You are here: Kabbalah Library Home / Yehuda Leib HaLevi Ashlag (Baal HaSulam) / Shamati Articles / 9. What Are Three Things that Broaden One’s Mind in the Work / 9. "What are Three Things that Broaden One’s Mind in the Work" – lessons / "What are Three Things that Broaden One’s Mind in the Work" – Lesson on November 21, 2007

Shamati, Article #9

[From minute 21:23]

What do we accomplish through education? All of education is about having a second nature. A person is accustomed to all kinds of behavioral habits in which he feels good, but he really doesn’t feel good. He would like to blow his nose as children do but, no, he was taught to do it in a certain manner.

There are many things that one is not allowed to do even when no one else is looking, e.g. how one uses the toilet and the shower, in sleeping, and in all kinds of other ways. One is taught these ways and is used to them. This also pertains to one’s body. There are many things that come from habits; it is something one can’t move away from. God forbid if something should happen as happened to me: I broke a leg and then, after an operation, I needed to learn to move differently and it was very difficult. We just need to pay attention to these little things.

All this is second nature. One was taught these things. His mother placed him in a certain position and he got used to it. We haven’t even begun talking about foods or behaviors.

This also has to do with mentality. What is mentality? Take a child and he will develop depending on where you put him. This will be his second nature. It will be very hard for him to change, very hard. It will remain in him. He will have to acquire different ways of covering it up.

Besides the basic Reshimot (reminiscences), and I would say that are almost without description, the rest of who we are, is from our second nature, from education. When one has to educate himself within the spiritual nature, one enters a new education that is very, very different from what one had learned before. From now on, one has to educate himself that bestowal is good.

One has learned from books and other places that this is the way one sits, the way one eats, the way one sleeps, that this behavior is nice or not nice, and that this behavior is usual or unusual. When one watches a movie, one takes behavioral codes from it; one learns from it. The whole life of an ordinary person in our world is about scenes that he saw from some kind of movie or from some other place. Thus he learns to behave, and thus he does behave. He has nothing from himself. He sees a certain behavior and it is satisfactory to him for all kinds of reasons. He accepts it (this happens subconsciously) and then he behaves in this way.

What does Baal HaSulam say? “I don’t sit because that’s the way I want to sit, or lie that way or eat that way because I want to, but society forces me.” That’s it. Now that one has begun to educate himself in spirituality, he must learn very thoroughly how that happens.

We also need to educate the new generation. Those from the younger generation who have a point in the heart go straight to education through Kabbalah. Those children of the new generation even without a point in the heart already have an approach to life that is completely different than the approach of the last generation and of the two generations before them. It is a completely different approach.

Therefore, all of the teaching programs that we have from the Ministry of Education (and all the materials in general that they want us to use) don’t work with the new generation because they have a completely different approach to life. They see things differently; they approach life differently. They have a completely different perspective. As I have said before, they are like aliens. This is something unfamiliar in our world. Educators still don’t feel this. Even I am hesitant to go into details but it looks completely different.

The new generation, once they have grown through suffering—or maybe only the Kabbalists—will be able to find a suitable method of education for themselves. This will be thanks to Kabbalists since they will never understand their nature by themselves. However, it will be very very, difficult. The generation gap is a catastrophe. In another five years when they reach the age of twenty or so, life will be very different.

Habits will become second nature with them also. That is how it will be. The general Kli is already different and thus it will acquire different forms of behavior. It already demands different forms of behavior.

Question: How can I get to a situation where I envy a friend who bestows? I have no idea what that is.I don’t know if he bestows or not.

If one looks at the friends and sees the extent to which they give of their time and strength, intentions and concentration of thought, not wasting the moment, and how they all are involved in running after the goal, using as many means as they can discover to the maximum efficiency, then one is envious of them because he is not like that. He allows himself to rest, he has problems—as if they don’t—etc. So, I am envious. It isn’t clear that I am envious?

This is the way each person should see the others. One sees the others as the great ones of the generation. Isn’t it envy that helps one to be somewhat like them? To the extent that one describes them as the great ones of the generation, one will try to be in some way like them. One can’t calm down. How can one be calm if they are all like that? Envy eats away at a person more than shame. Shame closes him and envy opens him.

Question: I understand about educating in order to bestow in actions but we are saying that bestowal in an inner attitude. How is it possible to educate a person? For example, with friends it is clear but how can you educate a class of children to relate to each other in bestowal? How is this possible?

I can’t at this moment give general solutions on how to take a class and begin to work with them in this manner but I think that we all see examples of bad education. If one or more children in a class become leaders, they can pull the entire class in their direction. This same action can be done in the opposite direction. Take a few children aside and quietly ask them what they want such as a bicycle at the end of the year, a trip abroad, or money. Tell them they will receive it if they do a certain kind of work in their class. These two or three will be the leaders and, quietly, they will pull the whole class in this or that direction.

You will see how they can do this. “With payment,” as Baal Ha Sulam says, “you hire people to work for you.” This is an example. What’s so bad about it?

You can use one thousand and one tricks. I don’t know, I am not an educator; but use human nature and all the many currents that are within the group which is the class, i.e.,, the leaders, the followers, the relationships between girls and boys, the relationships between beauty and strength, all of these. Play with the ego. Of course, don’t use an abstract method but use one that you can “buy” them with. Again, slowly they will discover that there are things that suit their nature and afterwards they will understand that there is great profit in it. Begin to give out medals or some kind of special prizes. Actually do this. Everyone should take it seriously otherwise they won’t get anything out of it.

One can play with the desire to enjoy very directly; one can manipulate it. One can do just about anything with another person, anything he needs. One only needs to know to approach the ego, not through subjugation, punishment, or detentions, but especially to navigate them toward reward, i.e., to Lo Lishma (not for Her sake). It’s possible. All in all, a person is looking for pleasures, for pride, passion, or respect. That’s what he is drawn to in society. Except for physical passions, there is money, honor and knowledge; so use them.

Question: What is the difference is between altruistic organizations that teach to bestow and our concept in Kabbalah of “bestowal.” How are these expressions different?

What is the difference with us? They won’t be learning about all kinds of things that they now learn in school but half (or most) of the time they will be studying about the world they live in. This will be their principle study: what are the systems in a person’s body and in nature, how the systems work in the spiritual nature, and what are the relationships between people and between souls. All these things are connected and directed to do one thing only: to show a person, “Look and see what kind of world you are in. Look around you. Look at how nature works, what it punishes you for, and what you should be rewarded for. Come see how to get along.”

This is “teaching him the wisdom of life.” The majority of the time will be involved in this, including games, and all kinds of teaching aids like movies, trips, etc. All of this is to place the person in the correct position, in his opposite nature. Let’s go to a prison or to a hospital. Let’s lock him up in a room for a whole day. What will he think about? What will he relate to, this or that? This teaches him; teaches him with understanding, with love, with explanations, God forbid not with subjugation, but to give him impressions.

All in all, habit becomes second nature. We have to show him and instill into him all kinds of examples and standards. I mentioned before that one learns from movies. He sees how a hero behaves so he wants to behave like that also. Show him all types of behavior patterns. However, he should test them on himself to determine if they suit him or not. A person thus is educated through “formative learning.” He learns this way and is impressed by it. Then, it has to come together with an explanation, examination, clarification, and scrutiny of things. This is “education.”

Today, we just fill his head with all kinds of information or data that have no importance. He just doesn’t care about it; that’s it. The more his ego grows, the more he doesn’t want this kind of education. He doesn’t see any connection between what he receives in school and what he feels within him that he would want. He doesn’t care about history or geography. He doesn’t get anything from it. He doesn’t want a profession either. He doesn’t see that it gives anyone any freedom or pleasure. It’s like that joke about the Mexican laying under a tree. He is able sit under a tree without acquiring any education or anything. Does he have to work for thirty years in order to sit under a tree? He can do that now.

There is a very big problem in general with our educational system because it is not structured to build a person. It was structured to turn a person into some kind of screw in the general machine as we developed into a technocratic society; we would need a worker for this and an expert for that, and so on, doctors and engineers. That is the only thing our educational system is able to do for a person; other than that, nothing.

We have never succeeded in anything pertaining to the human part. Either people were wild like those who lived in Europe close to 300 years ago or they lived in trees about 500 years ago. It was terrible then except for some nobility who, according to their internality, were also barbaric.

All the education that was adopted in Europe and also came to Israel is not to edify the “person” but to build some kind of expert in some profession that we need. That is, we don’t need a person but we need someone knowledgeable in medicine, in vehicles, or in something. We don’t relate to who a person is, what he is, what his attitude to life is, to society, nothing. That is not important. “I pay you money and you do the work.” That’s it. This is what we asked for from schools, elementary schools, high schools, or universities, only this.

Now we have to end this because, whether we want it to or not, it is ending by itself. The young generation is not willing to accept it. For them, this kind of education no longer exists. They don’t want it. At best, they want some simple and easy profession so they can support themselves. Everything else is I for me. That’s it. There is a qualitative transition here between the generations. I am not yet ready to express it, but it will come.

Question: The education you are explaining now is very personal education including personal examples and personal relationships.

No, it doesn’t have to be personal. This is not like the special education given for the behaviors of retarded or special-needs children. It can be for everyone together. Its direction has to be clear. It is aimed toward edifying the individual and not toward how much he knows (such as professions, etc). If one is aiming toward a person, then one grades them differently, not according to how much he grasps from what you explain to him but according to the extent that he understands what is being impressed on him (i.e., the whole process of internal clarification) how much the society influences him, and how he affects society.

There are thousands of examples of how they themselves can reach all kinds of goals without any difficulty if they know how to direct society as a ship that will bring them to any goal they desire. Teach each and every one of them how to use the group. It is like sailing; it’s an art. In the end, they will get there but only through this kind of participation. We’ll see. I am not involved in all these problems but if we were connected to people who discuss it, who deal with this, are within it, as is necessary as this is their work, then we would be integrated in their questions, needs, problems and we could explain it a little better.

As it is now, I have questions concerning Lo Lishma to Lishma (for Her sake) and others like those. So I need to explain those. We would be closer to the public, to society if we could explain the solution to education in a clear way. I think they would listen because this is a problem that bothers everyone since everyone is either a father or a mother and they worry about it. If we could explain it clearly and provide a good solution, they would accept it.

Question: They used to display three frames a second to subconsciously affect people in the movie theatre. There was a story about that. It is possible to convince people that bestowal is good, to relinquish the ego, by those kinds of methods, like hypnosis.

No, by doing that one is turning a person into an animal. You are correct in that he would receive all the impressions and R eshimot (Reminiscences) and they would become second nature. Let’s say you could enter his memory with all kinds of cables and correct him there, weld in all kinds of cells of requests for all kinds of things. However, you don’t edify a person by doing that. It is against nature and thus it will not take place.

Also, humanity doesn’t agree with this, doesn’t accept it, and doesn’t do it. Although they do participate in all kinds of similar techniques in elections and in all kinds of manipulations on the public, but these things are very limited. They work according to the rules of the masses and are not really aimed toward a person’s subconscious. They don’t last. Nature itself, the Creator, is the obstructer here and doesn’t let this exist.

It is forbidden for us to use these things. By doing that, it would be as if we wanted to take a cruel correction method to this world where we controlled a person instead of using the method of the wisdom of Kabbalah and the system of correction. The wisdom of Kabbalah is to bring a person to awareness and consciousness so that by himself, by his power, by his decision, by free choice, he comes to resemble the Creator.

You want to make a robot of him, a machine that does what you want it to do. This is the opposite of development. One can read about it in many new age books. This will never take place because the general rule of development is opposed to it. It won’t work. No one will succeed with it, no one.

Question: Parents want only good for their children. They want them to learn some profession, and then earn well. How can we explain to them that Kabbalah also gives them that, that it isn’t just philosophy that is learned by a method?

This is exactly our work: to reach a situation where we can explain to everyone what the wisdom of Kabbalah is and to what extent its solution is a general one, a successful solution, the only solution, a natural and super-natural solution that comes to us by knowing the collective nature.

Actually, we are bringing people the world’s laws, the perfect, absolute laws of the eternal world. Whether you like it or not, that is what influences us and we are subject to and under the influence of these laws. So, it is worthwhile for us to learn them and realize them. To the extent that we can explain this to everyone, we will be successful— both we and they.

Now, we should discuss how we can formulate the message and to bring it to the nation quickly through all our means, using all kinds of communication services, to present it to the nation, and continue this journey until we succeed, until Gmar Tikkun (the end of correction). There is nothing else except education. All of Kabbalah is education, to educate a person as to how to correct himself.

Question: So with the people of the future, in relation to their children, will there be punishment? Are you saying that punishment is not a correction?

There is punishment, but punishment should be such that a person understands that this is the punishment that comes from nature against his behavior because it is not in balance with nature. It is not that he is “beaten” because “someone” feels like it although this is how it appears to him. So he runs away from the person, and hates him and the society that pressures him. Thus, he runs away from them. He needs to be shown that the beatings don’t come from society—especially not from society—but they come from nature, perhaps through society, but from nature. This is because he is not in balance with nature. This is actually the ideal situation.

It is just like when one stands across from a fire or on the edge of a cliff; he knows that he shouldn’t be doing it. Why? It’s because that is the law. There is nothing to ask. He can do all kinds of things but the law is clearly in front of him. If he jumps off the cliff or goes into the fire, that’s it, his life is finished. This is the way a person should see it. He should see how things are bad for him because he went against the law of nature.

Show him, if he does it without being aware of it, that there are laws of nature that operate on him according to his development. One sees with small children how they are safeguarded by nature from harm. There are also laws of nature that don’t take into account whether a person understands what is done with him or not.

So, we must analyze it and explain it to a person. Basically, we are teaching him to get to know the world he exists in. Slowly through this awareness, he discovers not this world but Ein Sof (Infinity), the Creator. This is what we should show him. In the meantime, it seems that he is fulfilling the laws of blind, inanimate nature. He progresses to the vegetative, animal, and speaking. Then he comes to a degree where he sees that all of nature is one thought, one desire, love, one approach, one attitude towards him. That’s it. It’s a gradual thing.

Question: Is there such a thing as beating children, prison, or those kinds of things?

One can impose beatings, imprisonment, and all those things on a person. Baal HaSulam talks about it in the Last Generation but on the condition that it comes from the corrected society; he sees this as the society and there is no other society. A person can escape it and enter another society but he will know that in that society there is good in certain things and not good in other things. This is according to a person’s ego. Then he needs to know that those are the laws. There are absolute laws that are not just about him, but apply to everyone in the entire society. There are prizes and rewards if you keep these rules.

This is education from the perspective of society. A person has to understand that education comes from society because it wants to keep the general law of nature and not because some maniac in charge of a company demands whatever he wants for his honor or for his pocket. There should be broad explanations about this and they should be as convincing as possible. Baal HaSulam wrote in the Last Generation that one constantly has to convince them about this, bring them proof that it is possible, and that there’s no other choice; otherwise there’ll be war. He writes this with only a few words but it describes the discernments for practical explanation.

Question: It is not clear to me if education is against nature or if education is something that evolves.

Education is to show a person what nature is. It’s very simple. That is education. For a child who doesn’t know what nature is, one opens his eyes a little and explains it to him. One not only explains to him but provides him with tools so that, later on, he will be able to get an explanation by himself. It is called “wisdom” when he deduces something, when he learns from experience how to connect things, to analyze things, theorize, and to receive from others. One not only teaches him the data but also how to acquire and process it. Basically, one is teaching him that he is within nature or Elokim (God). That’s the entire education.

Question: There are already subjects about nature in today’s educational system such as the structure of the world, how it’s built, and its material. In the earlier grades, there are already subjects about nature.

No, those subjects are not taught in the correct way at all. In all these subjects, the causes and effects of nature are not taught. There are no principles as to why it exists, how it influences a person to advance him to something, why it was created in that way specifically, nor that it is integrated with all the other parts of nature—with all other levels of nature, inanimate, vegetative, animal, it doesn’t matter what. We don’t teach that.

Those subjects are not taught as they relate to the person. What does he benefit from it? Each subject must answer the questions, “What is the sense of my life,” “Why do I need it,” and “Why is it built that way in respect to me.” The entire world is built in respect to us. If one knows that it is built for him to learn something from it, to use something from it for his benefit, and that, without it, he won’t achieve anything good, then it would be completely different.

In an egoistic way, it has to be shown that the world was created for the person. So, what does it matter if he knows about insects and all kind of other things in the world such as historical or geological periods or even mathematics if he doesn’t need it in the supermarket when he goes to buy something. Why does he need more than that? He needs it for living. That’s it. He has to be shown what he needs for living. Then one will see that 99% of what is taught in schools is not needed; thus they do not want to learn. All in all, a person’s ego is present and when he goes to school, according to the sense of criticism that exists today in the new generation, he sees that those things are artificial. There is no connection between those things and what he thought he would be given.

Internally he says, “Why am I here? Now they will say something interesting for my ego, my desire to receive, something worthwhile.” However, they talk about things that have nothing interesting about them. So until his ego develops, he just drags himself along in 1st, 2nd, or 3rd grade. But later, he is not able to do that.

Besides that, the pace of the education, the information, just doesn’t attract him. His “motor” works hyperactively. What is there to talk about at all? Some teacher comes into the classroom who doesn’t understand anything about life and she then begins to preach to him. What can she explain to him? What does she know herself except what she learned in some course? She is not directed to the child at all. They are not speaking on the same wave length. We don’t understand that this generation is special. They don’t receive on the same frequency as the previous generation. Their receiver is different.

Question: Does a child of today needs knowledge, just pure knowledge, without explaining the goal?

No. We learn that one educates according to the child’s ways. Do we know his ways? Do we know his soul, the passions of his generation? No, we don’t know. So, it is not education. Education is according to his ways.

What do we choose today? We decide that the child needs to know this subject and not that one. Do they need to know history? Or geography? For what? One can explain all of geography to him with a few good movies. He’ll learn it with interest. He is taught all kinds of other things.

I studied in school for ten years in those days; now it is twelve. Geography was taught from the fourth grade on. We studied it for six years. Once a week, we had a geography lesson. Look at how many hours we spent. I can’t say that nothing of what I studied remains but …

Today’s education is not according to human nature and that is the main problem. The essence of the problem is that the educators come from the previous generation and they want to educate the younger generation. It is not suitable. So, one can ask, “How is it in nature?” The parents are the ones who need to teach the younger generation by putting themselves in their place. It is written, “Educate the young according to their ways.” Educate them not according to your ways, but according to theirs. Otherwise, one can’t be an educator. It is a demanding requirement.

Question: One of the biggest obstacles in education is the doubt or lack of confidence in ability, and not ability itself.

In whom, in the teacher or the child?

Question (cont'd): The child.

I would have thought the teacher because the teachers of today don’t know how to control. They want to control and connect to the children but they can’t. So, they, too, feel self-conscious. With the children, it is something different. Lack of confidence for a teacher and a child stems from the lack of the correct approach.

Just as we are sitting here today, we are also sitting in a class, right? Here, we have children as well; it doesn’t matter that they are forty years old. We are studying. We are studying together, solving problems, and trying to learn what we are told about the rules of the world, what the Kabbalists tell us. We are trying to deduce some kind of correct education, behavior, and clearer goals. It’s for us and of course, it is not ready to present to children, but that is what we need to do.

We can see that learning is, first of all, interactive. It has to be consistent with the Friends’ Meetings and dissemination. The students have to understand what they are doing. It is similar to what we are doing here. They need to know that they are going to change themselves and the world. That is what the younger generation should know and be proud that they will have a new world; they are becoming the owners of the world. They need to be given a goal. The goal is not to acquire a profession so that they will earn well later and be able to go on vacations, have a refrigerator, a car, a home...

This means that both the teachers and the children have to have the same goal. The teacher cannot be detached from the development of the child. The teacher is invested in the same development and wants the same goal. He shows the child just a little of what he has learned from his own experience of walking on the same path. The whole world is walking on this same path. So now, the whole of humanity are like creatures that are headed toward a grand goal together. Just like what was once taught in the jungle, the children are taught what is right and wrong, what they should or shouldn’t do, and what’s dangerous or not. That’s how we teach them about nature and how to get along with it in order to achieve their goals.

In this, the children and the parents are together as one. They are one soul together and it doesn’t matter if it’s the previous generation or the present one. They are still together in this world. It gives them strength and confidence that they are going together and everyone is equal to everyone else. It is very, very important.

We use it when we play with children. We want to explain to them that we are together with them, playing with them, and equal to them. It is the same here. One is playing with life with them, with the whole of humanity. So, the approach of children toward parents, educators, and everyone else immediately will become different. They will become friends. They will be mutually connected, together with one goal, in one system. One makes them become active partners who are equal to others. One may ask if that is confidence. It is definitely confidence. Indeed, they receive pride.

Question: I heard you say that all subjects should answer the question of ‘what am I living for’, and that the child should feel that each lesson answers this question. Perhaps you can describe for me a futuristic picture of how a child will begin a math lesson in the corrected, future society, and the lesson answers his question of what he is living for?

I do not like fantasies like that. 90% of human activities are not necessary. Imagine if all the people would treat each other favorably; think then of how all the systems would operate between us. We need to sit down and try to talk about to what extent the systems would be different.

I am not talking about the police, army, crooks, and robbers. All these things would disappear. I am talking about provision, supply, and how people’s attitudes toward professions will change. A profession will be only in relation to how it benefits society.

I am not talking about the 99% of things that we consume, that we have no use for, and, to the contrary, do us damage. Yesterday, I saw this in the supermarket I was in. It is terrible what is happening. From this, a person begins to change. What can you say?

You mention math. Math is not a profession, not a field. It is a language. It is not a science. Thus, it is difficult to talk about it. One uses it according to what he needs in life. People begin to study the world, but not through the sciences of today since the sciences of today are also in this crisis.

We can continue developing more systems but they won’t give us any good or happiness; so we will discontinue them. We don’t need them. Why should one deal with things that give him endless knowledge but won’t benefit him? Things that bring him benefit according to his egoism are worthwhile for him.

And so it seems that all the sciences and knowledge, all these things, basically will be incorporated into very condensed activities in corporeality. This will be in order to definitely give each one the essential way of life for him and he won’t want more. In this way, he would be provided for.

Earth, as Baal HaSulam tells us, is willing to give everyone an abundance of all the essential things. What is “essential abundance?” This means that everyone will feel that they don’t need anything. They will ask, “Why are you giving this to me?” All the vocations will pertain to the internality of a person. What kind of math does one need for the internality of a person? The internality of a person is their internal task. It is the revelation of Godliness of the creature in the Olam ha Zeh (This World). That is the only task to be done other than for necessities and everyone will be involved in it.

What does he mean by ‘everyone’? One can see how the pyramid is ideally built for the whole world. There are those that can’t deal in an internal way in the search for the revelation of Godliness to others—i.e., the lower part of the pyramid, those who don’t have those tendencies. According to their tendencies, they will be involved specifically in bringing necessities to the world in a corporeal way. Those who have tendencies toward spiritual matters will be involved more in spirituality. It will work out naturally in such a way that each one will be exactly in his place and each one will do exactly the things that the world needs. The pyramid is thus organized.

We are organized according to our soul, according to its tendencies, and the connections between us. If we are aimed toward the goal with all our strengths, tendencies, abilities, and the external conditions needed to provide for ourselves—i.e., the corporeal necessities, and the spiritual ones, the revelation of Godliness to the creatures in Olam ha Zeh, then we would all be arranged beautifully in such a way that no one will take another’s place. In a perfect way, one will be positioned in his place of work: partly spiritual and partly corporeal, entirely spiritual, or entirely corporeal. He will want it and feel that it fits him perfectly.

Question: A moment ago, you said that the child should be an active partner in the studies. Do you mean a real partner in the school institutions, like in managing and things like that?

No. I am certainly not talking about that. Maybe a modern approach could be distorted like that. In general, democracy ruined things in life. What is democracy? One takes some person from the street and does a survey; and so for him that person becomes an example. Maybe this works well in order to sell something but, to educate someone, one needs someone who can see, someone with eyes in his head, not a child or a man off the street.

I am talking about a mutual connection between the teacher and the student who both are within a process for the same reason, the same goal. The only difference is that one is grown-up and the other is a child. The grown-up takes the child by the hand and, knowingly, leads him to the same goal. Even though both of them have the same goal, both are in the process of development.

This is not what we do in schools today. The teacher gets a diploma and he comes and preaches everything he has learned to the students. He doesn’t care if they need it or not. He teaches what the education department has decided that the teachers should give to the students in hours.

However, here we are talking about the students’ development, what they are able to attain, what material they need, and how to process it correctly. This is along with the games in society, learning what a human being is, and how one can discover the Creator in a small or large society.

This is through games; it is all a game. Everything that is unknown to us, yet we approach it, is called “a game.” The participation between the teachers and students is complete interaction.

The upbringing in which a child is born is similar to that in the jungle. People who were there have seen how the monkeys take their young and begin to show them this and that, what is permitted, and what is forbidden. The monkeys also give slaps. It's like punishment but it is not really punishment; it's just to draw attention. Thus the young monkeys understand naturally why it is this way or that way.

If one teaches children what they need for this life cycle, of course it is important to them. Why is it so obvious? It is because their souls need it. Today, the souls are beginning already to ask meaningful questions. What are educators bringing them, math and geography? What do they need that for?

Question (cont'd): The question is how does one actually know what children want? As you say, let’s suppose that there is a camp for Chanukah. Would you ask the children what activities they want?

Of course not. I explained that one doesn’t need to ask them because they don’t understand. Do I ask you what you need when you come here to study? No. We have a program; we have articles—articles about the society, the structure of reality, the internal development of a person, and the structure of the worlds. We study it in various ways, more or less in the way I received it from my teacher. Of course, there is a big difference because today we approach implementation more and more.

A student doesn’t have to know what he should receive. After all, he receives knowledge, examples, and exercises that should raise him to the next degree. He doesn’t know what the next degree is. Whoever is on the next degree can lower down to him all the means of how to ascend.

I used to live in Rehovot until 1980 and I know that within the Weizmann Institute there was a special department that used to develop games. Very clever people sat there. There were all kinds of shapes and colors, and so on. In addition to their imagination, they had an understanding of reality according to their age, i.e., this is the understanding for a 3 or 4 year old. I am not saying that they were 100% right in what they did, but we agree that the game is a serious issue and through it a person grows. It edifies a person.

In this, we are talking about mechanical games that enable a child to be more clever in something and understand. But here, with us, we are speaking about inner development. One needs to give a child tools so that through them he will grow as a human being, as similar to the Creator. This means to quickly reveal the point in the heart so that it surfaces, begin to work with it, and develop the vessels. We don’t have examples of that in our world. These are the things one needs to give a child.

This is an education for something completely different. One has to help him find that point and develop it. It has nothing to do with externality. This is “education of the internality of a person” and one gives him the tools for this. It is not considered part of the numbers and the quantity of information that he receives. It is actually the development of a person, not the filling of brain cells. It is the ability to allow him to be creative.

Question: How we will qualify teachers for this?

You are the teachers. Your qualification is your schooling. What do you think? What other teachers—those from the Ministry of Education? They should retire early. They have no other place. Who has failed? Is the failure not theirs?

Question (cont'd): Let’s say we have 7 billion children.

Internet, internet... I don’t have an answer; there is no answer. I don’t know when and how it will come about or what form it will take. However, I think that, in any case, it will be possible within one generation.

Both the teachers and the children will need to sit and learn. As usual, the younger generation will demand and force the previous generation to change themselves. Through the pressure of the children, the parents will have to change.

I don’t know what form the new education will take, if it will be the whole world, or if it will be needed immediately. It seems to me that we can publicize this information, this approach in the next few years and develop it as fast as possible. I also am not sure that this approach to education will be like the schools of today. I think it will be different; I don’t know. What we are used to is very, very artificial even though it is accepted throughout the entire world. This is the way humanity established its educational framework. It’s possible that it will be different.

I think that, from the beginning, children will be grouped and not put into classes. Education will be in small societies each called “a group” and education will be group education. This will give the young person practical understanding, in games, in everything, as to what bonding among bodies means and how it causes unity among souls. It seems that it won’t be school classes, but groups. It is still too early to talk about it.

Question: Isn’t the practical advice of the wisdom of Kabbalah about the problems of today— violence in schools, the violent child, the hyperactive child— is simply not to pay attention to these problems and to proceed to the development of tools for the spirituality of a person?

You are correct. Hyperactivity, violence and all these things… As soon as we begin to relate not to this education and how to seemingly correct something there and change it, but if we approach a general reform for all of education, then I think that these things will correct themselves.

This is because one begins to relate to the person and not to whether the person will interfere with your filling him with math. One will begin to relate to the person and accordingly begin to give him tools.

I don’t know but it seems to me that it all depends on their social organization. The urgency that is within them, the burning fire, the hyperactivity, is the great desire to receive that the current education is not able to give them and fills them with things they can’t stand. For example, I have a very nervous character and lack patience. If someone begins to explain things to me that I don’t want to hear, I immediately cut him off, shout, and throw him out of the room. That is the behavior of a hyperactive person. I can’t stand it. It is not according to my pace and it doesn’t interest me. I have prepared different vessels.

The child doesn’t understand what that means, but that is the whole matter. If one begins to give him what the souls of today want to receive, I am almost sure that all the issues of hyperactivity will disappear. Stop filling him with all those subjects he will never use, those that come traditionally from previous generations. It was that way and how could it not be so. What does he need to study today, for living—nice literature? He should forget everything they taught him. Educators teach him about the method and the fulfillments that were good for the exile, Galut of spirituality, for the development of egoism. This was fine then, up until today’s humanity.

As of today, in all places, e.g. in Mexico and America, everyone is talking about the hyperactivity of children. It is a world-wide problem. It’s not that the children here in Israel are especially disturbed; it is the same everywhere. This is a generation that asks for a different kind of fulfillment.

We just call them hyperactive. It is not ‘hype;’ they are just ‘active.’ They are active in accordance with their current internal demands. If one cannot fulfill them, just leave them alone. Let someone who can deal with it take over. The filling that educators want to give them is not suitable for their vessels. Of course, the children are bursting. Later, they go to drugs, to terrorism, or violence in schools, etc. It all comes from one reason: no one is giving them any means to arrange their inner world, nor is anyone fulfilling them with anything. No one gives them anything.

Therefore, they behave like crazy people, not knowing what to do, and, from this, they either go to drugs or to violence. Only the stupid, undeveloped ones remain the “good” children. They present themselves in a nice way and one says, “Look and see what a good boy.” What’s good about it?

Question: If we collect all the violent and hyperactive children in one class and begin to teach them the wisdom of Kabbalah, will they then sit there quietly and listen?

One has to understand that we are dealing with the desire to receive that developed in our generation into certain fulfillments. If one gives a child certain fulfillment according to his nature, he will be satisfied, relaxed, nice, and correctly developed; one won’t have any problems with him. That’s all. Educate the youth according to his way. We are not talking about 2000 years ago. We are talking about us—we who want to be human beings—and, according to our demands, we have arrived at that. So, one needs to give a child the right development in order to develop the human being in him.

This is the first time that this crisis has appeared in education. The younger generation is demanding that they be developed into human beings. Previously, people were just a screw in the machine according to what was needed, e.g. a shoemaker, a tailor, a builder, an engineer, an electrician. They were made into something and each one was asked to do his job. What educators made were production workers. It doesn’t matter if the worker is a lawyer or whatever; he is a production worker. He has to operate in society and produce something. That is all. That was the education.

Now for the first time, we feel it in the younger generation, even though we don’t really understand it, and there are already well-written studies concerning it that show the deficiency for the development of the human being within them. There are some that I have seen. There’s talk about it.

Question: If I leave my impressions from the explanation behind in this room and I go to the class that I teach once a week, I get to the class, and it makes no sense to mention anything there. The distance between them and the question ‘what is the meaning of life’ is so wide that it is not logical for a person to grasp an explanation such as ours. Could the child ask, “What is the meaning of life?” One looks at the child and says the most he could understand is football and then only maybe. This is what I want to understand. What does it mean that he asks himself what the meaning of life is?

He has a blockage from what the world offers him. Indeed, he is more egoistic than the previous generation. He has a blockage from his being filled with what the whole world offers him because this is not fulfillment for him. Thus, he is left with “football,” as you say. You are judging him because of that football.

For example, if you take a look at me, you could say, “Rav is on his own trip in life, and except for that he doesn’t know anything else in life. He doesn’t come out of his room. He is kind of crazy, a weirdo. Where is the enjoyment of life? Why doesn’t he travel? Why doesn’t he learn things?” When I go to visit my mother, she says to me, “You aren’t doing this, or doing that. You’re only teaching? That’s it? What’s wrong with you? Look at your brother…”

This is the way one sees today’s children. From all that one suggests to them, they only accept football. It’s not that they don’t want more, but no one suggests the things that suit them. They have one thousand inlets besides football but no one approaches them. What does anyone suggest to them? They don’t want to study this nor that; it is true. They don’t want these but there are many other things for them besides football. Their ego is bigger than that. Let’s say that you don’t have an approach to this; it seems to you that all the openings are blocked. Well, it is not true. You aren’t able to. So, don’t blame them.

Question (cont'd): A person who comes here is a person who asks, “What is the meaning of my life,” and that is more or less clear to him for the short period when he has that question.

We are not talking about those who have this “point.” We are talking about the children that do not yet have that question but the general desire to receive is ready for this. Then, this question is easy to pull out of there. The general desire is called “ lev” (heart), “point in the heart.” The desire is a little below the surface but to pull it up is very easy in regards to children especially.

Question: I am breaking the rule and I would like to talk about myself. What is happening out there is that the generation of today is a generation looking for attention and they want to be related to. I have experience with a hyperactive class. They are all savages today so if you don’t want them to break the chairs and throw you around in class… I tried it. I passed out newspapers. We talked about it. It works. That’s the only thing that can calm them down.

They gave you permission?

Question (cont'd): I didn’t ask anybody. I was in such a predicament that if I didn’t do this, my career would have been over. Only this can calm them down. It’s possible to talk with them and, as you say, they have many openings besides football. One simply has to find the approach.

That’s it. Yes, next question.

Question: I love mathematics and I want to understand what you are saying. People build roads, buildings, planes, and cars. Won’t they still build these things? In order to build these things, one has to study.

Of course, there will be those that want to do this. If they want to do this and do this with the intention to bestow, then there won’t be any problem. They should do it. We are not saying that a person has to limit himself.

Again, I will repeat. We are in a situation like a pyramid. In 99% of the pyramid are those who don’t see themselves as spiritual, as having ideals, thinking of evolution, delving into the whys, or thinking about the thought of creation. There is nothing like this for them. They want action. They want to have something to do.

It’s the same with us. Detach yourselves from dissemination and all kinds of other things and start dealing only with the tip of the pyramid. This is only for a very few. Thus they can build roads, etc. and will succeed and will reach Gmar Tikkun.

Let’s continue and try to ask serious questions. Over there is another, a music teacher.

Question: “Educate the child according to his ways.” This is actually Kabbalah in stages. So, there will be those who learn it in advanced form and those who will learn it in a simpler form. Also, math will remain and physics.

Of course.

Question (cont'd): It’s only that everything will be included in Kabbalah in a certain dose.

There is also Kabbalah within the pyramid.

Question: I want to ask about the ‘openings.’ My son studies in a private school for science in Jerusalem. We sent him there. It costs a lot of money. They learn all kinds of things— philosophy, and even more things than we have spoken about here. So, it is possible to reach the children through the inlets.

“Educate the child according to his ways,” says that each and every one has to find his place according to the pyramid. That’s all. There is no force. There is no coercion in spirituality. Let a person develop internally and one will see how, according to this internality, he joins his corporeal profession in society. However, the entire goal must be to sculpt the person. Actually, the child is doing that. But after he does it, he feels that he can add something external to his inner development. It comes as a natural urge. So, he’ll go to the same institute or college to learn a profession there, but it will be an external expression of what he has developed inside. It’s as if, from the development of his soul, a corporeal profession results.

Question: So, in the future lesson, the teacher enters…

Let’s say as a child he has developed something and so he already has chosen where he can be useful in society in an ideal way so that society needs him. Do you understand how one picked his profession then, i.e., according to where he is in relation to how much he can give to society? He chose then. It could be that he chose to be a street cleaner. You need to understand that the attitude to the profession will not be like it is today, according to what you earn and if you have a white or blue or black collar, etc.

This sort of thing was in the religious society and existed many years. Rabbi Yohanan, the shoemaker, the tailor… There were very great people who were involved with these professions. Do you know what a shoemaker was 2000-3000 years ago? In short, it was not an honorable profession nor is it today. If one wanted to say something unkind about someone, he called him a shoemaker. However, it was respected that a person worked. That was his job and his internality was among the great ones of the generation even though he worked as a shoemaker.

That’s how it was for many years until, let’s say, more or less 200 years ago. All those years, the person, and not who he was, was respected in Judaism, the people of Israel. Also, it was like this in the Eastern or Arabic countries and in the European countries. They didn’t pay attention to what a person had in his pocket nor to what he was, i.e., a professor or a simple laborer.

So of course, the approach to these things will be different, meaning the appreciation of society; all the things that Baal Ha Sulam writes about in the Last Generation.

Question: Our student from Los Angeles asks and suggests, and gets a lot of feedback from friends on the internet, that since now it is difficult to bring this message to the Ministry of Education, maybe it is worthwhile to form a youth movement to disseminate the wisdom of Kabbalah through their activities.

It could be. By the way, he has many opportunities there. It is probably the Moshe we know who is organizing studies and a group there, and is gathering Israelis together. He, specifically, has the possibility to do it and maybe to open some kind of class for their children, not now, but with time, let’s say, and have a meeting every so often. Based on that, they could give examples to others about how children become different, richer internally. Also, we should think about a winter semester here with children in a more goal-oriented fashion.

We will talk about it.

Question:I also teach theatre in a school for special education for children with problems of hyperactivity and, as a result of the talks of this week, I spoke to them about Kabbalah and they were very impressed. To talk to them about this world was possible— the desire to receive and things like that were clear— but to begin to talk to them about another dimension sounded imaginary. It is a class that I have worked with two years already and there hadn’t been any chance to talk to them about this. Many times, I have wanted to talk to them about that but it is not possible to begin to talk to them about spirituality but only as acts. What we talk about cannot be grasped.

You don’t need more. What are the wisdoms for? What are the dimensions for and other things? For what? Spirituality dresses in corporeality in the simplest way.

If one begins to connect to others and hears that this is the law of the world and he wants this law to exist between us, then naturally, without being told that it is spirituality, he discovers some kind of new power in the relationships between us. He doesn’t know that it is spirituality. However, he discovers it within his new vessel of perception, his new relationship to others.

For you, it’s called ‘spirituality, the Creator, power of spirituality’ and, for a person who doesn’t know, he’ll say that it is the world. What’s the difference? There is no difference. He discovered other relationships between us, other abilities. He now feels himself more connected to the whole of nature. He won’t know to call it by your words.

How did Abraham discover it; from hearing the perception of reality from someone? No, not at all, it was just the opposite. It should be in the most natural way. Don’t explain a word about Kabbalah. You need to explain to them in a simple way, a practical way, the simplest way.

We are coming from the other side, from the side of the scientist. This is not the right way. What for? You have to teach them how to develop the correct relationships between human beings. He will slowly discover that these relationships give him a feeling of what he is dealing with. He will begin to feel in different ways toward people and will begin to feel what is going on in his heart. He will begin to feel how nature truly “is breathing.” He will begin to feel it.

For him, it is not the levels of Yesod, then Hod, and later Netzah, so on and so on. No. For him, it is the world. Even if he doesn’t know what to call it, later he will, from inside himself. From his knowing, these names will surface in him even without hearing it from anybody or from reading it in any place. He will discover the spiritual world in a natural way.

What is the spiritual world? In the relationship of love, one toward the other, we discover the connection between us. In the connection between us, we discover the perfection and eternity of nature, its highest power that is called “the Creator.” This is revealed in the connection between us. Thus, he identifies with this more since this is a stronger feeling than his physical life. In this way, he as if elevates himself but this is without studying books. Baal HaSulam also writes that they won’t need to study from books but “through his soul he will be taught”. This also is done through games, simple games of the society. So, we shouldn’t use the words Behinot (aspect/ observation/ discrimination/ discernment), Partzufim, Reshimot. What for?

When 40-50 year-olds come to listen to my lectures for the general public, what should I tell them? I tell them about kinds of wisdoms and where free choice is possible. I tell them in an upside-down way, as if it comes from above.

In this case, with the children, begin at the bottom and go together with him through the development of the world, as if you discover the world together.

Question (cont'd): The issue is that all the teachers in the school talk to them about how important and nice it is to give. All of them say this. So, what can I add about what Kabbalah is if they already talk about the connection between the children; that giving is good between them, etc.?

Don’t tell him that giving is good since this is contrary to his desire. You mustn’t tell him that. That is not educating him according to his ways. How can you tell a child something that is against his spirit? You need to bring him a game so that he will see for himself through the game that’s it is worthwhile and beneficial to relate nicely to others since he gets more that way. Why? This is because the society will begin to encourage him, others will begin to respect him, and he will get some kind of prize. It is not that it exists artificially now and that it won’t exist tomorrow. He should learn that it is this way in life, in nature. As a result, there comes a change. However, never say anything that is contrary to his desire.

What does the Rambam say? He says that you reveal the secret slowly to children, women and young ones, whatever feels good to them, whatever is acceptable to them, until they become wiser. They themselves become wiser as a result of your explanation through a game.
It is done through a game and, suddenly, they say, “Oh, that’s not worthwhile for me. How do we maintain ourselves nevertheless? Here I will be ashamed, here they will tell me what to do, here I’ll get beaten, here they’ll put me in jail, here a fine, here something else, it’s not worthwhile.” All the time, they are saying, “It’s not worthwhile, not worthwhile,” but that is coercion. If the society encourages them and they gain from it, not fines that they run away from, a new format is made in this way, a form for them. But if they have to come to these conclusions themselves, that is worthwhile doing.

You come here and say that, now according to your program, you have to tell them that bestowal is good and so the child feels uncomfortable, moving around in his seat, and waiting for the lesson to be over. That’s the “hyperactivity” that you see.

Question: There is always that thin borderline between your desire to bequeath some knowledge or some experience to the younger generation and your desire to give them everything. Thus, maybe you are in some danger that they will want to kill you…

I am not going to delve into studies programs. There are many things which we need to learn from them. We have rules from Kabbalists; a lot of wisdom is concealed from us here. If there are questions straight to the point that we need to solve, we will find the solution, I am sure. If there is a question, then there is an answer already prepared for it. We will discover it. It’s not that we are wise but we will discover it because these questions and answers come according to the development of the generation. We will discover it.

Question: From your perspective, how does this mechanism work? What causes the change in the child if I begin to explain to him about the influence of the society on a person, about the desire to receive, not to go deeply into it.

One hears about the soul of Adam ha Rishon to which we are all connected and that all the power and the entire law of reality operates there, i.e., the connection between souls as one soul, that one Light fills them, and that this is called Ein Sof. There, the creation and the Creator are connected together in eternal adhesion.

If one hears something like this, similar to this, then he is influenced without his knowing it, without his awareness, by an Upper, special, power from there called “the surrounding Light” or “the Light that reforms.” Whether he wants it or not, he becomes similar by the simplest game that he is not aware of; that doesn’t matter. However, because of this, he changes. I use this system in all kinds of things.

What does Baal HaSulam say? Put him into a society. It doesn’t matter if he wants it, just as long as he says he is ready to participate in something. Gradually, he will be among other people who will influence him. He will want to be liked by the society. He will need to perform some activities. Suddenly, he will feel that it is worthwhile for him to participate on behalf of the society and, thus, he will continue with it. He will continue with it in order to get prizes, rewards, etc. from the society.

Then, he will begin to feel what is called “grace from Above” that in and of itself is a good thing even if he doesn’t get medals or prizes. He even will be embarrassed that he received a medal once he sees how great it is. No one even recognizes its greatness. He now knows the Gadlut (adultness) of bestowal. It suddenly comes to him to such an extent that he doesn’t want anyone to even know about it. It is that precious to him. This is called “grace from Above.”

Where does this “beast” get this from? It happens because he carried out activities that were compatible to Ein Sof to Adam ha Rishon and he didn’t even know about it; but that’s how it works. After all, he is within a system.

Are there teachers here?

Question: In this period now— the beginning of the way— if we suggest a certain system of education and, at this point, it doesn’t come from the government, and the society doesn’t encourage it nor support it, and the child doesn’t see it in his environment, then how do we introduce this along with what is going on in society?

It is difficult. I don’t know. There are questions that have no immediate answers.

It is just like your car has a flat tire and you are in the middle of the desert. What do you do? What can you do? If rescue comes, that’s good. If not, what can you do? These are like the conditions you gave me.

If the Ministry of Education would give their support, we could develop systems of games, activities, relationships, training for teachers, and training in other areas. It would be an arrangement. I don’t understand you. There are six and a half billion people and, in another 20 years, they will change. Are you saying that we have to educate them, to do something with them? Can we do something within our framework? Of course, not. Take even one state; you need a system.

You come to me from your failing system of education which is already ruined and corrupt. You ask me how to immediately rescue it? You can’t rescue it. You need to break it down completely. It will break down completely; nothing will help. We look at children who don’t go to school and see that it is better for them.

Do you remember that there was a doctors’ strike and according to statistics there were less people who died? I am not lying. Maybe you weren’t around then. It was about 20 years ago. I don’t remember when exactly. There was a doctors’ strike and an external office was set up to manage the health system. First of all, they did it better than the Ministry of Health. At the time, they suggested that they take it over permanently, and that it also would be better if they managed the country rather than the government. It’s not a joke. As a result of the doctors’ strike, it was discovered that there were less operations, less wasted money by a great percentage, and less cases of death.

What I want to say is, if we operate according to the ego, it is impossible for our activities to bring good. There is no alternative but sacrifice. You are not aware of the sacrifices because we don’t have any other way of seeing it.

Stop your method of education and you will see that perhaps it can be different. Begin to organize private education here and there, and other kinds of things. You will see. What is going on now will be destroyed in any case. There is no alternative.

One has to go to work and send his child to school. It is built in such a way that this is worthwhile for us to do since we gain from the whole process. From kindergarten, to school, then university, he goes to work for Coca Cola which poisons all of us and gives work to doctors who bring him death. That’s the process. It is one system that he can’t escape.

You are asking me now, tomorrow or today, how do I go to my class and what can I do? It is not a serious question. However, a solution will be found.

Question (cont'd): My question is actually if we need, first of all, for society to agree with it or can we introduce it as a model?

Society will not agree. It doesn’t understand that there is any solution. Everyone talks about a crisis. Here and there, they discover some kinds of correct processes. I see this according to the research that I receive; although I am not so involved in this. Sometimes, they even talk about the person’s ego as being the basis of the crisis. This is fine but there is no system. So, what about the ego, what is it that is not right, and what can be done with the hyperactivity if not to treat it with drugs? What should be done against drugs if not through jails or whatever? There are no solutions.

As Baal HaSulam tells us, everything that is revealed to us, that we develop through nature, reveals itself up to the state where we can’t stand it, we are not able to, and then we must move on. This is basically what a crisis is.

That is the way our ego developed. We get to something good and say, “Thank God, we succeeded.” Then after a while, we see that it is getting bad, the evil is revealed more, we are incapable of bearing it, and then we escape forward to the next situation. We get there, it is good, after a while it also turns bad, etc., etc. This is egoistic development. We, in any case, can develop and always see what is better. Why? This is because my ego grows and I recognize fulfillments for it ahead.

We have gotten now to a situation where one’s ego has grown but he does not recognize fulfillments for it since the fulfillments that lie ahead are not for the ego but are for the opposite; they are to bestow, to give. They are above the ego. He now has to acquire faith above reason, i.e., the Kli (vessel) of bestowal. Then he will discover that the next level is before him. There is no longer fulfillment for his ego; therefore it is a crisis. This was never such a crisis previously. There was development—suffering, wars, problems, revolutions, everything—but in a forward motion. It was obvious to everyone that something would come out of it as a result. There were places to which to escape.

Today there is no direction. Thus you are saying to leave education alone so that they will discover it by themselves, or however it will arrange itself. It will not work out.

In our situation, we must disseminate in all areas and show that our Kli has to change, that infinite fulfillment is before us, the entire picture of us standing opposite the Light. It will fill us but only according to compatibility; equivalence of form has to be explained. Here and there, are those who think this way. I received some research written about this that I will show you. However, this is something that must be explained.

Otherwise, humanity just stands there and doesn’t know what to do. They say, “So, we’ll give Ritalin or maybe we’ll just distribute drugs to everyone. What’s so bad? And terrorism… what should we do about that?” People just agree with this more and more. What can they do? They try to live with it, “That’s life. Do you have a solution? If not, why should we be sorry all the time?” So, they agree with it and don’t suffer. The will to receive in its protective form accepts things that it can not get rid of since there is no choice. Then if there’s no choice, it stops suffering. The problem of many is less painful. Then, one relaxes. That’s it.

Our revelation has to go to the general public. Therefore, there should be dissemination as broad as possible regarding the reason for the crisis and its solution. Education especially is the most sensitive issue because each parent wants his child to succeed, or, if not to succeed, at least not to encounter difficulties in life. We need to emphasize this for their sake, of course.

Besides this, we are in general the educational system of the world. What is Kabbalah? It is how to educate a person to be similar to the Creator, i.e., to be a human being ( Adam). Therefore, education is the closest thing to us.

Together with education, change certainly is involved, correction in the general system of society, humanity. Here would be all the things that belong to professions, the life of a person, the country, the systems of government, and the many other things that are included in the relationships between people. However, it seems to me the first approach will be through education and then later to social relationships.

Question: I want to say that there is a real consolidation of friends for establishing youth movements. They are sending emails; there is a really big desire with a lot of advice on how to do it.

It could be that this will be a solution, not a comprehensive one, but one of the steps that would be good to take. We will take it as an example. It shouldn’t grow into models that we already have, including models that we have from the religious sector. There is a very big crisis there in the education of the younger generation. It is felt even more there.

In the non-religious sector, what was there 50 years ago? Today, at least there is organized education, an arranged system of education, everything in order, and working like clockwork. It’s just that the children don’t want to learn. However, everything is arranged well for the parents and teachers, which is to say that it seems as if there is progress.

In the religious sector, it is to the contrary especially with the Orthodox. It seems as if there is a decline in the level of importance of the teacher and of values; a huge drop. We see it. The crisis is even greater with them. We’ll talk about it another time as this is a subject within itself. As Baal HaSulam tells us in the end of Introduction to the Book of Zohar, how one advances from externality to internality in the religious sector is a completely different area. It needs to have a different Ministry of Education.

Question: As confirmation to what you have said, we have begun a basics course in Givat Berner. Who asked for the course? It was a local Rabbi. During the lecture, he was sitting with his laptop, clicking on our clips. He was very impressed with everything he heard and, from one lecture to the next, more and more people are coming. They are also talking about inviting 12-13 year old children. He says himself that if he would say the same things that you say, they would throw him out feet first. He says it is good that we say these things and it doesn’t come from them because he feels that it can’t come from them. No one is listening; no one hears. The solution comes from us.

So today, one or two are listening and, with that, they recognize a crisis, problems. Tomorrow, more will listen. There is no choice. There is a limit to it all. The process is something we don’t determine. It doesn’t depend on people. As much as we can bring the disclosure of the system to the world, we will be able to speed up time and make the correction easier.

Question: Baal HaSulam said in the Last Generation that education cannot harm as long as a person like Hitler doesn’t appear and fulfill the demands of the ego. Then, all of education would fall in another direction.

From the side of evil, he changed education.

Question (cont'd): So, someone will come and say that he will fulfill their desire with something else and then from that person, from him, nature will simply continue in this different direction and not to giving, to bestowal, to love? What am I asking? What does Baal HaSulam mean that it should be religion and not education?

‘Religion’ is Kabbalah ; in all places where he says the essence of religion and its purpose, he refers to the wisdom Kabbalah, the system of equivalence with the Creator. This is what he calls ‘religion’. It is not what is called religion by a person on the street; that is called ‘traditions’ by us. They are the commandments that people have acquired through learning in childhood.

In all of his articles, don’t you understand what he calls religion? Don’t interpret according to your definition but according to what the writer means. Sometimes he uses it with another connotation in order to confuse so that the extent to which he is against it won’t be understood exactly.

It is clear that you must also understand his life, where he was, and how he wanted to define the wisdom of Kabbalah to the nation. He was not able to talk about everything so decisively. There were things that he had to conceal somewhat but religion is Kabbalah.

Question: Baal HaSulam sent his eldest son to study with great Rabbis who were connected especially to Gmarra and things like that.

It was also from the same intention. My rabbi, Rabash, received consent from Rav Kook and Rav Zonenfeld on purpose and studied because Baal HaSulam wanted to show that it was possible to be a Rav and also a Kabbalist and that it doesn’t harm a person. It does just the opposite; it raises him. That’s what he did with his son. What else could he do? I asked him what to do with my son and he told him to do the same. It's the same with the rest of the children.

Question (cont'd): That’s what I wanted to ask. We are doing that also. My son learns in a public religious school and they try to stuff them with all those subjects, Gmarra and laws.

What’s wrong with that?

Question (cont'd): He suffers very much from these subjects. I want to tell the truth. He really suffers. The teacher sometimes calls me and says that during the lesson he sits and thinks about something else. What should I do about that? Due to what I heard today in the lesson, how do I relate to this and explain it to him?

If people who are developing—especially more and more children—are not taught how to sit and to be absorbed in the study of Gmarra from the youngest age, from the “first day,” then more and more people will go against it. They are not able to. First of all, they don’t feel a connection to themselves and they don’t feel it benefits their progress. They don’t feel that the world needs it or that it is a profession within itself. They don’t feel that society appreciates it as they once did, i.e., knowing 200 pages, or 2000 pages. Today, there is nothing like that. Weighing a person according to what he knows by heart no longer exists within society’s awareness.

Today if I have more money in my pocket than you, that’s enough. Who are you with your pages of Gmarra knowledge? The problem is that everything collapsed. That is what Baal HaSulam writes in the end of the Introduction to the Book of Zohar. All these values were good during the Diaspora. During the time of the Diaspora, one simply had to let the people engage in it, to lie quietly for 1,500 years, 2,000 years. That’s it. Time passes and souls gradually develop even though one doesn’t recognize or know it.

It is like in any illness where there is a period of latency until the disease appears. Now is the time of the erupting of the disease. Now we discover the disease with which we have been ill all this time. Before now, we didn’t know we were sick. It’s like having a runny nose for a few days previously. One had some signs but then all of a sudden a cold or flu develops.

So in order to give them the opportunity to pass the time and to maintain the nation until the “disease” erupted, the Kabbalists themselves inserted Gmarra, Shulhan Aruk, education, ethics, and all kinds of things, to be more honorable, or whatever was needed.

However, today, when the desire to receive has reached a crisis in its last ascent, everything is falling apart and they (the religious) are facing a crisis also. Additionally, the children who seemingly want to study are not able to do so today. They are incapable.

In their eyes, those great ones are not so great anymore. No matter what, you can give them pages of Gmarra but it doesn’t help them anymore. They passed the boundary of exile when their desire to receive increased and you can not make them return there. You can use handcuffs or put limitations on them and restrict them from the regular world—limitations with certain clothing, lack of a profession, all kinds of things—to hold them. It will not hold up; it will break in just a short time. Nothing will help against the ego.

You ask what to do with your son? There’s nothing to do. You need to put him into a society that will develop him into a human being, a man. How? Make a society like this with your children and arrange that it be so. Open a class and use our teachers for all kinds of general subjects. We can develop these systems and educational programs together with them. We can also teach holy subjects in addition to everyday ones.

However, every subject will be considered as to whether it is worthwhile for them and what they need it for, for what purpose. The society should be encouraging and the fathers should be involved and adding value to it. There is a problem when the child feels that the father no longer values being involved with Gmarra. The fathers are running after money and not after the ideals that were once part of exile. That’s the way it is.

Therefore, I do not see any other way for us. Gilad Shadmon has been given the direction to build an education net of our own. You see that there are examples such as these in Israel and in the world. I am all for it. We will develop educational systems, educational programs, games, clips, and all kinds of things pertaining to them. Through this, we will be able to give examples to people and this will develop us as well in our approaches and ability to reach the world. This is similar to what Eliezer Ben Yehuda did with his son. He began teaching his son Hebrew when no one else spoke Hebrew; but he spoke Hebrew with his son.

Question: There is something here from the writings in The Last Generation on page 307. It is thus written:

“Maybe you will say that through education and public opinion it is possible to transform the nature of the masses and change them to altruistic. This is also a big mistake since education cannot do more than public opinion, meaning that public opinion would respect altruism and condemn egoism. As long as public opinion maintains altruism through the means of respectability and shame, it will help education. However if there comes a day when someone with excellent communication skills speaks out against public opinion, it is without a doubt that he would be able to change public opinion to meet his own needs.

We have a bitter example in our history of how someone was able to transform the well-behaved and educated country of Germany and turn them into devouring creatures through his daily demands. All the education of hundreds of years just burst like a bubble because public opinion changed and education had nothing to rely on since education cannot be preserved without the support of public opinion.”

Therefore, I say that if the parents and teachers value the same goal toward which they are aiming for with the children, then, in that, they are becoming partners, working together, developing together. They are doing it together. He explains the general system and how everyone participates in it. The children within the system see that they are active within it and are like the grown ups in an equal way. In fact, they are more than the adults since, in their relationship, they compel the grown ups to act in this way or that.

Therefore, this kind of education can exist because public opinion is surrounding it, the public being the group. Children who go to school now certainly enter great corruption. We hope we can correct that for ourselves.

Question: Right now we have a strike in our high schools. Is it possible to suggest an alternative at this moment?

No. We know that this strike was organized by a large organization that prepared for it, and they have special goals. To us, they don’t seem like goals but these are egoistic goals of their own. They know what they are doing. It isn’t that they are really thinking about education but about their pocket and other egoistic goals. That is clear.

If you want to introduce another system, to whom do you turn? Let’s say you turn to the parents. You must approach them systemically using the same tools that the parents are used to hearing and viewing, from which they are used to getting their information (in the wrappings that they can accept) to answer precise questions as to what is happening there in the educational system that has failed and is now striking.

I just can’t begin talking on radio or television. I can’t even open my mouth since I will ruin my name. If I do that now, I will not be able to do anything later on. I must prepare myself in a very, very measured way—strict, exact—suitable to what the public is ready to listen to from me. When I explain to them about the correction system, they must feel that it is a rescue system, really a rescue and not just some crook who has come to pull them into his demands.

Since we see that there is a problem, then, from today on, let’s prepare ourselves for this and proceed. However, we can’t do it immediately. Within yourself, you can do it relatively quickly, but we are talking about the whole of humanity, a monster. You see how long it takes for things to happen here.

Actually, they are still in the beginning of the crisis. I am not saying to wait. We need to proceed from this point since we understand from a revelation that something is demanded of us. However, we need to make a lot of preparations.

Let’s say this: we will be happy to receive all kinds of suggestions from our friends. Contact people at Bnei Baruch responsible to collect all the materials that deal with education, regarding the crisis in education in schools and within humanity in general, i.e., how to educate etc. We will collect all the materials and, together, we will see how to process it and how to present it, how to realize it within us and with our children, between us. It could be that it will be a project so good that we could present it with a few psychologists and a few teachers to the municipalities to get their support. There are ways.

Question: If we are talking about education for all ages, in groups, then would it be relevant to think that the older ones would be trained to teach the younger ones like in youth movements?

Yes, of course. That’s a good thing. Yes, children learn better from older children. A child wants to be like the older children, not so much like the adults. It definitely is worthwhile for us to do that as well.

Question: Let’s say if we were to go back in time and I would have written an article to the public explaining to them why we have a crisis. If it were a good explanation, then we would get into a stage where we would have to give a solution. Once, you said to tell them to learn from Baal HaSulam and now you say that is not exactly the way but that we need to tell them something different, somethingcloser to them. What is the bottom line? Let’s say thatI write an article together with you. We have reached the stage where we must present to them some kind of proposal, some solution. What can we tell them?

Look, as I am a scientist, I cannot give a solution other than through cause and consequence. That’s the way I see and feel. This is at the level of a person who wants to grasp the scenario and control it. I know where the crisis comes from, what the results should be, what process we have to go through, and why we are now stuck in the crisis, all these things. Once I know these things, then I am all set. I feel myself in control of some kind of perception of this reality.

It could be that it is possible to explain it simply to everyone. However, when you open this process to a person, either he will be able to accept it or he won’t be able to understand it. It might be too complex, difficult, or else he might have too many doubts. If you give him a short and small solution, then that’s OK. He can agree to that. When you know too much, then you humiliate him. There are all kinds of games here that you must consider. For example, when one writes an article at the university, he has to note that he doesn’t exactly know everything. i.e., that it came with the help of others, and give references to others. You need to think about how to do it.

Question (cont'd): So give me Kabbalah in the simplest way…

I recommend taking hyperactive children, those who began taking drugs, or those who just don’t want to study and really are against it, and find a solution for them with our explanations, with our techniques, with our relationships. Just like our friend the teacher told us that one moment before they were about to throw him out of the class, he opened “Kabbalah Today” and began reading together with them. Thus they calmed down and it was interesting for them. So, you ask about the bottom line; what he has told us is the bottom line. If this material interests them or not depends on the approach and who is presenting it to them, i.e., in what form? We can ask the video department to help us.

Question (cont'd): You said that slowly we need to begin to talk about it, to learn to advertise it. What do we do now? Do we begin to advertise; stage one? What would you say right now? Let’s say there is an opportunity to talk on radio and TV, to write a long article and distribute it to hundreds of thousands of people.

Lately, we spoke about this. We simply don’t talk about the crisis itself so much. Those who do mention the crisis, use it to go on to something else. We all have spoken about the crisis. First, we talked about it and they didn’t; now they are talking, and we no longer are. What for? We will go to the next step. The next step is the solution. They have nothing to say about a solution except to use less of this or that and, thus, maybe it will be better. Their solutions are not real solutions since it seems as if they want to stop development, which is impossible. So we have to present a solution through what we bring to them, i.e., a solution to education. Explain to them what is possible to do in the classroom with the ego that has erupted and what one needs to fulfill it as we spoke about today. Begin to explain it in a more detailed way.

Question (cont'd): Today we spoke on a level that is too high, too far, a bird’s view from above.

Okay, let’s take a small part of what we talked about and begin to elaborate on it. Write an article about it. See how it will be accepted into society and so on. Don’t worry; what is not accepted today will be accepted tomorrow. It can sit on the internet. It will be used in a short time.

Question: I have noticed from our articles that we are very cautious and almost never give practical advice such as give them a lesson for a quarter of an hour, don’t let them write, give them breaks, give them video films, and don’t get them involved in that… The explanation is usually more systematic, educational. Will this change? Will we really touch on the actual material, give practical advice?

We could, on condition that the advice will really help. If you give concrete advice, you should be sure that, if it is taken, it will be successful. However, we will succeed.