0725 - Preparation Has a Stronger Effect Part 1 - Preparing for a Farbrengen

00:01 It says in Chassidus that the hachonet of a mitzvah, when you prepare yourself to do a mitzvah, has a greater effect on the person than doing the mitzvah itself. Certainly, doing the mitzvah is the most important part. If you prepare yourself and you don't do the mitzvah, it's worthless. But if you prepare yourself and do the mitzvah, then the effect on the person is more than doing the mitzvah. Because if you do the mitzvah, it's a one-time act, and you do it and you finish with it. But if you prepare yourself and you're ready for it and you wait for it and you think about it, and then finally you get to the time of the mitzvah, that has a greater effect on the person. So I want to say, where was it felt? It was felt when people went to a farbrengen, a farbrengen of the Rebbe. There are things that people did as preparation for the farbrengen. There are things that people did for preparation for yechidus. That's a different story. But even for a regular farbrengen, you would prepare yourself. You would light. If it was a weekly farbrengen, you would specially put on a sertug, put on a gartel. Bochrim would also then dress the bigdei Shabbos. Okay, Shabbos, you anyway wear a sertug and gartel and bochrim wear bigdei Shabbos. But a weekly farbrengen, you would specially do that. Many people would go to the mikveh a second time, even though they went to the mikveh in the morning. They

01:17 would go to the mikveh a second time, closer to the farbrengen, to go specially for the farbrengen. Like Friday, a lot of people go Friday morning as they do every day to the mikveh. But before Shabbos, you go again as a preparation for Shabbos. So they would do it for the farbrengen. Certainly, if you went to sleep in the afternoon, and many times, knowing that there was a farbrengen in the evening, people would go to sleep during the day to make sure you are rested for the farbrengen. Part of the sleeping was part of the hachonet of farbrengen. Know that you're rested, that you're able to concentrate and listen to the farbrengen. So you'd go to the mikveh again. So this was all part of the feeling that you had as a hachonet of farbrengen. So when you came to the farbrengen and you're standing there waiting for the Rebbe to come in, and then the Rebbe walked in, you felt the kedusha. You would feel the kedusha anyway, even if you didn't make the hachonets, but not the same. Because you thought about it before and you prepared yourself with all the different things that you did, that made the person feel that you are in Gan Eden. When the Rebbe walked in, whether he started talking or said l'chaim or whatever it was, you were in a different world. You felt in a different world. But a lot of it is thanks to the hachonets that you made. Because in Chassidus it says

02:33 the hachonet has a greater effect on the person. Just like it says the opposite, the negative part. If you make a hachonet to an aveirah, it's even worse. They tell a story of Rebbe Yisrael Ben Dichevet that once he came to a place and he saw on the person there that he did a terrible aveirah. And he said to him, how did you do such an aveirah? So he said, Rebbe, don't worry. She counted seven days, etc., etc. She did all the other things. And the Ben Dichevet screamed, what? You prepared yourself seven days for an aveirah? You know what that means? If you do an aveirah because it's a horah gata better of you, it's one thing. But you prepared yourself? That has a greater effect, a worse effect on you than the aveirah itself. And on the good side, it's even more. When you prepare yourself for something good, then it has a good effect on you. So preparing for the farbrengen was a way that the person was a keila to be influenced and affected by what the Rebbe would say.