Are You Fulfilling the Desire that Will Give Your Life the Most Meaning?

Introducing the Pyramid of Your Desires

A pyramid of souls exists, based on the desire to receive. At the base of the pyramid are many souls with small, earthly desires, looking for a comfortable life in an animal-like manner: their focus is food, sex, and sleep. The next layer comprises fewer souls, those with the urge to acquire wealth. These are people who are willing to invest their entire lives in making money and who sacrifice themselves for the sake of being rich. Next are those who will do anything to control others, to govern and reach positions of power. An even greater desire, felt by even fewer souls, is for knowledge; these are scientists and academics, people who spend their lives engaged in discovering some- thing specific. They are interested in nothing but their all-important discovery. Located at the zenith of the pyramid is the strongest desire, developed by only a small number of souls, for the attainment of the spiritual world.

 

How to Enlarge the Importance of Your Best Desire

We all have this pyramid of desires within us, which we must turn upside-down so that the sheer weight of the top will compel us to aim for the purest desire, the infinite desire for truth. We must reject and discard all our earthly, egoistic desires and put every effort and energy into increasing the desire for spirituality. This is achieved through the proper way of studying.

When people truly wish to increase their longing for spirituality, then the light around them, the spiritual world hidden from them, starts to reflect back on them, making them long for it even more. At this stage, group study under a Kabbalist’s guidance is crucial. A major change in the souls descending today is that they have a definite desire to achieve spirituality. Even ordinary people are seeking something spiritual, something beyond our world.

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Finally, the Science behind Reincarnation

Reincarnation According to Kabbalah

In each generation over the past six thousand years, souls have descended that were here on previous occasions. None of us is a new soul; we have all accumulated experiences from previous lives in other incarnations.

Souls descend to earth in a special cyclical order. The number of souls is not infinite; they return again and again, progressing toward correction. The same souls are encased in a series of physical bodies that are more or less the same, but the types of souls that descend are different from one another. This is referred to nowadays as “reincarnation,” but Kabbalists use the term “development of generations.”

 

The Purpose of Reincarnation and Why Each Generation Is Unique

This intertwining, the connection of the soul and body, assists in the correction of the soul. The human being is referred to as soul, not body. The body itself can be replaced, just as organs can now be replaced. The body is useful only in that it serves as an encasement through which the soul can work. Each generation physically resembles the previous one, but they are different from one another, because each time the souls descend they are imbued with the added experience of their previous lives here. They arrive with renewed strength obtained while they were in heaven.

Thus, each generation possesses different desires and goals from the previous one. This leads to the specific development of each generation. Even a generation that does not reach the desire to know the true reality or a God-like recognition accomplishes the task by the suffering it endures. That is its way of making progress toward the true reality.

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Haazinu (Give Ear) Parsha – Weekly Torah Portion

Deuteronomy, 32:1-32:52
This Week’s Torah Portion | September 21 – September 27, 2014 – Elul 26, 5774 – Tishrei 3, 5775

In A Nutshell

The portion, Haazinu (Give Ear), deals with the entrance to the land of Israel. Moses begins with a song that serves as a reminder to the people when they abandon the work of the Creator in the future. The song praises the guidance of the Creator and His choice of the people of Israel, and presents the people of Israel as stiff-necked and one that has turned to idol worship.

Afterward there is an explanation of the punishment in the case of committing idolatry, and a statement that the Creator will not help Israel against their enemies in such a case. However, to the extent that Israel repents, the Creator will save them from all their enemies.

When Moses concludes reading his song, the Creator commands him to climb up Mount Nevo and look from there at the land of Israel. He tells Moses that he will die and will not be awarded entrance to the land of Israel.

 Commentary by Dr. Michael Laitman

The Torah contains all the secrets of the world. The Torah means instruction; it guides us on how we should conduct ourselves in order to advance. The Torah speaks of the whole of creation; it helps us cope with difficulties and shows us what to do.

The big question is why the Torah ends before the entrance to the land of Israel. In truth, the struggles, problems, the great dilemmas, and the difficulties of coping with all that awaits the people henceforth— especially in this portion,—are already in us.

The people has reached a state where it is ready to advance and enter the land of Israel, to cope with all the problems, and to rise above them. It is precisely through this war that the people acquires the land of Israel. The story speaks of our desires, our forces, which have become corrected through the light, through everything that we have done and went through in the desert in order to be ready to enter the land of Israel.

The song, Haazinu, praises the Creator, the force of bestowal. It stresses that we must always remember to interpret what is happening accurately, and extol the force of bestowal, the value of love of others, which is the great rule of the Torah, and for which we do all that we do. “Love your neighbor as yourself” is more just than a maxim; it is the purpose of each and every action, a rule that includes all our efforts. Continue reading “Haazinu (Give Ear) Parsha – Weekly Torah Portion”

Warning: Do You Recognize the Root Cause of Today’s Biggest Crises?

Look How Much Our World Is in Crisis Today

An overview of the state of humanity in our time yields a sullen picture, one that could aptly be named “a crisis.”1 It seems that in all areas of life—personal, familial, national, and international—we are faced with escalating situations to which there are no solutions in sight.

Depression is soaring, followed by an increasing escape to drugs and alcohol. The family unit is disintegrating; domestic violence, alienation, and divorce are perpetually increasing; social polarization widens; and corruption in the government has become daily news. War and terrorism have become globally commonplace; social decline, natural disasters—all those and more have become a daily reality to many.

Thus, uncertainty and insecurity increase. While past leaders could make long-term plans for humankind and determine their short-term actions accordingly, today they cannot outline clear policies for the continuation of our existence.

 

Are Today’s Enormous Crises Unsolvable?

In and of themselves, crises are not negative. Humanity has been in crises before; and every time they have produced more highly evolved states. A crisis in one field leads to the rising of new fields. But today the situation seems essentially different: collapse is happening in almost every field of life and almost simultaneously.

This escalating crisis is even more perplexing in view of the achievements of science and technology, which have provided us the means to make our lives much more comfortable and easier than ever before. It seems that time and space have shrunk and that the world is truly becoming a small village.

Theoretically, science should have provided us a sheltered world, one where we could live peacefully and safely without a care in the world. Many thinkers, supporting modernization, were certain that industrialization and progress would place humanity on the brink of a secure and bountiful era.

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What Kabbalah Is, Isn’t, and Why You Simply Can’t Live Without It

Why Kabbalah Was Hidden Until Now

For 2,000 years, the study of Kabbalah was forbidden to women and men under age forty, and there was a reason for this restriction. In fact, all the books of Kabbalah, including the Torah (the Pentateuch), were written only for our time, when everyone needs to practice the science of Kabbalah. What we should all do now is open the Kabbalah books and begin to learn how to attain the upper world.

 

What Kabbalah Is and Isn’t

Kabbalists have expressed their frustration at the fact that we are still not using the study of Kabbalah as a springboard for the attainment of the upper worlds, since that is the one key to the gate of spirituality, the knowledge and the understanding of the wisdom of the upper world, which means eternal life, happiness, wholeness, and bounty for all humankind

Kabbalah is a science with clear and concise laws that must be studied. It has no connection with charms and blessings and other things that are done in its name, originating in the time Kabbalah was concealed from people and ascribed magical forces. The books of Kabbalah clearly explain what steps we need to take to acquire that knowledge.

The special thing about genuine books of Kabbalah is that they are suitable for all and contain the connection between the soul of the person who is studying them and the upper worlds, from which that person’s soul originates. The books direct us to develop in our own unique way, according to our inner structure and the root of our souls. This is much like the way a person chooses a profession in our world— according to personal character and the inclination of his or her heart.

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