Kabbalah, the religion beloved by celebrities in the noughties

In the early 2000s, it was rare to see celebrities like Madonna, Ashton Kutcher and Lindsay Lohan without a piece of red string tied around their wrists. The bracelet signalled that they followed the mystical religion known as Kabbalah.

The religion appeared to reach its cultural peak during the first decade of the 21st century, which is when Rebekah Neumann, WeWork’s former chief brand and impact officer and wife of WeWork co-founder, Adam Neumann, joined.

In WeCrashed, the new Apple TV+ series which depicts the rise and fall of the co-working giant, you can see Rebekah (played by Anne Hathaway) wearing the thin red string around her wrist while guiding a meditation class.

Rebekah and Adam met in 2007, when she was still Rebekah Paltrow (she is the first cousin to Gwyneth), and she quickly introduced Adam to the religion.

And while the Neumanns incorporated their Kabbalah beliefs into the WeWork empire, over the ensuing decade, many other celebrities fell out of love with the religion.

Provided by The Independent Adam Neumann in 2016 (left) and Rebekah Neumann in 2010 (right) both wear Kabbalah’s red string on their left wrists (Getty)

What is Kabbalah?

Kabbalah has long been associated with Judaism. The word itself comes from the Hebrew word meaning “received knowledge” or “tradition”.

Kabbalah followers, or Kabbalists, say their beliefs date back to the origins of the Torah and they have been an accepted part of Judaism since the 12th century.

Kabbalist’s beliefs have been described as “mystical” as the practice focuses on direct communication with God through solitary study.

According to the Kabbalah Centre’s website, Kabbalah is “an ancient wisdom that provides practical tools for creating joy and lasting fulfilment. It’s an incredible system of technology that will completely change the way you look at your world”.

When did Kabbalah become popular?

The practice became popular in the US in the sixties when a rabbi, Philip Berg, began studying the religion during a trip to Israel in 1962.

Berg subsequently opened the Kabbalah Centre, which saw Kabbalah in the US focus more on personal improvement and spiritual happiness. He ran meditation classes and launched a Kabbalah 101 self-study class.

The way Berg ran his Kabbalah centres meant it was more easily digestible, as it didn’t require people to learn Hebrew in order to practice the religion. Instead, he published his interpretations of ancient Kabbalah texts.

However, Berg’s teachings had many critics. Rick Alan Ross, executive director of the Cult Education Institute, told Broadly that most of the Kabbalah Centre’s teachings have “no basis” in Jewish text.

He added: “Berg’s teachings represent his own idiosyncratic combination of beliefs. For example, that scanning the pages of the Zohar, even when you cannot read Hebrew, somehow will imbue you with supernatural power.”

Which celebrities followed Kabbalah?

As well as Madonna, other celebrities that have followed Kabbalah include Ashton Kutcher and ex-wife Demi Moore, Lindsay Lohan, Monica Lewinsky, Ariana Grande, James Van Der Beek and Donald Trump’s ex-wife Marla Maples.

Other celebrities who have been associated with the religion include Britney Spears, Mick Jagger, Naomi Campbell, Mary-Kate Olsen, Paris Hilton and Elizabeth Taylor.

Provided by The Independent Guy Ritchie and Madonna in 2008 (left) and Adam Kutcher and Demi Moore in 2007 (right). Both Madonna and Moore wear red string on their left wrist (Getty)

In 2014, Grande told the Telegraph that she turned to Kabbalah after her brother was “rejected by the Catholic church” for being gay.

“When my brother was told that God didn’t love him I was like, ‘OK, that’s not cool.’ They were building a Kabbalah centre in Florida so we both checked it out and really had a connection with it,” the singer said at the time.

“Since then, my life has unfolded in a really beautiful way, and I think that it has a lot to do with the tools I’ve learned through Kabbalah, I really do.”

In 2003, Madonna spent £3.5 million on a London townhouse she intended to turn into a Kabbalah centre.

“I think Kabbalah is very punk rock,” she said at the time. “It teaches you that you are responsible for everything. We don’t realise there is a bigger system at work. Everything that comes to you is for a reason – and I think that’s pretty revolutionary.”

When Berg died in 2013, the singer sent an email to The New York Times which read: “I learned more from him than any human I have ever met.”

She added: ‘“This one concept that he taught me, and that Kabbalah teaches, is that you have to take responsibility for your life. You can’t blame other people for what happens. You are in charge of your destiny.”

Kutcher and then-girlfriend Mila Kunis were also present at the funeral. It’s not known which celebrities, if any, still follow Kabbalah or attend the Kabbalah Centre.

What does the red string Kabbalah bracelet mean?

The red string worn around the wrist is the most recognisable sign of the Kabbalah movement.

It’s often worn on the left wrist and is said to ward off any “evil and misfortune” that could be “caused by the evil eye”.

What scandals was the Kabbalah Centre involved in?

Model Jerry Hall revealed in a 2005 interview with Index magazine that Kabbalah Centre followers who went through the “Door of Miracles” were expected to hand over 10 per cent of their income.

She said: “We had a fantastic time with the Kabbalah Centre for about a year. They give very practical advice on day-to-day stuff, like how to be a better parent. But we couldn’t go through the Door of Miracles unless we gave the Kabbalah people ten percent of our money, so we couldn’t study it any more.”

Money was one of the reasons why Madonna seemingly cut ties with the Centre too. According to a NewsWeek investigation in 2011, Madonna and Berg’s son Michael raised $18 million (£13.6 million) through their joint Raising Malawi Foundation.

They had planned to build a girls’ school in Malawai but the project folded after $3 million (£2.2 million) was spent at the LA Kabbalah Centre instead. This led to Madonna taking oversight of the foundation.

The Centre also saw a former student successfully sue Yehuda Berg, Philip Berg’s son.

The student alleged that Yehuda had tried to drug and sexually assuault her. Yehuda and and Kabbalah Centre were ordered to pay $177,500 (£134,450) in damages in 2015.

At the time, a Kabbalah Centre spokesperson told Broadly: “Yehuda has not been involved with the Kabbalah Centre since he resigned in 2012. When Yehuda left the Centre, he made clear that he was doing so because his departure was in the best interests of the Centre and in the best interest of his own personal effort to change his life.”

What is Rebekah Neumann’s history with Kabbalah and how was it introduced at WeWork?

It’s unsure when Rebekah Neumann began taking classes at the Kabbalah Centre in Los Angeles, but it’s thought to be when she moved out there to try and make it as an actor in the early 2000s.

It was Rebekah who introduced Adam to the school of thought, and it was at the Kabbalah Centre where Adam met Kutcher, an early investor of WeWork.

A close friend of Rebekah’s told Bustle in a 2020 profile: “There’s this saying in Kabbalah that the woman is the CEO of the relationship, and she was 100 per cent the CEO of the relationship.”

As chief brand and impact officer, Rebekah funnelled the religion into the WeWork offices too. The Bustle report says Adam “expected deputies to show up for Kabbalah meditation classes”.

A separate report from the Wall Street Journal claimed that Adam would bring teachers from the Kabbalah Centre to company offices and retreats to teach executives. Adam was also thought to have formed WeWork’s company values from what he learned through the religion.

In a 2013 interview with The Real Deal, Adam said: “I noticed that in the Kabbalah community, people were really helping each other. I wanted to translate that into business.”

A spokesperson for Adam later denied that Kabbalah had influenced WeWork’s philosophy, mission or business decisions.

Reference: Independent: 

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Pope, in toughest comments yet, calls Ukraine invasion 'armed aggression'

Reuters/VATICAN MEDIA Pope attends mass on the 400th anniversary of the Canonisation of St Ignatius of Loyola, in Rome

Reference: Reuters: By Philip Pullella

Local churches shun Vatican's moderate stance on Russia

ROME (AP) — The head of the Polish bishops’ conference has done what Pope Francis has so far avoided doing: He publicly condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and urged the head of the Russian Orthodox Church to use his influence with Vladimir Putin to demand an end to the war and for Russian soldiers to stand down.

Provided by Associated Press Russia Ukraine War Vatican

“The time will come to settle these crimes, including before the international courts," Archbishop Stanislaw Gądecki warned in his March 2 letter to Patriarch Kirill. “However, even if someone manages to avoid this human justice, there is a tribunal that cannot be avoided.”

Gądecki’s tone was significant because it contrasted sharply with the comparative neutrality of the Vatican and Francis to date. The Holy See has called for peace, humanitarian corridors, a cease-fire and a return to negotiations, and even offered itself as a mediator. But Francis has yet to publicly condemn Russia by name for its invasion or publicly appeal to Kirill, and the Vatican offered no comment on the Russian strike on Europe’s largest nuclear plant that sparked a fire Friday.

For a pope who has declared the mere possession of nuclear weapons immoral and cautioned against using atomic energy because of the environmental threat posed by radiation leaks, the silence was even more notable.

The Vatican has a tradition of quiet diplomacy, believing that it can facilitate dialogue better if it doesn’t take sides or publicly call out aggressors. It has long used that argument to defend Pope Pius XII, the World War II-era pope criticized by some Jewish groups for not speaking out enough against the Holocaust. The Vatican says quiet diplomacy helped save lives then, and it continued that tradition in its Cold War Ostpolitik policy of behind-the-scenes diplomacy.

Francis took an unprecedented step last week when he went to the Russian Embassy to the Holy See to meet with the ambassador. But the only thing the Vatican said about the meeting was that Francis went to “express his concern about the war.” He also spoke by phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

The Vatican secretary of state, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, took a similarly unusual step this week when, in an interview with four Italian newspapers, he actually named Russia in saying the war had been “unleashed by Russia against Ukraine.”

In the case of Ukraine, which counts a few million Catholics among its majority Orthodox population, Francis is not shy about his hopes to improve relations with the Russian Orthodox Church and its influential leader, Kirill. As recently as December, when fears of a Russian invasion were already tangible, Francis expressed hope for a second meeting with Kirill following their historic encounter in 2016, the first between a pope and Russian patriarch in a millennium.

“A meeting with Patriarch Kirill is not far from the horizon,” Francis told reporters in route home from Greece. “I am always available, I am also willing to go to Moscow: to talk to a brother, there is no need for protocols. A brother is a brother before all protocols.”

Francis’ ambassador to Russia, Archbishop Giovanni D’Agnello, met Thursday with Kirill at the patriarch’s residence in the Danilov Monastery in Moscow. Kirill's office said the patriarch recalled the “new page in history” opened by the 2016 meeting, expressed appreciation for the “moderate and wise position” of the Holy See in resisting being drawn into the conflict and insisted churches can only be peacemakers.

The Vatican didn't report the meeting and its spokesman didn’t respond when asked for comment.

One of Francis' top communications advisers, the Rev. Antonio Spadaro, however, noted Kirill is “facing a great challenge” to weigh the now-growing list of Orthodox priests, metropolitans and ordinary Ukrainian faithful who are begging him to raise his voice against Putin and change position. In an essay published by the Italian news agency Adnkronos, Spadaro didn't count Francis among them, though he quoted the pope as saying recently that it was “very sad” that Christians were making war.

 Provided by Associated Press Russia Ukraine War Vatican

That moderate tone was echoed this week when the Holy See’s ambassador to the United Nations stressed the need for humanitarian corridors in Ukraine to allow refugees out and humanitarian aid in. He didn't identify Russia as the reason they were needed, according to the Vatican summary of his remarks.

The Holy See’s foreign minister, Archbishop Paul Gallagher, met Wednesday with his Italian counterpart, Luigi Di Maio. The Italian foreign ministry said Di Maio “repeated Italy’s firm condemnation of the Russian aggression to the detriment of Ukraine and the commitment to continue on the path of effective and incisive sanctions against the government of the Russian Federation," while helping Ukraine in the “humanitarian, economic and defense areas.”

The Vatican, which is sending medical supplies to Ukraine, said nothing after the meeting.

Such silence has not been shared by the head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, who has been emphatic in his daily denunciations of the Russian invasion. Nor has it been shared by Polish bishops, who are now helping to mobilize the reception of tens of thousands of Ukrainian refugees who have crossed the border.

“I ask you, Brother, to appeal to Vladimir Putin to stop the senseless warfare against the Ukrainian people,” Polish Bishop Gadecki said in his letter to Kirill. “I ask you in the most humble way to call for the withdrawal of the Russian troops from the sovereign state that is Ukraine.”

“I also ask you to appeal to Russian soldiers not to take part in this unjust war, to refuse to carry out orders which, as we have already seen, lead to many war crimes," he added. “Refusing to follow orders in such a situation is a moral obligation.”