The Meaning of the Yom Tov of Purim

00:07 Speaker 1 Since we’ve finished a chapter, we need to start a new one. But Purim is coming up, so there will be a break until next Wednesday. So today we’ll discuss something connected with Purim, a topic of the day. Of course, each of us needs to prepare, as Chassidus expects of us. Just as halachah says that we ask and teach about the laws of a festival before it arrives, Chabad Chassidus teaches that before every festival we need to study its halachos, so we know how to conduct ourselves in practice. And for a chossid, whenever a Yom Tov approaches, we also need to study its teachings in Chassidus and the sichos, to understand what the festival is about and how to prepare for it. Baruch Hashem, we have been privileged to have a wealth of maamarim, sichos, explanations, and teachings about all the festivals, including Purim. But we’ll focus on at least one point connected with Purim. Purim has many aspects and several mitzvos. Broadly speaking, there are the four well-known obligations: mishloach manos, gifts to the poor, feasting and rejoicing, and reading the Megillah. There are other matters and miracles as well. And when it comes to the greatness of Purim—what is the festival about?—there are many teachings of our Sages and discourses, especially those brought in Chassidus, that speak of its essence. They tell us remarkable things about Purim’s unique stature. For example, there is the well-known teaching of our Sages in the Midrash, frequently cited in Chassidus. Several maamarim even begin with this teaching: “All the festivals are destined to be nullified, except for Purim.” In other words, when Moshiach comes, all the

02:55 Speaker 1 festivals will be nullified except for Purim, which will remain according to all opinions. There is also an opinion concerning Chanukah, and an opinion concerning Yom Kippur; those are disputed. But everyone agrees about Purim. It is a well-known teaching of our Sages that Purim will remain even in the future, when all the other festivals are nullified. Chassidus offers a wonderful explanation of this, too. What does it mean that all the festivals will be nullified? Aren’t they eternal? And why is it specifically Purim that will not be nullified? This is also discussed in Chassidus, beginning with the maamar in Torah Or on “All the festivals.” There are also several maamarim of the Rebbe on “All the festivals”; the teaching appears in a number of places. In any case, today we’ll focus on one point about Purim, a central point that is actually difficult to understand from the perspective of the revealed teachings of Torah. It is specifically through Chassidus that we have the ability to understand it a little. The Gemara in Tractate Megillah says—this is a famous passage: “Rava said: A person is obligated to become intoxicated on Purim until he does not know the difference between ‘Cursed is Haman’ and ‘Blessed is Mordechai.’” Yes, there is an obligation. Rava says in the Gemara that on Purim a person is obligated to drink, to become intoxicated. As Rashi explains, “to become intoxicated” means to get drunk on Purim, to the point that he cannot distinguish between “Cursed is Haman” and “Blessed is Mordechai.” That is what the Gemara says. But this teaching of our Sages is not at all understandable. First of all, what does it mean that there is an obligation to get drunk? Why should there be such an obligation? We know that drunkenness is not a good thing, and here we are told that a person is obligated to get drunk. Second, what does “until he does not know” mean? A person is supposed to get drunk until he reaches

05:01 Speaker 1 a state where he cannot distinguish between “Cursed is Haman” and “Blessed is Mordechai.” How could our Sages tell us that on Purim it is a mitzvah to do something that runs counter to Purim itself? The whole point of Purim is that Haman is cursed and Mordechai is blessed. Haman brought trouble upon us and wanted to kill us, so “Cursed is Haman” is what he deserves. And Mordechai, through whom the entire Geulah and the festival of Purim came about, is blessed. Why should we forget that? What is the purpose of not knowing? On the contrary, if a person reaches a state where he cannot distinguish between “Cursed is Haman” and “Blessed is Mordechai,” he is undermining the whole point of Purim. That is no longer the joy of Purim; it is the opposite of it. What is he rejoicing about? What is going on here? By the way, before we get into the explanation, there is another lovely point from the Rebbe in one of the sichos. The Rebbe once said on Purim 5714—you can look it up afterward—that Mordechai was a chossid, because if Mordechai had been a misnaged, he would not have instituted such a practice. Only a chossid could institute something like this for all generations. The Gemara derives it from the verse, “Days of feasting and rejoicing.” The Rebbe said that Queen Esther grew up in Mordechai’s home, so she saw what it means when chassidim farbreng. She saw how things should be, and that gave her a sense for mesirus nefesh. Queen Esther’s ability to risk her life came from growing up in a home where people said l’chaim from time to time. That is where it came from. The Rebbe said more about this in the Purim 5714 sicha. But we really need to understand the reasoning behind this teaching of our Sages. A great deal of ink has already been spilled by the Rishonim, Acharonim, halachic authorities, and commentators trying to explain what it actually means. So much so

07:11 Speaker 1 that we find something interesting in the Rambam: he says that a person should drink wine on Purim until he falls asleep. The Rambam explains “until he does not know the difference between ‘Cursed is Haman’ and ‘Blessed is Mordechai’” as follows: a person drinks a lot of wine, becomes tired, and falls asleep. Once he is asleep, he cannot tell the difference. That is how the Rambam explains it. So at Purim farbrengens, the Rebbe would sometimes say jokingly that there are those—and I think this is also brought in the Aruch Hashulchan, as a halachic way to fulfill the obligation—who drink milk. They drink milk, and that takes care of it: they fall asleep, forget, and cannot distinguish between “Cursed is Haman” and “Blessed is Mordechai.” Milk, too, makes a person tired and puts him to sleep, so he can fulfill the mitzvah of “until he does not know” with milk. The Rebbe would often say this in a joking vein: some people want to fulfill their obligation, so they drink a glass of milk. There is another version of it, too. The Rebbe said that you have to pinch your cheeks. What do you call that action? Huh? You can pinch them so they turn a little red and it looks as though you really are drunk. Then [unclear]—and that is how you fulfill “until he does not know.” In any case, one of the Rishonim also writes something interesting. What does “until he does not know the difference between ‘Cursed is Haman’ and ‘Blessed is Mordechai’” mean? They write that it is a matter of gematria. “Cursed is Haman” and “Blessed is Mordechai” have the same numerical value: 502. So the meaning of “until he does not know the difference between ‘Cursed is Haman’ and ‘Blessed is Mordechai’” is

09:06 Speaker 1 Not, G-d forbid, that a person gets confused and thinks Haman is blessed, G-d forbid. The point is that he can no longer do the calculation. When a person drinks a little mashke, he gets muddled, so it’s hard for him to calculate precisely. So he can’t work out the gematrias and see how “Cursed is Haman” and “Blessed is Mordechai” have the same numerical value. But that itself needs explaining. What is this—a game? First of all, if the point is that he shouldn’t be able to calculate gematrias, why specify Haman and Mordechai? It could simply have said that he should reach a point where he can’t calculate gematrias. Why choose this particular gematria? Second, and more importantly, Chassidus explains that a gematria shows a real connection between two things. It isn’t just a game with numbers. Gematria is a real concept according to Torah. The Rebbe explains in Tanya that everything in the world has life, and that life comes from the letters. When two things have the same gematria, it means that their life-force is the same, that at their root they share something. That is why they have the same gematria. So if “Cursed is Haman” and “Blessed is Mordechai” really have the same gematria, it means they have something essential in common. How can that be, when they are opposites? It’s interesting to see how Chassidus explains this. From it, we’ll understand something very deep about Purim—something many people get wrong, as we see in the world today. The whole world, a world of

11:20 Speaker 1 appearances and displays. We see it today among ourselves too, because we don’t learn enough Chassidus, and among people who don’t have the privilege of learning Chassidus at all. People misunderstand this whole idea. What does it mean to reach a point where you “do not know the difference between ‘Cursed is Haman’ and ‘Blessed is Mordechai’”? The Rebbe explains it this way: “Cursed is Haman” means “turn away from evil,” while “Blessed is Mordechai” means “do good.” In serving Hashem, there are two broad areas of work, represented by Haman and Mordechai. Mordechai represents holiness, and Haman represents kelipah. Holiness must be blessed. A person must be clear that holiness is blessed and kelipah is cursed. In other words, one must turn away from evil and do good: flee from bad things, distance oneself from them, and draw close to good things. That is the work of “turn away from evil and do good” throughout the year. But there is another aspect of serving Hashem. What happens when a person fails? What happens when he commits a transgression and finds himself in a bad place? Then there is teshuvah. What does the Gemara say is the power of teshuvah? It can turn deliberate transgressions into merits. A person can take things that are deliberate transgressions and, through teshuvah—especially teshuvah motivated by love, as the Rabbi explains—transform those transgressions into merits. What does that mean? Chassidus explains that there is a spark of holiness in everything. Not only in holy things, but even in things belonging to kelipah. There are sparks in everything in the world, even in the three utterly impure kelipos. In fact, the sparks found in the lowest things come from the greatest heights: what is higher falls

13:42 Speaker 1 lower. The loftiest sparks fall specifically into the deepest kelipos. Nothing can exist without a spark of holiness, so even the three utterly impure kelipos have a holy spark. But in the ordinary order of serving Hashem, we cannot refine those kelipos; we must reject them. Things that can be elevated—permitted things—a person should elevate by using them for a mitzvah. That includes food, meat eaten on Shabbos and Yom Tov, tzitzis and tefillin: things that can be elevated in holiness. A positive mitzvah refines a spark that can be elevated. Negative commandments concern sparks that have fallen so far that we cannot elevate them and must reject them. But through teshuvah, deliberate transgressions become merits. Teshuvah has the power to take even the sparks that fell into the three utterly impure kelipos and elevate them. So what are the two kinds of work represented by “Cursed is Haman” and “Blessed is Mordechai”? “Blessed is Mordechai” is work within holiness: drawing out a spark from something holy to perform a positive mitzvah. The same applies to permitted things that can be drawn close and elevated by making “all your deeds for the sake of Heaven.” “Cursed is Haman” is the matter of teshuvah: a person can take the holy sparks that fell into Haman, into the three utterly impure kelipos, and elevate them to holiness too. How? Through the work of teshuvah. This is also alluded to in what the Gemara says: descendants of Haman studied Torah in Bnei Brak. Or perhaps it says “in Bnei Brak”—I don’t remember the Gemara’s exact wording,

15:47 Speaker 1 but it says that descendants of Haman studied Torah. That means Jews came from Haman. Among his descendants were Jews who later became righteous people, Tannaim and Amoraim. Where did they come from? From the spark of holiness that existed even in Haman—Haman himself. From that spark came people who converted and became Jews, including Tannaim and Amoraim descended from Haman. Was it Shmuel and [unclear]? One of the Tannaim was a descendant of Haman.

16:18 Speaker 2 Physically.

16:19 Speaker 1 Physically, literally. And in our service of Hashem, it’s the same kind of work: teshuvah. So that is why “Cursed is Haman” has the same gematria as “Blessed is Mordechai.” It isn’t just a nice hint or a nice illustration. There was once a story Reb [unclear] told—a good one too. Someone said “l’chaim” and had a drink. Then he said that lekach has the same gematria as l’chaim. So after saying l’chaim and drinking a little mashke, you eat lekach. Lekach is a mezonos food, a cake. He took the lekach. Someone there did the calculation and said, “No, that’s not right. It doesn’t work; the numbers don’t add up.” I think lekach comes out higher than l’chaim if you calculate it. So he said, “In that case, I’ll have another l’chaim. That should make it work.” Perhaps twice l’chaim: one for the lekach and another l’chaim. But they told him, “No, now two l’chaims are too much for the lekach.” So he said, “I’ll take another piece of lekach.” They told him, “Now two pieces of lekach don’t fit. You need another l’chaim.” And so he went from l’chaim to lekach until the Rebbe finished laughing, until he stopped doing calculations, until his head gave out. Coupons. That’s what happens when you treat gematria that way. But of course, that isn’t the meaning here. The gematria of “Cursed is Haman” and “Blessed is Mordechai” isn’t just a superficial calculation. What does it mean? It means a person must reach a stage where he understands that “Cursed is Haman” is also like “Blessed is Mordechai,” as we said. What does a gematria mean? That they share the same idea, the same

18:20 Speaker 1 There is life in it; it is simply more concealed. That is the idea of gematria: it is clothed in a more concealed way. Just as I understand that “Blessed is Mordechai” contains holiness, Divine vitality, so too “Cursed is Haman” contains holiness. Not necessarily in Haman himself, but in its sparks. Through teshuvah, I can turn them into merits, transform darkness into light, take what was bad and make it “Blessed is Mordechai.” But according to this, a question arises: What does “until he does not know” mean? So far, we understand what it means that “Cursed is Haman” and “Blessed is Mordechai” have the same gematria. If so, what does it mean to reach a point where one does not know the difference between “Cursed is Haman” and “Blessed is Mordechai”? According to this, they are actually the very same thing. Yet here you are saying no: “Cursed is Haman” is not the same thing. You are saying that they are two different things. So what is it? A person has to drink until he no longer knows “Blessed is Mordechai”? According to what we have just explained, on the contrary, “Cursed is Haman” is the same thing, the same idea. So why does the Gemara say a person has to drink a great deal, say a lot of l’chaim, until he reaches a state of not knowing? That implies they really are two different things. According to what we have explained, that is not so; they are actually the same. So what does it mean, “until he does not know the difference between ‘Cursed is Haman’ and ‘Blessed is Mordechai’”? On this, the Rebbe offers an idea that is very fundamental to our subject: For a person to be able to do this work of teshuvah—to take all the things he did that were not good and transform them from darkness to light, so that they become merits—he must work in a way of “not knowing.” As long as a person, in his service of

20:17 Speaker 1 Hashem, is in a state of “knowing,” serving according to reason and understanding, within limits and boundaries, he cannot correct those things that were not good. As long as my service of Hashem is entirely according to reason and understanding, then of course “turn away from evil” and “do good” are two different things, two different worlds, and I cannot correct the evil. Serving Hashem must be specifically a matter of doing good; one cannot elevate things of darkness or correct those undesirable things. But when a person reaches the level of “not knowing,” a self-nullification beyond reason and understanding, he can reach that state. “Not knowing” does not mean having no understanding. Absolutely not. That is the point we need to understand here. People think that “a person is obligated to become intoxicated on Purim until he does not know” means he should drink so much wine and liquor that he becomes completely confused, goes wild, starts climbing on tables, rolls around and acts utterly crazy. He “does not know” because he has become a fool. But “not knowing” also has a meaning in our service of Hashem: through drinking more, a person rises to a level beyond reason and understanding, to a much deeper, more inward bond with G-dliness—beyond the soul’s reason and understanding. This is the idea of teshuvah: through teshuvah, a person rises to such a level of “not knowing,” beyond reason and understanding. When I rise to that kind of bond, beyond reason and understanding, I can turn “Cursed is Haman” into “Blessed is Mordechai.” I can transform it and correct it. And this—wait, wait—in Tanya. This was really the whole idea of Purim. What was new about Purim, about the festival of Purim? For the Jews, Purim was a movement of mesirus nefesh. This is what we have explained from the maamarim of Chassidus in many

22:13 Speaker 1 places. What was the whole idea of Purim? The Jews specifically reached it because the Jewish people were in a state of “not knowing,” of self-nullification and mesirus nefesh, throughout that entire year. In terms of their revealed faculties, their service according to reason and understanding, the Jews had not behaved properly. They had enjoyed Achashverosh’s feast; they had bowed to an idol. There were various things that were not good. But the Jews awakened that inner power, that movement of teshuvah and “not knowing,” and placed themselves in a state beyond reason and understanding. That is why the Purim maamarim speak so much about “until he does not know.” It is connected to this idea of “not knowing.” The service of Purim is “not knowing”; it is beyond reason and understanding. So how does that relate to not knowing the difference between “Cursed is Haman” and “Blessed is Mordechai”? There is a service based on understanding, the ordinary service of the whole year, according to reason and understanding. Then there must be a clear distinction between what is permitted and what is forbidden, how one must behave and what one must not do. A person must occupy himself with doing good. He cannot correct undesirable things; he cannot involve himself with evil. His service must be specifically to do good in holiness. But then Purim comes, and a Jew places himself in a state of “not knowing,” beyond reason and understanding. He connects to G-dliness through the level of yechidah in his soul, with a bond beyond reason and understanding. Then he can also transform “Cursed is Haman” and make it “Blessed is Mordechai.” That is the meaning of “not knowing,” that level of “not knowing.” At that level, there can be no difference between “Cursed is Haman” and “Blessed is Mordechai.” That is what the Rebbe wants to explain here. When Purim comes, it sometimes happens, G-d forbid, that undesirable things occur among people, because people think: Purim has arrived,

24:05 Speaker 1 anything goes. I can do whatever I want, and my ego can run wild. They drink liquor and go crazy. [unclear] First of all, there is the Rebbe’s restriction on drinking on Purim. Of course, there is a sicha pointing one way and a sicha pointing another, and various proofs people bring. Be that as it may, the Rebbe certainly said several times—and anyone who wants can check—that on Purim 5712, even before the restriction, the Rebbe said that “until he does not know” does not apply to yeshivah students, and that they must be careful. That is what the Rebbe said. Anyone who wants can look it up in Sichos Kodesh, at the Purim 5712 farbrengen. But what then? Of course, on Purim we should say l’chaim. But we need to understand that saying l’chaim and reaching “until he does not know” means “not knowing” in the sense we have discussed. It does not mean escaping from the intellect. When a non-Jew drinks liquor, what is his goal in drinking vodka? He wants to forget his troubles. Why do so many people today have such problems with drugs and alcohol? They have problems, they have troubles, they do not feel happy with their lives. So they take vodka or something else, go wild and lose themselves. After drinking, a person feels that the whole world is his, and then he does whatever he wants. He has a good time, but he is running away from awareness; he is running away from himself. For a Jew, “not knowing” means rising higher and higher. He rises to a level of connection with Hakadosh Boruch Hu that is beyond reason and understanding, beyond knowledge. Then he can engage in the work of teshuvah and turn even that into a merit. There is another discussion. I will just share one short thought, and then we will finish.

26:03 Speaker 1 This is another explanation, also very beautiful in terms of our service, of how the Rebbe interprets “until he does not know the difference between ‘Cursed is Haman’ and ‘Blessed is Mordechai.’” It is similar to what we have discussed, but a little more focused on practical service. The Rebbe says: “Cursed is Haman” means “turn away from evil,” and “Blessed is Mordechai” means “do good.” Now, in ordinary service, a person makes a calculation. There is a reason, an explanation based on understanding, for why we must turn away from evil and why we must do good. The enthusiasm I have for doing good is not necessarily the same as for turning away from evil; they are two aspects of service. We see this in practice. Some Jews have tremendous enthusiasm for doing good. They may fulfill all the mitzvos with the utmost care, yet when it comes to turning away from evil, they are not quite as careful. We see many Jews who are very frum, very observant, in matters of doing good, but when it comes to matters of Shulchan Aruch or turning away from evil, they look for leniencies. Then there are other Jews who, when it comes to turning away from evil, are the greatest zealots, but when it comes to doing good and fulfilling mitzvos with extra care, they are weaker. Why? Because one person is naturally inclined toward kindness and closeness, so he has a special feel and desire for doing good. Another person is more inclined toward gevurah, so he is more drawn to turning away from evil. When does this apply? When a person distinguishes between these things and says, “I like this one more than the other”—when he lives according to reason and understanding. But when a person connects to G-dliness in a way of “not knowing,” beyond reason and understanding, then between “Cursed is Haman” and “Blessed is Mordechai,” there is no difference for him.

27:43 Speaker 1 Essentially. It doesn’t mean that because it’s “turn away from evil,” he has more vitality in that, or more vitality in “do good.” The level of “not knowing” is the same: “Cursed is Haman” and “Blessed is Mordechai,” turning away from evil and doing good, have the same force for him. That’s one thought we can say about it.