ב''ה

This is a very important question.

Often times people are lost in this world. People feel very disconnected from The Creator and feel abandoned.

The first thing you need to do is understand that there is a Creator. This Creator made the world by choosing to give good to another. That is Divine Will. Divine Will expresses itself as Divine Love. Divine Will is the first creation and Divine Love is the expression of Divine Will in an individiualistic manner. God loves each and every creation for what they are.

The second thing you need to know is you exist because you are loved by The Creator. Your very existence is a testimony to the unique and special love that The Creator has for you.

The third thing you need to know is The Creator creates creation to give good to others. Thats right, nothing in creation is part of God in any way. The Creator is not within creation. The reason for this is to teach us humility, generosity, and self control. These traits coupled with patience and acting with forethought allow us to come close to The Creator. The Creator made you dependant but separate because The Creator values your individuality. The Creator wants to give YOU a loving relationship to The Creator.

Now that you know all this you can do three things that will allow you to be close to God.

• Pray directly and only to God. God is your Best Friend as well your Father and King. Talk about anything. Make prayer a regular thing. Talk about your day with God, ask for whatever you want, confess your sins and have a dynamic relationship with God.

• Realize that everything that happens is for your good. If you stub your toe think about how this is helping you. Why would God stub your toe? Have you been going in the wrong direction? You just recieved an extra bonus. What are you doing right? Understand everything is for your good.

• Last you need to develop your character. Humility, Generosity, Self Control, Balance, Patience, and action with forethought (courage) are the traits that The The Creator uses to run the world. Exemplify these traits.

Judaism teaches this is the entirety of Divine Will. Everything in The Bible is to teach these things in order to help everyone come close to God.

Judaism also teaches that as you develop your personal relationship with The Creator you should also follow the commandments of the Torah. In this manner you sanctify the physical self and the world around you allowing yourself to become even closer to The Creator. Do not forget that you are valuable to The Creator and do not forget to show others that they are valuable too. 

Sources:

Mesilat Yesharim and Derech Hashem both by Rabbi Moshe Chaim Luzzatto

The simple answer is yes.

The more complex answer is that Hashem, meaning God, loves everything and everyone equally as long as they exist.

You see the manifestation of Divine Will is reality itself as the root of Divine Love. Divine Favor is the way all things manifest Divine Love. 

Nonetheless Divine Love is a creation, it is not a “part of God” as many erronously believe, but the relationship that allows us to percieve The Creator exists. It was created that way and if uncreated all relationships, meaning reality cease to be.

If something exists then it is loved by its Creator. The reason punishment and suffering exists is not because of a lack of love, but because the person is incapable or unwilling of receiving the love in a revealed way.

It is comparable to a glass. The glass receives cool, clean, water constantly at a steady rate. If the glass is clean the water will taste good and cool. If the person dirties their glass and puts hot coals then the water will be very hot and dirty. The water itself is still clean and cool. It is the actions of the owner of the glass that make the experience unpleasant. In our example the water is Divine Love. The glass is the human being and the negative actions he or she does ،are reflected by the dirt or coals. However the love is the same. The human being has also the capability of expanding the size of the glass as well as share water to clean other glasses.

At the end of the day Divine love is manifest in something by its very existence.

If it exists it is loved by Hashem (God). All things are loved equally, but their purpose might be different or their level of clarity might be greater through effort.

SOURCES:

Derech Hashem, Mesilat Yesharim, and Daat Tevunot

By Rabbi Moshe Chaim Luzzatto. Feldheim Publications.

D.H. Translated by Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan.

M.Y. and D.T. Translated by Shraga Silverstein

Inner Space by Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan

Classes given by The Strettener Chief Rabbi, Rabbi Abraham Breinwein, clarified privately at his home from him afterwards, Kol Yehuda Yeshivah: Old City Jerusalem, Israel

Judaism says that the messiah will be the following:

•A man born from a fourth generation Jewish mother.

•His father must be a descendant of David through Sollomon. 

•He must be from the tribe of Judah.

•This means his paternal line is Jewish since Sollomon.

The messiah, meaning a man,  who meets the above lineage does the following in his lifetime:

•He brings all Jews to Israel.

•He eliminates all idolworship  and all enemies of the Jewish people, both external and internal to the Jewish people.

•Then he establishes eternal world peace. After he does this there is no strife between families or nations ever again.

• Last but not least he dedicates the Third Temple as per the prophecy of Ezekiel. At this point he is not the messiah, he is dubbed the prince of peace. In hebrew the language is Saar Shalom. Once he does this at the command of Elijah The Prophet he becomes the Messiah only after he is annointed by Elijah the Prophet.

Should a person be killed, meaning to die in any manner,  he is not The Messiah, but only a test to The Faithful of Israel.

Source:

Mishney Torah laws of kings and their wars, compiled by Rambam (Maimonedes)

Why do good things happen to bad people and bad things happened to good people?

The answer is that they do not. Let me explain.

The first thing that has to be understood is that God loves EVERYTHING equally. If you exist you are loved. Reward and Punishment have nothing to do with wether God loves something or not. 

This Value called love corresponds to the relationship between The Creator and creation in general and is not dependant on behaviour.

The second thing that needs to be understood is that everything has a purpose. Whatever it takes to shape you into the person that will fullfill that purpose will happen. This might include suffering or joy. This might include miracles and coincidence along with whatever background is needed for you to have. This also has nothing to do with reward and punishment.

This your Identity. This is who you are.

Reward and Punishment happen as a result actions. This happens through a system of consequences once the identity is established. The individual is born and then reaches puberty, at this point identity is set. Before puberty people are not held accountable for their actions, rather their parents are held responsible. After puberty the individual is held responsible for their actions based on their ability to understand and their ability to act. 

The wicked are given their reward in this world and then they die. The righteous are mainly rewarded after the resurection of the dead, but are also rewarded somewhat in this world. Sometimes the rightous suffer in order to give them greater rewards, more on that later.

The person must be good within the framework of the laws that God has given in The Torah. Jews have 613 laws and non-Jews have 7 laws. The person must also develop their ethical framework based on Faith, Humility, Kindness, Self Control, and Zeal to do God’s will. Their uniqueness comes in how they express their creativity within this framework.

This is called Meaning.

Death also purifies a person, unless they take their own life.

After death the person’s soul goes to a spiritual place of purification and the body rots and is purified throught the process. The corresponding spiritual process for the soul lasts a year at most. If the individual has been purified their soul enters a period of joy until the resurection. 

If the person has not been purified enough to enter the soul world and it is determined that the person is capable of refining themselves further they are reincarnated rather than resurected. 

This new body must correct the negative traits that the previous body did not allow the soul to refine. Then upon death the person repeats the process until they end up in the soul world.

Upon resurection the body that completed the task of allowing the soul to enter the soul world is resurected with the soul, BUT those memories of the previous lives that allowed it to become what it is are kept.

If a person is irredeemable and cannot enter the soul world and  be reincarnated to redeem itself their personality and essence is forgotten by all when humanity is resurected. 

Soul Roots have many bodies at the same time. A soul root has many soul branches. This allows the soul to remain in existence. It is only the soul branch lineage that is cut off along with the memory of the life of the individual if the individual cannot be redeemed.

This process is a sort of Virtual Island Mode. The Divine Will manifests Value to the individual and gives them virtual existence as a result (relative to The Creator who has actual inherent existence).

The Individual then exists as a sort of Island in creation having uniqueness in the value that they are uniquely suited for their task. 

The Mode of the individual is the meaning. The Meaning must occur within the framework of The Torah and the teachings of the Prophets aka Judaism.

The concept is known as the Virtual Island Mode or VIM (Value, Identity, and Meaning).

The three aspects are the אה, יה, וה.

The first aspect, Value is connected to the אה as an expression God willing reality into existence to give Good to another. The letter א represents the hebrew word אהבה as well as the word אחד. The first word means Love and the second means One. These concepts are created together to show that God creates the world to give good to another. 

That is why the loving relationship that is created emanating from God is created at the same time as the ה which represents the place where this realtionship manifests.

It can be compared to the light of a prism being created at the same time as the prism. The two are necessary to acomplish the goal of giving reality to a series of unique colors.

Identity is represented by the י as the awareness of the relationship God combined with the uniqueness of the individual ה. The first is sometimes called Chochma, Wisdom, and the second is sometimes called Bina, understanding. What this concept represents is the unique relationship each person or thing has with God as well as the uniqueness that person or thing has within creation and its relationship to others.

This can be compared to the various rays of light when split within a prism. Each of these rays allows for more colors to form along with shades of each color. All of these rays of ligh allow for beauty to exists.

Meaning is connected to the letter ו and ה. The first letter is the way that the person communicates their identity, creativity, emotions, and actions within the framework (ה) that Judaism allows them to use.

The first two aspects, Value and Identity create Awareness of God's will and love that forms the relationship God has with creation and with that person as well as the level of Autonomy (Free will granted a person).

Meaning is ultimately how Autonomy is used and wether the individual will be allowed to retain their autonomy throughout eternity.

Choosing to use one’s autonomy for constructive purposes will guarantee they retain their ability to grow after the resurection ie forever. There the person will be able to see the whole picture and they will ultimately rejoice in the way things happened. 

This is why the world has many events that require hardships as well as benefits. These hardships and benefits are the mechanism that shape people’s identity and are not congruent with their value. These are not bad things, but rather necessary events.

People are either good or bad based on their actions within the framework of The Torah. The punishments and rewards correspond to these actions. The process required to shape them into who they are is separate.

If good things are happening to a bad person then it is either to shape their identity or because they are not going to live beyond death in a resurected state. Conversly good people do not experience bad things, rather they are being shaped as necessary for their identiy or if they are suffering they are being purged of some small transgression.

If the measure becomes full we might see a bad person suffering in their lifetime as punishment not to alleviate their sin BUT rather to uphold The Honor Of God in public. Alternatively if a good person has done some great action they might be honored in their lifetime, not so much to be rewarded but because The Honor of God requires this. In these cases the Honor Of God requires consequences.

Last but not least good and bad things can happen to a group as a whole. There is also situations when it is determined that the generation in the world, a nation, a community, or a family will suffer or be rewarded as unit. The individuals within these units will then experience the suffering or rewards of their community as well iregardless of their own level.

Sources:

1: Mesilat Yesharim

2: Derech Hashem

By Rabbi Moshe Chaim Luzzatto, Feldheim Publications. MY translated into English by Shraga Silverstein, DH translated into English Aryeh Kaplan.

How does the concept of 'Value, Identity, and Meaning' (VIM) guide a person in making ethical decisions in today's world?

The concept of Value, Identity, and Meaning (VIM) is rooted in the following principles:

1. God creates to give good to another. Here we see the principle of Value. Everything created is a necessary part of this system.

2. That good must be the greatest possible good that can be recieved. This means that everything receives the maximum good it can receive. This ability to receive the good defines its unique identity.

3. That good must be earned in order that the reciever makes the good truly theirs. This is the meaning of life. The level of effort put into earning this good is the level of good one has aquired.

A person who accepts that they, along with everything and everyone else has equal value to God, they will be humble and make an effort to see the positive in others.

A person will also love themselves and have positive self esteem. They will understand that their unique situation is in order to shape their identity. They will accept themselves and their emotions as well as their inner personality.

A person who does the above but also understands that they must earn the good will act within the framework necessary to earn the good. This framework will guide them towards a moral path.

Value causes humility and positivity.

Identity as an extension of Value causes positive self esteem.

These two have Meaning within the framework of a system designed to earn goodness. Goodness is defined as the proactive relationship with God.

A person who understands that all things have value because God makes them will be humble while at the same time having positive self esteem. This leads them to developing a further connection with God through the framework of The Torah and Judaism as a whole. This gives their life Meaning.

The Meaning allows a person to self validate using their actions as guided by the Torah Framework. The Torah’s laws are designed to allow a person to emulate giving good to another at every level while doing so exclusively in the service of God. This connects God with kindness in the mind, emotions, and body of the person. Ultimately this increases the ability of the person to be aware of the good that God gives them.

Being aware of the great love God has for you increases exponentially as the process continues. As you become more aware of the relationship with God the level of awareness increases also. This causes great joy in a human as they understand how much they are loved. This understanding increases eternally as the Love that God has for each created thing and creation as a whole is beyond comprehension and every increase increases the level of comprehension.

Thus knowing everything has Value, a unique Identity, and Meaning allows a person to make themselves to be happy via kindness guided by Judaism.

This guides a person’s decisions via the framework of Jewish theology and Jewish Law.

Sources:

Rabbi Moshe Chaim Luzzatto

Relevant works:

Derech Hashem, Mesilat Yesharim, Daat Tevunot