The Main Question – Search for the Meaning

[Ronna]

Kabbalah researches the question of the meaning of life; everything starts from this question. Often a person simply does not realize it, but asks this question unconsciously. This could be a question of where to go, what to read, what to do or whom to marry. These are little meanings, but at the end of the day, all our activity is determined by the higher meaning, which correlates to the understanding of the relationship between a subject, as a spiritual substance, and existence. A person may not even find an answer to this question, but all his activity may constitute a certain form of the expression of this question.
This is a materialistic approach to searching for one's practical application within the framework of the real world. Later, when the level of self-realization increases in a subject, questions of an idealistic nature start to arise. Here a person enters a period of self-realization, of considering oneself as a part of an intelligent spiritual substance.
A person realizes that there is Upper Providence: "God exists, the Creator exits". The only problem is the question of what qualities are inherent in God or the Creator. Kabbalah claims that the Creator is the highest Law of Creation, the most synthesizing, containing all the rest of its particular laws, all of us, and all creations at all its levels and in all the worlds. This universal Law of Creation is called the Creator.
We can say that there is a period in man's activity in this world when he explores out of pure utilitarian interests. Later, when he starts to explore this world from the point of view of science itself, a pure science, then he already works towards the realization of the meaning of existence. This is a period of creation and altruism in the name of the Law of Creation.

Author: Michael Laitman, PhD

 

[Cosmo]

RE: The Main Question – S

oookaaaayyyy ... and the point is???

 

[Reverend Blair]

RE: The Main Question – S

That we should hijack the mystical facet of somebody else's religion?

 

[Jay]

Did anyone else catch that documentary on Newton the other day? I think it was on Nova.....

 

[Reverend Blair]

RE: The Main Question – S

Yup, that has nothing to do with Kabballa though...unless Madonna has suddenly decided to take up metallurgy.

 

[Jay]

Well, no not really. But I didn't think this thread was going to go anywhere.....

Good documentary though. A bit watered down, but good. He is really up there in my "most highly respected people" list.

 

[peapod]

The newton documentary was excellent, as for madonna, she sucks!

 

[Jay]

I like the conclusion that he was definitely looking for something, and it appears as if he never found it.

 

[GL Schmitt]

Like so many other esoteric subjects of which I have random bits of data floating about in my head, my knowledge of the Kabbalah comes from the moves.

A single movie, in point of fact: “A Stranger Among Us” (1992) starring Melanie Griffith and Eric Thal.

Giffith plays a hard-bitten New York cop trying to find stolen diamonds and a killer in the midst of the New York diamond trade.

Sort of like “Witness” except you have Melanie Griffith instead of Harrison Ford, and the Hasidic Jews of New York City instead of the Amish of Pennsylvania.

I rather enjoyed the film, but then, what do I know?

No doubt, like the Hollywood version of the Old Order Amish, the Hollywood version of the Hasidic Jews is oversimplified, and distorted to fit the plot, but I still believe that referencing some pop culture item would be a less startling method of opening up a dialogue about the Kabbalah.

Several films have attempted to show life from the pacifistic point of view. To date, all that I know include a “Sargent York” ending, with guns blazing away.

(In storytelling, pacifically yielding and compromising makes for a rather tame climax.)

Those films which try include “A Stranger Among Us” (Hasidic Jews), “Witness” (Amish), “Friendly Persuasion,” “Angel And The Bad Man” and the aforementioned “Sargent York” (Quaker)

Except that “Sargent York” is more about how he overcame his Quaker inhibitions and became a hero of World War One, “Friendly Persuasion” offers two contrasting decisions, and only the John Wayne oater, “Angel And The Bad Man,” really comes close to portraying what the pascifism of these religions entail.



I have not heard whether Madora has started to study the Kabbalah, but in my estimation, at least she has the chutzpah!

 

[pastafarian]

An old girlfriend of mine was into the Kabbalah. For me, it started as an illustration of the Law of Diminishing Returns. It holds no cultural attraction, if I'm mystical at all, it's not in any of the "practical" disciplines: palmistry, tarot, astrology, divination, numerology (of which the Kabbalah seems to be a particularly esoteric example), voodoo, hoodoo or economics.

It is incredible complicated, has a huge literature of commentary, which a cantor I knew who "dabbled" (his word, I'd call him an expert) in it told me was almost all BS and I think if you're smart enough and take it seriously will lead to madness of one sort or another--again, not unlike academic economics .

I know enough about it to know I don't know anything about it.

 

[Jay]

A good read/reference book for esoteric knowledge is The Secret Teachings of All the Ages, by Manly P. Hall.

I have a copy, but you can find it at sacred-texts.com.