Likkutei Amarim Tanya - Chapter 43 - Part 3

00:00 Ah, we’re back in our Tanya class, at the bottom of chapter 43, two lines from the bottom. The Alter Rebbe is explaining the concept of higher-level awe. He explains that higher-level awe comes from contemplating the inner dimension of G-dliness. Who is wise? “One who sees what is born.” You see how every single thing is born and brought into being from nothing at every moment. Yes. And what kind of bittul is this? Like the radiance of the sun within the sun. We discussed this at length in class. Now the Alter Rebbe adds another point. We’re going back to two lines from the bottom, to the words “in His blessed speech.” The Alter Rebbe says here that all created beings, including a person himself—his body and soul, and everything about him—are utterly nullified within the word of Hashem. And what kind of nullification is this to the word of Hashem? Like the radiance of the sun within the sun. The Alter Rebbe continues: “In His blessed speech.” This speech, which we said constitutes the entire existence of the created being—the created being’s existence is only the word of Hashem, like the radiance of the sun within the sun. The created being has no existence of its own; its entire existence is solely the word of Hashem, and apart from that, there is nothing besides Him. This speech, too, is united with His thought, and so on. Speech is united with thought. What is the Alter Rebbe adding here? That speech, too, is one with thought. This detail adds another dimension to the created being’s nullification to G-dliness. Because when you say that the created being is not an independent existence, that its entire existence is only the word of Hashem, like the sun’s radiance within the sun—then what is the radiance, and what is the sun? In this analogy, the radiance is the created being, and the sun is the word of Hashem. The created being’s entire existence is only the sun, only the word of Hashem. It has nothing apart from that. Now, speech: if we consider what speech means,

02:31 speech necessarily involves someone else. That is the nature of speech. Speech means speaking to another person, relating to him. So speech implies a relationship; it gives significance and importance to the person you’re speaking to. Thought, by contrast, has no relationship to anyone else. It is a person within himself. Speaking to myself. So even if we say that the entire existence of the created being is the word of Hashem, and that the speech of Hakadosh Boruch Hu has no existence apart from the word of Hashem, nevertheless, the very fact that there is a level of speech—and speech means relating to something outside oneself—gives the world significance. It follows that the world has some importance, some meaning, some substance. That is not “there is nothing besides Him.” True, the created being’s entire existence is only the word of Hashem, but the word of Hashem is itself something. In other words, the word of Hashem also makes room for a world. It says that there should be a world. So from the standpoint of the word of Hashem, you cannot say that the world has no value or importance whatsoever. In other words, here’s the distinction: the bittul we discussed earlier concerns the created being’s existence. The created being is not an independent existence; its entire existence is the word of Hashem. Now the Alter Rebbe is speaking about bittul with respect to the created being’s significance—not its existence, but its value, its importance. Something can have no existence of its own and still have importance, some value. Take even the analogy of the sun’s radiance within the sun. Even if we say—you could make the subtle distinction—that the radiance has no existence of its own, because its entire existence is only the sun, that does not necessarily mean we would say that the radiance has

04:40 no importance, no value, no quality at all. You can’t say that, because the sun’s radiance has a quality. After all, the whole purpose of the sun—as the Chumash says, “And G-d placed them in the firmament of the heavens to illuminate the earth”—is to give light. There is value in the light. The sun’s whole purpose is to illuminate the earth. If it does not illuminate the earth, something is lacking in its completeness. So the radiance has value and importance. All the more so with speech, which means that you give significance to someone else. Accordingly, the world’s existence has some value and importance; there is a relationship to it. That is why the Alter Rebbe now adds another point: the speech of Hakadosh Boruch Hu is united with His thought. In this detail, the analogy below is not the same as it is Above. For a person, speech and thought are two different levels. Speech is a level at which he goes beyond himself to another person. Thought is a level of the soul at which he remains within himself. But Above, speech and thought are together. Speech is never separated from Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Above, with Hakadosh Boruch Hu, they are one. Speech always remains united with His thought. It is never completely separated from the thought of Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Therefore, even after Hakadosh Boruch Hu says, “Let there be a firmament,” the created being remains nullified in the same way as thought. Just as thought is not an independent existence at all and has no relationship to anything outside Him, so too speech—even after He speaks and says, “Let there be a firmament”—has that same nullification as thought. So this is bittul even with respect to its importance and value. Let’s read it inside: “His blessed speech is united with His thought, etc., as explained above at length in chapter 21 by way of analogy.”

06:35 “As in the analogy of a person’s soul, where one utterance of his speech and one thought of his thoughts are truly as nothing, etc.” Think of a person. Before he actually speaks, while his speech is still in his thought, he is thinking about something he wants to say. At that point, the speech is entirely nullified and contained within thought. Not only does it have no existence of its own, it has no significance either. In the realm of thought, speech is considered as nothing, completely as nothing. The difference is that for a person, this is before he speaks. While the speech is still in thought, it is nullified; but after he speaks, it becomes an existence, something separate. With Hakadosh Boruch Hu, the new point is that even after He speaks, the bittul remains as it was before. Yes, even after Hakadosh Boruch Hu speaks, the word of Hashem is nullified to Him as though it had never gone outward, as though it remained contained within thought. Therefore, the world’s bittul is not only that the created being is nullified to the word of Hashem—that is bittul hayesh: the created being has no existence of its own, and its entire existence is the word of Hashem. It goes further: it is not even the word of Hashem. It is nullified within thought, nullified to that level of Hakadosh Boruch Hu which is above speech. At the level of Hakadosh Boruch Hu above speech, the bittul is one of being considered as nothing. That is a much higher bittul: not just the absence of independent existence, but the absence of significance. Do you understand the point? Hm? Is that clear?

08:21 Hm? Wait, we’ll get to that shortly. First, let’s establish the straightforward meaning so we understand what is happening here. And this is a major principle for understanding—the point we’re discussing is a major principle in Chassidus, throughout the maamar and this whole discussion. It applies whenever analogies are used. One of the fundamental principles in the approach of Chassidus is that when an analogy from the human soul is brought to explain G-dliness Above, you must always identify the point of the analogy. It applies only to the details that express a virtue. The details that are limitations do not apply to G-dliness. Just as no one would think, when you use an analogy of a flesh-and-blood king—as the Midrash says, “To what can this be compared? To a flesh-and-blood king”—that Hakadosh Boruch Hu Above, the King of kings, is flesh and blood. He is a king, but He is not flesh and blood. His virtue in the analogy is that He is a king; He does not have the limitation of a flesh-and-blood king. The same applies to every analogy in Chassidus concerning G-dliness. We always have to grasp this point: which detail is a virtue, and which detail is a limitation of the analogy? We take only the virtue, without the limitation. The same applies here. In a person, thought has a virtue and a limitation, and speech has a virtue and a limitation. The virtue of thought is that it is attached to the soul. Yes, thought is especially united with the soul. What is the limitation of thought? It stays inside. No one else knows about it. It remains within oneself. Speech: its virtue is that it can relate to someone else. It can also be revealed. The limitation of speech is that it becomes separate. It leaves the person and becomes separate. So, concerning G-dliness Above, what do we say? Concerning G-dliness, speech has only the virtue of

10:21 Speech, without the limitation of speech. Hakadosh Boruch Hu has the advantage of speech—that through speech He created a world. The world exists through speech; from speech came the created beings of the world. But it does not have the limitation of speech. The limitation of speech is that it leaves the soul and becomes a separate entity. Above, speech remains one with Hakadosh Boruch Hu. There is nothing apart from Him. So the world’s bittul is like the bittul of thought. Just as thought is considered as nothing, so too the world, from the perspective of Divine speech, is considered as nothing. But if we look closely at the Alter Rebbe’s wording here, he is saying something more. What does the Alter Rebbe say? In the first line at the top of page 62: “By way of analogy, in the human soul, a single utterance of its speech and a single thought of its thought are truly as nothing,” and so on. He isn’t speaking only about speech. He is speaking about thought too: thought, too, is considered as nothing. Earlier, the Alter Rebbe said that speech is one with thought. Now he adds that speech and thought are considered as nothing in relation to what? To the soul itself. That is another, much higher level of bittul. Do you notice the difference in the text? Look inside and you can see the distinction. Yes, there are several levels of bittul here. First the Alter Rebbe speaks of the created being’s bittul within the word of Hashem. Then he speaks about the bittul of speech and thought. Now he adds something else: speech and thought are nullified to the soul. In the parallel Above, the created being is nullified to the word of Hashem. The word of Hashem is nullified to Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s thought, which is certainly higher; and speech and thought are both nullified to Ein Sof, which is beyond

12:25 thought. What is the difference between them? What is the distinction between speech being nullified to thought and this greater bittul we are now adding—the bittul of speech and thought in relation to Ein Sof? The difference is that thought is not like speech; speech and thought are worlds apart. Speech is for someone else; thought is for oneself. Speech is physical; thought is spiritual. Speech is [unclear]; thought is a revelation. In fact, in what we’re learning now, we’re studying precisely this subject of speech and thought. There we see the various distinctions the Rebbe Rashab explains between them. Those are the points, those distinctions. But ultimately they have something in common. Ultimately, thought is an entity. It may be an entity characterized by bittul, a spiritual entity, with all the nuances—but ultimately thought is an entity. Thought is a garment. So the gulf between speech and thought concerns only a particular aspect: the ways in which they function. The particular point relevant to us is that speech is directed to someone else, and so it has a certain sense of independent existence. Thought is for oneself, so it has a more complete bittul. But ultimately thought is also a source for speech. There is a relationship between them. Thought and speech are not utterly incomparable. Both are entities; both are garments; and thought is necessary for speech. The soul, by contrast, is altogether beyond the whole concept of garments. So the gulf between the garments and the soul is absolute. They are entirely different in essence. The gulf between speech and thought concerns only their manner of functioning. One is an entity with bittul, and the other is an entity without that bittul. One relates to someone else, and the other does not. So there is a gulf between them in the particular respect relevant to our discussion. But ultimately thought, too, is an entity, and therefore thought, too, does not have an utterly complete bittul

14:22 . The soul itself, by contrast, is entirely beyond all of that. The whole matter does not apply to it; it does not even necessarily require speech. Therefore, the gulf between thought and speech on the one hand and the soul on the other is much greater. It is a gulf in their very essence. Thought and speech, by their very nature, have no connection to the soul’s essence. That is what the Alter Rebbe is expressing when he says that the word of Hashem is not only included within thought, but is included within Ein Sof Himself. This is the point the Arizal explained—the Arizal, sorry, the Baal Shem Tov explained. Tzimtzum is the simplest analogy: Ein Sof is present right here below, and therefore the created being is included within Ein Sof. This is also explained at length in the maamar. It is the third level of bittul in the maamar. “And this is what the verse says: ‘Behold, the fear of Hashem is wisdom.’” The Alter Rebbe says that, in light of this, we can understand the verse, “Behold, the fear of Hashem is wisdom”—that fear of Hashem is wisdom. What is the Alter Rebbe adding here? “And this is what the verse says: ‘Behold, the fear of Hashem is wisdom.’” Because here we see something striking, something not stated in Pirkei Avos. What did we quote earlier from Pirkei Avos? The Alter Rebbe will bring it afterward as well: “If there is no wisdom, there is no fear; if there is no fear, there is no wisdom.” That implies that wisdom precedes higher-level fear. There is lower-level fear, then wisdom, and then wisdom brings one to higher-level fear. But here the verse says that fear of Hashem is wisdom. So this verse makes a special point: the fear it speaks of is itself wisdom. They are not two things, one leading to the other; in essence, they are the same thing. Fear of Hashem is itself wisdom. And it is specifically in light of what the Alter Rebbe has just explained that this verse makes sense. Because according to what he has explained

16:22 now, what does wisdom mean? Wisdom means seeing G-dliness. What does a person see? He sees G-dliness; he sees the created being’s true bittul within the word of Hashem. So wisdom is itself higher-level fear. In other words, this is what higher-level fear means: the bittul of wisdom. They are not two things, one leading to the other. Rather, when a person reaches a deeper level of seeing and a deep, inward grasp of the created being’s bittul within the word of Hashem, that itself is higher-level fear. You could say—higher-level fear means self-nullification, but, but, but [unclear]. The wise person sees G-dliness, and so he is nullified. That itself is the point. Wisdom itself is higher-level fear. And afterward, when you say, “If there is no wisdom, there is no fear,” it implies that wisdom is a preparation for fear. That is another matter. Hm? In a moment. He will bring that too. Ah, but we understand why the Alter Rebbe brings this verse here, because this is where the point comes in. But look, he continues: “Yet it is impossible to attain this fear and wisdom except by observing the Torah and mitzvos through the external, lower-level fear.” One cannot reach higher-level fear directly. First there has to be a preparation. And that preparation is that one must first observe the Torah and mitzvos through the external, lower-level fear. And this is what he says—this is what the Mishnah states: “If there is no fear, there is no wisdom.” There must first be lower-level fear, and then comes wisdom, through Torah and mitzvos. Yes. And afterward one reaches higher-level fear. Ah, I see—“If there is no wisdom, there is no fear” comes first. Yes, you’re right. Here he brings fear and wisdom because of lower-level fear. “If there is no wisdom, there is no fear.” So look, he brings that first. Then, in fact, the question that arises here is that, according to this—

18:46 The Rebbe explains that “the fear of Hashem is wisdom”—that the fear of Hashem is itself wisdom. It is not wisdom because of something else. As we explained, wisdom is the idea of bittul, which is the very essence of this higher fear, yirah ila’ah. How does that fit with the wording of the Mishnah, which first says, “If there is no wisdom, there is no fear,” implying that wisdom is a preparation for fear? The Alter Rebbe actually explained this in chapter 23. As we mentioned in the previous class, the Alter Rebbe also discusses wisdom and fear there. At the end of chapter 23, he quotes the Sages’ statement, “If there is no wisdom, there is no fear,” and cites the Gemara’s description of wisdom as the gateway to a house. Torah is called “the gateway to the dwelling”: Torah is like the entrance, the gateway, while fear is the house. So wisdom—the wisdom of Torah—is a preparation for reaching fear. That would mean they are two levels, one leading to the other. The Rebbe explains that these passages are speaking about two different levels of yirah ila’ah. What the Alter Rebbe discusses here in chapter 43 and what he discussed earlier in chapter 23 are two levels of yirah ila’ah. There is a yirah ila’ah a person can attain through his own service of Hashem, and that is what chapter 43 discusses. And there is a yirah ila’ah that comes from above: the person only prepares for it, while the fear itself descends from above through a revelation from above. This is what the Alter Rebbe said earlier: through Torah and mitzvos, a transcendent light is drawn down, and that light brings about yirah ila’ah in the person. That is a yirah ila’ah that comes from above. Here, though, the Alter Rebbe is speaking about yirah ila’ah reached through contemplation, which is wisdom—a perception of G-dliness. Yes, and that is why this is

20:59 the difference. When it comes to yirah ila’ah that arrives from above, we say that wisdom is a preparation for fear. Wisdom—meaning Torah and mitzvos—is the preparation through which one subsequently receives yirah ila’ah. Here the Alter Rebbe is speaking about a kind of yirah ila’ah a person can awaken through his own contemplation. For this he cites the verse, “Behold, the fear of Hashem is wisdom,” because this yirah ila’ah comes from wisdom itself, from contemplating the loftiness of the Ein Sof. That is an important point for understanding this entire discussion. In other words, there are several levels within yirah ila’ah itself. Broadly, there are two: yirah ila’ah that comes from above, and yirah ila’ah attained through one’s own service, through contemplating the loftiness of the Ein Sof. But even this latter yirah ila’ah, the Alter Rebbe says, cannot be attained on one’s own. What must come first? Torah and mitzvos performed with yirah tata’ah, lower fear. The Rebbe gives a wonderful explanation of this in several maamarim. Here the Alter Rebbe says that to reach yirah ila’ah, there must be Torah and mitzvos performed with yirah tata’ah. This implies that a person needs two preparations to reach yirah ila’ah: Torah and mitzvos, and yirah tata’ah. Yirah tata’ah alone is not enough. It is not that you can simply proceed from yirah tata’ah to yirah ila’ah. To reach yirah ila’ah, you need yirah tata’ah to lead you to Torah and mitzvos, and through Torah and mitzvos you reach yirah ila’ah. Torah and mitzvos alone are also not enough. They must actually be performed out of yirah tata’ah. It is specifically the two together that prepare a person for yirah ila’ah. Why? What is the reasoning?

23:05 The Rebbe gives the following explanation. It appears in Sefer Hamaamarim Melukat, volume 3, in the maamar beginning “Ani Ledodi” from 5732. Those Torah scholars who studied it and asked about it afterward have forgotten the Elul maamarim. Yes, soon we’ll have to start studying the Elul maamarim all over again. There the Rebbe explains this at length and in a wonderful way. One particular point he explains is this: as we said and discussed in earlier classes, and as the Alter Rebbe mentioned earlier here, the difference between yirah tata’ah and yirah ila’ah is that yirah tata’ah comes from contemplating the G-dliness within the world, whereas yirah ila’ah comes from G-dliness itself, beyond the world—its inner dimension. Through his own service of Hashem, a person can reach only yirah tata’ah. A person sees a world. I look around and see a world. So when I want to contemplate G-dliness, in the natural course of things, from what I can perceive, I can contemplate only the G-dliness within the world. There is a world, and the world has an Owner: there is Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Whatever contemplation I undertake, I will always perceive G-dliness as it relates to the world. To perceive G-dliness itself, the inner dimension of G-dliness, cannot come from a person’s own abilities. That requires special assistance from above. It has to come from above. A person, by virtue of being in the world, is immersed in created beings. How can he come to an awareness of G-dliness—an awareness of that G-dliness? You need some connection to something beyond the world, to the higher fear associated with G-dliness itself. That is the role of Torah and mitzvos, because Torah and mitzvos are the inner dimension of His will. As the Alter Rebbe explained earlier, in Tanya chapter 35, Torah and mitzvos are the inner dimension of His will, beyond the world. There are mitzvos—mitzvos “which He commanded us.” A mitzvah is a command from Him. It is a revelation of the will of the Ein Sof. Therefore, Torah and mitzvos have the power to reveal yirah ila’ah within the soul.

25:04 That is the explanation here in Tanya of why Torah and mitzvos must precede yirah ila’ah. Through Torah and mitzvos, you connect with a will that transcends the worlds, and that can then lead to an awareness of the Ein Sof beyond the world. But Torah and mitzvos alone, without any fear, have no sense of something higher at all. There is no felt connection to G-dliness; the Torah and mitzvos are dry. So they will not have that effect either. The Torah and mitzvos must therefore contain at least yirah tata’ah, so that there is a sense of something higher. A person begins with yirah tata’ah, connecting to the G-dliness within the world, and then comes to Torah and mitzvos. Torah and mitzvos that follow yirah tata’ah will awaken in him an awareness of the Ein Sof beyond the world, bringing about yirah ila’ah. So this, too, is the meaning of the Tanya’s statement that reaching yirah ila’ah requires observing Torah and mitzvos through yirah tata’ah—both together, Torah and mitzvos and yirah tata’ah. They tell a story about Reb Zusha of Anipoli, who once made a request of Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Reb Zusha of Anipoli had the ability to ask for things from above, and they were granted to him. There are several stories about this. One of them relates to our subject. Reb Zusha of Anipoli wanted to ask Hakadosh Boruch Hu to let him feel the fear of Hashem that his Rebbe, the Maggid of Mezritch, felt. He wanted to feel the Maggid of Mezritch’s fear. So they told him that he—that it—that he would burst, that it wasn’t, that it wasn’t

27:48 For him. But he insisted. He wanted to feel something of the awe, the higher awe, that the Maggid had. So he insisted. He wanted them to grant him that feeling from Above. They told him no, that it was dangerous. But he kept wanting it. They say that in the Maggid’s beis midrash, where he would hold the farbrengen, there was a very large stone table. It was a table that one person—even ten people—couldn’t move. Just imagine how heavy it was. Reb Zusha was davening, and suddenly a terrifying awe came over him. He grabbed hold of the table because he felt he simply couldn’t bear it. He held on to it to withstand the awe and fear that had fallen upon him. But he was trembling so much that even that stone table began to move. It started shaking, until the students noticed that something was happening. He was afraid for his life, and the Maggid immediately... I don’t remember exactly how it ended. In the end, he saw to it that the feeling was taken away from him from Above. One of the students said—I don’t remember exactly; I read this many years ago—that the second miracle was greater than the first. In other words, taking the awe away from him after he had received it was a greater miracle than his receiving it in the first place. So you see that there are very high levels of awe that not everyone can bear. What is the kohen? At least.