Longing for the Future

I am a “Russian Israeli. This is the name of those who returned to their historic homeland from the places of dispersion, where the native language was Russian. I myself am from the Far East – I was born and grew up in Khabarovsk Krai. I’ve been living in Israel for about thirty years now.

Only twenty-one years after my departure for Israel, I was in Russia again, but as a guest. And it was not the Far East, but Moscow. I was not familiar with Moscow, so I could not say anything about the changes that had taken place there during that time.

And I wasn’t particularly interested in the city, I was more interested in the people. After all, in a very short period of time in history, they had to go through a storm of changes, from chaos to a complete change of lifestyle.

What is the new generation that grew up after the destruction of the “Unbreakable Union”? How has the change affected the older generation? What kind of Russia do Russians dream of today?

When I left Russia three decades ago, the flame of the idea of building a communist society was already dying out. It faded away, failing to warm either the Soviet people or the whole world, as idealists dreamed it would.

Maybe it’s for the best. Why live a pipe dream if you can just live and enjoy life, raise children, build, buy, get rich.

But why, then, do many people who lived in that era have an unquenchable longing for those not entirely well-fed and not entirely free times? Why would many want to go back to the Soviet country that was taken away from them by ruthless time?

And because I carry a piece of Soviet Russia in my heart, I can understand these people. But in no way would I want to go back to the past, no matter how beautiful it seemed.

I would like to wish Russia a future that promises every conceivable and inconceivable good, not only to the people of this country, but to all mankind. And so I used the works of a great sage of the twentieth century, a Kabbalist named Baal Sulam, in my wish. According to the definition, a wise man is one who sees the development of the universe from the beginning of its creation to its final development. And if this man devoted a lot of time to describing the development of Russia, he must have considered this people a very special part of all mankind.

Wise people say that without the past there is no future. It is given to us by nature to make mistakes in our deeds, so that we will not repeat them in the future. But this law only works when the root of the error is found, not just a mistake.

A little more than a hundred years ago, barely freed from serfdom, Russia stepped to a completely new social and economic relations for the world. It was a revolutionary idea in every sense.

Just think about it – to undertake to build a society in which a person feels secure in the future, not because he has accumulated money, property, or acquired an important position. But because “Man is man’s friend, comrade and brother,” and everyone works for the benefit of “friends and brothers,” receiving from society a guarantee of full provision of everything necessary for normal life.

A truly great idea. But, what results were achieved in doing so?

“…As we all see how a huge society of many millions in a country like Russia, which occupies an area larger than the whole of Europe, which has a reserve of minerals almost unparalleled in the whole world, has decided to introduce a collective economy and has virtually eliminated all private property.

And since no one had any other concern but for the good of society, it would seem that they had already grasped the full meaning of the commandment to “give to one’s neighbor” as far as the human mind could comprehend it. And at the same time, look what it cost them. Instead of rising and surpassing the bourgeois countries, they fell lower and lower until they were unable even to provide their workers with the standard of living of the workers of bourgeois countries, they could not even promise them their daily bread and the opportunity to cover their nakedness somehow. *

Now let’s see what happened next. Having lived through a relatively short period of chaos, misery, poverty, banditry, and robbery after the era of socialism, another Russia was born. With an abundance of goods and products, with opportunities to travel abroad, with the abolition of all restrictions on travel and finding work.
It would seem that you should live and enjoy life as they do in Western countries. But no, here in a very short period of time the priorities have changed again.

So why did failure follow failure? Maybe it’s all about the mentality of the people, their roots, their character? No.

There is one significant difference between the people of Russia and other nations. The fact is that none of the developed wealthy countries have set themselves the task of achieving the commandment of “Love of neighbor.

To build a society of equal opportunities – yes, a society of equals before the laws of the state – of course, a society of consumers and producers – goes without saying. Plant democracy, liberalism, and tolerance all you want. But not unselfish service for the good of man.

One would think that the ideology of the bourgeoisie was smarter and more far-sighted than that of the Russian revolutionaries. And rationalism took over utopia. No.

The spark of love for one’s neighbor, once brought into our world by our Biblical forefathers, was simply alive in the Russian people. Only thanks to her presence could such a “crazy” idea of building a perfect society on the ruins of semi-semi-feudal Russia arise.

And yet these madmen were only one step away from tremendous success.

“One sin, however, this nation has committed, and the Creator has not forgiven them. And the fact is that that precious work entrusted to them, which is ‘giving to their neighbor,’ and which they began to do, should be for the sake of the Creator, not for the sake of mankind. And in consequence of doing their work not for the Creator’s sake, from the standpoint of nature itself they had no right to exist. “*

In other words, nature will never agree that this precious gift from above, the spark of love, should be used only to meet man’s material needs.

After all, it was intended primarily to unite the people – “man to man is a friend, comrade and brother. And it was she who gave birth to slogans about brotherly love, equality and happiness of all people. And the initiators of these undertakings were the carriers of the spark of love – the People’s Volunteers and revolutionaries.

But from these sparks of love, which these idealists tried to instill in the people, only slogans could be born. For in the rest of the mass of people lived a very different nature. And according to it, the rich wanted to be even richer and the poor didn’t mind taking from them what they thought was theirs.

And what love for one’s neighbor is there, when everyone is willing to share the last of what they have. “Plunder the loot” was the foundation on which they tried to build the future, and which was understood by the people.

And since the idealists could not force the people to become altruistic and fraternal alliance, they decided to do it by force, through brutal repression and “penal institutions.” But, just as you cannot establish the final peace through wars, neither can you plant love through hatred and suffering.

And when the Union collapsed, the time for slogans and illusions ended, and true human nature was set free. And this is a terrible force capable of destroying the entire world. But, most surprisingly, it was precisely on the huge gap between the slogans of brotherly love and the brutal reality that the longing for an unfulfilled dream was born in many.

And there will be no way to chase this “genie” of man’s selfish nature back. Except for one thing – to revive that spark of love that still smolders in people with memories of such beautiful but unfulfilled desires.
And not just revive, but learn how to use that spark of love. But without violence and repression. After all, it contains the germ of a future ideal relationship, not only for the people of Russia, but for all mankind.

*BaalSulam, The World