The Problem With Some Mystics.

William James in his series of Gifford lectures on Natural Religion delivered at the University of Edinburgh in 1901 – 1902 began and defined the study of mystics and mysticism.  He offered so four general insights into mystics.  They are:

1.Ineffability—The handiest of marks by which I classify a state of mind as mystical is negative.  The subject of it immediately says that it defies expression, that no adequate report of its contents can be given in words.  It follows from this that its quality must be directly experienced; it cannot be imparted or transferred to others.
[William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience, Longmans, Green and Co., 1902, Dover edition 2002, p380]
 
This experience of connecting with the Divine is one of a finite meeting up with an infinite.  The finite mind cannot fully take in what it encounters and thus is overwhelmed.  The mystic knows this and is trapped, needing to explain what happened and yet knowing the inadequacy of the words it will use.

2.Noetic quality—Although so similar to states of feeling, mystical states seem to those who experience them to be also states of knowledge.  They are states of insights into depths of truth unplumbed by the discursive intellect.  They are illuminations, revelations, full of significance and importance, all inarticulate though they remain; and as a rule they carry with them a curious sense of authority for after-time.
[William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience, Longmans, Green and Co., 1902, Dover edition 2002, p380-381
 
This experience is so powerful, so overwhelming with certainty that it compels the vast majority of mystics to confess, to tell others of what happened and what the mystic has learned.  It is this quality and the compulsion that comes with it that drives them to teach, preach, and for some to write.

Now, let me present what happens when a mystic gets so caught up in those feelings of certainty and compulsion that they leave behind the reality of the ordinary and the everyday experience of life and common sense.
Bnei Baruch is a non-profit institute dedicated to aiding in the teaching of Jewish Kabbalah.  Their efforts are commendable.  They offer much for free and the books that they do sell are inexpensive and quite reasonable.  All in all a worthwhile organization offering the knowledge of the Jewish Kabbalah for those who wish to come, taste, and learn.

Bnei Baruch was established on the premise that “only by expression of the wisdom of Kabbalah to the public can we be awarded complete redemption” (Baal HaSulam {Rav Yehuda Ashlag})
Rav Michael Laitman, Kabbalah for The Student, Laitman Kabbalah Publishers, First Ed. 2009, Third Printing, pg. 858.
 
"There is no other way for the populace to achieve spiritual elevation and redemption except through the study of Kabbalah, which is an easy and accessible way.  However, only a few can achieve the goal using other parts of the Torah."
Rav Yehuda Ashlag, “Introduction to The Study of the Ten Sefirot”, Item 36
Rav Michael Laitman, Kabbalah for The Student, Laitman Kabbalah Publishers, First Ed. 2009, Third Printing, Pg. 503
 
"The prohibition on studying Kabbalah was only for a limited time, until 1490.  But since 1540, everyone should be encouraged to engage in The Book of Zohar, since only by studying The Zohar will humanity achieve its spiritual salvation and the coming of the Messiah.  Hence, we must not avoid the study of Kabbalah."
Avraham Ben Mordechai Azulai, Ohr HaChana (light of the Sun)
Rav Michael Laitman, Kabbalah for The Student, Laitman Kabbalah Publishers, First Ed. 2009, Third Printing, Pg. 503
 
With such good intentions, the powerful experience of the mystical can lead the mystic astray.  For example, Rav Michael Laitman wrote the following:

"The primary mistake is that there are “Kabbalists” who teach that there is some connection between the human body and the spiritual Kli [vessels], as though the spiritual Kli clothes in a human body, as if within each corporeal organ clothes a spiritual organ.  In their view, if one performs a physical act or any physical motion whatsoever, it seemingly contains spiritual content.  They think that in so doing, one actually performs a spiritual action.
Their mistake stems from the Kabbalists’ use of the language of the branches, using worldly words to name and define spiritual terms.  This is the reason for the strict prohibition in the Torah, “Thou shalt not make unto thee a graven image, nor any manner of likeness.”  In other words, it is forbidden to image spirituality in corporeal shapes, not because this could inflict harm Above, but because the false image would prevent one from understanding the Creator’s ways and approaching the goal.
…This is what Baal HaSulam [Rav Yehuda Ashlag] writes in his “Introduction to The Study of the Ten Sefirot.” Those who want to study the Kabbalah the right way are advised to leave all the books on this subject, except for The Book of Zohar, the writings of the Ari, the writings of Baal HaSulam, and the writings of Rabash.
Interpreting the Torah as a historic narrative contradicts the verse that says that the whole Torah is the names of the Creator, that is the Torah of the world of Atzilut, and that all the words in it are Holy Names.  It is important to remember that it does not speak of this world, and the people in it (see “Introduction to The Book of Zohar”, item 58)."
Rav Michael Laitman, Kabbalah for The Student, Laitman Kabbalah Publishers, First Ed. 2009, Third Printing, pg. 520-521.
 
So, let us examine what Michael Laitman and his teacher Yehuda Ashlag just said.

In 1991, Michael Laitman established Bnei Baruch with the purpose, as he said, to bring about the spiritual transformation of the world and the people within it by aiding to bring about the coming of the Messiah.  ‘There is no other way for the populace to achieve spiritual elevation and redemption except through the study of Kabbalah…’ hence Laitman established a place to teach, a publishing house, an internet website, and a television station, all with the express purpose of teaching the Kabbalah since there ‘is no other way…to achieve spiritual elevation and redemption’.
And yet, the error of those other so-called ‘Kabbalaists’ according to Laitman is that they are so delusional that they believe that ‘in their view, if one performs a physical act or any physical motion whatsoever, it seemingly contains spiritual content.  They think that in so doing, one actually performs a spiritual action.’  Rav Laitman is so caught up in his mystical realm of Kabbalah that he has left common sense behind.  If no physical activity can bring about redemption then his whole purpose in life, his establishing Bnei Baruch is for nothing.  Since everything involved in creating and implementing that institution is a physical act.  The act of study involves a physical body and physical objects such as tables, chairs, and books.  The act of teaching involves physical bodies and physical objects and physical interactions.  If redemption comes about by studying Kabbalah and making Kabbalah available for others to learn and study – this can only be done by physical acts.  If the study of the Kabbalah alone brings about spiritual transformation then it must be true that ‘any physical motion whatsoever’ can bring about spiritual transformation and change.

Laitman, and it seems his teacher, lost their way, wandered off into abstract realms, and forgot the everyday realities.  They somehow came to be so caught up in their mystic texts and thinking exclusively it seems in such things that they forgot what it is that they are doing and who and what they are.  They are physical beings existing in a physical world.  A world that they believe was created by the Creator, the Holy One Blessed Be He.  The whole purpose of their life is dedicated to doing a physical goal to do a physical activity such as teaching and study so that they could accomplish a spiritual act.  This simple fact they had forgotten and thus made a mockery of themselves, by making pronouncements that are in fact foolish.  They are themselves examples of engaging in ‘the primary mistake’ of those other ‘Kabbalists’ since they teach that spiritual redemption and bringing about a spiritual goal can be accomplished by the physical act of studying and teaching the Kabbalah.

What about the idea that believing that ‘interpreting the Torah as a historic narrative’ is a mistake?  That statement is also invalid and it is contradicted within the very passages where that claim is made.  Laitman quotes the Torah and its commandment comes from the book of Exodus 20:4-5, wherein it is recounted how Moses went up to the top of Mt. Sinai and was given two tablets where the Ten Commandments were written on and then Moses came down from that mountain and instructed the people in those commandments.  This was the Torah recounting a historic narrative.  It is only if the text truly was recounting the history of the Jewish people that there could ever be a people who would have the teachings of Torah and its fourfold ways of understanding that text, from the peshat—the simple and literal understanding of the text as a historical narrative to the idea of the Sod—the seed or mystical teaching which is what the Zohar is, a commentary on the Torah.  If the historical narrative is not one of the underlying meanings of the text then there would never have been a Kabbalah to teach and study.  By quoting the historical narrative and then claiming that there is no such meaning in the text, you are making a nonsense statement.  You are contradicting yourself and failing to understand common sense.

One of the greatest mystics of the Jewish people was Rabbi Akiva, who helped to decide what would be the texts in the Holy Scriptures and was someone who actually stood before the Divine Throne and live to tell that tale.  Akiva knew that the Torah was both a mystic text and a historical one.
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Laitman has spent too much time only studying the mystical teachings and thus lost his way.  He is an example of what happens when you neglect the physical everyday world.  If you do, you begin to forget how to understand how things really are, you make mistakes and say foolish and contradictory things.  You lose sight of real purpose—which is to live in the Divinely created physical world to accomplish the physical tasks that can bring about spiritual change and transformation.