The way our desires evolve both defines and designs the entire history of humanity. As humankind’s desires developed, they urged people to study their environment so they could fulfill their wishes. Unlike minerals, plants, and animals, people constantly evolve. For every generation, and for each person, desires grow stronger and stronger.
People began to want to change nature and use it for themselves. Instead of wanting to adapt themselves to nature, they began wanting to change nature to fit their needs. They grew detached from nature, separated and alienated from it and from each other. Today, many, many centuries later, we are discovering that this was not a good idea. It simply doesn’t work.
Mr. Gorbachev noted in 2005: “History increases in velocity and there is danger of falling behind in consciousness.” “Today,” he said, “we need new thinking for a new century,” including new vision for politics, business, and civil society. “The future needs to be for all of us or we won’t have it at all,” concluded Mr. Gorbachev.
Well, let’s move close to the clearer point of view:
“The reason for this crisis is human egoism which increases every generation. But we cannot fight it directly and force people to love one another. We cannot force love. That is why we have to utilize the power of society over individuals. Each and every one of us is greatly affected by society: each of us wants respect from society; each of us is influenced by the opinions of society. If we can make it so that the most appreciated thing in the world will be giving-more appreciated than any other act of man, then people will want to give, they will want to bestow and to share, because they will want the respect of society. We have to see how we can cancel, revoke all of the prizes in society, except for one prize: the appreciation of a person’s contribution to society. So when we point to a person and say that he or she gives to others that would be the greatest reward of all. That will make people give to one another, and love one another. Because we see how society influences people. I think we can do that. I hope that together we can build a new civilization.” (Rav Michael Laitman)
The history of Kabbalah goes hand in hand with the history of mankind. It literally goes back to the emergence of the first man, and reaches a state of entering Eretz Israel, the spiritual land of Israel, the so-called World of Atzilut, where mankind resides within its eternal realization, outside the boundaries of time and space, immortal and perfect.
It is said that his name was Adam, Adam ha Rishon in Hebrew, the first human being who marked the beginning of the entire human race. He is the author of the first book on Kabbalah.
The year 1995 was marked by Kabbalists as a very special year; a year that is a historic cornerstone from which begins a genuine change in man’s relation to the world, in his relation to the wisdom of Kabbalah, and his relation to his destiny.
That change is a consequence of a process of evolution that man goes through, which compels him to bond with the leadership of creation, to take an active part in it, to rise to the same degree where he will be master and guardian of the whole world. If he does not aspire for that, then the collective law of creation will make him do it by torments that will force him to think of such questions as: “What am I living for?” “What do I exist for?”, and examine the purpose of his life and ask why is he living so poorly.
We want to be safe from the forces of nature which threaten us; we want to feel peaceful, happy and fulfilled, but instead we feel miserable, empty and weak. We feel weak not in relation to the externality of nature from which we sought to protect ourselves, but in relation to our internal nature, the desire to receive inside of us, which has grown and which we did not want, and could not correct, when it was small.
We let it grow, we developed it, we tempted it; we filled it with whatever it desired through this process. And so after thousands of years we discover that it is so big that it rules us and we cannot exist without fearing the future, feeling both empty in the present and not knowing what to do in the future, since it rules us and pushes us into conflicts, as Baal HaSulam says, into hydrogen wars.
The question is, whether it is in our power to stop this development, of which we have lost control, that is, the development of the internal desire to receive inside a man. In retrospect we cannot say that this whole thing has no roots. Of course, this is the way it was supposed to happen. We are talking about having succeeded or not, and we refer to the balance of powers alone. After all we were not supposed to succeed or not to succeed. According to the end, this is the state we should have reached. But today, when we realize what the goal of this development was, we have to find out the right way to continue.
There is as much difference between a language and an alphabet, as there are people in our world who can speak but are unable to read or write. The most ancient spoken language is that of the Bible, which goes back to Adam. The language of precepts and later on of the narrative is derived from the spoken language of the Bible. All of these languages combined and each of them in particular have been extensively used in our religious literature.
The language of Kabbalah was the last one to develop. It is the most difficult language, because to understand it one should be able to feel the spiritual categories of which this language speaks. This is the most precise language of all. Only the language of Kabbalah can accurately render all the spiritual information. However, it can only be received by a student directly from his Kabbalist-teacher. Since for many generations there were only a few Kabbalists unconnected with one another, the language of Kabbalah was the last to develop. Even today it can only be “learned” from the Kabbalist.
