A Living Thing

00:00 No, someone might imagine that even if you live it, you live it only in connection with the beautiful names and [unclear]. And it can be in the body, too. A person really wants to live it intensely, but that’s not... But [unclear] with chassidim, with chassidim. Someone might imagine: You do the things the Rebbe says, study Chitas, study Rambam, study [unclear], really. But if it isn’t connected to you, it isn’t connected to [unclear]. I understand that this isn’t a course in understanding deep topics in Gemara, no. But you live it, and you have to study halachah; not study for eight hours, [unclear] study for an hour, and still you study Gemara, yes. But [unclear] know only halachah, and still study only dry legal rulings. But that has to come from doing [unclear], which is in-depth study [unclear], but this matter, these matters. [unclear] of a bochur—that this is his picture of things, that this is the central point of his whole life. So, but the point is... The point is not to be disconnected from it. But it is clothed in nature, [unclear]. The Rebbe says [unclear]. But the point, the point is in practice. But [unclear], what the Rebbe... I know that I cannot know the reason for it. The Rebbe [unclear] Likkutei Torah every week. I can [unclear] what we study, the...

01:58 [unclear] the Frierdiker Rebbe [unclear], the Rebbe [unclear]. But a person has to be [unclear]. So he studies, [unclear] studies guidance, the Rebbe [unclear]. But you have to know: You must [unclear] in Gemara; you must study this section every week. I don’t know; there’s a lot of reason behind it. I cannot know why at precisely this time. But fine, it’s simple. There’s a month, [unclear], when people already go wild on the first day. That’s not [unclear]. But what comes after davening is a continuation of davening. Nature is a continuation of the miracle; that’s the... Not to break the world and [unclear] nature itself, [unclear]. Nature is a continuation of what came before. A continuation of what came before: the miracle, nature, [unclear] world. And I tell the story of Reb Shilem, who, while he was in Lubavitch, week after week in Lubavitch, lived with chassidishkeit. He was a great mashgiach in Lubavitch, a mashgiach in Lubavitch. But simply [unclear], and [unclear] already [unclear]. And they tell about that—the Rebbe [unclear] a great deal of curiosity about it. It becomes clothed in the world, not like in Lubavitch, where every week they went wild with torn sacks and torn... [unclear]. But [unclear], simple clothes, ordinary clothes—there weren’t any. There were sacks [unclear], torn clothes. He says that when he came to Lubavitch, he couldn’t come [unclear], he...

03:55 Came to Lubavitch with his [unclear]. Everyone [unclear], they go [unclear]. But there has to be a spirit of Chassidus... It becomes clothed in nature, yes, fine. But it’s a continuation of...

00:00 [unclear]. So that was when he was in yeshiva. So I’ll say: But let it be a big one. Very good, all right. [unclear]. There’s no difference between the time when you’re in yeshiva and the time when you’re no longer in yeshiva. And this is what the Rebbe... [unclear] remember the good days. [unclear]. It isn’t spelled out exactly what that means. The idea is to remember the time we spent in yeshiva, and we take that with us for the rest of our lives. As I say, for a bochur, that’s the beginning. It’s not just that you don’t do one thing here and don’t do another thing there; this is the advice itself, something that touches the soul. What is he, what is a Jew? But if things are good here, and he can’t work on himself, what does he do? During the period when he was [unclear], that was the first year, there was a time in yeshiva when he no longer had straightforward, structured studies. [unclear] so that he could learn after his secular studies. After that, he needs to be in yeshiva, and it’s possible to arrange a fixed schedule for secular studies. And—

01:41 Then [unclear] came in. But during those periods, a person has to study secular subjects for four hours, at any rate. There has to be [unclear], there has to be Tishrei, there has to be [unclear]. Ah, all right, that’s how it was; that was the situation here. But for the moment, it must be said, he now knows that he simply has to keep studying Torah subjects. And [unclear]. But during those periods, if a person has to study secular subjects for four hours, he also has to study Torah subjects for four hours. When a person... So the Jew—Tomchei Temimim continues from generation to generation. But when you leave Tomchei Temimim, it isn’t just a period in a person’s life. But [unclear], we need to go back to that same booklet.