Text-Based Tanya—Week #68

um before we begin today's lesson we want to dedicate the learning today for Rafael hayam mayor Ben simakasha a young boy who needs our prayers and our help and Hashem should send a speedy recovery complete and speedy recovery okay this is text-based Tanya we're still in chapter 39 and we started speaking about kavana about the intent the emotions with which we Infuse our mitzvahs and we were speaking about um different levels of intent yeah okay and the different levels of intent depend on where your emotions are coming from either you can get them from meditation or you can get them from the hard wiring of the Jewish soul and depending on where you got your emotions from that's how high so to speak the Mitzvah is going to reach the Mitzvah that was fueled by that intent so the higher intent goes to Bria and the lower intent goes to utsira remember all this yeah and we spoke about the the malachim being emotional creatures and that's why they're called hyus they're called animals and they're attached to yitzira which is a more emotional world as opposed to Bria which is a more intellectual world and that uh basically when we do the Mitzvahs and we learn Taylor down here with the right intent so we're creating we're creating reward for ourselves after we get up there to Ghanaian and that's where we left off we said right before the two dots right there's a kiskar mitzvahimitz foreign it is above and and uh uh limited created beings intellect remember we said Bria is a world of intellect everything there is all about understanding Hashem and the pleasure in Bria which is if you remember that also yeah is all based on under the pleasure and Bria is about understanding Hashem so that's Bria it's all understanding like yatira is emotions but he is higher than that it's understanding but Silas is even higher than that it's above understanding so adzillus which is above understanding are one with him meaning they're infinite that therefore no finite being congrats them not even souls and angels his intellect is one with him in a wondrous in a wondrous type of unions infinitely more so than in briah because down there in Bria um things are concealed compressed with with symptoms and [Music] Chabad so that the created beings are able to receive from his lead us Hashem to understand that to know Hashem and to understand some level of understanding of of the infinite one according to the limited capacities of these created beings in a way that wouldn't overwhelm them out of existence and in a way that would not erase them from being created beings so that they don't revert to their their origin and become totally subsumed in godliness in other words in Bria things are diminished enough so that finite entities very lofty fine identities souls and Angels but I'll I'll be at the finite nonetheless things are diminished so that these spiritual entities which are ultimately fine are able to receive something from Hashem in accordance with their capacity and that won't overwhelm them out of existence [Music] and this symptom this compression is what allows the the glimmer to shine there uh of the Chabad of Hashem to these souls in Bria in other words if it wouldn't have the effect of symptom if it wouldn't be compressed or condensed then it would be overwhelming and they wouldn't be able to tolerate it in contrast that's not so it's not really subject so much to Tim Tsum he says not so much does I feel I mean there is somewhat of a symptom there because it is an Islam it is a world it's just barely a world created intellects meaning even lofty created intellects like angels and souls are not really able to appreciate appreciate anything in that seal us it's just too unfiltered that's why no thought of theirs meaning of created entities can grasp anything over there inazilus that's why atzillus is a uni it's a very exclusive neighborhood it is the dwelling place of that not just Sadiq but Sadiq delim Chavez used that's even higher than love and awe which come from intellect remember before we were talking about love and all which come from intellect is the highest level there's love and awe that come from the instinctive emotions that are hardwired into the nashama and then there's the higher love of the love and all that comes from intellect and meditation we're saying that comes from even higher than that is respectively is uh higher than the intellect of any created being is these great Elite the way they serve Hashem is in a manner of America of a chariot we'll explain what that means a chariot Villiers in a way where they're totally surrendered they have no separate existence and they become totally subsumed within the light of Hashem them and everything that belongs to them through the way that they perform Mitzvahs with absolute Bittle with absolute surrender like it says the Patriarchs are are very much the merkava the The Chariot vahina the fishes because their entire lives this was their mode this is the mode that they were in constantly they were constantly in a mode of absolute surrender of really having no separate selfhood no independent sense of existence other than hashem's absolute existence so that that's that's the level about silos but somebody whose Soul root is not lofty enough to to reach such a Pure service to become totally absorbed and nullified into hashem's light in any regular uh on any regular basis rather they're they're only capable of doing this once in a while intermittently who can make with us for instance when they DaVinci corresponds to the world of atzillus so then they're able to go into that mode of total surrender and losing any separate selfhood but they're not able to maintain that all day long the objects were able to maintain it all day long no matter what they were doing eating sleeping drinking whatever they're able to constantly maintain that voice but uh there are people who are not Sadiq and regular people who can hit that at sealless level when they damaged Vanessa and especially when in the Bowing in the stachavoice the Bowing because every bowing that you do in in is a is a sort of a reflection about zealous like it says in the kabbalahim in the section about Kabbalah Shabbos that um this is the the Bowing is the idea of totally surrendering to Hashem and in admission that you have no significance unto yourself so those people who are not able to regularly maintain a nutzillus type level if they don't so they're Aveda is corresponding to the world of Bria programs and he says the kabbalists know that there's an exception to this once in a while they do get a special guest pass into atsilos through the mayanukwin through the feminine Waters Virginia okay hold on say Let me let me let me just stop before we go to the sky meets for Mitzvah because you're going to think we're repeating ourselves because we started with scar Mitzvah Mitzvah okay this is what I was dreading for I did I tell you that I was dreading today for over a year did I tell you I was dreading today for over a year what was I dreading exactly what's happening right now everyone's like this was such an interesting class for over a year of my life it was so meaningful now we just read like a whole page and I don't know what he's talking about okay so and yeah and I could just skip it I could you know what I could do I could say well you guys you're not gonna you're not gonna be able to learn it anyway so I'll just skip it but if I no if I would have said that you know what you guys would do you won't be insulted no if I were to come in here and say the the following few chapters are a little bit too tough for you guys I think I'm gonna gloss up you wouldn't be insulted okay [Music] yeah part was practical that was a nice little nugget there I mean that's just something that most of us do three times a day hopefully okay but listen I know it's a lot of kabbalistic words and it's a lot of it's a lot of taxonomy it's like describing things with labels and names that are not words that we use in day-to-day conversation but let me just repeat what I just read in in a couple simple English sentences just to prove to you that you're basically following okay so don't don't tune out on me okay what we described is different levels of serving a chef and they correspond to different levels of worlds we said that if you the lowest level from whence you can muster up some cavana cavana means love and all of Hashem when you do a Mitzvah the lowest level is you just use your natural hardwired instinctive love we call it avamasuteris and if you do that your Mitzvah will Ascend to the world of yitzira very good and yitzira is primarily a world of when you serve Hashem with love and awe that come from instinctive instinctive love and all the highest yes because they are instinctive because they are in animalist they are animalistic yes okay they are creatures of habit of nature okay and yet Sierra as you mentioned is primarily a world where what energy is most obvious the emotions okay which one we didn't even speak about Asia we didn't really speak about it okay higher level than that if you do a Mitzvah in your kavana comes from your meditating on what you understand about Hashem so then the Mitzvah reaches the level of Bria and Bria is a world where what is the primary basis of reality in Bria intellect that's why what are the entities that hang out in video what do they do what's their experience of reality well I don't know if we call it meditating I mean down here we call it meditating but the intellect of Hashem is the fabric of reality in Bria and it's very pleasurable to have that openly revealed and that's what the souls and the angels in Bria do they just are very deeply intellectually immersed in understanding Hashem to their capacity obviously you know it's limited and that's what we said there's a symptom that makes it possible for intellect for for finite intellect to receive these this this level of appreciation okay and then we said there are a few people very few who their service of Hashem corresponds to at silos and we describe that as being the the Avada of whom for example well we said to digma dalen and we we specifically singled out who did we mention yeah we mentioned the RVs yeah and we said the others served Hashem in them in a manner of a what merkava which means total surrender now all of us can have our moments of total surrender for instance especially when you bow however they're moments of surrender we're not able to maintain that as a constant state of being whereas they always were able to maintain that okay fine that's what we just read you understood all of that right okay okay all right [Music] where it's here oh because you think about the number four yeah I mentioned that we haven't spoken about Asia would be the fourth one that we haven't spoken about that's the lowest one so I'll give you a hint that's when you do a Mitzvah with no cavana and what about if you do a Mitzvah with worse than cavana with not just the absence of cavana but a negative intent like to fool people to think you're a good guy so you can rip them off we'll find out you know it okay we're gonna find out okay here we go now the reward Salve meaning the Mitzvah has inherent value [Music] the Mitzvah has inherent value when you do a Mitzvah you're actually creating something it's not just busy work that has no value you tell a little kid because you want to keep them busy uh go color in your coloring book and then I'll give you uh a candy you don't really want their picture that they're coloring you're just trying to keep them busy and then you give them the candy to motivate them to color in the coloring book but really the reward has nothing to do with the work but Scarlets for Mitzvah means that when you do a Mitzvah you're doing something you're making something that actually has value and the reward is to be able to appreciate what you accomplished pitish uh this is a very interesting concept here from the scar of something you can know what the thing is and and you can know its level in other words sometimes when you're trying to when you're trying to describe something that's really lofty and indescribable you can reverse engineer it and you can deduce yeah based on the scar of something you can figure out what that thing was so something that might be very lofty it's hard to describe it but I'll look at the the scar from it and then I can work my way backward and figure out what what it was so he says like this the ain't loan or Asic bonus studies we have no we have no business dealing with the concealed things meaning there are certain things are just too lofty for us to understand namely this discussion of these great Sadiq who are on the level of merkava guys don't forget the title of this book say if it's Albany name there's a book about regular people so we don't know anything about like we mentioned it we mentioned it but like don't don't worry too much about it rather the revealed things are for us and after those things meaning the regular revealed things everyone should be drawn and that is that we should know what is the proper service of Hashem with awe and love in a manner that is revealed in the heart and specifically on love that come from meditation which is the higher level of producing all in love which corresponds to the tens fears of Bria H or at least awe and love that come from the nature of the brain and that would correspond to the tense fearsov okay so since we understand that myth was done with various levels of kavana Ascend to various worlds respectively that's the scar we can reverse engineer and we can understand a little bit what it is that the Mitzvah actually consists of if there's a Mitzvah done with sufficient intent to reach a world of emotion like like yitzira then we know that what was the Mitzvah was an emotional act and if there's a Mitzvah that was infused with sufficient intent to be able to ascend to an intellectual world like but yeah then we understand what was the Mitzvah the Mitzvah was an intellectual Act that's what we're that's all we're saying okay the Mitzvahs are ascending and as we said after 120 the person goes up there and he hangs out in whatever world uh his Mitzvahs are and he gets to go to the art gallery of his own art gallery yeah these are his pieces yeah well it doesn't have to be 11 months you can go quicker you can go quicker really so you don't have to do the whole 11 months no that's maximum but they that's bothering you no that's maximum 11 months but but yeah yeah I can get it you can get quicker yeah yeah you have to get a good lawyer but um yeah okay so can I ask you a question so you're talking about the simple folks yeah right so when the ish Pash does a mitzvah is there love in awe or is there no love at all there is love and all okay and where is he or she getting the love and off from um the latent Love Therefore the level of that Mitzvah is the world of it's Europe okay very good but you're saying that loved them so much why don't their Mitzvahs go up higher oh okay so would that mean like in the world like it went outside yeah I don't know I don't know how to answer that question I don't know how to do easy pass I don't know I know that yeah I also heard stories about the greatness of the simple the simple people the same as saying pure yeah three of blemish well everything simple usually means someone who's not so so much of an intellectual and he went to the top of his ability and therefore he's so amazing to us I mean I gotta tell you it's true that the the the the simple the simple shoe what he called the shoe repairman who says till him all day like that's like the hero of the balship stories but I'm going to tell you the reality it says here in Tanya that the higher level of kavana is that which is produced through meditation so maybe some people don't need that well some if some people are not capable of it he told us that very clearly just now and also back in chapter 18 he said there are people who are not capable of reaching that okay so they're not capable they're not capable somebody who's not capable and they don't they don't meditate because they're not capable they're not doing anything wrong and you don't need to you just have such an innate love of an awful yeah but maybe that job allowed him to meditate like that you know we're out in the field and the poem yeah maybe what are you going to say it's not the higher level is that which is produced yes isolation no I didn't I didn't even describe where the meditation takes place or how it's done we're going to talk about that later chapters 41-50 so it's not an isolated well we'll talk about that later how it's actually done when it's done yeah yes the intellect yes so if you don't have the intellect yeah you can't meditate right if you don't have enough intellect but maybe maybe there's an intellect it's very simple yeah it doesn't mean the person's not smart just means it's not a deep thinker yeah okay it's beautiful the middle shot is beautiful but want to know something anybody who's able to come to this class and follow cannot get away with the monopshota okay we're not putting down the the simple people okay but still the highest level of cavanas that which comes from from meditation okay let's keep going here because we described really three levels now two levels of of cavana and then a third level which is like off the charts and now we're going to talk about another state of being the atzillus level that the only the obvious really are there all the time okay yeah I guess it is called the kavana yeah yeah it's just not kavana the way we normally think of it yeah however when you serve Hashem without arousing any awe or love even in your brain right even in your brain like if you can't arouse it in your heart and feel it as an emotion at least think about it in your brain remember we spoke about that in chapters uh 16 and 17 we spoke about the two nice that if you can't get your heart to actually feel at least think about it and relate to it as a concept but no somebody who doesn't even do that is you know he doesn't even arouse the latent love the native love that is latent within the heart and bring it out into a revealed State he doesn't even do that but rather he leaves that latent love latent he leaves it buried in his heart just like the way it was when he was born just like it was before he started serving this service of Hashem is it stays down here in the world of Separation which is called the outer worlds it doesn't have the power to rise up and to become included within within hashem's Oneness videos which are namely the ten sphere eyes it can't be absorbed in the tens fears it just stays down here the commercial customer in the physical world where he did the Mitzvah yeah now he still did the Mitzvah the Mitzvah still has the refining effect that we learned about in 35 36 and 37 but the kavana there's no cavana so it doesn't have that spiritual liftoff like it says and by the way we're not even talking about somebody who does a mitzvah what we call with a negative intent with it with an ulterior motive we're talking about somebody who does a Mitzvah by wrote he doesn't based on the The Habit which he formed from his childhood his father and his teacher habituated him to fear Hashem and to serve Hashem she's not really serving Hashem for hashem's own sake he's doing it because it's habit so is it still a Mitzvah yeah it's still a Mitzvah but it doesn't rise up to any world yeah doesn't this negate the fact that doing the Mitzvah itself takes on a spiritual I just said the Mitzvah still a Mitzvah right right yeah and he didn't get in there it didn't get enhanced it sounds like it's you're in a plane you don't take off or no you know what it is it's like it's like getting in a plane and driving it across country yeah you could you could do that so he's just doing it out of habit okay I didn't say it's not a Mitzvah it's still a Mitzvah but it doesn't have that in enhanced impact and it doesn't go up to any of the spiritual worlds it's not serving a sham for a shem's sake because the service for for this for the sake of the service itself is only possible if at least you arouse the latent love at least the latent love let's see at least bring that out of the concealment of the heart and into the Revelation and at least in the brain at least in the brain is just like a person doesn't do anything for somebody else unless either he loves him or he fears him in other words if you're motivated to do something for somebody there has to be a motivation what's the motivation either love or fear says so too it's impossible to be motivated to serve Hashem if you don't at least he calls it remember the the thoughts that are in the mind and the recesses of the heart that's the way he refers to the the lower level the Ava mesuteris the Natural Instinct of love he calls it a memory sort of like spiritual nostalgia you know like that trigger of that like that that feeling of that warm fuzzy feeling that familiar feeling it's uh it's not deep it's not intellectual but it's uh it's something and uh so that's the lower level and he's saying this guy didn't even do that yeah so so it better to give a dollar a day for tadaka or a hundred dollars once for a hundred days what what how how does that pertain to this Savannah and sometimes no but your your two scenarios have nothing to do with kavana they have to do with two different ways of doing it they have nothing to do with two levels of Corona you should ask me do I repeat you should ask me the route doesn't mean inherently that it's a repetitive act well why don't you make it an Apples to Apples comparison and say according to Tanya is it better to give a dollar to DACA with no intent or is it better to give a dollar to Dhaka with intent what's the answer of course it's better to give with intent now let me ask you a real question is it better get to give to Ducker without intent or not to give to duck at all to give it without intent obviously we're not telling you not to do mitzvahs oh I am so upset that you said that I'm so come on I said clearly I said and on your birthday no less I now okay you have to redeem yourself here I said clearly before the Mitzvah still a mitzvah don't worry about up don't worry about up tell me what does the Mitzvah do come on don't forget 35 36 37 it brings mashiach okay that's that's not cap liver you know what you know what come on come on remember we said before why is it depressing okay we can't have everything and it's not like there's nothing you can do about it it's not it's not like it's unchangeable like you could just have more cavana next time it's not like it's unfixable but then can't you have two of them okay yeah that's always the sneak that's the hack is always no for somebody you love or fear right right he's just explaining as a martial he's saying that if you do something you have to have a motive to do it right I'm not gonna if I do something for somebody it's because I actually I must have some level of of feeling otherwise I wouldn't do it I would do nothing so he's saying at least you should at least have some level of intent to see the bird that only helps her own kind oh that's not no that's not what it's saying it's it's just a martial it's just a martial it's just a marshall he's just explaining that if somebody does something they have to have a motive it's a it's not good or bad it's a fact when people do things they do it because they have a motive to do it people don't do things randomly unless they have a neurological issue where they do stuff that they can't control themselves the Mitzvah can't be emotive enough well why is the Mitzvah motivating that's my question why do you think a Mitzvah is motivating but the whole answer why is a Mitzvah motivated why do you care about a mitzvah okay so that sounds like you're thinking a thought about it it's causing you to Value it okay so that's the answer that's intellectual law love and all gold is better than well that's not Pharaoh what you just described is an intellectual cavana uh so maybe you have Cavani you don't even realize it is it feels a little bit different but yeah okay all right let's can we finish this chapter yeah I would love to finish this chapter what don't worry if the love and fear of people was just a muscle it was just a marshall it was literally just a marshall we're not talking about it hold on a second you get momentum that you do a Mitzvah and it becomes more it becomes easier to do the next mitzvah not necessarily intent at least you're doing it at least you're doing something good now I wonder if we could say the mits for Good Earth Mitzvah applies to kavana as well if you do a Mitzvah with kavana then it becomes easier the next time to do it with kavana again probably yes probably it works with Daddy the thing it was just a marshall he was Justice for what he was making a statement when people do things they have a reason why they did it that's it and then you must have been motivated to do it why were you motivated to do it is that motivation also part of your Cabana motivation is cavana why did he do the Metro I know what you did you did a Mitzvah why did you do it what your answer to that question is that's your code exactly exactly that's it yeah davening is a little bit different if davening I mean I don't want to get into this right now but if you can do one Fila put together from All The Thrillers of a year it elevates all your dominating once below basically if you could you can cut and paste words from all your feelings from the whole year and if you put together one good davening from all of the year what like what no like regular days no you put together one whole dominant to take one word from from this day and another word from another day and you cut and paste you take the best to take the greatest hits yeah okay yes anything else besides motivation in kavana no motivation is cavana that's all it is that's all it is it's a it's a synonym kavana and motivation are synonymous okay let's keep going because I would love to finish today's chapter hold on a second is all right oh yeah yeah okay fine so he said um hold on let me make sure I'm in the right spot for 40 right 30 no 39 31. big um Avo ID that we have a game it's not enough to just have one motivation to have love you have to also have all at least the lower level of hawk we're going to explain that later so we're not going to get into that now Asics however let's say you do a Mitzvah really with no good intent at all not just neutral intent or lack of intent but really A negative intent like you do it to build up your own reputation click like like you want to make a reputation of your for yourself as a scholar so azai then I go that um that ulterior motive comes from clippersnaga it's an actual scriptures it's not an Aveda it's not an outright sin but it's certainly not holy so it's clip assay so now that Clipper of clippersnaga gets into your Toyota that you're learning for that reason and then unfortunately the title that you're learning is stuck in Exile in that Clipper the fish are but it's temporary element which brings healing to the world then when you do chuva then all the Torah that you learned for an ulterior motive will also be able to get redeemed out of that state and then that can go up again according to whatever cavana you switch to foreign without the right intention because if you'll do that hopefully not hopefully he says certainly certainly I don't know why I said hopefully certainly you will come to Le Shema says because eventually you're going to do whether in this lifetime or in the next reincarnation sooner or later it's always the next reincarnation you might do children because no one will be utterly thrust away eventually everybody gets in everybody makes it but let's say a person does a Mitzvah Stam he calls it not Le Shema and not meaning not for the love of Hashem or all of Hashem but also not for any selfish reason just neutral why do you do it I don't know I just I just used to doing it it's just my habit okay let's say you just did it that way then getting the mitzvah redeemed out of that state doesn't doesn't depend on chuva because remember we said before if he does it for a not nice intent he needs to chuva before he can get the Mitzvah out of that that captivity but here he did he didn't do it for a not nice intent he just did it with zero intent so now it doesn't even require chova yeah but rather immediately once he starts getting back on track and learning for the right reasons then that which he learned without intent will be combined to that which he is now learning with intent and it flies up with it hooray when he was doing it in order to become a Taurus scholar and be respected then it got caught up in clippersnaga and he has to do Chiva to get it out of that state but here he just did it without any kavana without any particular thought at all so to get it out all you have to do is just wake up oh I'm sorry I wasn't thinking let me go back on track and let me serve Hashem for the right reasons and then it just all gets fixed and it flies up that's why we say person should always engage in tournaments even without intent because he'll come to do it with intent why do we say that now he's explaining to us a deeper understanding of that saying we under it's a deeper understanding of yase we have a deeper understanding of why we say a person should always engage in terrorists even without intent because what we're saying is the stuff that you did without intent it doesn't go to waste you can combine it retroactively with the stuff that you start to do with intent and then the whole thing gets lifted okay so it's an investment and also uh without cavana as he explains in the Zaya a similar concept that uh you can lift up the the davening that had no intent I'm not talking about the davening that was for negative intent but I'm saying that daviding was just thoughtless mindless by wrote you could lift that up by just getting back on track and focusing and Diving for the right reason okay that's the end of chapter 39. I'm so relieved we have what but we're not done yet we have one I told you 38 39 and 40 are the most formidable chapters so we have one more chapter like this and then uh for me at least it gets a little bit easier okay yes 40 is also Cavanagh yes