Simchas Torah - The Inner Meaning of the Holiday in Light of Chassidus | Rabbi Asher Perkesh

00:00 Simchas Torah is the most wonderful day for the deepest bond between a Jew and Hakadosh Boruch Hu. The Zohar tells us that Shemini Atzeres is the day when “Yisroel and the King are alone together”—that is, the Jewish people and Hakadosh Boruch Hu are alone with one another. They unite in the most wonderful, deepest way, and from there bursts forth the greatest joy: a Jew takes the Torah scroll, dances with it and rejoices with it. Because at that moment there is only the Jew and Hakadosh Boruch Hu, and through the Torah they become one single reality. So today we’re going to explore in depth what Simchas Torah is really about. Why is Simchas Torah such an exalted day? Such a joyous day? What is the reason for the great joy we celebrate on Simchas Torah? Because, seemingly, there’s a simple question: Rejoicing on the festivals of the year is a Torah mitzvah. The Torah says, “You shall rejoice on your festival,” and that applies to Pesach, to Shavuos and to Sukkos. Yet we don’t see joy bursting through all boundaries on every festival. The Gemara says there is no rejoicing without meat, and no rejoicing without wine; we need to buy gifts for our wives and children. Those are different ways of celebrating the joy. But this joy that bursts through every boundary, with dancing for hours and hours—we don’t find that on the other festivals, not even on Sukkos. Although Sukkos is called “the season of our rejoicing,” it’s specifically on Simchas Torah that, as the halachic works say, the Jewish custom is to rejoice and dance in celebration of the Torah. It’s a Jewish custom. But what is the reason for this joy? We have a few simple questions about Simchas Torah that we want to understand. And when we understand them deeply, we’ll see that Simchas Torah is really the day that marks the culmination of

02:20 all the festivals of Tishrei—the day when a Jew’s bond with Hakadosh Boruch Hu reaches its deepest and most wonderful point. That is the reason for the boundless joy we see in Jewish communities everywhere. So let’s look at the particular way we celebrate Simchas Torah. It’s very interesting: throughout the Jewish world, people celebrate with a closed Torah scroll, with its mantle on, dancing around the reading platform. That’s more or less the practice in Jewish communities everywhere. And the obvious question is: We’re talking about Torah. What is Torah? Torah is wisdom. Torah is “your wisdom and understanding in the eyes of the nations.” Torah is the wisdom and will of Hakadosh Boruch Hu. How should we celebrate the Torah? We should be sitting and learning—studying Torah, finding new insights, working hard at it, delving into it. Yet Simchas Torah is precisely the day when we study less than on other days of the year. Jews are busy dancing, celebrating and eating festive meals. The joy bursts through every boundary, even the boundaries of the clock. So the question is: What does that have to do with rejoicing over the Torah? Why do we celebrate Simchas Torah specifically with a closed Torah scroll that we don’t study from, dancing with it and spending hours and hours dancing and rejoicing instead of sitting and learning? Another simple question arises about Simchas Torah: What is the connection between Simchas Torah and Shemini Atzeres? Why this day of all days? What happened? Why did we suddenly think of it now? After all, the giving of the Torah was on Shavuos. That’s when we should have Simchas Torah. We received the Torah on Shavuos, and Hashem descended upon Mount Sinai. Hashem gave us the Ten Commandments on 6 Sivan, and in our prayers we call it “the season of the giving of our Torah.” That’s when we should celebrate Simchas Torah. What are we—why do we wait until now for this celebration? Shemini Atzeres, specifically

04:33 now, is when we finish the Torah, right? This is when we finish reading the Torah scroll. But that itself needs to be understood: Why do we finish reading the Torah then? When the Sages established the laws of Torah reading, why did they arrange it so that we finish on Shemini Atzeres? They could have arranged the calendar and the whole cycle so that we’d finish reading the Torah on Shavuos, and then celebrate with joy and dancing. But no—Shemini Atzeres. What’s the connection? So let’s get to the heart of the matter. First, from a historical perspective, to understand the connection between Shemini Atzeres and the celebration of the Torah at this time: We know there was a whole process of receiving the Torah, until we finally received the second Tablets, which happened on Yom Kippur. Hakadosh Boruch Hu gave the Torah, the Ten Commandments, on Shavuos, but afterward we still went through an entire process. On 17 Tammuz, Moshe Rabbeinu came down with the first Tablets. But because of the sin of the Golden Calf, he broke the Tablets. Then he prayed, and so on, until on Yom Kippur Moshe Rabbeinu came down with the second Tablets, and Hakadosh Boruch Hu told him, “I have forgiven, as you requested.” So, as many seforim say, the joy of Shemini Atzeres and Simchas Torah is our joy over the second Tablets—over receiving them. But this, too, needs to be understood: Why do we rejoice over the Tablets we received on Yom Kippur, rather than over the beginning? Especially since at the giving of the Torah we were all righteous. It was before the sins; we hadn’t yet had any of the upheaval of the Golden Calf. The Jewish people were like a newborn child. Precisely then, when Hashem gave the Torah amid thunder and lightning and the entire Jewish people stood before the mountain, that should have been the most beautiful, most joyous day. That’s when it would have

06:35 made sense to dance and celebrate. Instead, we wait through this whole—this entire process until Yom Kippur, and then we dance? And another question: Why don’t we celebrate Simchas Torah the day after Yom Kippur? I understand that dancing on Yom Kippur itself wouldn’t be appropriate. It’s Yom Kippur, a day of self-denial, a fast day. Fine, it’s a day of teshuvah. So the next day! We don’t do that. We wait fourteen days—about thirteen days—and only then do we start dancing. Why do we wait so long, until Shemini Atzeres, to dance? And why do we dance in this interesting way, specifically with a closed Torah scroll, as we asked? What explains all this? The key point is that, as we’ve already discussed, we’re talking about the festivals of Tishrei. There’s a chain that begins in Elul and grows stronger, connecting one festival to the next. The festivals of Tishrei aren’t separate occasions. There’s a very deep connection that we keep building, more and more, until Shemini Atzeres arrives. That is the culmination, the high point of everything at the heart of the Tishrei festivals. We discussed the Baal Shem Tov’s teaching on the verse, “Then the maiden will rejoice in the dance.” The Baal Shem Tov revealed to us the great secret that we’re actually in a process of searching and meeting. It begins in Elul, when a Jew seeks to come home. The son looks for his father, and the father looks for his son. A distance has developed over the course of the year: because of how we behaved during the year, we became distant. The son is distant from the father and the father from the son, and then the search begins. A wise son will seek his father. First of all, there’s the wise son

08:49 He doesn’t give up. He searches and searches and searches, saying, “I want my father.” And that search begins back in the month of Elul: “Let us search our ways and examine them.” Elul is the month of teshuvah, the month of taking stock, when a Jew goes day by day, searching more deeply within his soul each day. That is how the month of teshuvah progresses. The chapter we’ve been saying throughout these weeks, from the beginning of Elul until Hoshana Rabbah, is Tehillim 27, “Of David: Hashem is my light and my salvation.” There we say the well-known verse: “On Your behalf my heart says, ‘Seek My face’; Your face, Hashem, I seek.” In other words, throughout Elul and Tishrei, all fifty-one days until Hoshana Rabbah, we have been occupied with seeking: seeking the inner face, the innermost part of our heart and soul, and seeking “Your face, Hashem,” the innermost dimension of Hakadosh Boruch Hu. The two are actually dependent on one another; they are connected. When we reveal the innermost part of our soul, we also reveal the innermost dimension of Hakadosh Boruch Hu, because a Jew is truly a part of G-d above. The Jew and Hakadosh Boruch Hu are, in essence, one. That is one point. The deepest part of a Jew’s soul, called the yechidah of the soul, unites with the One—with Hakadosh Boruch Hu, Who is one, singular and unique. We deepen that connection more and more each day. Rosh Hashanah arrives, and with it the cry of the shofar, when the innermost soul awakens in every Jew. During the Ten Days of Teshuvah, we bring that into every detail, correcting our actions, until Yom Kippur, “once a year”—“once” alluding to the yechidah. As Tosafos says in Tractate Menachos, page 18, “one” refers to the soul

10:57 called the yechidah. On Yom Kippur, that “one,” the yechidah, the life-force of the soul, is revealed in a Jew, and he unites with the oneness of Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Then comes what follows Yom Kippur, the day of connection, the day of the meeting. It begins with all the work of teshuvah on Yom Kippur, arising from the deepest bitterness of a Jew’s search and the bond he builds with Hakadosh Boruch Hu, and reaches its peak in the Ne’ilah prayer. As we discussed, Ne’ilah means that the gates are locked, and the Jew is alone together with Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Then the embrace of love begins. “A wise son makes his father glad,” as King Shlomo says in Mishlei. It is the great joy of a father whose wise son searched for him and found him. With that meeting, the process of joy begins, and that is what happens as Yom Kippur ends. This is true teshuvah. As we discussed in the Baal Shem Tov’s teaching, teshuvah is not only about sins and transgressions. Its essence is that the soul returns to her father’s home as in the days of her youth. The soul returns to her innermost depths, returns to herself, and there she meets the innermost dimension of Hakadosh Boruch Hu. They unite and become one, and from there the process of joy begins. Until Yom Kippur, we are constantly moving upward, searching until we find. The Ne’ilah prayer is the connection. Then the stages of joy begin: bringing that joy into ourselves. That, too, is a whole process, until we bring it to the deepest place, and that is the seven days of Sukkos. Then comes the eighth day, Shemini Atzeres. About the seven days of Sukkos, the Torah tells us, “You shall dwell for seven days.” A Jew sits in the sukkah. The sukkah symbolizes the embrace; it symbolizes love. The sukkah has four walls and a roof of sechach. As explained in the sefarim, the significance

13:14 of the sukkah is “Your sukkah of peace.” It expresses the great embrace with which Hakadosh Boruch Hu embraces every Jew. As Rabbi Levi Yitzchak of Berditchev says, a sukkah requires two walls and a handbreadth, or three walls and a handbreadth, depending on the opinion. Rabbi Levi Yitzchak of Berditchev says that this is the shape of an embrace. If we look at a physical embrace, there is the person’s body, then the arm, and then the hand—three walls and a handbreadth, the hand. This expresses the great embrace of Hakadosh Boruch Hu: “And His right hand embraces me,” as King Shlomo says in Shir Hashirim: “His left hand is under my head, and His right hand embraces me.” The Alter Rebbe, author of the Tanya, explains: “His left hand is under my head” refers to Rosh Hashanah, the time of the left. “The left hand pushes away”—the quality of awe. The Days of Awe are a time when awe awakens in a Jew, associated with the left hand. “His left hand is under my head”—the head. A Jew’s soul awakens through the awe that arises on these days. As we discussed, this is not fear of punishment; it is awe of Hashem’s greatness. But it is “His left hand is under my head.” Then the second half of Tishrei arrives, and “His right hand embraces me”—the great embrace with which Hakadosh Boruch Hu embraces us. “Then the maiden shall rejoice in the dance.” For the seven days of Sukkos, a Jew is inside the sukkah, eating, drinking, sleeping and carrying out all his activities there, surrounded by the great embrace of Hakadosh Boruch Hu. He learns that even when he eats, sleeps or takes a walk, he is surrounded by Hakadosh Boruch Hu. He brings Hakadosh Boruch Hu into his everyday life. After that great joy, there are also the Four Species. As we discussed, the point of the lulav and the Four Species is to bring it into the heart—to bring all of this, this great love,

15:20 deep into the heart: “And you shall take for yourselves.” Then comes the eighth day, an aleph over a zayin: after seven comes eight. The number eight expresses what is beyond nature. Seven is the seven days of the week; seven symbolizes limits. There are seven years in the Shemitah cycle. The number seven recalls the seven days of Creation. All of that is connected with nature. Eight symbolizes the infinite. Eight breaks through boundaries. So when the eighth day arrives, the aleph over the zayin, eight signifies the deepest, unlimited connection between Hakadosh Boruch Hu and the Jewish people. That is why the joy is unlimited. Regarding Shemini Atzeres, the Alter Rebbe gives a wonderful explanation: What does the word “atzeres” mean? Atzeres means a festival. That is its meaning in the Torah. When we speak of an atzeres, it means to stop—as Rashi explains, to stop doing work—and to gather and celebrate. That is one meaning of atzeres, a kind of festival. But there is more to the word. Atzeres also has the sense of absorbing something. When a person says, “Stop,” he means to pause, to take time to absorb something more deeply. “On the eighth day, you shall have an atzeres”—the Alter Rebbe explains that this is the day when a Jew absorbs everything inwardly. In other words, he internalizes, in his deepest place, everything that has happened over the past two months: everything in Elul, the days of Selichos, Rosh Hashanah, the Ten Days of Teshuvah, Yom Kippur, the four days between Yom Kippur and Sukkos, the days of Sukkos, and Hoshana Rabbah. Then Shemini Atzeres arrives. This is the day when we absorb and internalize it all, taking it and bringing it deep, deep within, into our hearts and souls. Absorbing it means preserving it, holding on to it, and with it we draw strength for

17:48 Throughout the whole year. The joy of Shemini Atzeres is this wonderful joy: a Jew rejoices with Hakadosh Boruch Hu, and Hakadosh Boruch Hu rejoices with the Jew. On this day, the deepest point in a Jew’s connection with Hakadosh Boruch Hu is awakened. We see this in the offerings of Shemini Atzeres as well. It’s remarkable: during Sukkos there were many, many offerings. Look at the verses we read in the Torah reading for Sukkos. There are so many offerings, especially the bulls. As the Midrashim say, there were seventy bulls corresponding to the seventy nations of the world—an expression of the life-force bestowed upon the entire world. Then, after the days of Sukkos, comes Shemini Atzeres. The Torah says, “On the eighth day, there shall be an assembly for you.” And what do we offer? One bull, one ram. Here there are no great numbers, just one bull and one ram. The Midrash says: corresponding to the Jewish people. All those bulls and offerings relate to the nations of the world, to the life-force bestowed upon all the nations: “Praise Hashem, all nations; laud Him, all peoples.” That is Sukkos. Shemini Atzeres, as we said earlier from the Zohar, is “for you.” The Midrash says this too. Midrash Rabbah on Parshas Emor tells us what happens on Shemini Atzeres. It gives a parable of a king who made a feast and invited everyone in his kingdom. For seven days, the king celebrated with them all. Then came the eighth day. The king said: The celebration is over; the feast is over. He called his dearest beloved and said to him: The formal celebration is over. Now come, you and I will enjoy whatever we have here. Now it will be just you and me celebrating. That, says the Midrash, is “On the eighth day, there shall be an assembly for you.” On this day, that wonderful choice is revealed. It had actually begun on Rosh Hashanah. On Rosh Hashanah we already said, “He will choose our inheritance for us.” Hashem

19:58 chose the Jewish people at the sounding of the shofar. When we sounded the shofar, we said, “He will choose our inheritance for us, the pride of Yaakov whom He loves forever.” But that was in shul. It was still “on the covered day”—still concealed. On Yom Kippur, there was the Holy of Holies, and there too, as we discussed, it was once a year, but it was in the Holy of Holies, a sacred, exalted place. Here, though, we bring it down into the world, so that it shines throughout the world and is revealed in the most open and public way. “There shall be an assembly for you.” And so, when a Jew comes to Simchas Torah, we take the Torah scroll and dance with it specifically while it is covered. What are we expressing by that? If we study wisdom, there are limits to it. Intellect has its limits. Each person has his own understanding. Some people are wiser than others, and each person studies, understands and grasps things according to his capacity. However wise and profound a person may be, ultimately our understanding is limited, and so our joy will be limited too. But on Simchas Torah, this is not merely limited joy. Here the joy of a Jew’s deeper, more inward bond with Hakadosh Boruch Hu is revealed—not a bond with our limited understanding, but with the infinite wisdom of the Torah, as it is, so to speak, with Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself. The Torah is a hidden treasure, one with Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself, beyond all comprehension and grasp. In that deepest bond between a Jew and Hakadosh Boruch Hu through the Torah, the joy has no limits. That is why we dance with our feet while the Torah scroll is closed. Here the power of a Jew’s feet finds expression, for a Jew’s feet

22:08 represent the power of action, the power to bring things into our world. A Jew’s feet lift up even his head. They give him the strength to rejoice, and with that strength he has healthy feet with which to walk. “And Yaakov went on his way”: after Simchas Torah, he takes those feet with which he danced and rejoiced with the Torah—and not only rejoiced with the Torah, but made the Torah rejoice. The Frierdiker Rebbe used to say: Simchas Torah does not mean only that a Jew rejoices with the Torah. It means that the Torah rejoices. It is the Torah’s joy. The Torah wants to dance. The Torah rejoices when Jews study it. The Torah rejoices that Hakadosh Boruch Hu gave us the Torah, and it wants to dance. It asks the Jew to pick it up and dance. So, as it were, the Jew becomes the Torah’s feet, because the Torah wants to dance. All this takes place on Simchas Torah. The Alter Rebbe tells us in a maamar of Chassidus: Shemini Atzeres, Simchas Torah, is the day on which every Jew receives the abundance that will guide his Torah study and service of Hashem throughout the entire year. Listen to the wonderful words the Alter Rebbe says. On Shemini Atzeres, Hakadosh Boruch Hu gives every Jew the abundance for his conduct in Torah and mitzvos for the whole year. He says that this is why we say “Who causes the rain to fall” in the prayer for rain on Shemini Atzeres, Simchas Torah: the prayer for rain symbolizes the rains of blessing through which Hakadosh Boruch Hu gives every Jew the abundance for his conduct in Torah and mitzvos. And when “you walk in My statutes,” Hakadosh Boruch Hu promises us, “I will give your rains in their time.” So all the rains—which include all material needs and all blessings—come through the great joy of Simchas Torah. And that is why we were told—the

24:23 Rebbe Rashab also told us—that when a Jew dances during the hours of Simchas Torah, dancing more and more, fulfilling the mitzvah of the day with joy, with those dances we draw up barrels full of blessing and abundance for the entire year, both materially and spiritually. The Baal Shem Tov says that this is why they are called hakafos. Hakafos can mean buying on credit: a person goes into a store, takes what he buys, and pays later. Hakafos means that Hakadosh Boruch Hu says to a Jew: Listen, I’m giving you everything. The joy of Simchas Torah breaks through every boundary; joy breaks through barriers. On this day Hakadosh Boruch Hu says to a Jew: I’m giving you abundance, blessing and success in everything. On Simchas Torah, says the Frierdiker Rebbe, the gates of light, the gates of blessing and the gates of success are opened. So Hashem says: I’m giving you everything on credit. Over the course of the year, pay Me according to your ability. We need to know how to seize this opportunity, to make use of this great day of Simchas Torah, to unite with Hakadosh Boruch Hu through the boundless joy of Simchas Torah, and to carry that joy with us throughout the year. May each and every one of us have a year of light, a year of blessing and a year of success in all material and spiritual matters. And may we merit, as we also say in the Simchas Torah prayers, “On it the Tzemach will come, on Simchas Torah.” Tzemach refers to King Moshiach—Tzemach is his name. May he come and redeem us, and may we rejoice with the complete joy of the true and complete Geulah. May this truly be a year of complete Geulah, speedily in our days.