Text-Based Tanya—Week #78

the weekly text-based Tanya what chapter are we on 44 very good today's learning is Lily nishmas Rafael Zev Ben eliezerakain so the learning today should be the scores is nashama and uh if you want to make a bracha we have zyness and drinks here I have a little fruit smoothie here what is this green energy green energy okay so since chapter 41 we've been speaking about what have we been speaking about since chapter 41. love it off very good very good that is precisely the answer I wanted to hear in fact there's only one way you could have answered better than what you said on love um yeah that would be the only way you could have done it better and the only reason I say it's better is because in chapter 41 he says you have to start with the awe start with the respect and the boundaries and then the love which is important in interpersonal relationships as well okay and we've spoken about yeah meditation is the tool that we use to create emotions and we spoke about different meditations different meditations means it's been it's interesting because a lot of people when they think of meditation they think of zoning out so they're like what are the different meditations like different positions that you sit on the floor in and they don't understand that meditation here especially in a Chabad context means different subjects for contemplation so we spoke about different subjects for contemplation different ways to trigger different love and awe and we're going to continue with more stripes and varieties and flavors of love and all pedigm dollar chapter 44. Cole madriguez two levels of love that we've spoken about he's going to tell you what they were but who remembers last week from chapter 43 what are the two kinds of love that we spoke very good very good yeah excellent he said Abu Salem and so actually he said it in the reverse order she said the lower and then the higher he really he first says the higher and then he's like but don't worry about that and then he's like and then the lower yeah also known as it's the higher level it only comes as a Matana as a gift from above yeah and then the lower level of love which is generated through contemplation called avas Elam not eternal love like but Islam like the world and that is a love that you get through contemplating is to contemplating but what about Hashem because there's a million things the creation of Hashem which is the world thinking about the world and then redirecting or reappropriating the love that you have for things of hashem's world and realizing really that ought to go toward the one who created that world so somebody asked that last week as well where does Ava Mr Terrace come oh you weren't here oh okay and what did I say last week when someone said what about the album is this what did I say you remember does mean innate but I said it's a perfect question that you're asking and we're gonna we're coming up to it yeah so you're asking the right question because it is going to come up on its own but but not just yet but perk up your ears because it's coming okay so he says these two levels of love the higher level in the lower level can be further subdivided into Infinite sub degrees each person according to their level in other words there's many different versions of these loves as there are people and probably more like two Jews three opinions there are probably as many different ways of experiencing these loves as there are people and probably more because probably each person capable of experiencing it in different ways depending on the humidity I know for me the humidity affects my my Ava definitely definitely okay oh I say these things not to be funny by the way I just want everyone to know I mean I know it's funny but I mean it really seriously I know it's funny and I know why people laugh but I'm not I'm not I don't want to confuse anyone to think that I'm being silly I'm being I'm yeah I'm being yeah so I'm saying is like this catch-all phrase that if you really want to get technical probably includes in it in well he says infinite like so I was going to say it probably includes more different actual types of love than you could count that's what he said Lane cats yeah more than you could count but there there's a rubric within which you can fit these types of love so basically we're speaking in categories that's also a helpful thing to know when we're talking about these spiritual Concepts they're so fluid and so abstract and so nuanced just remember all these words that we use are labels for General categories don't get too technical to try to nail everything down and put it in a box these are just helpful labels but where one category overlaps with another category or sometimes even where the higher level of one category could be even lower then the lower level of a higher category am I really confusing you now there's a lot of overlap just be just what I'm saying is just relax okay so at any rate there's a lot of different types of sub degrees of these loves commercial customers like desire says about the verse where does it say where's the verse Kyle which is from where yeah initially very good excellent her husband is known at the gates but the Zaire says hello [Music] the husband who is known not beside him at the gates but the sheer the amount that each person is able to muster in other words Hashem is the husband who is known relatively each person knows Hashem on the level that they're capable of knowing him and that level also grows through a lifetime as well so it's not just each person it's each person on any given day will know Hashem at a different level so all these levels of Love are all proportionate to our capacity to know Hashem on that particular day that's why love and awe on Love Actually says here on love I called the hidden matters that belong to God it's what I was saying before it's like don't try to nail it down so much these are very fluid abstract Concepts their definitions change and overlap don't get too don't try to nail it down the Taylor meets face on the other hand Torah and Mitzvahs are the revealed matters for us and our children to do in other words you want to talk about love and all no problem I love to talk about love and all just don't get too attached to definitions because they're fluid and relative you want to talk about halacha oh no problem that we could be very technical there's a right way of doing something in a wrong way I know a lot of people get offended by that a lot of people who are into the personal relationship with Hashem I'm spiritual not religious those types and they get very offended that there's a correct or incorrect way of performing a mitzvah but you know what I know a lot of people who are into the technical side of Allah who get weirded out by the love and awe so Hashem made all types I made all types but we got to be both we got to be both we got to know which stuff is which the love and awe is nice to learn about more than nice to learn about it's vital to learn about just understand these are abstract Concepts and then as far as practical Judaism okay you want to be very very rigid and you want to say right or wrong how do you do it give me the actual parameters how much of this do I have to eat and what amount of time in order to do them it's no problem we could quantify stuff when it comes to Mitzvah observance but when it comes to love and all it's like it's very hard to quantify it's a very personal thing and it's different for each person like I said it could be even different at different moments for the same person okay we all have one total and one law talking about when it comes to action which makes sense because when you're talking about action and don't get me get get into give me any of that Quantum stuff okay I'm not interested in that right now you're talking about from like a Newtonian physics point of view the World Of Mice of action you could pretty much only do one thing one way at one time okay you can't look base Helen by shamai are both right but when it comes to chanukkah you can only light one minute or one way so when it comes to halacha everything is basically it is what it is not so when it comes to on love it's very dependent and very personalized on the person's capacity how much dos they're able to have in their heart in their mind and in their heart canisical like we said above okay so please just understand that this emotional stuff is very hard to pin down if you ask about a halacha yeah either I could tell you your yatesa you were not yet you were you you did it or you didn't do it but it comes to uh love and awe that I have the love yeah you did well no did I really well compared to the way you'll have that love tomorrow no but compared to the way your capable of doing it right now yeah well I just want you to quantify I can't quantify these These Things Are very abstract okay why is he saying this at this juncture here however there is one type of love after he gives us this preface now he throws you for a loop and he says however there's one type of love which actually contains within it all the different levels of avaraba and Ava Salem the higher love and the lower love that we learned about last week last chapter and it is equal for every Jewish Soul which is funny because we just said that love is so different for each individual and ha and now we're saying there's this love that is universal and equal for all Jewish souls and where do you get it from it is a yerusha it is an inheritance of the quest that we get from the avace here we go very good so you heard but that's very good you heard the Q when we say yerusha Allah oh hold on I remember I loved it to eurusha chapter 18. yeah okay so now we're getting to Ava Mr Ted it's very good he didn't use the word yet but you recognized it from that term yerusha very good excellent the high no and this is namely desire explains on the posseck and the verse from Tillman my soul I yearn for you at night that's what this love is called it's a long name for a love now my soul I yearn for you at night that's the name of the love what I have no idea what it means yet I'm just telling you the name of it that's it yearn for my soul my soul I'm speaking to my soul my soul I yearn for you my soul at night that's what the verse means okay and desire explains what is that level of Love described by that phrase and tell him [Music] that you love Hashem with a love of Jennifer come out this dabco Elaine boguffa of a Goofer the way that um the how should we translate this uh the way that the soul the nafish cleave to the body and the body loves them in other words um the basic desire of the body to be enlivened by the soul survival you want to know something morbid that I say every time I teach this and I always say it because in this generation everybody is so depressed and they say well not everybody wants to live you're right on a cerebral level a lot of us don't want to live but you take a depressed person and you try to suddenly drown them and they'll fight back now after they're finished fighting back they'll be like why did I fight back I wish I died so there's a survival Instinct it's hardwired the body wants to live now I wouldn't have had to say that a hundred years ago because everyone 100 years ago knew that everyone wants to live well they were they spent a lot of energy on survival so they all knew they wanted to live yeah so in this generation we all think we want to die which is true on some level there's a part of us that is morbid and self-destructive Freud called it the death wish which I believe is actually the you want to hear my theory is that Freud was talking about the desire of the nephishella kiss for self-annihilation not in a self-punishing way but its desire to become subsumed in the Oneness to lose its separate selfhood and that's what he was he didn't have words for because he uh yeah you know young he part from Freud because of spirituality Jung was very into spirituality as essential to mental health and Freud being Jewish could not afford that luxury being Jewish he could not admit that spirituality had any real place in The Human Experience it's funny how how much Jews will fight with their own jewishness and then have a huge disproportionate influence on secularizing the entire world just because they're uncomfortable with their own jewishness he was married to a very religious woman oh Freud yeah yeah it's probably very threatening yeah yeah why no Freud grew up in a secular uh you know very comfortable in in I mean during one of those periods in history where no he was not persecuted no so the soul or the body wants to stay alive the body wants the soul don't get distracted okay I know I'm very interesting and all my little asides are podcast worthy okay but don't get too excited about it let's stay back on topic okay don't worry about it just let's stay very very focused the body wants the soul right let's just keep it really simple the body wants the soul right okay right the body wants the soul so just remember that that's what it means my soul I yearn for you who's speaking to whom the body speaking to the soul and saying I want you because you're my life I don't want to die Klima that is to say now we're going to shift it okay on a higher level you Hashem are my soul my life my real life yearn for you meaning I yearn for you like a person who's yearning for his life force for instance if he's sick and weak um a person who's weak and he doesn't have his life force he yearns for his life force to uh to return to him so that's what we're describing the the love of Hashem that is akin to the body's yearning for the energy of the soul to fill it we want Hashem why not because of obviously law because Hashem created everything and everything's so exciting but hold on why are you excited about the things he made be excited about him himself that's a whole meditation this is much more simple you have a hard-wired desire not to die to be alive when you're not overthinking things okay that simple desire for your life force is the most basic desire for Hashem you want the life force because he is the life force period simple as that this is what we're set yes so this is the love that we're describing now it is a love of Hashem that is first of all Universal called it because it is just the basic desire of the organism to maintain its life when he goes to sleep now say he hopes to be re-energized by his sleep tired person imagine a tired person in such a way do I yearn for the infinite light the true life of all lives that when I get up in the middle of the night to learn I'm yearning for my life to be returned to me for Hashem and Torah are totally won Toyota Hashem are totally won at any rate the point is I'm loving Hashem I'm yearning for Hashem the way I'm the most basic level the body wants the soul to keep it alive commercial customers like desire says person gets up every night let's talk about people get up at midnight and serve Hashem until the morning okay so that is the type of love that is sort of like the avamed about back in chapter 18 in chapter 19. it is similar because it is a yerusha in fact it's not just similar it's the same love really but it's an inheritance yeah I mean as opposed to what why why does he highlight it's an inheritance cultivating it through meditation right very good like Ava Salem you have to actually go engage in that cognitive exercise in order to create that love this he's saying it's already there in fact it's the most Basic Instinct that's just hardwired you don't want to die now there's a certain little bit of cognitive exercise required here because you do actually have to be intelligent enough to make the analogy that your desire to not die actually is here's a little bit of a cognitive step your desire for Hashem who is that life force or the source of that life force so you have to actually be capable of making that Association ah this desire that my body has for life is ultimately a basic expression of my desire to have Hashem the life of all lives present in my life a very generous manipulation almost it says yeah but he's making a a statement that this is already Universal and and I think it could be demonstrated like I said even a depressed person if you sudden if you sneak up on them suddenly and try to kill them they'll fight for their life yeah but until then they're still struggling it doesn't matter that's not my point to the to the contrary that only that only amplifies the point so somebody could tell that tell you they're suicidal and a second later you try to run up and murder them and somehow their body will fight back and after they fight off the attack they'll say why did I do that I wish I died but it's amazing it's remarkable that there's this basic desire for life yes correct yes it is self-serving it's only a manipulation if you don't believe that these two things are really related but he's saying that these two things are not only related but they're the same thing correct so he's like just jfyi uh he says I'm not getting into whole theology class right now we're not talking about the greatness of God the greatness of creation and all that that obvious Alum stuff you can contemplate another time he says I just want to tell you on a really simple level this desire that you have to not be weak and tired and exhausted and drained the desire that you have that your energy should be within you should feel alive you don't want to feel drained you want to feel energized he says okay what is that energy that's Hashem so you already desire our shop it's just another tool in the toolkit if you don't want to use this you can go back to other Salem or you could wait around forever to kick in okay and if you don't like this one we have another one in the back he's going to whip out another Advocate okay get ready high humidity it really depends some people thrive on them okay let me Zoom now we have a greater love a love that is greater than that it is similarly also an inherited love that every single Jewish Saul has installed like when you get the not that I've used a Windows computer in over 20 years but you get the right get the Windows Office Suite when you get the right you get Microsoft Word I still I've been using a Mac for 20 years and I still have to get the Microsoft Word for Mac it's so dominant I remember back in the 90s that every computer every computer was a PC would have Microsoft Word I don't know why that's my muscle for it but anyways so yeah what's the question Jewish Souls because what you're talking about an inheritance that you got from your fathers so this is a family thing these are the people who are the spiritual descendants of Abraham Isaac and Jacob so this is an inheritance we got from the uh from the others he Master closer but I am not and it is what is referred to in that as a section of Zaya like a son who strives for his father and mother did he loves more than his own self and Soul and Spirit This Is filial Love filial devotion the son who loves his parents you're going to say again this is even worse than the previous thing because today everyone will say they don't want to live and they don't love their parents all the basic things that the altareba used is like we don't even have to discuss it because it's so Universal and we live in such a world today where all these basic Universal things are in question it's like everybody likes to live no we don't like to live right and we're not even being contrarian we're that messed up but hold on a second let me illustrate this just like I explained before everyone wants to live okay and I told you how I could prove that so everyone loves their parents no I hate my parents that's why I've been therapy for 30 years okay let me explain something to you even somebody who hates their parents loves their parents which is why you're in therapy for 30 years you're not in therapy for 30 years because of all the other people you hate there is a basic fundamental natural connection to love your parents and when for whatever reason that becomes difficult or impossible it causes huge disruptions precisely because it's such a basic normal thing well we're gonna get there we're gonna get there we're gonna get there how do you know you're in a relationship right that when you hate somebody you don't just move on right even if you don't talk to them anymore we're gonna get to hold on a second okay thank you so we have this basic love a child has this basic love for their parents now he says do we not all have one father so similar to Navy seekha where you take your basic desire for life and you transfer it over to you don't even transfer it you identify that it is a desire for Hashem so similarly here we say you take this phenomenon of the love that a child has for a parent and you realize that that is really the love that we have for our Father in heaven for Hashem again what do these two loves have in common that they are building on something that's Universal that's already in the the factory default settings like I said it's like getting Microsoft Word with your Windows computer it's already there is [Music] and although who could dare approach the level of love even a thousandth of it that the faithful Shepherd that means my should obey no had meaning these paradigms really originally in context to describing Hashem May should have been his relationship with Hashem nevertheless [Music] there is at least a smidge and a tiny degree of it that we are able to experience mayor Le qualities which shines into the general body of Jewish souls in every generation like it says there's an extension of in every generation to illuminate the generation however this extension of Maisha Obama which is present in our souls is in a hidden State Allah and in order to bring it out from its latent State into a revealed state liais bisgales so that should actually be felt in your heart and mind like it is not wondrously removed from you but it is accessible it is near to you in your mouth and in your heart remember this is from the title page this matter is very near to you in your mouth in your heart that you may do it is what does it mean it's near to you that it should be habitual on your tongue and in your voice to summon up this intent in your heart and in your mind that means to regularly delve in mentally to these matters about Hashem is our true father and the source of our life that's referring to those two types of love and to arouse in your heart the love for Hashem which is like the love for a father so anyways he's saying it's interesting these are based on factory default settings but they require some degree of mental exercise sort of hybrid between the Ava mesuteres and the Ava that we bring about through meditation because it's not made whole cloth for meditation like Ava Salam is but it is uh it does require some degree of meditation he says however it's not so hard if you habituate yourself this way it will become second nature and even if you think you're fooling yourself and that it's not authentic don't worry because it really is true deep down the album Mr Terrace is there the love of Hashem is there in other words don't think you're faking it that you're fooling yourself to think that you're creating this love because you don't have to create this love because it's already installed in you so don't worry about that it's just bringing it out into a revealed way so that actually gets translated into action what does it mean to bring it into action it means the tighter you learn the mixers that you do because of this love is to give pleasure to Hashem like a son who wants to give gratification and wants to give not us to his father so at any rate the love is there no matter what you do it's just the activating it that's going to require uh your work yeah is not a meditation though he just calls it to remember he calls it remembering no his whole point no then what will be the point of it okay so let's go back to that but I want to do it in 60 seconds or less the point of the Ava Mr Terrace is not that it gets triggered by a case of martyrdom that is not the point that's an illustration that it is there it is there because we see that non-observant Jews will give up their lives throughout history in order to remain Jewish so that's the proof that the phenomenon exists that's not what he says to do he doesn't say to hire uh the Spanish Inquisition just creep up on you but that's not his point no no no no no no no no the trigger is the illustration that the phenomenon exists as far as an avoida what he tells you to do about it he says to remember that it's there to remember that it's there when you'll remember without a trigger that's his whole point if you're going to wait around for a trigger then then he didn't give you anything but what he's saying here is this is not remembering something that's already there this is using something that's already there as your subject of meditation which is a little bit of a hybrid because it is meditation but it's meditating on something where you're already working with a certain Baseline they're remembering the true advocateus that you call the the short way back in chapters 18-25 yeah you activate that love just by remembering that it's there here you're building on it through some type of mental exercise but you're building it it's already there so it's like a hybrid it's not straight meditation but it's not straight triggering we'll call it triggering but it's not really triggering it's an internal activation of the of the Hidden love so this is a hybrid which was exactly what you asked before we started the chapter like hey what's up with others and Terrace so this is what he's up to now okay regarding this it says that Hashem includes or matches a good intent to a deed liaise godfin Le particular that gives the action wings to fly above like we spoke about earlier we said chapter 17. it's either 16 or 17. that sometimes you can't achieve real Ava or real Europe but just the desire to do so if it's enough to bring you to action so that can serve as wings for the mitzvah and he's saying the same thing over here just the fact that you consciously think about these loves so whatever the outcome as long as it gets you to do what you need to do so it is serving its purpose and the pleasure that Hashem has for his part and that you could also vicariously have for your on behalf of your soul is like the metaphor of these the King's son who was in prison and comes out what we spoke about in chapter 33 about having Joy about hashem's joy that he's getting a Dwelling Place in this world foreign this level the first love we spoke about today it is not that hard to activate it if you habituate yourself to do so however let's say you're not able to manage to bring it out nevertheless then fine just think about it and that'll count as if you actually connected with that level of love so you're going to tell me I thought about it and I didn't feel it fine no problem as long as you thought about it it counts I mean as long as you thought about it and then you did what you're supposed to do afterwards meaning you actually learned then that counts always wins but that's the whole no no no no no no no no no no no that's the whole point Hashem combines a good intent to a miser to a deed you have to have the deed you have to have the deed if you don't have the deed then you can have really amazing loving all and that's worthless but if you do have the deed then even very puny love and all will count will be enough you just have to make sure to follow through with the deed okay we're almost finished with this chapter I'd like to finish this chapter today these two types of love that we spoke about now and like a son who strives for his father and mother the two loves my soul I yearn for you and like a son who strives for his father and mother those are the names of those two loves today although they are both he made the point they are both inherited they're hardwired in the soul as well as the awe that's included within them because it's never just purely love the Love Has within it the all the fear of separation from your beloved [Music] there's an awe that's included in that love which is the fear to be separate from your father or your source of life he says these loves or AWS Oz or loves are not called tivium natural Alex except if you just leave them alone to be totally instinctive for us is then they only lift up the Mitzvahs that you do because of them to the world of yitziro avocation but if you bring them out to actually feel them meaning you activate them through meditation then it's called the arousal of the heart then it goes much higher goes to the world of Champions and lifts up the Titan Mitzvahs that you do because of them up to that level in other words he says like this if you don't do anything with these two types of love then at the very least as long as you act on them when I say don't do anything I mean don't meditate on them you just leave them raw and natural as long as you act on them and they bring you to do Toyota Mitzvahs so it's of a certain level which he calls yitziro but if you add to it some type of contemplation where you meditate on it as a subject to meditation to amplify it then it kicks it up to another level goes up to the level of Brio chios because in order to get these native instinctive loves to come out into your heart in a in a conscious way takes Focus takes meditation takes uh constant practice to think about how Hashem is our true father and our true life true father is that one type of Love true life is the other type of love right well actually the other order true life and our true father so when you think about how it is true then you get the best of both worlds you guys understand this is very very simple okay there is natural love and there is intellectually generated love so chapters 18-25 is a prime example of which is natural or intellectually generated natural and let's say previous chapter 43 when it talked about Ava Salem primary example of intellectually generated and here in chapter 44 and what are they a hybrid you're taking something that's natural but you're amping it up through some meditation um should know what it says in the desire the mother roosts he's describing anything that is born from intellectual contemplation has that relationship to that world of video Which is higher it's higher than you two yatira is just uh emotional this is intellectual the light ate furthermore is he says now I want to tell you something even more these two types of love that we've been speaking about in chapter 44. these two types of Love we've been speaking about actually have within them an aspect of Alvarado remember from the previous chapter we said there is but don't worry about it because you can't detain it through meditation so he says I want to tell you something these two types of love we're learning about in this chapter they actually have something that you couldn't get through Ava Salem they have a certain aspect of avaraba right he says not like Abba Salam Ence however don't think that you shouldn't engage in Avis you still should in order to get that fire of love to to shoot up you should still do the absalam to get it you fan its fire until no water could put it out why why should okay let me back up he says because these two lives we're learning about this week are hybrids they have in as much as they are natural they have a certain similarity to the rabba is also something you can't create it's not of human effort it's a Matana well this is a yerusha it's similar in that respect oh so now I can just skip Ava Salem he says no don't skip Ava Salem still you do all of them do all of them still do Ava Salem which means intellectually generated love because why because when avas Elum is really raging and on fire when it is then it's more powerful than enough common like the advantage of gold over silver has a certain gold is silver with fire in it metaphorically there's a certain fire in it certain passion the meditation is the fire and the passion as opposed to something that you didn't work for because it's already installed in you so there's no fire and passion it's more calm the gun keys he says also this is the whole purpose of life is to work on trying to create more love and awe so don't exempt yourself from Ava Salem says everybody has to try to contemplate the greatness the glory of God according to their capacity commissioner like it says Hashem created the world in order to be known so the purpose of life is to know him which means you got to work as much as possible intellectually to try to contemplate and to appreciate so don't exempt yourself from Ava Salem that we learned about in the previous chapter however please appreciate that these two types of love we're learning about in chapter have a certain advantage over Ava Salem following the advantage of the two types of love from chapter 44. because they are yerusha they are given to us then they are greater than anything we could have accomplished on our own and in that sense they're similar to avaraba which is love that was given to us as well which is greater than anything we could accomplish on our own nevertheless still engage in the meditations that bring about Abbas Alam from the previous chapter because first of all is on fire then it is a greater form of love than these other two loves and also he says because that's the purpose of life the purpose of life is to come down into a body and try as much as you can to uh connect through your through your own mind through your own ability to to contemplate so don't just skip that and say oh great I got these two types of love that are basically already done for me like a Betty Crocker cake mix that's what they are you know it's like oh you're such a good Baker well the secret is a mix of a cake mix right whereas Ava Salam is like no you went out and you bought a sack of flour and eggs and you know whatever else it's much more maybe even you grew the wheat not sure to think about the metaphor but okay much more labor intensive it's much more labor in terms Ava Salem is much more labor intensive correct correct but because it's labor intensive it's going to be proportionate to your labor whereas were given by Hashem or mostly given by Hashem so it has that certain capacity that's beyond what a finite being could access self-made as opposed to someone who inherited right exactly and so we have both we have the self-made man and the trust fund baby types of love right and we should do both we should do both okay very good