The Days That Bring the Tidings of Matan Torah to Their Peak - The Days of Tashlumin in Light of Chassidus

00:00 Who hasn’t heard the famous joke? What do the three festivals—Pesach, Shavuos, and Sukkos—have in common? On all three, there’s a problem with food. On Pesach, there’s nothing to eat: everything is forbidden, everything is chametz, and you can barely find anything to eat. On Shavuos, there’s no time to eat: the festival has barely begun and it’s already over. One day. On Sukkos, there’s nowhere to eat. You have to find a sukkah, a kosher sukkah, and by the time you find one, you’re hungry. But let’s talk about Shavuos today. The festival itself is behind us, but we come upon something distinctive about it: it has no Chol Hamoed. Pesach lasts seven days, eight outside Israel. Sukkos lasts eight days together with Shemini Atzeres and Simchas Torah, nine outside Israel. Yet Shavuos lasts only one day, or two outside Israel. There’s no Chol Hamoed. Why doesn’t Shavuos have Chol Hamoed? On the other hand, we know the custom, as the Alter Rebbe also writes in his siddur: we do not say Tachanun through 12 Sivan, inclusive. Why? The Gemara in Tractate Chagigah explains it. On page 17, the Gemara explains that in the time of the Beis Hamikdash, Jews would make the pilgrimage three times a year: “All your males shall appear before the Master.” Jews would go up for Pesach, Shavuos, and Sukkos, and on the festivals they had to bring many offerings. There was the appearance offering, the rejoicing offering, and the festival offering—offerings they had to bring, the burnt offering of appearance and the festival peace offering. To bring those offerings, they had to bring them to the Beis Hamikdash, to the altar. So imagine tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands. At various times over the generations, hundreds of thousands of Jews, perhaps even millions, would make the pilgrimage

02:19 to Jerusalem, and families upon families had to bring their offerings. Of course, twenty-four hours weren’t enough, especially since the hours for bringing offerings in the Beis Hamikdash were limited, from shortly after the start of the day until midday. Altogether, there were fewer than six hours when offerings could be brought, and that left a great many Jews who still needed to bring theirs. On Pesach, that’s what all of Chol Hamoed was for: they could make up for it then. Sukkos also had Chol Hamoed. But what did they do on Shavuos, which lasts only one day? For that reason, there were make-up days, and the Gemara discusses this at length: how we learn that the days from the day after Shavuos through 12 Sivan, inclusive, are added as make-up days. On those days, all the Jews who hadn’t managed to bring their offering on the first day would bring it. That remains true now, even though we no longer have the offerings. These days are still considered make-up days, and as mentioned, our custom is not to say Tachanun or confession during them. In other words, the joy of the festival of the Giving of the Torah continues into these days as well. And here the question arises: why are the festival offerings of Shavuos brought on weekdays? It’s interesting. On Pesach, the make-up days fall within the festival. They are festival days, Chol Hamoed. According to the Torah, they are festival days, called “holy convocations.” They are festival days by Torah law, even though we call them Chol Hamoed, and the same is true of Sukkos. Shavuos, specifically, lasts only one day, and the days on which its offerings are brought are ordinary weekdays. They aren’t festival days. What’s the explanation? Of course, the simple explanation is just that: the Torah gave us only one day, and with no other choice, these days were added so the offerings could be brought. But that explanation itself, of course, is hard to accept.

04:29 In the Torah, there is no such thing as “no other choice.” Everything in the Torah is precise. The fact that the continuation of Shavuos, its make-up days, was established in such a way that the Torah did not designate them as holy from the outset—they are ordinary weekdays, yet on those days we continue bringing the festival offerings, and they are make-up days—points to something unique, something essential to Shavuos in particular. So today we’ll talk about this wonderful idea. It holds a wonderful message for... precisely the days after Shavuos, when Shavuos is already behind us. On the great day of the Giving of the Torah, we received the Torah anew. Every year, our receiving of the Torah is renewed, the Giving of the Torah is renewed, with new energy and new light. And then we continue into the days that follow. The fact that the make-up days of Shavuos are specifically weekdays carries a very special message for our everyday lives: how do we take the message of Shavuos, of the Giving of the Torah, into all the days of the year? We can understand this through another interesting point about the Giving of the Torah. Halachah says that when we recite the prayer before Shema Yisroel each day in Shacharis—the passage beginning, “With everlasting love You have loved us, Hashem our G-d, with great and abundant compassion”—we are saying a prayer in which a Jew asks Hakadosh Boruch Hu to grant us love for the Torah: “Enlighten our eyes in Your Torah, attach our hearts to Your mitzvos, and unite our hearts to love and fear Your name.” Later in this blessing, the final blessing before the morning Shema Yisroel, we say, “And You chose us from every people and tongue.” Halachah, as brought in the Shulchan Aruch, says that when we say these words, we should have the Giving of the Torah in mind: at the Giving of the Torah, on the day... at the time the Torah was given,

06:46 Hakadosh Boruch Hu chose the Jewish people from every people and tongue. That means the day of the Giving of the Torah is the day of the choosing. It is the day Hashem chose the Jewish people. Now, when we think about it, a very simple question arises: what does it mean that Hashem chose the Jewish people at the Giving of the Torah? Wait—we had left Egypt fifty days earlier, and even in Egypt the Jewish people were already a chosen people. If we look at the Jewish people, their story did not begin with the Giving of the Torah. It began with Avraham Avinu, when Hakadosh Boruch Hu told him, “Go forth from your land, your birthplace, and your father’s house,” and chose him. Then came the holy patriarchs and the tribes. Even when the Jewish people were in Egypt, they were a distinct and separate people, and we had special mitzvos, including bris milah. After the Exodus from Egypt, we also received mitzvos: the Pesach offering, matzah, and, as Rashi says, Shabbos and other mitzvos along the way before the Giving of the Torah. So what do we mean when we say, “And You chose us from every people and tongue”? What was new at the Giving of the Torah about Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s choice of the Jewish people? Here there is a wonderful, profoundly important explanation. The Alter Rebbe states it briefly in Tanya, and it is explained at wonderful length in the teachings of Chassidus. It is one of the foundations of Chassidus concerning a Jew’s special connection with Hakadosh Boruch Hu, and Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s special connection with the Jewish people: the concept that Hashem chose the Jewish people. What does it mean that Hashem chose the Jewish people? When we speak about the Jewish people, there are truly wonderful things about them. The Jewish people—Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov—were servants of Hashem. Avraham rejected all idol worship, smashed the idols, devoted himself to Hakadosh Boruch Hu, and was a holy man who served Hashem out of love.

09:01 Great. Yitzchak served Hashem with great awe. Yaakov served Hashem; he never stopped serving Hashem for a moment, as we see in the Torah. Who were they? Our holy forefathers, the great figures of our people. In other words, the Jewish people are a special people because of the unique holiness they possess. But when we say, “You chose us,” we are saying something else. Think for a moment: what does it mean to choose something? When you choose, you don’t choose because of the special qualities it has. If you take something because it is special, holy, or wonderful, that isn’t really a choice. Its qualities, its importance, its usefulness, how wonderful it is—those are what make you take it. Imagine someone with two foods on the table. One is nutritious, tasty, and healthy. The other is spoiled or rotten and unpleasant. He says, “I chose the good food.” What do you mean, you chose it? You had no choice. Would you take something spoiled, something that isn’t good for you? Of course not. That’s not where the word “choice” applies. Now think about Hakadosh Boruch Hu and the Jewish people: our holy forefathers compared with the nations of their time and the time of the tribes, or the people of Egypt when the Jewish people were there. The practices of Egypt were corrupt; it was “the nakedness of the land,” and, as Rashi explains, a lowly nation. The Jewish people, by contrast, as we are told, did not change their names, their clothing, or their language even in Egypt. They stood apart from all the nations. So what would it mean to say Hashem chose them? They were a special people because of their unique qualities

11:07 which they possessed. That was before the giving of the Torah. When the moment of the giving of the Torah arrived, something new happened: “You chose us from every people and tongue.” Hakadosh Boruch Hu chose the Jewish people at the giving of the Torah—not because of their unique qualities, not because of the special soul they possess, and not because of their special strengths, talents, or conduct. All those things were there, but they were not the reason Hashem chose the Jewish people. When we say, “You chose us from every people and tongue,” we mean precisely that at the giving of the Torah, Hakadosh Boruch Hu chose the Jewish people because that was His free choice—not because of our special importance or qualities. He chose us because He wanted to choose us. Choice depends on the one who chooses, not on the one who is chosen. True choice, genuine free choice, is not based on something special about the thing chosen. If it is special, then there is already a reason, a logical necessity, something about it that draws you. That is no longer called choice. Choice means: I chose. As it were, Hakadosh Boruch Hu says at the giving of the Torah, “I choose the Jewish people because I choose them—not because of their importance, their holiness, or their conduct, but because I decided to and I wanted to. I choose them because I chose them.” “You chose us.” You chose us from all the nations. That choice comes from the deepest place. Intellect, however lofty and exalted, remains intellect. Choice comes from somewhere much deeper, beyond intellect, beyond anything limited, beyond reasons and explanations. Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s choice of the Jewish people comes from the

13:19 deepest place, beyond all levels, sefiros, worlds, explanations, and reasons. It is Hakadosh Boruch Hu in His very Essence, constrained by nothing. He cannot be confined to any intellectual explanation, to any consideration of importance or virtue. Nothing can compel Him or say that He must choose for a particular reason. He chooses because He wants to choose. Choice comes from the Essence and Being of Hakadosh Boruch Hu, and that happened at the giving of the Torah. The same is true of the Jewish people in relation to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Just as Hashem chose us at the giving of the Torah without any explanation, reason, or special quality, but through a choice arising from His Essence, so too a Jew chooses Hakadosh Boruch Hu on Shavuos. Just as Hashem chose us—“You chose us from every people and tongue”—we, too, chose Hakadosh Boruch Hu. “Fortunate is the people for whom this is so; fortunate is the people whose G-d is Hashem.” The Jewish people chose Hakadosh Boruch Hu over all others—over all other gods, G-d forbid. What does that mean? Here, too, what does “choice” mean? A Jew chooses to serve Hashem: “Choose life.” It is the same idea. There are certainly many wonderful reasons to choose Hakadosh Boruch Hu, to choose a life of Torah and mitzvos, to be a Jew who serves Hakadosh Boruch Hu. There are many explanations, and many material and spiritual benefits. “Taste and see that Hashem is good”—it is the most wonderful thing. But when we devoted ourselves to Hakadosh Boruch Hu at the giving of the Torah, we all said together, “We will do and we will hear.” Before the explanations, before “we will hear,” we said, “We will do.” That devotion is called choice. I choose life. I do not take life because life

15:30 is the most beautiful thing there is and it looks good to me, because I understood it and then came to that realization. A Jew chooses Hakadosh Boruch Hu, chooses to serve Hashem, chooses to receive the Torah, because he chooses. As we said, that choice is not because of all the wonderful things I will receive, or because of any interest of my own, material or spiritual. A Jew chooses Hakadosh Boruch Hu from the very essence of who he is, from the deepest place in his soul. It is not built on intellect, explanations, or questions of “What will I get? What will I gain?” I don’t want anything. I only want You. I only want to serve Hakadosh Boruch Hu. I am not looking for anything for myself. This brings us to the well-known saying of the Alter Rebbe, which he would say when he entered a state of deep dveikus. The Alter Rebbe would say with feeling and utter devotion: “Master of the Universe, I don’t want Your Gan Eden. I don’t want Your World to Come. I want only You—You Yourself.” A Jew wants Hakadosh Boruch Hu not for Gan Eden, not for the World to Come, and not for any benefit, material or spiritual. A Jew wants Hashem because he wants Hashem, because he chose Him. Choice. That is the essence of Shavuos. With this as our foundation, we can gain a very deep insight into the essence of Shavuos, the time of the giving of our Torah, and the special practices of that day. It explains why Shavuos has no mitzvah unique to it. We asked on another occasion: Why is there no special mitzvah on Shavuos? All the festivals have their mitzvos. Shavuos, though, is above every particular detail. It is the choice. A Jew chooses Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Atzeres

17:24 It will be for you. This is a day of connection, a day of coming together. A Jew connects with Hakadosh Boruch Hu, and Hakadosh Boruch Hu connects with the Jew. This is not about some particular matter, some particular action or deed—celebrating freedom, celebrating joy, celebrating the explanations. This is the day on which a Jew celebrates the choice: Hakadosh Boruch Hu chose the Jewish people, and we chose Hakadosh Boruch Hu. And this is also why the days in which one can make up the offerings of Shavuos are weekdays. That is exactly what we are talking about now: weekdays. In other words, they do not have to be special days. With the other festivals, Pesach and Sukkos, to bring the offerings and make up what was missed during the festival, it still has to be within days that share in the festival’s holiness—special days, holy days, elevated days, days of joy, sacred occasions. Then we can bring offerings. Shavuos comes and tells us: No. Even on weekdays, on days with nothing special about them, days that are not supposed to be special—even on those very days, you connect with Hakadosh Boruch Hu with the same connection you had on the day of the Giving of the Torah, on Shavuos, on that great day when you received the Torah. And that is the deepest message we need to take from Shavuos into all the weekdays. A person says: Shavuos was a holy day, a Yom Tov. I stayed up all night, learned Torah, we read the Ten Commandments, we received the Torah amid all the sounds, lightning and thunder, and everything we celebrated around it. And then, the very next day, it is a weekday. We go straight into ordinary days, weekdays, and that continues through the rest of the year. The Giving of the Torah reveals that our connection with Hakadosh Boruch Hu is not dependent on special conditions, special days or especially holy days. Precisely on the simplest days—

19:35 precisely on weekdays—a Jew’s connection with the Torah does not depend on any special form or conditions. A Jew’s connection with Hakadosh Boruch Hu is there on ordinary days, on weekdays, on a simple day, an ordinary Wednesday. You get up in the morning, and after davening you take a sefer, sit down and learn Gemara, Mishnah or halachah. It can be on an ordinary day, in an ordinary place. There are no limits or conditions—not of time, not of place, not of anything. Every Jew, even the simplest of the simple, on any weekday, on the most ordinary and unremarkable day, wherever in the world you may be, only needs to take a Torah sefer, sit down and learn. Then you connect with Hakadosh Boruch Hu in the deepest and most wonderful way: the connection of “You have chosen us from among all the nations.” It is the connection of “You have chosen us from every people and tongue.” The Alter Rebbe says it in one remarkable line in Tanya. I want to quote the Alter Rebbe’s words, because they express something very wonderful and very deep about what the Giving of the Torah means for us throughout the year. The Alter Rebbe says in chapter 49 of Tanya: “‘You have chosen us from every people and tongue’ refers to the physical body, which in its physicality resembles the bodies of the nations of the world.” That is a quotation from the Alter Rebbe’s words in the holy Tanya. “You have chosen us from every people and tongue,” the Alter Rebbe tells us. Who are we talking about? About the choice, Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s choice. It does not make sense to speak of choosing a Jew’s soul. To choose between two things, there have to be two comparable things. “The second soul in Israel is truly a part of G-d above.” A Jew’s soul is unique; it has no equal. There is no choice, no comparison at all, between a Jew’s soul and all the other souls and life forces in creation. The Jew’s soul, that most special, pure soul—

21:46 is a part of G-d above. Where is the choice through which Hashem chose the Jewish people? In the physical body. The body. Our body resembles the bodies of all the nations of the world, and it is for this Jewish body that the entire Torah and all the mitzvos were given. The Rebbe relates in the name of his father-in-law, the Frierdiker Rebbe, that his father, the Rebbe Rashab, once raised his sleeve and said to his son: “Look at this sleeve; look at this arm. For this flesh, this flesh, the entire Torah and all the mitzvos were poured out.” The Jew’s physical, material body is the purpose. For its sake the entire Torah and all the mitzvos were given. In other words, Hakadosh Boruch Hu chose the simplest thing, the most physical thing: the material body, which in its physicality resembles the bodies of the nations of the world. And that body becomes a holy body the moment it fulfills a mitzvah. This mind becomes a holy mind the moment one fills it with words of Torah. And so it is precisely on weekdays, precisely in simple things, precisely in the simplicity of everyday life—in an ordinary place, at an ordinary time—that the simple soul of a simple Jew has the wonderful ability to connect with Hakadosh Boruch Hu. “You have chosen us from every people and tongue.” May Hakadosh Boruch Hu help us make use of these days for making up what was missed—to bring things to completion, in every sense of the word: to attain wholeness, to complete, to add and to make up what is lacking. May we make use of these holy and elevated days, when the light of the Giving of the Torah still shines in the world, to make the right resolutions: to devote ourselves to learning Torah and to fulfilling the mitzvos, with an inner recognition that “Fortunate are we! How good is our portion.” “Fortunate is the people for whom this is so; fortunate is the people whose G-d is Hashem.” “Choose life”—choose Hakadosh Boruch Hu, as Hakadosh Boruch Hu chooses us. And together may we soon merit to see Hakadosh Boruch Hu revealed here in this physical world with the coming of Moshiach Tzidkeinu: “The glory of Hashem will be revealed, and all flesh together will see that the mouth of Hashem has spoken.”