Likkutei Amarim Tanya - Chapter 37 - Part 7

00:01 Where is the Alter Rebbe up to in his explanation here? In this chapter, the Alter Rebbe explains the whole idea of making a dwelling place for Hashem in the lower realms. As the Rebbe explained in chapter 36, when Moshiach comes, there will be a dwelling place in the lower realms: the Ein Sof will be revealed. The light of the Ein Sof will be revealed down here as it is, without any garment or covering. But this does not mean that it will only be made then. We are actually making it now. We Jews, the Jewish people, are making the dwelling place in the lower realms right now. So what is not happening now? All our deeds and our work will be revealed at the time of the Geulah. Our work now is to make that dwelling place in the lower realms: we connect the physical things of this world with Hakadosh Boruch Hu, and we do that by fulfilling mitzvos. So all the mitzvos, and all of this work, bring about what will happen when Moshiach comes. Then the dwelling place in the lower realms will be revealed. The Alter Rebbe explains in detail how we do this by fulfilling a mitzvah. First, there is the object used for the mitzvah: we take a physical thing from kelipas nogah and make a mitzvah with it. Then the Alter Rebbe also discusses the animal soul, which likewise comes from kelipas nogah. By taking that animal soul and fulfilling a mitzvah with it, we connect the physical with Hashem. We make it a vessel and bind it to His will through fulfilling the mitzvah. The Alter Rebbe explains that, more specifically, there are two aspects. We say that two things will happen in the future. First, there will be

02:09 “I will remove the spirit of impurity from the earth”: Hakadosh Boruch Hu will remove all impurity from the world. On the other hand, there will be a revelation of G-dliness in the world, as it says, “The glory of Hashem will be revealed, and all flesh together will see.” So there are two things: Hashem will remove the spirit of impurity, and the light of the Ein Sof will be revealed here in the world. For that, there must be two aspects to our service of Hashem. Through a person’s work with good and evil, and through the 365 prohibitions—through observing the 365 prohibitions—we remove the vitality from the three impure kelipos, and that causes—sorry. By doing so, we prevent the kelipos from drawing vitality from holiness. This will bring about “I will remove the spirit of impurity from the earth” in the future. And by fulfilling the 248 positive mitzvos, we draw holiness into the world, until, in the future, the refinement is complete. Kelipas nogah will then leave the realm of impurity, the three impure kelipos will be completely nullified—“I will remove the spirit of impurity from the earth”—and kelipas nogah will be elevated to holiness. Then the whole world will appear... But what does this have to do with the whole world? A person is limited; he has his own animal soul, and he has... So how does this affect the whole world? The Alter Rebbe explains that the entire world was created for the Jewish people. There are six hundred thousand souls, and the world likewise has six hundred thousand portions. The world is divided into six hundred thousand portions corresponding to the six hundred thousand souls. So each individual soul has its own portion of the world, created for it, and each soul must work with that portion: its food and drink, clothing and utensils,

04:14 its home and everything a person uses day and night. That is the portion belonging to that soul. It waits for a Jew to come and refine it—to eat it, drink it, and use it. With the strength gained from that food and drink, the Jew performs mitzvos. Through this, not only is the person’s soul elevated, but the portion of the world belonging to that soul is elevated too. When each of the six hundred thousand souls carries out its work, not only with the person’s soul but also with its portions of the world, the entire world is elevated as well. On this point, the Rebbe said that the six hundred thousand souls are only the general souls. Each of those six hundred thousand souls also has six hundred thousand sparks—six hundred thousand individual souls. In general, there are nefesh, ruach, neshamah, Atzilus, Beriah, Yetzirah, and Asiyah, and there are myriad details, but all are included in those six hundred thousand souls. The Rebbe gives an explanation of this in the maamar beginning Basi Legani, 5711. It is the second maamar the Rebbe delivered when he accepted the nesius, on Yud Shvat 5711. There is a wonderful explanation there by the Rebbe of the wording we recite in Maaneh Lashon. At the Ohel, we say the words in Maaneh Lashon: “A soul emanates from a soul, is attached like a branch to a tree, and is joined like a link in a chain.” That is the wording in Maaneh Lashon, describing how souls are connected to one another. This relates, for example, to what the Rebbe says here: the six hundred thousand souls are general souls, and each of those six hundred thousand souls has myriad sparks. They divide into six hundred thousand individual souls. In other words, six hundred thousand are included within each of the six hundred thousand. There the Rebbe cites the wording we recite in Maaneh Lashon: “A soul emanates from a soul, is attached like a branch to a tree, and is joined like a link in a chain.”

06:29 And “attached like a branch to a tree, and joined like a link in a chain.” So the Rebbe says: These are beautiful expressions, but what do they mean? There are three aspects here. First, “a soul emanates from a soul.” That is a soul of Atzilus. Then it says, “attached like a branch to a tree.” A branch and a tree belong to the plant kingdom. After that it says, “like a link in a chain.” That belongs to the inanimate realm. So the Rebbe explains that these are three kinds of souls. “A soul emanates from a soul”—I think, if I’m not mistaken, the Rebbe explains that this is the soul as it comes to us from Beriah. That’s how I remember it. The wording is “emanates,” so there must be some explanation of that point there. Then the branch and the tree, the plant kingdom, correspond to Yetzirah. And the link in the chain, the inanimate realm, corresponds to Asiyah. There the Rebbe explains the expressions “emanates,” “attached,” and “joined”—all of those terms. The Rebbe examines each one closely. In other words, there are souls connected to one another that come from Beriah, and there are souls connected to one another that come from Yetzirah. There are souls connected to one another, and that is why one is compared to a branch of a tree and another to a link in a chain. One belongs to the inanimate realm, another to the plant kingdom—different levels of the soul. In other words, there are general souls. One soul is connected with many other souls, and that is why there are so many souls. There is the all-encompassing soul—the soul of a Rebbe, the leader of the generation, who encompasses the entire Jewish people. He is the single, all-encompassing individual who includes all the souls. But beyond that, there are also souls that develop into groups of souls,

08:43 Souls that belong to a particular group and are connected to one another. This comes up, too, because people on mivtzoim sometimes ask about it, or it comes up in classes. One of the questions many people ask, although it isn’t really part of the plain meaning of the Tanya here—but we need to know it so we can answer people on mivtzoim—is about reincarnation. Many people ask this question. We know that when Moshiach comes, there will be the Resurrection of the Dead, and the souls will rise with their bodies. So they ask: Since we know about the reincarnation of souls, that a soul comes down into the world several times, which body will rise in the Resurrection of the Dead? The first body or the last body? What will happen at the Resurrection of the Dead? After all, one soul can come down into the world several times. There’s a letter from the Rebbe about this, a letter about the Resurrection of the Dead. Maybe they study it here. It’s a letter they’re studying here now. No? Well, if they’re going to study it anyway—but they studied it for Rosh Hashanah and Moshiach. I don’t want to interfere, but the Rebbe says something very interesting there: Each soul has its own portion that it rectifies. This is based on the principle the Rebbe cites from the writings of the Arizal, that each of the 600,000 souls has 600,000 sparks. It follows that when a soul comes down into the world, what that soul accomplished in the world remains accomplished; if it needs to come down again, that is to complete its remaining portion. But there is a portion it did accomplish. There is the portion for which the soul came down into the world. After all, it’s impossible that a person did not perform at least some mitzvos. Even someone who lived his entire life completely distant from them surely fulfilled some mitzvos. As the Rambam writes about the teaching,

10:25 “Hakadosh Boruch Hu wished to grant merit to the Jewish people; therefore He gave them Torah and mitzvos in abundance.” It’s inconceivable that a Jew would live in this world and not fulfill any Torah and mitzvos. So he has rectified some portion of his soul. What remains? Another portion that he has not rectified. So we say that the portion of the soul he rectified is the portion of the soul that belongs to that body. When Moshiach comes and the dead rise, all the bodies will certainly rise in the Resurrection of the Dead, and each will rise with the portion—with that spark of the 600,000—that he rectified. So several people can have the same soul, but different portions of that soul. The portion one rectified will be with his body, and the portion another rectified will be with the other’s body. The Rebbe gives an example there, if I’m not mistaken: When you light a fire, you can draw many flames from one fire. Although it is one fire, you can produce many flames from it. The same distinction applies to a soul. It is one soul, but many sparks come from that soul. One person rectified the attribute of chessed; another rectified the attribute of gevurah; someone else rectified a different spark. Each rectified a portion of that soul. Let’s continue here in the Tanya. So up to this point, the Alter Rebbe has explained that every member of the Jewish people refines his own portion of the world. When all the Jewish people rectify the portions of the world they need to rectify, the whole world will be elevated to holiness, and that will happen when Moshiach comes. Let’s continue at the bottom of page 48, six lines from the bottom, at the end of the line: “Each spark does not descend into this world...” Each of the 600,000 sparks, of the 600,000 souls. So,

12:27 it did not descend into this world. The Alter Rebbe will go on to say shortly that it did not descend into this world for its own sake, but to rectify the person’s body and soul. That is what the Alter Rebbe is about to explain. But look at what he says: “And even though it is a great descent for it.” Okay, this descent is also a great descent. “Even” here doesn’t mean “even though”; it isn’t introducing a qualification. Rather, it means “also.” In other words, the Alter Rebbe wants to emphasize that the soul descended into this world, and that this descent is not just any descent—it is a great descent. So he says, “Each spark did not descend into this world,” and “it is also a great descent for it.” In other words, the soul’s coming down into the world is a descent. Not just a descent, but an exceedingly great descent—and, in fact, an actual exile. The soul’s descent is not just a descent, or even just a great descent; it is a descent in the form of exile, actual exile. It isn’t an ordinary descent. Exile means that a person finds himself in a situation he did not choose. The whole idea of exile is that a person is in a place where he isn’t in control, as though he has been taken into exile. It is no longer his normal situation. So when we say the soul comes down into the world, that is a descent. Beyond that, the Alter Rebbe says, it is a great descent. And what kind of descent is it? One that has the character of exile—actual exile. Why do we say it is such a great descent, that it is exile? We’ll see; he will explain it now. But first, we’ve reached the word “even.” Notice that the wording here is a little difficult. You might expect him to say “also” instead. The Rebbe points out that the Alter Rebbe specifically chose the word “even.”

14:25 “Even though it is a descent”—because that is the wording of the verse. We’ll come to the descent through the worlds. There is the familiar verse: “Everyone who is called by My name, and whom I created for My glory, whom I formed, whom I even made.” There, too, “even” means “also”: “whom I also made.” The verse says, “whom I even made.” Why does it use the word “even”? That is precisely the point. It isn’t incidental that it says “whom I even made.” It says “even” because the descent into Asiyah is an exceedingly great descent. It is not just another descent. There is the descent from Atzilus—“My name,” “My glory”—to “whom I created” and “whom I formed.” But the descent into Asiyah is so great that the verse uses the word “even.” And that same word can also connote anger, as in the plain meaning of the expression “the anger of Hashem,” which is found in Asiyah. This physical world is a world of the intellectual faculties of kelipos. That is why the word “even” is used. The Alter Rebbe uses that wording here because he, too, is explaining the soul’s descent. So he uses the same expression as the verse: “even”—“whom I even made.” The Alter Rebbe is saying here that the soul’s descent is not just a descent; it is a great descent, an actual exile. Why is it an actual exile? The Alter Rebbe says: “For even if he is a complete tzaddik”—even if a person here below is a complete tzaddik, serving Hashem with fear and with abundant love accompanied by delight. He serves Hashem with fear and abundant love accompanied by delight, the highest level in serving Hashem. There is also a discussion among the Rebbeim about this phrase, “fear and abundant love accompanied by delight.” The explanation is that the Alter Rebbe means a person can be on a level where he serves Hashem with fear and abundant love accompanied by delight all at once. There is such a thing as serving Hashem with fear. And fear itself has higher levels: lesser fear and greater fear.

16:20 There is a person who serves Hashem with love, and love, too, has levels: love, great love, abundant love, and love with delight. Here the Alter Rebbe wants to emphasize the very highest level. This is not merely a person who serves Hashem with fear and serves Hashem with love—even at high levels of both. Rather, he serves Hashem with fear and with abundant love with delight. In other words, he has fear and love at the same time. To do that, a person needs the greatest degree of bittul: to be able, at the same time, in the same moment, in the same state, to have both the movement of fear and the movement of abundant love with delight. He needs to have the capacity for it in practice. That is the highest level: fear and love at once, two opposites. And of such a person we say that even someone who, here in this world, serves Hashem at the very highest level of Divine service, with fear and abundant love with delight, “will not attain the level of his attachment to Hashem with fear and love before his descent into this material world.” He will not attain even the love and fear he had before descending into this physical world, “not of the same kind, nor even a fraction of it.” The soul below, even if it achieves the highest level of perfection, cannot attain even a drop of the love and fear it has before descending into the world. “There is no comparison or resemblance between them at all.” There is no comparison, no resemblance, between the soul’s love and fear above and its love and fear below. Rabbi Levi Yitzchak, the Rebbe’s father, points out a very interesting detail here. Rabbi Levi Yitzchak asks a simple question: Why is the Alter Rebbe so precise in the Tanya? When the Alter Rebbe speaks here about the soul’s love and fear below, he uses the term “fear”—serving Hashem with fear

18:11 and love. He writes in Lashon Kodesh. But when the Alter Rebbe speaks about the soul’s love and fear above, he uses the Aramaic: “He will not attain the level of his attachment to Hashem with dechilu u’rechimu,” fear and love. Why? Why, when speaking about the soul below, about the tzaddik here below, does he write in Lashon Kodesh, “fear and love,” while for the soul above he writes in Aramaic, the language of Targum, “dechilu u’rechimu”? You would think it should be the other way around. First of all, he could have used the same language for both—either Lashon Kodesh for both or Aramaic for both. But even if the Alter Rebbe wanted to vary the wording, it should have been the reverse. When speaking about the soul above, Lashon Kodesh would be more, much more, fitting. When speaking about the soul below, where there are already external forces, a descent, and so on, he could have used Aramaic, “dechilu u’rechimu.” Indeed, we find in several places in the Tanya that the Alter Rebbe makes this distinction. For example, in chapter 4 of Tanya, when the Alter Rebbe speaks of the soul’s descent, he says “from the head of all levels”—using the Lashon Kodesh word for “levels”—“to the bottom of all levels,” using the Aramaic word. So there we see that for above he says “levels” in Lashon Kodesh, and for below he says “levels” in Aramaic. But here the Alter Rebbe does the opposite. For above, he says in Aramaic, “dechilu u’rechimu,” while for the soul below he writes in Lashon Kodesh, “love and fear.” Rabbi Levi Yitzchak says something like this: What is the difference between Lashon Kodesh and Aramaic? The answer is that Lashon Kodesh represents the inner aspect, while Aramaic, the language of Targum, represents the back aspect. One is inward, and the other is the back, the external aspect. That is why [unclear] arranged

20:05 this whole matter of the language of Targum. In fact, in the weekly parsha, this is where it says “Yegar Sahadusa”—it is written in Aramaic. That is the back aspect. So, in any case, he was not given this gift simply to feel the fear of Heaven that the Rambam had. He held the shofar in his hand, and suddenly he began to tremble with fear. He was gripped by such great fear that he simply could not steady himself. His body began to shake from all the... and his shofar fell and broke. Then he had no shofar with which to perform the mitzvah of blowing the shofar. That is what happens when a person seeks things that do not belong to his level. So not only did he not... He had not asked for it to be taken away from him altogether so that he could feel [unclear], and in the end he also lost the means to perform the mitzvah. A person needs to be content with the fear that belongs to him, not seek lofty things. They tell a similar story about Reb Zusha of Anipoli. They say that once Reb Zusha of Anipoli asked Hakadosh Boruch Hu to let him feel the fear of the Maggid of Mezritch. That is how the well-known story goes: Reb Zusha of Anipoli once wanted to ask Hakadosh Boruch Hu to let him feel the fear that the Maggid of Mezritch had—and then an even greater fear. In the Maggid’s beis midrash there was a table made of stone. A real table, like the stone tables they used to make; nothing in the world could move it. Once a table like that was set down, it stayed there forever. So there was such a table there, the table at which the Maggid held his tish and conducted everything. It was a big, heavy table, and it took many people to... So

25:54 overcome by the fear that descended upon him, Reb Zusha grabbed hold of the table to keep from falling. Yes, and he shook so much that the table began shaking along with him. It was that intense, and... yes. In the end, he asked to be saved from it as well. This is an example of the difference even between two people: one person does not have the physical capacity to bear the fear that a different tzaddik, on a higher level than he is, experiences. So when we come to the soul’s fear here below, compared with the fear the soul has above, then when it is in a body... certainly the body cannot bear it. It is not a vessel for that kind of fear. And so, the Alter Rebbe says, all this explains the magnitude of the soul’s descent. “But its descent into this world”—this continues what the Alter Rebbe said earlier. Look, a spark does not descend into this world for no reason. Why did it descend? For its own sake, after all, it is a great descent. The soul seemingly gains nothing from descending; it only loses. It loses the fear it has above. So what is the purpose? “But its descent into this world to become clothed in a body and a vital soul is solely in order to refine them.” The entire purpose of the soul’s descent into this world is to refine the body and the animal soul. It is not for itself; it is only to refine the body and the soul. “And to separate them from the evil of the three impure kelipos by observing the 365 prohibitions and their offshoots.” Through the 365 prohibitions, the animal soul is separated from evil. That is one side, the side of evil. On the other hand, the purpose is “to elevate his vital soul, together with its portion of the world that belongs to it, and bind

27:41 and unite them with the light of Ein Sof, blessed be He, which he draws into them by fulfilling the 248 positive mitzvos through the vital soul, which carries out all the practical mitzvos, as explained above.” So by observing the 365 prohibitions, he separates the evil from the soul. By fulfilling the 248 positive mitzvos, he connects the animal soul with the Divine will, with Hakadosh Boruch Hu. That is the whole purpose for which the soul was brought down. The soul descends not for its own sake, but to refine the body, the animal soul, and its portion of the world.