The Thin Line between Love and Hate - Official Kabbalah Publication of the Bnei Baruch Kabbalah Education & Research Institute
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The Thin Line between Love and Hate

In an article called, “Scientists prove it really is a thin line between love and hate,” Steve Connor, editor of The Independent, reports: “Scientists studying the physical nature of hate have found that some of the nervous circuits in the brain responsible for it are the same as those that are used during the feeling of romantic love – although love and hate appear to be polar opposites … the ‘hate circuit’ shares something in common with the love circuit.”

Actually, Kabbalah goes even further and explains that love and hate differ only by one’s intention: Is it aimed towards self-benefit or another’s benefit? In other words, if we love for our own benefit, meaning that we care for the object of love only because it provides us pleasure, then it doesn't differ very much from hate. On the other hand, if we truly try to acquire the feeling of love, the intention of benefiting others, we will experience a much broader and more complete reality because we will feel the world through another.

There, beyond ourselves, we will feel a completely different flow of time, space, and perception. We will cease to perceive only ourselves and will replace “self” with “other.” By transferring the center of perception from within to without, we will actually begin to perceive the Upper World -a sensation of boundless fulfillment and the all-inclusive flow of life.