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The Latent Sense

Reception in Kabbalah is all about perceiving the spiritual
world. It is a world invisible to the five senses, but one we
certainly experience. If everything we perceive depends on
our senses, it stands to reason that all we need to sense the 

spiritual world is a special sense that perceives it. In other
words, we don’t need to look for anything outside of us, but
we need to cultivate a perception that already exists within us
that lies dormant. In Kabbalah, this perception is called “the
sixth sense.”
Actually, the title, “sixth sense,” is a bit misleading; it is not
a “sense” in the physiological meaning of the word. But because
it enables us to perceive something that we otherwise wouldn’t,
Kabbalists have decided to call this different means of perception
“the sixth sense.”
Here’s the crux of it all: our five senses are “programmed”
to serve personal interests. For this reason, all we perceive 

is what seems to serve
our best interests. If your
senses were somehow programmed
to serve the interest
of the whole world,
then that’s what we would
perceive. In this way, each
of us would be able to perceive what every other person, animal,
plant, or mineral in the universe perceives. We would
become creatures of unlimited perception—omniscient, literally
Godlike people.
In such an unbounded state, the five senses would be used
in a very different way. Instead of focusing on personal interests,
they would serve as means of communication with others.
This is why the sixth sense, which enables perception of the
spiritual worlds, is not a sense in the usual meaning of the
word; it is the intention with which we use our senses.