Likkutei Amarim Chapter 15 · 5785

00:00 Speaker 1 Big ones. Who didn’t? Oh, Ayala, yes.

00:04 Speaker 2 Ayala.

00:05 Speaker 1 I have no idea. Chani only told me yesterday. Yes, yes, she lives in my building. In her building, a floor above, something like that.

00:15 Speaker 2 Ours.

00:17 Speaker 1 Chani’s.

00:18 Speaker 2 Chani’s.

00:19 Speaker 1 Yes.

00:19 Speaker 2 Not ours.

00:20 Speaker 1 Huh? And did Rivka give birth? You’re so boring.

00:23 Speaker 2 She said it with their concern. Yes.

00:25 Speaker 1 I saw her today.

00:26 Speaker 2 She had a boy, right?

00:27 Speaker 1 A girl, a girl, a girl. She has a boy; now she has a girl.

00:29 Speaker 2 I saw her with her son in [unclear][?].

00:31 Speaker 1 Where?

00:32 Speaker 2 Far away.

00:33 Speaker 1 It must have been the boy.

00:34 Speaker 2 And what did she name her?

00:36 Speaker 1 I don’t know.

00:36 Speaker 2 The blanket was tucked in.

00:38 Speaker 1 Maybe. I don’t know, I didn’t see.

00:40 Speaker 4 We’ll learn chapter 15. Chapter 15 is the last of the three chapters, chapters 13 through 15. There are people here who don’t attend the class regularly, so let’s review the general idea. The Tanya is, broadly speaking, a book about the beinoni. In other words, it guides each of us in how to serve Hashem. We’re beinonim; none of us is a tzaddik or a rasha. So the Tanya—

01:12 Speaker 1 Of the Tanya, yes.

01:13 Speaker 4 What?

01:13 Speaker 1 We’re not the beinonim of the Tanya. We want to be.

01:16 Speaker 4 Last week we learned that each of us is a beinoni of the Tanya. That’s the content of chapter 14.

01:20 Speaker 2 Above.

01:24 Speaker 1 Michi. We didn’t have a [unclear].

01:26 Speaker 2 We were looking.

01:26 Speaker 1 Here, we’ve only just started.

01:29 Speaker 2 Looks like they’ve arrived, the trio is in place.

01:35 Speaker 4 I’ve said this before—I’ve heard it several times in our classes. People often say to a Chabad chossid, and you hear a Chabad chossid in our generation say: Really, it’s already possible to be a tzaddik, and everyone needs to be a tzaddik, and we’re tzaddikim. So nobody has a problem hearing someone say, “You can be a tzaddik.” But, “You can be a beinoni”? No, no, no, not a beinoni! Nobody has a problem being a tzaddik, but a beinoni—that already sounds mediocre to him. The Alter Rebbe wrote the Tanya as a teaching for the many, for everyone, for all of us. A tzaddik is someone who is truly on a level that a person cannot reach on his own. It’s a gift received from Above. And a rasha, as we said in the previous chapters, is someone who cannot overcome himself and commits transgressions. We’re not people who commit transgressions so readily. If you said to any of us, I don’t know, “Come and desecrate Shabbos,” or “Commit some other transgression,” we wouldn’t do it. None of us would say, “I don’t feel like fulfilling the mitzvah of sukkah,” or “I don’t feel like lighting Shabbos candles today.” That doesn’t happen with us. We’re not on the level of resha’im. We’re certainly not tzaddikim either. That’s the level of beinonim. And he explained in the previous chapters, 12 and 13, that there are many levels among beinonim, and so on. There’s a very high level, and a beinoni is indeed on a very lofty level. But “the level of the beinoni is attainable by every person, and every person should strive for it”—that’s the content of chapter 14. So, before we start learning the text here, I wanted to say by way of introduction that the Tanya is, in general, a book about beinonim, a book for beinonim. That is, it guides us, the beinonim, in how to serve Hashem. And so that this will be clear, and we can really understand it in an orderly way, internalize it, remember it, and know how to do

03:27 Speaker 4 it, the Alter Rebbe gives us guidance. But the Alter Rebbe’s guidance isn’t arranged step by step. The book is structured—the Alter Rebbe builds his guidance in a different way. The Tanya has two parts: the first runs through chapter 34, and the second from chapter 35 to the end. In the first part, the Alter Rebbe explains how anyone can, by awakening his love and awe, reach a state where he doesn’t commit transgressions—and much more than that, but we’ll leave it at that for now. How can anyone be a beinoni in practice, not committing transgressions and fulfilling mitzvos? In the second part, the Alter Rebbe says: You can’t be satisfied with simply fulfilling mitzvos. You need to fulfill them with feeling, with love and awe. He guides us in how to fulfill mitzvos with love and awe. Those are the two parts, broadly speaking. In the first part, which discusses how to fulfill the mitzvos in practice—and that is the beinoni’s concern, fulfilling mitzvos in practice, in thought, speech, and action—the Alter Rebbe divides the discussion into several thematic sections, you could say. At the beginning, in the first twelve chapters, he explains what a beinoni actually is. He asks many questions in the first chapter; we won’t go back over them now. In explaining what a beinoni is, he says: A tzaddik is someone who... Every person has an inner life and an outward life. His inner life is his intellect and emotions. Who am I? I am what I understand and what I feel; that’s me myself. And then there are the things he does: actions he performs, things he says, and thought is also a kind of activity, as we discussed at length. So there is the inner life and the outward life. A tzaddik is someone whose outward life isn’t the only thing that’s whole—not only does he commit no transgressions and fulfill mitzvos in practice, but his inner life is also wholly devoted to Hashem. That’s a tzaddik. A rasha is someone who not only has a yetzer hara within, but also actually stumbles into transgressions, in his actions and speech too. What is a beinoni? What does “half and half” mean? It means that his outward half—thought, speech, and action—is like a tzaddik’s. He doesn’t stumble into transgressions. His inner half is like a rasha’s: he has a yetzer hara. That’s more or less what the Alter Rebbe explains at length in the first twelve chapters. He goes into it further afterward; there are more details. Then he explains how a beinoni serves Hashem. So the next chapter, chapter 16, begins, “Now, a great principle in the service of Hashem...” From the next chapter onward, he begins explaining how to serve Hashem. That continues from chapter 16 onward; the exact point doesn’t matter right now. In between the end of the explanation of what a beinoni is and the beginning of the discussion of serving Hashem are three chapters: 13, 14, and 15. If all you want to do is explain who the beinoni is and how he serves Hashem, you’ve finished explaining what a beinoni is by chapter 12—so start explaining how he serves Hashem. What are those three chapters doing in the middle? We explained that here the Alter Rebbe says to a person: Okay, now you know what a beinoni is? You know what you need to be like? Listen, before he explains how to serve Hashem, you first need to internalize three things. Chapters 13, 14, and 15. Three things a person needs to internalize. They’re not about the actual service of Hashem; they’re things a person needs to know so that he can serve Hashem. What are those three things? First of all, the first

05:27 Speaker 4 thing chapter 13 says is, “Consider yourself like a rasha.” The whole message of chapter 13 is: Listen, a beinoni can have all sorts of levels. You think this person is a tzaddik? No, he’s still a beinoni. You think this one is a tzaddik? No, still a beinoni. You think this one is a tzaddik? Still only a beinoni. What does that mean? However far you progress in serving Hashem, don’t think you’ve already become a tzaddik. That’s the first thing. Then he continues in chapter 14. Wow, now we’ve explained that a beinoni is such a lofty level—what a beinoni! How can I reach it? “The level of the beinoni is attainable by every person, and every person should strive for it.” It belongs to everyone. How does it belong to everyone? He explained that in the previous chapter, chapter 14. What’s the third thing? Once you “consider yourself like a rasha,” and know that this is attainable for you, what else is missing? What’s the third foundation, the third pillar holding up the structure? That’s our chapter. Let’s look inside. “With this we can understand what is written: ‘Then you will again see the difference between a tzaddik and a rasha, between one who serves G-d and one who has not served Him.’” That’s a verse in the Book of Malachi. Malachi is speaking in a prophecy about the future. A wonderful chapter, by the way. If you’re not familiar with it, it’s worth looking at inside; the words really are wonderful. The whole chapter speaks about the future Geulah, and there, among other things, it says that in the time to come, when King Moshiach comes and Hakadosh Boruch Hu is revealed, “then you will again see”—you’ll recognize the difference between a tzaddik and a rasha, between one who serves G-d and one who has not served Him. The Gemara asks: Isn’t a tzaddik the same as one who serves G-d? Isn’t a rasha the same as one who has not served Him? Why the repetition? If he serves G-d, he’s a tzaddik. If he doesn’t serve G-d, he’s a rasha. What is the Gemara’s explanation for this repetition? The Gemara says:

07:21 Speaker 4 First, in chapter 13, he says, “Regard yourself as wicked.” The whole point of chapter 13 is: Listen, a beinoni can rise from level to level. You think that makes him a tzaddik? No, he is still a beinoni. You think that makes him a tzaddik? No, still a beinoni. You think that makes him a tzaddik? He is still only a beinoni. What does that mean? However far you advance in serving Hashem, don’t think you are already a tzaddik. That’s the first thing. Then he continues in chapter 14. Wow, now that we’ve explained that a beinoni is such a lofty level—what kind of beinoni? How can I reach that? “The level of the beinoni is within the reach of every person, and every person should strive toward it.” It applies to everyone. How does it apply to everyone? He explained that in the previous chapter, chapter 14. What’s the third thing? Once we have “Regard yourself as wicked” and know that this does apply to me, what else is needed? What is the third foundation, the third pillar holding up the building? That’s our chapter. Let’s look inside. “And with this we can understand what is written: ‘Then you will return and see the difference between a tzaddik and a wicked person, between one who serves G-d and one who has not served Him.’” That’s a verse in the Book of Malachi. Malachi is speaking in a prophecy about the future. It’s a wonderful chapter, by the way. If you don’t know it, it’s worth looking at inside; the words are truly wonderful. The whole chapter speaks about the future Geulah, and there, among other things, he says that in the time to come, when Moshiach comes and Hakadosh Boruch Hu is revealed, “you will return and see”—you will recognize the difference between a tzaddik and a wicked person, between one who serves G-d and one who has not served Him. The Gemara asks: Isn’t a tzaddik the same as one who serves G-d, and a wicked person the same as one who has not served Him? Why repeat it? If he serves G-d, he’s a tzaddik. If he doesn’t serve G-d, then he’s wicked. Why does the verse repeat itself? The Gemara says:

09:30 Speaker 4 because it’s what he’s accustomed to doing.

10:00 Speaker 5 Because that’s what he’s accustomed to.

10:02 Speaker 4 That’s what the Gemara says. What does it mean to be “one who serves G-d”? It means someone who reviews his learning 101 times. That’s what the Gemara says. What follows from this? The Gemara explicitly says there that both the one who serves G-d and the one who does not serve Him are completely righteous. So the Gemara is explaining: Don’t think that someone who does not serve G-d is wicked. That’s not what it means. He, too, is completely righteous. So the Gemara says that “one who serves G-d” and “one who does not serve Him” are not the same as “the righteous” and “the wicked.” What does the Gemara explain? It explains the difference between someone who does not serve G-d and a wicked person. What is the difference between a righteous person and one who serves G-d?

11:14 Speaker 5 I never reviewed it.

11:14 Speaker 4 That, the Gemara does not explain. It says they’re not the same. What isn’t the same? Someone who does not serve G-d is not wicked; that’s something entirely different. But the Gemara leaves open the difference between a righteous person and one who serves G-d. Figure it out yourself. So the Alter Rebbe says, “And with this we will understand what is written, ‘Then you shall again discern.’” What we’ve explained here in Tanya helps us understand what the Gemara did not explain. What have we explained in Tanya, from chapter 1 through the previous chapter? We’ve explained what a beinoni is, right? Yes. Once we know that there is such a level as a beinoni—a person who is neither righteous nor wicked—we can understand the difference between a righteous person and one who serves G-d. How? The difference between one who serves G-d and a righteous person, which the Gemara did not explain, is... This page is a little blurry for some of you. Mine is too.

12:21 Speaker 5 There’s “one who serves,” yes.

12:23 Speaker 4 Yes, no, no, I know the wording. What’s the difference? “One who serves” is in the present tense. He is serving now; he is in the middle of the work. And what is the work of one who serves G-d? It is the struggle with the yetzer hara: overcoming it and driving it out of the “small city.” What is the small city? The body. So that it does not clothe itself in the organs of the body. That work truly takes great effort and toil, to fight it constantly. And that is the beinoni. Now that we understand what a beinoni is, says the Alter Rebbe, we can answer for ourselves the question the Gemara does not answer. What’s the difference between a righteous person and one who serves G-d? The one who serves G-d is not a tzaddik; he is a beinoni. Why is he called one who serves G-d? Because what is a beinoni? Someone who is working and fighting against the yetzer hara. He is in the middle of the work. He is serving now, so he is called one who serves G-d. He is not a tzaddik. So what do we call a tzaddik? Does a tzaddik not serve G-d? If the beinoni is the one called “one who serves G-d,” what does that imply about the tzaddik? That he does not serve G-d, right? So what’s the explanation?

13:43 Speaker 6 That can’t be.

13:44 Speaker 4 Huh?

13:45 Speaker 6 That can’t be.

13:46 Speaker 4 Let’s see. The Alter Rebbe says that the tzaddik is indeed not called “one who serves G-d.” He is called “a servant of Hashem.” He is not in the middle of the work; he is a servant. He has already finished the work.

14:01 Speaker 6 His whole being is that he serves—rather, that he has served Hashem.

14:03 Speaker 4 He—

14:05 Speaker 6 He served and finished.

14:06 Speaker 4 He isn’t working to change himself, still in the middle of the work. He has already done it.

14:10 Speaker 6 He’s already there.

14:11 Speaker 4 Yes, he has already become a servant. For a tzaddik, that is a description of who he is, not an action he is doing. Just as you might call someone wise or a king: a wise person isn’t someone who is now learning to become wise. He is wise. A king is already a king. So too, a servant has already finished the work. He has completely finished the struggle against evil, until “he has driven it away and it is gone, and his heart is hollow within him.” Based on this, chassidim—not necessarily the Rebbe—point out another beautiful detail here. The prophet Malachi says, “Then you shall again discern between... one who serves G-d and one who does not serve Him,” and the Alter Rebbe says that a tzaddik—

15:02 Speaker 6 This isn’t YouTube.

15:03 Speaker 4 Huh?

15:05 Speaker 6 It’s something new. Do it afterward; it isn’t disturbing me.

15:09 Speaker 4 The Alter Rebbe says—It doesn’t bother me that they’re baking. That—

15:17 Speaker 6 Too cold. Can you?

15:20 Speaker 4 A beinoni is one who serves G-d, and a tzaddik is a servant of Hashem. Right? That’s what we said. Doesn’t something sound off to you? If he’s called “one who serves G-d,” then the other should be called “a servant of G-d.” If he’s called “a servant of Hashem,” the first should be called “one who serves Hashem.” Why is one called “one who serves G-d” and the other “a servant of Hashem”?

15:46 Speaker 6 Because it’s different. Elokim is associated with judgment.

15:49 Speaker 4 Judgment, contraction, concealment and hiddenness. So why? That’s true.

15:55 Speaker 6 The concealments are stronger for the beinoni.

15:56 Speaker 4 Hmm?

15:57 Speaker 6 The concealments are stronger for the beinoni.

16:03 Speaker 4 For the beinoni. A beinoni is someone who experiences concealment and hiddenness. The yetzer hara covers him: it covers his intellect, his feelings, his soul, and does not let them be revealed. So he works to remove the concealment associated with the name Elokim, to remove the contraction and reveal what is within him. A tzaddik doesn’t have that. He isn’t working, he isn’t fighting concealment and hiddenness. That isn’t his concern. His concern is to become utterly devoted, to be a servant of Hashem. What is a servant? Someone who submits to his master. His whole concern is to submit to his master, to Hashem.

16:43 Speaker 7 What?

16:51 Speaker 4 Okay, so based on what the Alter Rebbe [unclear], we now know what a beinoni is. That helps. It helps us explain the difference between a tzaddik and a wicked person.

17:06 Speaker 7 Between a tzaddik and a beinoni.

17:07 Speaker 4 Between a tzaddik and a beinoni. Yes.

17:10 Speaker 7 “One who serves G-d” and “one who does not serve Him”—both refer to G-d.

17:14 Speaker 4 It turns out that both are beinonim. Exactly. You’ve already jumped ahead to the answer. The Alter Rebbe did not come, as we said, to tell us novel Torah interpretations. It’s not as though there was a question in the Gemara that nobody knew how to answer, and then the Alter Rebbe opened Tanya and was clever enough to answer a question no earlier generation could answer. That’s not the point. Obviously, the Alter Rebbe came to teach us how to serve Hashem. Why does the Gemara’s answer to this question matter to our service of Hashem? Its relevance lies in what comes next: “And among beinonim, too, there are two levels.” What does “too” mean? Who else has two levels?

18:11 Speaker 7 A tzaddik.

18:11 Speaker 4 Right, a tzaddik. A tzaddik for whom things are bad and one for whom things are good, right.

18:15 Speaker 7 And a wicked person too.

18:16 Speaker 4 And a wicked person for whom things are good and one for whom things are bad. A complete one and one who is not complete. The Alter Rebbe says: Just as we learned about two levels of the tzaddik in chapter 10 and two levels of the wicked person in chapter 11, there are also two levels of the beinoni. When the verse says, “Then you shall again discern between the righteous and the wicked, between one who serves G-d and one who does not serve Him,” it speaks of the righteous and the wicked in general terms, one category each, but details the two levels within the beinoni: one who serves G-d and one who does not serve Him. Why is the beinoni called “one who serves G-d”? He has a yetzer hara and fights it, so he is called one who serves: he is in the middle of the work. But what does it mean for there to be a beinoni—a beinoni as described in Tanya—who is “one who does not serve Him”?

19:12 Speaker 7 It’s different. It’s about reviewing one’s learning. So yes, he does serve, but not—

19:16 Speaker 4 We said that a beinoni as described in Tanya is a Jew who never commits a sin and only does mitzvos. He has never sinned and never will. So much so that even neglecting Torah study—when someone is learning and stops for a single second, even lifting his head—counts as neglecting Torah study.

19:39 Speaker 7 He talks about the weather, like our teacher.

19:42 Speaker 4 Talks about the weather.

19:44 Speaker 7 Talks about the weather.

19:44 Speaker 4 I’m not talking about the weather. I mean that for a moment his thoughts wander. He is sitting in front of a sefer, learning Torah, and for one moment he loses concentration. There are things troubling him, things that interest him or matter to him; he finds it difficult, and his thoughts drift away. The moment his thoughts drift away, he is no longer a beinoni. I’m not talking about someone who [unclear]. Wait, this is a very high level. How can we say there is a beinoni who does not serve Hashem? What does “serving Hashem” mean, then? How can that be? The question is clear, yes?

20:25 Speaker 7 Yes.

20:26 Speaker 4 The Alter Rebbe explains that there are also two levels among beinonim: “one who serves G-d” and “one who does not serve Him.” Nevertheless, even though he is not called “one who serves G-d,” he is not wicked. What does that mean? He never slips up—not in action, not in speech and not in thought. He has never sinned in his life and never will. So he is not wicked, but he is also not called “one who serves Hashem.” For he has never committed any sin, not even a minor one, not even transgressing a rabbinic ordinance, as we saw at length in chapter 1.

21:03 Speaker 7 But there’s a “but.”

21:05 Speaker 4 And he doesn’t just avoid transgressions; he also fulfills every mitzvah he can fulfill. All right, he isn’t a king or a kohen, so he can’t fulfill the mitzvos that depend on those roles. But of all the mitzvos he can fulfill, he never misses a thing—not in the past, not in the future, and not in the present. Even Torah study, which is equal to them all: his mouth never ceases from learning. About whom was it said that his mouth never ceased from learning?

21:29 Speaker 7 Abba Yehuda.

21:30 Speaker 4 About Rabbah.

21:31 Speaker 7 Who was among the Tannaim.

21:33 Speaker 4 Yes, the Angel of Death couldn’t take him from this world because his mouth never stopped speaking words of Torah. That’s a beinoni. And he could be a beinoni who is not serving Hashem. How?

21:46 Speaker 7 How was it with Rabbah? At first, in the beginning, he wasn’t really a beinoni.

21:52 Speaker 4 Of course he was a tzaddik. We discussed this in the texts. What exactly was it? Where did he fall? Where was his mistake? If only our falls were like that. Yes. Today someone asked why Moshe Rabbeinu was punished when he struck the rock. He said, “What? He spoke. They told him not to speak. He spoke.” That’s not it. Well, of course, like every time—the first strike, it’s as if, what?

22:15 Speaker 7 It blossoms.

22:17 Speaker 4 For that. So I said—someone asked, and they argued about it here, and in the end I said about him, “If only our mistakes were like Moshe Rabbeinu’s.” So why isn’t he called one who serves G-d, even though he doesn’t stumble into transgressions? Because he doesn’t wage any battle with the yetzer to overcome it. He overcomes the yetzer hara without a battle.

22:49 Speaker 7 That’s his disposition. Like, that’s just how he is; he doesn’t go beyond...

22:53 Speaker 4 Yes, the Alter Rebbe spells it out. He doesn’t battle the yetzer hara to overcome it through the light of Hashem that shines upon his G-dly soul, or through the mind’s rule over the heart, as explained above. There are two details here. Remember? Do you remember? Chapter 12, when we discussed the beinoni. We said how a person can overcome the yetzer hara. We mentioned two things there, two things that help a person overcome it. One is the light of Hashem—Hakadosh Boruch Hu helps him, the light of Hashem shines upon him. And the second is that Hakadosh Boruch Hu gave him the natural ability for the mind to rule over the heart. He explained there when each is used. When is it used? Did you hear?

23:29 Speaker 7 That’s Hashem. So in both cases it’s Hashem who gave him the light.

23:35 Speaker 4 Hakadosh Boruch Hu gave him a kind of head start, an advantage—and it’s a double advantage. You need to know when to use each one. When do you use each one? He discussed two levels of the beinoni there, but that isn’t relevant right now. In any case, I only mentioned the two expressions used here. The light of Hashem shining on the G-dly soul in the mind is one thing; the mind ruling over the heart is the second. The details he discusses there are explained at greater length there. I’m only reminding you that we’ve already discussed it. So he doesn’t need this battle to overcome the yetzer hara. Why? Because his yetzer does not oppose him at all to stop him from his Torah study and his service of Hashem. We’re not talking about someone who has no yetzer hara. He has a yetzer hara.

24:18 Speaker 7 It doesn’t manage to...

24:19 Speaker 4 It’s not that it doesn’t manage to, and it’s not that it sits idle. He has an active, strong yetzer hara. He loves worldly things, he has an animal soul, and he may be a coarse person, and so on—an animal soul in full force. And yet his animal soul doesn’t fight against the side of holiness. How can that be? He has no need to fight it at all. For example—what sort of yetzer hara, what sort of animal soul, is so animalistic and coarse on one hand, yet doesn’t fight against holiness on the other? What kind of thing is that? For example, someone who is naturally diligent in his studies from birth, because of a strong melancholic temperament. The person loves to learn. It’s a pleasure; he enjoys it.

25:14 Speaker 7 He’s more occupied.

25:15 Speaker 4 Not because he’s occupied. Some people love to study. Put him in a group and he doesn’t feel at home. Give him a book—not necessarily a Torah book, anything. You know, a bookworm. He isn’t looking for anything else. He likes being by himself with a book, immersing himself in it deeply. There are non-Jews like that too, a great many of them. You don’t have to be Jewish for that. In our generation, perhaps—but without those people, we wouldn’t have all the technology we have today. It’s precisely those people. Or someone who... whose Torah... You weren’t following, so thank G-d, no. There’s a science called astronomy. Today, in astronomy, there are discoveries literally every few days—remarkable discoveries that no one ever knew about before. People sit and devote their entire lives to it, and governments invest billions upon billions in a science that, as everyone knows, will never produce anything for anyone.

26:23 Speaker 7 Really, why do they sit and research it?

26:25 Speaker 4 They just—

26:25 Speaker 7 It interests him.

26:27 Speaker 4 A human being is an intellectual creature, and someone who is intellectually inclined is interested in ideas. He has that sort of melancholic temperament, an inward-looking nature, and he likes to think, likes to delve deeply. So a person with an animal soul like that, who is Jewish and grew up in a religious home and received a good education—they saw this in him from early childhood. You can see that he’s interested not only in Gemara and Torah and Chassidus. So why wouldn’t he keep mitzvos? On the contrary, in his learning, his entire animal soul, his entire yetzer hara, is occupied with Torah study. It doesn’t interfere with him. All his Torah study is one big yetzer hara. It interests him; it gives him pleasure; he enjoys it; it makes him feel alive. Other people see how beautifully he learns and admire him for his intelligence. Why would he stop keeping mitzvos? All the honor and desires in the world are there for him within Torah; he doesn’t need anything outside. Nothing interferes. And likewise, he has no struggle with desire for women. Some people do have that desire and a struggle with it—many people simply don’t know how persistent it is, and they can’t withstand it. He doesn’t have it. He doesn’t occupy himself with it; he’s cool-tempered by nature. It doesn’t interest him or stir him. And the same goes for other pleasures of this world. Some people are drawn to tasty food they see, or certain smells, or, I don’t know, a beautiful house, something luxurious. It doesn’t touch him. Give him a book, let him study, let him—

28:15 Speaker 7 Rabbis aren’t for sale.

28:17 Speaker 4 Because all of this comes from the yetzer hara, from his personal pleasure, from what he feels. Here he expresses himself, here he feels himself, here he comes alive, here his sense of self grows. What did we say at the beginning, back in chapter 6? What’s the difference between holiness and the sitra achra? The sitra achra is something that is not G-dliness; it feels its own self. That’s it. Holiness is nullified to G-dliness. The sitra achra is not nullified. How can you see that it isn’t nullified? It feels its own self.

28:48 Speaker 7 So the very fact that he’s studying [unclear], and not because—

28:51 Speaker 4 If, if—

28:52 Speaker 7 He’s serving Hashem, that’s—

28:53 Speaker 4 If his Torah study is for its own sake, then he’s studying for Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Here he’s studying for himself.

28:59 Speaker 7 Exactly.

29:00 Speaker 4 What do you mean? This is what it says. It says this everywhere, not only here. I think everyone knows the famous story of the Baal Shem Tov, who once came to a beis midrash and said he couldn’t go in because there were so many prayers there—it was full of prayers, and he couldn’t enter. It was full of dveikus; he couldn’t get inside. And then, words of Torah too—you couldn’t get in. He said, “Yes, they aren’t rising upward.”

29:28 Speaker 7 Yes.

29:30 Speaker 4 People sat there, and they were tremendous geniuses and wise men. There are many such stories in Chassidus, several stories about the recluses. That was all their Torah study. There’s a story about one person. I have to tell this story. It’s not so well known, but it’s also written in Shivchei HaBaal Shem Tov. It’s a book the Frierdiker Rebbe gave our Rebbe as a wedding gift, and he asked the Rebbe to know it thoroughly before the wedding. It’s a book worth buying and reading—stories of the Baal Shem Tov that aren’t found in other books. There are many stories in it about demons and spirits.

30:07 Speaker 7 Is it called Baal Shem Tov?

30:07 Speaker 4 Shivchei HaBaal Shem Tov. It’s a book written by one of the Baal Shem Tov’s attendants. There are many stories there whose source is the Alter Rebbe; he tells them from the beginning of the book. Most of the stories there aren’t told to children, because so many of them are about demons and spirits. The stories there are all rather frightening, all sorts of things. In short, you have to look inside the book, but that’s its name. Anyway, among other things he relates there—I think that’s the source—a story from the days of the Baal Shem Tov. There was a Jew who was a great tzaddik. The whole town honored him. He was a great tzaddik, and he had a practice that every Friday afternoon, after going to the mikveh for Shabbos... Hm?

30:56 Speaker 7 The recluse.

30:57 Speaker 4 After going to the mikveh on Friday afternoon.

30:58 Speaker 7 About the recluse? Is this a story about the recluse?

31:00 Speaker 4 One of the stories about the ascetic—there are several—is that he would sit outside on a stone near the mikveh. After immersing, he would come out and sit there so that everyone leaving the mikveh would see him. It’s considered auspicious to see a tzaddik when you come out of the mikveh.

31:17 Speaker 7 That’s what it turned into.

31:18 Speaker 4 This was his custom every Erev Shabbos after the mikveh. All week he would sit and learn nonstop, twenty-four hours a day. On Erev Shabbos he would go to the mikveh, sanctify himself in honor of Shabbos, come out, sit on that stone for about half an hour, and then go to welcome Shabbos. He did this for years. One day the Baal Shem Tov said he had seen this and told them to take away the stone. When they took it away, the man came and saw that the stone was gone. A day or two later, he passed away. Did it give him life? No. All the vitality in his Torah study came from the honor people gave him.

31:54 Speaker 7 Yes, very much. All of it was for me. How did he feel? That he was a tzaddik.

32:01 Speaker 4 All right, there are lots of stories like that, but this isn’t the place for them. So the yetzer hara doesn’t interfere with his Torah study. He enjoys learning Torah. The yetzer hara doesn’t draw him toward aveiros. He has a cold yetzer hara; he isn’t attracted to the things of this world. “Therefore he does not need to contemplate Hashem’s greatness so deeply as to give rise, from his understanding, to a spirit of awareness and fear of Hashem in his mind, to keep himself from transgressing prohibitions. Nor does he need to arouse love of Hashem so strongly in his heart, to cleave to Him through observing the mitzvos and studying Torah, which is equal to them all.” Because love and fear are the roots of all the mitzvos. Love is the root of all the positive mitzvos, and fear is the root of all the prohibitions. So obviously, even a person with a nature like this—if he doesn’t contemplate Hashem’s greatness, or think about how important it is to keep the mitzvos, and no love or fear is aroused in him at all—then of course he too will commit aveiros. He does need some contemplation, but he doesn’t need to fight. A little contemplation is enough for him. He doesn’t need to contemplate at length to arouse love of Hashem in his heart; it’s enough for him to contemplate in his mind. “The hidden love in the heart of all Israel, who are called ‘those who love His name,’ is sufficient for him.” There are several fine points here, but before we go on, I want to stop and emphasize something. We’ve learned several times already—and surely anyone who has studied Chassidus even once or twice has heard this everywhere—that serving Hashem involves contemplation, and that contemplation awakens emotion, right? He contemplates Hashem’s greatness, understands it, and it flows, trickles down into his heart, awakening love and fear in him. It’s simple: when you contemplate something good, you want

34:11 Speaker 4 it. When you contemplate something frightening, you’re afraid of it. So too with Hashem’s greatness. In other words, contemplation gives birth to the middos. Right? Why are chochmah and binah called “father” and “mother” in the chapter—where is it? Chapter 3. Why are they called father and mother? Because they give birth to the middos. Why do they need to be born? If he doesn’t contemplate, there won’t be any middos. So where would they come from? A person will just suddenly start loving holiness? Where would his love for holi—for—what? He can’t see it. Why would he suddenly begin to love it? If he contemplates and thinks, then it can happen. Contemplation can bring forth—illuminate—give birth to a middah, an emotion, in the heart. If he doesn’t contemplate, then... Right? This is explained everywhere. Yes? Is it explained or isn’t it? I need to hear a yes.

35:05 Speaker 8 Yes.

35:08 Speaker 4 Why do I need to hear a yes? Because isn’t it wrong? After all, we know that every Jew has a hidden love. He has a neshamah, and its nature is to love Hashem. As we’ll discuss later, from chapter 18 through chapter 25—eight chapters. He has love of Hashem. Why does it need to be born? It’s already there.

35:39 Speaker 8 But it’s hidden. It needs to be revealed.

35:41 Speaker 4 It needs to be awakened. But why does it need to be born?

35:44 Speaker 8 It needs to get through to the heart, I’m saying.

35:46 Speaker 4 What’s going on here?

35:55 Speaker 8 It’s difficult.

35:56 Speaker 4 Huh? Difficult, difficult.

35:58 Speaker 8 Difficult.

35:59 Speaker 4 It’s hard for you to be a Jew. The G-dly soul has two kinds of love.

36:07 Speaker 8 So which love?

36:09 Speaker 4 There is intellectual love and there is natural love. These are two kinds of love. They come from different sources, look different, and respond differently. They affect a person differently. They are two distinct things, though both are called love. Ultimately, both are revealed through contemplation, but they are completely different. And when we speak of a love that is hidden—wait, which hidden love? If we’re talking about intellectual love that is hidden, what does “intellectual” mean? A love born in the heart as a result of intellectual contemplation.

36:55 Speaker 8 It isn’t.

36:55 Speaker 4 So what does—what isn’t? There is such a thing as intellectual love: a person contemplates, and then an emotion awakens in him. That does happen.

37:03 Speaker 8 But that isn’t hidden love, that’s...

37:04 Speaker 4 Ah, but sometimes we say there is a love hidden in his mind. What does “hidden in his mind” mean? It means it hasn’t yet been born in the heart; it is still hidden in the mind. Gestation, nursing—whatever you call the stages—it’s still hidden in the mind. In other words, it isn’t really love at all. He has understood and reached the conclusion that he ought to love. Hidden love in the mind is in the mind. Yes. So there is no love in the heart at all; it doesn’t exist there. It exists only in the intellect. There are three levels—more than three levels. When we speak of love hidden in the heart, that is something else entirely. He was born with it, and it is there. It is strong, it exists, it has force, it is eternal—it just isn’t revealed in the heart. Something prevents it from being revealed. That’s something different. Yes? So what does he say here? Let’s go back to line four. This person is a beinoni but not an “oved Elokim,” one who actively serves Hashem. Right? He does not need to contemplate Hashem’s greatness so deeply as to give rise, from his understanding, to awareness and fear of Hashem in his mind, to keep from transgressing—and to observe the mitzvos. Right? What is enough for him? The hidden love in his heart is enough. A beinoni like this, whose yetzer hara does not interfere with his service of Hashem, doesn’t need intellectual love; the love in his heart, the natural love, is enough for him. All right? Later we’ll also see why. But it was important for me to emphasize this, because it is essential to understanding everything that follows. Since he makes do with the hidden love he already has, he doesn’t exert himself or toil to give birth to love through the intellect. That is a love he doesn’t have, and he would have to work to bring it forth. Instead, he makes do with the love he already has. Where? In his heart. He makes do with that. We’ll see later when

39:23 Speaker 4 it awakens and how this works for each person. That comes later. He makes do with just this. Therefore he is not called an “oved” at all. Why? Because this hidden love is not the product of his own action or effort at all. He received it as a gift. What work have you done? You haven’t worked; you haven’t done anything. You were born with it. Rather, it is the inheritance passed down to all Israel from our forefathers, as discussed later, from chapter 18 onward. We’ll also see that we need it, and that even a beinoni has something to do with it—a great deal to do with it. But if his entire service of Hashem relies on hidden love, he is not called an “oved Elokim.” He is a beinoni. He doesn’t commit aveiros; he has not committed and will not commit any aveirah. He doesn’t even neglect Torah study. Even in thought, he will never slip up, not for a second, not for an instant. But he is not an “oved Elokim”; he is not fighting his yetzer hara. Why? Because he is using the hidden love. “And likewise, even one who does not”—this is a further step. There is someone who, by nature, is not diligent in his study or in davening; his yetzer hara pushes back. Right? But he has trained himself to study with great diligence, and habit has become second nature to him. So now this hidden love is enough for him. As long as he had to fight his yetzer hara, he had to give birth to love in his heart through contemplation. Then he was an “oved Elokim.” Now, it’s not that he has become a rasha; he is still a beinoni. But he is no longer an “oved Elokim,” because he isn’t fighting. He has grown accustomed to it. The truth is, that’s very difficult. Anyone who goes on a diet knows that starting is very easy. The problem is sticking with it. Right? When a person does something against his nature and succeeds, he gets hold of himself

41:27 Speaker 4 Another day, another day, another day, until eventually it becomes easy for him. But it can take a long time for that “eventually” to arrive. As long as a person still has to fight his yetzer—today too, right now too—he is working. But the moment it becomes second nature to him, he says, “Boruch Hashem, I’ve succeeded. That’s it; from here on I won’t fall.” True, you won’t fall from here on, but you’re no longer serving G-d. Unless you choose to study more than you’re accustomed to. Let’s give two examples of this. How are we doing for time?

42:09 Speaker 9 There’s time.

42:11 Speaker 4 Blessed are You, Hashem our G-d, King of the universe, by Whose word everything came to be.

42:16 Speaker 9 Nine twenty.

42:22 Speaker 4 And this explains what the Gemara says: one who serves G-d is someone who reviews his chapter a hundred and one times, while one who has not served Him is someone who reviews it only a hundred times. Those are the two examples given there in response to the question about the verse in Malachi, in the Gemara in Chagigah. Why did the Gemara choose that particular example? Because the usual practice really was to review each chapter a hundred times. Do you understand the Gemara? When the Gemara said it, reviewing every chapter a hundred times was what everyone did. As it says a little further on in the Gemara, consider the donkey drivers in the marketplace: they hire themselves out for ten parasangs for one zuz, but for eleven parasangs they charge two zuz. What kind of calculation is that? Ten parasangs cost one zuz, and one extra parasang doubles the price. It should have been one zuz and a tenth. It’s because that extra distance is beyond what they’re accustomed to. You’re not paying me for the distance; you’re paying me for the effort. As people say, someone came to me today to have his tefillin checked. He asked me, “How much does it cost?” “Eighty shekels.” “Well, it’s very urgent; I have to get it done. Can you check them now?” “Yes, go and come back.” “How long will it take you?” “About twenty minutes.” “You charge eighty shekels for twenty minutes?!” You’re not paying me for the time. You’re paying me for the effort.

43:56 Speaker 9 For the result.

43:58 Speaker 4 Yes.

43:59 Speaker 9 For the skill involved.

44:00 Speaker 4 Yes. That’s how payment works, human nature being what it is; it’s the same everywhere. You’re not paying for—for the result; you’re paying for the, for the...

44:10 Speaker 9 They charge for that here too.

44:12 Speaker 4 Yes, for the expertise, for the effort, for the... In everything, you pay for the skill. A painting worth who knows how much gets sold because it’s something special, something special, and people pay more for what goes beyond the usual. So why does the Alter Rebbe give two examples? Why does he give examples at all? Maybe we should first understand that. What would have been missing from the explanation without the examples?

44:43 Speaker 9 A lot, if it isn’t work.

44:46 Speaker 4 If it isn’t work; yes, work means going beyond what they’re accustomed to. So I would have thought that was perfectly clear. The Rebbe asks an even stronger question.

44:55 Speaker 9 The usual practice, as it were, of the...

44:58 Speaker 4 The Rebbe’s father asks an even stronger question. He doesn’t ask why the Alter Rebbe gives two examples. Rather, why does the Gemara give precisely these two examples? What numbers did the Gemara pick? A hundred—nice round numbers like that—and ten. Yes?

45:17 Speaker 9 Why not one?

45:18 Speaker 4 So he explains: what is the work of a beinoni? To change the ten faculties of his soul, right? As long as you’re working with the ten faculties of your soul, that’s within the usual pattern. But to change that pattern, you need something beyond those ten faculties, a higher G-dly power. You have to step outside yourself—an act of mesirus nefesh, a move outside the system, outside the box. Something has to shake you up. As long as you keep going along the established, familiar path, you can’t rise beyond it. To rise beyond it takes mesirus nefesh. You have to make an effort; you have to toil. That explains the ten. Why does it say a hundred? It’s the same thing: the faculties of the soul are ten times ten, making a hundred, and then there’s one more. “Therefore, this hundred-and-first time, which exceeds the habit he acquired from his youth, is equal to all of them.” That one time is equal to all hundred, and more than that, it surpasses them—not merely surpasses them, but with greater strength and greater vigor. That is why he is called one who serves G-d.

46:37 Speaker 9 The other one isn’t working, he isn’t—

46:39 Speaker 4 The other one isn’t serving G-d. He’s a beinoni, the beinoni of Tanya, a beinoni on Rabbah’s level. He isn’t serving G-d; he isn’t toiling. Hakadosh Boruch Hu wants us to toil. Perhaps that’s what emerges from this whole chapter. We’ll continue in a moment, but here you can see the point very strongly. If a person can keep all the mitzvos, in thought, speech and action, without toiling, what does Hakadosh Boruch Hu care? What does He want from us? Hakadosh Boruch Hu tells me: “You can’t be a tzaddik. I don’t want you to be a rasha. I want you to be a beinoni.” What is a beinoni? Someone who doesn’t stumble into transgressions. Fine. I had a yetzer hara; I toiled, I worked on myself, I contemplated, and now I’ve risen to this level and I no longer commit transgressions. What’s wrong with that, so to speak, in the eyes of Hakadosh Boruch Hu? What’s bad about it?

47:48 Speaker 9 [unclear]

47:50 Speaker 4 Hakadosh Boruch Hu is not satisfied with the result. Hakadosh Boruch Hu wants the work. And this is the third principle. A person needs to know three things. “Be in your own eyes like a rasha.” However hard you try and however much you succeed in your avodah, always remember that you cannot be a tzaddik. Oh, does that discourage you? You can be a beinoni. Everyone can; there’s no problem with that. You don’t believe me? Read chapter 14; learn it again. Well, once I finally succeed in working on myself, am I done? No, no, no, no, no. It doesn’t end there. Fine, but what does it mean to work? The effort and the toil are what we call serving Hashem. Now that we understand that the goal of a beinoni’s avodah is not success—the goal is the work itself—we can begin learning how to serve Hashem. That will be the next chapter. But wait, let’s finish this chapter. So, he is called one who serves G-d because—why? Why is only he called one who serves G-d? What’s happening here? To change his habitual nature, he must awaken love for Hashem by contemplating Hashem’s greatness. Where? In his mind. If he awakens the love for Hashem’s greatness, the love that is in his heart, his habits won’t change. To change a person’s habits, to affect the animal soul and change it—what do habits have to do with this? His habit is to get excited about this world, and he needs to... truly fill his heart, or at least make learning Torah, keeping mitzvos and so on his habit. To change his habits, he has to awaken specifically an intellectually generated love. If he uses his natural love, even though it is much stronger than the intellectually generated love, it will not change the animal soul. We’ll soon see why. By contemplating Hashem’s greatness in his mind, to gain control over

50:19 Speaker 4 the nature in the left chamber of the heart, which is filled with the blood of the animal soul that comes from kelipah, from which that nature arises. And this is complete avodah for a beinoni—the beinoni’s full, perfect avodah. There is another kind of avodah for a beinoni who finds this difficult, who cannot do it. Why can’t he? Who can’t? Contemplate Hashem’s greatness and toil; make an effort. What does it mean, “can’t”? There can be all sorts of reasons. A person might be, how shall I put it, simple-minded. What can you do? He doesn’t understand.

50:57 Speaker 10 He can’t.

50:58 Speaker 4 Huh?

50:59 Speaker 10 He can’t.

50:59 Speaker 4 He can’t. He doesn’t understand. Hakadosh Boruch Hu gave him a mind with certain limitations, and he can’t manage to contemplate. He can’t. What can you do? That’s his nature; that’s how he was created. Someone else, given his mental abilities, actually could. So what happens? Hakadosh Boruch Hu puts him in a position where he has to support a family, he has children, and he has no time to breathe. What can he do? He has responsibilities, all kinds of obligations. He has no time. He can’t spend two hours contemplating during morning davening. He can’t. He desperately wants to, but he can’t. There are all sorts of other reasons. So the Alter Rebbe says in this chapter that even someone who, for whatever reason, cannot serve Hashem with complete avodah—cannot arouse the love of Hashem in his mind—still has another way. Fine, don’t despair. Why? Ah, line nine: “to arouse the hidden love in his heart.” All right: if you can’t do the other kind of avodah, that’s a sign that this is your task. Some people’s task is complete avodah, and others’ task is avodah that is not complete. So that’s your task. “To use it to rule over the nature in the left part of the heart, which is also called avodah.” Why is that also called avodah? Because fighting one’s nature and yetzer until one arouses the hidden love in one’s heart takes effort. It doesn’t awaken on its own. You have to exert yourself to awaken it a little. But when there is no struggle at all, this hidden love, in itself, is not called one’s avodah at all. If he makes no effort to awaken it, that isn’t avodah. But if he does make the effort, that too is avodah. We still owe an answer to

52:52 Speaker 4 one point: Why is it really this way? Why, to change the habitual nature of the animal soul’s yetzer hara, do we specifically need an intellectual love? The natural love of the G-dly soul is its very nature. The G-dly soul is eternal; it is literally a part of G-d above. It is within every person. Its love burns for G-dliness. When that love is revealed—as he writes there in chapters 18 and 19—all the kelipos melt like wax. A person who has never kept mitzvos in his life is suddenly faced with a test of faith, and all at once he throws everything aside. “No, I’m a Jew. I’m ready to die.” What, you’re ready to die al kiddush Hashem? A moment ago you weren’t keeping mitzvos, and suddenly you’re ready? What happened? When that love awakens, nothing can stop it. So with our ordinary reasoning, what would we say? Why toil and exert ourselves so much, contemplating in order to arouse intellectual love? Let’s invest a little more in the hidden love. It’s easier to awaken, too, because it’s already there. You don’t have to bring something new into being; you have to awaken something that already exists. You don’t have to build anything. It’s there—you just have to bring it out. Tell us how to bring it out; he’ll explain that later. We’ll let it out of the bottle and we won’t have any problem. And ultimately, that hidden love in the heart is much stronger than any love I can generate. How much can I—what can I possibly generate with my mind and my heart? What kind of love can I reveal there? When the G-dly soul’s love is revealed, surely it will finish off the yetzer hara in a second, make mincemeat of it.

54:50 Speaker 11 I hope that’s not how it works.

54:52 Speaker 4 Why isn’t that how it works? That’s exactly what I’m asking. Why not? The Alter Rebbe says no: to change one’s habitual nature, you specifically need the love in one’s mind. He said so explicitly. Why? It’s very simple. The G-dly soul and the animal soul—we spoke about them in the chapters on the two souls—don’t communicate. They aren’t friends. When you talk to the G-dly soul about matters of this world, it has no idea what you’re talking about. That’s not its thing. It speaks of love, of G-dliness, of understanding, of comprehension, of Hashem’s greatness. Talk to it about worldly matters, and it doesn’t understand what you want from it. When you come to the animal soul and try to explain, “Listen, lift your eyes,” it’s an animal. Its eyes are pointed down; that’s what it sees. It wants food, and to feel good, pleasant, warm, and comfortable. That’s what it wants. That’s what it feels. They don’t have—they don’t have a common language. One speaks Hebrew, the other speaks, I don’t know, Portuguese. They don’t understand each other. Yes. When the G-dly soul’s love awakens, what happens to the animal soul at that moment? It looks on and says, “Wow! How beautiful!”

56:16 Speaker 11 Amazing.

56:18 Speaker 4 It doesn’t care. It sees something very beautiful, very great, but it doesn’t feel connected to it. We see this in practice. A person goes to some seminar—it happens often. Suddenly he hears for the first time that there is G-dliness, throws everything aside, puts on a kippah and tzitzis, and becomes religious in a second. A month or two later, a year or two later, it all starts to fall away. What happened? When the G-dly soul suddenly revealed itself, came out of the bottle, the animal soul made room for it. It was frightened and stepped back. But as soon as the G-dly soul withdrew, the animal soul went right back to its place. The G-dly soul’s love is so far above the animal soul that the animal soul feels no connection to it. It doesn’t affect it. The animal soul is afraid of it, runs from it, makes room for it. “The heart is yours now. I can’t deal with this. The heart is yours now; you take the davening. You’re on fire now. Burn as brightly as you like. I’ll move aside, keep quiet, and lower my head.” Then it ends, and the animal soul goes back to its place. It hasn’t changed. To change the animal soul, to change its habitual nature—what does that mean? Before, it was accustomed to doing things a certain way. The animal soul is me. You have to change something about the soul itself. Of course, it won’t suddenly start loving Hashem. But for something in it to change, you have to speak to it in a language it understands. How do you speak to it in a language it understands?

58:00 Speaker 11 Intellect.

58:01 Speaker 4 Intellect. Intellect. When a person understands, who is doing the understanding? I am. It’s the animal soul’s intellect. We spoke about that in chapters five, six, seven, and eight. When I understand, the animal soul understands. True, it doesn’t understand much, but what it does understand matters to it. And when love awakens in the heart—an intellectual love—then, yes, it isn’t as strong, but it is a love that the animal soul also feels part of. It has a connection to it, and because it has a connection to it, that love can change it. And only that kind of love can change it, while what is required is avodah that changes it. What does “avodah” mean? It’s related to the term for processed hides. Have you heard that expression? The word avodah comes from the idea of processing hides—working a hide. Why use processing specifically? We process all kinds of things. Why use the term specifically for hides? A cowhide or a sheepskin has to be processed before you can use it.

59:19 Speaker 11 Hide with an ayin.

59:19 Speaker 4 Hide with an ayin. Sorry. Yes, to process it—well, it’s so thick. A cowhide is a full two centimeters thick, covered in blood and hair. If you haven’t seen it, it’s quite a sight and interesting to see, but it’s not… In short, you put it in lime, and it’s incredibly heavy—it weighs a ton. The lime settles, so you have to pull the hide and stir it. It’s backbreaking work that takes, at the halachic minimum, twelve days, I think, if I remember correctly, until the lime eats away the hair and that layer. Then you take it out. When you take the hide out of the lime, it has changed. If you just leave an untreated hide, after a few hours, a day or two, it rots.

1:00:13 Speaker 11 It stinks.

1:00:15 Speaker 4 You don’t want to know. Take it out of the lime, and you can leave it forever. It will never rot. It has changed in its very nature. That’s what processing hides means. It’s very, very hard work, very, very unpleasant, and accompanied by a very, very bad smell—but the hide changes. Its properties have changed. The animal soul is like a hide. Left to itself, it has its own smell and wants all the same things it always wanted. Changing it takes tremendous effort. But the result of that effort is that it changes. And for it to change, there has to be a love that can move it. Only an intellectual love can do that. All right, now that we know that the central concern of the beinoni, and our central concern, is serving Hashem—working hard to bring forth intellectual love—the Alter Rebbe will now give us two chapters explaining how. How do we reveal it?

1:01:27 Speaker 3 Ah, let’s see what you’ve got. We’ll see next week too.