The Rebbe's Final Message | Gimmel Tammuz

00:00 It was during the Gulf War. In the month of Shvat 5751 came the difficult, historic days of that famous war, in which there were great miracles. My friends and I were a group of young men serving as shluchim in Melbourne, Australia. The arrangement is that after young men finish their studies in the junior and senior yeshivos, at around age twenty, the Rebbe sends groups of them to yeshivos around the world, to more remote communities. Their job there is to learn and teach, and to bring the light of Torah and Chassidus to far-flung places and cities. We were in Melbourne, Australia. Under the rules at the time, we young shluchim had to stay there for at least two years. That was a condition: you went for two years, and during those two years you did not go back for any reason in the world. We had to accept that before leaving. Even a family celebration—a brother’s or sister’s wedding, a bris, a bar mitzvah—was not a reason to leave in the middle of shlichus. Two full years. We didn’t even travel to the Rebbe during that time. Whenever we went, we stayed in that place for two years, and our job was to be there, to learn, to teach, and to strengthen the yeshiva and the community. We arrived in Melbourne after Pesach 5750. Almost a year later, in Shvat 5751, a desire arose among our group of students—a longing, an intense thirst. We wanted to travel to the Rebbe. We knew that 11 Nissan was approaching, the birthday on which the Rebbe would enter his ninetieth year. It was a great day, a historic day. We very much wanted to be there for those days, 11

02:34 Nissan and Pesach, exactly a year into our shlichus. We knew it was impossible. One of the conditions of going on shlichus was that you went for two years. But we were young and bold; perhaps you could say we had the chutzpah to ask. We sat down and wrote a letter to the Rebbe. There were five or six of us. We wrote that 11 Nissan, when the Rebbe would enter his ninetieth year, was approaching, and that we very much wanted the Rebbe to give us the opportunity and the privilege of traveling to be with him on that great day. We made commitments. We said that, with Hashem’s help, if the Rebbe gave us permission, it would certainly add—as we wrote—to our renewed energy and vitality in continuing our shlichus the following year. We also took on additional study, both in Nigleh and in Chassidus. The chance was almost zero. We were sure we wouldn’t get approval; perhaps, on the contrary, we were putting ourselves in a position we shouldn’t have. But, being young men, we wrote the letter to the Rebbe. As was customary then, we sent it by fax. A few hours passed—I don’t remember exactly, but I think, almost certainly, it was even that same day—and we received an answer. A response came from the Rebbe. Wow. We were already tremendously excited. We looked at what the Rebbe had answered, which came by fax, and his response was extraordinary. It was an enormous surprise. In his holy handwriting, the Rebbe circled the words “renewed energy and vitality in our shlichus,” and wrote: “In that case, it is worthwhile, and may it be at an auspicious and successful time.” In other words, the Rebbe was expressly agreeing. We had undertaken that the trip would give us renewed energy and vitality in our shlichus, so he agreed to it and blessed us that it should be at an auspicious and successful time. I remember

05:13 the excitement was sky-high. We were beside ourselves. It was something very special, and it was a historic change in the rules of shlichus. As it turned out, a few months later the Rebbe himself said that this was also a change for other yeshivos that had asked the same question: it gave their students the possibility of traveling to be with the Rebbe even in the middle of shlichus. At the time, it was a great revolution, a great joy, tremendous excitement—and a major change. We didn’t understand then just how deeply this came from the Rebbe’s immense love. As chassidim, of course, we knew that the Rebbe felt our desire, our yearning and our thirst, and gave us the opportunity to make it happen. As King Shlomo says, “As water reflects a face back to a face, so one person’s heart reflects another’s.” The Rebbe felt our love and responded by giving us that opportunity. But we understood the depth of it only many years later. That Nissan 5751, when we merited to be with the Rebbe, was in fact the last time we merited to see him in robust health, with sichos, farbrengens, and everything the Rebbe gave us then—dollars, blessings. We returned to Australia for another year, and by the time we came back, 27 Adar had already passed. Sadly, the Rebbe’s health was then different, and we no longer merited to hear his voice at farbrengens and so on, as is well known. Looking back, we saw the Rebbe’s extraordinary ruach hakodesh. Through his ruach hakodesh, he foresaw what he foresaw and wanted to give us this special opportunity to spend a few more weeks with him in that way: to see him, hear him, be together at farbrengens, and receive everything a chossid can receive from the Rebbe openly, clearly and directly, as we did. When we think about it

07:39 today, looking back—I think to myself: we were a small group, only five or six young men, and these were momentous days, great days. The Rebbe was then leading a major campaign. Beyond everything the Rebbe was doing at the time for Jewish life throughout the world, this was right in the midst of the Gulf War. As is well known, the Rebbe himself stood in the breach and guided the response, instructing the Jewish people how to approach it with bitachon, trust in Hashem. It was an extraordinary time. Yet the Rebbe found the time and the moment to turn to a small group of young men, to care for us, help us and stand by us, giving us this wonderful opportunity to be together. It shows the greatness of what chassidim mean when they call a Rebbe a raya mehemna, a faithful shepherd who cares for each person individually and for the entire Jewish people as a whole. During that month of Nissan, when we merited to be with the Rebbe, a new and very special period began. It was a time when the Rebbe began the great campaign to prepare the world for the coming of Moshiach Tzidkeinu, if we can put it that way. As we said, after the Gulf War, the Jewish people and the entire world saw the great miracles and wonders with their own eyes. The predictions had been as dark and dire as could be, and the Rebbe was the only leader who stood firm and spoke with complete confidence: “A land upon which the eyes of Hashem your G-d are set, from the beginning of the year to the end of the year.” There was nothing to fear. Eretz Yisroel was the safest place. There was no reason to flee. Those words of complete confidence proved prophetic—an absolute prophecy. The Jewish people and the entire world truly saw, through great miracles and wonders, how the Gulf War came to an end then.

10:03 In such a wonderful way. Already in those days—and even before then, but especially in those days, following those great miracles—the Rebbe began using those wonderful expressions: that we had now entered a new era, the era of the days of Moshiach; that “all of you should stand ready to greet Moshiach Tzidkeinu,” as the Rebbe put it then. That month of Nissan was an extraordinarily uplifting month. The farbrengens, the sichos, the joy, the excitement, the things the Rebbe said about our already standing on the threshold of the Geulah. Especially after Pesach came the famous sicha, one of the most powerful, historic, and well-known sichos the Rebbe delivered then. On 28 Nissan, the Rebbe said, “Do everything in your power to bring about the days of Moshiach, to bring Moshiach Tzidkeinu”—that it rests in the hands of each and every one of us. Those words, that sicha, which transformed the heart of every chossid and, really, the heart of every Jew, brought about a genuine revolution. We are living in a truly extraordinary time. That sicha was followed by more farbrengens. Throughout that year, from Nissan 5751 until Adar 5752—eleven months—Shabbos after Shabbos, week after week, both in weekday sichos and in sichos on Shabbos and Yom Tov, the Rebbe explained in various ways the role of our generation and the special role of our time. The Rebbe spoke about how we were already entering the opening of the generation of Geulah. This is our generation; this is our time. We need to enter the atmosphere of Geulah already. And here is the wonderful thing, which is what we will discuss today: what the Rebbe taught us in those months, in those sichos. As I said, it had actually begun several years earlier. For a number of years already, the Rebbe’s sichos on Geulah had been different. The excitement, the intensity and fervor, the words, the way he spoke: Behold,

12:42 he is already here. Open your eyes. Each of you, do whatever you can. Let every action we take be directed toward this goal. I remember, some years before the Pesach we are talking about now, the Rebbe devoted an entire farbrengen to a wonderful explanation. He spoke about the Rambam’s well-known teaching: every Jew must always look at the world as though it is evenly balanced, half liable and half meritorious, like a scale that even a very small thing can tip to the positive side. A Jew must know: a person should always view himself and the entire world as evenly balanced. If he performs one deed, says one word, or thinks one thought in the positive direction, he tips himself and the entire world toward merit and brings salvation and deliverance. I remember the farbrengens at which the Rebbe spoke about this Rambam with holy passion, with tremendous fervor, saying that we must publicize this teaching everywhere—to ourselves, to those around us, to every Jew in the world. A Jew needs to know the power he has and the great responsibility he bears: one deed, one word, and one thought can bring about the revolution. The coming of Moshiach Tzidkeinu depends on it. Don’t think this is only for great people, important people, tzaddikim, the holiest of the holy—that they are the ones who will do it. Each and every person needs to know that with one single deed, one single word, one single thought, one specific action you take in the positive and proper direction, you have the power to transform the world into a place of light, a place of salvation, a place of deliverance, and a place of Geulah. So what exactly was new in that final year? What exactly changed in what the Rebbe said during those last months, and what does it mean for us today, where we are now? The subject, if we were to put it in a single word—what

14:57 exactly was the Rebbe’s point? The heart of what we heard from the Rebbe in those months was that the time had come to begin living—to live with Moshiach and Geulah. Not just to believe, but to live it. That is really the difference. The Rebbe began speaking about living Moshiach, living Geulah, entering the atmosphere of the days of Moshiach. How do we do that? What does it mean? As the Rebbe explained, first of all, a Jew needs to understand that, in terms of the era we are in, this is where we are now. Of course, one needs to be a Rebbe and a tzaddik to know that. Not just anyone can say it. The Rebbe saw it and told us. We are now in that era. The world is now at the end of exile and the beginning of Geulah. We have already entered this era, the era that opens the age of Geulah for us. We need to know the time, to know the era. But what does that mean in practice, in what we actually do? There are several points here that I want to discuss now as practically as possible, if “practical” is the right word. The first thing the Rebbe spoke about was learning. For a person to be able to live it, not merely believe in it—faith is something every Jew has naturally. Of course, faith also needs to be developed and strengthened. There are moments when faith weakens. There are moments when it is harder to hold on to faith. But a Jew believes. “I believe”—the thirteen principles of faith, including, “I believe in the coming of Moshiach, and even though he may delay, I await his coming every day.” Every Jew says that or thinks it. We believe in the coming of Moshiach. We believe in the resurrection of the dead. These are among the thirteen principles. But faith is not the point here. What is new in our generation, in our days now, is not only to believe in it, but to live it as well. To live the

17:07 Geulah, to enter its atmosphere already, to live with the real, inner sense that we are already in that atmosphere. For that, we need to know what Geulah means. What does the time of Geulah, the age of Geulah, mean? To live it, we need to learn. Learning has a power. The Alter Rebbe tells us in Tanya that when a person learns something, there is something unique about learning—especially when the learning is serious, thoughtful, and deep. When a person studies something in depth, he becomes united with it. That union comes about naturally within the person. In the words of Tanya, it is “a wondrous union, the like of which, or anything comparable to it, cannot be found in the physical world: to become one and united from every side and angle.” When I learn, I become united with what I learn. It becomes one with me. The person and the material he studies and delves into—especially when he studies it deeply—become one. What you learn enters into you and becomes part of you. You live that way; you think that way. It becomes your way of thinking. So the Rebbe says: Let’s begin learning about these subjects. Start with Tanach, many of whose books speak about Geulah. There are the Midrashim, the commentaries on Tanach, the well-known Midrashim, the Talmud—extensive sections of it—and, of course, the works of Chassidus. Especially in Chabad Chassidus, there are tens and hundreds and thousands of maamarim and sichos that discuss Geulah and explain it in depth. Studying these things will lead us to begin breathing it, entering its atmosphere, living with Geulah as something real, personal, and tangible. Over time, the Rebbe also spoke about another point. When we begin looking at the works of Chassidus, what is the essential point? What is the fundamental transformation that will actually take place in the days of Moshiach? What are we looking forward to? People sometimes talk about the days of Moshiach without having studied the subject; they have just heard a word here and a word there,

19:33 A verse, a Midrash. Sometimes it sounds to us like some kind of era when everything will be nice and rosy. As the Rambam says in his famous words, there will be no war, no hunger, no competition, no hatred and no jealousy, and goodness will be abundant. All of that is true. But when we speak about the spiritual content—about how much we can live the Geulah in our daily lives today, from a spiritual perspective—the days of Moshiach are the time when G-dliness will be revealed completely in the world. Absolute oneness will be revealed in the world. The prophet says, “For they will see eye to eye when Hashem returns to Zion.” The prophet Yeshayahu says, “The glory of Hashem will be revealed, and all flesh together will see that the mouth of Hashem has spoken.” With the coming of Moshiach, the shell of the world, the part that conceals the truth, will fall away. We will be able to see the world as it truly is. We will discover absolute oneness, the true reality of “there is nothing besides Him”—that there is nothing apart from Hakadosh Boruch Hu. For all of creation, down to every detail, is really the Divine power, the word of Hashem, that brings it into being and gives it life at every moment. There is nothing apart from Him. The Rebbe says that today, through studying the teachings of the Baal Shem Tov in particular, the teachings of Chassidus, which expand on this subject of Hashem’s oneness and teach us “there is nothing besides Him” in the most tangible, essential, expansive and profound way—through learning about it, contemplating it, davening and thinking about it—we enter that atmosphere and can begin living that way already now. Even though, in this time of exile, we still cannot see it with our physical eyes, we can already understand it with the eyes of the mind and begin to live that way, to the extent possible. What does it mean to live that way? The Rebbe said

21:43 at a farbrengen on Simchas Torah 5752: What does it mean to live with Hashem’s oneness, with “there is nothing besides Him,” in daily life? The Rebbe said that this is the teaching of our Sages at the end of Tractate Kiddushin: “I was created only to serve my Maker.” A person knows that he is not in this world for any other purpose. The whole reason I was created is to serve my Maker. If I understand the truth that there is nothing besides Him, that my entire existence and all of creation are part of Divine oneness, then I cannot have two kinds of life: some hours when I serve Hashem and other hours when I live my personal life. There is the time when I’m at the minyan, the time for davening and the time for classes; and then there’s the time when I’m doing business, eating, playing or traveling. They’re separate periods that I don’t mix: here I serve Hashem, and here I do what I feel like doing, what I want, what I enjoy. But once a Jew knows this absolute truth, understands it and lives with it—contemplates the fact that, really, there is nothing besides Him, that there is only Hakadosh Boruch Hu, the one and only reality—then that applies to daily life too. It does not mean that a person stops eating or doing business, or leaves daily life behind, G-d forbid. In the very things I do, I see a Divine purpose. “Know Him in all your ways”—in my own ways, in daily life, in physical, material reality. In every single thing, I look for how Divine oneness is expressed there, how “there is nothing besides Him” is expressed there. How can I bring Hakadosh Boruch Hu into my

23:38 daily life? One of the stories the Rebbe told many times is about a chossid who was a businessman, but also a great chossid, one of the early chassidim of the Alter Rebbe. He was in the middle of his business affairs, working out figures for large, important transactions. When he reached the end of his calculations, where he was supposed to write the grand total, he found that, as though of its own accord, he had written “There is nothing besides Him” in place of the total. Afterward, the chassidim asked him, “What is this? What did you write here?” He said, “I saw the words ‘grand total,’ and it suddenly came to mind: the grand total of everything we do is to reveal G-dliness in the world, to reveal that there is nothing besides Him.” And so that is what he wrote. He did not do it as a game or a joke, or with any deliberate intention. It came out instinctively. What else could “grand total” mean? That is the grand total of our entire lives. This is what it means for a person to live the Geulah in daily life. As the Rebbe explained so wonderfully at that time, the Geulah is not about escaping exile. It does not come to break exile or destroy it, or to have us all flee our homes and go somewhere else. As the Rebbe often explained at farbrengens, the Hebrew words for “exile” and “redemption,” golah and Geulah, have the same letters, with the addition of an alef. In other words, life, reality and the world remain—as the Rambam says, the world will continue in its normal course even when Moshiach comes—but with an alef: the Alef, the Master of the World; the light of Moshiach; the light of Hakadosh Boruch Hu; the light of Divine oneness. That is what will illuminate every detail of our physical lives. What is the Rebbe asking in those

25:36 sichos from that year, sicha after sicha? That we, chassidim and Jews, begin now, as much as possible, to live this kind of life: to bring Divine oneness into our daily lives. We should seek Hakadosh Boruch Hu not only in the beis midrash, not only when I sit and study a page of Gemara or a maamar of Chassidus and experience the Divine light there, but also in simple things—in the street, in food, in play, in business, in all the ordinary things of daily life. To bring into them the Divine light of “there is nothing besides Him.” At another farbrengen around that time, the Rebbe spoke about something even deeper and more subtle, if one can put it that way, in this whole matter of living the days of Moshiach. The Rebbe also said something wonderful about studying Chassidus. The teachings of Chassidus are connected with the light of the Geulah, and Divine oneness is explained there. But the Rebbe spoke about something very interesting. This was in Cheshvan 5752, around Parshas Lech Lecha, which speaks about the Covenant Between the Parts. Hakadosh Boruch Hu promised Avraham Avinu ten lands, including those of the Kenite, the Kenizzite and the Kadmonite. In practice, Avraham Avinu did not receive all ten; he received only seven. The Jewish people entered the Land of Israel, and there were only seven lands: those of the Canaanite, Hittite, Amorite, Perizzite, Hivite, Jebusite and Girgashite. Wait—what happened to the Kenite, the Kenizzite and the Kadmonite? We all know what is written in the Torah and explained further in the Midrashim. The Rambam discusses how, in the days of Moshiach, there will be another three lands that we have not yet conquered: the lands of the Kenite, the Kenizzite and the Kadmonite. There are various opinions as to whether these refer to Ammon, Moab, Edom or the Philistines. They are explained in several ways, but they are additional lands located today outside the boundaries of the Land of Israel. Even in the time of the Beis Hamikdash, even when the land was originally conquered, they were not conquered.

27:43 them. But when Moshiach comes, “when Hashem expands your borders,” we will receive the ten lands. Chassidus explains the difference between the seven lands we have already conquered and the ten lands—the three additional lands we have not yet conquered. According to Kabbalah, seven corresponds to the seven middos, and three to the three faculties of the mind, known as chochmah, binah, and daas. In other words, a person has seven middos. Middos are emotions; Kabbalah divides the emotions of the heart into seven. And there are three faculties of the mind: chochmah, binah, and daas. So far we have conquered only seven lands. That means that the main focus of serving Hashem throughout the period from Moshe Rabbeinu’s time until the coming of Moshiach is working on our middos. A Jew needs to refine his middos. That is what our lives are about: refining our middos. Pirkei Avos is about refining our middos—becoming purer, more courteous, more of a mensch, more refined. Refining our middos, the traits of our souls. But when Moshiach comes, we will rise to such a high level that we will also be able to refine and purify the mind. These are the lands of the Keini, Kenizi, and Kadmoni, the three lands we have not yet conquered. For the work of refining the mind, so that our intellect is entirely pure and clear, is a much subtler and more difficult task. Only in the days of Moshiach will we be able to do it perfectly. So the Rebbe spoke at that time about how, since we had said that we had already entered the period of the days of Moshiach, now was the time to begin studying topics, maamarim, and works of Chassidus—not only the maamarim that help us refine our middos, conquer the seven lands, the seven nations, meaning the bad middos, and transform them into good middos, but also to work on the mind. There are many maamarim of Chassidus. The Rebbe mentioned the maamarim of the Mitteler Rebbe in particular, but more generally, there are two kinds of maamarim in Chassidus.

29:48 Some maamarim of Chassidus speak more to the heart, to the middos and emotions, while others speak to the mind: deep intellectual maamarim about Hashem’s greatness, the order of spiritual worlds, the sublime light before the tzimtzum, and lofty levels—very deep maamarim. Now that we are at the stage of the days of Moshiach, the Rebbe says, the time has come to study those maamarim as well, to begin working on the mind too. All of this is part of our reality today, now that we have already entered the days of Moshiach, and we should begin living in that atmosphere. And last but not least, I want to mention one more very interesting thing that we were privileged to hear from the Rebbe in the later years on this subject: joy. Joy. We know that Chassidus has spoken about joy since the time of the Baal Shem Tov. He emphasized that joy is central to serving Hashem. It is one of the foundations of the Baal Shem Tov’s teachings: he brought joy to the forefront, even though it is also written about in the Torah and the Midrashim. But we know that Chassidus made joy a central part of serving Hashem. In the later years, the Rebbe spoke about serving Hashem with joy. There are many explanations, many reasons, and many ways of contemplating why we really need to be joyful in serving Hashem. “Serve Hashem with joy; come before Him with song.” Why is joy so important? Tanya and other works of Chassidus discuss joy in serving Hashem at length. But there is something special being asked of us today. As the previous Rebbe, the Frierdiker Rebbe, wrote in letters he composed in the midst of the terrible years of the Holocaust: “Rejoice and be glad in the joy of the true and complete Geulah.” We should already be joyful over the good news, the tidings of the Geulah. If we are already entering the atmosphere of the Geulah, we know that the joy of the Geulah will be exceedingly great.

32:07 The prophets speak about it again and again: “Everlasting joy will be upon their heads.” “Then our mouths will be filled with laughter,” it says in Tehillim. When Moshiach comes, there will be laughter, because there will be tremendous joy. “And she laughs at the day to come,” says King Shlomo, alluding to the final day, the day of Geulah, when there will be joy and laughter, true joy. Since we are already at the stage of entering the light of the Geulah, that also calls for us to have the greatest possible joy: the joy of feeling that we are already entering the time of the Geulah. And the Rebbe said at one farbrengen that when we rejoice with the great joy of knowing that Moshiach is coming, that joy itself will bring the Geulah even closer. The Rebbe also said that the letters of sameach, “joyful,” can be rearranged to spell Moshiach; sameach together with the ten faculties of the soul has the same numerical value as Moshiach. In other words, joy should permeate every faculty of the soul. The Rebbe spoke then about how shliach has the same numerical value as sameach. Shliach. Every Jew is a shliach. To be a shliach of the Rebbe, to be a chossid of the Rebbe. Shliach has the same numerical value as sameach. And shliach together with the ten faculties of the soul has the same numerical value as Moshiach, just as sameach together with the ten faculties of the soul does. So we should be joyful and serve Hashem with joy, with a special joy that comes from already believing and feeling—and already living in the atmosphere—that Moshiach is coming. That joy itself will bring closer and hasten our departure from the darkness of exile, so that we merit to reach the light of the Geulah, the complete Geulah, and that it happen today. As the Rebbe spoke about so often: when we say today, “I believe with complete faith in the coming of Moshiach; I await him, and I await him every day to come,” it means today. Not that I await him every day to come whenever he wishes, but that every day I await him to come that very day—that it happen today. As Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi heard from Moshiach himself when he asked him, “When are you coming? When will the master come?”

34:23 He answered him: “Today.” Today itself is the day of Geulah. May we merit the complete Geulah today. May everyone have a joyous month of Tammuz, and may this month, the fourth month, be transformed, as the prophet says, into gladness, joy, and festivals.