Quote of the Week 183 - Tao, the Mother of Ten Thousand Things

Something mysteriously formed.

Born before heaven and earth.

In the silence and the void…

It is the mother of ten thousand things.

I do not know its name;

I call it Tao.

--Tao Te Ching, as quoted in The Divine Feminine in Biblical Wisdom Literature, by Rabbi Rami Shapiro

Hebrew Mantras - Adonai Hineni

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Quote of the Week 182 - Process and Effort

The fact is, that in our lifetime we are never guaranteed we will live long enough to finish what we want to accomplish. No guarantee. What we are guaranteed, however, is that we will live long enough to try, to begin the  process. It isn’t about achievement, it is about the effort, the process, the journey, the phases along the way.

--Rabbi Gershon Winkler

[Observation by Steve Gold: And any achievements we may accomplish along the way are just stepping stones in the process, which is never-ending]

Quote of the Week 181 - Intuition

Deep within you, within the recesses of your being, lies the library of intuition, but you do not know how to reach it, and you don’t have access to its wealth. We are all rich, deep within. Great people receive a small fountain from that knowledge, and that’s why they become great. The knowledge of the mind, the senses, and instinctual knowledge do not help in this. All those kinds of knowledge, all those resources, are important and we need them and can use them, but the highest of all knowledge is intuition.

Intuition does not require any evidence at all; it does not need to ask if something is right. When you have intuition, you don’t have to ask about it, because you know it’s right. That knowledge helps you see things and know things as they are, and then you no longer see things incompletely and partially.

--from Essential Swami Rama, Swami Jnaneshvara Bharati, Editor

Quote of the Week 180 - One Breath

Everyone on this planet shares one breath and one life force.

--Pandit Rajmani Tigunait

Quote of the Week 179 - Overcoming Evil

“The Talmud notes that the Shema has the unique ability to dispel the forces of evil…The reason for this should be obvious: evil has power only when it is seen as disconnected from God. If one thinks that there can be a force of evil apart from God, then one can be harmed by it. However, if a person recognizes that even evil is a creation of God, then it no longer has any power over him. God Himself said through His prophet, ‘I form light and create darkness. I make peace and create evil; I am God, I do all these things.’ (Isa. 45:7)…In any case, the Shema declares that God is One. If God is One, then His purpose must also be One. Since God’s purpose in creation was to do good, then the only reason that evil exists is to enhance the world’s ultimate good. If a person has a deep realization of this, then the forces of evil have no power over him.”

-- From Jewish Meditation, a Practical Guide, Jewish Meditation, a Practical Guide, by Aryeh Kaplan, Pp 123, 124.

“The evil inclination and lust are agents of God. They carry out God’s will to mislead a person in order that he will overcome them. From them, you can learn to be as mighty as they are. Just as they never slacken in their work but are trying to destroy you day and night…just as they are happy and delighted to carry out God’s will, it should be as clear to you that God wants you to overcome them until you will conquer yourself and all your desires will be under your control – until you transform them to good…we will take a lesson from the evil inclination to act just as it acts to fulfill God’s will.”

“Evil does not come down from heaven. Nevertheless, evil that exists has an inner power giving it life. And this [inner power] is total goodness. So if you look at the inner aspect of evil, you will only see the good in it.”

--From The Ten Principles of the Baal Shem Tov, translated by Yaacov Dovid Shulman.