Kabbalah and Philosophy

Since the beginning of time man has been searching for the meaning of his life.

In this course we will examine the similarity and the difference between the wisdom of Kabbalah and philosophy.

Through Baal HaSulam's article "The wisdom of Kabbalah and philosophy", Rav Michael Laitman opens for us a wonderful porthole into the understanding of thousands of years of search by humankind for the meaning of life.

Philosophy is an outlook on life. While everyone is running and rushing around, the philosopher sits and researches the essence of his life. Ancient philosophy has existed since 1000 BC. In history books one can see that each nation had its own philosophers, each who developed different views from which developed religions and other methods of life. An exception is the Jewish nation, which is almost never mentioned in the evolution of philosophy. It seems as if throughout history the Jewish nation has not participated in this process of researching the essence and meaning of life. Is it possible?

Lesson 1

The Creator: A dialogue or a sensation?

• Why doesn't the Jewish nation appear in the evolution of philosophy?
• The Kabbalah 'emerges from the cave' to answer humanity's pains
• Is it possible to discuss what is not sensed and seen?
• Research of spirituality through sensations
• What is researched: the Creator or His actions?

If we observe the development of humanity during the previous generations, we see that in actuality all the nations, societies, and cultures, have developed in a certain direction. There may be gaps of few hundred years between them, but yet it is the same regular development of a desire to receive which grew from the level of root, to the first (Alef), second (Bet), third (Gimel) and fourth level (Dalet).
In our days the third and fourth levels of the desire to receive are already beginning to form. The development is gradual, yet quite similar among the different nations and different cultures.

For example, in the philosophy discussed by Baal Hasulam, first there was the ancient philosophy, the one before the Greek philosophy, from the tenth century BC. Later there was the Greek philosophy, especially from the fifth century BC. After that was the Roman philosophy, around the beginning of the modern calendar, and later came the philosophies of ancient China and India, Confucianism and Buddhism. Finally there was the philosophy of the middle ages, the philosophy of modern Europe and Islam. Heading all of these were truly great minds, people who have established the progress of humanity.

What is interesting is that the nation of Israel is not on this map, which is remarkable, since philosophy is a study of life. If we open the study books we will see that all nations have evolved the way they look at life - how to live, what to live for, what they need, what is their cause, purpose, and what does everything exist for? It is as if they have been preoccupied with these issues, and the greatest minds of every period have been working on the solution of them and writing about their answers. In contrast, the nation of Israel seems like beasts that don't have such questions, which is extremely interesting.

Indeed it appears that there hasn't been such development in the nation of Israel throughout history. The Rambam, who was considered to be a Jewish philosopher, dealt with it a little, and possibly Yehuda Ha Levy too, but in general the nation of Israel did not have great philosophers.

Today the entire discipline of philosophy has collapsed to such an extent that humanity doesn't deal with it any more, and it is possible to see that the same questions that were asked then, are still not solved. Not only they haven't been solved, but no one is even close to their solutions. Today both philosophy and other sciences do not appear to be helpful in understanding the essence of life. It is only now that we see the wisdom of Kabbalah awaken and reveal itself to the world. It is ready to answer the questions of humanity, to link all of the problems and solve all the contradictions. This is what is happening in today's generation.

Indeed, this is the reason why the nation of Israel did not have a philosophy. Everything already existed from the beginning and therefore this nation did not have any questions of that kind, or any urge or need to get involved with all of these questions. It was all written by the prophets. What came after the prophets, are only philosophical interpretations of sorts.

What the philosophers wrote now seem like child's play. There have been great minds amongst them, some of whom were very dedicated to discovering the essence of life, but despite this, the human intellect is not capable of more. That is why now it is gradually becoming evident where the wisdom of Kabbalah and philosophy stand, and how great the difference is. That is, we understand what a big difference there is between the human intellect used by philosophy for the research of these essential questions, and the divine wisdom that man acquires from research of the upper world about the essence of existence, life and creation.

What is spirituality?

"A great amount of labor has been done by philosophy to prove how corporality is an effect of the spiritual, and how the soul gives birth to the body. Even after all this labor their deductions are not accepted by the heart at all."

Why not? This is because they could never construct with any method or research an appropriate and direct link that establishes how spirituality is clothed in the body, activates the body, and gives it life. They could never explain it. "And their main mistake was in grasping spirituality" meaning what spirituality actually is. "Since they determined that it gave birth to corporality, which is certainly false". They determined that spirituality gives birth to corporality in a direct way, through some gradual actions. "Since every father needs to have some resemblance to his offspring, because this relationship is the path and the manner through which his offspring is brought into existence. In the same way, every performer of actions needs to have some relation to his actions, through which he comes in contact with them. Thus, since you say that spirituality is detached from all corporal deeds, then it follows that there is no path or relation through which the spiritual can come in contact with the corporal, or move it in any way." So there is no connection, because if there would be such a connection that corporality would emerge from spirituality then I would certainly be able to directly pass from corporality to spirituality. This path does not exist.

"But the understanding of the word "spirituality" does not even belong in philosophy. How can something which has never been seen or sensed be discussed? What can the discussion be based upon?" What does this mean? We are used to investigating only things we are able to sense, measure, repeat, compare, i.e., we use a scientific approach. Then we consider it science, we call it wisdom, and it can be discussed. Since there are other people sensing the same things I do, I can discuss the research with them. But we do not sense spirituality, so surely each one can make his or her own personal image about it and write things that can not be grasped by the sensory organs. It turns out that only the Kabbalists, who first acquire a sixth sense (a spiritual sense), can feel/perceive spirituality. Only to the extent that spirituality is sensed or perceived it can be researched and written about. Philosophy, on the other hand, which is based entirely on logic and human intelligence, is unable to research spirituality, simply because philosophers do not sense it.
"But if there is any definition which divides and separates the spiritual from the corporal, it belongs only with those who have once attained something spiritual, and sensed it, the true Kabbalists. Therefore the wisdom of Kabbalah is necessary in order to truly research what spirituality is."

The philosophy of His essence

What is His essence?

"And with His essence, which philosophy loves to discuss extensively, and prove all of the laws of negation that are in Him, the Kabbalah does not deal at all." We do not discuss the creator or research Him. Why? "Because how is it possible to define anything using concepts that can not be grasped or attained at all? The definition of negation is not less valuable than the definition of existence, since if you see some thing in the distance, you will recognize it against all of its negative components, meaning all that is not there" When I see something, even if I don't recognize it, I can already be certain of what it is not.

"This is considered to be recognition to some extent, because if the object is truly distant from the eye then even the negative is not recognized. For example: If we see from afar some black image, and recognize that it is not a person or bird, then this is considered to be seeing, because if it would be more distant we wouldn't be able to decide that it is not a person.
And from this come all of their confusions and irrelevance, because philosophy loves to take pride in understanding the entire negative of the Creator's essence while the wise Kabbalists put their hand to their mouth in that place, and even a simple name they do not give Him" The Creator "Because we can not define with any word or name that which we have not attained, because the word indicates the beginning of the attainment of a thing."

Philosophers discuss the creator despite the fact that they have not attained Him. The Kabbalists on the other hand, who aim to attain a true sensory and concrete attainment, can not say anything about the Creator which they cannot sense. In Kabbalah, only what is perceived in the senses is discussed. In philosophy, because the mind wonders here and there even without the senses, it attempts to discuss the Creator. That is why philosophy discusses the Creator, while Kabbalah only discusses the Creator's actions.

"But His luminescence, blessed be He, in reality" the lights that arrive from the Creator to reality "they discuss and discern to a great extent, meaning all of those illuminations that they merited to attain clearly, no less than concrete attainment" of this world.

Kabbalists deal with what emanates from the Creator to us, and with all that is both in the spiritual worlds and in this world. Philosophers discuss the Creator Himself, and that is actually the root of their mistake, because they do not sense the Creator or His actions. They therefore have no basis for real scientific research. This is why philosophy is not called a science.