Tanya By Rabbi Yitzchok Minkowicz Chapter 8 - How to protect our greatest gift from G-D - our Soul

welcome to this week's uh tanya class we are starting this week uh chapter eight chapter eight in tanya and this week um i'd like to just give an introduction before we go into the chapter i'll help you understand better what the alter is trying to address and accomplish and that is as follows the goal of kabbalah mysticism tanya is to allow us to live a peaceful happy life one that we have a deep meaningful relationship with god now obviously once you have a relationship with god a sincere relationship with god a good relationship everything's great so there are things that we do to enhance that relationship and there are things that we do that i'm not gonna use the word kills the relationship because killer means like it's gone but that diminished relationship weakened the relationship now obviously it's like a seesaw the stronger the relationship with god more peaceful the more happy and the more fulfilled life you're living so the goal is to keep the relationship with god strong solid and as we know as a basis of all mysticism very enjoyable and very happy that is the goal now obviously as we already learned the last few weeks in tanya god gave us a godly soul and the godly souls the driving force that will keep us on track and a healthy strong relationship with god god also gave us an animal soul that will try to get us off track not because it really wants to get us off track because it was hired by god but the goal is to get us off track that we should want to be on track and the more we want to be on track the more we work on being on track the greater the relationship is going to be greater than if we didn't and deeper and deeper greater than if we didn't get diverted and try to get off track so in other words the fact that we are pushed or edged to go off track you can look at it oh that's it that means it's not meant to be no it's because god wants to give you some current that when you get back on track you deal with a greater greater force and greater vigor so the distractions and the challenges is not so we should get completely distracted or completely challenged on the contrary so we should find strength to come back back or greater vigor so in this week in chapter 8 the author is going to explore and analyze and create a beautiful um image to show you what takes you off track what happens when you go off track and how you can get back on track the goal is not to focus on the fact that you're off track but knowing the enemy is half the solution you have to know what your enemy is you have to know what's taking you off track what's keeping you off track and more importantly if you gotta attract how to come back on and it's all part of the journey but you got to know the players so the altar begins in this week's uh chapter of tanya and he says like this he deals with it on three levels because we know that the window that we have to the world there's three windows we have to the world what are the three windows that we have to the world or in terms of the language of tanya the three garments that we have that expose us to the world and expose us to getting off track or the area where the battle takes place the spiritual battle takes place that is in thought speech and action makshava dibor and maisa so the altered goes through each one of these levels of thought speech and action shows you where the enemy namely the eight sahara is going to come in to try to attack knowing where he's coming to attack hopefully be successful and if you're not successful knowing what it takes to come back on track so we're going to start exploring um with the world of action we're going to go to the world of speech and we're going to go to the world of thought so let's start with the world of action the world of action so the author gives an example and again you can you can use any example you want we're going to take the example that although he gives and he says okay so what is the world of action for us in terms of our spiritual focus with god so if we want to make sure we stay focused on god very simple we got to follow all the positive commandments and we can't digress and do any of the negative commandments that we shouldn't be doing so for example the alphabet says take for example one of the commandments in the torah is that we should only eat kosher which animals we could eat with trans we can eat um um how you have to prepare um the food and certain uh um years of the produce you can't eat and you could eat but you know in term simple english the laws of kashrut there are things which are mutar permissible for us to eat 100 kosher kosher means we have the ability to elevate it and there are thing certain things which are asur forbidden to eat so what does that mean and we discussed it at lent last week just to recap what does that mean something is mutar something muta means that it's in the neutral territory um in the kabbalistic current we call the klipat noga it's an area where it can go you can elevate it by having the right intention or you can downgrade it by having the wrong intentions and doing bad things with the energy you receive from the food it can go both ways so that's called muttar meaning it's open you have the ability it's a neutral zone you can either elevate it or downgrade it that's mutant then you have something which is called asura ussr means god said it's forbidden what does mean forbidden we do not have the power to elevate it what does that mean practically you eat it you have just now taken it within you something which you don't have the power to elevate and because you have the power to elevate it's actually going to downgrade you and we'll explain what that means so there's the world of muta and asura so in this chapter the article says when a person goes ahead and eats something consumes something which is forbidden to eat something which is 100 not kosher and you go ahead and eat that so in the kabbalistic terms you ate something which is asur which is tied up to weird to the shalosh klippo to the three impure klippot which means they don't have a redeeming factor what does that mean that means it's not like you went ahead and did something for business it was you and you did a forbidden act by you doing for back you forbid an act you engage in something that was wrong here the item itself in here it's called the hefsa the item itself is forbidden so when a person does something wrong so you went ahead and did something which you could either done it not done it and now you engage in something which is forbidden so when did it become forbidden when you engage in it here you not it's not that you your engagement made it forbidden the item is forbidden the item itself is something which we don't have the power to elevate so what happens when you go ahead and consume something that just forbidden now you've downgraded yourself and you've taken something within you that is from the three and purely port and how are you gonna elevate it so the algebra comes and he asks a simple question you're a godly man you have a godly soul true you have an animal soul but the animal soul wants to enjoy a jewish animal soul the way the altar defines it a jewish animal soul has no interest in eating something which is forbidden he might want something which is kosher and really really enjoy it that's his big sin and as the godly soul he just we discussed last week just wants to be nourished so he can serve god he doesn't look at food as a tremendous pleasure it's a function it serves a function i need anything you need gas for your car you fill up a tank of gas that's the way a a godly man looks at food i need gas for my body so i do whatever you eat drink eat the taste is that important it's healthy it's going to nourish me i'll have strength to serve god to study do it so wonderful the animal soul is not happy with that no no what does it taste like they want to know the exactly what it tastes like it has to taste good and it has to have a nice sizzle and a nice texture and a nice look whatever the way you know you get excited about a pleasure about food not something forbidden so the optimum says the animal soul just wants it to taste good and tastes great and so uh it involves in the taste so that is what you don't need anything forbidden it's not shallow scripted it's not forbidden it's creeped out noga and because you're just so involved in the taste of it you forgot about god that's basically what you did you forgot about god you left god somewhere and you're so consumed with this taste of something which is secondary because ultimately god created you about the relationship with god now you've taken something which is cleveland no again you downgraded it possibly the shallows but by going ahead and having the you know the proper thoughts and the proper intention doing a little true you can you can elevate it as we discussed last week here we're talking about eating something which is forbidden this is not something which is permissible and you you got involved with the tremendous taste of it here you ate something which is forbidden so the item itself is tied up in charlotte's clippers how are you going to elevate that so the answer this question is a very simple question how does a jew come to do something like that because you want to know the enemy knows how do you go from point a all the way down to point z i got it you go point a to point b fine you're eating something it tastes good you gotta go involved with the taste right but how do you go from just enjoying something a kosher steak to eating god forbid something a a a steak which is traith how do you do that so the entrepreneur says and it's important to know this you didn't just go to eat a non-kosher steak very simple the godly soul has zero interest non-coaches doesn't even just not even on the radar pleasure for sure not that's what god wants so where the animals all go to eat a non-kosher state this is very simple what happened was first you ate kosher but you got involved in the whole taste and the excitement and the the passion of the of the of the pleasure which is really superficial as you got involved in the passion and the pleasure of the taste you know what happened you lost your spiritual sensitivity so because you lost your spiritual sensitivity because you so speak left god on the side while you're indulging in a good drink or in a good delicacy so really what happened at this point you didn't forget about it forget about god a little bit and then you get more involved in the food and then you start running a marathon after finding more delicious food here and delicious food there right so really what's happening is as you're really doing something which is permissible but even in the permissible you're forgetting about god because you're focused on the taste so as you start focusing on the taste hi how are you welcome welcome come inside have a seat as you start focusing on the taste as you get more and more desensitized and you're not sensitive to god's presence what happens you forget you can forget about god so when you forget about god what do you end up doing you end up eating something which is forbidden so that is one area where the author explains first in the world of action in the world of action where you can end up eating something which is forbidden not because you decide also monday to rebel against god but as you basically went away from having a relationship a strong relationship with god you start to flounder away and you eventually ended up eating something forbidden but bottom line is you still ate something forbidden what happens before we get into to to speech and thought what happens with somebody that goes ahead and eats something forbidden the reality is ultimately we're jewish and we have a godly soul so we want to have back that relationship with god the october says ultimately what happened now you you took something which is physically non-kosher you consumed it you got to clean up you got to clean your act you got to get back to god but the problem is you're so disconnected because why you're you're so disconnected because within you what do you have within you you have a something which is a disconnect from god how do you get it out of you yeah how do you give back how do you get it out of you you had to get that you have to get out of you so you can get back to god in other words it's not only if you get back to god you have to get rid of this huge blockage that's within you surgery right spiritual surgery so the alternative says there's something which is called there's something which is called kibbut we're after 120 if we make it to 120 but let's hope when a person passes away and there's a funeral and you're put into the grave there's something which is called kibutakeva of the cover in the grave where the uh angels come and pounce away on you they gotta get it out you ate something which was forbidden they literally have to you know spiritually pounce it out of you it's not pleasant right could you imagine after you die you're trying to die in peace everyone's you know like uh all the nice eulogies everyone made about you and you're trying to go go you're almost listen and you want to go you're ready to go on your journey to peace normal stuff they stop pouncing on you right what do you want they got to knock it out you shouldn't have eaten a hot dog exactly there you go bingo but why regret it then stop now now that i know what's gonna happen i'm gonna have to have second thoughts don't worry about it huh okay so that is level one level one so next time you that's and i like what you said next time before you i mean that god doesn't apply to anyone here but just in case it ever happens that you think of eating something forbidden just know what happens after 120 when you're laying in the grave and trying to go peacefully and you're going to be pounced it's just going to happen after writing tanya again the goal is not god forbid to to tell you any scary stuff the goal is to tell to get you close to god and to not want to do something like that because you don't you want to die in peace you want it when you're done i hope to 120 this time like you suffered enough in this world it's ready now it's time to go to heaven okay so that's one area in the world of action then there's a second area what is that in the world of speech what does that mean god gave us an opportunity to have a relationship with him how do we have the relationship with god through our speech prayer torah study nice and kind words loving words peaceful words right what's coming out of your mouth uh is is you know what singing and dancing jewish songs ideas what to become closer to god right through your speech what happens instead of using the gift god gave you of praying and studying and doing mitzvoth and inspiring people and talking love and kindness and being nice to people instead we're not even talking doing anything forbidden we're talking if you go ahead and you just start talking in hebrew it's called the varan battalion dwarf metallic means idol chat yentesh stuff right this you know you're talking narushka nonsense things that have no value or no meaning it's just vomiting means it's empty words but talking right constantly talking empty words we're not talking about again we're making a distinction we're not talking about um we're not talking about god we're not talking about making fun of someone else in hurry that's a different category itself we're talking simple diver talent simple tournament talking things which are inappropriate just stop you know just like not uh classy talk no irish nourish cheap talk what's the problem with that what's the problem very simple because in the sma that we're obligated to say twice a day and there's a positive commandment in there what it's saying the smart says you should talk about what about torah so we have a positive commandment to talk about what torah now every mitzvah has a time constraint for example you say you do the prayer service in the evening and the praise service in the morning shabbat is on you know the seventh day of the week uh you know kipper is once a year or every every mitzvah has its time everything has its limit kid this you don't make a kid this with a you know with five gallons of wine that has a shear there's a certain measurement every mitzvah has a measurement what is the measurement of how much torah study you want to do how many hours they should you study total how many minutes you tell us the answer is all day with as long as long as you have energy in your mouth to speak talk words of torah you know when you shouldn't talk words of torah when you just can't you can't move your mouth you can't move your mouth you shouldn't be i mean how can you talk as long as your mouth can move what should you be talking what should be coming out of you what words of torah words are torah means learning mishnah learning talmud learning some hummus uh talking kind to somebody talking pleasant to someone talking helping somebody inspiring somebody anything that's godly that's what you have an obligation to do so you're sitting in slam and talking about whatever right the weather in the news and politics that you can't make a dent any way in correct that's dwarf talent what's the major issue again let's go back to the original point the goal is to have a what a relationship with god if you're talking torah and you're talking a mitzvot and you're talking um nice things now wow so god the god is coming through your mouth what happens the problems when you're talking to vernon mchale and the real problem is you're not talking torah you killed the relationship not totally but for that moment you killed it as you talk more dwarventalum you're basically creating a disconnect between you and god and obviously the relationship is important so you come after 120 has to be cleaned up too i don't need to scare you i'm telling you what when it doesn't tiny it's brought down it's brought down brought out in many places of mysticism so what happens after 120 you ready for this one huh something which is what we don't know if we want to live to be 120 now live now good life i know after you read this study this tanya it gives you like a perspective on what how you should plan for your future so what happens after 120 there's something which is called cafella what's cafe color coffee hell is like this you ever um when you were younger maybe you know even play slingshot you take you take a rock right something hard you take a rubber band and you're standing here you pull it back slings all the way over there right so you're sitting here half a mile away your friend is sitting there what are you calling slingshot your friend gets it from the other side wherever he is picks it up right slings it over now who's having fun you and your friends now what are you how do you think the rock feels right now can you imagine yeah can you imagine the rock was you that's what kaphakala is that's what the angels are going to do at 120. that's he wants to live to be 120. why so don't don't talk to vermont salem talk words of torah you want to have an issue what is there any other religions i can convert to i may be in trouble it's the best religion we're giving you the answers we're giving you a tip we're telling you how to live your life give me ahead of that you're giving me the giving you the cheat sheet right oh yeah um here we go so that was what your speech that was speech speech no we're not finished with speech that was part a of speech part a is what if you're talking devouring by talent means you didn't do anything bad yet but what happens if not only you're not learning torah or talking mitzvot or talking kindness and fine you're not knowing you're not talking just idle chat but now you start sitting and making fun of people no one ever does that right we all always speak nice for other people but you may start talking derogatory about someone else or even about yourself you stop making fun and the other person gets you know embarrassed or you talk lush and hara laksan haram means talking about other people there's a whole lot of allah but allah is talking about other people even by the way even if you're talking good about other people gossip gossip gossip so now see when you're talking to chad not the not the end of the world you get the slingshot but you can recommend it right here you're actually talking lost in horror you're making fun of somebody else you're gossiping what's the what's the real issue the real issue is you create a disconnect instead of spending time with god and with godly things what are you busy with talking about somebody else what's godly about that nothing not only it's not godly you actually downgrading yourself into as we said before what happens now when you come to heaven it got really dirty you know certain times if you get like a shirt that's dirty you can like you know take a little water you can wash it off but sometimes you put into the washing machine right and depending on what what type of clothes it is it goes on the hot cycle the cold cycle so in heaven there's something which is called gay genome right gehenna is hell what does hell mean there's two types of hell by the way there is hell of fire and hell of snow florida is a fire and new york is a snow right but but bring it up a few notches probably more than a few notches right so what is it what is gahannam chalet that's where you go into purgatory i mean where it burns it's on the fire the fire is on hell it's burning you burn it you gotta burn it out you sat and made fun of people you sat and gossiped i mean how you gonna get out of you you god gave you a pure soul that was beautiful pure and clean and clear you went ahead and you didn't study torah you gossip you did all the other stuff that you shouldn't be doing right so what happens now you have to go to gahannam and they gotta br they got to clean it up i mean you have to get it out of your system so when hey you ready for the details when does one get hell of fire and one of snow snow means really freezing cold like in new york apparently it's pretty cold much colder than that so very simple god gave us 248 positive commandments and 365 negative commandments right now god says don't do this and god says do this so you have 365 ways to disconnect from god and you have 248 ways to connect to god and you can keep on doing it multiple times over and over again now what happens is like this when you go ahead and god says don't do this whatever that and it's 365 so you can go through the list and you go ahead and you go do it that takes a fire from you i'm going to go ahead and i'm going to do what i'm not going to be doing when you go to do something you shouldn't be doing that that you're doing it from fire i don't care i'm going to do it anyway that you didn't do it cold-bloodedly you don't cold-bloodedly transgress a negative commandment you usually do with some kind of passion i'm i'm going to do it anywhere right that's fire the fire is going walking a fire did not listen to god you're a fire not to listen to god so what what kind of hell do you need there neither connected me though you need fire to burn you out you had the burning desire not to listen so they're gonna burn you out what happens in a positive commandment you're supposed to do this mitzvah right you have 200 foot and you don't do it so you didn't do it with a passion you're not doing it you could be lazy you know what i mean not doing a positive act comes from a coldness not from a hotness from a heart you'll actually do something negative but from when from you'll do it lack of warmth it's really you're cold so what happens god says oh you want to be cold i'll teach you what cold is and you go through hell which is really really cold again the goal of this class i want to remind you constantly this is not about telling you all the negative things that do happen this is a natural result for cleanup process the goal is to stay focused and to know there's there's possibility to fix things why would you want to fix it if it's so hard to fix them might as well to begin with on the right path okay would you say that the fire uh purifies sure the goal of all the stuff the goal of all this stuff keep up the cover what happens in the grave and kafka killed the slingshot and the hell of fire and water and cold the goal is not to hurt you the goal is to take out the junk because they got the the part that that was had to disconnect and by taking over burning out the disconnect or whatever you do to get rid of the disconnect you'll be able to be once again reunited with god it's pure purification absolutely yes purification purification purification okay so so so far we spoke about what action speech and one more point here is very simple what we say before we have a positive commandment positive commandment for what to be the back to bomb to study torah constantly so what happens if a person doesn't study you're not going and talking about bad about other people you're not chit-chatting you're just not starting just doing nothing with your time so here the problem is you you transgress the negative commandment and you're not studying torah so obviously you have to go through a purification to to to to accomplish that which is basically um um uh the right the hell the hell of of of of um snow right plus um whatever it takes to um transform clean up the time that you wasted and there's the goal like you said as a purification and b to stay focused and stay in the safe zone what's a safe zone very simple what's the safe zone study torah study torah do the commandments obviously don't transgress and think about god constantly now so far the outer addressed right the action speech the thought right negative thoughts also here he's coming to address something very unique and that is as follows and he says like this everything we spoke about up until now really affected affected the emotions your emotions that have to be cleaned up because the emotions obviously took you astray the emotions what you got involved with you know the excitement of something negative like knows when a person's let's say making fun of somebody and gossiping you think there's a big thought process in here no just emotionally it you know somebody it's excitement right it's your emotions going wild let's make fun of somebody right now let's talk about this person there's no major in you don't need that you don't need a big brain for that you just need a gossip and the contrary i think the less of a brain it's easier it's the gossip here comes a long doubter and he addresses another issue and that is as follows here he says there's possibility because what's the ultimate goal the ultimate goal is to keep connected to god so he showed you how you disconnect your emotions from god and what you have to do with it for the purification process here he deals with a different issue where um there's times you can actually contaminate and desensitize your intellect your intellect and shouldn't be focused on god and that's pretty intense why because till now you affect the emotions father at least the mind was focused on god or not disconnected from god consciously or subconsciously that is when you start studying different religion different philosophy different sciences because these are all brain stuff so as you're studying like different theory different history and different sciences and different religions what are you actually doing you're taking your brain because you need your brain to study it what are you putting in your brain all this data now what's the issue issue two issues one issue is what are you not doing at that moment you're not studying torah you're not praying you're not thinking about how you can make the world a better place for god that's issue number one number two is you're actually filling it with things which aren't godly and that the october says that could be the worst the worst part that you can do to corrupt yourself because it's something which is called conducive which is holiness holiness means that god is there in this type of wisdom everything comes from god but it doesn't come from the holy part of god it comes from obviously an external part of god everything ultimately comes from god now there is one exception let's say a person said listen i need i need a livelihood if i'm not going to go for example and study you know these type of uh books and all these type of uh um history and sciences how am i going to have pronunciation fine and that's correct doctor the author brings down even my mommies for example studied medicine why because he needed it for eternal living and he was actually you know the doctor the the the king's doctor and so on that then then obviously it's okay why because you're not doing it for a disconnect for god you're doing it to make god's world better in order to make god's world better you have to learn a profession so it's like anyone let's say you have to go to business school to learn how to manage your business so if you're going to business school because you're basically bored and just for a hobby that can be a problematic issue but if you're trying to run a successful business and in order to run it successfully you have to learn systems and learn you know let's say technology fine then it's 100 okay and then it's permissible obviously if it's not necessary for for something productive business profession then it's something which would not be okay to do so here in this chapter it's an extremely important chapter because the author outlines you um and put in simple concrete words is ultimately you want to have a deep meaningful relationship with god always and as long as you're able to have a deep meaning relation relationship with god you'll be in safe zone your mind will be filled with torah your emotions will be filled with your feeling for god you'll be able to relate to other people in a real way because you're not relating to him on a materialistic way or in a physical way that you know that differentiates us because people every person's different why is every person different our physical structure is different man women tall big you live here he lives there and so on and so forth right but that's all in the physical world in the spiritual world we're all one we're all part of god so if we stay focused on what on our spiritual connection to god our godly connection with other people we'll have a great life in this world and the world to come you want to do any cleanup that'll be great unfortunately there's many many things that the yetzer harar tries to do to distract us from doing the wrong actions saying the wrong things thinking the wrong things we're human it happens so we got to get you have to get back on track like the real bolshover you know i hear you but i'm not going to i'm not going to fall prey we're going to stay strong stay committed and the truth is we each know it from our lives because when you study torah when you pray and when you do mitzvot we all know how we feel how do we feel we feel great we're aligned with our maker we're aligned with god we're aligned with our purpose in this world and there's no greater and better life than being aligned with god so this chapter chapter 8 is extremely like a crucial chapter because what happens is if you don't know the um potholes in the road you'll fall in here he outlines you the paddles of life and make sure the paddle the pitfalls make sure don't fall in and if you do you'll get out it's not a big deal get out back on track and that's why i think this is one of the i mean one of the most it's not necessarily sometimes it sounds a little scary all these things but the reality is it's the truth you have to know the truth you have to know really what happens and by something by knowing what happens you know what not to do also so it's a great chapter to learn it's a great job to study and it really you know it like it like wakes you up and saying oh my gosh you know even though it's challenging now to stay on track it's much easier and as difficult as it is it's much easier to fight to stay on track as tough as it is versus a deal when you get off track later on