GOD’S NAME OF CREATION
Why do Jews have a hidden inner voice that loves God, believes in the Divine, and always pulls a Jew toward virtue?
We are all descendants of our father Abraham, who was completely permeated with love of God. Abraham willingly sacrificed all he had for the sake of fulfilling God’s directive. Even before Abraham had spoken with God, he willingly gave his life in defense of monotheism.247See Shem Mi-Shmuel, Parashas Lech Lecha pg. 86 s.v. be-midrash rabbah. The Rebbe of Sochatshov explained that the Midrash compares Abraham’s jumping into the furnace in Ur Casdim to the sacrifice of Chananya, Mishael and Azaryah (see Daniel 3) because both had no hope of salvation. Abraham had never seen a supernatural miracle, and when he was willing to give his life in defense of his monotheistic beliefs he did so without the slightest hope of miraculous intervention. Chananya, Mishael, and Azaryah also fully gave their lives when they entered a blaze instead of bowing to Nebuchadnezzar’s idol, for they had been told by Ezekiel the prophet that God was not about to miraculously save them. Thus Abraham and Chananya, Mishael, and Azaryah represent the most perfect examples of total dedication to God. Abraham transformed his personality so that he was totally connected to the Almighty.
It was at the moment of his final trial of faith248Abraham was tested with ten trials of faith. For the final test, God commanded that Abraham bind his son Isaac to the altar and offer him as a sacri-fice. See further Ethics of the Fathers 5:3 and Genesis 22. that he fully inter- nalized the level of yechidah. That is why his last test mentioned the word yechidah: Kach na es bincha es Yechidcha, “Please take your son, your only one, and offer him as a complete offering” (Gen 22:2).
Abraham had waited one hundred years for the birth of Isaac, the son who was suitable for the continuation of Abraham’s mission. When the Almighty asked for the sacrifice of Isaac, He was requesting that Abraham take all of his dreams and hopes and sacrifice them joyously for God. Abraham was not to merely give up his most beloved son; he was to perform this task with ecstatic joy, devotion, and a sense of connection to the Divine.249God never told Abraham where to offer Isaac. Abraham, as a result, had to be in a state of mind that would allow for prophecy in order to hear from God where to bind his son. A prophet must be overwhelmed with ecstatic joy in order to commune with the Divine. Since Abraham had to be ready for proph-ecy, God was demanding from him ecstatic joy. See further Shem Mi-Shmuel, Mo’adim pg. 13. Abraham fulfilled the challenge. Despite losing all sense of spiritual inspiration,250It is written, Va-yar es ha-makom me-rachok, “He saw the place from afar” (Gen. 22:4). The Zohar explains that ha-makom is really a reference to God. Abraham saw God from a distance because he lost all sense of inspired spirituality. Abraham reached to his depths and performed the binding of Isaac with joy. As a result yechidah entered him fully.251Shem Mi-Shmuel, Mo’adim, pg. 13. In Abraham, yechidah was an or penimi (inner light) and not merely an or makkif (a transcendent light). Our patriarch bequeathed this level of soul to all of his descendants—the Jewish people.
The inner point within every Jew, in which he or she believes in God and loves God, is a genetic inheritance from Abraham, and God Himself protects this point and does not allow it to be sullied and destroyed. In the prayer liturgy, the Divine protection of the pintele yid, the small spark of faith, is appreciated in the first blessing of the silent devotions. The first blessing of the silent Shemoneh Esreh prayer thanks God for serving as the Shield of Abraham. The blessing is not merely thanking God for having protected Abraham in the ancient pagan world; according to the Chiddushei Ha-Rim, it is an offering of thanks to God for protecting the piece of Abraham that is within each and every one of us.
Generally, yechidah is a hidden voice, an innermost point, while in Abraham it was revealed because his entire personality was yechidah. Abraham was the first individual to internalize yechidah. This is the meaning of the Vilna Gaon’s teaching that the small heh in the word be- hibbaram teaches that only Abraham (and tzaddikim like him) had all five levels of soul. Others might hear yechidah on special occasions, but they have not fully internalized it within.
The Hidden Love
Abraham was filled with ahavah, love of holiness. He loved humanity, Jewry, and most of all, God, with every possible ounce of passion.252See further Nesivos Shalom, Parashas Vayeira pg. 107, s.v. ve-ha-Torah ha-kedoshah. In fact, in scripture God named him Avraham Ohavi, “Abraham who loves Me” (Isa. 41:8). Since every Jew has a connection to a little piece from Abraham, there is a hidden love in the hearts of Jews. Deep within stands yechidah, a voice within the Jewish soul that is totally attracted to God. This part of the person would willingly sacrifice his most precious wishes,253The word for life in Hebrew is nefesh. Sacrifice of one’s life is called mesiras nefesh. In the Bible nefesh really means desire or will, as in the verse, im yesh es nafshchem, “if you so desire.” Life is called nefesh because continued living is our strongest and most powerful desire. his life, for God’s sake.
Every Jew has this hidden love and faith.254The Hebrew term for “faith,” emunah, really means, “hold.” Faith is the feeling of holding God’s hand and trusting Him. See further Horeb, Chapter 10, where Rabbi Hirsch writes, “Emunah means to hold fast to God.” Abraham was the person of love and the teacher of faith. Our piece of Abraham fully believes in God just as it is fully willing to express its love of God. Even the worst sinner or the most obnoxious atheist, in the depths of his heart, has an undying passion and loyalty to God and His Law. When the Jew is challenged to keep his faith, when he is placed on a stake and offered a choice, “Death or idolatry?” Almost always, the Jew will choose martyrdom. Even the sinner who scoffs at the faithful will willingly give his life. For at the moment of supreme challenge, the deepest depths of the heart are awakened; the Jew realizes that idolatry means disconnecting from God, and his yechidah voice calls the Jew to sacrifice and he joyfully obeys.
Udel, the daughter of the Baal Shem Tov, would regularly say, “Jews have done well. God Almighty is our patron. But God also has done well. See, even a man like Feivish, a thief who cared little for Torah and observance, when he was placed in the supreme challenge, he chose martyrdom over converting to a faith that was not monotheistic.”
Two centuries later, Udel’s words still ring true in light of the following account from Rabbi Israel Spira.255I have paraphrased Rabbi Spira’s account titled, “Even the Transgressors in Israel,” that can be found in Y. Eliach’s Hasidic Tales of the Holocaust, pg. 155. Rabbi Spira said of this story, “This particular story is one of those stories that deserves to be published in a book.” In the Janowska concentration camp,256The Janowska Camp was a notorious place of suffering and pain. Y. Eliach described the camp in note 1 of Hasidic Tales of the Holocaust.
The Janowska Road Camp was situated near the cemeteries and sand mountains outside the city of Lvov, in the Ukraine. It was established in October-November 1941 by Dr. Wechter, the governor of the district of Galicia, and S.S. Major General Katzman, police chief of Galicia. Officially a forced labor camp, it was in reality a place of torture and death which was eventually taken over by the S.S. economic administrative main office (WHVA), the agency that controlled concentration camps. The camp was notorious for the cruelty of its German commanders and their Ukrainian and Russian collaborators. In many instances, inmates were brutally murdered for the entertainment of the camp officials. Tens of thousands of Jews, mainly from Eastern Galicia, met their deaths there. The Germans, because of the threat of possible resistance, liquidated the camp in a surprise action on November 20, 1943. there was a notorious Jewish policeman, a Kapo, whose name was Schneeweiss. This man was known to have no consideration for his fellow Jews who were in a less fortunate position. In fact, some prisoners felt that the Nazis were more understanding than Schneeweiss.
Before Yom Kippur a group of Jews approached Rabbi Spira, the Grand Rebbe of Bluzhov, with a request. They begged him to approach Schneeweiss and ask for a special work assignment for Yom Kippur. They did not want to perform any melachah, Biblically prohibited forms of work, and they wanted to pray the special prayers of the holiest day. The Rebbe was afraid to ask Schneeweiss but he could not disappoint Jews who wanted to observe Mitzvos in the midst of the Nazi inferno. The Rebbe approached the Kapo and begged him to assign this group of Jews to work that would not entail a Biblical sin. Something was touched in the heart of the hard man; he promised the Rebbe that he would try to help.
Mr. Schneeweiss arranged that on the morning of Yom Kippur the Rebbe and his followers were assigned to clean barracks. He gave them rags, and the students did not use any cleaning agents so as not to violate the holiness of the day. Around midday, two Nazis entered the room pushing a cart laden with delicacies never seen in the camp. There was steaming meat and white bread instead of the watery filth that was usually served as “soup.”
“Quick, get up and eat lunch!” One of the Nazis ordered. None of the men moved.
Schneeweiss stepped forward and said, “Today is the holiest day of the year, we Jews fast on this day.”
The Nazi was shocked at the insolence, “You are all working for the Whermacht. If you starve yourselves you are guilty of sabotaging our war effort. Whoever does not eat is a traitor! Tell them to eat!” He screamed.
Schneeweiss drew himself up a little straighter and said, “We Jews do not eat on Yom Kippur.”
The Nazi took out his revolver and shot Schneeweiss. He ordered the remaining stunned Jews to clean up the martyr’s blood and he left the room.
Mr. Schneewiess, of blessed memory, had not kept Yom Kippur for years, but at the moment of ultimate trial he gave up his life for the sake of God’s honor. His yechidah expressed itself.257Purim is also a day of the revelation of yechidah. Yechidah is revealed through sacrifice. We all received our yechidah through Abraham’s sacrificing of his own desires during the binding of Isaac, and for all of us moments that call for supreme sacrifice trigger a revelation of yechidah. Mordechai’s willing-ness to sacrifice all for the sake of God’s honor, when he refused to bow to a human despite Achashveirosh’s command, caused the revelation of yechidah. Mordechai is called ben Kish in the Scroll of Esther. The Talmud teaches that this was his name because hekish, “he knocked,” on the gates of prayer. Kish is an acronym for kutzo shel yud. Mordechai knocked on the gates of prayer through arousal of the hidden apex of the yud, his yechidah (Rav Wolfson).
The Tanya is a work written by the first Lubavitcher Rebbe to explain how every Jew can easily reach perfect observance of all of the commandments. His most powerful argument is based on the hidden love of yechidah.
Every Jew has a hidden love for God. In moments of supreme test you and I would willingly give up our lives so as not to harm our connection with the Almighty. In truth, every misdeed, in a certain sense, harms the bond with God. Every sin is really a form of idol-worship; it is a denial of the reality that God is the absolute Master and the One who sees, judges, and punishes. If we are willing to give up our lives so as to maintain the health of our relationship with Him, shouldn’t we be willing to sacrifice whatever lusts are attracting us to the sin? For instance, if a store-owner has a temptation to deceive a customer, in essence it is a desire for a small pleasure (money). If the shopkeeper is conscious of the fact that he would give up all pleasure, his life, in order to stay connected with God, wouldn’t he easily forego a few ill-gotten pennies in order to maintain the bond?258See further Tanya, Chapters 18-20. 259Perhaps the hidden voice of yechidah is the meaning of the following Mid-rash in Shir Ha-Shirim Rabbah. In the Song of Songs, the Shulamis woman (the symbol of the Jewish nation) remarks that she is asleep yet her heart is awake. The Midrash explains the verse in the following paragraph:
“I am sleeping”—the Jewish nation said to God, “Master of the world, I am sleeping from the commandments but my heart is awake to perform acts of kindness; I am sleeping from charities but my heart is awake to perform them; I am sleeping from the sacrifices but my heart is awake for the recital of Shema and prayer; I am sleeping from Jerusalem’s Temple but my heart is awake for synagogues and houses of study; I am sleeping from the ketz, the set time for redemption, but my heart is awake for sal-vation; God’s heart is awake to redeem me.”
Perhaps the Midrash is saying that externally we are sinners, who neglect our obligations and historic mission, yet internally our hearts are filled with a Godly soul—yechidah—that seeks to fulfill as many obligations as possible and it yearns for redemption.
The Place of Yechidah
According to Sefer Yetzirah our world appears in triplicate form: space, time, and person, as discussed in Lesson Two. Within a person there is yechidah. In time there is Yom Kippur. What is the place of yechidah? The Western Wall.
Yechidah is the part of the soul that is never sullied. Even the worst sinner cannot destroy yechidah’s call to holiness. Similarly, while the Temple in Jerusalem was burnt by the Babylonians and later the Romans, the Western Wall was never destroyed, and the Divine presence never left its environs. Thus, it represents holiness that cannot be destroyed.260See further Tzion Ve-Arehah pg. 115 s.v. kotel ha-ma’aravi. This was also the symbolism of the ner ma’aravi, the Western candle in the menorah (the candelabrum in the Temple). According to our tradition this western flame would miraculously always stay lit, and all the other flames would turn toward it. It symbolized innermost holiness, the internal flame in Jewish hearts that even the worst sinner cannot extinguish.261See further Tzion Ve-Arehah pg. 115-116. Ma’avar Yabok explains that the four directions east, west, north, and south parallel the four faces on the Divine Chariot: the face of man, the face of an eagle, the face of an ox, and the face of a lion. The four groups of Jewish tribes during the forty years in the desert (the nation was split into groups of three tribes each for the sake of camping and traveling) also parallel these concepts. East represents the face of man (in the chariot) and the group of tribes led by Judah, the holiest members of the Jews. West represents the face of an eagle and the lowest level in the Jewish nation, the group of tribes led by Dan. The lowest Jews do not have their own deeds; all they have is their yechidah, an innate goodness. On the west, there is the Western Wall and the western flame, representatives of yechidah.
See further Emunas Etecha, Parashas Kedoshim pg. 70. Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai is the personality who revealed that there are secrets to the Torah. There are also secrets in every Jewish soul. Even the soul that seems fully evil has a hidden point, its yechidah, through which it is fully righteous and beloved to the Almighty. This secret cannot be broken. Lag Ba-Omer, the day when Rabbi Shimon revealed the Zohar, is a day of yechidah. It, like Purim, is a holiday even the lowest Jew can relate to. On this day the innermost secrets within our souls glow, and we all sense a bit of the hidden tzaddik that we all are.
The Realm of Evil
God’s light takes on different forms, each progressively more physical, as it evolves through different stages. This process is called the seder hishtalshalus. The five different parts of the soul are different points along a personal seder hishtalshlus.
God’s world is perfectly balanced. In order to maintain the harmony that allows for free choice the entire seder hishtalshlus has a polar image of evil forces. Therefore, there are parallel soul parts that are physical and pull towards evil. There are five soul parts that are from the realm of evil—the physical. For example, the Tanya teaches that the Godly nefesh is concentrated in the blood and in the right ventricle of the heart, and the physical, animalistic nefesh is in the left ventricle of the heart.262Tanya, Chapter 1. Thus, just as there is yechidah—a hidden soul part that pulls to virtue—there is also a hidden voice of physicality that pushes a person toward sin and hate.263Perhaps this is the subconscious voice that Freud discovered and discussed (heard from the Stitchiner Rebbe). See further Emunas Etecha, Parashas Kedoshim pgs. 67-71.
When the Jewish nation left Egypt the various forces of evil, represented by the Egyptians and their deities, were smitten. There was one idol that did not fall initially whose name was Baal Tzefon. The root of tzafun is tzadi, peh, nun, which means, “hidden.” The evil urge is also called tzefon in the verse, Ve-es ha-tzefoni archik mei-aleichem, “I will distance the tzefoni [the hidden evil urge] from you” (Yoel 2:20). The symbolism of Baal Tzefon’s survival was that the revealed forms of evil had been defeated, yet the hidden, subconscious evil had not been destroyed.
When the Red Sea split the hidden form of evil crumbled. Rabbi Isaac Luriah explained that the splitting of the Red Sea and the revelation of a dry sea floor represented an emergence of the Alma De-Iskasya, “the hidden world.” The waves of an ocean are always visible and they represent the revealed dimension, while the sea floor that is usually covered with water represents the hidden realm. Apparently, when Jewry arrived at the Red Sea, we found our inner voice of virtue, we revealed our Rav tuvcha asher tzafanta le-yereacha, “the great amounts of Your good that are hidden away for those who revere you” (Ps. 31:20). We revealed yechidah, and then the hidden evil force that had broadcast anti-Jewish hate and sin collapsed.
The Jewish reaction to the revelation of the hidden was a musical one as the entire nation sang Shiras Ha-Yam—the Song of the Sea. There is a simple psychological explanation for this response. When they saw the hidden world and discovered their own hidden soul they glimpsed an entirely new perspective. A vast, exciting new world appeared before them. When you see a magnificent new universe you become a new person and the only possible response is song.264Heard from the Stitchiner Rebbe.