Ears to Hear 3 | Beis Rabbeinu in Babylonia - Part II

00:00 Speaker 1 “And Hashem gave you a heart to know, eyes to see, and ears to hear.”

00:08 Speaker 2 Ears to Hear. Audio programs for the Temimim from the World ATA.

00:14 Speaker 3 I’m listening to this sicha, and I see that all these things are written there—actually written there. It’s a sicha by the Rebbe himself. It’s not that one person did this and someone else wrote that. The Rebbe writes everything, everything. Things you couldn’t have dreamed would be written are written there. It was simply the Rebbe. The Rebbe was revealing himself; the Rebbe revealed himself here.

00:41 Speaker 2 Shalom aleichem to all the Temimim in Tomchei Temimim Lubavitch yeshivos throughout the Holy Land and the world. We are now beginning a special edition of Ears to Hear, a program steeped in a strong bond with the Rebbe, Melech HaMoshiach shlita, and with his central mission: to bring us to Moshiach, our redeemer. This time, our program focuses on the kuntres Beis Rabbeinu ShebeBavel. In the previous program, we studied, explored, and delved into the depth and essence of this special kuntres, released on 28 Cheshvan 5752. In this program, we’ll hear remarkable things about the kuntres itself, its publication, and the excitement and stir it caused throughout the world. The unique character of Beis Rabbeinu ShebeBavel was already described in the publication Hatamim: Lubavitch is our Jerusalem, and the house where our Rebbe davens is our Beis Hamikdash. The passage tells of a son asking his father why there is such great joy in Lubavitch when chassidim come to the Rebbe. As he puts it, “After all, the Beis Hamikdash has been destroyed, and wild creatures dance where the Holy of Holies once stood.” His father answers, “You are right, my son, you are right. Yet from the day the Beis Hamikdash was destroyed until Hashem, blessed be He, has mercy and sends us the righteous redeemer, Lubavitch is our Jerusalem. The shul where the Rebbe davens is our Beis Hamikdash; the room where the Rebbe sits is our Holy of Holies; and the Rebbe is our Ark, containing the tablets of Hashem’s Torah.” This description in Hatamim already conveys what makes Beis Rabbeinu ShebeBavel so special. In the kuntres before us, the Rebbe takes “our Jerusalem” and “our Beis Hamikdash”—once understood only as an expression of the chassidim’s feelings—and shows that this place belongs to all the Jewish people, to every Jew, wherever they may be. It is the place where the Shechinah rests during exile, the place from which the Geulah will begin. In order

02:48 Speaker 2 to study the kuntres, understand what was new about it, and learn what was happening behind the scenes when it came out, we’ll now speak and farbreng with Rabbi Menachem Mendel Friedman, rabbi of the Chabad community in Hadar Ganim, Petach Tikva, about the kuntres’s special significance. We now begin the program with Rabbi Friedman. Shalom aleichem, Rabbi Friedman.

03:12 Speaker 3 Aleichem shalom.

03:13 Speaker 2 Well, baruch Hashem, we’re here for this special edition of Ears to Hear about the kuntres Beis Rabbeinu ShebeBavel, which came out on 28 Cheshvan 5752 and caused such a stir. First, I’d be interested to hear how you experienced its publication—where you were coming from, how much it affected you, whether anything in particular shifted for you. I’d be interested to hear about your personal experience first.

03:38 Speaker 3 When this kuntres came out, I was still a little kid, not yet twelve. I was learning in the mesivta in Kiryat Gat, and I remember that you could buy the new booklet of the Rebbe’s sicha at the yeshiva gedolah. I don’t remember if it cost one shekel or two, but I bought it. I sat on my bed in the dorm, leafing through it and reading. Suddenly I saw the Rebbe saying these things so plainly. I mean, the most extraordinary things imaginable were simply written there: the Nasi of our generation, the Moshiach of the generation, 770, Beis Moshiach. I remember feeling tremendously excited. It was just—it was everything I had always known. That was what I knew from home: I knew the Rebbe is Moshiach.

04:47 Speaker 4 We were always taught that, even before 5751 and 5752.

04:49 Speaker 3 Always. I mean, I didn’t divide it into two categories, two roles held by different people. The Rebbe is Moshiach. It was the most obvious thing, but I had never seen it in a sicha by the Rebbe. And suddenly I saw it in writing. That was a special excitement. I remember looking at it, thrilled, and saying, “It’s written here. It says it explicitly. The Rebbe is talking about it.” It really felt like the end of days—as though a time had arrived when the Rebbe was saying what you had always wanted him to say, and there it was in writing. I remember seeing a letter my grandfather wrote to the Rebbe in the mid-1950s. In his pan, he didn’t yet address the Rebbe in writing as “the Rebbe, Melech HaMoshiach”; he wrote “the Rebbe shlita.” But in the letter itself he wrote, “I want the Rebbe shlita to reveal himself to me as he himself truly is.” When you read that, you understand what he wanted. He wanted everything out in the open, everything revealed. Everything there is to reveal about the Rebbe—he wanted it all revealed. It was simply understood that the Rebbe is Moshiach, and we were waiting for that to become revealed. Then, suddenly, you look and you see: he’s revealing himself. Right there, in the Rebbe’s sicha. It isn’t some secret passed by word of mouth that people talk about. I also remember a farbrengen of Anash in Tzfas in the summer of 5751. It was in someone’s home, and I happened to be there. I remember people talking about how some were saying the Rebbe was Moshiach, and all sorts of discussion about it.

06:55 Speaker 3 It was something new, something that caused great excitement. People didn’t know exactly how the Rebbe... They had received answers; there had been responses. But apart from that private farbrengen, I hadn’t heard people talk about it like that. And suddenly I’m sitting there, holding this sicha, and I see all these things written—actually written. A sicha by the Rebbe himself. It’s not that one person did this and someone else wrote that. The Rebbe writes everything. Everything you couldn’t have dreamed would be written is written there. It was simply the Rebbe revealing himself; the Rebbe revealed himself here. It was a truly special excitement.

07:41 Speaker 4 As you read the whole kuntres, what was the main point that captivated you?

07:47 Speaker 3 Look, I—

07:47 Speaker 4 Maybe it was the illustration, or...

07:49 Speaker 3 At the age I was when I read it, I wasn’t exactly following its entire structure and content. It was the words. The words the Rebbe was saying: the Nasi of the generation, the redeemer, Moshiach, who redeems the Jewish people in his generation; his house, 770, Beis Moshiach. It was just incredible. It was—

08:13 Speaker 4 Looking at the kuntres today—looking at it now—what makes it unique to you? What is it about this special kuntres that moves you?

08:22 Speaker 3 First of all, I don’t know why we need to look back. We need to look ahead. Look, this kuntres doesn’t need our interpretations. It needs to be studied. The Rebbe simply establishes and sets out this entire subject of Beis Rabbeinu, of 770, grounding it in nigleh, the revealed dimension of Torah. There are defined parameters: the principal Beis Hamikdash Me’at of the time of exile, the Nasi of the generation who resides there, and how its special status continues into the Geulah. The unfolding of the Geulah will begin there, too. It’s like many things the Rebbe established—many Chabad and Chassidic matters that the Rebbe explained and grounded in nigleh. Whether it was the custom regarding the third Shabbos meal or sleeping in the sukkah, the Rebbe explained and developed them through nigleh. Here, too, it seems the Rebbe took this concept of Beis Rabbeinu ShebeBavel and established it. But perhaps there’s a difference from the things I mentioned earlier: those were Chabad customs. Here, people knew about it, and there were expressions of it, too, as the Rebbe quotes in one of the footnotes.

10:07 Speaker 4 Footnote seventy-four.

10:08 Speaker 3 Yes.

10:09 Speaker 4 From Hatamim.

10:10 Speaker 3 He quotes Hatamim saying that Lubavitch is our Jerusalem, and so on.

10:16 Speaker 4 But that was a feeling.

10:17 Speaker 3 Yes. And let’s say that there probably weren’t words in nigleh for that feeling either—

10:26 Speaker 4 Words from nigleh.

10:26 Speaker 3 It wasn’t in those words—there was that expression. Apparently, throughout all the generations, chassidim knew that nothing could compare to being in the Rebbe’s presence. That was clear and obvious. As it says in the letter quoted in Hayom Yom for 30 Shvat, chassidim regarded the day they arrived in Lubavitch as their birthday. In other words, they didn’t wait for someone to tell them it was their birthday. Chassidim knew. Chassidim knew that this was Gan Eden HaElyon, and so on. But here the Rebbe establishes this idea, really builds it: there is a Beis Hamikdash, and it continues even during exile. That is what the Prophets say, and what the Gemara says. It exists in every generation. And what are the reasons for this? What gives it such an exalted status? There are also novel points that, seemingly, did not exist even in previous generations—entirely new ideas.

11:29 Speaker 4 Who was “the house of our teacher in Babylonia”?

11:30 Speaker 3 Yes.

11:30 Speaker 4 There wasn’t a “Rabbeinu.”

11:31 Speaker 3 Yes, but these new ideas—for example, that when the Geulah comes, it will begin at Beis Rabbeinu—that is a remarkable new point. And what’s interesting here is that the Rebbe builds the case for it in the kuntres. The Shechinah returns with them: just as, when they go into exile, Hakadosh Boruch Hu goes with them, so too He will return with them. So it follows that the Geulah will begin from the last place where the Shechinah was. The Rebbe builds this with proofs, along the lines of the Sanhedrin returning to the last place to which they were exiled, and proceeding from there. Interestingly, in the sicha that is one of the sources for this kuntres, as noted at the end of the kuntres—28 Sivan [unclear], 5751—the Rebbe speaks of this as something the leader of our generation can demand and bring about: that the Geulah should come specifically from this place. That implies a particular demand and action on the part of the leader of our generation. And surely that is so. It may be that this is the very mode of action. As the Rebbe once explained, Moshiach’s first defining characteristic is [unclear]. The first sign, before his actions, defines who he himself is. And his first action is [unclear], because everything Moshiach does is through [unclear]. We can see it plainly: all the Rebbe’s campaigns, all the Rebbe’s initiatives, are part of an explanation of Rashi or the Rambam or—everything is part of delivering a discourse in Chassidus and Nigleh, and so on. Moshiach’s contribution encompasses everything. And perhaps this is the action itself, the action the Rebbe speaks about on 28 Sivan [unclear]: that the leader of our generation can act, demand and bring it about. The mode of action is simply to establish it on this basis, and thereby bring it about. It simply becomes—

13:43 Speaker 5 What the Rebbe said on 28 Sivan [unclear]—the idea that the leader of our generation demands that the Geulah begin here—the Rebbe then constructed a full, well-founded case for it in Nigleh, in the form of a kuntres. That is the demand of the leader of our generation brought down into the language of Nigleh.

13:57 Speaker 3 Yes. That is how the demand is carried out: now it is simply established as such. It is part of... It belongs not only to the approach of prayer, or request and demand; it is also an answer, an explanation grounded in Torah.

14:12 Speaker 5 What is so significant about bringing things down into Nigleh? I mean, the Rebbe brings everything down to that level. As we were saying in the sukkah and at seudah shlishis, these ideas could have remained in the realm of—just as the Rebbe mentioned on 28 Sivan [unclear].

14:25 Speaker 3 I’ll tell you: there’s a sicha of the Rebbe, if I’m not mistaken from 5742, perhaps Parshas Chukas-Balak, where the Rebbe dwells on a Rashi that says, “I do not know its interpretation.” Rashi writes that about something whose interpretation he does not know. The Rebbe asks: how does Rashi know that it actually has an interpretation according to pshat? If there is a matter whose interpretation he—the foremost commentator on pshat—doesn’t know, perhaps it is meant to be explained through the Torah’s other approaches: remez, drush or sod. Who says that when Rashi says, “I do not know its interpretation,” he is telling us there must be a pshat interpretation, only he does not know it? The Rebbe discusses how it certainly does have an interpretation according to pshat as well. It’s an interesting subject, because there are places where the Rebbe says that some things truly can be explained only according to sod. Hakadosh Boruch Hu left certain matters that way so that we would sense that the Torah is beyond intellect; their explanation is only according to the inner dimension of Torah. Perhaps even there the intention is that there is also some explanation on the revealed level, some explanation that reaches pshat. But I don’t want to reconcile those points now; I’m not taking responsibility for that. The point is that the Torah also has—and above all has—pshat. The greatest depth is found precisely in pshat. As the Rebbe explains, the essence of Torah is revealed specifically in Rashi’s explanation of the plain meaning of the verse. The more straightforward it is, the more it can contain the most essential matters. There is another sicha in which the Rebbe explains that even compared with the Ramban—who was also a commentator on pshat—Rashi is different. In the Ramban, there are still matters founded on

16:24 Speaker 3 Kabbalah, on the inner dimension of Torah. That is why the deepest matters, concerning a dwelling [unclear], are reflected specifically in Rashi’s pshat. The five-year-old beginning to learn Scripture—the child who does not know how to ask—it is precisely in young children, in whose mouths Hashem’s name is familiar, that the essence shines forth, specifically in their understanding.

16:48 Speaker 6 That, essentially, is what’s new about the kuntres.

16:50 Speaker 3 What?

16:50 Speaker 6 So that was what made it special.

16:52 Speaker 3 I’m offering this as a possibility. Your question is really a general one about the Rebbe explaining things and establishing them in halachah, in Nigleh, in pshat. There is something to this. One could say that with the Rebbe, even the deepest matters, matters at the very heart of faith, are often approached, so to speak, with a simplicity that allows them to be explained to a five-year-old beginning to learn Scripture. In other words, if that five-year-old has a question about something, and the question calls for an explanation, that explanation becomes the straightforward interpretation. You don’t tell the child, “Well, when you grow up you’ll understand. This isn’t for you, little one. Wait a while—you’ve jumped into a very lofty subject.” No. The five-year-old’s understanding becomes the yardstick for determining whether this really is the plain and true interpretation. That is a truly remarkable innovation. It is part of bringing the Shechinah down to earth: these matters don’t remain in the heavens, not even in the lowest heaven. They come down to earth, all the way into straightforward human understanding, into the Torah’s Nigleh and practical halachah.

18:16 Speaker 6 Perhaps this is also a new element in the whole subject of Moshiach, especially in the sichos of 5751. In them, the Rebbe mentioned several times the idea that the entire Geulah of Moshiach is at hand and that all the necessary preparations have already been completed. Then suddenly there is a kuntres in which the Rebbe grounds the subject in the foundations of the Midrashim and the Zohar. It is an entire work built on a firm foundation from the Gemara and from fundamental Torah sources. On that basis, the Rebbe establishes that Moshiach’s coming [unclear]—that the Geulah will begin here. In other words, the whole matter of the Geulah of Moshiach is built here on a more explicitly Torah-based foundation, and in that way it comes further down into the world.

18:49 Speaker 3 So, if I understand what you’re saying, the Rebbe’s explanations follow the idea the Rebbe often cites: “He has made everything beautiful in its time”—Hashem made everything fitting for its time. You’re saying that these explanations, and both the possibility and the need to bring them down to the level of Nigleh, correspond to the fact that, in the world itself, a time is arriving when these matters are beginning to become relevant in practice. In other words, if Moshiach is already having an effect on the nations, and there is something of a beginning of the fulfillment of the promise—

19:26 Speaker 6 —of his words.

19:27 Speaker 3 Yes, the sicha on Mishpatim is an example. So it becomes something like this: If a question arises because of the times, the first thing is to answer that question. If we do need to answer it, that means we have been given the ability to do so—to rule on a matter that is relevant right now. So when the time for a particular matter arrives, that becomes its plain meaning. Along these lines, we can also mention the interpretation the Rebbe gives here in the kuntres of the remarkable allusion in the Rambam’s wording, “builds the Beis Hamikdash in its place.” There are two allusions in the Rambam’s wording. Here it refers to Moshiach’s place at the time of the Geulah. It is an extraordinary interpretation. There is a letter the Rebbe issued in 5728, I think. It is printed at the end of volume 8 of Likkutei Sichos, and there the Rebbe examines the Rambam’s wording in the laws concerning the signs of Moshiach. The Rebbe offers two interpretations of “in its place.” Here the Rebbe refers to one of them. There is another interpretation there too, but in this kuntres the Rebbe suddenly reveals a surprising interpretation, entirely connected, of course, to the kuntres’s overall new point. And you can see that it is connected to the time, because this interpretation—that “Moshiach builds the Beis Hamikdash in its place” refers to Moshiach’s place—came after [unclear] at 770, which the Rebbe pointed out. In other words, reality in the world makes it possible for these things to be revealed and to have an effect within Torah. Apparently it works from both directions: revealing these things in Torah brings them about in the world, and through

21:55 Speaker 3 that, their revelation in Torah also becomes possible, because this is now what the moment calls for. Specifically regarding the Rambam and the interpretation of his words, there is a sicha of the Rebbe’s, I think from Vayigash 5746. I’m putting this in my own words, not precisely, but this is the general principle as I understood it. The Rebbe says that there are certain special books, such as the Rambam’s work, that are comprehensive works. They lie, so to speak, along the central axis of Torah, in such a way that every genuine new insight revealed over the generations has to be found in the Rambam. I would call it a [unclear] book, a living book. That is, the book updates whenever there is a new insight. If the insight is genuine, you ultimately find it there. And it may truly be revealed only then. As is known, the Tumim says that ruach hakodesh was bestowed upon authors, and with their human intellect they could not have anticipated all the insights that would be found in their works. But those insights are there by design. And when the time comes, specifically in 5752, then what does “builds the Beis Hamikdash

23:22 Speaker 7 in its place” mean?

23:23 Speaker 3 “Builds the Beis Hamikdash in its place.” It means Moshiach’s place at the time of the Geulah. The fact is that the Beis Hamikdash is there, and Moshiach built it. So that becomes the holy place. The allusion to this begins to emerge, like something that had been hinted at and concealed and then

23:41 Speaker 7 came to be revealed.

23:42 Speaker 3 Came to be revealed, yes.

23:43 Speaker 7 Why does this happen specifically in 5752? Couldn’t it have happened in 5751?

23:46 Speaker 3 What is special about those years is explained in many sichos. In 5752, we are already at Friday morning, or Friday afternoon—after midday—or, according to one interpretation, already past the last quarter of the day. In other words, we have reached a time when Shabbos is really drawing near, with all the signs and everything that entails. So you can see why these things happen then. There is the expression that “Melech HaMoshiach is revealed and comes”; this comes after the year in which “Melech HaMoshiach is revealed and comes.” So the time itself calls for it.

24:35 Speaker 8 What is interesting to see in the kuntres is how all the virtues build from section one to section two to section three. Throughout the kuntres, the Rebbe builds up the virtues of Beis Rabbeinu. Why is it so important for me to know now about the virtues of Beis Rabbeinu at the time of the Geulah? When the Geulah comes, we’ll know. There will be the Beis Hamikdash, and Beis Rabbeinu will be situated in Bavel, and everyone will know. Why is it important for me to know the virtues of Beis Rabbeinu during galus and tell others about them?

24:58 Speaker 3 Well, first of all, I don’t entirely connect with the question, because I’m studying a kuntres of the Rebbe’s. The Rebbe is teaching me what he is teaching me right now, so I need to learn it, live with it, and teach it to others too. You could ask the same question about why we study the teachings on Geulah at all, and all the explanations in the Shulchan Aruch and about the inner dimension of the Geulah. Let’s wait; we’re here, and with Hashem’s help we’ll live to see it all. But we need to live with the Geulah. And particularly here—it’s interesting that one of the kuntres’s sources is also a sicha on Parshas Pinchas. Pinchas differs from many sichos in which the Rebbe constantly emphasizes that in just another moment we will be in the Geulah. In Pinchas, the Rebbe, so to speak, captures the moment before the Geulah and speaks specifically about it: how we need to live this moment so that the Geulah will be as it should, because it has to be the true and complete Geulah. So we need to live it. And because the Geulah is an inner reality, it has to be present within us, completely—in thought, speech, and action, and so on, as explained there at length. So perhaps the very fact that, in this kuntres too, the Rebbe goes right into the chronology of events and begins with Beis Rabbeinu’s virtues during galus is significant. It’s as though, when we write the résumé of Beis Rabbeinu in Bavel now, we say: Listen, first you should know that there was once a great Beis Hamikdash in Jerusalem. You should know that the Mikdash traveled and settled there. You want to know what Beis Rabbeinu in Bavel is? Read about the Beis Hamikdash that existed, and from that you’ll begin to appreciate what you have. Then the Rebbe gradually moves on from those earlier places where the Mikdash traveled and settled, and suddenly it turns out

27:12 Speaker 3 that this is actually the future Beis Hamikdash. It is the very site of the future Beis Hamikdash, as the Rebbe quotes from the Maharsha. In other words, you look at this building now, and it is the very site of the future Beis Hamikdash. The Maharsha’s point matters now: you should know that Beis Rabbeinu in Bavel is the very site of the future Beis Hamikdash. He is speaking to you about the future. And the Rebbe also takes hold of the moment of Geulah itself and tells you that the Geulah will begin here too. Seemingly, I have the past, and I also know that in the future it will be connected to the Beis Hamikdash, and that all the shuls will be connected to the Beis Hamikdash through Beis Rabbeinu in Bavel. Why do you need to capture this particular moment? Why is it urgent?

27:58 Speaker 8 The moment when the Geulah arrives.

27:59 Speaker 3 Yes. You see that it cannot be otherwise, and that it matters. You see that this is what the Nasi of our generation demands: that there be no interruption in between. Throughout galus, the Nasi of our generation maintains the preparation for the Geulah, the efforts on its behalf, and the anticipation of it. There won’t be a single moment when the connection is, so to speak, broken and we say, “All right, we’ll meet in Jerusalem.” It’s not like saying, “Hold on, I’m in an elevator talking to you on the phone; if we get disconnected, I’ll call you right back.” There is no such thing—no interruption, even at the very moment of Geulah. So [unclear] must be there too, at the height of its glory. It receives and hosts the Third Beis Hamikdash. Now, to your question: you and I are both waiting for the Third Beis Hamikdash to be revealed right now. We know it will be revealed at 770. You ask me what practical difference it makes—why do we need to know? This entire sicha is here so that we won’t miss that moment of Geulah. We should also know that throughout all the generations the Mikdash traveled and settled there. But you see that the Rebbe devotes a whole stage of this sicha, of this kuntres, to establishing that at the very moment of Geulah, the Shechinah returns together with its last location. Perhaps the root of this is also in the sicha on Parshas Pinchas, concerning [unclear].

29:40 Speaker 9 So that’s the greatest practical difference.

29:41 Speaker 3 Certainly.

29:42 Speaker 9 To be present at—

29:43 Speaker 3 Yes, yes.

29:43 Speaker 9 If you tell a Jew that he can be there at the moment the Geulah arrives, in the place where the Geulah will begin, he’ll do it without any problem.

29:49 Speaker 3 Yes, exactly.

29:51 Speaker 9 The first question is: When I’m in 770, with all due respect to the special kuntres and its special words, how can I feel, there in 770, that Moshiach is coming at any moment, any second? After all, we’re talking about students who spend an entire month with the Rebbe, an entire year with the Rebbe, or more. How can you feel that?

30:09 Speaker 3 When you understand something, then you can talk about feeling it. Wisdom gives life. The fullest understanding, the fullest sense of life in something, comes when you understand it thoroughly. Simply contemplate and study this kuntres properly. Don’t think—no, it doesn’t start with feelings. You can’t approach it under pressure to feel something: “I have to feel it. The taxi’s already honking; I have to feel it.” It doesn’t work that way. In fact, this morning I studied a maamar in which the Rebbe discusses how wisdom itself is in the category of the living, while the power within wisdom to produce new insights is called the vegetative aspect of the living. It’s an outgrowth of the intellect, [unclear]; it isn’t the intellect itself. When you’re preoccupied with producing insights, that isn’t wisdom itself. Wisdom itself is the very attachment to the subject, so that the subject itself shines forth. That is, quite simply, the Chabad approach. As it says, if you engage only with the intellectual aspect and want to draw emotions from it, that happens by necessity. The intellectual aspect compels emotions to arise. But the inwardness of the matter, the inwardness of the intellect—Pnimiyus Abba, Pnimiyus Atik—works through delight, as the Rebbe explains.

31:47 Speaker 9 An inherent revelation of grace.

31:49 Speaker 3 Yes. In the maamar on Chanukah, [unclear] [?], it explains that the delight of Pnimiyus Atik is above will. Will activates all the faculties, but it rules and governs them. Delight activates all the faculties, but they act of their own accord. In other words, they don’t feel that someone is activating them and that they’re being forced to fulfill some obligation. Rather, it becomes their own source of life.

32:20 Speaker 9 How does that apply to Beis Rabbeinu?

32:21 Speaker 3 Good. With anything you want to know, feel, and live with, you have to be completely immersed in the matter itself: understand it and live with it. Live with Moshiach; live with the Geulah. And when you’re in the place itself, the Rebbe’s place, that has to be on the highest possible level.

32:44 Speaker 9 So this isn’t just about a reminder from the kuntres on Beis Rabbeinu. Any sicha about Moshiach reminds you of Moshiach, as opposed to “Moshiach is revealed here” and something sensational. Generally, the main reminder is simply to engage in matters of Moshiach, but this is...

32:57 Speaker 3 Certainly, certainly. Of course.

32:59 Speaker 9 Now that we’ve understood what is special about the kuntres, Rabbi Friedman, a final thought to close this special edition of Ears to Hear about the kuntres.

33:07 Speaker 3 Perhaps we’ll end with the opening. The foreword to this kuntres is dated 28 Nissan 5751. On that same day, the recording was also released of the sicha from Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu’s visit to the Rebbe two weeks earlier. There were very powerful words there about Moshiach. The Rebbe went so far as to say that all the work had already been completed, all the appointed times had passed, and the only thing remaining was the arrival of Moshiach Tzidkeinu. The Rebbe then said that not only was the Geulah destined to come, but it was already standing at the threshold, waiting for each and every Jew to open the door and pull the Geulah into the room. Everyone has etched in their minds the motion the Rebbe made. There’s a video of the Rebbe making that pulling motion and saying, “Into our room.” So when you think about the fact that the kuntres Beis Rabbeinu Sheb’Bavel was released that same day, and that there the Rebbe explains what Beis Rabbeinu Sheb’Bavel is and what its role is—or, as people say today, what its place is, with an emphasis here on an actual, physical place—what is its place at the time of the Geulah? Time and place come together: at the time of the Geulah, it also becomes the place of the Geulah. Then those words, “pull the Geulah into the room,” into our room, take on a very, very special meaning. It means pulling the Geulah into our room quite literally.

34:57 Speaker 9 Sensational.

34:58 Speaker 3 Yes, this place where the Rebbe is. May Hashem help us see it this very moment, with the Rebbe revealing himself and redeeming us.

35:07 Speaker 9 Amen. Yasher koach, Rabbi Friedman, for these special words. May these words surely have their effect, and may everyone act, with Hashem’s help, so that we won’t have to travel to the Rebbe or come to the Rebbe or pull the Geulah into the room.

35:16 Speaker 3 We’ll always travel to the Rebbe—then it will be at the Third Beis Hamikdash.

35:20 Speaker 9 Amen. A tremendous yasher koach. Yechi Hamelech.

35:25 Speaker 10 Ears to Hear. Audio programs for the Temimim from Es”h Olami. For more programs, dial star 6358. Long live our master, teacher, and Rebbe, King Moshiach, forever and ever.