Terumah 5782 - The Mishkan, or the Menorah, in every Jewish heart

00:00 They tell a story about the chossid Reb Hillel of Paritch, one of the great chassidim of the Tzemach Tzedek, and before that, of the Mitteler Rebbe. They say that when he was a child, his father, Reb Meir, was a chossid of Reb Nochum of Chernobyl and Reb Mottele of Chernobyl. His father brought him to Reb Mottele of Chernobyl when he was very young. They say that when Reb Hillel saw Reb Mottele, he was startled and raised an alarm as though there were a fire. Reb Mottele said that the boy was a holy child, and that he could see the fire—the Divine Presence resting upon the tzaddik. They also say that they asked for a blessing for him, because they knew Reb Hillel was somewhat stooped, that his shoulders were a little hunched. Reb Mottele of Chernobyl said that [unclear] of Russia would stand on his shoulders, right? [unclear] would lean on his shoulders. Later, when he grew older, he traveled to the Alter Rebbe and became one of the great chassidim. He did not actually see the Alter Rebbe himself. Afterward he became a chossid of the Mitteler Rebbe, and then of the Tzemach Tzedek. He was one of the great chassidim. In the chossid Reb Hillel of Paritch, the words of Reb Mottele

01:52 of Chernobyl came true. In later years he traveled from town to town. He was a shadar, as they used to call it, an emissary of the Merciful One, traveling through the towns of Russia as a shliach of the Tzemach Tzedek. As they used to say, he “sold spirituality and collected material support.” That is, he went from place to place, spoke about Chassidus and taught Chassidus to all the Jews living in those towns, particularly in Kherson. The settlements were a major focus: in those days, Jews lived in villages that had been established so they could earn a living, and the Jews had fields. Thousands of Jews lived there, and over the years he would travel among these towns and speak about Chassidus. He also collected money for Jewish causes, for Torah and mitzvos, and for the needs of the Tzemach Tzedek. They say that once Reb Hillel of Paritch came to the Tzemach Tzedek feeling utterly broken. He wept bitterly and said that because he spent so many days of the year traveling among the towns, he had no time for himself: no time to learn, no time to daven. He had to go from place to place, jostled about on the roads. And the Chassidus he taught the simple souls there—they did not have a great capacity to absorb or the ability to understand much. So he felt he was losing his time: while he was going around and traveling

03:25 through all those towns and settlements, he could instead be sitting and learning Torah and engaging in the service of Hashem. Reb Hillel was a great man, a holy man, who had reached very high levels in Torah and in the service of Hashem. They say that the Tzemach Tzedek once became deeply absorbed in dveikus for a time. It was so intense that Reb Hillel began to tremble violently. He said that all the dozens of times he had traveled to the Mitteler Rebbe, to the Tzemach Tzedek and to his chassidim had been worthwhile just to be present at that moment, during the Tzemach Tzedek’s dveikus, seeing the state and the dveikus he had reached then. Afterward the Tzemach Tzedek said: “The Gemara says: Rav Nachman bar Yitzchak said, ‘We are workers of the day.’” What does the Gemara mean by “We are workers of the day”? On the plain level, the Gemara says there that a person should sleep at night and learn and daven during the day. “We are workers of the day”—people of the daytime, day workers. But the Tzemach Tzedek interpreted it: “We are workers of the day”—our work is to bring light. “Day” means light, “and the main journeying is by daylight.” Our role, our work, is to bring light. Souls descended into this world to illuminate it with the light of Torah and the service of Hashem; that is why we are here. So do not [unclear] the journeys; you must keep traveling and sharing.

05:06 And spreading the light of Torah and Chassidus. Yes, that is why we are here in this world. And indeed, in the years that followed, the Rebbe’s people traveled to all the towns and brought them light. The weekly parsha is Parshas Terumah. Parshas Terumah opens with the subject of “They shall make Me a sanctuary, and I will dwell among them.” From this point on, beginning with Terumah, there are five parshiyos—Terumah, Tetzaveh, Ki Sisa, Vayakhel and Pekudei—whose entire sequence deals with building the Mishkan: “They shall make Me a sanctuary, and I will dwell among them,” “They shall make an ark.” Building a Mishkan and a sanctuary for Hakadosh Boruch Hu. What is the sequence of the parshiyos? First came the giving of the Torah, in Parshas Yisro and Parshas Mishpatim—those are the parshiyos of the giving of the Torah—and from there we move to Parshas Terumah, to “They shall make Me a sanctuary, and I will dwell among them.” The Ramban says that this is how we should understand it: at the giving of the Torah, the glory of Hashem, the Divine Presence, was there—“Hashem descended upon Mount Sinai.” Hakadosh Boruch Hu descended at the giving of the Torah, and the glory of Hashem, together with the entire heavenly retinue, with the Divine Chariot and all of that, rested openly upon Mount Sinai. All the Jews saw the revelation of the Divine Presence at the giving of the Torah. That same glory of Hashem that was upon Mount Sinai rested in a concealed way in the place of the sanctuary, particularly in the Holy of Holies, where the ark containing the Tablets stood. That is the Beis Hamikdash. The Beis Hamikdash is the place where the Divine Presence that was upon Mount Sinai, openly revealed at the giving of

06:50 the Torah, was afterward brought into the sanctuary. And that is why the Torah begins specifically with “They shall make Me a sanctuary.” The first thing the Torah tells us about is the ark. Indeed, the Ramban asks: Why is the ark the first thing the Torah tells us about? Because it was “the principal purpose,” in the Ramban’s words. The principal purpose of the Mishkan was for the Torah, the ark, to be there, and through the Torah the Divine Presence would rest among the Jewish people. That is “They shall make Me a sanctuary, and I will dwell among them.” And this is how the Alter Rebbe explains it in terms of serving Hashem, in Tanya. The Alter Rebbe explains that when the Divine Presence was revealed at the giving of the Torah, when “Hashem descended upon Mount Sinai,” all the Jewish people saw the Divine Presence openly, to the point that there was [unclear]. “You were shown so that you would know that Hashem is G-d; there is none besides Him.” What was revealed at the giving of the Torah? It was the revelation of Hashem’s oneness, the revelation that “Hashem is one and His name is one,” that “Hashem is G-d.” Yes, “there is none besides Him” was [unclear]. Yes, they saw openly that there was nothing else. “They saw that He alone exists”—it was a revelation of oneness in which they saw that there is nothing in the world besides Hakadosh Boruch Hu alone. But the Jewish people could not contain it. And so, the Alter Rebbe says, after the giving of the Torah, Hakadosh Boruch Hu commanded them to build a Mishkan.

08:17 They were commanded to build a Mishkan in which Hakadosh Boruch Hu would dwell, through the service they performed there. And the Alter Rebbe continues: “Since the Beis Hamikdash was destroyed, Hakadosh Boruch Hu has nothing in His world but the four cubits of halachah.” When a Jew sits and learns Torah today, anywhere and at any time, within the four cubits of halachah, he makes a sanctuary and a Mishkan, a dwelling place for the Divine Presence. That is what the Alter Rebbe calls it. The word is “ushpizkan.” Ushpizkan means a host. He brings the Divine Presence into himself—into his head, his heart, the 248 limbs and 365 sinews of his body. Through this he brings light and brings Hakadosh Boruch Hu into the entire world. And this is the theme of Parshas Terumah. After all, it says, “They shall make Me a sanctuary, and I will dwell among them.” The holy Alshich, the holy Shelah and other early authorities cite a Midrash. It is not known where the Midrash itself is found, but they cite it in the name of the Midrash. It says, “They shall make Me a sanctuary, and I will dwell among them.” The holy Alshich and the holy Shelah ask in the name of the Midrash: On the face of it, “They shall make Me a sanctuary” is singular, while “I will dwell among them” is plural. Seemingly it should have said, “They shall make Me a sanctuary, and I will dwell in it”—in the sanctuary. What does “among them” mean? They explain, citing the Midrash: “It does not say ‘in it,’ but ‘among them’”—within each and every Jew. Every Jew has a Beis Hamikdash. Every Jew, through his service of Hashem,

10:01 can become a Beis Hamikdash for Hakadosh Boruch Hu. That is the Beis Hamikdash. We were commanded to build a Beis Hamikdash, a physical Mishkan, with all the details we learn in the weekly parsha, but that is the physical Beis Hamikdash. There is also a spiritual Beis Hamikdash that every Jew must build in his heart. This is cited from the Baal Shem Tov. The holy Baal Shem Tov says that when Hakadosh Boruch Hu said, “They shall make Me a sanctuary, and I will dwell among them,” the Beis Hamikdash was planted in every Jew’s heart. Every Jew has this “among them,” this “within each and every Jew”—a Beis Hamikdash within himself. This helps us understand why the Torah speaks at such length, over five parshiyos, in detail and minute detail, about every aspect of the Mishkan. There are many mitzvos, important and great mitzvos, that are given only one verse, a brief word, in the entire Torah. For example, the laws of Shabbos are all contained in the Chumash. Sacrifices, shechitah—in the entire Torah it is stated in just one word, two words altogether. And from that we learn all the laws of shechitah. But when we come to the Mishkan—five parshiyos, again and again, in detail and minute detail, describing how each thing was made. Rather, the point is, as we have discussed, that this is the meaning of “They shall make Me a sanctuary.”

11:33 “And I will dwell among them.” Just as every person has a Beis Hamikdash in his heart, so every detail of the Mishkan that the Torah tells us about is a detail of the Mishkan a Jew must build in his heart. And by learning Torah, observing mitzvos, and illuminating the world, a Jew makes a Mishkan and a sanctuary for Hakadosh Boruch Hu. On this basis, the Tzemach Tzedek explains a Midrash. The Midrash says about the words in the weekly parsha, “They shall make Me a sanctuary, and I will dwell among them”: “Wherever it says ‘for Me,’ it never ceases to exist.” It lists about ten places, ten things described with the word “for Me,” that “never cease to exist”—they are eternal. One of those ten is the Beis Hamikdash. The Tzemach Tzedek asks: What does that mean? The Beis Hamikdash was destroyed. So what does it mean that it “never ceases to exist”? Rather, according to the Midrash, “They shall make Me a sanctuary, and I will dwell among them” means “within each and every Jew.” So every Jew has a Beis Hamikdash in his own life. The Beis Hamikdash “never ceases to exist.” Every Jew has a Beis Hamikdash, and all the details of its vessels, boards, and curtains represent aspects of serving Hashem. And we find—indeed, we find in books of Chassidus, yes, and even from—

13:01 Already among earlier Torah scholars, before the Baal Shem Tov, we find in their writings explanations of everything in the Beis Hamikdash and the Mishkan, and how these exist within every Jew’s soul. This goes back even earlier; it is brought in the book Toras HaOlah. The Alshich, too, explains all the details of the Mishkan in terms of every Jew’s service of Hashem, and how every Jew has a Beis Hamikdash and a Mishkan. I would like to talk about the menorah. Of all the vessels of the Mishkan, one of the most important in the Beis Hamikdash was the menorah. The Torah tells us in the parsha about a “golden menorah,” describing the menorah in the Beis Hamikdash. What does the menorah represent, and how is it explained in terms of a person’s inner service? The earlier scholars already say of the menorah—the Alshich writes—that it alludes to the human body and to the way a Jew connects with the Torah. The “golden menorah” represents the way a Jew lives a life guided by the Torah. And he explains a number of details of the menorah: how they are found in the human body and how they relate to the Torah, as expressed through the body.

14:21 The Alshich notes that the menorah was eighteen handbreadths tall. Eighteen handbreadths are three cubits, which he says is, in general, a person’s height, as the Gemara says. So the height of the menorah corresponds to the height of a person, to the human body. He explains that the three branches on one side and the three branches on the other are the two eyes, the two ears, and the two hands: one eye on the right and one on the left, one ear on the right and one on the left, and one hand on the right and one on the left. In other words, through these organs a Jew can study Torah and observe all the mitzvos. With both eyes he looks, studies, and contemplates—that is what the eyes are for: seeing and understanding, delving into the Torah. The ears are meant to hear words of Torah, and the hands are for bringing Torah and mitzvos into action, fulfilling the Torah’s words. That is how the Alshich explains the details of the menorah: it shows how a Jew must sanctify all his limbs and all aspects of his life, and connect with Torah and mitzvos. He also cites the earlier scholars, who say that the entire theme of the menorah is

15:45 “For a mitzvah is a lamp and Torah is light.” The menorah alludes to “For a mitzvah is a lamp and Torah is light”: every mitzvah a Jew performs is a small lamp, and through the Torah he studies, “Torah is light.” He creates light and brings light to the entire world. He also cites a book called Sifsei Kohen, known as Shach al HaTorah. The author of Shach al HaTorah was one of the great Kabbalists in the time of the holy Arizal, and he lived in Tzfas. His name was Reb Mordechai HaKohen. This book is quoted often, and the Tzemach Tzedek cites it many times as well. The author of Shach al HaTorah also explains all the details of the menorah as they relate to Torah. He says that the menorah represents “For a mitzvah is a lamp and Torah is light.” As for all the menorah’s details: first, it had seven branches, corresponding to the seven books of the Torah. The Midrash, too, says that the Torah has five books, but it can also be counted as seven. The book of Bamidbar up to “And when the Ark traveled” is considered one book; the Gemara says in tractate Shabbos that “And when the Ark traveled” is a book of its own, and what follows it is another book. That makes seven books of the Torah. He says that the menorah’s seven branches correspond to those seven books. In addition, it had cups, knobs, and flowers. And here he says

17:19 that the knobs and flowers allude to... He also says here that the six branches allude to the six orders of the Mishnah, while the central shaft represents the Written Torah. When we look at it all in terms of “Torah is light,” that is what the menorah represents. The menorah’s six branches correspond to the Oral Torah, the six orders of the Mishnah, and its central shaft represents the Written Torah. The point is [unclear], that everything in the Oral Torah flows from the Written Torah: “Toward the face of the menorah shall the seven lamps shine.” When a Jew studies the Oral Torah, he must always remain connected to the Written Torah, and that, too, can be seen in the menorah. And when we come specifically to the cups—the cups were... He brings a wonderful Midrash here. The Tzemach Tzedek cites a Midrash on the verse, drawing on the earlier scholars. When we say that the menorah alludes to the Torah, there is the verse “The opening of Your words gives light,” in Tehillim 119. Regarding “The opening of Your words gives light,” it is written in the works of the earlier scholars—he cites the book Akeidas Yitzchak, whose author was one of the Jews expelled from Spain, one of the great Torah scholars, and lived in the time of Ibn Ezra, in the time of... The book Akeidas Yitzchak also brings this.

18:49 But Chassidus, Chabad Chassidus. He discusses there the idea of “The opening of Your words gives light”: each of the Five Books of the Torah alludes to details of the menorah. There are five books of the Torah, and “the opening of Your words” means the first verse of each one. He says that if you count the words in each of those opening verses, you can find all the numbers associated with the menorah. The first verse of Bereishis, “In the beginning, G-d created the heavens and the earth,” has seven words. Sorry, those seven words correspond to the menorah’s seven branches. Then there is, “These are the names of the children of Israel who came to Egypt with Yaakov; each man and his household came”; that verse has eleven words, corresponding to the eleven knobs on the menorah. Then there is, “And He called to Moshe, and Hashem spoke to him,” yes, the verse in Vayikra; there are nine words there, corresponding to the nine flowers. Then, in the first verse of Bamidbar, there are seventeen words, corresponding to the menorah’s seventeen handbreadths. That is how the count works. In fact, it is eighteen handbreadths, seventeen handbreadths; it depends on how you measure the menorah, with the legs or without them, and it is not entirely clear. This has to do with the menorah’s height. And then there is the last verse, “These are the words.” The verse, the verse

20:46 at the beginning of the book of Devarim has twenty-two words, yes, and those twenty-two words correspond to the twenty-two cups. That is “The opening of Your words gives light.” The entire Torah, “the opening of Your words”—the first verse of each of its five books—alludes to every number found in the menorah. This shows that the menorah truly relates to Jews. This is something we spoke about: it shows that the holiness of the menorah is the holiness of the Jewish people, of their bodies. And with this body, a Jew becomes a source of light through “A mitzvah is a lamp and Torah is light”—the Written Torah, “The opening of Your words gives light,” and the Oral Torah, the six orders, the six orders of the Mishnah. This is the light of the menorah: through Torah, a Jew becomes a source of light. And not only does he himself become a source of light; he also illuminates the world. After all, “A mitzvah is a lamp and Torah is light,” and “The soul of man is Hashem’s lamp.” A Jew has a soul, and when he studies Torah and observes mitzvos, he illuminates the world. This is what the Rebbe explains: Hakadosh Boruch Hu created the world, and the world is a place of darkness. Hakadosh Boruch Hu sends the soul down into the world so that the soul—“The soul of man is Hashem’s lamp”—will connect with the menorah, with Torah and mitzvos, for “A mitzvah is a lamp and Torah is light.” Through this, the Jew illuminates the world; he makes the world bright. And as there are more souls and more light, they illuminate the world more and more, until the world is illuminated and the verse “Hashem will be your everlasting light” is fulfilled in the complete Geulah. This is something interesting that we find concerning the menorah. An interesting thing, a very interesting thing. And I want to tell you that when we come to the menorah—the Rebbe once spoke about this. The Rebbe once spoke about something interesting we find in the Rambam. You see, regarding the menorah, in the Rambam there is

22:48 There is a manuscript in the Rambam’s own handwriting in which he drew the menorah in his Commentary on the Mishnah. This is the manuscript, this is the drawing, in the Rambam’s own hand, and this is how he drew the menorah. When you look at it, you notice some interesting things. Two of them are unfamiliar to most people. One is that the Rambam drew the menorah’s branches straight. He did not draw them curved, but drew the menorah with straight branches. The Rebbe brings evidence for this from Rabbi Avraham, the Rambam’s son, who writes that his father drew the menorah with straight branches and says that this is how it was: in the Beis Hamikdash, the menorah had straight branches, unlike the way people draw it today, with curved branches. That is a whole subject, and we do not have time to go into its details now. But there is another very interesting thing in the Rambam’s drawing, another difference. When the Rambam draws the goblets—there were twenty-two goblets. The twenty-two goblets correspond to the twenty-two letters of the Torah, as the Tzemach Tzedek explains and as other sources also mention. For the light of the twenty-two letters of the Torah, as we discussed, is the light of Torah that illuminates the world. Now, what do the goblets look like in the drawing? Regarding the goblets, the Rambam says they were “long cups,” “Alexandrian cups”—those are his words. That is a goblet; he does not mean an ordinary cup, simply a large cup or a tall cup, but a cup with a wide mouth and a narrow base. So it is wide at the bottom—this, this is what he... And at the top, at its mouth, it is wide, it is wide. That is not how the goblets appear in most drawings of the menorah. What does an ordinary goblet look like? Its mouth is at the top, and its base is

25:00 at the bottom. In other words, the base of the goblet is below, where it is narrow, and the top is wide. That is how people draw the menorah. All the goblets there—three on each branch, with six branches and another two—make twenty-two goblets in all. They draw them as ordinary goblets look: narrow at the bottom and wide at the top. In the Rambam’s drawing of the menorah, it is the other way around. The Rambam draws all twenty-two goblets with the narrow end at the top and the wide end at the bottom. As though the goblet were standing with its opening at the top, with its edges at the top. The goblet is wide at the bottom and narrow at the top. And this is quite remarkable. There are a number of drawings that were made; I think this is a manuscript that reveals the goblets, and in none of the drawings do we find such a view. The Rambam draws the goblets upside down. We have to assume that the Rambam got this from a Midrash, from some source; he received it from his teacher or found a Midrash. We do not know where that Midrash is. There, the goblets were arranged this way, upside down: the wide part below and the base above. But the question is, why? It is strange. There is an established principle—we say regarding all mitzvos, as the Gemara says, that a mitzvah must be performed in the way something grows; it must be positioned from the bottom up, as it normally grows. A lulav must be held in the way it grows, and the same applies to everything else. What is the meaning of this strange feature—that according to the Rambam, the goblets on the menorah were fixed upside down? The opening of the goblet was below, the wide end below and the narrow end above. How do we explain that? The Rebbe says more about this and points to the Gemara in Menachos. There is a Gemara in Menachos, and a Gemara in Shabbos that mentions it briefly. The source of the discussion is the Gemara

27:07 in Menachos 86. The Gemara says regarding the menorah: “Do I need its light?” Why would Hakadosh Boruch Hu need the light, the light of the menorah? “After all, throughout the forty years that the Jewish people traveled in the desert, they traveled only by His light.” As they traveled through the desert, there was a pillar of cloud and a pillar of fire; these lit the way and showed them where to go. Does Hakadosh Boruch Hu need the menorah? Is there a shortage of light, so that we need to produce light with the menorah? That is the Gemara’s question in Yoma, in Menachos. The Gemara answers: “Rather, it is a testimony to all who enter the world that the Shechinah rests among the Jewish people.” The whole purpose of the menorah was to serve as a testimony, to show that the Shechinah rests among Jews. “It is a testimony to all who enter the world.” In other words, the menorah was not meant to provide light for Hakadosh Boruch Hu, so to speak; it was not a source of light for the Beis Hamikdash. The Beis Hamikdash, the Shechinah, the site of the Beis Hamikdash—they are the light. The whole purpose of the menorah is to illuminate the world, to bring light to the entire world, to spread light throughout it. It is a testimony to all who enter the world that the Shechinah rests among the Jewish people—so that, through the Shechinah’s resting among the Jewish people, the whole world will know it. In other words, the light with which the Shechinah illuminates the Jewish people must be visible throughout the world. And the Gemara says something else about the verse in Melachim—whereas in the Torah, in Parshas Terumah, there is a different order, two [unclear]—“He made windows for the house, wide on the outside and narrow on the inside.” What does that mean? Rashi says that ordinarily, when a person builds a house, he makes windows. The windows are made narrower on the outside and

29:08 wider on the inside. Why are windows made that way? Because you want sunlight to enter the house and spread through the whole room. You make the window a little narrower on the outer side and a little wider on the inner side, facing into the house, and that way [unclear], the sunlight shines into the house and spreads through the whole room. The verse says that in the Beis Hamikdash it was exactly the opposite. As Rashi says about the windows: they were narrow on the inside and wide on the outside. How could that be? In other words, the windows of the Heichal in the Beis Hamikdash were a little narrower on the inside, on the Heichal side, and widened as they faced outward. Why? They were oriented in precisely the opposite direction. To show that “Do I need its light?”—the light is not for Me. The whole purpose of the light is to be a testimony to all who enter the world, to illuminate the world and show it that the Shechinah rests among the Jewish people. So we arrive at this striking point: the whole purpose of the menorah is to spread light to the world. The Rebbe said that this explains the shape of the goblets. What was the menorah for? On the basis of “Do I need its light?” the menorah was meant to spread light throughout the world, so that the light—the Shechinah that rests

30:38 among the Jewish people—would thereby be revealed in the worlds, even to the nations of the world, and illuminate the entire world. So when they set up the menorah in the Beis Hamikdash and made its goblets, their shape expressed the idea of giving. In simple terms, what is a goblet for? There is a cup and there is a goblet. The Mitteler Rebbe explains that a cup is primarily a recipient. A plain glass is a vessel: you put water into it and drink from it. But a goblet is a larger cup, as the early authorities call them, “long cups” or “large cups.” The main point of a goblet is that you pour from it. It does not just receive, like a simple cup; it also gives drink, pouring into other cups. In other words, its function is to give. The purpose of the goblets is to spread G-dliness, to spread Torah, to spread its ways throughout the world. And because that is their purpose—to give, to be “a testimony to all who enter the world,” like the windows that were wide on the outside—the goblets too were made in a way that expresses the spreading of light. Not to keep the light to themselves, not to have it only for themselves; on the contrary, the mouths of the goblets faced downward, to show that this is the point: the light must go outward, illuminating the

32:09 entire world, so that the light reaches everyone. And when we speak about this, that is what we mean when we say that a Jew must be like a menorah. That is what the Rebbe Rashab said: everyone must be “a lamp to give light.” A Jew must know that his task is to illuminate, not to keep things to himself. He must be someone who gives, who brings light, who illuminates the world around him. Everyone must see to it that the world around him becomes brighter, that another Jew learns about Hakadosh Boruch Hu, that another Jew learns about Torah and mitzvos. We must give to others. Everyone must know not to be absorbed in himself and his private concerns: What about me? What is happening in my home, with my affairs? Not to be occupied only with himself, with my Torah and mitzvos, my service of Hashem, my Gan Eden, my concerns. A Jew must also give to others. He must shine, be a source of light. He must illuminate his surroundings, like a goblet with its mouth facing downward, pouring and pouring all the time. As it says about Avraham Avinu: “Who awakened righteousness from the east?” And as the Midrash interprets the verse, “Who awakened righteousness from the east?”—“awakened,” with an ayin; the Midrash says: Avraham came and began to illuminate. Avraham Avinu, the first Jew—his whole task was to illuminate. Wherever he went, he spoke about Hakadosh Boruch Hu. “And there he called upon the name of Hashem”

33:33 “G-d of the world”—do not read “he called,” but “he caused others to call.” Not just for himself: he caused others to call, so that people throughout the world would know about Hakadosh Boruch Hu. And we learn this from the menorah. I remember that I had the privilege of being with the Rebbe on Simchas Torah 5746. I’ll tell you a story, something that happened that Simchas Torah. It was a wonderful Simchas Torah. In general, there was tremendous joy in the Rebbe’s presence. The joy of Simchas Torah broke through every boundary, every measure and limitation. There was immense joy. The forty-eight hours of Simchas Torah were hours of extraordinary joy. This was on the second night—in America, after all, there are two days of Yom Tov—the second night of Yom Tov, the night of Simchas Torah. The custom was that the Rebbe would first hold a farbrengen. On the night of Simchas Torah, after Maariv, there was a farbrengen. It would continue until midnight, and only afterward would everyone go to hakafos. Usually, on the second night of Simchas Torah, the hakafos were [unclear]. First came the farbrengen, and it was a very joyous farbrengen. From there, everyone went on to hakafos. There’s something interesting here, I must tell you: it involved great self-sacrifice. Every year, on the second night of Simchas Torah, the crowd, especially the young people, would go out on a procession. They would visit shuls in New York, all sorts of shuls in the area, to

35:15 bring joy. Those who arrived late to the farbrengen—there was a whole discussion about this responsibility, about the self-sacrifice involved, about having to set aside their own desire to be at the farbrengen, and about arriving late because of it. Yes, because the Rebbe wanted them to go and bring joy to fellow Jews, to bring light, to visit other shuls and bring Jews joy. Afterward they would come to the farbrengen. Some arrived in the middle, others toward the end, and still others right at the very end. By the time the crowd returned, the Rebbe was already about to conclude the farbrengen, and then everyone would go to hakafos. That Simchas Torah night, the farbrengen was especially joyous. The Rebbe was in very high spirits, very happy. At the end of the farbrengen, the Rebbe took a cup and drank from it. It contained wine for saying “l’chaim.” The Rebbe drank everything in the cup, until it was empty. The Rebbe said that, generally, there is a significance to full cups. Concerning the Beis Hamikdash, it is said: “The service vessels sanctify when full.” But now there was a significance to empty cups: everyone should finish drinking whatever remained in their cups. The Rebbe asked everyone there to drink the entire contents of their cups. Then the Rebbe took his cup and turned it upside down, with the base facing upward. He held the cup in his hand, drank all the wine in it, said “l’chaim,” and then took the

36:44 cup and turned it upside down, with the base facing upward. He said that everyone should do the same, and began singing a joyous Chassidic niggun. There was immense joy. All that time he held the cup in his hand and waved his hand with great joy. The crowd danced and moved about, and there was a great commotion around the hakafos. Then the Rebbe said: Hold the cup like this, with its base facing upward. The Rebbe said that in the Rambam’s drawing of the menorah, its cups are depicted upside down. [unclear] He spoke about the cups of the menorah and explained that the menorah is “testimony to all the people of the world that the Shechinah rests among Israel,” and that every Jew is one of the branches of the menorah. The Alter Rebbe explains in Likkutei Torah that the seven branches of the menorah represent the seven types of Jews among the Jewish people. The menorah, after all, represents the community of Israel. And every Jew must be “a lamp to give light,” to illuminate the world. So we all need to be like upside-down cups, giving outward. We shouldn’t think only about ourselves—what I need, what I want, and what I demand—but become vessels that give to others. Each person should go out into the world, illuminate it, give to others,

38:09 give goodness, give light, give warmth, and illuminate every place they go and every place they stand. Each person should be a light that shines outward. This is how the Rebbe spoke, holding the cup in his hand the entire time with its opening facing upward, and explaining that we can learn even from the upside-down cups of the menorah: every Jew must be a lamp to give light; every Jew must illuminate. And with Hashem’s help, may each of us take up this work and not be so wrapped up in ourselves, but be a light that shines outward, illuminating our surroundings and the entire world. This is the whole purpose of the Mishkan: “They shall make Me a sanctuary, and I shall dwell within them”—within each and every Jew. A Jew is a Beis Hamikdash, and must build his own Beis Hamikdash within himself. And with the menorah of that Beis Hamikdash, which is “testimony to all the people of the world,” he must illuminate his surroundings and illuminate the world with Torah and mitzvos. And may we indeed merit, speedily in our days, to see the Third Beis Hamikdash, and merit Hashem’s light throughout the earth.