Likkutei Amarim Tanya, Chapter 27 - Part 7

00:01 We’re at the end of chapter 27, near the bottom of page 34. “This is what our Sages said.” The Alter Rebbe has explained at length here why a person should not feel any distress or worry over having thoughts of sin and improper desires during the day, while going about his ordinary affairs. He should see them as an opportunity Hakadosh Boruch Hu has given him to fulfill the mitzvah, “Do not stray after your hearts and after your eyes.” For a beinoni in particular, this is the main part of his avodah. The Alter Rebbe goes on to explain at length how much pleasure Hakadosh Boruch Hu derives each time a Jew practices iskafya with forbidden things. Then he speaks along the same lines about permissible things, which we’ll get to. Each time a person restrains himself, in either kind of matter, he thereby subdues the sitra achra. Through this, a higher level of holiness is drawn down Above, and it is also drawn down to the person here below. As the Alter Rebbe just concluded, through iskafya, besides accomplishing something special Above, a person also brings about something within himself here below: tremendous assistance in his avodah. The Alter Rebbe continues: “And this is also what our Sages said: ‘When a person sanctifies himself a little below, he is sanctified greatly from Above.’” The Alter Rebbe is saying that, based on what we’ve learned here, we can explain this teaching of our Sages. It’s just what we said: when a person practices iskafya even the tiniest bit—even with the smallest thing—he is sanctifying himself.

02:16 As the Alter Rebbe says, this applies to permissible things and so on. Through each and every act of iskafya, a higher level of holiness is drawn down, bringing tremendous assistance. So we see the meaning of what our Sages say: “When a person sanctifies himself a little below, he is sanctified greatly from Above.” The wording of the Gemara is: “He sanctifies himself a little; he is sanctified greatly. Below; he is sanctified from Above.” That is the Gemara’s wording, divided into two parts, two ideas. In fact, when learning this Gemara, the Maharsha understands it as two separate ideas. First, a person sanctifies himself a little. He begins to make himself holy in small ways, and he is then sanctified greatly: from Above, he is given the ability to sanctify himself much more. After he sanctifies himself greatly below, he is then sanctified from Above. It’s as if there are two stages. That’s how the Maharsha explains it. I don’t know exactly how to understand the Maharsha, but that’s what he says. The Alter Rebbe, both here and at the end of chapter 12 of Igeres Hateshuvah, understands it not as two separate ideas, but as one explaining the other. That’s why he quotes them together. The Gemara wants to explain just how incomparable the effect from Above is to what a person does. It’s far greater. Whatever a person does below, what he is given from Above is beyond comparison to it. Those are the two details: “A person sanctifies himself a little.” Compared with what I’m given, my action is little, and the little that I do is done below. A person is down here. How much can he really do? Living in this physical world, whatever I do will be little. But

04:16 “he is sanctified greatly”—yes? Hakadosh Boruch Hu sanctifies you greatly, and that “greatly” comes from Above. In other words, “from Above” explains “greatly.” Precisely because it comes from Above, it is so much greater than what you do. At the end of Igeres Hateshuvah, as is well known, the Alter Rebbe gives an analogy involving the sun. I think he quotes it in the name of the Ramban or something like that. We see down here how the sun moves. Sometimes you look at the sunlight coming through a window, at the shadow, and you see it moving slowly, then a little more. Every minute or every few minutes it moves another millimeter, another centimeter. It moves very slowly. But at that same time, the sun up above—the sun itself, as is well known, travels hundreds of thousands of kilometers every minute, I don’t know, enormous numbers. The sun moves at an incredible speed. So while up above the sun is moving very, very fast, covering hundreds of thousands of kilometers, down here we see only a small movement. That’s the analogy he gives: a person does a small act down here—“a person sanctifies himself a little below.” You do a small act of iskafya, a small act of avodah here below, and the response that comes from Above—the arousal from below bringing an arousal from Above—is beyond comparison. There is no proportion between them. That’s what he means here by “tremendous assistance in his avodah.” Chassidus explains the saying that a person gives a handful, and Hakadosh Boruch Hu gives two handfuls. A person gives Hakadosh Boruch Hu his maximum, and Hakadosh Boruch Hu gives him according to His maximum. It’s the same idea.

06:19 “With all your might” draws down the “might” Above, even though the two are beyond comparison. What does “with all your might” mean for me? A little extra. Instead of learning for half an hour, I learned for half an hour and a few more minutes. Instead of sitting at the table like that for— I stayed a few more minutes. I practiced iskafya; I did something small in quantity compared with the truly limitless level Above. But because, for this person, it counts as “with all your might”—he did more than he is accustomed to—it becomes the vessel that draws down the “might” Above. The “might” Above is the true “might”; it is truly without limit. That’s what Chassidus says regarding “with all your might.” Here we’re speaking about holiness, about a person sanctifying himself. Holiness, too, is beyond limit, so what comes from Above is beyond comparison. The Alter Rebbe continues: Until now we’ve spoken about iskafya and what it accomplishes through the act of restraint, through the distinct virtue of iskafya. Now there is another virtue. Besides everything we’ve discussed here, “he also fulfills a positive mitzvah of the Torah, ‘You shall sanctify yourselves,’ and so forth, since he sanctifies himself with what is permissible.” Beyond all the virtues we’ve discussed so far in this chapter—the virtue of turning away from evil and of iskafya—there is another point: a positive mitzvah. Every time a Jew sanctifies himself and practices iskafya, he fulfills the Torah’s positive mitzvah, “You shall sanctify yourselves,” and so forth, since he sanctifies himself with what is permissible. There is a verse in the Torah—we’ve just read these parshiyos in the last few days—“You shall sanctify yourselves.” That’s the verse the Alter Rebbe quotes here: “You shall sanctify yourselves and be holy.” “You shall sanctify yourselves and be holy.” It appears once in Parshas Shemini, toward the end of Parshas Shemini, and the same verse is also in Parshas Emor or Kedoshim. Kedoshim. “You shall sanctify yourselves and be holy, for I, Hashem, am holy.” I think that’s also something that

08:24 So it appears. The same wording appears twice, and it isn’t clear which “You shall sanctify yourselves” the Alter Rebbe is referring to here. On the one hand, the verse in Parshas Shemini would seem to be about eating. In Parshas Shemini, “You shall sanctify yourselves” follows the discussion of forbidden foods. The verses there say, “Do not make yourselves repugnant through any creeping creature that creeps, and do not defile yourselves with them, lest you become defiled by them.” Forbidden food dulls a person’s heart. The last verses of Parshas Shemini deal with eating, and that is where it says, “You shall sanctify yourselves.” So, seemingly, it makes sense that the Alter Rebbe meant that verse, which speaks about eating. That also includes the idea of “Sanctify yourself with what is permitted to you.” But there is another line of reasoning that suggests he specifically means the verse in Parshas Kedoshim. That is also what it sounds like in chapter 30, where the Alter Rebbe cites the verse in connection with the same subject and writes, “You shall be holy,” and “You shall sanctify yourselves.” He brings both verses. So it sounds as though he means “You shall sanctify yourselves” in Kedoshim, since he cites “You shall be holy” along with it. And the Ramban is really the basis for what the Alter Rebbe brings here—that the mitzvah of “You shall sanctify yourselves” means “Sanctify yourself with what is permitted to you.” It is a well-known Ramban in Parshas Kedoshim, on “You shall be holy, for I am holy.” The Ramban asks: What is the Torah telling us here? After everything we learned in Parshas Shemini, Tazria, Ki Seitzei, and Acharei—all those matters of holiness have already been discussed. What does Rashi say? That “You shall be holy” in Parshas Kedoshim means separation from forbidden relationships. Along similar lines, Rashi comments on “You shall sanctify yourselves” in Parshas Kedoshim. Rashi also says it means separation from forbidden relationships or idolatry; I don’t remember right now. Separation from idolatry. Hm? Forbidden relationships—that’s “You shall sanctify yourselves,” in any case. But no, no,

10:22 Rashi does not interpret it as “Sanctify yourself with what is permitted to you.” For Rashi, that simply isn’t the plain meaning. But the Ramban does. The Ramban disagrees with Rashi at length at the beginning of Parshas Kedoshim. So that raises the question of which verse teaches the mitzvah of “Sanctify yourself with what is permitted to you.” In the Rambam, there is no such positive mitzvah. In the Rambam’s count of the 613 mitzvos, there is no positive mitzvah of “You shall sanctify yourselves.” The Rambam does not include it among the positive mitzvos because he holds that it is a general command. A general command is not counted among the 613 mitzvos. That is the Rambam’s approach in his introduction: he does not include it, so “You shall sanctify yourselves” is not counted among the 613 mitzvos. But other early authorities do count it. The Rebbe cites them; it is in Kuntres Maayan. The Rebbe brings the view of the author of Halachos Gedolos, and Sefer Chareidim’s understanding of the Ramban. These are various early authorities and great Torah sages who counted the 613 mitzvos somewhat differently from the Rambam, including the Ramban. That does not necessarily mean the Alter Rebbe rules like them as a matter of halachah. More generally, in Tanya the Alter Rebbe sometimes uses the expression “a positive mitzvah of the Torah” about certain things, and that does not necessarily mean he holds that way in halachah. Sometimes things are stated in Chassidus in a way that is not the halachic ruling. For example, in Tanya the Alter Rebbe writes about prayer, at the end of Likkutei Amarim, that it is rabbinic. In Shulchan Aruch, the Alter Rebbe rules that prayer is rabbinic. There is no contradiction. There are several things like that. In any case, as far as this is concerned, quite a number of the great early authorities and great Torah sages consider it a positive mitzvah of the Torah. So when a Jew practices iskafya, the Alter Rebbe says that, besides fulfilling the positive mitzvah of the Torah, “You shall sanctify yourselves,”

12:15 “You shall sanctify yourselves,” and so on—sanctifying himself a little below. The Alter Rebbe goes on to explain what “You shall sanctify yourselves” means, adding an explanation that relates to everything we have learned in this chapter. What have we learned? That there are two kinds of pleasure for Hashem: pleasure from iskafya and pleasure from ishapcha. They are two kinds of pleasure. So the Alter Rebbe adds something here. It is not just an interpretation of the verse; it relates to the whole chapter. The verse says, “You shall sanctify yourselves and you shall be holy.” The Alter Rebbe wants to show that this verse is speaking specifically about a beinoni, not a tzaddik—a person who has desires. That is what the Alter Rebbe explains. “You shall sanctify yourselves” means: Make yourselves holy. From this verse, we understand that it is not speaking about tzaddikim. It is speaking specifically about beinonim. The person discussed here in chapter 27 has desires, so it is fitting to tell him, “You shall sanctify yourselves.” The wording implies that he is not inherently holy. You would not say “You shall sanctify yourselves” to a tzaddik. A tzaddik is already holy—holy in his very being. He has already become holy. Holiness has already permeated his entire being. “You shall sanctify yourselves,” as an action, can only be said of a beinoni who needs to work on himself: “Make yourselves holy.” That is, although in truth he is not holy and separate from the sitra achra, he has not yet reached the level of being inherently holy and separate from it. Because—sorry—because it remains in its full strength and might, as it was from birth, in the left chamber of his heart. The sitra achra is still present within him in full force, as the Alter Rebbe said earlier. He merely subdues his inclination and sanctifies himself. That is the meaning of sanctifying himself a little below. He has a desire, a wish, an inclination. So what does he do? He compels himself, subdues his inclination, and acts against his appetite, against what he wants. That is “You shall sanctify yourselves.”

14:21 So we understand that this mitzvah can be fulfilled only when a person is on the level of a beinoni. That is “You shall sanctify yourselves.” Then the Alter Rebbe concludes with the second part, which is also a very significant new point in relation to everything we have learned in this chapter. How does the verse continue? It says, “You shall sanctify yourselves,” and then, “You shall be holy.” What does that add? Here the Alter Rebbe says something new: “You shall be holy” means that, in the end, he will truly become holy and separate from the sitra achra. The Torah promises that if a person works on himself in the manner of “You shall sanctify yourselves”—though he is not yet holy, has desires and a yetzer hara, and needs to fight; though he is making himself holy through iskafya—the Torah promises, “You shall be holy.” Ultimately, through this work, he will truly become holy and separate. Simply put, that means he will reach the level of a tzaddik, the level of ishapcha: he will truly be holy and separate from the sitra achra. This happens “through their sanctifying him greatly from above and helping him gradually expel it from his heart.” This is the explanation of what we said earlier: “When a person sanctifies himself a little below, they sanctify him greatly from above.” According to what the Alter Rebbe says here at the end of the chapter, what does it mean that “they sanctify him greatly from above”? It means they give him the ability, through this work of iskafya—“You shall sanctify yourselves”—to reach even the level of a tzaddik. Through it, he will also reach the level of ishapcha. That is precisely what “they sanctify him greatly from above” means: they help the person, through repeated acts of iskafya, to reach the level of ishapcha as well, “gradually expelling it from his heart,” until, little by little, he is completely rid of the yetzer hara. So the Alter Rebbe has, how shall we put it, good news at the end of the chapter: through a great deal of work

16:18 Through iskafya, a person will ultimately reach ishapcha, the level of a tzaddik. But what he writes now seems to contradict what he said on the previous page. Earlier, the Alter Rebbe said that perhaps this is what a person was created for, and that his service throughout his life is to wage this battle. A person can practice iskafya his entire life and never finish. Yet here the Alter Rebbe concludes that through extensive work in iskafya, he will eventually reach the level of being truly holy and set apart. How do those two things fit together? It seems like a contradiction. The Rebbe asks this in the maamar Basi Legani 5727. The Rebbe discusses this passage in Tanya and writes that it does not mean the person becomes a tzaddik. That is not its meaning. “And gradually drive it from his heart” means that in the particular matters he has worked on, he reaches a state of ishapcha. But there will always be other matters in which he needs to struggle. In other words, when we learned earlier that “his service throughout his life is in this battle,” we might have thought it meant battling the same desires, the same wants, the same issues. No. Through extensive work in iskafya, he receives help from Above to reach a state of ishapcha. The particular thing he has worked on for a long time becomes utterly out of the question for him. That is the meaning of “and you shall be holy.” But the Alter Rebbe does not mean that he becomes a tzaddik in every respect. He means that through extensive work on those particular matters, he reaches that level in those matters. So he has both virtues: the virtue of iskafya and that of “you shall be holy”—becoming holy and set apart. But since, in essence, he is a beinoni, there will always be other things he needs to struggle with. So—

18:20 He has both virtues. There will be certain things in which he reaches that level, while he remains a beinoni and still has work to do in iskafya. In the maamar Basi Legani, the Rebbe says that this is the idea of “when the sitra achra is subdued,” and so on. He explains it at length there, but it is relevant simply to the meaning of Tanya: that is what the Alter Rebbe meant here. So we have learned chapter 27. Throughout the chapter, the Alter Rebbe explains the tremendous virtue of iskafya and what it accomplishes, and we told a few stories. Since we are learning this chapter, it is especially relevant to talk about this. We see in the chapter, in the maamarim, and in Basi Legani that iskafya is a great and precious form of service. From everything we learned here, we understand how great and lofty iskafya is. So what about the practice of iskafya today? There is a whole discussion about how it should be done. Some people make the mistake of thinking that today, in our generation, we do not need iskafya. The Rebbe rejected that several times. And the Rebbe’s maamar explains at such length the great virtue of iskafya. So how could one say that? At the same time, the Rebbe’s teachings include guidance about “you shall surely help him,” and so on. How does iskafya work in our generation? There were, as is well known, several yechidus meetings about this with Reb Nissan Nemanov. He was a chossid who found it very difficult to come to terms with our generation and this whole question of iskafya. Reb Nissan had a yechidus with the Rebbe. For Reb Nissan, iskafya burned in his bones—the kind of iskafya practiced

20:42 in the time of the Rebbe Rashab, when people spoke about iskafya and actually practiced it, very intensely and rigorously. When he was in yechidus with the Rebbe, the Rebbe told him that today one must be very careful about this. The Rebbe explained that ours is a weak generation. People do not have the strength, and if they practice iskafya in ways that affect the body, they become weak and then do not do what they need to do. One must not make that the main thing. On the contrary, today we need to make sure people are healthy so they can learn, daven, and serve Hashem. The Rebbe told him that, G-d forbid, this does not mean there should be no iskafya, but that iskafya should not harm one’s physical health. In fact, none of the examples the Alter Rebbe gives here in chapter 27 involve iskafya that affects physical health—not even the example of delaying one’s meal. [unclear] There is nothing like that here. In maamarim of other Rebbeim, and later among Chabad chassidim, we find people actually practicing and speaking about iskafya in much more rigorous terms. The Rebbe Rashab speaks in very strong language; Chassidus sometimes uses strong language. But the Rebbe said that in our generation we must be very careful about this, and he gave Reb Nissan guidance. There are several accounts of their yechidus meetings and how it all unfolded. There are also several letters in Igros Kodesh, particularly in volume 12, in which the Rebbe gives fundamental, very practical guidance. In one of them, the Rebbe relates a story about the Rebbe Maharash. A chossid came to the Rebbe Maharash and asked how to repair his soul. He had been scheming and had various flaws in his character traits. The Rebbe Maharash told him to undertake six hundred fasts. The chossid was alarmed: six hundred fasts! The Rebbe Maharash told him, “I do not mean

23:06 fasting from food.” [unclear] The fast was to be with his mouth: restraining himself from speaking, a fast from speech. He told him to reflect on himself for fifteen minutes every day. The story says that when the same chossid returned two years later, the Rebbe Rashab looked at him and did not recognize him. That is how completely he had changed. The Rebbe cites this account of the Rebbe Maharash several times as an example that iskafya need not be about eating. Today, iskafya should primarily be in speech, in the faculties of the soul, in the soul’s garments. The Rebbe writes several times in his letters about guarding the senses—that is, guarding against bad thoughts. Iskafya in those areas; iskafya in speech, in saying Tehillim, [unclear]. And the Rebbe writes something very interesting several times in Igros Kodesh: today, iskafya means learning for several hours without interruption. That is the iskafya the Rebbe speaks of. In other words, sitting at your desk when you want to get up and see what is going on, check the news, or look at something else—and instead learning for several hours without interruption—that is iskafya. So it is not that iskafya is absent today; rather, there are particular areas in which we should practice it. Now, of course, there must also be iskafya in eating. We should not make the mistake of thinking that today we can eat whatever we want. But the practice today is to eat what you are given, without adding all kinds of seasonings and turning it into delicacies. At the same time, you need to eat healthily. You need to keep to regular mealtimes. That is what the Rebbe means: do not play games with mealtimes or sleeping hours. Of course, one must protect one’s physical health. But within that, there are desires and indulgences—things one does not need,

25:17 So with those things, there certainly has to be iskafya. And as we see here in Tanya, the greatness and wonder of every single act of iskafya is immense; it reaches all the revelations of the Infinite. Reb Shlomo Chaim had a saying—and since this is a time when we need the Geulah, we need a saying connected with Moshiach. His fiftieth yahrzeit was just this week. He would say: It is written, “I thank You, Hashem, for You were angry with me; Your anger will turn away, and You will comfort me.” This appears in the prophecy of the Geulah, the reading for Acharon Shel Pesach. Reb Shlomo Chaim explained that this verse is talking about iskafya. When Moshiach comes, we will see how much G-dly revelation and how much reward there is for every act of iskafya. Then we will thank Hakadosh Boruch Hu for the desires He gave us. “I thank You, Hashem, for You were angry with me”—for all the times You gave me desires that enabled me to practice iskafya. “Your anger will turn away”—Reb Shlomo Chaim would say that we will ask Hakadosh Boruch Hu for just one more opportunity to do another tiny bit of iskafya—“and You will comfort me.” We will appreciate so deeply how much we lost by not practicing iskafya during the time of exile. We will say: Give us just one more opportunity. But Reb Shlomo Chaim says: That’s it; it will already be “Your anger will turn away.” The shop will be closed. What you did not do in this world, you will no longer be able to make up. So we have to appreciate the time of exile now: you still have an opportunity to do one more act of iskafya. Later, that will be worth fifty thousand euros.