Likkutei Amarim Chapter 43 (Part 2) · 5785

00:00 Speaker 1 Okay, we started learning chapter 43 last week. Because it’s a short chapter, I wanted to finish it in one go, but... So what, Rab—

00:10 Speaker 2 There won’t be a class next week because of the farbrengen.

00:13 Speaker 6 Oh, right.

00:13 Speaker 2 Yes. Unless you want to on—

00:16 Speaker 6 Thursday.

00:17 Speaker 2 One day, Thursday, that is.

00:20 Speaker 6 I don’t know. At least for Thursday.

00:21 Speaker 2 Check, whatever... Check and—

00:27 Speaker 1 So what did he begin discussing in chapter 43? He began by saying that there are two levels of yirah, of awe. That’s the first part of the chapter: there is lower awe and higher awe. What’s new about saying there are two levels of awe? After all, earlier he also spoke about several levels. Why is he suddenly introducing two levels here? He says no, it’s not the same thing. Everything discussed in the previous two chapters—three levels of awe—was all within lower awe. Lower awe itself has three levels. And here, at the beginning of this chapter, he adds another level within lower awe, a fourth level. Apart from the whole subject of lower awe, which has four general levels, there is also something entirely different called higher awe. He explained why we need—what is required for a person’s avodah, for ordinary service of Hashem, its beginning, its core and its root, is lower awe. If a person has no kabbolas ol, no awe of Hashem, then he isn’t serving Hashem; he’s serving himself. So first of all, there has to be awe. And of course there also has to be love—he explained that too—because the main part of avodah is love of Hashem. But without awe, it isn’t possible. Even avodah motivated by love needs to be permeated with awe. He spoke about that. And at the beginning of this chapter he introduced the idea that there are two levels of awe: the lower awe we’ve been discussing, and higher awe. What’s the difference between lower awe and higher awe? What’s the essential distinction? Lower awe comes from the external aspect of G-dliness, while higher awe comes from the inner aspect of G-dliness. Remember we discussed that distinction? Yes. So he brings

02:22 Speaker 1 an analogy. The Alter Rebbe brings an analogy in this chapter. What’s the difference between awe that comes from the inner aspect and awe that comes from the external aspect? There are two analogies. He brings one analogy to help us understand—because we’re talking about awe of Hashem, right?—what awe of the external aspect means, and another to help us understand awe of the inner aspect. What is awe of the external aspect? It’s like awe of a king. When a person is in awe of a king, he doesn’t know the king himself. He isn’t in awe of the king’s personality. He’s in awe of the king’s actions, his rule, his greatness. He isn’t in awe of the king himself; he’s in awe of how the king is revealed in the world. That’s the awe. So it’s called external awe. It comes from the king’s external aspect. And for inner awe, he brings the analogy of a person’s awe in the presence of a tzaddik. When someone stands before a tzaddik, there’s no awe of the tzaddik’s external aspect. That doesn’t evoke awe. Even when a person stands before a great tzaddik and recognizes that he’s a tzaddik, it doesn’t cause the same kind of awe he feels toward a king. But he does feel a certain kind of awe. What is it? He says it’s something entirely different. Here the awe doesn’t come from the person’s conduct, his external aspect or his actions. It comes from who he is. A person feels that he’s standing before someone so great, and that evokes awe. Here the awe really isn’t... Later he explains that the difference between external and inner awe, between lower and higher awe, isn’t only what causes the awe—whether it comes from the external or inner aspect. It’s also a difference in the kind of

04:21 Speaker 1 awe, in what the person feels. If someone is in awe of the external aspect, it produces one kind of awe; if he’s in awe of the inner aspect, it produces another kind. What’s the difference between the two? With awe of the actions, of the external aspect, he’s afraid. He’s simply afraid. With awe of the inner aspect, there’s no fear at all. A person stands before a tzaddik, and there’s no question of being afraid. So what does he call it? He calls it yiras boshes, awe expressed as shame. It’s also a kind of awe, but the essential feeling in being in awe of a tzaddik isn’t fear. It’s shame. He feels ashamed simply to stand beside him. When we think about what shame means: when a person feels ashamed, what does that mean? I’m ashamed—so what? When someone is shamed in some way, what does he feel? It’s not just, “I feel uncomfortable.” No. He wants to be utterly nullified.

05:52 Speaker 7 To disappear.

05:52 Speaker 1 He wants to disappear. Right, to disappear. He wants the earth to swallow him up. He doesn’t want to exist. Shame is a movement of bittul bimetzius, a feeling that one’s very existence is nullified. The difference between external awe and inner awe isn’t just that one is fear and the other is shame. Fear is felt in the external aspect of the heart. Inner awe means that a person nullifies himself. That’s called bittul—bittul bimetzius. He wants to nullify his... He feels that it would be better if he didn’t exist. That’s what inner awe, higher awe, is about. So he explains it along these lines. Of course, there is only one Hakadosh Boruch Hu; He isn’t a king at one moment and a tzaddik at another. These are only analogies. But what do they illustrate? When a person contemplates the greatness of Hashem, it depends on which aspect of Hashem’s greatness he considers. If he contemplates how Hakadosh Boruch Hu is great and gives life to all the worlds, and how He watches me and sees at every moment what I think, say and do, then he’s afraid. But if he contemplates Hashem’s greatness—not that Hakadosh Boruch Hu gives life to the world and watches me, but the greatness of Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself, without reference to me—that’s just like contemplating the king or the tzaddik and focusing on who that person is inwardly. Similarly, one can contemplate the actions: how Hakadosh Boruch Hu creates the world and governs it, materially and spiritually, and everything He does. Or one can contemplate Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself. When he contemplates G-dliness itself, Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself, the inner aspect of G-dliness, it gives rise to higher awe, yiras boshes. Yes. So that’s

07:50 Speaker 1 the first part, which we’ve already learned: there are two levels of awe, two broad categories. He also explained that each contains many details and many levels. The two broad categories are external awe and inner awe, which give rise in the heart to fear and to yiras boshes. How does he continue? This is where we got to; this is where we stopped. How does he continue? On page 60b, in the fourth line, the line beginning “Ein chochmah,” he goes on to say: “And in love, too, there are two levels: ahavah rabbah and ahavas olam.” First of all, that’s a new idea. Someone who’s never heard of it thinks, “I love—I love.” What does it mean that there are two kinds of love? With awe, we understood it, and now we understand more deeply that there really are two kinds of contemplation, arising from two different causes and producing different feelings. But what does it mean that there are two different kinds of love? He says “too.” What does “too” mean? It means that the two levels of love correspond to the two levels of awe. In other words, just as there is awe that comes from the external aspect and awe that comes from the inner aspect, so too there is love that arises from the external aspect of G-dliness and love that arises from its inner aspect. That’s what he’s now going to explain. Maybe before we start learning the text itself, there’s a general point to make that isn’t written here. It isn’t even written between the lines, as it were, but I think that without it, this is difficult; otherwise it gets confusing. Here in Tanya, the Alter Rebbe is speaking in general about serving Hashem: how a person should serve Hashem in an orderly way, as a beinoni. How does a beinoni serve Hashem? That’s the subject here. So for ordinary service of Hashem, there’s no need to confuse a person, a beginning student, with endless levels and sublevels, distinctions between levels, different approaches to study and their reasons.

10:26 Speaker 1 There’s no end to it. That’s not the goal. The goal is to explain to a person how to serve Hashem. So when the Alter Rebbe divides the levels of love and fear here, he does it very simply. He says: two levels of fear, and corresponding to them, two levels of love. We have only... The Alter Rebbe recognizes only two levels here. Yes. In truth, that isn’t the whole picture. When you get into the details, even ahavas olam, which he’ll explain and discuss in a moment, has a great many levels explained in Chassidus—different levels, and even different concepts. And ahavah rabbah itself is divided into two levels elsewhere: ahavah rabbah and ahavah beta’anugim, love with delight. Here the Alter Rebbe doesn’t divide them. Here ahavah rabbah is ahavah beta’anugim; they’re the same thing. In Chassidus, though, major differences are explained between ahavah rabbah and ahavah beta’anugim. And within ahavah rabbah itself, Chassidus lists at least five different kinds of love. At least five kinds of ahavah rabbah, each arising through a different contemplation and touching a different point in the soul. Each has its own character, is expressed in something different, and accomplishes something different. Similarly, ahavah beta’anugim has a number of levels, and there are lower and higher levels of ahavas olam. Here the Alter Rebbe... Anyway, I wanted...

12:01 Speaker 8 Bring it... Yoshke, bring it; I’ll take it.

12:08 Speaker 1 It was important to me to put things in order and, before we start explaining the difference between ahavas olam and ahavah rabbah, to stress that what’s explained here is really in the broadest possible terms. The Alter Rebbe isn’t going into any details here. So he says: Love, too, has two levels.

12:32 Speaker 8 And a spirit enters with him as well.

12:37 Speaker 1 Ahavah rabbah and ahavas olam. And we said that, following the way this is presented, it should be like the discussion of fear, which has two levels, inner and outer. So let’s begin this way. Ahavah rabbah is ahavah beta’anugim; they’re the same thing. And it is a flame that rises of its own accord. Do you have to do anything to make a flame rise upward rather than go downward?

13:14 Speaker 8 That’s its nature.

13:15 Speaker 1 That’s its nature. Ahavah rabbah is something a person doesn’t have to do anything to experience. It’s a flame that rises of its own accord. Ahavah rabbah does not come through one’s own work. It comes from Above. What does “comes from Above” mean? Exactly what it sounds like: Hakadosh Boruch Hu gives it. And when, and to whom, does it come? As a gift. There are people to whom Hakadosh Boruch Hu gives the gift of ahavah rabbah, ahavah beta’anugim. To whom does Hakadosh Boruch Hu give such a gift? To someone who is complete in fear of Hashem. So it’s true that it doesn’t come through one’s own work, but who receives a gift? There’s a saying of our Sages, worded in Aramaic. “If not... [unclear]...” You know its meaning in Hebrew. It’s a saying of our Sages in Aramaic: If he hadn’t brought him pleasure, he wouldn’t have given him a gift. You give a gift to someone who brings you pleasure. The person who brought pleasure didn’t do it for the gift, and the gift isn’t a payment for what he did. But if he hadn’t brought pleasure, they wouldn’t have given it to him. Similarly, ahavah rabbah is received as a gift. To whom is it given as a gift? To someone who is complete in fear of Hashem. As is known regarding our Sages’ statement, “It is the way of a man to pursue a woman.” Love is called “man” and “male.” Where do we see that? In the verse “He remembered His kindness.” The verse uses the word zachar in connection with kindness. So here zachar means—hmm?—not “remembered,” but “male.” What?

15:18 Speaker 8 Nowadays women do the seeking, the pursuing, as it were.

15:21 Speaker 1 Ah, nowadays—fine, it’s the time of exile. You know, it says that in the time of exile “we were like dreamers.”

15:26 Speaker 8 Yes, as if everything got mixed up. Yes.

15:32 Speaker 1 There’s a story about one of the Tannaim who ascended on high and then returned. They asked him, “What did you see there?” He said, “I saw those above below, and those below above. I saw an upside-down world.” Those below were above. So they said to him, “You saw an upside-down world? You saw a world that is right-side up.” It’s here that things are upside down. As it says, “He remembered His kindness,” and a woman is referred to in the verse as “a woman who fears Hashem,” as is known. And without fear coming first—so, first of all, why is ahavah rabbah given to someone who is complete in fear? Because love is male, and fear is a woman, female. So it is the way of a man to pursue a woman. Once you’re complete in the matter of the woman, you’ll be given the matter of the man. That’s the first point; that’s the way love works. This love of Hashem has the characteristic that it comes to a person only after he is complete in fear. That’s one thing. Then he says something else: “And without fear preceding it, one cannot attain this ahavah rabbah.” That’s another point. First we said it’s the way it works. How did you put it? The way—the way of a man is to pursue a woman. It could also be the other way around, though. Yes. That’s generally the way; it could be the other way around. He says no. He says not only is it the way of love to come after fear; more than that, without fear preceding it, one cannot attain this ahavah rabbah. It’s not merely the usual way; it’s impossible without it. Why? Because this love is from the level of Atzilus, where there is no severance or separation. Ahavah rabbah, or ahavah beta’anugim, means that within a person’s soul, G-dliness—G-dliness itself—is revealed and felt. G-dliness itself is the world of Atzilus. What is the nature of the world of Atzilus? Atzilus is called the world of unity. Do you ladies know that? What, in general, is the nature of the worlds of Beriah, Yetzirah, and Asiyah? Created beings, right? In what sense—how are these beings created? Why are they called created beings? Because

17:56 Speaker 1 they were created as something from nothing. What was created as something from nothing? What exists now that didn’t exist before? What was there before they were created?

18:08 Speaker 9 Nothing.

18:09 Speaker 1 There was G-dliness. There was ayin, nothingness. Ayin is not an entity.

18:12 Speaker 9 Ah.

18:13 Speaker 1 Before they were created, there was only G-dliness. There wasn’t anything else. After the created beings were created, there was something that was not G-dliness, something separate. It could be something very, very, very spiritual, like Beriah, or a little less spiritual, like Yetzirah, or still less spiritual, or even physical. But what all these worlds have in common is that they contain created beings, and a created being is separate. If it were G-dliness, it wouldn’t be separate; it would be G-dliness. That’s very clear, right? Why is Atzilus called the world of unity? Atzilus also suggests being “with Him” and close to Him. Atzilus is not a realm of created beings. Nothing was created there.

18:54 Speaker 9 So what is there?

18:55 Speaker 1 In Atzilus there are no created beings.

18:57 Speaker 9 So what is there?

18:58 Speaker 1 What?

18:59 Speaker 9 G-dliness?

19:00 Speaker 1 The revelation of Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s powers. His powers. It’s like, by way of analogy—

19:05 Speaker 9 What does it mean that the powers are one? What is this unity? Unity of what?

19:10 Speaker 1 That His powers are Him, not someone else. Yes, I’ll give an example.

19:15 Speaker 9 No, but the unity.

19:16 Speaker 1 In some places—in many places—an analogy for G-dliness is drawn from a person. It’s one of the analogies used. So Atzilus is called the body, while Beriah, Yetzirah, and Asiyah are called garments: thought, speech, and action. The world of Beriah is, so to speak, Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s garment of thought. Yetzirah is His garment of speech, and Asiyah is action. Thought, speech, and action—Beriah, Yetzirah, and Asiyah. Beriah, Yetzirah, and Asiyah are, so to speak, Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s thought, speech, and action. So to speak, yes? What are we saying? Why do we use this kind of analogy? Because what are a person’s thought, speech, and action? There’s me, and then there are the actions I do—we’ve spoken about this a lot, right? When a person acts, he can do things that aren’t who he is. He can put his foot somewhere unpleasant, somewhere it hurts, somewhere it gets cut. Right? He can say something he knows isn’t true. He can think words he knows are false. Right? Why can he do that? Because that isn’t him. A person can’t understand—I don’t know—“It’s morning now; the sun is shining now.” He can understand the words “The sun is shining now.” He can think the words “The sun is shining now,” but he can’t understand it, because—because that is him. Is that clear?

20:46 Speaker 10 No. What does “because that is me” mean?

20:50 Speaker 1 I can say—I can take the statement “Two plus two equals eight.” I can say it.

21:01 Speaker 10 Yes.

21:03 Speaker 1 I know it isn’t true. I can say it. I can even think those words. I can understand it. But I can’t understand it. Why can’t I understand it? Because my understanding is me. I can take some object and change its shape, but I can’t change myself. I am me. Right. What does “I am me” mean? Who is this “me”? My mind and my feelings—that’s me. Right? So they say no: my real self is the essence of my soul; my will is me. My mind and feelings are my faculties. They aren’t really me. True, that’s how we always speak. Right. So they say, fine, my mind and feelings aren’t really, really me. But they are me. They aren’t someone else. They aren’t a created being. They aren’t something I do. They are me. The mind and feelings are utterly united with the essence of the soul. They aren’t someone else. When a person thinks, he feels, “I am thinking.” When he feels, it isn’t someone else feeling. Right. The same applies to the world of Atzilus. It is the revelation of Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s faculties—His Chochmah, Binah and Daas; His Chessed, Gevurah and Tiferes. Yes, they are faculties, but they are His faculties; they are He Himself. That is why it is called the world of unity. They are Divine faculties, but they are utterly united with Him. That utter unity is why it is called the world of unity. There is no—there is nothing there in Atzilus. How could there be?

22:33 Speaker 10 The potential for holiness, the potential in building.

22:38 Speaker 1 The potential for worlds. No. No. I don’t know what it says there, but no. So, just as with a person—

22:56 Speaker 10 Sorry. Well, we made coffee, and sorry. Yes, we know.

23:10 Speaker 1 So it is called the world of unity. “The world of unity” means that apart from G-dliness—there is a saying of our Sages: “There are no angels in Atzilus.” Atzilus. There aren’t even angels there. An angel, even the holiest and greatest angel, is a created being. That isn’t G-dliness; it is a created being. The great angels are in the world of Beriah. In the world of Atzilus there are no angels. Why? Because there are no created beings there. All right. So he says: What is ahavah rabbah, “great love”? Ahavah rabbah is when a person senses the G-dliness of the world of Atzilus. What does “from above” mean? Something beyond the worlds is revealed within a person: the Divine light of the world of Atzilus. And sometimes a person is given this as a gift. Who is given it? Someone whose awe is complete. All right. Why is it given only to someone whose awe is complete? What has he done that is so special? Someone might come along and say, “I have merits too. I’ve given a lot of tzedakah, I’ve done a lot of mivtzoim, and I’ve devoted myself completely. So what if I don’t have awe? I’ve done great things too. Why don’t I deserve it?” Right? This means that awe has some quality that allows that unity with G-dliness to be revealed in a person’s soul. Are you following?

24:48 Speaker 11 Yes.

24:48 Speaker 1 What is that quality? He says: Without awe coming first, it is impossible to reach this ahavah rabbah, because this love—which love? Ahavah rabbah, a love of delight—is of the level of Atzilus. Atzilus is a state in which “there is no division or separation.” There is no created being there, and nothing separate from G-dliness, G-d forbid. What is the nature of awe? And he breaks off the sentence in the middle because it is so obvious that he doesn’t need to explain further. What doesn’t he need to explain? How has this explained why one cannot reach that love without awe? What kind of awe was he talking about? Someone whose awe is complete. Who receives ahavah rabbah? He said earlier: someone whose awe is complete, right? What does that mean? What kind of awe does he have? Complete awe, yirah ila’ah, the higher awe. Right? What is the nature of yirah ila’ah? We spoke about it at the beginning of the class.

25:47 Speaker 11 Humility.

25:49 Speaker 1 Shame. He becomes nullified. Bittul bimetzius—nullification of his very sense of self. Only when a person nullifies his sense of self can G-dliness be revealed within him. As long as he sees himself as a separate entity, he is separate, and Atzilus cannot be revealed within him.

26:07 Speaker 11 So who merits this? Only someone who—

26:09 Speaker 1 Someone whose awe is complete. No, no, no, no. We’re talking about ourselves. I—I’m going to open a parenthesis here. In this chapter, the Alter Rebbe is only explaining the four levels: yirah tata’ah and yirah ila’ah, ahavas olam and ahavah rabbah. In the next chapter—what’s the next chapter? What comes after chapter 43?

26:36 Speaker 11 Four.

26:37 Speaker 1 Forty-four. Through the end of chapter 49, the Alter Rebbe will explain how we bring these forms of love into practice in our everyday lives—all the levels mentioned here, including the loftiest ones. But right now he is only explaining what they are. All right?

27:00 Speaker 11 Mm-hm.

27:01 Speaker 1 All these things can be revealed within every person. This is a book for beinonim.

27:04 Speaker 11 All right, but in—in practice, really, what—

27:07 Speaker 1 In practice, we’ll see later that not only is it possible, it’s very easy. And we’ll see even more—

27:13 Speaker 11 It happens. It isn’t merely possible, just a theory.

27:14 Speaker 1 It happens. And we’ll see, moreover, that on the contrary: the loftier the level, the easier it is to reveal. You just need to know how. There’s a way. It really isn’t hard. It really isn’t hard.

27:34 Speaker 11 Yes?

27:35 Speaker 1 Hmm?

27:35 Speaker 11 It isn’t hard.

27:39 Speaker 1 It’s much easier than understanding what exactly is being revealed.

27:43 Speaker 11 What we believe and what we don’t. Yes, exactly.

27:47 Speaker 1 No, you don’t need to believe it. These things are explained. They’re explained very, very clearly, in a very straightforward way. Just as we understand every word here, we need to understand every word there too. It’s all right.

27:59 Speaker 11 No question about it. It can be understood.

28:05 Speaker 1 So that is ahavah rabbah. Ahavah rabbah is a love of delight. It means that the world of Atzilus is sensed in the soul. And why does it come only to someone who first reaches the level of complete awe? Why can’t it come without awe? Because complete awe means bittul bimetzius: a person is ashamed of his sense of self and nullifies it. Then he is no longer separate, and Divine light can be revealed within him. That is ahavah rabbah. But ahavas olam is the lower level, right? It comes from understanding and awareness of the greatness of the blessed Ein Sof. Ahavah rabbah is received as a gift. Ahavas olam does not come as a gift. It comes through contemplation; it takes work. It comes from understanding and awareness of Hashem’s greatness. Contemplation of what? Of how Hakadosh Boruch Hu “fills all worlds” and “encompasses all worlds,” and “all is considered as nothing before Him.” Earlier we said that one reaches awe by contemplating how Hakadosh Boruch Hu fills all worlds and encompasses all worlds, and all is considered as nothing before Him. That is how one reaches awe. Right? That’s what he was talking about. What does he say here? Through those very same words—literally word for word—through what appears to be exactly the same contemplation, one also reaches love? Do you hear what I’m asking? So what is the explanation? It’s very simple. When contemplating Hashem’s greatness, there are two sides to it. Everything has two sides. What am I contemplating? Am I contemplating how much greater Hakadosh Boruch Hu is than I am? Or am I contemplating how abundant His goodness is—how He gives life to the worlds and gives us life, happiness and a livelihood, and—? It is the same greatness. But which aspect of that greatness am I contemplating? The greatness itself, or what His greatness brings about? If I contemplate what it brings about... Maybe we should start—

30:45 Speaker 1 Another way. From a different angle.

30:48 Speaker 12 Not just what it brings about.

30:49 Speaker 1 Maybe from another angle. What causes a person to feel awe, to be afraid? What makes a person want to be drawn toward something? It’s very simple. When something is close to a person, something he understands and grasps, and he understands that it’s good, he wants to come closer to it. When something is distant, great, frightening, beyond his grasp, he feels distant from it, and that makes him afraid. Right? It’s always like that. Behind every level of love, without exception, is a feeling of closeness. He feels close to that thing, so he loves it and is drawn to it. Behind awe is a feeling of distance from the thing, so he is afraid. That’s the most general, most fundamental difference between love and awe: whether he feels close to something or distant from it. Even when contemplating the greatness of Hashem, if you contemplate what Hashem’s greatness does, you’re looking at what it does for me. He gives me health, He gives me a livelihood, He gives me children, He gives me life. He gives me things that are good and pleasant for me. When you look at what Hakadosh Boruch Hu gives, you feel closeness. If you look at His greatness—how is He so great? How can He do such a thing?—then I feel distance. So you’re contemplating the same things, but what aspect of the greatness are you contemplating? And what does that mean? He goes into the idea that “all is considered as nothing before Him.” Let’s say he doesn’t discuss the first two points. What kind of contemplation of “all is considered as nothing before Him” brings a person to a higher level? What kind of love—ahavah rabbah or ahavas olam? Which are we discussing now? Ahavas olam. No, not ahavah rabbah; ahavas olam, a lower level of love. The contemplation is that all is

32:58 Speaker 1 truly considered as nothing before Him, like the nullification of a single word in the thinking soul while it is still in the person’s thought, or in the desire of the heart, as explained above. Right? The light that gives life to all the worlds—all the worlds are considered before it as truly nothing, like that single word. We spoke about this last week. Through this contemplation, the attribute of love in the soul will naturally shed its garments. What are the garments of the attribute of love? In my own case, what do I love? Love means being drawn toward something, right? Drawn toward what? What is a person drawn toward? If only.

33:54 Speaker 13 Toward what? Toward Hakadosh Boruch Hu.

33:58 Speaker 1 In simple terms, a person is drawn to whatever he’s drawn to: different things in this world, right? Now, we see that one person is drawn to certain things, and his friend is drawn to similar things, or to different things. Right? Love is a force, a force of attraction. That force can be clothed in one thing or in another, each person according to his nature. So the things of this world in which my soul’s power of love is clothed are called the garments of love. One person’s power of love is strongly clothed in eating; another’s is strongly clothed in some field of knowledge—I don’t know, chemistry, computers, painting, architecture, whatever. And another person’s love is clothed in something else, something that gives him pleasure and joy. So all the things of this world can be garments of the attribute of love. Right? What happens when a person begins to contemplate what the true good is? The true good is G-dliness. The One who gives all the good in the world is Hakadosh Boruch Hu. So if the true good is really Him, and all the things I’m drawn to are actually nothing, then his love—my love, the love of whoever is contemplating—once I understand and internalize this, my love will simply shed the garments of this world and become clothed in Him. Then I’ll begin to love Him. If a person understands: love is a force of attraction. That force of attraction called love doesn’t care what it loves. Its nature is that it needs something to attach itself to, something to love. If we can explain to it—no, no. If we can explain to it that the greatness and pleasure and happiness and joy there are

36:34 Speaker 1 a thousand times, a million times greater than here, then my power of love will simply throw all the things of this world in the trash and stop loving them, and it will begin to love Hakadosh Boruch Hu. You have to explain that to it. That’s work: explaining it to it. And that is what’s called contemplating the greatness of Hashem.

36:53 Speaker 3 Like a mathematical formula. You do it.

36:57 Speaker 1 That’s exactly what’s called a path in the service of Hashem. What should you contemplate? And you understand it logically, too. Now it’s clear to you that if you do this, if you contemplate it until it becomes real to you—once it becomes real, once I’ve contemplated it until I believe it, until it’s clear to me that it really is so—I think it’s quite obvious to anyone that love will immediately shed its garments. That’s it. It can’t be otherwise. Meaning that it will no longer be clothed in anything that gives physical or spiritual enjoyment or pleasure. Some kind of knowledge or intellectual pursuit, for example—that too is a spiritual matter of this world. It will shed all that and come to love Him, desiring nothing in the world, neither physical nor spiritual, except Hashem alone. Because he will understand that Hashem alone is the source of life for all pleasures. And He is their source of life to such an extent that all the pleasures of the world are utterly nullified before the pleasure of Hashem. “All are considered as nothing before Him”: compared with the pleasure found in Him, all the pleasures of the world are considered as though they don’t exist. And more than that—more than merely “considered as nothing”—he adds another point. When you understand that something... When we say something isn’t important at all, right? What kinds of things do we say that about? Often, at the grocery store or somewhere else, they give me ten agorot in change, forty agorot—even forty agorot. Do me a favor, keep the coins. They have no importance at all. Right? So when we say—

39:08 Speaker 3 If he doesn’t give you the coins...

39:10 Speaker 1 What?

39:10 Speaker 3 If he doesn’t give you the coins, then we...

39:11 Speaker 1 Ah, yes, but think about a person’s attitude. When you tell someone that something isn’t important, that it’s “considered as nothing,” what does he picture? There are all sorts of things in the world that aren’t important. There are stones by the side of the road, out in the field. He regards them as unimportant; he pays them no attention at all. He knows they exist, but they aren’t important. Right? That’s what “considered as nothing” means, isn’t it? So what did we understand at first? That once a person understands that the source of life, the source of all pleasures, is G-dliness, all the pleasures of the world will be as nothing, of no importance. Right? That’s what we’ve understood until now. Correct? But he says no. The Rebbe says no, no, no—that’s not what it means. It doesn’t mean that the pleasures of the world are some sort of reality that just isn’t important. They aren’t a reality at all. What’s the difference between unimportant and nonexistent? There’s a difference between a stone lying by the side of the road, or a stone a person kicks aside as he walks, without even noticing that he’s doing it, and there being no stone at all. Nothing. It doesn’t exist. That’s a difference, right? So this is what he says: What does it mean that there is, G-d forbid, no comparison whatsoever between this pleasure and that pleasure? It’s like the utter lack of comparison between absolute nothingness and eternal life. There’s no comparison between them—no comparison at all. What’s the difference between zero and one?

41:08 Speaker 4 There’s no such thing as a one.

41:09 Speaker 1 Huh?

41:15 Speaker 4 There’s no such thing as a one.

41:15 Speaker 1 Even if you had an infinite number of zeros, they would still be zeros; they would never become one. Right? A person standing still compared with a person walking very, very slowly—that’s a difference beyond comparison. The one standing still will never get anywhere. He’ll stay right here. The one walking is going very slowly, but he’s already moving. The difference between zero and one is beyond comparison. It’s an infinite difference. Right? Now, what’s the difference between one and infinity? It’s exactly the same thing.

41:47 Speaker 4 Yes.

41:48 Speaker 1 That’s also infinity, right? Yes. So what’s the difference between zero and infinity? It’s beyond comparison to what’s beyond comparison. Right? The Alter Rebbe says: First of all, when I said “of no account,” I didn’t mean it’s something unimportant. I meant it has no value in comparison. And what kind of “no value in comparison” did I mean? No value in comparison to something that itself has no value in comparison. As it says, “Whom have I in heaven but You? And besides You I desire nothing on earth. My flesh and my heart fail; the Rock of my heart...” and so on, as will be explained later. Now a person might come and say, “Fine, but who is this talking about? Someone who has desires. Someone immersed in the desires of this world, who gets excited about worldly things. Fine, he has a very, very powerful capacity for love. So when he contemplates the greatness of Hashem and strips his love of its coverings, and that love becomes invested instead in G-dliness, he’ll really soar. But I know myself. True, I get excited about worldly things—I won’t deny it—but it’s not such a big deal. I don’t get that excited. I’m not so coarse and materialistic. So maybe when I contemplate, too, just as I don’t love those things all that much, I won’t love Hakadosh Boruch Hu all that much either. My capacity for love is weak. What can I do?” Right? So the Alter Rebbe immediately tells him that even someone whose soul’s capacity for love is not invested at all in any physical or spiritual pleasure—he’s a cold person; worldly matters don’t... nothing excites him—even he can set his soul aflame like fiery sparks, with a powerful flame rising heavenward, through the contemplation described above, as will be explained later. So at the end of the—at the end of the next chapter, the Alter Rebbe will explain that this same contemplation can work very well even for a person who is cold by nature and doesn’t have that kind of...

44:11 Speaker 1 So we’ll see that in the next chapter.

44:14 Speaker 4 Let’s just finish today.

44:18 Speaker 1 So what has he discussed up to this point? He’s finished explaining that there are two ty—just as there are two kinds of fear, there are two kinds of love. And just as the two kinds of fear relate to the external aspect of G-dliness and the inner aspect of G-dliness, so too with lo—with love: There is love that comes from contemplating the greatness of Hashem—how He brings the whole world into being, gives it life and provides it with pleasures. That’s an expression of His greatness. And there is a love that comes from above, which is a person’s sensing G-dliness in his soul. The difference is that higher fear does come through avodah: the avodah of bittul, of the fear that comes from shame. But higher love—ahavah rabbah, love of delights—comes when love from above descends upon someone who is complete in his fear. What’s the practical difference between ahavah rabbah and love of delights? There’s one level, and another level, and another level—but what’s the difference? What does a person feel? This is love, and that’s love. Why do you call them different things? If you say they’re two different things, then just as we explained with fear, a person must feel two different things. They’re not the same. Right? So I think we have to say that ahavah rabbah and ahavas olam don’t have the same effect on the soul and aren’t the same kind of love. Do you hear? Right? What’s the difference between ahavas olam and ahavah rabbah? Very simple. A person contemplates the greatness of Hashem until he understands that there lies the source of life, the source of pleasure, the source of happiness, and he longs to reach G-dliness. When a person wants something very, very much, he burns. What character does that have? Burning. Fire. It hurts. He feels thirst, yearning, and burning love. But when the light of Atzilus is revealed to a person from above, what does he feel? Is he burning for something? G-dliness is felt in his soul. Delight. There’s no fire there, no flame, no burning, nothing. Right. So what does he feel? It’s

47:20 Speaker 1 called, uh—

47:22 Speaker 4 Taking delight in Hashem?

47:24 Speaker 1 What?

47:24 Speaker 4 Taking delight in Hashem.

47:24 Speaker 1 Taking delight in Hashem, yes. What’s the greatest pleasure a person has?

47:29 Speaker 4 But what does it mean to take delight in Hashem?

47:30 Speaker 1 We’ll understand in a moment. It’s very simple to understand. What’s the greatest pleasure a person has? Everyone, without exception. What? Being alive. And what pleasure does a person not feel at all? Being alive. The thing that gives a person the greatest, greatest, greatest pleasure—he doesn’t feel it. It isn’t consciously felt, right? Unless he thinks about it, he doesn’t feel it. It’s an essential pleasure. It’s a pleasure bound up with his very essence. Right? Because we’re talking about love of delights: a person senses the very essence of G-dliness. It’s the delight in Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself.

48:22 Speaker 4 Now, that delight—

48:23 Speaker 1 It’s something you can’t even imagine. But do you understand the analogy? The idea? Right? What is revealed within a person is that his delight is in living with Hakadosh Boruch Hu. G-dliness is felt in his soul.

48:41 Speaker 4 Who does that happen to?

48:42 Speaker 1 Huh? It happens to every one of us in the next chapter.

48:46 Speaker 4 No, no—how wonderful! A delight.

48:52 Speaker 1 Wait, wait, wait. Give me a few more minutes and I’ll finish the chapter. So up to this point he’s explained the two levels of fear, which we now understand were really just an introduction to understanding the two levels of love: a burning love that comes through contemplating the greatness of Hashem as He brings the worlds into being, and ahavah rabbah, which is revealed in a person’s soul from above after he brings himself to complete bittul through fear. And the difference between them. “And behold, this level of love...” Which love is this? What was the last kind of love we discussed? Ahavas olam.

49:30 Speaker 4 Olam.

49:31 Speaker 1 Yes. “At times it precedes fear.” Love—ahavah rabbah, he said, cannot come before fear. Ahavah rabbah, which is of the level of Atzilus—“there is no severance or separation there”—will not be revealed to a person until he is complete in his fear. But ahavas olam can sometimes be revealed to a person before fear, “according to the level of daas that gives birth to it, as is known.” Why does it depend on daas? Because every love and every fear is born from contemplating something. And we’ve said several times already that contemplation alone does nothing, even if he understands this or that. He has to firmly focus his daas on it, right? And since... He adds in parentheses: “Daas includes chassadim and gevuros, which are love and fear.” So since it is daas that brings love from potential into actuality, and daas includes chassadim and gevuros, there can be times when the chassadim are already ready to descend and become revealed. How does that show itself? “Therefore, it is possible for a wicked person and a sinner to do teshuvah out of a love born in his heart, to remember Hashem his G-d, without fear.” Such a thing can happen. We see it often. Nothing particular happened to a Jew; no bombshell hit him, nothing happened. One day he woke up and wanted to return—to return to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. He starts keeping mitzvos, becomes stronger in his observance. What happened? What suddenly happened? Until now you were a sinner. What made you suddenly wake up? Sometimes Hakadosh Boruch Hu gives a person love before fear. Without an introduction, without kabbolas ol, without what is called the beginning of avodah, without its core and root coming before love. That can happen.

51:34 Speaker 4 It’s a merit. Sometimes the merit of one’s ancestors brings it about.

51:37 Speaker 1 The merit of one’s ancestors is something else. Sometimes it happens even without that merit. A person has fallen to such a low level. Hakadosh Boruch Hu loves every Jew. Hakadosh Boruch Hu doesn’t want a person to fall, so He reveals something to him.

51:50 Speaker 4 So then it becomes something.

51:51 Speaker 1 It doesn’t necessarily have to come through a person’s choices. But Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself wants a Jew to return in teshuvah. He loves every one of us. And so even a wicked person who has committed sins can do teshuvah out of a love born in his heart when he remembers Hashem his G-d, even though he hadn’t served Hashem and had no fear before that—no fear of sin, no kabbolas ol, nothing. Nevertheless, fear is included in that love too. Obviously, when a person has a revealed love of Hashem in his heart, he won’t sin at that moment. He won’t commit transgressions. It’s just that this fear included in the love is on a small scale and remains hidden: the fear of sinning by rebelling against Him. As we said, fear of sin is on a small scale. Remember? Within lower-level fear itself, fear of sin is the lower level. There’s fear of sin and fear of G-d. Remember we discussed that? Yes? Lower-level fear has several levels. Its lowest level is fear of sin; its highest is fear of G-d. So when a person begins his path with some love of Hashem that suddenly comes to him, without any contemplation or preparation, right? There’s fear there too, but it’s only fear of sin—of not rebelling against Him, G-d forbid. The love, though, is revealed in his heart and mind. But for love to come before fear is something exceptional. It’s a temporary exception, an act of Divine providence from Hashem for that particular moment. Hakadosh Boruch Hu wanted to bring him back in teshuvah, as in the story of Rabbi Elazar ben Durdaya. Do you remember the story? There was a Jew who committed many, many, many sins—the gravest sins in the Torah. He transgressed the three gravest prohibitions in the Torah, at least two of them, and... in the end someone said something to him, one of the Tannaim said a certain

53:54 Speaker 1 word to him, just one word, and he came to his senses. He went and sat between two mountains, put his head between his knees, and wept aloud until his soul departed. He didn’t contemplate anything or do anything else. Hakadosh Boruch Hu wanted to bring him back in teshuvah. So love was suddenly revealed in him before fear. The Rebbe asks about this. The Rebbe explains the story; there’s a wonderful explanation from the Rebbe. The Rebbe asks: In Rabbi Elazar ben Durdaya’s case, what was revealed? Which love was revealed in him—ahavah rabbah, or... ahavas olam?

54:32 Speaker 5 Love.

54:34 Speaker 1 What?

54:34 Speaker 5 Ahavas... love... ahavah rabbah.

54:36 Speaker 1 What was revealed in him?

54:37 Speaker 5 Ahavah rabbah, wasn’t it?

54:38 Speaker 1 We said ahavah rabbah can’t come without fear first.

54:42 Speaker 5 But if Hakadosh Boruch Hu wants it, then...

54:45 Speaker 1 We said that can’t happen. He isn’t a vessel for it. It can’t be revealed in him.

54:49 Speaker 5 So he contemplated—

54:50 Speaker 1 What was revealed in him was ahavas olam. Ahavas olam can also be, as he said earlier, a love like fiery flames, and “all is considered as nothing before Him,” and “who will not ascend to heaven”—all of it, all of it, all of it is ahavas olam.

55:04 Speaker 5 The weeping, that is—

55:06 Speaker 1 But that’s exactly what the Rebbe asks. Since we have to say that only ahavas olam was revealed in him, how could ahavas olam lead to his soul expiring? Why is that a question? Why is it a question at all? Because what is ahavas olam about? Ahavas olam is when he contemplates: I exist, and I love Hakadosh Boruch Hu because He gives me something. He is the source of life; in a sense, He is there for me. In a subtle way, yes? So ahavas olam, a love grounded in the person’s own existence, cannot lead him to want to nullify himself. If we were talking about ahavah rabbah, I would understand. But here we’re explicitly talking about ahavas olam. How could his soul have departed?

55:49 Speaker 5 But from that level he—

55:51 Speaker 1 No. So the Rebbe explains how—

55:53 Speaker 5 He started at the level—

55:54 Speaker 1 The Rebbe explains two different things.

55:55 Speaker 5 It can also happen in an hour if—

55:57 Speaker 1 The Rebbe says no. The Rebbe gives a simple, beautiful, and very understandable answer. In other words, his soul departed not because of the love, but because of the teshuvah. Teshuvah is a matter of “with all your might.” It’s mesirus nefesh. The love he had was ahavas olam. His soul departed because of the teshuvah, not because of the love. Love—

56:26 Speaker 5 All right, but the fact that his soul departed is...

56:30 Speaker 1 It wasn’t because of the love.

56:33 Speaker 5 Who said it was because of love?

56:37 Speaker 1 Why did his soul depart? He was [unclear], and that’s why his soul departed. It couldn’t have been because of the love. So what was it? The teshuvah. Teshuvah comes from the essence of the soul. It doesn’t come from the soul’s faculties that are enclothed in the body. Well, we’d have to look at the sicha itself. That’s the point the Rebbe explains. So, yes, such a thing can happen through Divine providence as a temporary exception. But when it comes to a regular path of service that depends on a person’s choice, it doesn’t work that way. A person can’t wait for Hakadosh Boruch Hu to pour a spirit from above upon him and... First he has to observe Torah and mitzvos.

57:17 Speaker 5 Not rely on a miracle.

57:17 Speaker 1 Not rely on a miracle. First, one has to observe Torah and mitzvos through lower-level fear on its smallest scale—not fear of G-d. At the very least, there should be fear of sin, kabbolas ol, fear of sin: “Turn away from evil and do good.” He must illuminate his G-dly soul with the light of Torah and its mitzvos. Then he has chochmah. And then, afterward, there will be higher-level fear, and then the light of love will shine upon it. Why? Because “ve’ahavta” has the numerical value of twice “or,” meaning “light,” as those familiar with the mystical teachings know. “Or” is two hundred and seven, and “ve’ahavta” is five hundred and fourteen. “Ve’ahavta” is twice “or.” What does that mean? That the light of love shines within a person only after the light of Torah and mitzvos is there first. So in this chapter the Rebbe discussed—and really finished explaining—the broad levels within the two general levels of fear and the two general levels of love, when each is revealed, and what kinds of contemplation... He gave us an overall framework for love and fear. Right? From the beginning of the next chapter, the Rebbe will start explaining how to put this into practice.

58:39 Speaker 5 You said five hundred and seven.