Nonexistent Free Time

I have been working diligently on my new project over the past two weeks since the time of my last posting. Even though I am waking up an hour and half before going to work each morning, I have found that I still don’t have as much time as I would like to. I devote the first hour to my daily learning seder and the last half hour to working on this project. While occasionally I am able to find small amounts of “free time” here and there throughout the course of the day, for the most part I am limited to just 30 minutes a day.

Yesterday, I was zoche to speak with Rabbi Tal Zwecker on the phone for the first time. In the course of our conversation, Rabbi Zwecker related to me how he had completed his translation of Noam Elimelech in his "nonexistent free time". Hearing this was a tremendous chizuk to me and also a reminder of the words of the Piaceszna Rebbe:

If you are willing to exert yourself, you will find storehouses of hidden time.

The New Tactics Of My "Holy" Yetzer Hara

My yetzer hara let me enjoy a few days of unbridled enthusiasm and energy as I started my new project before he unleashed his latest campaign against me. Understanding that I usually see him coming a mile away, this time he decided to approach me with an ingenious new guise; instead of attempting to stop me, he tries to shove me forward.

When I am davening, he will lean over and whisper a new citation from a sefer that I should immediately go look up. When I am learning, he will encourage me to put aside all the seforim that make up my daily learning seder and devote myself solely to my new project since working on it can also be considered as "learning". When I am at work, he tells me that I should ignore all the "profane" tasks assigned to me and use the time to work only on my "holy" project.

It has taken me a few days to finally understand that the "whispers" I was hearing did not originate from my yetzer tov. I resolved to push these whispers out of my head with both hands and to focus fully on whatever I was engaged in at the moment.

With Hashem's help, by doing this I will be successful and proceed with my project with the proper perspective.

Sitting In The Plate

Excerpt from Opening the Tanya:

It is told of the Saba Kadisha of Radoshitz that in his youth before he became rebbe, he was terribly poor and often had nothing to eat. One year, after he had eaten nothing from Yom Kippur to the day before Sukkos, his wife sold a jewel she had and bought candles, challah, and potatoes for the festival. When he saw the candles and challah on his return from the synagogue, he was very happy, recited the Kiddush, washed his hands, and sat down to eat. Being very hungry, he ate ravenously, until he stopped and said to himself: “Berl, you are not sitting in the sukkah but in the plate!”

Someone can be tending to the most basic needs of his body and with conscious intent be observing the mitzvah of eating in the sukkah, yet still be sitting in the dish and not in the mitzvah.

Eizer L'Shabbos - Sukkos Campaign

Secure online donations may be sent via the Eizer L'Shabbos website here.

New Book Releases From Breslov Research Institute

Rebbe Nachman and the Knights of the Rosh HaShanah Table

The Fiftieth Gate: Likutey Tefilot - Volume 3

What Is Going On Behind The Scenes?

On Erev Yom Kippur, after receiving the Sudilkover Rebbe’s brocha, I began to devote the majority of my “free time” to a new project that I pray will serve as a great source of chizuk to others.

The more that I work on this project, the more my ratzon to complete it increases. Unfortunately, with this increased ratzon, my ratzon to continue blogging has decreased. I honestly believe that the whole purpose of my “A Simple Jew” blog was to develop my knowledge, writing skills, and contact network to the point where I could take on this new project. In a sense, my last five years of blogging has served as a springboard for this project.

I certainly do not intend to pull the plug on my blog with this posting; just to inform my readers why my postings have been more sparse recently.

Guest Posting By Rabbi Perets Auerbach - “In the Wilderness”

(Picture by P. Gillet)

“Bamidbar” (“in the wilderness”) is the name of an entire book of the Chumash (Pentateuch). The Torah was given specifically in a wilderness, away from civilization. Fields, forests, and mountains share this quality, but each one has its special nuance that makes the practice of hitbodedut in it have a unique taste.

“For Dovid, in the wilderness of Yehudah” (Psalms 63:1). “If only I had wings, I would distance... I would stay over in the wilderness, selah” (ibid. 55:8). Dovid HaMelech wandered through the wilderness expressing his longing for God in hitbodedut. What is its special quality?

The city at night is empty after a day of the masses pursuing materialism. Their “somethingness (yeshut)” is embedded in the sidewalk and lingers on. Fields, valleys, and forests are full even at night with sparks, light, and souls in the grass, trees, and flowers. The unique quality of the wilderness is that it is devoid of all of this. It is accordingly the best setting in which to attain bitul (nullification of ego). With not even positive energetic distractions, one is left to dig within and face himself. From this to nullify ego and sprout, flower, and blossom from amidst surrounding desolation into inclusion in the Ein Sof (Infinite One). Dovid HaMelech appreciated this so much that he was happy to abandon his royal accommodations in order to have the special Divine communion that only the ‘unfriendly’ wilderness provides.

In Rabbi Nachman’s story, “The Lost Princess,” the Viceroy follows a side-path through forests, fields, and wildernesses in search of the Lost Princess. Tefilah (prayer) is a quest of searching for the Shechinah (Divine Presence), which represents the sefirah of Malchut (“Kingship”). It catapults the soul to Keter (“Crown”), the ultimate source of Malchut.

“Triple-header.” Keter expresses through three heads: RaD”LA (“Unknowable Head”), Atik (“Primordial One”), and Arich Anpin (“Vast Countenance”). Arich, from which arises our deepest feeling of yearning, is called the “root of the emanated.” One connects to it through yearning – through “tree-hitbodedut” in the forest. Atik, which is the root of delight (oneg), is the “end of the Supernal Emanator.” One links to it through meditation in the delightful “field of holy apples” (another symbol for the sefirah of Malchut/Kingship). RaD”LA, which is related to bitul, remains aloof. One accesses it through hitbodedut in the wilderness–the place of complete ego-nullification.

The seder ha-hishtalshelut is the order of the worlds. The Divine flow is transmitted below through this order. In Rabbi Nachman’s story, the Master of Prayer would entice people to leave material pursuits and go after spirituality. He would take them out of civilization. Civilization is a metaphor for the seder ha-hishtalshelut. The ultimate meaning of taking them “outside of civilization” is that he would take them outside the seder ha-hishtalshelut. They would beat the system. “Mesirat nefesh iz gohr andererish—giving up one’s life is something completely different.” That is, one who puts his entire self into spiritual pursuit and gives everything for it accesses the light that surrounds all worlds. This light jumps past the order (hishtalshelut) and is a direct gift from God, coming without any intermediaries. It affords special closeness. It is reserved for those who are totally dedicated.

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From Rabbi Perets Auerbach’s “The Science, Art and Heart of Hitbodedut.” This work-in-progress may be purchased by contacting the author by email: peretsz@gmail.com.

5770 = שְׁעַת

Last night, the Sudilkover Rebbe told me that 5770 (תש"ע) will a year in which Hashem will express His rachamim (compassion) and ratzon (desire). He explained that this is hinted to in the fact that the letters that make up this year תש"ע can be rearranged into the word שְׁעַת that is found in the tefilla of Avinu Malkeinu:

אָבִינוּ מַלְכֵּנוּ תְּהֵא הַשָּׁעָה הַזּאת שְׁעַת רַחֲמִים וְעֵת רָצון מִלְּפָנֶיךָ

Without Understanding - Selichos

I understand very little of what I am saying with the Selichos that I recite each morning. As I am saying them, one part of me tells me that my time would be better spent if I recited the entire Sefer Tehillim that day instead. Yet, I know that saying Selichos during this time period is what I am supposed to do and that avoda that I am supposed to engage in.

Ultimately, it is not about what "I" want to do, rather what Hashem wants me to do that is important.

Rabbi Itche Meyer Morgenstern: Explorations In Tanya

“I speak, however, of those who know me well...”

As explained earlier, any person who believes in the holiness of the tzaddik has a connection to him and these words are meant for him. It is especially clear that one is a student of the Baal HaTanya if he feels the deep G-dly light that is imbued in his works. One who grasps the inner holiness of Torah without love, fear, and dveikus through the Da’as afforded by this holy work can be sure that his soul is deeply connected to the author.

The fact that the Baal HaTanya reveals a dual path of entering the avodah of toiling in serving Hashem while at the same time feeling the light of the unity of Hashem is alluded to in the Baal HaTanya’s name, שני-אור, which can also be read as “two lights” or a dual illumination. Of course, when the Tanya discusses the aspect of toil, this is also included in the light of the yichud.

On a simple level, the Baal HaTanya wrote in his great humility that this was merely a work for those who were close to him. But on a deeper level, this is because there are some great souls who do not follow the path of the Baal HaTanya. Rav Avraham Kalisker did not hold like the Baal HaTanya, for example. In addition, the entire path of Slonim in Chassidus is not like the way of the Baal HaTanya. Many great luminaries held that the Baal HaTanya was mistaken. These greats argued on the entire pathway of revealing the depths of Torah in this manner, even citing as proof that the Maggid had taught that the Mishnah that one whose wisdom exceeds his deeds ultimately loses his wisdom also refers to developing too much Chochmah in Chassidus.

This opinion is the path of those neshamos that are rooted in judgment, such as the Be’er Mayim Chaim, a student of the Maggid of Zlotchov who was also rooted in judgment. [Rav Michel Zlotchover died while singing a melody of his own composition during the third meal of Shabbos.] He explained the Talmudic dictum that one who does not understand the laws of divorce and marriage should not administer them metaphorically. One must first master the subject of “divorce,” that is how to distance evil, before one can focus on doing good.

Of course, these are completely valid paths in avodas Hashem, since they hold that a person first build his spiritual level before focusing on understanding the depths of Torah. According to these greats, one should only learn that which is really suited to him. But the focus of the Baal HaTanya—like Beis Hillel explained above—is to shine the light of G-dliness into a person even if he is still in an aspect of mochin d’katnus, of immature and constricted consciousness. The reason for this is similar to the Talmudic axiom that a little light dispels a great deal of darkness. This path of teaching wisdom even to small neshamos is rooted in the side of Chessed.