Posted on 04/06/2011 5:18:44 AM PDT by SJackson
'Newsweek' article claims organization's founders live luxuriously, money for Africa charity Raising Malawi went to LA offices.
As the Madonna-run charity Raising Malawi collapses, the Kabbalah Centre is coming under fire for lavish expenses, according to a Newsweek article published this week.
Raising Malawi, which was meant to found a girls' school in one of Africa's poorest countries from which Madonna adopted two children, imploded last week, despite reportedly raising $18 million and spending $3.8 million on the planned school. Kabbalah Centre International, the pop star's partner in the foundation, is now being investigated by the FBI.
According to the report, only $850,000 of the money $3.8 million was actually spent in Malawi, while the rest was spent in Los Angeles, at the Kabbalah Centre's offices.
Newsweek reported widespread corruption in the organization, saying that the Centre's founders, Phillip and Karen Berg and sons Michael and Yehuda, live in Beverly Hills mansions owned by the organization. The Kabbalah Centre also reportedly pays for the Bergs' "food, furniture, clothing, gas, nannies, tutors, gardeners housekeepers, personal assistants, and more exotic indulgences such as luxury cars, first-class flights and spas."
In response to the charges, Kabbalah Centre's lawyer Shane Hamilton told Newsweek that the Bergs' luxurious lifestyle is "a parsonage" that is part of their salary. The organization said that the Bergs "have taken a vow of poverty." "Disaffected followers have accused Berg and his family of treating congregants like personal servants, housing them four to a bedroom, paying them a $35-a-month stipend, and advising them to apply for food stamps," the article explains. Hamilton explained that that "chevre," Kabbalah center members, "take a vow of service and are supplied with basic necessities in exchange for 12-hour days of labor," much like Scientology's Sea Org. In fact, Newsweek says that the Kabbalah Centre's detractors call the organization "Jewish Scientology."
Some Kabbalah Centre-related lawsuits include an allegation that it benefited from a Ponzi scheme that ended in the conviction of Mark Goldman, of Goldan, LLC, who frequented the Manhattan branch. There have also been civil suits "alleging that the Kabbalah Centre had exploited the trust of wealthy followers in order to pillage their bank accounts," Newsweek reported.
What is it with these Hollyweird types and their cultist religions? They aren’t the brightest bulbs on the tree in the first place..........
If you’d like to be on or off, please FR mail me.
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Glad to see that twit Madonna feeling some heat.
The FBI doesn’t launch investigations on a whim. Must be some serious stuff going on.
“jewish scientology”
good one
Slavemasters and slaves, Beverly Hills style. Kabbalah and Scientology have given all the disaffected hippies a family. Unfortunately, the family is a cult and the ‘children’ are brainwashed.
This is what happens when you are so desperate for fulfillment that you will jump on any bandwagon that comes along. These cults are all the same - the only one who makes out is the leader.
So is Kabbalah the Jewish equivalent of Christianity’s Tele-Evangelists?
http://www.aish.com/sp/k/Kabbala_1_What_Is_Kabbala.html
...Kabbalah is to Torah what philosophy is to science.
Like science, the Torah gives us the facts that are fully perceived sensually and rationally quantifiable.
Like philosophy, Kabbalah gives us the grander abstract picture that the facts present...
...These three people illustrate the different approaches to Kabbalah.
The “data” or facts that Kabbalah deals with are the narrative of the Torah, and its entire body of religious law. The “researcher” represents a person who sees the laws and narrative as they are, understands their immediate meaning, but does not get the larger picture.
The “great scientist” represents the Kabbalist who sees the various local points and then begins to get a feel for the greater picture. He needs metaphors to describe the abstract unity he perceives, and he is aware that this tool is likely to be vague and only approaching the understanding that he has acquired. Although limited by the tools at his disposal, the complex picture the great scientist communicates can still give us a sense of the reality that he is grappling with.
And then there is the pseudo-Kabbalist — “the eavesdropper” — whose Kabbalah is basically unrelated to Torah, except perhaps as a springboard for his imagination. He has discovered “sources of energies,” “divine emanations,” and ways to “expand consciousness,” but it all stems from his fanciful illusions...
Too much mysticism. I´ll stick to Torah.
http://www.mechon-mamre.org/jewfaq/kabbalah.htm
...Mysticism and mystical experiences have been a part of Judaism since the earliest days. The Bible contains many stories of mystical experiences, from visitations by angels to prophetic dreams and visions. The Talmud considers the existence of the soul and when it becomes attached to the body. Jewish tradition tells that the souls of all Jews were in existence at the time of the Giving of the Torah and were present at the time and agreed to the Covenant. There are many stories of places similar to the Gentiles’ heaven and hell. The Talmud contains vague hints of a mystical school of thought that was taught only to the most advanced students and was not committed to writing. There are several references in ancient sources to ma’aseh bereishit (the work of creation) and ma’aseh merkavah (the work of the chariot [of Ezekiel’s vision]), the two primary subjects of mystical thought at the time.
In the middle ages, many of these mystical teachings were committed to writing in books like the Zohar. Many of these writings were asserted to be secret ancient writings or compilations of secret ancient writings, and some probably are. It is important to remember, however, that such secret writings that are not the results of public debate in authorative rabbinical courts must never be understood (actually misunderstood) as contradicting the laws that were openly discussed and properly enacted. All too many Jews as a practial matter have rejected the law and have prefered to practice their misunderstandings of Kabbalistic books or their rabbis’ misunderstandings of them. This is simply inexcusable: The proper subject for such writings is why we do what we do when we observe the Torah, not what we need to do to observe the Torah...
Every cult advocates that humans can become like God. Sick.
Too much mysticism still, thanks. I´ll stick to Torah.
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