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Rebbe Nachman didn’t come to make us “more religious.” He came to make us more real.
Rav Shlomo Katz opens the “treasure chest” of Rebbe Nachman’s Torah — teachings that heal the inner storm, settle the mind (yishuv hadaas), and draw down peace and truth into our homes, our relationships, and our own hearts.
Boker tov everyone. Thank you for coming. Rosh Chodesh Tammuz. Sponsored by the Silver family in memory of בתיה פיגא בת ישראל, anonymously in memory of all the holy chayalim that gave their lives and the ones who are working tirelessly to protect us in Eretz Hakodesh.
Bemishpachat Vizel lerifuah sheleima of עטל שרה בת חנה, יעקב שלמה בן בילה, and a zivug hagun for Esther bat Rachel. And the week is sponsored by the Finns, hakarat hatov for all the learning and davening for a rifuah sheleima of דוד נפתלי בן איילה אהובה and the rifuah sheleima of אברהם יעקב בן דבורה פיגא ונחמה בת דבורה פיגא בתוך כל שאר חולי ישראל by Michael and Cindy Levy, memory of Liora bat Zelig zichrona livracha. And the week and specifically today is sponsored by my sister and brother-in-law by Yudi and Michal Reinitz. Today is our grandfather's yahrtzeit, חיים יצחק בן נחום ישראל הכהן, my mother's father, 26 years ago.
תהי נשמתו צרורה בצרור החיים. Okay, yofi. So here we're going to be ending off our year learning something from Rebbe Nachman of Breslov that is almost like this piece is almost you could say the tachlis of everything. The tachlis of everything, everything, everything.
The piece you have in front of you is from the Sefer Likkutei Etzot, which are the short summaries of and focusing on ikkar teachings from Likkutei Moharan. And this piece falls under the category of emet ve'emuna, of truth, truth and faith, truth and belief. In the series we've been doing over here for quite some time now, we've been exploring many different avenues and ways for us to receive direct guidance from Rebbe Nachman to feel and sense tranquility and peace and serenity and shalvat hanefesh, mamash shalvat hanefesh, right in our hearts and all the etzot of the tzaddik. Mainly, the truth is mainly focusing around two themes: one we spent a lot of time which was hitbodedut and the other one that we only spoke about for a sec which is the Torah of Azamra based on lesson 282, the famous teaching in Likkutei Moharan 282.
All we're trying to do is receive counsel from the tzaddik to be healthy, basically to be mentally healthy which also is directly connected to being physically healthy, to be spiritually healthy. I think that's something that many of you would say, have you seen Breslovers, you want to tell me they're spiritually healthy? Well, yeah, some of the Breslovers I know. He just came back from Uman yesterday! Are you spiritually healthy? Yeah! So you have all sorts of different definitions of spiritually healthy, but when one really engages on a day-to-day level with the teachings of the tzaddik and it's not just once in a while, but Rebbe Nachman becomes the guide, your actual tour guide, there is a derech, there's a mahalach, it's not stam just random pieces of advice. There actually is a framework, there's a tzurah, there's a shape to the day.
Rebbe Nachman, there's an amazing, I'm sure you've seen this and you've learned this before, the book by Rav Chaim Kramer called Anatomy of the Soul, where in that book what we have over there is the ability to see how the Rebbe was a master, a master in physiology. The Rebbe speaks about every single limb, how it corresponds to all the other areas in our life, it's a masterpiece, and the same thing how it's always like keneged what's going on with our neshama with the levels of our soul. But the bottom line of it all is that you could learn so much information, you could understand certain things and not understand certain things, but there's a level that precedes all of it and that I think at a certain point becomes just like a request for a gift, for it to be just a simple gift. And that of course is having the emet, having truth in our lives.
We always know that even when we say the word "I live with truth," that's the alignment, that's the balancer, that's what keeps everything else, that's what keeps all the other things flowing in motion when a person senses that their day is surrounded around the concept of emet. And the other obvious word that we're looking for is that I live with emuna, that I have faith and I have a certain element of knowing and being attracted and drawn and guided to the truth because this world is mamash alma deshika, this world is not the truth. What does that mean when we say this world is alma deshika and when people people die they go to olam haemet. What does that say about our time here? Our time that I mean a Lubavitcher would say that's like the perfect recipe because here we're we're trying to make truth in in this world.
Dira betachtonim. The Breslever would say I'm just getting through this world in order to get to the olam hanitzchi the world of truth the world of emet. So what are you busy doing down here? I'm busy making I'm busy drawing down teachings from above that'll make my journey towards the olam hanitzchi that much more powerful and that much more guided and centered. So what we're going to be seeing today is how do these worlds combine hopefully leaving us with a strong grasp on what what matters as we're going through the summer as we continue to live in a state of complete and total unknown.
Someone asked me yesterday would you be shocked if America just starts to decide like if if if the the President of the United States would just begin to start bombing the daylights out of Iran and put them into whatever one of his classy words are. I don't know not classy actually but you know one of his big words. Huh? Negative. Classic.
Classic. Classic right you know obliteration like all these big words he's used and Yidden have been dreaming to hear from other people and then they get completely changed the day later. None of us would be shocked because there's no mahalach of truth when we look out into the world there's no flow of emet outward there's no flow of emet you know. So we're we're still very much in a very you know if we really allow ourselves to be real with with the times we're living in there's still a a very big you know general sense of unknowns and a bunch of unknowns.
We need to hold on to that which is reliable which that that can't be you know that which that which can't be shaken that which can't be tormented with and the Rebbe was the the strongest way he spoke about what we're going to be speaking about today it was almost like there's no chochmas at a certain point you have to hitbatel you have to you have to completely annihilate before something you have to let go of something to create something much bigger right in front of you. So let's learn the Rebbe's words everything that we just said right now and may this learning we're doing right now be a tfilah that we can hold on to at least for the rest of the summer if not for the rest of our lives bezrat Hashem. Amen.
אי אפשר לבוא לאמונה אלא על ידי אמת.
You want you want to come to say I believe in Hashem I believe in Hashem it's great belief without truth without a seeking towards the truth and learning what that means and trying hard to focus is there more pages and trying not and trying to focus on the emet without that don't Rebbe Nachman's saying something wild here he's saying don't call it emunah.
אי אפשר לבוא לאמונה אלא על ידי אמת. The only way one can reach this world called emunah is only through truth.
היינו כי עיקר האמונה הוא במה שאין השכל מבין.
כי במקום שהשכל מבין אין שייך אמונה. I'm telling you every word here is is a is a just an explosion of of energy that's really what I'm feeling explosion of energy let's start again. A person can't come to the to emunah unless they have truth now when I say the word truth what usually comes into your mind being able to being able to authenticate something. That's usually how we respond to the concept of truth that I can authenticate and that's that's true with everything else in the world.
Zot omeret proof. Proof in science. That generally speaking that was that's how I defined coming to a truthful conclusion right? There's only one problem with this because the Rebbe says ikar haemunah what's emunah all about הוא במה שאין השכל מבין emunah begins at the place that my mind can't understand it can't authenticate it can't prove anything.
כי במקום שהשכל מבין אין שייך אמונה.
Because the place where the mind starts to grasp if you grasp something ein shayach emunah put it like this do you believe in electricity? No. No. Right, because ma shayach, מה שייך אמונה איפה שהשכל, right? Do you believe in love that you have for a friend? Yes. Yeah, but quite often it's actually not belief, it's more like ke'ilu I understand why I love them and therefore I love them, which is a much lower level of love.
Because the real, those real things we're speaking about, במקום שאין השכל מבין, bemakom shehashechel mevin, ein shayach emunah. If you understand something, don't start saying it's emunah. That's why, when we think about this right now, does any, do any of us understand the Torah? So we could say to a certain, hopefully we say to a certain extent. Hopefully we say to the greatest extent we've had until now in life.
But even with beyond all that, it's really a story of emunah. So we'll see in a second how truth comes into the picture. Yeah? I was just listening to Rabbi Yoy Jacobson's seven-hour hachanot for the Yom Tovs and he says at some point in it that like a baby, right? A baby when, when they're nursing, they don't, they're not like, "Oh, I wonder how this milk gets made. I wonder how like this really interesting that the food turns into whatever like this whole thing." A baby's not, a baby's just looking, like just, it's just trust, it's just emunah, just like a feeling that is so much deeper than the level of understanding and if you even go into the place of understanding, it takes away from, right, it'll stop to taste what it tastes like.
It'll stop to taste what it tastes like. Which is basically how we understand Rebbe Nachman's approach to the world of philosophy and philosophers. And one of the reasons maybe you could say why was he so, bless you, why was he so adamant on people not learning certain sefarim that are, what it's called, sifrei hamchakrim? Because you may come to certain levels of understanding, but you know what will end up happening to you? The taste won't taste the same anymore. Your taste of being close to Hashem and keeping Torah and mitzvot will become diluted because you're constantly contrasting it to your philosophical conclusions of what you're learning.
And we think, "No, no, no, the more I'll understand, then the more that I'll be able to connect to the truth." It's this catch-22 because we're supposed to keep on learning, and yet we're supposed to keep on holding on to temimus. Which one is more important? And in the world of Rebbe Nachman, he basically tells us you don't have to compromise if you know how to go about the search in the right way. You don't need to compromise. And that's hopefully what we're trying to do today.
Because none of us want to feel like, "Okay, the Rebbe said really emunah starts from the place that we don't understand. What's more important for me, to understand things or to believe in Hashem?" Of course to believe in Hashem. That means let's not try to understand anything. That doesn't work with the Rebbe either.
But it's got to be a combination where I don't feel like I'm compromising anything on the taste, which is the ikar at the end of the whole game. Hashem wants us to go through this world tasting that feeling, that non-complicated feeling of direct, literally it's called yenika, which is what suckling is like a baby, to absolute direct receiving chayus, life-force from Hashem and to taste that. And to be, imagine, baby once they're finished, they're, you know, finished nursing, "I'd also love a pizza." Ke'ilu, because what you get, what a child get, what we get when it's directly from the source, לא צריך שום דבר אחרי זה. You don't need anything else.
You don't need supplements. You don't need supplements. It's to be completely nourished directly from Hakadosh Baruch Hu. This is what I feel the Rebbe's whole mahalach of life is all about.
And all his teachings are guiding us to that place. Let's finish the first paragraph.
ואם כן כשאין השכל מבין מהיכן יבוא להאמין במה שצריך להאמין. When the mind isn't capable of understanding what it's trying to understand, where will the emunah come to believe in what he, what a person should believe in? Al ken, therefore, we've already established basically till now, she'emunah does not come from understanding because grasping and intellectually comprehending has a limit, by every human being it has a limit.
על כן עיקר אמונה תלויה באמת. Emunah is dependent really on truth.
שאם ירצה האדם להסתכל על האמת לאמיתו יבין מאליו שצריכים להאמין האמונה הקדושה בהשם יתברך ובצדיקיו האמיתיים וב.
ובתורתו הקדושה אף על פי שאי אפשר להבין בשכלנו המגושם.
If a person wants to look at the truth and to understand it in the deepest depths, the prerequisite is believing in full emuna with full emuna in Hashem, in his tzaddikim, and in his holy Torah, even though I know that I can't fully grasp through my mind what the story is all about. So this is a very, it's Rebbe Nachman is addressing what seems to be a contradiction for the human mind to grasp. It's basically you're going into, it's like an amazing thing. It's not, it wouldn't happen in biology or chemistry, any of the sciences, because the theories are fully inclusive.
The theory that you learn in school for chemistry or biology, anything, there's theories that prove why what you see in front of you, how it happens and how it works and why it works, nachon? But when it comes to learning Torah, it doesn't work like that. So how do I approach something that I know there's no theory to really test it? And I'm not, I don't want to go on a tangent of bashing programs that have like, you know, seminars of proofs, because sometimes people actually need that to get them, I actually, I do believe that sometimes they're important, because I think sometimes these seminars get people to, like, it turns on the engine, you know. It does something, it stirs something up. In the past, I always used to, I feel so bad that I should do teshuva on this.
I used to always, like, look at these seminars, and not mentioning names of different places, but I'm like, God, would you want your belief in, in the living God to be based on proofs? Because someone, someone else can come and disprove everything I said right now, too. That's easy. I want it to be above a place that can be proven or disproven. But sometimes you do need that to get a person's motor going.
And we have the greatest example, a raya for that. When Am Yisrael were being formed as a nation and leaving Mitzrayim, what did our emuna really work on? Proofs. Heavenly proofs coming from heaven that God exists. It was nissim gluim, revealed miracles.
The shayla is always, why doesn't God do that again? It was needed then at that time to actually get the engine to, to turn on. That, that's what was needed back then. I mean, don't get me wrong, I'd be fine, I'd be fine if something completely beyond nature and miraculous appeared right now. But it's like thousands of years of Hashem saying, I know that's what you think you want, but it's not really what you need.
You have what, everything you need to, to go. Now it's about filling it with truth. And truth is meal hasechel. Real truth is meal hasechel.
It's above and beyond our ability to grasp something. So Rebbe Nachman continues the end of the second paragraph: כי על ידי הסתכלות על האמת בעין האמת יבין מרחוק שהאמת הוא כך רק שאי אפשר להבין בשכל וצריכין רק להתחזק באמונה שלמה. This is so beautiful. When I look at the truth through the eyes of truth, I will understand from far, יבין מרחוק שהאמת הוא כך.
Usually, I think in order to understand that a truth is a truth, I have to go as close as I can and understand and the theory, and based on the theory from up close it makes sense to me to proclaim something as truth. Rebbe Nachman says with emuna, what happens is you can see the truth from far and still say that's a total and complete truth, even though my mind is not close, mikarov, and doesn't fully grasp it.
רק שאי אפשר להבין בשכל. You can't understand this with your mind.
וצריכין רק להתחזק באמונה שלמה. And all you need is to strengthen yourself in emuna sheleima. Friends, help me with something very, very important right now, and really give, give me all your attention because this is the ikker of the whole year of learning Rebbe Nachman. What does a person receive in their flow of life when they live like this? What is the first feeling a person begins to actually physically sense? Not just spiritually sense, but physically sense, when Rebbe Nachman says something like this where he explains that even from far I could say that's the truth, I don't fully understand it yet but I believe that's the truth and I proclaim it from far.
What is, what is, I hope my, my question's clear. What happens to a person when they live like this? Serenity. A calmness. Safety.
Why? What did you say? She said serenity. Why? Why is that? It's, it's true. You have an inner clarity. You just...
Oh... clear? It's why things are clear to you now? No. But you do. No, but that's that's the whole game.
You actually do have a clarity. But it's not the type of clarity that people—it's not secheldik. Sorry? It's not sechel clarity. No, it's not sechel clarity.
It's something, it's neshama clarity. It's soul clarity. Tranquility. Shalvat hanefesh.
That actually is what what happens to a person. For some people it's the most threatening thing in the world cause it puts in doubt their whole method of how they survive in this world. So it threatens the daylights out of you. It only threatens you if your life is built upon a mahalach of השגות שכליות גשמיות מגושמות, which means how would you say that? where everything that you've achieved in life and everything that you're standing on are things that are proven.
For some people it's also something to be measured. Like it's tangible. It's like marriages where it's always based on, you know, this like non-spoken verbal communication of really prove me that prove to me that you love me. Prove me that you love me.
Show me that you love me, right? Those are not the things we're interested in. It's emuna. It's emuna in the emet of what we have. It's something else.
What else do we feel when we when we understand that this is what the Rebbe is saying is the tachlis, yeah? Safety. What does that mean? Why do you say that? Because well A, because you realize that Hashem's in control and therefore everything is happening according to how He thinks it's going to be good. So that makes you feel safe. Yeah.
Based on that it's like someone has your back, but the someone is Hashem who has your back. Like not gonna not gonna let you go. Nachon. That's safe, makes you feel safe.
And you're not alone. And you're not alone. You ever, I don't know if it was like this in your era, but in my era of going to bar mitzvahs, I remember something funny. There was this one thing we would do for the bar mitzvah boy where he would be standing with his back to us and he'd have to do a whole free fall.
Free, yeah, free falling, right? Trust fall? Is that what it was called? Right. Did you have that? Did anyone do it? No, I was just thinking that that the the trust and the sense of safety from that there's purpose and and design and that things aren't arbitrary, because it's that feeling of that there's no purpose to to what's going on. Okay, so this is a very this what leads us to the next thing. What is the what would seem to be the danger if this is misunderstood incorrectly? If this is misunderstood incorrectly that now you that the point of life is to live with emuna and emet and not davka sechel, then what's the danger in misunderstanding this concept? That you wouldn't put any action into...
That that you're basically like you're saying if I'm going bitul, I'm going bitul the whole way. You want me to go into bitul, and by Hashem, אני אתך עד הסוף. Ad hasof. And that would mean akol tov.
akol tov, which would mean... You don't do anything... But you mean me doing something or not doing something can't mess around with what the emet is. The emet is eternal.
What does it matter? And you know what's interesting is that that's actually true. It's just a chaval because you're wasting your you're waste of a creation. I mean you can't tamper with truth. Truth is truth.
Emuna is emuna. So it's actually a true statement. Like me mevateling and blowing away my whole life, it's not going to tamper with the eternal pillar of truth in the world. But what Rabbi Nachman's looking at you and saying, that can't be what your soul, if you listen to your soul, your soul doesn't want you to live like that.
You can't. You gotta be chazak and figure out how do I fit into this crazy picture of emet and emuna? How do I fit into it now? What's my truma, you know? What's my my donation, you know? What's my addition to the picture that I'm living in? And then when you when you begin to discover that through hitbodedut, through all the eitzot that Rabbi Nachman gave us, you look back at what you thought was tranquility and serenity and you laugh at it because in comparison to when a when you're actually aligned with your purpose in this world, it doesn't come close. It's a much deeper, deeper experience of serenity. Yeah.
Where does this come into play when you're going through an experience that's painful and yet you know that it's Hashem and you do look for that understanding of what Hashem is wanting you to know? Like what is the refinement? What is the message here? Is that if you go to a level of looking to understand that... Very good question. No I think it's I think it's an awesome question what you're asking. Did everyone hear her? It's a very important, I would say like this.
Approach lechatchila, meaning even from the beginning, approach the attempt to understand with humility, with understanding I'm only going to be able to understand it to a certain extent. And not I'm only going to move forward when I fully understand why this thing happened to me, because most of us don't. Most of us don't. To approach it with anava, with intellectual humility, which is one of the hardest things in the world for people to do.
But essentially this could lead you to teshuva. Hopefully it will. And that's the point, right? And hopefully, like the Gemara says, if a person sees that bad things happen to him, the lashon is Yifashpesh bema'asav, that means let me start to look at how I, how I'm, forget about the world of mind, how am I doing on an action level? How are my actions? Start with, the problem is when you don't start with humility you go straight to the place of that you're going to, you're going to crack the code and based on understanding. And no one ever's cracked the code, it's not the code cannot be cracked.
Moshe Rabbeinu is the smartest person that ever lived didn't crack the code, he didn't try. But isn't it also something that we are meant to be toiling with here is this, where is Hashem in it? Yeah, but it doesn't contradict saying approaching it with humility. That we won't really know. You'll hopefully know when it's sincerely asked, you'll know to the extent that you need to know for your exact purpose, but that the truth is so much bigger than your limited perception and you get what you need along the way.
Is that okay? Does that... It's a very good question what you asked. Bemet. I think it was the strongest question you've asked all year.
Bemet. No, you always ask good, so this was like cause it's true, like that's what we were saying before of like we could exempt ourselves, you know, from even trying if we know that the point isn't to understand. But that can't be the, that's not how we roll either. Mamash no.
And yet still know that when I really ask you Hashem ayeh, and it's hopefully as real as possible, don't put these, these like gvulot on Hashem and saying like only, don't put limits on God where you say only when you fully reveal to me the whole truth of why this happened to me will I then move forward. Because Hashem is basically saying, sweetest, it's impossible.
כי לא יראני האדם וחי, it says Hashem telling Moshe Rabbeinu, a person can't see me, that means to fully grasp me, v'chai and continue to live. You can't continue to live after that.
Yes, Jenny. Your hand was up, yeah? Yes, it was. I have to make sure I say this right, but it could be an instance where you feel like something is happening to you, but with the thing where you're supposed to see emet from afar, then instead of it happening to you, you see how you're supposed to interact with the people around you and then change that, change your interactions with your environment and then that helps you see emet not from where your only your perspective and Hashem's perspective, which you won't understand, but from afar, what's your role with this person, what's your role with that institution or whatever it is that's causing you the blockage or stirah. It's like everyone is sharing their deepest insights for the last shiur of the year.
Do you know how many times I've learned this and I never ever thought about what you just said? That word. That's a diyuk, that means what we're doing is like we're medayek. How do you say that, like pinpoint, pinpointing a word and expanding upon that to understand the context of the lesson. Do you, do you know, do you see the word that she was talking about? Merachok.
כי על ידי הסתכלות על האמת בעין האמת, when you look at truth really from the eyes of truth, יבין מרחוק שהאמת הוא כך, you'll understand from this zooming out place. And you know what happens when you zoom out? You realize, oh there's a lot of other people here trying really hard to do good in this world. But sometimes what's the obsession of the authentic soul searcher? It's like I'm going to go as close as I can and what happens when I get closer and closer? It's all about me. But the emet contains everyone.
Everyone's part of the story. That's what you were saying. Okay I just wanted to make sure. That's a gevalt diyuk.
That's really a beautiful, no pressure on anyone else with your comments. But be-emet, the tag teaming here, there's a very, very chazak diyuk. Tell you, I've seen this like, you know, for many years, I never, ever thought of it like that. I had that experience that I've been working with through many weeks of Torah and I've been processing it and it was happening to me and I felt it and then I was like okay so what's my role beyond myself, how can I, you know, it's, this is from life experience to be able to come out.
Wow, chazak meod, Shoshana. Chazak meod. Yasher koach. It's amazing.
Now, the Rebbe continues. So what is it that you need, let's just establish it? In order to be attached to that which really matters, which is emet, which is the truth. Hashem is the King of the world, the Torah is emet, and the tzadikim are emet, and that, they make, some of them the fake ones make it very hard for us to attach ourselves to that one, but Hashem should have rachmanut on Am Yisrael not to be led astray by false prophets mamash, b'ezrat Hashem. So here we're saying like this, what we need is truth.
And the way to get the truth is through emunah, is through belief. So the Rebbe now says like this: כשאדם חזק באמונה מאוד, when emunah, when you basically like you know a real revolution in this country happened with the book The Garden of Emunah. And I don't even remember when that came out. When that sefer came out from Rav Arush translated by Lazer Brody, I remember it was record breaking numbers of sales.
It was something wild that like the English speaking Chassidic non-Lubavitch, right, community started learning, it was like the hottest item. How many of you ever saw that, learned that sefer, The Garden of Emunah? When that came out it was basically the people's lives, people's lives were really transformed. They couldn't pinpoint it like, but their tzarah of living was different. But if we had to give it a name, what would it be called?
כשאדם חזק באמונה מאוד, that's actually what the name of their life is: כשאדם חזק באמונה מאוד.
When emunah is not this thing I lean on when I hear sirens proclaiming incoming ballistic missiles from Iran, but when emunah is on a day like today tfu tfu b'ezrat Hashem, when it's a Thursday in the end of June in Tammuz. Hopefully no one's going through too many crazy crises b'ezrat Hashem. When emunah is just as strong like that and emunah is the guideline of my day to day, same thing.
כשאדם חזק באמונה מאוד, so then Rebbe Nachman says hey there's a gift waiting for you.
What's that?
זוכה אחר כך לבוא אל השכל. What does that mean? Does that mean many things are revealed to you afterwards? What gets revealed to you afterwards? Truth, but truth through sechel.
זוכה אחר כך לבוא אל השכל, meaning you can reach a place of intellect, Rebbe Nachman says, כשאדם חזק באמונה מאוד, when a person's very strong in emunah. The point, everyone always thinks, oh Rebbe Nachman says figure out a way to chuck your intellect, sh'vikat hamoach.
No. Rebbe Nachman says there are times in life to chuck intellect, but אתה חונן לאדם דעת ומלמד לאנוש בינה חננו מאתך חכמה בינה ודעת. We say it every single day in Shemoneh Esrei, which means God, you graced man with knowledge, with da'at, or at least we should say with the ability to attain knowledge. And also some inherent knowledge that we have.
The point is not to say this whole thing of da'at to throw it away, the point is don't use your da'at to be that which enables you to believe in Hashem. That's where it gets dangerous. But after the emunah is established and it's chazak, כשאדם חזק באמונה מאוד, the Rebbe says what happens after that?
זוכה אחר כך לבוא אל השכל. Yeah.
He's teaching us how we do get towards that da'at. I think so. Because we think that we're doing it ke'ilu our way. We're not really getting anywhere.
Well, you may get sechel, but you're not going to get da'at. It might be a da'at of sheker or there's too much of it going in the other direction then you really get the real da'at. Through the filter of emet. Bidi'uk.
Bidi'uk. Yeah, Chamalibah. I feel like, I don't know, I see it as the opposite. I was thinking at the beginning of the piece that the more that we use our sechel, maybe I'm already programming it with like the foundation of Hashem in the picture, but I think the more we learn, the more humbled we are about the world because even though things work systematically like let's say biologically, there's no answer to Why it is.
Science can explain how things happen, but it doesn't explain why it happens. And I think that that's the most humbling thing that leads us to Hashem. Well because they say that the why is irrelevant. The world says the why is irrelevant, right? It's so intellectually dishonest.
No, no, trust me, I'm with you. I'm with you on that. I'm just saying the why is removed because it's not important for the proof of existence. The proof of existence is how, right? Why is בכלל לא זו השאלה.
And I don't know then maybe like Jews who have like more of a pull to know the why, I think learning about the world like using the sechel first engenders a real ratzon to figure out the why. Using sechel first, you're saying. Yeah. I mean I feel funny saying that if the tzadik is saying something else, but not funny enough.
I don't know just like I feel that I've experienced the opposite. Really like the more yeah, I think I mean I grew up frum so I think I always had a concept of Hashem but I feel like other people that I know who didn't like the yiddishe neshama wants to know. Like you learn and it's like why does it happen that way? Why? Why? Why? You see that with kids. Kids always ask why.
I think because they are just more connected to Hashem and maybe as you get older the ego kicks in and then the why is not as important but I think to a lot of people it is. Like I think the sechel does bring to a place of wanting to know more. The answer to why is always in the world of emes is always the same. What's the answer to the question why? Think about it, we've spoken about it many times in Hebrew.
Ask it in Hebrew. Ask it in Israeli. Kacha. Kacha.
Meaning like what's the real answer to any why about like anything? Why did I go through... like anything. Why is this like this? Why does this flower look like this? Your question of why is more... it's not really why, it's for what did I go through these things.
It's a different question. It's not lama, it's like we've learned it's lema, for what. A Jewish way of asking why is not why, it's lema. It's a goyishe way to say lama.
Yidden don't ask lama. Lama yomru hagoyim we say in Hallel. Lema is a way we approach that question. And I think that that's very different.
Those are very different worlds. Stomeret when I operate through sechel the highest level of question I can get to is lama. When I operate through emunah that leads to sechel my question will become lema, for what was this? Because why I'll never understand. Why is in...
why is God. Lama is Hashem, it's kacha. Keter kol haketarim. I'm not even supposed to know.
It's like כי לא יראני האדם וחי mamash. So I think the sechel can lead us to the lema. Like looking at the world and studying the world and seeing the intricacy and the complexity and the beauty that leads us to lema. I don't know if that's the sechel actually.
I think that that's the emes and emunah. That's the emunah. The sechel if it originates from sechel it'll only lead you to lama. But when it's through the mochin of higher mochin, higher intellect, which is in a state of...
I can't go into this right now as if I understand it even but when I'm going this route I do like he says וזכה אחר כך לבוא אל השכל. I can come more to the sechel now in order to ask the lema through the world of emes and emunah. Darya, what do you want to say? Yeah well I learned from Rav Katz that... Rav Daniel Katz.
Yes. Daniel Katz, sorry. I'm also Rav Katz. No people were looking at you like...
that Baal Shem Tov taught that emunah is dveikus with Hashem. That's a higher consciousness level. So when you understand emunah that it's not through an intellect but it's through keter, it's through your higher consciousness level, then you first have to experience that as an experience, spiritual experience, and then when you have that open expanded consciousness and awareness then you can use that to use your sechel which is your chochmah bina v'daas to understand... to make some sense humbly or not.
It's almost word for word what he's saying over here. Exactly. It's almost word for word what he's saying over here. Mamash.
You know, they were both- connected, Rebbe Nachman and the Baal Shem Tov. So when he says yada chazaka be-emunah first you have to have emunah and then you can bring it down to your sechel. Nice. So let's substitute right now some words over here.
When a person has first has a spiritual experience of dveikut which I there is no right word in English for that when they have that and they could testify they could you can't testify meaning you can't prove that you experienced that. That's the whole point. It's beyond the level of proof then I can go to the place of the lower state of consciousness which I work through my intellectual faculties. Nachon.
It's funny that I grew up frum too. No one ever spoke like that. What? I also grew up frum. The worlds that you and I probably grew up in no one spoke like that if you were frum.
If you spoke like that you're like you're from the whoo a little bit strange but it's it is beautiful to see that it is becoming slowly slowly more integrated into certain areas you know not fully yet the job is still very very big but it is the dibur mafchid it's not as scary anymore. Your frum woman frum looking women speak speak like that it's a big besorah for the world I think. Okay let's continue again כשאדם חזק באמונה מאוד זוכה אחר כך לבוא אל השכל וכל מה שמחזיק את עצמו באמונה יותר בא השכל יותר. And the more that you set yourself up for living a life of emunah stronger and stronger as emunah being the source of everything you come more and more to sechel כי הדבר שהיה צריך מתחילה להאמין מחמת שלא הבין דבר זוכה אחר כך להבינו בשכל על ידי אמונתו החזקה.
So beautiful. Rebbe Nachman says that thing that in the beginning I had to believe because I wasn't able to grasp something so I believed in it. The gift of believing in something and trusting that there's something bigger than just your intellect the gift is that Hashem will come and show it to you and say hey now now you can understand this now because you're not based I'm not worried that you're gonna base your emunah on this so you based your emunah on emunah. So now I'm gonna give you all these different gifts of intellectual comprehension because now you're not Hashem's saying I'm not worried that you're gonna base your relationship with me on proofs and stuff like that.
So now it's a gift to understand more how in how or you know everything relative like how Hashem created the world or for what did for what I would say even better for what Hashem created this you'll understand this better. You don't just have to walk around believing gam zu letovah gam zu letovah but Hashem will say no no no I'm gonna show you this שתבין תמונה יותר גדולה. Going back to what Jenny said. You're gonna see a bigger picture now and you'll under you'll be able to understand through zoom zooming out and seeing a bigger picture that this thing is much much bigger than you and that it works.
And thank God you're not the one that's calling the shots. Thank God there's a koach elyon that's menahel et hakol that's running everything. But he only says that comes after establishing that my life is a life of emunah אמונה טהורה אמונה שלמה emunah in the Torah emunah in mitzvot. Then Hashem comes and says now that you've established yourself like that in this world here you want to want to come see the world from a bigger perspective and you'll understand a bit more why the certain pieces that seem to you completely disconnected why they're in their place.
You know when you ever have those moments in life that you at a hopefully at a you know hopefully we all have these moments in life trying to put this down like to our world. And I know there are a lot of hands up but I just have to try to get this out in the right way hopefully siyata d'shmaya. You ever have moments in life where it's somehow you stuck with Hashem through the emunah factor and it's not that everything got solved in your life but the flow of shalva with Hashem starts to kick in and then Hashem says now let's look back at why you went through everything and there's a moment of oh now I understand why I had to go through this. That's what Rebbe Nachman is saying.
That's what Rebbe Nachman is saying. And the more emunah I have the more Hashem is like and that's why you had to go through this and that's why you had to go through this but not the other way around. I was thinking that moving back and seeing from far is the ability that Hashem is giving us. I mean you can choose to see from far.
That's right. You can choose to see from far. I mean your choice is this, your choice is to choose the emuna and when you get to a deep enough level of emuna then Hashem says now you're ready and he'll move you back and now all of a sudden you'll be able to see a bigger picture. So even that ability is from Hashem.
Nachon, legamre, legamre. But Rebbe Nachman now says this and afterwards in the paragraph יש לו דברים גבוהים יותר שהם נסתרים ממנו ואינו יכול להבינם בשכל. But then you don't get too excited about this understanding game because there'll be other things that you don't understand. Certain things yes, certain things no.
So what do you do?
ואז צריך להתחזק את עצמו יותר באמונה. Emuna. I have said this so many times and I attribute Reb Zalman every time I say this Midas Emes. Emuna is a verb, it's not a noun.
It's so important to remember this. Emuna is a muscle. Reb Lio screamed this over his wife's body, his daughter's bodies, he was screaming this: Emuna is a muscle. Emuna is not something you have or you don't have.
Emuna is actively right now offered to you and the shayla is what am I doing with it now? Therefore Rebbe Nachman writes that afterwards there's more things in life that I may not understand but thank God emuna isn't a stagnant passive spectator phenomena. It's an active, active muscle. Emuna comes from the word imunim, lehisamen, to exercise, train. So if that's the case don't freak out that now there are other things you don't understand.
Just remember, it's like a person that stops going to the gym and he's like why do I feel like this? You're shocked because you stopped. I was feeling so good, why don't I feel like this anymore? It's only because it's a, this is what it is, like this world is the gym. Ha'olam hasheker isn't the gym. Ha'olam ha'emes within this world is the emuna of the muscles of lehisamen of emuna.
There's a beautiful pasuk it says about Mordechai and Esther's relationship when we first meet them in the Megilla so the pasuk is ויהי אומן את הדסה היא אסתר בת דודו. That's what the pasuk says in the Megilla.
ויהי אומן את הדסה. So people, I mean the pshat of that translation is he trained her, zos omeres he, he raised her or we don't really understand.
Omna? Fostered. Foster cared, keilu. And they use it in modern Hebrew. Nachon, nachon, but what's the pnimiyus of it?
ויהי אומן את הדסה, he gave over to her emuna.
ויהי אומן את הדסה. How else is she going to do, she's this young beautiful Jewish sheina maidel that has to go and do things that baruch Hashem none of us could imagine we'd have to do with Achashveirosh. And she's doing this לשם הצלת עם ישראל. You want to understand that? Good luck trying to understand that.
No, you go to the world of emuna and afterwards Hashem will show you, let me explain to you why this had to happen and what happened to you not the other way around. It doesn't work like that. Where did she receive that koach? Through the training.
ויהי אומן את הדסה.
And it keeps on happening, it goes over and over again in our lives where we have to re-plug ourselves to the training to meet the next level of the orchard of the lights and gifts that Hashem is waiting to give to us which only comes after a dveikus like I'd say Dalia what you said before, it only comes after the experiential state of being of being close to Hakadosh Baruch Hu. And you can't explain that in words to people but the way to get to there is through dveikus and emuna and that is the definition of emes in this world. So again: ואחר כך יש לו דברים גבוהים יותר שהם נסתרים ממנו ואינו יכול להבינם בשכל.
ואזי צריך להתחזק את עצמו יותר באמונה.
להאמין במה שנסתר ממנו עתה. To believe in what is now being concealed from you. v'eino mevin b'sechel that I cannot understand with my mind.
עד שיזכה להבין גם אלו הדברים בשכל וכן לעולם.
Until you're able to understand those things also with the sechel and that's. You know there's certain things I would never say fall under this category because you could never you'll never be able to understand it besekhel and those that say that the following thing can be understood besekhel are not the right leaders for Am Yisrael and that is why did people have to get killed in order for us to live here? That is a test of emuna that is unfathomable. Especially especially for those that are directly affected by it in their own homes. Why do I say that why is it that I said before that there are those that can even sekhel-dick that? Because what's the logical explanation of why did these people have to be killed? Because what's the sekhel behind it? How would you logically explain such a thing? Because that's the price you pay for being an independent entity in this neighborhood.
Right? That that's the log that's the sekhel explanation right? I feel like when we hear statements like that I feel the pasuk קול דמי אחיך צועקים אליך מן האדמה. Can you hear the blood, the voice of the blood of your brother screaming saying you're going to use that language with me? That may be true about the independence of Guatemala or something. Don't ever use that logic for the independence of Yiddin being in Eretz Yisrael God forbid. You can't understand it and you'll never understand it.
It's like so there's certain things that don't even attempt. It's not like you know we could look back now and be like oh and that's why we got you know you may have been able to use that up until 1967 because it was such a far fetched dream of a reality to be able to conquer such a dwelling right? But from bless you but from the moments that Hashem performed these insane miracles through the Kiddush Hashem of all the holy chayalim and chayalot that were killed through 67 you try to use your sekhel to solve the issues here and not your emes and emuna and you want to explain why so many thousands and thousands of families are bereaved families based on sekhel? So at a certain iy efshar you can't go there. When things aren't operated through emuna then the sekhel is clearly more limited clearly more limiting and that's what we need such a such compassion on our souls and on our decision makers to really start getting their emuna kicked in over here like big time. Imagine if Bibi went to bein hazmanim yeshiva imagine be-emes imagine this for a second if the Prime Minister now that his court has finished right I think the current court case is finished.
Just his testimony. His testimony. Okay he has more time now. Bein hazmanim he finds a בין הזמנים אמונה ישיבה one of these Breslov yeshivas that just talking emuna all day long right? He emerges back for the next zman in the Knesset and the whole train of thought right is it's not that he loses mochin it's just that he'd be operating starting off from a different place and it wouldn't be the situation that you hear Baruch Hashems only during war or during primaries in the speeches but the Baruch Hashem is a is a very lechatchila real real one.
What would that do to the people?
כמה שאנחנו צריכים מנהיגים אמיתיים שבאמת מאמינים בהשם. Okay third to the bottom line אבל לזה צריך להיות האמונה חזקה מאד מאד עד שתתפשט האמונה בכל האברים. How do I know my emuna's getting stronger? So Rabbi Nachman uses a physical example it's very strange when he does this but it's not as that strange when you look at other sefarim they speak about this as well specifically the Nesivos Shalom who goes to this all the time. The Nesivos Shalom explains there are three levels of emuna.
There's emunat ha-moach, emunat ha-lev, about that the Magid of Mezritch said the distance between the moach and the heart is even greater than the distance between heaven and earth. Not so pashut. But the third level was emunat ha-eivarim. There's a beautiful ma'amar in Parshat Vayishlach and also in Parshat Vayera because he speaks about this by the Akeidah and he speaks about this also by the famous fight between Yaakov and Saro shel Esav.
The pasuk in Vayishlach it says וירא כי לא יכול לו ויגע בכף ירכו. The angel saw I can't chap... him through emunat hamoach through his emuna of the brain. I can't get him through emunat haleiv.
So what am I gonna go for? Avarim, emunat ha'avarim, his his his consciousness, God consciousness, his experience of what Dahlia said before of deveikus is permeated his whole being. But still, person is in a physical body and those things actually hurt. You can't hurt someone when your sechel and your leiv are completely refined by making insults, it doesn't it can't touch you. What could touch you? We live in a physical world.
So it says Vayiga bikaf yireicho. That's when he hits him physically, he comes to the conclusion that's the only real damage I can do to him in this world. Our enemies are looking at us and it's the same exact thing. It's like amazing.
These Jews still feel what they feel, but the only way we can get to them is through physical pain, so we'll keep on going that route. So Rebbe Nachman says in order for you to be fully guarded in this world from from getting sucked into mind games that you usually generally generally come from from self-doubt, he says אבל לזה צריך להיות האמונה חזקה מאוד מאוד עד שתתפשט האמונה בכל האיברים. Now how do I know if emuna has reached each one of my limbs? How, no, how would I know that emuna has reached each one of my limbs? So in the another teaching from the Nesivos Shalom on Parshat Vayera, it describes the pasuk that Avraham Avinu had to send out his hand in order to grab the ma'achelet which means the knife to shecht, the pasuk is weird. It says וישלח אברהם את ידו.
Do you usually think like I have to send my hand to do something if I have to grab something? It's like I'm going to send my hand right now to pick up this piece of paper, no I just do it, right? So the Nesivos Shalom explains there so beautifully that when a person reaches a level of emunata evarim, how do you know if it's reached that level? If your physicality simply can't go against the will of Hashem. The emuna has permeated you so fully that you're poshut not capable of going against the will of Hashem which in the Tanya they'd probably say that's the tzaddik. He's not involved in that struggle, he's not capable, the tzaddik is not capable of of doing these aveiros. But then Rebbe Nachman says what happens when I live like that, right? What a what a world, what a what a beautiful way of living, but then he ends off in saying ואז יוכל לזכות לבוא אל השכל על ידי אמונה.
And then he says something amazing, then you can also reach your mind in order to get to emuna. Well wait a second, what is the sechel? How do you say sechel in English? Common sense. How would you say physiologically? Brain. What is the brain? An organ.
An avar. Meaning now since emuna has permeated all of your physical being, now the brain could be trusted. Rewired, it's completely rewired mamash, the way that it functions is rewired, there was a reboot. Now you could go back and trust the brain when emunata evarim has taken over your life.
And then that's that is the shleimus of the adam. That's this this picture we drew up here is a shleimus of how a person can walk through this world al pi shitas Rebbe Nachman. So if we entitled this this series called The Path of Tranquility or mashehu kazeh with always referring to like what brings the calming and the peace and the soul, this is the picture that we've been trying to draw for for quite some time in this shiur and I'm so thankful to Hashem that we went back to Rebbe Nachman's teachings this year and hopefully be'ezrat Hashem we'll be privileged to learn the Torah of the tzaddik for many more years to come and it should really be all these things we're learning here should mamash be lema'aseh. Like it should never stay in this room, it should always be practically implied, implemented in our daily lives and don't hold back on the chiddushim, like keep on as you saw today, everyone's own chiddush with what they've thought, what they have to offer, it strengthens all of us, it strengthens me, so I give thanks to Hashem and to all of you, each and every one of you and it should be a strong and healthy summer where our emuna just gets stronger and stronger.
Yasher koach everybody.