Hashem Suffers When His Children Are Suffering

Welcome to our weekly program, The Inside Story of Chabad in America, through the Mindel Archives. This program is a continuation of last week's — you can always click back and see it.

Before we learn this, people wanted to know — so we mentioned one thing that the Rebbe mentioned about the Aibishter: that everything He does is only to bring down the Shechinah. That's it — everything He does is only for that reason. Why? Because this is why the world was created, and this is why He created it — that's all, no personal motives. This is what we spoke about last week.

The Rebbe asked Rabbi Mindel to find [a source] — I think some of you were putting it in Talks and Tales, I'm not sure — but I showed you last week, I spoke about it. So there's one [source] that when Rabbi Mindel wrote, he mentioned something, and this is from the Gemara, and I think it's important to mention it because this is the mashal of the avodah in this world.

So I'll tell you what's mentioned there. There was a house, and there was an upstairs and a downstairs. For example, Reuven was the owner of the upstairs, and Shimon was the owner of the downstairs. All of a sudden the house fell down — there was a fire, or whatever happened — it was destroyed. So they had nowhere to live. The Mishnah says that Reuven, from the upstairs, comes down to Shimon and says, "Please build a house, because you cannot have an upstairs without a downstairs."

So the Mishnah says: if Shimon agrees, fine — Shimon builds the downstairs, and Reuven builds himself the upstairs. But what happens if Reuven comes to Shimon and says, "Build the downstairs," and Shimon says, "I'm not ready, I don't want to build, I can't, whatever the reason" — what should Reuven do? Reuven has to have a place to live. So the halachah is that Reuven can build the downstairs, even though his apartment is upstairs. But in this case, he can live there until Shimon decides to move in, pay him the money, and when Shimon decides to move in, then Shimon moves in downstairs, and Reuven builds himself the upstairs. This is the Mishnah.

So the Rebbe says: just like there is this halachah, there is a spiritual parallel. There is Reuven and there is Shimon, the owner of the Bayis. Let's say instead of Reuven, it's called the Aibishter, who lives upstairs. Downstairs is the Bayis — we are downstairs, we are created to do [the mitzvos]. All of a sudden there was [a churban], and the house is destroyed.

What happens when a house is destroyed? Then the Baal Habayis doesn't have where to live, and the Shechinah doesn't have a place to live, and we don't have a place. What happens — the Mishnah says the Baal Aliyah [the one upstairs] goes to the one downstairs and asks him, "Please build a house." So the Aibishter comes to us and says, "Do the mitzvos, so that you'll be able to have a house, and I will be able to have an upstairs — because I cannot have an upstairs without a downstairs." So the halachah is also, as the Mishnah says, that he can't go upstairs until there's a downstairs.

So the Shechinah is in galus — if we're in galus, the Shechinah suffers also. So He tells the Yidden, "Build a house." So they build, and then everything is fine — you have the Shechinah.

What happens — the Mishnah says — if the one upstairs comes to the one downstairs and says, "Build," and he doesn't want to build, or he has no money — the Yidden don't want to do mitzvos, or they don't want to do it — the Shechinah is begging them. What's the halachah? That the Shechinah Himself can build it downstairs, until we do teshuvah — until we decide to move down, then we do teshuvah, and that's it. Meaning, the Shechinah doesn't leave us alone — even in galus, the Shechinah is with us, He's downstairs, He's with us. That's not the kavanah — the Shechinah is downstairs with us.

So when we decide to do teshuvah, then — but if we do the right thing, if we do the mitzvos the way we're supposed to, Moshiach will come, and you have downstairs and upstairs, everything is fine. Moshiach will come anyway, but while [we're in galus] — the Shechinah is here, but that's not it — the Shechinah needs His place upstairs.

So the whole idea, as we said last week, is to bring down the Shechinah — that is to bring the geulah, and that is the responsibility of a Yid, that he does the mitzvos, that he wants to bring Moshiach. And that's the — and next week we're going to say why we say that a Yid cannot — cannot just be here. Why — what is he supposed to do? The Yid does everything for the Shechinah, but what is the Yid['s role] — how is he supposed to act here, to bring down the Shechinah, so that the Aibishter should have a dirah right here in this world, and in gashmiyus.

Next week we will continue. Thank you.