Question & Answer With Yitz - Charting Likutey Moharan

A Simple Jew asks:

Rebbe Nachman of Breslov said that his teachings were made up entirely of complex linkages known as bechinos. Has anyone gone through all the lessons in Likutey Moharan and made a chart that visually displays the connections between all these bechinos?

If not, would you imagine that such a chart would help a person better navigative the intricacies of this sefer and aid his understanding?

Yitz of A Waxing Wellspring answers:

Until recently I really would have thought 'yes' .. but now, where I'm holding, I think when someone tries to learn Torah as if its the same thing as learning information, we're missing the essence of what it is to learn Torah. Part of not charting it out is forcing yourself to make it a part of you.

There will always be those people who argue for charting it out, and when it does happen, I think it will be a good thing, but it will also be a sad thing, just as the writing down of the Mishnah was. It means that people wont have to work as hard to attain it and so, it's value has been somehow cheapened. Yes, there's nothing stopping someone from learning it without the charts, ie. the old fashioned way, but how many people do you know that memorize the whole Mishnah rather than keep it handy on their iPhone/PocketPC. (or people who do the Daf without Artscroll because they really want to work for it.)

The other downside of the chart is mistaking the ability to understand the sefer at a glance with the deep relationship that only develops with time. When people see it and think it makes sense, think they get it, it's significantly less interesting. This is the same sort of problem people have with traditional Judaism when they want to return, they think they know what it is, when what they think they know is a bunch of superficial observations.

It's easy for me to describe this because I see how guilty I am of these things on a daily basis.