The Chosen People

The Meaning of the Chosen People in the Bible

Nov 20, 2007 Mark Zimmerman

The Chosen People are not a physical nation or race, but people who have been granted a special desire to unite in common love for one another beyond all boundaries.

"We must first understand why the Torah was given to the Israeli nation and not to all the peoples of the world. Is there, God forbid, nationalism involved here? Of course only an insane person would think that."

~Baal HaSulam in "The Revelation of Godliness" (Matan Torah)

Where the Torah writes of Israel as "the chosen people," it is not talking about a nation or a race, or any form of superiority.

Who Are the Chosen People?

"The chosen people" means that the function of the people of Israel is to serve humanity. How should the people of Israel serve humanity? The wisdom of Kabbalah states that the duty of the people of Israel is to unite on the basis of the spiritual law "love thy neighbor as thyself," and based on this unity, be an example for humanity in how to implement correct relationships between people.

Moreover, if we are not talking about a physical nation or race of people, then who are these "people of Israel" whose duty is to serve humanity the example of how to live life correctly?

Israel - its Definition According to Kabbalah

Israel is a combination of two Hebrew words: "Yashar" (straight) and "El" (Creator), and stands for one who has a sincere desire to discover the existence of the Creator (Israel = straight to the Creator). One can belong to any culture and have this desire, because it is independent from all of our inborn traits and environmental nurturing.

This spiritual desire exceeds all physical boundaries. One who has such a desire feels that there is a much more fundamental basis than national or cultural borders, upon which all people should equally connect and unite.

Thus, anyone who receives this urge to connect to others beyond all our created boundaries is called one who received a spiritual desire-the desire that is called "Israel." Such a person is one of the "chosen ones" and has the opportunity to work on himself in order to rise above the boundaries of this world, and discover the love between us that exists in our spiritual connection to one another.

The Mission of the People of Israel

Making this connection a livable reality for humanity at large is the mission of the people of Israel, and the method which was given to this people-the wisdom of Kabbalah-was designed as the guide for how we can unite beyond our physical boundaries, and reach common love between us.

Love Thy Neighbor As Thyself - The Purpose of Creation

Kabbalah states that reaching "love thy neighbor as thyself" is the purpose for which humanity and everything we perceive in existence was created. In evolving to the state of "love thy neighbor as thyself," humanity had to go through many generations of increasing separation and individualization. This evolving separatedness would reach a tipping point, where we would start recognizing how flawed our state of life is, and at the same time, start to feel the need to unite beyond our separatedness, and fix our state of life. The Book of Zohar stated that time would begin in the year 1995, and that it would begin in a small group of people who would take upon themselves the work of reaching the level of unity as described in the words "love thy neighbor as thyself," and then disseminate this unity to humanity at large.

Related Material:

• Kabbalah.info - all concepts presented in this article were learned from the free materials and resources available at the Bnei Baruch Kabbalah Education and Research Institute - www.kabbalah.info

The copyright of the article The Chosen People in Kabbalah is owned by Mark Zimmerman. Permission to republish The Chosen People in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.

Love

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Feb 16, 2009 5:32 PM

Guest :

I am so glad to read this, as this is exactly what I believe the chosen people are and that's the way I always knew it since I was a little girl at my school (Catholic).
My peace was troubled when I attended a service at a Christian Church and the guest Pastor (from a Christian Church in Albuquerque), said during his sermon two Sundays ago that: "Israel, the current nation is the chosen people and the blessed by God" and that the United States needs to support Israel in everything, so we U.S. as a nation be blessed by God". That, if the U.S. didn't support Israel, we as a nation will be destroyed! The whole sermon was dedicated to these statements. He also said that he read a book about liars and according to this book a "liberals" lie more than "conservatives". As he was getting deeper into the topic, I became very frightened by his words and a sea of confussion invaded my mind. Many questions came to my mind: Why, if I love my neighbor as myself; help others, obey the 10 commandments,go to Church on Sundays, pray everyday, teach my children to do the same can't I be blessed and saved? If only Israelies and those who support them will be saved and blessed, why do all Christians say that if they accept Christ as their savior they will be saved, blessed. Isn't this contradictory? I asked these questions to several friends of mine who are Christians from different denominations (evangelical mostly) and they all said: Oh, yes it's in the Bible. That, just confused me more. Only one friend, who is 7th day Adventist and a Catholic told me the same that I just read here in your site. For several days I've been thinking about this looking for the real meaning of "Chosen People" and this Pastor's message, which I saw as a way of sayin there will be a war and the U.S. may or may not be on Israel's side, so prepare yourselves to support Israel and when time comes if the Government supports it, you support it and if the government does not support it, go out and protest. I wrote an email to the Pastor of that Church with many questions. I even asked him if Israel decides to kill every single moslem there is for no reason do we have to support so we can be blessed? No answer so far and I don't think he will answer. It was really disturbing, it wasn't a message of peace.
frightened from Riverside.

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