A private conversation between two Rebbes

all right so this is from the fourth volume of from the suus from uh the additional material in the back and the um title is the 13th day of the month of Tish which is the the Y site of theah fourth and um being that this is this is an edited talk uh the original was meaning the day itself of which for that occasion uh the year was T base which would have been not yet not 1962 because you know the uh Jewish year changes a few months before secular year so it would have been like the last few months of 196 at any R in Con in connection with the 13th of Tish which is the yard site the day of passing of theah I'm going to tell a story that I was saying in first person I'm going to tell a story from the one who Y is today that happened in his youth in the year either or t z that means either 5606 or 5607 meaning what 1846 or 1847 is my math right yeah I think so at any rate it had to have been before the publishing of in 5608 1848 the was very fond of his son the who used to come enter into his room every single day okay theed had seven sons that was the youngest and the eventual successor all of the brothers became leaders in some capacity uh but they took on uh leadership of different communities the marash was the one who inherited luich the actual town of lubich the leadership there and he was the next in the link of the chain of rebis at any rate so the reash used to enter into his father theed every single day and then sometimes sometimes a few times one time he entered at a late hour at night after meaning the private audiences that had gone on for a long time so apparently the tamik had been entertaining uh visitors I don't mean entertaining visitors like uh you know serving tea I mean granting Yus that means allowing people to come in and have their soul to- Soul moment which uh y this is a time where one seeks not just uh councel and advice and guidance and blessing but it's a time of um bearing one's Soul it's a special type of meeting that has with the so the had been granting meetings and it went on for a long time more than usual so it was a particularly long session of in the course of their conversation so now that is speaking with the um that complained in front of his son about the about how much time was spent because of the and he said what do they want from me um not sure if I'm capable of conveying this but the reason that I find this s fascinating and why I wanted to share it with you is because of this incredibly rare glimpse into the behind the scenes um there are very few stories that give this level of the private uh behind the scenes conversations and mentality and perspective of the Reb it's just highly unusual that we would have a story like this and obviously the fact that that AB told this story was deliberate um that EBA was privy to many Insider stories that he would have heard mostly from his father-in-law um and that EBA whenever that would choose to reveal one of these stories it was always extreme I mean everything that I did was extremely deliberate but especially we're talking about this was at a public address remember this was a fa so the is basically creating public record and that's a very crass way of saying saying it is creating public record it's more than that it's when it debba says something it's bringing it more into the world making it more of a a reality here at any rate I just think it's a such an interesting Insight at any rate so the says to the I want to be careful how we describe it because I want to be very um mindful we're talking about extremely holy people here but forgive me for the crass expression after an exhausting day of work okay uh you understand his day of work was means literally opening yourself up to connect to the deepest deepest soul of the people who are seeking you out so he turns to his son he says what do they want from me I could be learning during this time I could be learning during this time and and you think about what that means we're not talking about somebody who is is trying to be comfortable in life and he's trying to choose between what he prefers personally we're talking about somebody who's devoted his entire life to to the community the is saying like why do they why do they think basically how I'm interpreting it and I I hope I'm not taking Liberties why do they think this is the best use of my time I want you to understand the is not complaining like you know I like chocolate instead of vanilla it's not a personal preference thing what he saying is why did they force me to spend so much time in this capacity meaning taking these y meetings when I could be learning during that time meaning ostensibly what the is accomplishing through his learning is more Ben beneficial to the world and and even to those people who are seeking him out it's more beneficial than granting these these audiences and remember what do these people coming in talking about um a lot of them are coming in talking about parosa the you know they they can't make enough money and which what should they move towns for a new business opportunity or they're asking about health matters for a family member or a shid they're trying to marry off a kid you know real mundane pedestrian day-to-day type stuff and you're talking about again I really hope I'm not being crash here but imagine if somebody could when Albert Einstein was at Princeton you ever seen that picture somebody came in on the day he died and they took a picture of his desk and the chalkboard in the background imagine if anyone who wanted to could just walk in I mean I guess wait your turn but then walk after waiting your turn you walk into Albert Einstein's office while he's in the middle of figuring out the whatever he was working on he already did the theory of relativity at that point but you can go to Princeton and come in and say um to Albert Einstein um I had to sell my cow this year and I'm not sure how I'm going to make a living and I have a couple kids who need to get married like please you see these chalkboards over here that means I'm involved in some deep stuff I can't really be having this conversation right now right okay so it's kind of wild this idea that we're coming to a Torah giant was absolutely prolific as far as not only very similar to his his grandfather the AL not just uhis the Ty pus but also hanig the revealed parts of T he was a pisc AIC means he was a halik um ruler he made decisions people would write to him with h uh dilemas so he wasn't just uh a master of the mystical parts of TOA but also of the revealed what we call the revealed parts of t meaning the legalistic so he's complaining to his son that manash and saying what do they want from me I could be learning during this time didn't answer anything rather what he did that got up and he walked over to the um I shouldn't say he got up maybe he was already standing it's possible that he stood quite possibly he stood always in the presence of his father but he walked over to the Bookshelf where the d d is an acronym elim the words of the Living God that's aidic way of referring refering to the writings of the mym that says so there were there were writings of the's own his own my mod um and they were on the Shelf there in the room so that got up and he walked over to where these these books these SPM these holy books were he removed the or he um yeah he removed the curtain and in parenthesis it says for this bookshelf there were no doors it wasn't like a cabinet but rather what they did is they spread out upon it Vin a curtain so the removed the curtain I don't think it means he took it off probably means he like you know lifted it to reveal the uh theum the the holy books that were there and he started counting the number of volumes that were on one of the shelves he counted more than 30 volumes and he turned to his father with a question you know they say what's the most Jewish answer to a question another question so what what had theed asked what do they want what do they want from me I could be learning during this time that abam marash did not answer rather he got up he walked Ian again I don't know if he got up he walked over to the Bookshelf he parted the curtain and he starts counting the books these are not books that theik owned it wasn't to show him what a big Library he owned these were books that he had off authored in his lifetime and he starts counting them 1 2 3 4 and he got up to over 30 books and that turned to his father and he asked him a question would his father have been able to write so many my if he hadn't received so many people in answered yes you're right you understand the question would you have been able to write all of these books if you hadn't given people as much as you as much as you had done and theed answered him you're right actually meaning I wouldn't have been able to produce so much in writing if I had not granted so many people when my father-in-law told this story that I is saying when his father I mean his father-in-law his his reab the F Reb told this story he added maybe this will give us more clues into understanding the meaning of what happened there were three types three categories within the writings of the so theb is saying when his father-in-law told this story he would add to the story this fact which was that the writings included three categories Al my modm sh transcripts of my modm that he heard meaning from the Al from his grandfather b um commentaries or explanations of my modm meaning not just a strict transcript but his elucidation of what the mimer was saying gim mym that he himself had authored as a Reb in his own right okay because the first two categories are either the transcripts of another Reb or his commentaries of the motem of another the third category are his own original my modm and most of the volumes that were on that particular shelf mentioned in the story H gimo were from the third category just information to share with you that when the FED would tell this story or when he told it he added that piece of information by the way jfyi when the pointed out that one shelf and said would you have managed to produce so much if you hadn't granted so much time to and he and the said no the the the books or the holy books that the madash was pointing to mostly were the original insights of the Tam okay it's understood that when the said I could have been learning during this time it is obvious that when he said I could have been learning more during this time it his intention was not to hold back or even to diminish the influence that he was giving through Yus in order to learn more for himself that's not Poss you understand thatb saying it's not like he was saying he would like to take away time from others and give more time for himself because it is a that you are not only allowed to you're supposed to be you're supposed to negate the study of Torah if if when there's a Mitzvah that only you can fulfill and what the was able to accomplish through what he was able to give people through nobody else could give that only the could do it so he had permission according to T to do what he was doing and furthermore we are promised that when you give TOA in this case not just monetary but with your heart and soul your brain and heart become refined a thousandfold so theb is saying like this when the was saying why do they make me have these meetings I could be learning during this time it wasn't like he was saying I want to take away from what I'm doing for the people rather we have to look at it like like this first of all he had a Torah dispensation clearly to not be learning during that time because giving Yus was a Mitzvah that only he could do okay and also by granting Yus it was refining his heart and mind meaning it was making it possible for him to learn on an even higher level during the times when he was learning Al so rather sh what was he intending to say that through learning he could actually deliver the same thing he was delivering through parentheses similar to the way rash shim was able to make it rain through his to study others would pray for rain Reby shim would learn TOA his TOA would make it rain in other words the was saying like this why are they asking to get from me in this style of delivery I could go learn not instead of giving them what they want I could go learn in order to give them what they want I can give them what they want I can give it to them through learning that the's learning would have been able to deliver to them what what they wanted what they were seeking in you understand what was saying he wasn't complaining at saying how could they take me away froma because we know that toyra exempts somebody when they're doing a Mitzvah that nobody else can do he wasn't saying I'm losing out on my li because we know that by giving generously to other people it was refining his mind and heart so during times he was able to learn he was able to quote unquote catch up really what he was saying was why do they want me to deliver it this way I can give them the same end result through my learning okay so now we understand the father's question now we have to understand the son's answer following okay and this is what the answered that the power to write my mm of the third category meaning that which constituted his own insights as a Reb unto himself and to reveal the hidden Torah in a revealed way it came about specifically in a manner of his literally translated means in clothing or investment like a lush is a a garment hisus means that when you take something and you dress it up in another thing there are two ways that something particularly we're talking about uh something intangible can be transmitted one is you just put it out there and it's out there the other is his slous we actually getting it to fit the recipient in an integrated way so what we're saying is like this the could have generated and put it out in the world and it would have been in the world and it surely would have had a certain kind of effect in the world just just for existing but hisus means that it was put out there in a way that was accessible that people were able to relate to it let's we're in the middle of a sentence I want to just finish here we know the is the revelation of the of the soul the fifth level which is not a level which which is really the core the essence of the Soul and from the the level of comes forth the power to say and write follow what what the Reb is saying here it's not just the of the who are coming to it's also the and when and in in truth once you're talking about y you can't even make such differ differentiation between the and the because that's the whole point means means Oneness that it was specifically The Forum of Yus that put theed into a mode of his slous that whatever holy energy he was giving off was transmitted in a form that others were able to integrate it now what does that mean it becomes slightly more apparent as we continue but at this point just let's let's let's establish like this in theory the tamed could have benefited those people just by putting out more books and that indeed was what he was complaining he was saying I could be more involved in scholarship my scholarship would help people my scholarship would make the world a better place for those very people who are seing me and that that abash was pointing out yeah but there are different modes of having an influence and specifically it's the Forum that puts your influence into a mode of his where what you're putting out there is being received in an integrated fashion during the no no it doesn't mean that you're sitting Inus and you're processing the the content of your books that's not not what it means it means that the time that the is spending with people oneon-one is changing the way that his influence is received in the world or maybe even changing the way he puts out his influence how much time do we have over here 11 okay let's move quickly this answer had to come from his son who afterwards became his successor it was he specifically who was able to to arouse this in his father meaning his son who was not yet a reab but who would go on to be a reab and understood at least in some potential form what a reab is and he was able to point out to his father how Theus format was essential to his father's role as a reban the whole question for does not know that saying how did he not know it before first of all every good teacher only tells you what you already know what do they of course all truth is uh plagiarism only lies are original but sometimes you need to hear it confirmed or you need to hear it stated in a little bit different terminology in fact that's a probably probably a pretty good example of hisus like I always kind of knew that to be true but it didn't click for me until so and so said it in such and such a format that's a great example of his lobus at any rate probably also he wanted to make sure that his son knows it too well could also be that he wanted his son to know but I think it was also a genuine interaction I think it was a genuine uh question the tamed was asking maybe it was just like a frustration well I think it was a frustration actually asking just like frustrated at that specific moment of all the time had thought he could have been learning Torah right yeah I'm sure all of these things are true okay let's let's continue here we don't have a lot of time stories of the righteous even those stories that happened when they were young meaning the story happened when the was young but especially those stories that were told to us or revealed to us by aasi meaning the Reb rebit was the one who revealed the story they are directions for our service of hem so to with this story in addition to the fact that we Glimpse the wisdom of the even as a young manal like it says that little pumpkins you can know them from their uh youth you can tell them you can already tell when they're little how they're going to grow so you can tell his wisdom from two things first of all just the very fact that even as a kid he knew how to arouse his father he knew how to sort of wake him up and also the specific answer that he gave he didn't answer him straight he answered him as a question and it wasn't just to be clever like I said you know Jew answers a question with a question but also it was because of the of K and he wanted to be very careful with honoring his father so instead of acting like oh his father didn't know something he did know it he just sort of asked the question back to allow his father to be the one to answer it so that shows his wisdom but there's a teaching here for our although it is true that every good thing that a person does everything unto itself has an effect that it tips the scales like the ram famously described the image Every Good Deed tips the scales toward Merit and it defs the world meaning every little thing is connected to the entire world no man is an island in a good way meaning everything affects everything although that's true meaning to say if you go and do something good on your own that nobody knows about it actually is in a spiritual way benefiting the whole world for everybody yes that's true a topic B but we cannot be satisfied only with that the refinement of the world has to be specifically in this manner of hisus which I'll call getting involved in real life how about that as a functional translation now theb is saying not just the story about the saying for us that by getting involved in other people lives in a manner of is slabas meaning actually trying to put yourself in their shoes and understanding their situations and understanding how they think it adds extra light for the giver as well like our sages say Al on the verse from mishle I believe it is May a Hashem Hashem enlightens the eyes of both of them both the teacher and the student the giver and the recipient so I'll say some very daring stuff that I probably have no right to say um the rebis igis in a way is like because you see that dealing with people's regular lives all types of people are writing to the deba about all types of real life questions and you can see the the way that EBA guides people to deal with family issues money issues health issues every type of thing it's like seeing how the Reb operates in now that same Reb is also the author of my modm that are describing levels of is that are preimum and like not only is it the same person you know we can't imagine like I was saying before you go to Einstein you bother him in the middle of his chalkboard stuff and prinston and ask him for some uh life advice doesn't really make sense but not only does it not make sense cuz it's like why are you bothering this incredibly important busy guy but it's like why would you expect he would have an answer because the truth is I wouldn't think Einstein could give good life advice especially not when he's what his life was a mess yeah of course right so it's kind of a wild concept that one person could be the the genius and could be the Practical guide they're usually not the same guide so what we're saying here is that I want to be so careful but it was the's ability to teach the deepest Concepts to reveal the deepest sidus cannot be divorced from the Reb's practical just practical downto Earth care caring compassionate guidance you can't separate the two because the reality is that one actually makes the other possible which is counterintuitive because they seem like opposites they seem like if you even if you had a a potential to specialize in one area by specializing in one area it would tear you away from the other per se and what we're saying is no it's actually one and the same thing and then not only not only is the rebba saying this as an insight about how rebba functions but the rebba is then saying this is actually talking about how we function which is a classic Trope in the Reb's teachings is always to take stories of the rebas and make it about us where the Reb is saying like this if you want to really have an an influence you want to really be holy you want to really be true to your Soul's mission in this world yeah obviously that's through learning tah of course it is but it's also through talking to regular people about regular life and helping them okay so you want my fan Theory totally this is like I take no responsibility for any of this being accurate or correct I'm just now just saying some stuff so you guys know me a little bit you know that I I don't have real social anxiety I more have like sensitivity to stimuli that makes social interaction unpleasant for me you guys know that about me like I get very highly like disregulated easily because I get overwhelmed by stimulus and and I and I and like okay so I don't like interacting with people oh this class is a great example okay I don't mean it in that way but I kind of do mean it in that way we don't care it's which is a great okay right everybody get out right it's not it's not easy for me to come here it's not easy for me to go anywhere I'm the type of person I've only later in my life forced myself to show up with people's Sim because I finally figured out that people care about that took me years took me decades to find out people care if you go to their simus because it's so painful for me to go because it's like okay but at any rate I could spend this hour learning on my own I could probably learn more quickly I can promise you I've seen for myself I would never ever and and as much as I still complain about it which is really aah on my part but as much as I hate having to explain things to people why didn't they understand that that was so patently obvious why are you asking that question as much as it's annoying for me the hobus having to actually speak in a way that other people could understand and use what you're saying um if I didn't do that I wouldn't understand anything I wouldn't understand I would think I understood maybe on some abstract level I would understand so I'm saying from personal experience even if it's unpleasant to have to do the human interaction aspect of things that's where everything comes together that's where the rubber meets the road so to speak and I don't think my experience is completely unique I think this is something that everyone can apply in their own way it's like when you have something especially inspirational that you've learned it's not really complete until you can give it over to somebody in a way that they can act on it but do you feel like with the Amy letters and everything that yeah the Amy column which I hate I mean I it's not nice for me to say that I hate it but I really hate it not your comfort zone not it's far from my comfort it's my discomfort Zone um but there's no question that it changed my brain and even on just a a physical level but certainly spiritually yeah of course it benefited me and I don't mean it benefited me oh you you had a reputation for I mean don't question it spiritually benefited and and again I don't mean the the Merit of having helped people I mean I wouldn't be able to understand things process I wouldn't process wise yes exactly exactly exactly um we're not saying this about the re we're not well we kind of are saying about the Reb we just want to be careful how we say it because you know it's the Reb but look when when I I keep going back to the Einstein thing when Einstein came to Princeton no Einstein is nobody was gonna say oh we have Einstein at Princeton let him teach he didn't teach a class you know why he didn't teach a class because that would be a total waste of having Einstein now imagine not only you have Einstein and not only he's going to teach a class he's going to teach a 101 survey of physics class to a bunch of 18y olds no no not that no in fact you're gonna have Einstein sit in the cafeteria and answer questions about life and every schmendrick can come over and say um you know I'm having this issue that issue anxiety relationships and Einstein's gonna have to answer you I'm saying that's that's a crazy concept that's what makes giant so what we're saying is it's counterintuitive specialize in one thing or the other the two should not not only they don't go together one diminishes from the other with saying no you can't have one without the other isn't that what in the introduction that really it is better that if it would have been possible would been better to answer each person indivually in the introduction of of Tanya yes he's saying that it's not possible to give everybody their but it's also interesting what he says and therefore I created a system of of mas but it's the same thing he wouldn't have been able to create that system if not for all the time he spent first answering real people's questions about oh oh oh I hear your Insight you're saying that Al based Tanya onus if he hadn't had all of those Yus conversations who knows if he would have been able to write Tanya it's a very bold statement and it's probably true according to what we just learned it's probably true which is a wild concept okay at any rate um thanks for coming out um kic doid yeah you can turn it off