The
Secret: The Phenomenon/ The movie/ My Challenge
By
Kabbalist Rabbi Yitzchak Schwartz
THE
PHENOMENON
I began
teaching a few weeks ago
here in
of the
Secret'. My intention is to take on the challenge of exploring the
essence of
this phenomenon whose impact is felt on a global level. It's main
appearance is
in the form of a movie entitled "The Secret ". "The Secret" is
now the
subject of seminars, articles, national talk shows and other forms of
supplementary
literature. It's based on the premise that the greatest figures
of history all
shared a secret - "The Law of Attraction". For whatever reason,
the presenters
of this movie felt that now [ actually about a year ago] is the
time to
'reveal this cosmic secret.
THE
MOVIE
The movie is
very well done, presenting the principle that your thoughts or
desires,
whether positive or negative, manifest in reality. Therefore, if you
take hold of
this power and direct your thoughts\will in a positive non self-
sabotaging way,
the universe will grant you anything you want---something
like your own
personal genie in a bottle 24/7. The movie's battery of
scholarly
presenters, historical natural proofs, life applications as well as
tips
for 'getting
it'--were very impressive. Although I must confess, being Jewish
for me, and
for many others, is often experienced as being the
constant
skeptic, a Holy skeptic--mind you, always feeing like there must be
more to it
than the agenda that all these and other glossy eyed sworn
believer-presenters
want to sell to us---in fact, my stomach began to get a
bit queasy
after watching one too many of these semi-proselytes do their
thing. After
having said that, I must admit that it was a very powerful
presentation!
MY
CHALLENGE
What's driving
me to depart from my normal writing style [and comfort
zone] and
tackle this subject are a few factors;
A. I've been
using something similar to the 'Secret's' formula [before I even knew
it was a
phenomenon]
for years, especially this last year both for personal situations and
to coach
others.
I can
definitely testify that it works and oftentimes miraculously!
B. If this
phenomenon has that big of a cosmic/global
impact, I'd say it's worthy
of some
serious
study.
C. Being a
long-time student of Jewish wisdom, both the revealed and mystical
types, I am
absolutely,
screamingly certain that over the last few thousands of years of Jewish
scholarly
history,
involving millions of brilliant and inspired minds, there were
countless
luminaries who
lived "the
Secret", in their own way - and in that mass of historical brilliance,
there
must be hidden
somewhere a
uniquely Jewish take of "the Secret" and most likely even 'the secret
of the
secret'---
I'm driven, or
better yet obsessed to uncover it!
D. Last, but
not least, there was something weird about how they projected God's
role in the
movie i.e. if
you resonate with the vibrations of the law of attraction properly,
then, 'YOUR
WISH [be it
$1000,000, a new Porsche, or a life filled with happiness] IS GOD'S
COMMAND!'
The Universe
somehow becomes our cosmic genie in the bottle or Divine bellhop, if
you
prefer.
But isn't
there a bit more to the dynamic of our relationship with the Divine
than that?
So I began to
explore...
After sending
the above commentary out in my weekly email, I received a lot of
messages from
people who
wanted to know what the Jewish/Kabbalistic tradition teaches concerning
these
ideas.
Previously,
after introducing the essential idea of 'The Secret' as being a way to
miraculously transform
your will into
manifested reality, we stated that our main challenge is to find the
Jewish
element of the
'Secret' as
well as the secret of the 'secret'. I received a lot of messages from
people
who, after having
found that
they have discovered [often a long time ago] the power and the reality
of
manifesting
their desired
outcomes in life, nevertheless, felt that they wanted to know what the
Jewish
tradition
teaches,
especially in light of the very shallow portrait of the G-d-man dynamic
that
was presented in the
movie.