Likkutei Amarim Tanya - Chapter 46 - Part 6

00:00 Speaker 1 The greatest of all kings becomes involved in every detail, every aspect and every facet of a simple person’s life. And then, yes, we say that the king shows him his love. Not just that: it emphasizes that this is not merely love, but a great and immense love. And how does he show it to this person? By sending him all his servants, down to the last detail. So that is the idea. The Rebbe explains that, in the parallel, all these details apply to Hakadosh Boruch Hu and the Jewish people as well. So now we come to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Until now, the Rebbe has discussed these two points. The Rebbe spoke at length about both aspects of what it means to be a great king and a king of vast dominion in relation to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. As for greatness—yes, “His greatness is beyond searching.” And as for the vastness of His dominion, he goes into the whole lengthy discussion of how He

00:57 Speaker 2 gives life to all the worlds—to all the worlds, and to countless worlds without end, with all their details.

01:04 Speaker 1 Then the Rebbe added another point, a third point, which exists only in the parallel. As we explained in the previous class, with a great king of vast dominion in the physical world, the people ultimately do have some significance in relation to the king. So much so that we say, “There is no king without a people.” The king’s entire standing, all his greatness, is built upon the existence of the people, the ministers and the servants. That is what makes him a king. The larger the people and the larger the country, the greater the king becomes. So that itself shows that the people have some significance in relation to the king. But regarding Hakadosh Boruch Hu, we say that “all before Him is considered as nothing,” encompassing every detail of bittul. As we explained in the previous class, this shows how utterly exalted and elevated the King is. That is where we got to. The Rebbe has discussed one side of the analogy and how it applies to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Now the Rebbe will go on to the other side: how Hakadosh Boruch Hu, the great King of vast dominion, descends and becomes involved with a simple, lowly person. That is where we are. Yes, on page 68b, after the two dots. In the passage of Tanya we have covered up to now: “And they all ask,” says the Alter Rebbe, “Where is the place of His glory? And they answer: The whole earth is full of His glory.” All these angels and all these worlds—all those countless details we mentioned earlier, the thousands upon thousands and myriads upon myriads of hosts without end, all of them, all the angels. So all these angels and all the ministers of Hakadosh Boruch Hu ask, “Where is the place of His glory?” They ask, “Where is Hakadosh Boruch Hu?” “Where is the place of His glory?” And they answer, “The whole earth is full of His glory.” What is the answer? The answer is, “The whole earth is full.” In other words, the angels are searching for

03:13 Speaker 1 Hakadosh Boruch Hu. They ask, “Where is the place of His glory?” “Where” is an expression of questioning and wonder: Where is it? Because however much they grasp, understand and know, it does not bring them to an awareness of Hakadosh Boruch Hu. In other words, Hakadosh Boruch Hu is utterly beyond the angels’ existence, and that is why they ask, “Where is the place of His glory?” And those who answer say, “The whole earth is full of His glory.” What does “The whole earth is full of His glory” mean? The Alter Rebbe explains here that “the earth” refers to the Jewish people. Here the Rebbe offers a wonderful interpretation of the verse the angels say: “Holy, holy, holy is Hashem of Hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory.” What does “the whole earth” mean? “Earth” refers to the Jewish people. Where does it say “the Jewish people”? It says “earth.” The meaning is, as explained in Chassidus, that the Jewish people are called “earth.” We find this in the verse, “For you shall be to Me a desirable land.” The Beis Dovid says there is a verse in which Hakadosh Boruch Hu tells the Jewish people, “For you shall be to Me a desirable land.” The Jewish people are called Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s “desirable land,” as also brought in Hayom Yom in the name of the Baal Shem Tov. The Baal Shem Tov says that when a person comes to a piece of land, it can contain exceedingly precious things of all kinds—gold, petroleum, oil and all sorts of valuable things that are found specifically underground. These are the most precious things, hidden in the most unexpected place. In the same way, “desirable land” refers to a Jew: every Jew contains treasures of Torah, tzedakah and holiness, wisdom, and all the wonderful, good things within every Jewish soul. You just have to dig into the ground, remove the soil, the debris and everything covering it—the dust—and reveal them. So when we say “earth,” it refers

05:16 Speaker 1 to the Jewish people. It is not only because “earth” is associated with wanting to do the will of its Maker, and the Jewish people, too, are called “earth” because a Jew wants to do Hashem’s will. It is also connected with the way “earth” refers to the Shechinah, to Malchus, which is likewise called “earth.” This relates to the Jewish people, who are connected with the Shechinah of Malchus as well. In any case, according to this, the angels ask, “Where is the place of His glory?” and then they say, “Holy, holy, holy is Hashem of Hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory.” So what does that mean? The angels say that, for them, He is “holy, holy, holy.” “Holy” means set apart and beyond. “Holy, holy, holy”—three times holy. He is many levels beyond what another being can grasp, all the way to the infinity of Hakadosh Boruch Hu. But when it comes to the “earth” of the Jewish people, the opposite is true: “The whole earth is full of His glory.” It is specifically among the Jewish people that Hakadosh Boruch Hu is found. By the way, this also needs examination, as the Rebbe asks in a note that was published a few years ago. The Rebbe points out that this needs examination if you look at the wording of the prayers. There, that is not the answer to the question. In the wording of the prayers, they ask, “Where is the place of His glory?” and we find that the response is, “Blessed is the glory of Hashem from His place.” “Holy, holy, holy” is said earlier in the wording of the prayers, in what we say in Mussaf. How does it go there? “And they call to one another and say: Holy, holy, holy is Hashem of Hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory.” It does not say that this is an answer. Why do they “call to one another and say: Holy, holy, holy is Hashem of Hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory”? After that come the lines about asking one another, “Where is the place of His glory?” and the answer is, “Blessed is the glory of Hashem from His place.” So there it sounds as though “The whole earth is full of His glory” is not an answer

07:20 Speaker 1 to the question “Where is the place of His glory?” In other words, “Holy, holy, holy is Hashem of Hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory” is what the seraphim say. And the question “Where is the place of His glory?”—according to the wording of the synagogue prayers—appears to be a question they ask, but the answer to it is not “The whole earth is full of His glory.” They are answered, “Blessed is the glory of Hashem from His place.” Here, though, you see the two things being linked. The Rebbe leaves this as requiring further examination. In any case, what are we saying here? What is the essential point? The point is that the Rebbe says this requires further examination. But I’ll get to the heart of the matter; the central point is clear. The point is that the angels cannot grasp the Atzilus of Hakadosh Boruch Hu. They have no connection to the Atzilus of Hakadosh Boruch Hu. We are now learning, in the maamar for tonight, about the angels, the seraphim and this whole subject, and how it is specifically through the Jewish people... So what do they say? “And the whole earth is full of His glory”—Hakadosh Boruch Hu has descended below. Now you see that, and he goes on and will continue. By the way, there is more on “Where is the place of His glory?” Just as an aside, this is called glory seen through a wall. On the plain meaning of “Where is the place of His glory?” there is also an explanation that... In the name Havayah, the Shechinah, Malchus, is the letter hei. And the hei has a spelling-out. The spelling-out is the inner aspect of the hei, yes? Now, the hei can be written in three ways. You write the hei in its full spelling—that is, the word “hei.” How do you spell the word “hei”? You can write it with an alef, you can write it with a hei, or you can write it with a yud. Three possible spellings, and from these come three forms. How do you calculate the gematria? There are four forms of the name Havayah: 72, 63, 45 and 52. The entire gematria of the name Havayah depends on how you write

09:18 Speaker 1 The hei—whether you write it with an alef, a yud, or a hei. So according to this, that is the meaning of “Where is the place of His glory?” “Where is the place of His glory?” means that the alef, the yud, and the hei, which are the letters used to spell out the letter hei, are the “place of His glory.” In other words, that is where the inner dimension of malchus is found. The letters alef, yud, and hei are the inner dimension of malchus. That is the root of malchus. Malchus itself is the letter hei. But spelling it out with an alef, a yud, or a hei gives three forms of the inner dimension of malchus. Malchus is divided into three levels: keser, chochmah, and binah. The alef is keser, the yud is chochmah, and the hei is binah. So that is the meaning of “Where is the place of His glory?” In other words, where is the root, the inner dimension, of malchus? In the alef, which is keser; in the yud, which is chochmah; or in the hei, which is binah. Yes, that is the root of malchus. So the angels say, “Where is the place of His glory?” It is beyond them. In other words, they cannot grasp it. It is specifically to the souls of the Jewish people that the root is revealed. Only the outer dimension of malchus is revealed to the angels, whereas the souls reach its inner dimension, its root—“where.” And why do I say the souls? Because to the souls of the Jewish people, the aspect of “where” is also revealed; the inner dimension is revealed within them too. That is the meaning of “And His glory fills the whole earth.” Anyway, that is an aside; we will not go into it now. At any rate, what does he write here? That the angels do not grasp Hakadosh Boruch Hu. This is precisely why it is the souls of the Jewish people. For Hakadosh Boruch Hu set aside the upper and lower realms. Hakadosh Boruch Hu left them—“set aside” as though He left them. Hakadosh Boruch Hu left the upper and lower realms and chose none of them. Hakadosh Boruch Hu did not choose any of the worlds, upper or lower, but only Israel, His people. Hakadosh Boruch Hu chose only the Jewish people,

11:24 Speaker 1 who are Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s people. So this is the point we discussed earlier about the king: however great and exalted a king he may be, to whom does he descend? To the despised and lowly man. This refers to the Jewish people, who are in a state of being despised and lowly. “And He took them out of Egypt, the nakedness of the land.” Now the Alter Rebbe explains what it means to be lying in the refuse. In the analogy, where did we say the man was? In the first analogy, this despised and lowly man was filthy and lying in the refuse. So the Alter Rebbe explains here too what it means to be filthy and lying in the refuse. It refers to Egypt. “And He took them out of Egypt.” In other words, Hakadosh Boruch Hu did not choose the Jewish people when they were on a high level. He chose them when they were at their very lowest. Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s choice of the Jewish people was made when they were lying in the refuse. They were in Egypt, the nakedness of the land. “And He took them out of Egypt, the nakedness of the land, a place of filth and impurity.” Egypt was a place of filth and impurity. Not through an angel and not through a fiery angel; rather, Hakadosh Boruch Hu, in His glory and by Himself, descended there. Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself descended to Egypt, to that place. “As it is written, ‘And I descended to rescue him from their hands.’” From where do we learn that Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself descended? As we said earlier in the analogy, the king himself descends to the person in the refuse and takes him out of it. The same applies to Hakadosh Boruch Hu: He sent neither an angel nor a fiery angel. Rather, He Himself descended to Egypt, the nakedness of the land, and brought the Jewish people out of Egypt from there. The verse the Alter Rebbe cites is, “As it is written, ‘And I descended to rescue him from their hands.’” Now, someone asked the Rebbe a question about this. There was a Jew in Eretz Yisroel, in Jerusalem—he spoke only Yiddish—named Rabbi Avraham Ashkenazi. He was a Torah scholar and a great chossid. He was the grandfather of several of the Kohanim who are also

13:41 Speaker 1 here. Berl Bonga [unclear], who is here with his family, and several other fine Jews. At any rate, he was a Torah scholar and headed a kollel in Kfar Chabad. He was one of Rabbi Alter Genchovsky’s students. He himself did not come from a Chabad family; on the contrary, he came from a family of Litvaks. Be that as it may, he was among the chassidim, a chossid with tremendous respect for the Rebbe. So he asked the Rebbe this question. A simple question. He asked: The Alter Rebbe writes here in Tanya—what is the proof that Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself descended to Egypt, not through an angel or a fiery angel? “As it is written, ‘And I descended to rescue him.’” It says “I descended,” meaning that Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself descended. But, he asked, in the Pesach Haggadah we cite a different verse. What does the Pesach Haggadah say? “And I will pass through the land of Egypt”—not through an angel; “I,” and not an angel; “I,” and not a fiery angel; “I,” and not a messenger. And “Against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments”—I, and no other. That is learned from an entirely different verse: “And I will pass through the land of Egypt.” That verse is in Parshas Bo. By contrast, the verse the Alter Rebbe cites here in Tanya, “And I descended to rescue him,” is in Parshas Shemos. Why did the Alter Rebbe use a different verse? Why not the verse from the Haggadah? It is a straightforward question. So first, a student of the Rebbe did not quite understand the question. The Rebbe showed him that there is a verse cited in a Midrash that does indeed use this verse. It says that for the Jewish people, Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself descends, as it says, “And I descended to rescue him.” And he cites a Pesikta... there is such a wording. Yes, it appears in some Midrash. But the Rebbe clarified and said: Fine, that Midrash exists, but why would the Alter Rebbe look for some obscure Pesikta, as they say, for a far-off Midrash? Why not cite the

16:00 Speaker 1 Haggadah, which everyone knows from the Pesach Seder? Here the Rebbe gives a wonderful explanation that shows just how precise every detail is. The Rebbe explains to him that there is a very great difference between the verse “And I descended to rescue him” and the verse “And I will pass through the land of Egypt.” There are two reasons given for why Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself had to descend to Egypt, not through an angel or a fiery angel. One reason is what it says here in Tanya: because Hakadosh Boruch Hu loves us so much, His great love led Him to come Himself rather than send any messenger. Like the analogy of the king who himself descends to the man lying in the refuse, this demonstrates the greatness of His love. On the other hand, there is another explanation, as the Alter Rebbe explains in Likkutei Torah. In the passage about why Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself descended to Egypt, he writes that if an angel had descended, then because Egypt was a place of so much filth and impurity, the angel would have been burned up. Or, not burned up—it would have become coarse. Then the angel itself would not have been able to bring the Jewish people out of Egypt. The impurity of Egypt would have affected and tainted even the angel. To prevent the forces of impurity from drawing any sustenance from it, only Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself could descend to Egypt. No angel, no fiery angel. Something along the lines of the fallen angels, and so on. These are two different reasons. Therefore, the verse “And I will pass through the land of Egypt” speaks about striking them down. Hakadosh Boruch Hu is describing a blow against the impurity of Egypt. It is speaking about the plague of the firstborn, yes? So there the subject is how Hakadosh Boruch Hu battles the impurity of Egypt. It does not emphasize Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s love for the Jewish people. There one could understand that it is because of

17:52 Speaker 1 The reason, as we said, was the impurity of Egypt. Since this was the plague of the firstborn, the kelipah of Egypt had to be broken. To break the kelipah of Egypt, it could not be done by an angel or by a seraph. Only Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself could descend into such a place without, G-d forbid, allowing any spiritual sustenance to be drawn from it. That is the verse, “I will pass through the land of Egypt.” By contrast, the verse “I will descend to rescue him” comes when Hakadosh Boruch Hu sends Moshe Rabbeinu to explain to Pharaoh how much He loves the Jewish people. It is part of the mission He gives Moshe at the burning bush, when He speaks to him of “Israel, My firstborn son.” He tells him of His love for the Jewish people: they are “My firstborn son.” Then He says, “I will descend.” He sees the suffering of His people now, and “I will descend to rescue him.” Those verses express Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s affection and love for the Jewish people. Now, what is the purpose here in Tanya? The Rebbe wants to explain the idea of love: “As water reflects a face to a face.” That is why the relevant verse here is specifically “I will descend to rescue him,” the verse that expresses love, rather than “I will pass through the land of Egypt.” Here again we can see how every verse, every point, in Tanya is precise to the last detail. The Rebbe specifically brought this verse and not another. But what does the verse “I will descend to rescue him” tell us? Where is the allusion in “I will descend to rescue him”? There is a well-known idea brought in the sefarim in the name of the Ramban. Where does this verse emphasize that it was Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself, not through an angel or a seraph? That is the plain meaning: it says, “I will descend”—I Myself. Yes, but

19:40 Speaker 1 let’s understand it in greater detail. There is the well-known teaching brought in the sefarim in the name of the Ramban. The Maharal [unclear] does not bring it, and neither do several other teachers. It is said in the name of the Ramban: Why do most verses in the Torah always say, “And Hashem spoke to Moshe”? They are not written as though Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself were saying, “And I spoke to Moshe.”

20:12 Speaker 3 First person.

20:13 Speaker 1 Rather, it is a third-person speaker. It is not written as Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself speaking, nor does it say from Moshe’s perspective, “And Hashem spoke to me.” It is written as though a third party were telling us that Hashem spoke to Moshe. Who is that third party? The Ramban writes—and this is brought in the sefarim—that the third-person speaker is Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself, above the name Havayah, above Moshe, above all action, and above [unclear]. It is Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s very essence, above all these things, relating that Havayah speaks to Moshe. Those are the verses written in the third person. But sometimes verses are written in the first person: “I.” “I am Hashem”—in the first person, as in the verse he cites: “I am Hashem your G-d, Who brought you out of the land of Egypt.” The meaning there is that the third-person speaker Himself enters the account and says, “I.” I Myself—the concept of His very essence. And that is precisely what happens here when He says, “I will descend to rescue him.” “I will descend” means I Myself; it refers to His very essence. Of course, in its plain meaning, “I will descend” refers to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. But the allusion lies in the first-person “I will descend”: it is the third-person speaker, He Himself—not any revelation, not any name, nothing else, but He Himself. This is always carefully worded. In the Pesach maamarim, the Rebbe, as is well known, would repeat this whenever he mentioned it. You can see it clearly in the maamarim: whenever the Rebbe mentioned this expression from the Haggadah, “in His glory and by Himself”—the expression the Rebbe also uses, that Hakadosh Boruch Hu in His glory and by Himself descended there—the Rebbe would say that the Rebbe Rashab explains in a maamar, and in several places, the meaning of its two parts, “in His glory” and “by Himself.” “In His glory” refers to Malchus of Ein Sof before the tzimtzum. That is the meaning of glory: “There is no glory except for a king.”

22:17 Speaker 1 That is the aspect of the Shechinah, of Malchus. But which Malchus? We are speaking here of Malchus before the tzimtzum, Malchus of Ein Sof. And “by Himself”—what does that mean? “By Himself” refers to the concealed Tiferes, which is called “Himself.” This is the essence, His very essence: the concealed Tiferes before the tzimtzum. These are the loftiest levels. That is what is meant by “in His glory and by Himself”: the level of Malchus before the tzimtzum and the concealed Tiferes before the tzimtzum. That is what descended there. Specifically the level of Malchus before the tzimtzum descended to Egypt to rescue. To bring out whom? To draw a Jew close. To bring the Jewish people out of the land of slavery, out from under subjugation.