Transcript
Good morning, Boker tov, welcome back to 10 minutes of meaning, 10 minutes of Tanya. As always, we remain grateful to our dear beloved sponsors, our series sponsors Michael and Marilyn Fedak, not only for 10 minutes of meaning, so much more generosity in our community. Thank you Marilyn and Michael. Please help yourself to slushies, soup, coffee, pastries at our Rav Shaila corner cafe at the Boca Raton Synagogue. And today we will finish the fifth perek of Tanya. We're making our way through, not teaching Tanya, but learning Tanya together out loud. I'm not qualified to teach it. I'm barely qualified to learn it out loud together with you, but since none of you volunteered, I'm doing my best. So we're on the third section of this fifth chapter, the fifth perek of Tanya. The these last four prakim have been dealing with the definition of the godly soul, the חלק אלוקה ממעל ממש. We talked about every one of us is endowed with an animal soul, a base soul, an instinct, a drive. We have so much in common with animals. And we're not trying to destroy or purge or slaughter the animal soul, we're trying to train the animal. The best animal is not a dead animal, the best animal is a trained animal, that the trained animal is in your service. So the animal in us, if we can train it to be of service to us, and meaning through us to Hashem, that's the ultimate best use of the animal soul. That's what we'll pick up with in perek vav in chapter six when we continue next week. But for now, we're finishing perek hey, which is the godly soul. We've been understanding the different ten sfiros, the ruach, nefesh, and neshama. We've been talking about the three levels, the five levels, the ten levels. We're talking about the levush, the garments of the soul, dibur, machshava, and maaseh, speech, thought, and action. And lastly, we were talking about how mitzvos represent the garment. And a garment's important. A garment is how we identify, a garment protects us from the elements, a garment is the uniform that we wear, but in the end of the day, the garment is not us. The garment is what we're wearing. As opposed to Torah. Torah is like mazon. Torah is like lechem. Torah is like mayim. Torah is food and water. Food and water, we eat and drink, we absorb, and a moment on the lips, a lifetime on the hips. What you eat becomes you. It's not like the garment that you wear, you put on and then you take off. The food and the beverage that we eat and drink, it becomes who we are. We, our body expands based on or or decreases based on what we eat and what we drink. So it is part of the essence of who we are. So while mitzvos that we do are the levush, they're the garment that we wear, we connect to Hashem through them, but we're still separate distinct beings, Him and us. Torah, we absorb, we eat, it becomes one with us, is fully integrated in us, and therefore, it is the highest level, the highest yichud with which we connect to Hashem. The Baal HaTanya wrote, the highest yichud with which we connect to Hashem is a mishna, a gemara, or a halacha. Also farbreng, also study a sicha, also learn a chasiddishe Torah, also sing, also do avodah, all important. But the highest yichud writes the Alter Rebbe in the fifth perek of Tanya, the highest yichud is a mishna, a gemara, a halacha. This is where we left off last week. וזהו שכתוב תורתך בתוך מעי. That's the pasuk in Tehillim. Dovid HaMelech says your Torah is b'soch mei'ai, it's in my kishkes. Now the simple understanding, we've seen many chidushim in this perek of Tanya. The simple understanding of Torah is in my kishkes means, it's in my kishkes like I was raised on it, I love learning it, it's who I want to be, it's in my kishkes. It's in my kishkes. But the Alter Rebbe says that's not what it means. Sorascha b'soch mei'ai doesn't just mean learning Torah is in my kishkes, it means when I learn Torah, the Torah is in my kishkes. It means I eat the Torah, I drink the Torah, I absorb the Torah, the Torah becomes the essence of who I am. That brings us up to the third and final section of perek hey of Tanya. כמו שכתוב בעץ חיים שער מ\"ד. As it says in Eitz Chaim, as it says in Eitz Chaim, לבושי הנשמות בגן עדן הן המצוות, והתורה היא המזון לנשמה שעוסקים בעולם הזה בתורה לשמה. One day, hopefully after 120, our soul will be extracted from our body and we'll all go up on high. And in the olam ha'emes, in that olam haba, in that world to come, in that world of truth, there'll be complete revelation. Hashem will be utterly and entirely revealed. There'll be no barriers to seeing, to feeling, to knowing Him. There'll be no free will because Hashem Himself, His presence will be undeniable. So in that moment and at that time, all we'll want, all we'll crave is to come close to this revealed essence of the Ribono Shel Olam in that olam ha'emes. So in that world of truth, the mitzvos that we do during our lifetime, they're the garments of the soul in the afterlife. The Torah that we study in our lifetime, lishmah, that's the food for your soul in the afterlife. Now, why do I need garments in the afterlife? Is it like Florida? Is it like New York? What's the weather? Do I need a winter coat? Am I short sleeves? What am I wearing in the world? world to come? Why is the Baal HaTanya describing that in the in the world to come, in the afterlife, in Gan Eden, so the הלבושים של הנשמות זה המצוות. The garments are the mitzvos, and the food is the Torah that we learned during our life. Why do I need that in the afterlife? So Rav Chaim Miller in his commentary here writes the following. In the afterlife your soul will be exposed to intense divine revelation. To remain comfortable in that environment, it needs to A, protect itself from receiving more revelation than it can handle, and B, absorb whatever is safe and comfortable for it. In other words, sunlight's good. It's good to go outside. More and more research shows at some point, especially here in Florida, you have no excuse, go outside and go for a walk twice a day. Some vitamin D, go get some sunlight. It's good for you, it's good for you. But if you try to stare up directly into the sun, you'll be blinded. So, lehavdil but in the world to come, the revelation of Hashem, it's good for you. Be exposed to the sunlight of Hakadosh Baruch Hu. But if you try to stare right at it, not good for you. You can't handle it. So you need a levush, you need sunglasses. The garments in the world to come are the sunglasses to handle the revelation, the light of Hashem. So we'll need garments. How do we earn garments? We can't earn them in the world to come. In the world to come, there is no free will, there is no choice. It's too late, you can't earn them. So how will you have the best UV ray, if that's the right term, sunglasses to not go blind in the world to come? Based on the mitzvos that we do in this world. The mitzvos you perform during your lifetime provide the garments for the soul to protect it from too much revelation, or I would say the sunglasses. The Torah that you study in this world enriches the soul's capacity to absorb revelation. Now we also need to, we need to be strong, have stamina, in order to absorb the revelation in the world to come. How will we be strong and have stamina? Because of the Torah that we learned in this world. So the mitzvos in this world give us the sunglasses or the garments to not go blind in the next. The Torah we learn in this world nourishes us to have the stamina and the strength to be able to experience the highest of revelation in the world. Velishma haynu. The term lishma, now the Baal HaTanya, the Alter Rebbe is going to define the term Torah lishma. This is famous. It's quoted in any conversation about what does it mean Torah lishma? And Torah lishma is not a modern term. Torah lishma goes back to the Mishna. Pirkei Avos, the Gemara in several places, talks about be somebody who learns Torah lishma. Even if you learn shelo lishma, even if you do Torah and mitzvos shelo lishma, מתוך שלא לשמה בא לשמה, to try to be, strive to be a person who learns Torah lishma. What is Torah lishma? What does it mean Torah for its own sake? Lishma. Torah in or for its own name. What does that mean? Torah lishma. What is Torah lishma? So the Alter Rebbe writes, כדי לקשר נפשו להשם על ידי השגת התורה איש כפי שכלו. The intention to attach your soul to God through understanding the Torah according to your mind's ability. Torah lishma means that while you're sitting and learning Torah, the Mishna is open, the Gemara is open, the halacha is open, the learning of Torah is not intellectual gymnastics. It's not an academic exercise. It's not because it's fun, that the whole intent and the mindfulness while you're learning Torah is dveikus. I am cleaving, I am connecting, I am attaching myself to the Almighty through this learning of Torah. This is Hashem's blueprint for the universe. So when he tells me if an ox gores another ox, this is what happens. There's 39 melachos that I could do on Shabbos, that I can't do on Shabbos. Basar b'chalav, there's bitul, there's no bitul, it's not. Whatever area, whatever I'm learning, that learning is in order to create a dveikus, an attachment, and a connection. This is the diary of the Almighty, this is the blueprint of the Almighty, and I am connecting to Hashem. The goal, the essence, what is Torah lishma? Torah lishma means I'm not learning Torah, certainly not as a weapon to beat others. I'm not learning Torah for my own ego or honor. I'm not learning Torah because it's fun. I'm not learning Torah because it's intellectual. I'm learning Torah lishma. What is lishma? zogt the Alter Rebbe, lishma means the goal of dveikus, ish k'fi sichlo. Each person according to their level. Each person according to their level. So the more literate, the deeper, the more profound, the more pnimius, so the more we can attach through the learning of Torah. The less mature intellectually, emotionally, the less skilled, so we can attach on a different level. That is Torah, that is Torah lishma. That is Torah lishma according to the Alter Rebbe. Now that's not what everybody agrees. So, interestingly, Rav Chaim Volozhiner, that elicited a tremendous pushback from Rav Chaim Volozhiner. The Nefesh HaChaim had an altogether different understanding of Torah lishma, sort of pushing back on the Alter Rebbe, on the chasidisha perspective of Torah lishma. And again, as I mentioned, it's a Gemara in Psachim, that Torah and mitzvos even lo lishma will lead to lishma. It's a Mishna in Avos, warns of, urges us to study Torah lishma, don't make personal use of the crown of Torah, learn Torah lishma. Many, many sources in Mishna, in Gemara, about Torah, about Torah lishma. So this is the Alter Rebbe's view that we that Torah is, when we learn Torah, the highest goal of Torah is in religious life, the highest goal of religious life, life is d'veikus. Torah leads to clinging to Hashem. However, Rav Chaim Volozhiner disagrees. Rav Chaim Volozhiner in Nefesh HaChaim in Shaar Daled, in the fourth shaar has a critique of the Chasidish view of this Alter Rebbe of Torah lishma, and he says lishma does not mean d'veikus as most people believe, but rather lishma means for Torah's sake. So whereas in Chasidus the highest level is d'veikus, albeit it's achieved through Torah, the Alter Rebbe also says the highest yichud is to learn a mishna, gemara, halacha, but the purpose of the Torah which is the highest yichud is to achieve d'veikus, because d'veikus is the goal. So for Rav Chaim Volozhiner, for Volozhin, for for the Litvisha, the highest goal is Torah. Torah, Torah, Torah. Torah lishma means for its own sake. It means for the sake of Torah. It means to understand it, to learn it, to love it, to engage it. It doesn't mean just d'veikus. Lishma doesn't just mean d'veikus, because if it meant d'veikus, Rav Chaim Volozhiner says say Tehillim all day. You could be dovek b'Hashem, you could cling and cleave to Hashem by saying Tehillim all day. Do hisbodedus, meditate on Hashem all day. What does Torah lishma means? That lishma for the name and for the sake of Torah, of Torah. All your speech, all your give and take in the words of Torah have to be for the sake of Torah. Don't superimpose on Torah, don't project onto Torah, don't distort Torah, don't make Torah conform to your times. It's all lishma for the sake of Torah, for the sake of Torah. And he tries to bring a raaya from Rosh Hashana, Nedarim, and elsewhere. So in Shaar Daled of Nefesh HaChaim, Rav Chaim Volozhiner cultivates this alternative understanding that when a Yid learns Torah, it has cosmic influence and cosmic implications. You create cosmic angels through the learning of Torah, and therefore everything's about Torah. And the spiritual heirs of Rav Chaim Volozhin, call it Lakewood, call it, Rav Schechter's gonna be here this Shabbos, he holds that YU is the is Volozhin. Volozhin was transplanted into America because it's Yeshiva University's beis medrash. But a Litvisha view in the Nefesh HaChaim is that Torah lishma doesn't mean d'veikus. Torah lishma means Torah, for Torah's own sake. The highest thing you could do is learn Torah, love Torah, know Torah, talk in Torah and Torah is for its own sake and no alternative agenda. The Eglei Tal of the Sochatchover Rebbe, in his Eglei Tal, הקדמה דאגלי טל also has what is a famous, famous because I happen to know it, a famous understanding of what is Torah lishma. Because many people misunderstand and they think if you get a gishmak out of learning, you're not doing it lishma. If you get joy and happiness, oh what a parsha shiur! Oh what a shiur in Tanya! What a daf yomi! What a simchas chaveir! What a, I enjoy it, I love it, I have fun at it. It's gishmak, that's not Torah lishma. Torah lishma has to be even if it's not fun. Even if I'm all serious. So in his Eglei Tal, in his Eglei Tal of Rav Aaron Bornstein, the Sochatchover Rebbe writes, Chosid of the Kotzker. And he became a Gerer Chosid under the Chidushei HaRim, then he moved to Sochatchov, the first Sochatchover Rebbe. So in his הקדמה לאגלי טל, which is on the malachos of Shabbos, this is what he writes. I'll read it to you in the translation. By way of mentioning I'd like to recall what I heard from some people who have shifted from the way of logic concerning learning the holy Torah. They said that if one learns and creates insights and is happy and enjoys his learning, he's not learning as lishma as one who learns simply and does not get any enjoyment whatsoever and only learns for the sake of the mitzva. But he disagrees. The reason being that one who enjoys his learning is mixing his own personal enjoyment into the learning. The truth is, this is a widespread mistake. It is the opposite. This is the essence of the mitzva of learning Torah. To rejoice, to delight, to enjoy in his learning and then the words of Torah are absorbed into his blood. And when one benefits from the words of Torah, he becomes attached to them, to the Torah. See Rashi on Sanhedrin. And as the holy Zohar writes, the yetzer hara and the good inclination only grow through joy. The good inclination grows from the joy of Torah. If you say that because of joy that he was learning is called not lishma, so then the joy further lessens the power of the mitzva, weakens the light. So it must be that joy is also considered to be lishma. While according to the strict letter of the law, one who learns solely due to enjoyment and not because of the mitzva is called not lishma, like one who eats matzah because he enjoys it, not for the taste, about this they said a person who still learns not lishma will bring him to learning lishma. But one who learns for the mitzva and enjoys it, this is learning lishma and completely holy. So if you're learning, you know, I know somebody, one of my dear friends, has a member of his family who grew up in rabbinic family, grew up in Yeshiva, and unfortunately left the way of observance. But still loves learning. And he told me he once came down on a Friday night and he found this person sitting at the dining room table and they were they were doing they were mechalel Shabbos with a Ketzos and a Nesivos open in front of them. They love learning. The Ketzos, the Nesivos, the machlokes, the intellectual gymnastics, the chakira, the lamdus, oh gishmak, while they're being mechalel Shabbos. So that's not Torah lishma. If you like the intellectual gymnastics, if you like the chakira. and the *lamdus* and the back and the forth and it's fun, that's not *Torah Lishma*. But says the *Aglei Tal*, if you're learning because you want to know the word of *Hashem*, but you also enjoy it, that is *Torah Lishma*. So you see there's a big *machlokes*, *Chaim Volozhiner*, *Aglei Tal*. But the Alter Rebbe here in the fifth *perek* of Tanya says *Torah Lishma* means for the purpose, for the goal of *Hashem*. So let's finish the fifth *perek*. והמזון מבחינת אור פנימי. Now while the *Eitz Chaim* and the *Zohar* drew a distinction between *mitzvos* as garments, Torah as food, the Tanya argues that Torah is both a garment and food. Torah is the sunglasses protecting you from the light and the food giving you the stamina and the strength. והלבושים מבחינת מקיפים. ולכן אמרו רבותינו זכרונם לברכה שתלמוד תורה שקול כנגד כל המצוות. That's why our rabbis taught us a mishna in *Peah*. We say it every morning, the *Talmud Torah Keneged Kulam*. Learning Torah is equal and opposite all *mitzvos*. שהמצוות הן לבושים לבד. because a *mitzva* is only the garment, and the garment's still separate and apart from you, you could take off the garment. התורה היא המזון וגם הלבוש. But Torah is both a garment and what you absorb and eat, what's inside you. בנפש המשכלת שמתלבש בו בעיונו ולימודו. for the rational divine soul which is absorbed in analyzing and studying Torah. וכל שכן כשמוציא בפיו ודיבור. all the more so when you learn not just with your eyes, and you learn not just in your head and your heart, but when you learn out loud, when you learn with your mouth, when you verbalize, when you articulate, שהבל הדיבור נעשה בחינת אור מקיף. because the breath exhaled into the words elicit transcendent divine lights. כמו שכתוב בפרי עץ חיים. So while Torah is primarily an experience of knowledge, so we also have to articulate. We have to express, we have to say the words, verbalize them, and when we verbalize them, then it endows the experience with the quality of a garment. So learning is eating, becomes part of us. When we say it out loud, when we learn out loud, it's both eating and it's also wearing that garment, both for this world and setting ourselves up for the next. So in conclusion, when we learn Torah and perform *mitzvos*, our soul becomes ready to receive divine light, divine revelation in this world and in the next. And Torah in particular is the highest level because it is imbibing, it is absorbing, it is integrating, it is eating the essence of *Hashem*. We become one through that *yichud*, through the highest level of learning Torah. How? Learning a Torah that's *lishma*. Not a Torah for our own name, not to be the smartest, not to know the most, not for the greatest honor, not for the most money, not to land the best girl, but Torah *lishma*, to be *davek t'Hashem* through the learning of Torah that we do. With that we finish *perek hei*. *B'ezras Hashem* next week we'll pick up with *perek vav*. Have a great day. Stay happy.
