Likkutei Amarim Tanya - Chapter 35 - Part 6

00:00 This is where we’re up to: “and then.” So let’s briefly sum up what’s being discussed here, to understand what the Alter Rebbe is coming to explain now. In the second half of chapter 35, the Alter Rebbe begins to explain the advantage of fulfilling a mitzvah over studying Torah. Earlier, we spoke about Torah and mitzvos in general: Hashem’s wisdom and will are found in them. Because Torah and mitzvos are His wisdom and will, Torah and mitzvos together are the oil through which the Shechinah is drawn down. The Shechinah means Hashem’s presence resting upon us. And how is the Shechinah revealed? The Shechinah rests upon the body through Torah and mitzvos—not through the soul, and not through love and awe, even love and awe in themselves. They cannot draw down the Shechinah, because there is an element of independent existence in them. By contrast, Torah and mitzvos are Hashem’s will, His innermost will. That is where Hakadosh Boruch Hu is found, so to speak. That is why the Zohar says that Torah and mitzvos are the oil that feeds the flame; that is where the Shechinah is drawn down. In the second half of the chapter, the Alter Rebbe explains that, within this, mitzvos have an advantage over Torah. That is why the wording—and this is [unclear]—does not say “Torah and mitzvos.” It specifically emphasizes action. Indeed, in the verse, the emphasis is specifically on doing. What is special about action? The Alter Rebbe explains several points here. First, he explains—and this brings us to the first distinction—that with Torah, the drawing down is into the soul alone. With mitzvos, it is also into the body. In other words, the drawing down through Torah is not simply a matter of Torah being spiritual. Rather, it is drawn down

02:09 only into the soul. It does not affect the body to the same extent. A mitzvah, by contrast, must be performed with the body, so this drawing down reaches the body as well. Another distinction is that with Torah, the drawing down reaches only two of the divine soul’s garments. With a mitzvah, it also reaches the divine soul’s third garment, the garment of action. Torah is primarily a matter of speech and thought, so Hashem’s light is drawn down only into the inner garments, the more spiritual garments of the divine soul. For Hashem’s light to be drawn down into the third garment, the garment of action, which is the lowest garment—that is another advantage. So there are two advantages here: one concerns the divine soul, and the other concerns the body. Now the Alter Rebbe goes on to explain an advantage that also concerns the animal soul. This is a third advantage of mitzvos over Torah: with a mitzvah, the drawing down also involves the animal soul. It is not only a matter of the divine soul’s third garment, and not only a matter of the body. It also concerns the animal soul, because a mitzvah has an effect on it. First let’s look at the Alter Rebbe’s wording inside, and that is where we’re up to. Yes, the line with “garment,” halfway through the line: “and then.” Yes, orally, right? “And also the energy of the vital soul within the actual body, which comes from kelipas nogah”—when a person fulfills a mitzvah, the energy of the vital soul within the actual body, which comes from kelipas nogah, is involved too. This is the part of the soul connected to kelipah, the vital soul that comes from kelipas nogah. Broadly speaking, the vital soul is the animal soul, as the Alter Rebbe says in chapter 7. Here the Alter Rebbe calls it “the vital soul within the body.” Usually, “vital soul” and “animal soul” mean the same thing. So why does the Alter Rebbe not want to call it simply

04:07 the animal soul here? Although earlier he does call it the animal soul—[unclear]—here the Alter Rebbe is careful to use the term “vital soul,” because he is speaking about the moment a person is performing a mitzvah. At that moment, you cannot call the soul that is performing the mitzvah the animal soul, so the Alter Rebbe calls it the vital soul. That is, its vital aspect. We said at the beginning of Tanya that the animal soul has several functions. The animal soul gives life; it “clothes itself in a person’s blood to give life to the body.” The body’s vitality comes from the animal soul. The animal soul also has negative and positive character traits, and other aspects. So it is the vital aspect of the animal soul that is present and engaged when a mitzvah is performed. Thus, “the energy of the vital soul within the actual body, which comes from kelipas nogah,” is also transformed from evil to good. After all, kelipas nogah also has evil in it. It is evil; it has an element of evil. So this aspect is transformed from evil to good and becomes truly incorporated into holiness, just like the divine soul itself. The animal soul—the vital soul from kelipas nogah—is transformed from evil to good and incorporated into holiness. How? Why do we say that when a mitzvah is performed, the vital soul is also transformed for the good and incorporated into holiness? The Alter Rebbe explains: “Since it is the one that acts and performs the mitzvah.” The animal soul, the vital soul from kelipas nogah, supplies all the energy and vitality needed to actually perform the mitzvah. “Without it”—without the vital soul—“the divine soul could not act within the body at all.” Without the vital soul, the divine soul could not do anything. Why? Because it is spiritual. The divine soul

06:08 is a spiritual soul, while the body is physical. The divine soul and the body are two opposites with no direct connection to each other. The divine soul is entirely spiritual, entirely G-dly. It has no connection to the physical, material body. The body is entirely physical. These are two different kinds of existence. What brings about the connection between the divine soul and the body? The animal soul, which serves as an intermediary between them. What is the intermediary between the divine soul and the body? The vital, animal soul, which is clothed in a person’s blood in the heart, from where it spreads throughout the body. The vital soul clothes itself in the blood, and through it reaches the entire body. What is the Alter Rebbe explaining here? He already said this at the beginning of Tanya. The principle he stated there is: what exactly is the animal soul’s role? Usually, if someone thinks about it without Chassidus, without looking at what Chassidus says—even if they study Chassidus, but study it very superficially, only paying it lip service—it can seem as though the animal soul is just kelipah and the yetzer hara, and its whole purpose is to interfere with the divine soul and confuse it. But when we look at the beginning of Tanya, we see that this is not so. The Alter Rebbe says right at the beginning: “Every Jew, whether righteous or wicked, has two souls,” two nefashos. In other words, the Alter Rebbe explicitly says that a tzaddik, too, has an animal soul. If the animal soul were nothing more than kelipah, then a tzaddik would not have an animal soul. A tzaddik would have only one soul, the divine soul. After all, the Alter Rebbe himself said that a tzaddik is someone who has transformed himself completely, so that his entire being is

07:57 Only holiness. He has no desires and so on. Nevertheless, the Alter Rebbe says right at the beginning of Tanya that even a complete tzaddik has two souls. What is the role of the animal soul? That is what the Alter Rebbe is saying here: the animal soul is not merely “animal.” For us—for ordinary people, for a rasha, and even for a beinoni—the animal soul plays the role of an animal. It has desires, wants, character traits, and so on. But in truth, the essential purpose of the animal soul is to serve as an intermediary. The G-dly soul is entirely spiritual, literally a part of G-d above. So the G-dly soul cannot connect directly with the body; it has no connection to the body’s physicality. For the G-dly soul to act through the body, it needs a garment, and that is the vital soul. The vital soul is closer to the body. It is clothed in the blood within the body, and through the animal soul, the vital soul, the G-dly soul can be present in the body. So essentially, the animal soul is a garment whose role is to connect the G-dly soul with the body. The difference is that a tzaddik has completely refined and purified his animal soul, so it is no longer an animal. His entire animal soul is nothing but a garment. It no longer has an existence of its own; its whole purpose is to serve as a garment for the G-dly soul, so that the G-dly soul can act through the body. Nothing more than that. By contrast, for an ordinary person—a beinoni, of course, or a rasha—the animal soul is also an animal. It also has its own sense of self, its own existence, its coarseness and its nature. But in truth,

09:45 that is not its purpose. In truth, what is the purpose of the animal soul itself? To be a garment and an intermediary, connecting the spiritual soul with the physical body. And now we come to our point, even with a beinoni at the moment he performs a mitzvah. What happens then? Who wants to perform the mitzvah? The G-dly soul. The G-dly soul has the desire and eagerness to perform it, but it cannot perform the mitzvah itself. Why? Because it is spiritual, while mitzvos must be performed with a physical body. And can the body perform a mitzvah on its own? It cannot do that either, because the body is material, and its physicality is not a vessel for the spirituality of the G-dly soul. So it needs this garment in between—the vital soul—which clothes, connects, and joins the G-dly soul with the body, enabling the body to perform the mitzvah in actual practice. So what happens? Throughout the day, when he is not performing a mitzvah—and we are speaking here about a beinoni—his vital soul is not simply a garment; it is not like a vehicle for holiness, as it is with tzaddikim. It has desires of its own. So throughout the day, his animal soul struggles with his G-dly soul. It is not acting as a garment or serving the G-dly soul. It does its own things, wanders about, and so on. But at the very moment he performs the mitzvah, since the mitzvah can be performed only through this garment of the animal soul, which gives the body the strength to perform it, at that moment there is a transformation. That is what the Alter Rebbe says here: it is transformed from evil to good. The kelipas nogah of the animal soul is transformed from evil to good in performing the mitzvah, because it is only through the animal soul that the mitzvah can be performed in actual practice. So, seemingly, this point

11:40 is how the Alter Rebbe explains the answer to the question we asked at the beginning, the question the Alter Rebbe raises earlier in Tanya: Why did our soul descend below to be clothed in a body and an animal soul? This concerns the very nature of a beinoni’s avodah. First, let us begin with the answer. As we explained in the previous class, what is a beinoni doing in this world at all? Certainly, the deed is the main thing: through Torah and mitzvos, he brings about the indwelling of the Shechinah. That is what we said earlier. A beinoni has Torah and mitzvos. But the Alter Rebbe’s question is not just about Torah and mitzvos themselves; it is why the G-dly soul is clothed in the animal soul. That is what the Alter Rebbe explains here: by performing the mitzvah—and the mitzvah can be performed specifically through being clothed in the animal soul—the animal soul, too, is brought into holiness and transformed into good. That is the general point of a beinoni’s avodah in this world. It follows that performing a mitzvah has an advantage in three respects. To sum up what we have learned so far, performing a mitzvah has an advantage in three respects. First, with a positive mitzvah, the G-dly soul is involved not only through a spiritual garment, as it is with Torah, but also through the garment of action. Second, Torah affects only the G-dly soul, while a mitzvah affects the body as well. Third, Torah involves only the G-dly soul, while a mitzvah also affects the animal soul. It brings the animal soul into holiness: he uses its strengths, which belong to kelipas nogah, to perform a mitzvah. They become something holy. Now the Alter Rebbe asks: “Although the essence and substance of the animal soul in his heart—namely, its evil character traits—have not yet been incorporated into holiness.” The Alter Rebbe asks: seemingly, this is not

13:51 a genuine bringing into holiness. What are you saying? Since the animal soul is what gives the body the strength to perform the mitzvah, we say that it is brought into holiness. But the essence and substance of the animal soul have not been transformed. When I perform the mitzvah, what happens? It comes into action: the animal soul gives the body strength, and the body performs the mitzvah. So the mitzvah involves the body and the vital animal soul as well, because the animal soul supplies its strengths. I could have used those same strengths for things that are not good. I had strengths, energy, belonging to kelipas nogah, and I could have put that energy into foolish, wasteful things, even into outright evil. Instead, I took those strengths and put them into holiness. So something has been brought into holiness. But the Alter Rebbe asks: seemingly, this reaches only the external aspect. In its essence and substance, the animal soul remains as it was. We are talking about a beinoni. It cannot be that he has now stopped being a beinoni. Even while he is performing the mitzvah and investing effort in it, the animal soul is still present in its essential nature. A beinoni’s animal soul has not become pure; it still has evil character traits. So a part of the person remains unconnected to G-dliness. What is the problem? Why does this concern the Alter Rebbe? The problem goes against everything we discussed earlier. We first explained: How can the Shechinah rest upon a person? Through bittul; that is what allows the Shechinah to rest upon him. What does the indwelling of the Shechinah mean? The Shechinah is a revelation of the infinite light, and where is the infinite light revealed? Where there is bittul. Where there is a sense of self, the infinite light is not revealed. So the Alter Rebbe asks here: since its essence

15:45 And the very essence of the animal soul has not been transformed to good. So if that is the case, something is lacking in the bittul. A hidden element of selfhood remains in the very essence of the beinoni’s animal soul. It still has not been transformed; in its very essence, it remains a separate entity. It is an existence, not G-dliness. So part of the person remains outside G-dliness. How, then, can the Shechinah rest upon the person? That is what the Alter Rebbe is asking here. “Although the very essence of the animal soul in his heart—its evil middos—has not yet been incorporated into holiness...” Look at the Alter Rebbe’s wording: “Nevertheless, it also agrees to holiness.” Its very essence is not incorporated. It agrees; it goes along with it. Only the energy I put into the mitzvah, the power of action I invested in it—that particular energy, those faculties I invested in the mitzvah—are incorporated. But the soul itself is not incorporated; it merely agrees. So he says: You see, it also agrees to holiness, because when the mitzvah is actually being performed, the animal soul, its very essence, is compelled by the person’s self-restraint. Right now, he cannot do something else. And when a person acts, he acts with his whole being. So at the time of the act, the soul, including its very essence, submits itself to holiness. It allows its faculties to be used for the mitzvah. It, too, agrees to holiness, and against its will, it answers “Amen.” In any case, the phrase that follows is “against its will, it answers Amen.” Where does that expression come from? Everyone knows. It is a story from the Gemara—though perhaps not everyone knows it. It says that on Shabbos, when a person comes home from shul, two angels accompany him home. Two angels arrive. That is why we say Shalom Aleichem at the table.

17:44 That is the whole idea: two angels arrive, one good angel and one bad angel. If they see that everything in the home is as it should be—I do not remember the exact wording—the good angel says, “May it be Hashem’s will that it be this way next Shabbos too.” And the bad angel answers “Amen” against his will. That is where the expression comes from. The Alter Rebbe uses it here. There is an explanation of it too, but in any case, what does “against his will” mean? Even the bad angel has to agree and say “Amen.” He, too, agrees. “Amen” signifies acceptance: he accepts it upon himself. So here, too, the animal soul answers “Amen” against its will. It agrees; it goes along with it. It agrees to let the person perform a mitzvah, and it becomes willing to do the mitzvah. This happens through the ascendancy of the G-dly soul in the mind, which rules over the heart. It does not come from the animal soul itself, from its own nature. This person is not a tzaddik; he is a beinoni. So it does not come from the animal soul’s essence, but from the G-dly soul’s ascendancy over it. This is the mind ruling over the heart, as the Alter Rebbe explained in the previous chapters. In any case, through the G-dly soul’s ascendancy, it brings the animal soul to agree and become willing to perform the mitzvah. “And at this time, they are in a state of exile and sleep, as explained above”—the animal soul’s evil middos are in that state at this time. They are now in a state of exile and sleep, as explained above. “Therefore, this does not prevent the Shechinah from resting upon his body at this time.” So the fact that the essence of the animal soul

19:30 has not yet been transformed in itself does not prevent the Shechinah from resting upon his body at this time. In other words, the Alter Rebbe gives the answer here. Here is the precise point: How can the Shechinah rest upon a person even though his very essence has not changed? Because at the moment he performs the mitzvah, there is nothing but the mitzvah. When I am actually performing the mitzvah, everything is nullified to it. At the time the mitzvah is performed, the entire reality of the world is nullified to its performance, including the very essence of the animal soul. If you delve deeper, you can start breaking the matter down and say: It is only going along with it; it is merely agreeing. It agrees, but in itself it does not want to. That describes the particular way it happens. But what happens in practice? Right now, as we perform a mitzvah, the whole person is involved in it. Even the part that participates only by agreeing—in whatever way it happens—is, in actual practice, agreeing and willing. Everything within the person is engaged in the mitzvah, even below the level of conscious awareness. So in actual practice, nothing opposes it. That is why the Shechinah can now rest upon the whole person. In Tanya, every word is precise. It is interesting that the Alter Rebbe uses several expressions here. When he speaks of the animal soul agreeing to take part, he spells it out in several ways. He begins, “It is compelled to holiness.” Then he says, “Against its will, it answers Amen.” Then, “It agrees,” and then, “It becomes willing.” Four expressions. The Alter Rebbe uses four expressions for the animal soul’s going along with, agreeing to, and participating in the performance of a mitzvah. What is the meaning of these four expressions? “It is compelled to holiness,” the power of the mitzvah. Then there are

21:47 two more expressions later. He says, “And at this time, they are in a state of exile and sleep.” We will explain that shortly. First, let us explain these four expressions. What do they mean? Reb Levi Yitzchak, the Rebbe’s father, has an interesting insight that explains them. He puts it this way. This involves a little Kabbalah, but it can also be understood through Chassidus. The books of Kabbalah say—and Chassidus explains as well—that the Hebrew word for mitzvah has four letters: mem, tzaddik, vav, hei. If we take mem and tzaddik and apply the Atbash substitution, mem becomes yud, and tzaddik becomes hei. In Atbash, the first letter is exchanged for the last, and so on. So “mitzvah” becomes the letters yud, hei, vav, hei. The difference is that yud and hei are written in coded form, through Atbash, while vav and hei are written explicitly. Why? Because these represent the hidden and revealed dimensions. Vav and hei are revealed, so they appear openly. Yud and hei, by contrast, are hidden, so they appear in concealed form. In other words, because the main thing in performing a mitzvah is the actual deed, vav and hei are written openly. But the yud and hei—the aspect of the mitzvah that we understand, its reason—remain hidden, and so they are written in concealed form as well. That is what is written in the sefer. In any case, there are four elements: mem, tzaddik, vav, hei, corresponding to yud, hei, vav, hei—four letters. He says that these four letters correspond to four aspects of performing a mitzvah, and that is why the Alter Rebbe uses four expressions. The aspect of action, corresponding to the lower hei, to malchus—that is what he calls “compelled to holiness.” The malchus aspect of the animal soul is the part

23:31 of the action. This is by way of coercion—being compelled toward holiness. He explains in Kabbalah why holiness here is malchus of holiness. This is kodesh; the final hei is malchus. In any case, it is coercion toward holiness. This refers to the power of action of the animal soul, the lower hei of the mitzvah. After that, he says, “the vital force, Amen.” This refers to the middos of the animal soul. He explains that Amen, as it says, has the numerical value of Havayah and Adnus. Yes, that relates to the idea of unification; it is malchus. In other words, this already includes the middos of the animal soul as well. Then, yes, what is the third point about these two expressions? That it is not willingly: “coercion” and “against its will.” In other words, the animal soul must give over these powers because they belong to it, so it gives them over by coercion, against its will. After that, the Alter Rebbe says “agree.” This is already something deeper, a matter of agreement. It comes from the faculty of binah, the upper hei. In other words, at that level there is already agreement. Through this, he succeeds in persuading the animal soul to agree to the mitzvah. Then he goes further and says “desire.” Not only does it agree; it wants to. This comes from the yud, for the yud is chochmah and bittul. So there, when chochmah is revealed, the animal soul not only agrees; it also wants to. These are four expressions, from the bottom up, that the Alter Rebbe uses to describe how the animal soul becomes nullified when a person fulfills mitzvos. After that, the Alter Rebbe says: there is exile and sleep here. What are exile and sleep? This refers—and we will get to the evil part of the animal soul. As explained in Chassidus, there are two aspects to the animal soul. There is the positive part, and there is its animalistic part, its evil part. We will get to the part of the

25:38 vital soul. So the Alter Rebbe first said “coercion,” “agree,” and “desire,” but there is the evil part of the animal soul, to which none of these expressions can apply, because it is evil. But the Alter Rebbe says that it is in exile and asleep. The evil part of the animal soul does not participate in the mitzvah, but at least it is asleep. So exile and sleep—the Alter Rebbe spoke about this earlier. There is a very great insight here. In chapter 13, the Alter Rebbe said that when a beinoni davens, he has a love of Hashem like a flame of fire in his heart. And here he says something new along the same lines. There, in chapter 13, the Alter Rebbe says that the evil is asleep. When a beinoni davens, the evil is asleep. Here, too, the Alter Rebbe speaks about exile and sleep, as mentioned, but there is a very big difference. There, he is speaking about a time of love of Hashem and davening. Here, the Alter Rebbe teaches that it is not only at a time of love of Hashem: even when a Jew fulfills a simple mitzvah, that too brings about exile and sleep in the animal soul.