrender, or transcend, Truth. In this we find ourselves not in communion with each other(perhaps the essence of religion), but in Union with the Being inside of every being. That is, the macrocosm that is reflected in every microcosm. Perhaps we could call to mind Indra's net, or a holographic universe, where within every nexus(form of connection) is a node(essence of connection), and implied within every node is a complete nexus. Also put, the forms we adopt in order to reveal the aforementioned Unity have already been completed, or filled, with the abundance they both desire and exist within, as every form exists in a sea of mutually interpenetrating forces. Any way we might like to view this, the answer is the same at every point of this web: "Raq B'Yachad!" Only together, do we rise higher, and dig deeper - into that which encompasses and surrounds Creation. In doing so, we build a world above the corporeality that pulls at us, a new world that has never existed and can never exist as a potential form among forms(or a thorn among thorns)and that has nothing to do with Being or being! Here we are no longer subject to the whims of the sea, eternally tempting us to return to lesser things, to draw outmore being from Being and in doing so falling into the forgetfulness which plagues corporeal man - the forgetting of the Other. The fall from grace, from love of man. No, we now ride upon the sea in a vessel only possible by mutual effort, mutual guarantee(Arvut), and love of friends. This vessel(Kli) is the beating heart of our One True Identity, the body of Adam Kadmon. The sea of Ain Sof, Infinity, has been tamed and satisfied. All this becomes possible as we hear the call - "Love thy neighbor as oneself" and feel roused the desire to serve, and to love. It is said "There is no coercion in spirituality" - this is the Love of being by Being, and the eternal service to every soul that lies dormant in every shell. B'Shalom, Jack Holden *Stay tuned for further explication of the method of Kabbalah, and perhaps get a taste for the form of Connection and Love that we practice!
Two or three times every week for the past 8 months I have been closely and meticulously scrutinizing Rav Michael Laitman's writings! Allow me to explain. I sit on the editorial board that edits Rav Laitman's original work for content, english usage, and stylistic approach. These articles are published weekly in The Jerusalem Post and The Isreal Times, to name a few.
Below is an example of this work with the edits left in to show examples of our work. It is both an honor and a privilege to be trusted with such exalted responsibilities......
Institutionalized Anti-Semitism at UC Berkeley—Facts and Details
And yet, one email caught my attention in particular. It came from none other than Mr. Dan Mogulof, Assistant Vice Chancellor, from the Office of Communications and Public Affairs at UC Berkeley. In the email, Mr. Mogulof grumbled that the “piece in the Jerusalem Post about the ‘Palestine’ course at Berkeley was outdated, incomplete and inaccurate” because the course had been cancelled two days prior. Mogulof also expressed his hope that in the future, I and my colleagues would “see fit to confirm facts and details prior to publication.”
I thought this was a sound advice, and decided to check the facts and details concerning anti-Semitism at UC Berkeley, and share my findings with the readers. What I learned did not surprise me, but seeing all the evidence en masse still depicted a distressing picture.
First, if, according to Mr. Mogulof, “the facilitator for the course … did not comply with policies and procedures that govern the normal academic review and approval of proposed courses for the Decal program,” then why did the university reinstate it less than a week after its cancellationsuspension? {^^ this paragraph is a little unclear - lacks foundational info ^^}
As you will see below, there is a good reason to be concerned aboutfor concern for the future of Jews onin American campuses.
Facts and Details
Anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism at Berkeley date back to the 1990s, when “Berkeley’s predominantly left-wing student body and facultyadopted Palestine as their new political cause.” During the second Intifada it became far more overt and aggressive, and student testimonials began to stream into the media. Gradually, the university established a name for itself a name as a hotbed of anti-Semitic and anti-Israel activism.
As pro-Palestinian students became more aggressive in their conduct, including an incident that involved ramming a shopping cart into a Jewish female student who was peacefully expressing her support for Israel, legal procedures were taken against the institution. Although the university did not dispute the facts, the procedures did not amount to any ruling, and the anti-Israel and anti-Semitic atmosphere became increasingly apparent.
In 2014, Ami Horowitz, who maintains a video channel on YouTube, shot a two-part video clip at UC Berkeley. In the first part, Horowitz he waves an ISIS flag and shouts yells pro ISIS remarksclamors. In the second, he waves an Israeli flag and speaks in favor of the State of Israel. The results areis damning. The only “negative” comment he got while waving the black and white flag (while smoking a cigarette) was “You can’t smoke on campus, they’re gonna cite you.” But when Mr. Horowitz waved the Israeli flag, he was verbally assaulted attacked several times, while passersby hurled and curses and shouteds were hurled at him the entire time.
Berkeley Is Not Alone
True, you can edit videos to “tilt” the truth your way. Yet, The Jewish Voices on Campus collection of video testimonials, and the documentary, Crossing the Line 2: The New Face of Anti-Semitism on Campus, validate that anti-Semitism on US campuses is a widespread, deep-rooted problem. Though the testimonials are often disturbing to watch, it is only because of their obvious authenticity. The films will leave no doubt in your mind: US campuses are plagued with anti-Semitism.
Anti-Semitism does not just appear out of the blue. It buds when Jews become estranged from one another. When it surfaces, we instinctively unite. But when it calms, we lash out at each other and rush to bond with the nations.
And yet, the nations are continually excluding us. Whenever something goes wrong, they blame us for it. Even after 9/11, a large and clear inscription on the wall at UC Berkeley (where else?) said, “It's the Jews, stupid.” And if you look into our roots you will discover that we are truly different.
Why Are We Pariahs?
We, Jews, are a nation that was conceived from its inception for the purpose ofto bringing redemption to the world. Without fulfilling our vocation, our ancient sages tell us, the nations feel that there is no justification to our presence here on Earth. It may not be a conscious thought in the mind of every gentile, but the everlasting hatred toward us speaks volumes. Whenever anything goes awry, people mutter, “It's the Jews.” Because people cannot find the reason for their anger, they blame whatever plight they are facing at the moment on the Jews.
However, our only real fault is that we have abandoned our calling. We have forgotten what redemption means, and so we cannot give it to the nations. At the foot of Mt. Sinai we were told that if we did not unite “as one man with one heart,” then this would be our burial place. And once we united, we were instructed to be “a light unto nations.” We have been tasked with sharing thate unique bond we had created when we united at the foot of the mountain.
Some two millennia ago, we lost our bond and declined into unfounded hatred. At that moment we became unable to convey our special unity and caused the nations to feel that we are redundant, harm-doers, pariahs in their lands. With the nations’ growing egoism, and our inability to offer any cure, they cannot understand why we are here. We should be unequivocal about this: The nations do not want us out of Israel; they want us not to exist!
An Urgent Cure Required
As egoism and self-absorption spread, societies are falling apart the world over. The only solution to thisthe problem is to unite above our egos, and the only ones who are expected to show the way to do thisit are the Jews. But until we are able to fulfill our dutyAas long as we continue to refrain from it, the world will accuse us of causing wars. It makes no difference that we do nothing of the kind. What matters is that we are not bringing unity, and the absence of unity is causing wars throughout the globe.
The current wave of hatred will keep growing until we stop hating one another. This puts the solution to anti-Semitism on US campuses, and everywhere else, for that matter, squarely in our hands. If we unite, and cover our mutual dislike with friendship, we will reignite that special bond. By doing this, we will once again be “a light unto nations.”
Anti-Semitism is forcing us to unite. If we unite of our own volition there will be no need for anti-Semitism and it will fade away.
In a 2013 televised conversation I had with the late, Prof. Robert S Wistrich., then an internationally renowned researcher of Anti-Semitism at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, he said that as one who had been researching Jew-hatred his entire life, he believes that the reason for anti-Semitism has to do with the age-old mission of the Jewish people to be a light unto nations., and explained that this mission has to do with the inclusive commandment, “love your neighbor as yourself.”
The world is telling us that it is time to return to our roots. It is time to reunite, and reignite our mutual responsibility, and our love for one another. We need not love our neighbors as ourselves because we want to. We need to do it because the world requires that we show the way. Without our example they will remain in mutual hatred and will destroy each other. But before they do, they will destroy us. The world will not forgive us until we give it what it needs, and what it needs is our example of unity.
Conspiracy theories, UFOs, prophecies, religions, mysticism, sects... The web is filled with countless self-proclaimed ways of understanding the world or promising faith concepts for a better life in a next world. After reading and watching such content intensively for over two years, I was left with a simple question: what is the meaning of my life?
Did it have to do with conspiracy theories? That would have led me to investigate into political intrigues worldwide. Did it have to do with religion? That would have led me to follow certain precepts and immerse into a community of people who respect these precepts without question. UFOs? Well...
All things considered, i was left with no answer to the most important question: what is the meaning of my life? And I don't mean this as an escape to the everyday life: I love my profession, I'm a grounded person who enjoys friends and dinners and travelling and reading and working out to get rid of that belly and much more... But all that felt empty without any sense of purpose. To quote the story of "Alice in Wonderland", I was ready to " go down the rabbit hole".
And then a little over a year ago, I hit it.
Growing up as a Christian, I was mesmerized by the Old Testament, especially the Pentateuch - the first five books of the Bible - and the Creation, the story of Adam and Eve. Then I learned about the ultimate book of Creation: the Zohar.
I can't explain what happened after, but if you are interested in finding out, then the rabbit hole is calling you too and all I can do is show the door, you're the one who needs to enter...
I recently wrote a song specifically for a group of people, and for a specific reason. I wanted to express to my exalted "10" how they make me feel about the desire to connect with each and everyone of them. Because I have been conveying my feelings in song from a very early age, to me this form of communication is second nature . However, while music is universally received, the general consensus is that most people simply do not write songs to make a point, or to share a feeling.
All too often I am reminded of this and so I am taken aback by the accolades bestowed upon me when I provide my heart in song. What is this form of communication: this form of connection? My imagination returns to an age old mystery: What is music?
My dear friend Rav Michael Laitman has this to say about music:
Music is a language that can express the deepest inner feelings of a person. It can excite and elevate a person, change a mood and the direction of thought.
Music can transport us from one place to another, depending on its style. According to a few sounds or chords we already feel where it comes from: is this European, Indian, or South American music?
In the United States national styles of music from all over the world became mixed together, producing a kind of musical “salad” that has spread all over the world because it is suitable for most of humanity.
Music immediately arouses memories in a person and produces special feelings in him. Words penetrate into us through the mind, and we are compelled to activate a mechanism of comparison, memory. And music, in contrast, immediately takes the emotion out of memory and awakens it within us, whether we want it or not. It penetrates into a person without asking permission.
Music connects us with the surrounding conditions in which it is heard: with time, space, movement and events; all of this is immediately awakened in our memory together with the sounds that we hear. Music is the world and everything that fills it.
All of our senses, other than sight and hearing, are very meager, as if they were undeveloped. Even though the sense of smell has very great significance; it developed in us when we were still living in the trees. When we came down from the trees and became humans, we began to be involved with all kinds of work that isn’t typical of animals and we spoiled our sense of smell.
Our sense of taste was also spoiled because we are no longer animals. There was a time when according to smell and taste we could distinguish what nourishment was appropriate for us and what wasn’t. But today we are no longer able to do this. We create many food products with tastes and smells that attract us; however, in fact, they are poison for us.
Even the sense of touch has limited possibilities and confuses us too much. We have stopped living in an environment of natural simple things that are appropriate to our nature. We create so many artificial products and phenomena that confuse our sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste so that there is nothing true in them that we can trust.
But from the great variety of sounds that we hear, music impresses us to the greatest degree. Only the crying of a baby or a siren that immediately arouses us is stronger than music.
I have nothing to add to this description other than to say I feel the same way as does The Rav. And so I humbly submit the song in question in hopes that you may share in its message:
Man today
has reached the highest level of development in history of mankind. We can
simultaneously connect with anyone around the world with a click of a button at
any time of the day. We can travel, start a business, write a book, program a
new web application or buy almost anything we have ever imagined. (And yes we can launch a blog with a couple of friends!) So why is our
media filled with economic, social, political and natural threats?
According
to Dr. Michael Laitman, bio-cyberneticist and author of over 30 books on the wisdom
of Kabbalah, Man is now at the crossroads of the next step in human evolution. Kabbalah teaches that from our current egoistic condition, we must learn to
imitate nature by intentionally benefitting society as a whole with our talents.
According to the wisdom, there are four levels of existence: still, vegetative,
animate and speaking, each comprising these four levels within themselves. Man
is currently at the speaking level of the animate degree.
The Law of Nature is Bestowal
What
happens to a pen dropped off a table? The law of gravity immediately operates
and the pen falls to the ground. According to Kabbalah, the law of nature is
bestowal. Hence, our failure to adhere to this law of benefitting the
environment causes nature to gradually force us to comply to it. As long as we
fail to do so, we will remain in a state of imbalance with nature and our
crisis will only get worse.
This is why
Dr. Laitman shares the wisdom of Kabbalah through his books, conferences all
around the world and the kab.tv website. We are at a crucial
time in history. But wherever there is chaos, there is opportunity: what is
next for mankind?
