Mastering the Ups and Downs

HH

Rabbi Nachman said that for him the greatest ups were easy to attain, his main devotion lay in bringing it down. So obviously this science and discipline is to be found in his teachings.

There were many great sages and kabalists, and many great revelations and how to merit to attain revelations and Divine Inspiration. But what about all the time in between, when one just can't be there? And one who does merit the ability to bind himself to the supernal, this can be like a fix of holy heroin, a blast out of this mundane world into true holy reality, but what happens next? And even though this is obviously the most holy achievement, can there still be a problem of dependency, need, and addiction?

Rabbainu has the solution!

Na Nach Nachma Nachman MayUman

Make it Real

HH

Moshe Rabbainu said to the Children of Israel (Deuteronomy, Portion of Neetzuvim), “You are standing today, all of you, before Hashem….” Do not think this was like some type of “listen up folks, we’re standing before the Lord now…” G-d forbid. When Moshe Rabbainu told them that they were standing before HY, he gave them to completely realize this reality, to have consummate awareness of it in their minds and hearts, it was a wave of prophetic consciousness.

For a few decades the western world has been enchanted by different meditation systems, yoga, and the likes, but something seems fundamentally deficient, because if a person would even for one second achieve real humility, he would attain such a mighty conception of HY that it would completely blow his mind and alter his entire life radically. The tzadik does this, with one word, one statement he brings a person to the real consciousness of HY.

Na Nach Nachma Nachman MayUman

Earth First and Central

HH

Imagine being suspended in the atmosphere 1000 meters high. Pretty frightening. Good thing that we have the solid earth under our feet. The reality however is that we are the earth. It isn’t like we just happened or managed to secure ourselves on earth. Perhaps the whole superficial perspective of the heliocentricity is due to the faulty premise that first there was space and then then formations of matter therein. The reality is that first there was earth, and everything from great to small was derived from the earth (this is a dictum in the Medrash often cited in the Kabbala – הכל היה מן העפר אפילו גלגל חמה), and we know that man is a microcosm of the universe, which means that wherever man stands he is the earth, suspended in the reality (“hypostasis”) just as securely as earth.

  

With this understanding we can explain the commandment of not to have foreign gods – which HY set for the gentile nations (Deuteronomy 4:19), to mean that a Jew is forbidden to see himself existing as some arbitrary floating dot in space, where all types of others things also meander, roam, or orbit. A Jew must be geocentric, knowing that the whole world was created for him (see Likutay Moharan Torah-teaching 5), and revolves, operates, and functions completely in synchronization to him. Every person according to the level of humility – likening to the earth – pivots themselves closer to the truth of this reality. The tzadik is the quintessence of this (Likutay Moharan 70), and is the root of all the souls.

There is definitely a perspective that HY created to see the world as if it was created in space together with all types of other forces and formations. That is a superficial perspective which HY set for the nations to be occupied with, but a Jew must not let himself get stuck there. That is like getting stuck with the physics of Newton and refusing to acknowledge and understand quantum physics, just much much worse. [See the beginning of Daas Tevunos 2, where the Ramchal reveals that HY made the world this way, that there is the true reality of the Torah, and there is a superficial facade masking it].

This is what it says in (Deuteronomy 31:17), “Because my G-d is not inside of me I have been beset with all this evil.” That is when one loses the true perspective that he is the world and G-d is shining into him, he falls into the hands of all the multivariable forces and formations competing in the superficial ecosystem of the universe.

It is also possible to understand with this the first two of the Ten Commandments which we heard directly from HY. The first commandment, “I am Hashem… Who took you out of the land of Egypt,” Egypt in Hebrew is mitzra-yim, borders and constraints, because as long a person retains this outlook that he exists in space together with other things, then he is living under the domination of limitations. The second commandment says, “You should not have foreign gods….” this was explained above, that as long a person sees himself as a creation in space he will be subject to the vying entities in his universe.

Na Nach Nachma Nachman MayUman!

Wake up to Reality! Na Nach Nachma Nachman MeUman!

HH

Technology and Substances have greatly helped the world understand the probability of man tenets of our faith which previously were just that – faith, and now understood to be matter of facts. Like the telephone – making it a given that one can speak to HY whenever and wherever, and the cameras – making it a given that everything we say and do is recorded. And of course there is now augmented and virtual reality which is rapidly progressing. Previously I posted how the movie Matrix might have been inspired by the holy Petek, that movie made a huge impression and impact on the world, powerfully raising awareness of an idea which is just growing stronger and stronger – that our very lives, all our movements, interactions, and dealings, are just projections of the perspective of our minds which might be and can be programmed to experience all life events. Studies and experiments with lsd and other hallucinogens make it clear that people can easily be introduced to life in an alternative reality. These themes are already rampant in the movies and tv. Recently a very popular tv show – Criminal Minds – ran a whole program based on a villain who would drug people and have them live a completely different reality. In the end the villain captures a high member of the fbi and induces her with his drugs having her believe that she is crippled and in severe unbearable excruciating pain. Ultimately the lady breaks out of the spell by virtue of an age old teaching of Our Holy Sages that when one is completely inundated under duress of his evil inclination GF, which imprisons and captures his mind and thoughts, and even Torah learning doesn't break him free, he should remember the day of death – and by contemplating her death, this woman realizes that her entire existence as a cripple is falsehood, and she breaks out. At the end of the show she tells her team that the only thing that kept her going until she was able to break out was by repeating a mantra – no it wasn't Nanach, because Nanach works on the first shot, nuclear bombs don't need to be clustered – "wheels up" – which for various reasons elicits the holy teaching of Rabbainu, that no matter where a person has fallen to, even in the most defiled quagmire of impurity where everything is utterly repugnant with the stench of sin and he can't even find a single point of good, his entire existence is rotten to the core GF and everything is just bleak gloom GF, even from there one must know that there is no existence without GD and he must scream "A-YAY?!" where is he really at?! Where is the GLORY of GD?! (wheels – is similar to A-YUL – which is the ram associated with the awesome quest of A-yeh, and up – is close, especially in Yiddish, to Hope). And by screaming A-yay one transforms his entire reality to be that of the highest revelation of Gd.

Na Nach Nachma Nachman MeUman!

The innate prohibitive problem with movies and tv

HH
Much has been said to explain why movies and tv are so detrimental, but even they don't address the main core of the issue, and therefore when it comes to really kosher educational media there are allowances and approval. The truth however is that the very nature of movies is harmful and the quintessential opposite of Torah values.
The Talmud extols Rav, one of the sages, praising him for never ever glancing out of his four cubits, and this virtue is an instruction enumerated and highly encouraged in the classic work Raishis Chuchma and other ethical works. In these holy texts we find a term "chaizoo (the sight) dihigh (of this) almu (world)," the Ramchal in Adir Bamurom goes so far as to say the senses we have are actually inhibitions which block the true senses of our soul! And in one of the greatest revelations of Rabbainu Na Nach Nachma Nachman Me'Uman, the Story of Ancient Times of the Seven Beggars, Rabbainu revealed how the saints completely transcended the sensory faculties of this world. Now even though these are obviously tremendously high levels which at best we can pray for from our very remote vantage point, nevertheless they are the true reality of this world, and even if we do not see ourselves achieving their recognition it is definitely forbidden to give power and strength to the false reality. So as much as we are trapped and enslaved by the facade of this world, and we must contend with it, there is really no excuse to bring upon ourselves extraneous succor to the allusion. Such is the nature of every movie, even a very kosher and educational one, it entraps a person in the facade of the world. For the lessons we learn even with our physical senses are seeking the truth which is really imbued and transpiring, whereas a movie is really intent on the visual scenario which is the antithesis of the reality. So even when there is a good message the loss might far out way the gain.
Na Nach Nachma Nachman Me'Uman