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Kabbalah was born on the day of Shavuot

The festival of Shavuot is one of the most important for Kabbalah, because even its name comes from what happened that day, in which Moses received the Torah from God. The word "Kabbalah" comes from the Hebrew "lekabel" which means "reception."

The Mishnah at the beginning of the Treaty of Avot says: "Moses received (" kibel ") the Torah at Sinai and transmitted it to Yehoshua, and Yehoshua to the elders, and the elders to the prophets, and the prophets transmitted it to the men of the Great Assembly ... " This is the " seder hakabalá ", the order in which wisdom began to pass from mouth to ear from Moses to the present day.

Rabbi Manny Viñas clarifies that we know on what date this Torah transmission occurred, because we only have to count 7 weeks from the second day of Passover (the Omer's account). That is, 50 days after the people of Israel left Egypt, the "kabalat haTora", the reception of the Torah on Mount Sinai occurred. So the 6th of the month of Sivan, during the feast of Shavuot, is one of the most important for those who study Kabbalah.

Why do Kabbalists study all night on Shavuot?

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Tradition tells us that on the night of Shavuot, Jewish families gather, have a dinner that may include dairy products (kosher laws have not yet been promulgated), girls and women light candles, and men often read the Torah and study late into the night

If the Torah was delivered on a night like this, it is logical that for thousands of years the righteous men dedicate themselves to study it during the Shavuot.

A Kabbalistic interpretation Rabbin Manny Viñas tells us that the Jewish people, while in Egypt, had been infected by Pharaoh's practices of black magic and sorcery. Therefore, Jews were at the lowest possible spiritual level, and was not prepared to receive the Torah.

Hence the rush to leave Egypt: if they had delayed another day, they would have been trapped. They did not have time to prepare the dough, to leave it, and that is why they had to eat unleavened bread. They could not gather food, so they had to trust in God and collect every morning the manna in the desert, but only the necessary one for the day, there was no time to be lost, it was necessary to reach Sinai in the exact stellar moment.

That journey, according to Kabbalah, is an ascent from the lowest and most unclean level, to a state in which they could receive the Torah. Those were 49 degrees of promotion, until the night of the 50th day when the reception finally occurred, the "ha-kabbalah Torah."

To abandon selfishness in order to receive the light of Kabbalah

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Of course, it does not make sense today to measure those 49 days, those degrees of ascent, depending on abandoning practices of black magic and sorcery. Pharaoh and the rise of the count of Omer have another meaning, perhaps deeper, more spiritual, more related with the vision of a kind of stairway to heaven (Jacob's ladder), in which we glimpse the 125 steps that separate us from the upper lights and the infinite world.

And for that account, that ascent and that ladder to have spiritual meaning for us today, they have to be linked with our current degrees, with our contemporary "sorcery" or "black magic".

My master, Rav Michael Laitman, tells us that the shavuot means the possibility of immersing ourselves in the study of the Torah, of the higher lights of Kabbalah, to abandon the selfishness that holds us captive, that is destroying our planet, and that converted us, as Hobbes said, in "homo lupus homini", man as the wolf of man.

Pharaoh means selfishness, while Moshe means to bestow, so shavuot means "Love your neighbor as yourself."

In Egypt there was not yet the Jewish people. It was a conglomeration of slaves, dedicated to work, to eat, to survive isolated from one another.

But when those 600,000 souls arrive at Mount Sinai, something amazing happens, the greatest miracle in the history of Kabbalah: they had walked 7 weeks ascending from egoism, and they could receive the Torah, only because they had committed to watch over each other, with the phrase "we will do and we will listen." That changes everything. From there, Kabbalah is born, the science that studies the transit of the upper lights from top to bottom and from bottom to top, the bestowal, the way of Love to your Neighbor as yourself, just a night like the one that is finishing.

What does Shavuot mean for Kabbalah today?

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It means fundamentally a point of inflection, a day for the return to the wisdom of Kabbalah, for study, to share those lights, to write a simple article of diffusion like this.

You no longer have to be a Jew to study Kabbalah, because this science has been opened by Baal HaSulam for all nations, for all men, including women, and for children. The prophecy tells us that, at a given moment, when the Massiach era approaches, "even children will have access to divine knowledge."

That divine knowledge is not only the study of the ten sefirot, of the Tree of Life or the Mystery of Creation, the Maasé Bereshit. In Babylon, a Gentile asked Rabbi Hillel to explain the whole Torah while standing on one leg. Hillel said: "Do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you. That's all, the rest you can learn in Yeshiva, go study. "

That simple commandment, shared by some of the great religions of the world, was what God transmitted to Moses on the feast of Shavuot. And it still has a lot to do with us.

We live in a world in crisis. Our ego as Humanity has grown so much that we are devouring the planet. We want to receive (consume) more and more each day, to the point that we are depleting the planet's natural resources. We have become, so to speak, cancer cells on the organism that is the earth, on Pangeia.

The result of that ruthless appropriation has catastrophic consequences against us, because we are part of that organism that we are devouring. Wars, pandemics, hunger, depression, destruction of family and social ties that previously helped us move and "being" in the world.

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And interestingly, it is not a problem only of people suffering from hunger, exclusion, violence. Many rich and famous people, film artists and famous athletes, who possess everything they can materially desire, feel that their lives have no meaning. The list includes Michael Jackson, Madonna, David Beckham, Ashton Kusher, Britney Spears, Demi Moore, Paris Hilton and Mick Yager among others ...

They look for spiritual answers, in Buddhism, meditation and other oriental techniques, but lately, also in Kabbalah. It is the reason why many well-known stars of the jet set study Kabbalah, and confess that the study of this science has helped them to balance their lives.

Kabbalah is a theoretical and practical science, which includes the study of books, group study with a Rav, meditation and acts of faith above reason.

It is an arduous path, that of the correction of our ego. But the practical results - and that I can personally give you faith - is that you achieve in this life balance, peace, and contact with the origin, with the Creation, with the higher lights.

And it all started on a 6th day of Sivan, a night like this of Shavuot, when Moses received the Torah after the 600,000 souls had committed themselves to take care of each other, when they said: "We will do and we will listen."

Óscar Reyes-Matute
(Samuel Ibn Motot / שמואל אבן מתת)

Video recommended:
Michael Laitman:
Shavuot: The Great, Special Holiday of "Receiving The Torah"

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