Tanya (Part 13)

Good morning Boker to welcome back to 10 minutes of meaning. Please help yourself to coffee slashes pastries in Arabila corner. Want to express our gratitude to 10 minutes of meaning. Generously sponsored by our dear friends Marilyn and Michael Fedak. Thank you so much for your generosity in this and so much more. We are learning together not teaching but learning together say and we are middle of second per the first per spoke about the first soul the lowliest soul we have the nephish bahame the animal soul a soul that we're not trying to slaughter or purge the animal in us but train and elevate and empower and enrich and take the animal impulse the animal instinct our nature the five senses the way in which we experience the world physically and to have it serve the higher soul which is the beginning of the second parag. The second parag deals with that we are all we're each a piece of God. And so when searching for God, evidence, proof, a feeling of Hashem's existence, we don't have to look everywhere outside of ourselves. All we have to do is look within ourselves because where Hashem can be found most poignantly, most profoundly, most potently is in the mirror is within our very self. So we last left off in the Balatana was describing that the truth is that all souls to a certain degree are equal an element of the soul. All souls are equal and that we all emanate. We all come from himself. as the metaphor of the child is born from the seed of the father and again in antiquity they thought that the seed began in the brain and from the brain descended down the spinal cord and from there the insemination the child was formed and we saw said that's protected connected to the pituitary gland other ways of interpreting the decision for conception begins in the brain and filters down but for our purposes the balatanya now talks about that that original seed of that conceives begins life has within it all of the potential within the person. So it begins as a as one cell and splits several times. In that one cell ultimately is the person's brain and the person's toenails. Every part of the person from the head to the toe from the kila to the every part of the person is incorporated and programmed and designed and contained within that original original spark within that original seed. Even ultimately the toenails are formed from the very same drop that the child's higher faculties that their brain that their intellect comes from through a nine-month gestation in the mother and that drop ultimately progresses downward is transformed evolves so that the same thing that ultimately expresses itself in the brain is the source of the toenail. They both come from the same the same place. Even in the nail the drop is only changed in the form but the inner identity the source the origin is the same as the branch. So even the child's body itself all the organs are nourished by the brain. So now we can understand in the child the nails draw their spiritual nourishment and energy from the brain in the child's head. So what's this metaphor? What is the balana getting at? He's first referencing two sources for the relationship between what the father contributes what's contained in that original drop of seed how it evolves and develops and manifests in the different parts of that child. tells us that the seed of the father the white the form the tendons the bones and the nails this connects not for now to the secret of Adam's clothing in the garden of Eden that according to the medish his body was like a body armor made with nails and this connects to that and I say not for now to impress you as if I could explain it I just don't have time now but the truth is that's a cover for the fact that I can't explain it anytime not only not now but we'll stick with the not for now. So now that we depict it in detail, the lowliest part of that child, right? So a husband and a wife conceive and the husband contributes his seed and in that moment in that moment that he contributes that seed begins a process of conception, gestation and what will come out will be a healthy baby. And what the father contributed will not only be in the baby's brain, intellect, cognitive capacity, but the baby's toenail. The baby's toes, the lowliest part so to say of the baby is also finds its origin in that original contribution of that original seed. So it all connects back to the brain of the father and mirroring this precisely. And here the batan used the word. I saw someone sent me shared with me this week uh the Reb was reviewing a writeup of one of his talks where he spoke about we comfort we console Hashem and he wrote in the margin the word the Reb was insistent that whenever we depict an emotion a feeling a description of Hashem it's important like the balata to use the word what does the word kul mean figuratively don't project human experience human uh body on the sh it's a vocabulary that we can use to relate to identify to understand because that's our experience but of course is categorically different so when we ascribe it to him in anthropomorphism we have to use the word figuratively the insisted here the metaphor is perfect and exact figuratively The metaphor is perfect and exact as a metaphor in the root of everybody is the super root of the as they descend rung by rung from Hashem's wisdom. In other words, here in the in the metaphor, Hashem is the father. From his brain descended this seed that's going to inseminate the world with us, his children. And it happens this development this insemination this seeding the world through the chain of four spiritual worlds which are called we'll get more into as the PK says in you made them all with wisdom it all comes from your brain Hashem so we let me summarize we you and I all of us every year is an expression a unique and distinct manifestation expression of Hashem in this world from where his brain because again the Balatanya invoked the Rambam that Hashem is wisdom and intellect the Mar disagreed and said that's not all Hashem is he's more than that but the Balatana at least in this context quoted the Rambam so from Hashem's brain intelligence truth wisdom he inseminates the world namely in us and even the lowly even the pathetic Even the insignificant even the temporary and temporal us are expression manifestation of that brain of of Hashem Miller in his uh commentary here has a thought why do I feel such a wondrous and powerful unity with my own biological child because that child came from me it's an essential expression of who I am in the same sense I'm a child of Hashem since my soul is derived one way or another from his superaler wisdom which is an essential expression of who he is so the love that we have for our children Not only because of the sacrifice and the effort and the selflessness that we give to our children but because the child is an expression of us contains our very DNA is an extension an expression of us. We are an expression are an extension of Hashem and the same unconditional love we have for a child as an extension and expression of ourselves has that boundless endless unconditional love for us as an extension and expression of him through his superal through his superal wisdom. So then the balatana continues now that he's given this metaphor just like the seed that begins in the father's brain descends comes and seminates and then the child from the child's brain all the way down to the child's toenail all are an expression of fulfillment the manifestation of that original seed that came from the brain we are all from Hashem's brain that descended and emanated through those four worlds and developed and through his own constriction expresses itself in us And the result of this spiritual downgrade, this evolution through the four worlds is that from his divine wisdom, from his brain came of is not meant here to be a disparaging, not meant to be um judgmental. It's a description of common folk. It means that you don't have to be the biggest grace of you don't have to be the most righteous. You don't have to be the biggest. You don't have to be in the Torah. It means it means the common folk, the average man that the uh through through simple people and common folk. But nevertheless, like a biological child, those souls still remain bound with the wonders and awesome unity with our original essential source with the original seed that began it all. So just like if you were to see someone's toe or toenail, you would say, you probably would say a toenail. It's the is that the expression of a person? This I'd like to introduce myself. This is my toenail. This says everything about who I am. I don't know, maybe some people paint their toenails and put jewelry on the toes and but the average toenail is not the best. They're not putting their best foot forward, pun intended. But the to the toenail is the lowest most base expression of who a person is. That's compared to the amarat the lowliest, most base, most uneducated, most ignorant, most simple person is also coming from just like the toenail comes from the same place that created my brain also developed, evolved, descended into expressing itself in my toenail. My bone and my toenail come from the same place. Even the brain is a much much much more sophisticated expression of that original spark and seed than the toenail. But they came from the same place. So even the it's the common folk the every man every all of us are direct emanation of the of the supernal wisdom of Hashem. They come from his brain. The the sophisticated advanced brain of Claw Israel and the lowliest toenail of Claw Israel have at their core everything in common in coming from the same place that original sparked that original seed which leads us now to the third part of the second per which is the end of the second par. The third part takes us took us from the first paric was the nephesh Bahami the animal soul. The beginning of the second paric was that we have what he calls the is the second and we talked about why is it called the second that we're all made from literally that is not interestingly that's not that's not a metaphor that's not figurative there the says the word we are not metaphorically not not using it as some drussia Not saying it hypothetically but literally literally and then he unpacks that what does that mean that all of us are a piece of God. It means from Hashem's brain is superal wisdom he seated all of the Jewish people and whether we a particular Jew is a toenail or the brain we all come from the same sparkal wisdom the same source and we all have the same origin namely our father Hashem. Now the third part the bala moves to the notion of the leader the sadic because the saddic is not the toenail the saddic is the brain of the child. So that child has a brain, liver, lungs, kidneys and toenails. Who in cla are the brain and who's the toenail? The tenonail can say to the brain, whoa, relax. We both come from the same seed. True. But the brain can say that may be true, but the brain is more sophisticated, more advanced, contributes more than the toenail. So the bala then moves to the role and the goal of the sadic. We end with this of the average person, the simple people are nurtured and energized from the and the scholars the heads of the children Jewish people in their generation which is so in other words what dictates to wiggle the toe. What is determining for the toenail to grow? What decides when it's time to cut the toenail or in particular cases certainly not mine get a pedicure for the toenail? What decides all that? The brain. So yes, the toenail says I come from the same place as you the brain. But the brain is what dictates for the toenail determines for the toenail is what decides for the toenail. So we too the aha we may be able to proudly say we say find our source in the seed the supernal wisdom the brain of our shared father hashem but but we derive we are nurtured and energized from you the sadikim of the generation who are the brain of the generation so the idea of the sole connection between spiritual master and disciple is becomes a center p focus ofus and of kabad in particular and we'll pick up with next week. My friend Rabbi Vovvski was explaining to me that the Balatana's understanding of the role of the saddic, the doctrine, what they call what scholars who like to study this call the doctrine of the righteous, the doctrine of the sadic is different than otherus the role. So for example, apparently on a site says otheruska they don't say ever. It's always somebody's site and a site is a reason to omit on a site which is reflective of a fundamental difference in understanding the role of the and we'll pick up with this next time the third part of the second per of may it be a day of Yeshua for