Tanya Chapter 32 - Part 7

00:00 We’re at the end of chapter 32, on page 41b, at the line beginning... “And also”—no, the line beginning with the word “And also.” So what is the Alter Rebbe saying here? In the second part of chapter 32, the Alter Rebbe says that there is a particular situation in which we say there must be ha—ah, hatred. That’s what is meant by “it is a mitzvah to hate him,” right? “If you see the donkey of someone you hate.” “Someone you hate” means that sometimes the Torah says there is a person one must hate. What situation is it talking about? As the Alter Rebbe explained, it’s a very, very, very specific situation: a person who is your peer in Torah and mitzvos, to whom the mitzvah “You shall surely rebuke your fellow” applies—someone who is with you in Torah and mitzvos. He is on your level in Torah and mitzvos, you have rebuked him, and nevertheless he has not turned away from his sin. In certain, very specific situations like that, there is a mitzvah to hate him—in order to hate the evil, and so on, as we explained in the previous classes. But if he is not on that level, he is not your peer, he is not even close to you, and so on—if all those conditions are not present—then, on the contrary, there must be love. Through love, you should bring him closer, as Hillel said: “Love your fellow creatures and bring them close to the Torah.” Then the Alter Rebbe added another point, a second point: Even with those whom the Torah says one must hate, because they are close to you and all the conditions for hatred do apply, it does not mean hating the person. It means hating the evil within him. But the person himself, his soul, the spark within him, must be loved. There is no contradiction between the two. There must be love because of the good within him and hatred because of the evil within him, as we discussed at length in the previous class. Because every

02:09 person is made up of two souls. Two souls means two lives, two people, two distinct essences, two things present within him. There is the vital soul, connected with the animal soul, and that is where the evil lies. From there, it can happen that even though a person is your peer in Torah and mitzvos, the evil has taken hold of him so strongly that he does not do teshuvah. In that case, there is a mitzvah to hate the evil within him. But at the same time, that same Jew also has a Divine spark. The Divine spark is G-dliness, and G-dliness must be loved. As we learned at the beginning of the chapter, I love a Jew because he is literally a part of G-d above; our souls share a common root. So there are both elements: love because of the good and hatred because of the evil. Now the Alter Rebbe adds a third point, going even deeper into this whole matter. Beyond saying that there is no contradiction between loving a Jew’s soul, the good within him, and at the same time hating the evil within him, the Alter Rebbe continues: “And also to arouse compassion in his heart for it.” There is something else the Alter Rebbe asks of a person. This is someone who is your peer; you have rebuked him and tried to awaken goodness and teshuvah in him, but you see that he is not doing teshuvah, and because of that you must hate him. Yet you are also asked to arouse compassion for him. In other words, until now the Alter Rebbe has spoken about hatred because of the evil within him and love because of the good within him—loving his soul. But there is a third element: the attribute of compassion. These are the three attributes: Avraham,

04:03 Yitzchak, Yaakov; chessed, gevurah, and tiferes; love, awe, and compassion. The love I have for a Jew’s soul is what he meant when he said there must be love for the spark, for the Divine good within him. Hatred of the evil is connected with the attribute of gevurah; sometimes hatred is required. But alongside that there is a third thing: arousing great compassion. In the Alter Rebbe’s words, “And also to arouse compassion in his heart for it.” A person must arouse the attribute of compassion, to have compassion for it. What does “it” refer to? The soul; the word is feminine. Yes, it refers to the soul: to arouse compassion for the soul, for the soul that has fallen into evil. “For it is in a state of exile within the evil of the sitra achra, which overpowers it in the wicked.” The Divine soul is in a state of exile within the evil of the kelipah, which overpowers it in the wicked. The evil has gained strength, and that is why the person is in the state he is in, under the sway of evil. Why? Because the soul is in exile within the evil of the sitra achra, and therefore you have compassion for him. You have compassion for the soul that has fallen among the kelipos. “And compassion nullifies hatred and awakens love.” Once I arouse compassion, I feel compassion for this Jew. I feel compassion for his soul, which has fallen down into the kelipos. Then compassion nullifies hatred. We can plainly see this in everyday life. You cannot hate someone you feel compassion for. You can really see it in day-to-day life. Sometimes, for example, someone among your friends may treat you badly. He treats you badly, gets in your way, causes you pain, does all sorts of things to you, and you get upset with him. You’re angry; you,

06:08 you feel that you hate him because of how he treated you. But the moment you change your thinking, so to speak, you pause and begin to understand why this person acts that way. You discover that he has troubles, he has problems, he is suffering from something else, he has difficulties, problems in his family, problems at home. Now you see him as someone who is struggling, and you feel compassion for him. If you feel compassion for him, you can no longer hate him. The moment I realize that this person is really someone to have compassion for, that compassion nullifies the hatred. And it does not only nullify the hatred; it awakens love. You want to love him, help him, lend him a hand, pull him out of the mess he is in. That is what the Alter Rebbe is saying here as well. The first stage is Ahavas Yisroel: I must love every Jew as myself because he is literally a part of G-d above. This is the essential love we discussed at the beginning of the chapter. After that comes an exceptionally specific situation, with all the conditions the Alter Rebbe gave—that he is your peer in Torah and mitzvos, with all the details. Only then, after all the rebuke and all the efforts to help, do we say there is a mitzvah to hate him. The mitzvah is to hate that person because of the evil within him. And then we say that at the same time there must also be love: love the good within him and hate the evil within him. After that comes a third thing: compassion. Compassion is the attribute of tiferes. We know that Chassidus always speaks about the attribute of tiferes. And by Divine Providence, we are right now in the days of tiferes. So the attribute of tiferes

08:03 is the middle path. The attribute of tiferes is balance; that is why it is called tiferes, a word associated with beauty, because it contains both attributes. Why? What we are learning here makes it easy to understand. To have compassion for a person, I need to see both sides. I need to see his soul, the spark within him, and recognize that he is a Jew. And what is a Jew? A part of G-d above, and all that. I love that. But I also see the evil within him, how he has fallen among the kelipos and into all sorts of things that are not good. Compassion arises from seeing both of those things together. Now there is compassion. If I see only the part of G-d above within him, there is no compassion. I see only his virtues, only good. Compassion does not apply then; that is love. If I see only the mud, only the evil, that causes hatred. “You who love Hashem, hate evil”—the opposite response. Compassion is the combination of the two. We see this in Tanya as well, in today’s Chitas. In chapter 45, the Alter Rebbe puts it in these words. So what does the Alter Rebbe say there? He speaks about a form of avodah in which love is connected with the attribute of compassion. In chapter 45, he is talking about love awakened through compassion. The Alter Rebbe says to contemplate—what was his wording there, and what further explanation is needed?—“the spark of G-dliness that gives life to the Divine soul, which descends from the Source of life, from the blessed Ein Sof, Who fills all worlds and encompasses all worlds, before Whom everything is considered as nothing, and becomes clothed in the skin of the serpent, utterly distant from the light of the King’s countenance.” The two extremes. If you think only about the soul’s virtues, that will not yet awaken compassion. It will awaken love, chessed. If you contemplate only

09:57 If all you see is that he is at the very lowest point, that also won’t do it. An awakening of compassion comes from bringing together two lines, two movements, two perspectives. On the one hand, you contemplate how exalted the soul is. The more you contemplate the soul’s greatness—and that is why the Alter Rebbe goes on at length, speaking of the Life of life, of the Infinite One, blessed be He, and of all the worlds. You contemplate the soul’s greatness, how it is rooted in the greatness of Havayah, in the highest place. Then you contemplate the other extreme: how the soul descended below and is now in a place of utter physicality, in a physical body, and so on—all these matters of the lowest levels of the kelipos and physicality. The two movements together awaken compassion. And, by the way, that is also what the Alter Rebbe says here. After a person awakens hatred for the evil within the other person, together with love for the good within him, the third quality comes as well, joining those two things together: compassion. Here is a person in a terribly difficult state. A soul so lofty, an actual part of G-d above—where is he? He is caught up in evil; look at the way he is behaving. Bringing those two things together awakens compassion. And once compassion is awakened, how can you hate him? It cancels the hatred. So the hatred lasts only a very short time. Hatred of the evil applies only as long as compassion has not been awakened. Once this contemplation has brought you to feel compassion for the person, hatred is no longer possible. What remains is compassion, and compassion awakens love. By its nature, if I have compassion for him, I love him. I will treat him as the Alter Rebbe says in Igeres Hakodesh: the quality of tiferes combines two lines, though it leans toward chessed. You can see it in practice,

11:45 yes, you have compassion for him. As [unclear] always puts it with a parable: on the one hand, his behavior does not merit it, yet that is the idea of tiferes—not acting on chessed alone. You have to treat him with compassion, to love him and draw him close even though he does not deserve it. In any case, that is the point the Alter Rebbe makes here: once compassion for him is awakened within you, you can no longer hate him. The Rebbe says that this is the meaning of the verse, “To Jacob, who redeemed Abraham.” It is said of Jacob. What does the verse say about Jacob? It is a verse in Tanach, in Isaiah, I believe: “Thus says Hashem to the house of Jacob.” What does the verse mean? On the simple level, the Midrash asks: Where do we find that Jacob redeemed Abraham? Historically, there is no account in Tanach of Jacob redeeming Abraham. So the Midrash says that when Avraham Avinu was in Babylonia and in danger, when they put him into the fire, the angels began to plead for him and seek to arouse compassion. Pleading on Avraham’s own merit was not enough. Pleading on Yitzchak’s merit was not enough. But when they invoked Yaakov’s merit, Avraham was saved from the fiery furnace. That is what the Midrash says, and that is the plain meaning of “To Jacob, who redeemed Abraham”: in the merit of Yaakov Avinu, Avraham Avinu was saved from the fiery furnace. Okay, it is a beautiful Midrash. But what does the Rebbe bring out in Chassidus? That is what the Alter Rebbe says here. Yaakov represents compassion; Avraham represents chessed, the quality of love. Every Jew has the quality of love. But sometimes that love is in exile, and it needs to be redeemed—the exile of the Shechinah, the exile of love. My love for Hakadosh Boruch Hu is in exile. Awakening compassion, then, awakens love. What does that mean? In chapter 45, the Alter Rebbe

13:45 speaks about love of Hashem. Sometimes my love of Hashem is in exile. I do not feel love for Hakadosh Boruch Hu because of all the materialism, coarseness, self-importance, and other undesirable things. I become mired in all of that, and my love for Hakadosh Boruch Hu does not reveal itself. By awakening compassion—and this is chapter 45 of Tanya—love can be brought about through compassion. When you awaken great compassion for the soul that has fallen among the kelipos, that awakening of great compassion will awaken love within you. This is “Jacob, who redeemed Abraham”: you come to love Hashem. Here the Alter Rebbe uses the same approach to arrive at Ahavas Yisroel. It is the same with Ahavas Yisroel. Ahavas Yisroel is in exile because there is a mitzvah to hate this person, and that mitzvah conceals the mitzvah to love him. I find it hard to love him because of the evil within him. But once compassion is awakened, compassion redeems the love. Compassion reveals the... Once there is compassion, you cannot hate. So it turns from hatred into love. That is the meaning of “Jacob, who redeemed Abraham”: compassion cancels hatred and awakens love. I once heard from—no, how did I hear this story? Reb Shlomo Bruk came to Cincinnati, and the Rebbe asked him to test the bochurim. So they told him that Melech Tzvi [unclear] was there at the time, I believe, in Cincinnati. I don’t remember; maybe I’m mixing things up. They told him about a particular bochur who knew Tanya by heart. No, no—they told him about a bochur who knew Samech Vov by heart. I think it was Melech Tzvi [unclear]. He knew Samech Vov by heart. So Reb Shlomo came to test him. He came and said, “I’ll test you on all of Samech Vov.” Then Reb Shlomo

15:53 said to him, “Before I test you on Samech Vov, I’ll first test you on Tanya. First I’ll see whether you know Tanya, and then we’ll test you on Samech Vov. All right?” So Reb Shlomo asked him how many times the words “Jacob, who redeemed Abraham” appear in Tanya. That was the question he asked him. The bochur gave a number, and Reb Shlomo told him he was wrong. No, he gave a number lower than the actual number. I don’t want you to give me the test now. In any case, he did not give the exact number. So Reb Pshil [unclear] said to him, “You don’t know Tanya, and you want us to test you on Samech Vov? First learn Tanya, and then I’ll...” That was the end of the test. Just a story, with a hint that also relates to the subject. Another story, about the Breslover chassidim, brings us to what the Alter Rebbe says here about awakening compassion for him. Chassidim relate that Reb Nachman of Breslov once came to the Alter Rebbe. He came because he wanted to know what Chabad Chassidus was. So the Alter Rebbe spoke Chassidus to him. Some say he spoke for hours; there are all sorts of versions of the story. I don’t want to give a number, because I think the story may be exaggerated, but in any case, the Alter Rebbe spoke Chassidus with him for several hours. Everyone writes six hours. Somehow, the Alter Rebbe spoke Chassidus with him for many hours. At the end, the Alter Rebbe concluded the maamar, the subject he had been discussing with him. The Alter Rebbe said, “Your mercies are many, Hashem.” It is a verse in Tehillim, right? Psalm 119. “Your mercies are many, Hashem.” The Alter Rebbe said: It means there is great compassion for Hakadosh Boruch Hu. “Your mercies are many, Hashem”—the Alter Rebbe rendered it: “There is great compassion for You, Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Such great compassion for You—”

17:52 That is great compassion for Hakadosh Boruch Hu. That is not the plain meaning, of course. The plain meaning is the opposite: “Your mercies are many, Hashem” means that Hakadosh Boruch Hu has abundant mercy. But the Alter Rebbe interpreted it the other way around: there is great compassion to be had for Hakadosh Boruch Hu. So they say that Reb Nachman said the whole journey had been worth it. He had also been to [unclear][?] to hear this vort, and he was moved by it. What is the deeper meaning of this vort? In our context, it explains what it means to love a Jew. “Your mercies are many, Hashem” means having compassion for Hakadosh Boruch Hu, who is present within a Jew. In other words, according to Chassidus, according to the Baal Shem Tov, Ahavas Yisroel means loving a Jew even when he acts contrary to the purpose, contrary to Hashem’s will, and is far from Torah and mitzvos. What the Baal Shem Tov revealed is that you should love a Jew even when he is in a lowly state. Why? Because once you understand what is here—a G-dly spark, a part of G-dliness in exile—you understand what it means when a Jew sins, when a Jew transgresses the Torah and its mitzvos: a part of G-dliness is in exile. So “Your mercies are many, Hashem” means great compassion for Hakadosh Boruch Hu, because a spark of His, a part of Him, is in a state of exile. How, then, can you hate that Jew? On the contrary, it arouses great love for him, and through that you can lift him out of his present state. The Alter Rebbe continues: “And King David, peace be upon him, did not say, ‘I hate them with the utmost hatred,’ and so on…” Here a question arises. After everything we have said so far, hatred seems to have been reduced to the absolute minimum. After all the conditions and explanations, there is almost no room left for hatred. So how does that fit with the verse in Tehillim where King David says, “I hate them with the utmost

19:49 hatred”? That sounds like the opposite. The phrase “the utmost hatred” means hatred in its fullest force, contrary to everything we have explained so far. How do they fit together? The Alter Rebbe answers: “King David did not say, ‘I hate them with the utmost hatred,’ and so on, except about the heretics and deniers who have no share in the G-d of Israel, as stated in the Gemara at the beginning of chapter 16 of Shabbos.” You know the Gemara, right? The Gemara there says that when King David said, “I hate them with the utmost hatred,” he was speaking about heretics and deniers. There can be such a situation with a Jew, yes? Heretics and deniers are not simply unlearned people. The Rebbe once shared a vort from the Frierdiker Rebbe. The Frierdiker Rebbe was in prison. Now, the Frierdiker Rebbe conducted himself in prison without accepting their restrictions. They imposed many prohibitions on him, and he was never intimidated by them. They tell that while he was in prison, the Frierdiker Rebbe said he wanted to tell a story. They told him, “We don’t tell stories here,” and became angry with him. The Frierdiker Rebbe told them, “When I tell a story, even the opponents listen to me.” And then he began telling the story. Yes, this was when he was in prison. What story did he begin to tell? “Once, a heretic came to the Tzemach Tzedek.” That was how he began: a heretic came to the Tzemach Tzedek and asked him a question. As he began the story, there was a Jew there who, may Hashem have mercy, had fallen into the forces of impurity and was the one conducting the proceedings against the Frierdiker Rebbe. That Jew said, “A heretic like me, I suppose.” That is what he said. The Frierdiker Rebbe answered him, “No. Eating sunflower seeds doesn’t make you a heretic. To be a heretic, you have to know how to learn.” That was the vort. The Rebbe repeated it, yes. A heretic is not someone who knows nothing, an unlearned person who shouts that he does not believe. That is not a heretic, and that is not who we are talking about here. Such a person

21:41 needs compassion, not hatred. When we speak of heretics and deniers, we mean people who really do know and do learn, who come from a place of knowledge and yet nevertheless, whether out of defiance or for their own gratification, go against Hakadosh Boruch Hu. So in the case of heretics and deniers who have no share in the G-d of Israel, we say, “I hate them with the utmost hatred,” as stated in the Gemara in chapter 16 of Shabbos. The Rebbe has lengthy explanations of this passage and sets out a number of conditions. Why did the Alter Rebbe need to write all these details? He mentions King David—what is he telling us through all this wording and by citing the Gemara in Shabbos? The Alter Rebbe wants to emphasize that even what is written here does not apply to just anyone. In short, it means that in our times, first of all, there are no heretics in this sense. Even a person who shouts that he is a heretic is, as we said, unlearned; he does not know. Today, they are all like children taken captive. That is the situation of Jews today, even Jews who speak this way: they are like children taken captive. It all comes from a lack of knowledge; it all comes from an entirely different background. So this does not apply. On the other hand, even if we suppose that someone really is a heretic, to hate him you would have to be King David. King David was a completely righteous person, and for him, hatred in its fullest sense could be possible: “I hate them with the utmost hatred.” But an ordinary person, who is not King David, must first examine himself: does this hatred truly come from the right place, or does it come from anger? Perhaps you are simply being zealous, as the Rebbe discussed many times. Zealotry—is it the zealotry of Pinchas, or is it zealotry born of anger? “Pinchas, son of Elazar, son of Aharon the Kohen”—

23:29 the Torah attests that his zeal came from a place of love. He was the son of Elazar, son of Aharon the Kohen, who was entirely kindness, entirely love. So Pinchas’s zeal was true zeal. But that was Pinchas. If a person has even the slightest doubt—doubt upon doubt—that perhaps his zeal comes from anger, then he must not hate. That is another condition the Alter Rebbe is conveying here, showing how thoroughly hatred must be ruled out. This is the foundation of chapter 32: the Alter Rebbe explains how deeply we must have genuine Ahavas Yisroel for every single Jew. Sometimes compassion is also needed to awaken that love. It must be true love, an essential love, for every kind of Jew. And it is specifically through love that we can bring him close. [unclear]