In the previous section we studied the Alter Rebbe's own words about the oneness of the Holy One, blessed be He: "והוא לבדו הוא" ("and He alone is"). Now we will look closely at what these words actually mean, and at their precision, a precision that is often overlooked.
"פירוש" ("the meaning is") that He alone is "הוא ממש, בלי שום שינוי" ("He, literally, without any change whatsoever") - He remains exactly as He was, and nothing in Him has changed. On this the Alter Rebbe brings the verse that states the matter in absolute terms: "כדכתיב אני ה' לא שניתי" ("as it is written, 'I, Havayah, have not changed'") - for if something had been added to Him, He would thereby have changed.
"כי עולם הזה וכן כל העולמות העליונים אינן פועלים שום שינוי באחדותו יתברך בהבראם מאין ליש" ("for this world, and likewise all the upper worlds, effect no change whatsoever in His blessed oneness by their being created out of nothing into something") - the fact that so vast a "something" came into being, and likewise the creation of all the upper worlds together, changed nothing at all in His oneness and His singularity: they added nothing to Him and effected no change in Him.
"שכמו שהיה הוא לבדו הוא יחיד ומיוחד קודם הבראם, כן הוא לבדו הוא יחיד ומיוחד אחר שבראם" ("for just as He alone was, single and unique, before they were created, so He alone is, single and unique, after He created them") - and again the emphasis: He alone, single and unique, exactly as in the wording we brought from the Yalkut Shimoni. Just as He was single and unique before the creation, so He alone is single and unique after it.
This is the foundation of the entire matter. These are enormous, powerful words, and the whole avodah is to understand them:
We are not speaking of mere information, but of study, of internalizing, of actually feeling it. And when a person feels this, he is able to fulfill "אנכי ה' אלוקיך" ("I am Havayah your God") in every single detail of his life, and "לא יהיה לך אלוקים אחרים" ("you shall have no other gods") in every single detail. For once a person internalizes this, anything that stirs in him and pulls at him is nothing but nothing at all, an illusion, emptiness. There is no reality other than the reality of the Creator, and He is the One who tells a person what to do and what not to do, while everything else simply has no relevance and no existence. Certainly one must live this way and do everything according to His word; it is only that in order to truly internalize it, one must first understand it, and out of the understanding it will seep into the emotions as well.
It is worth emphasizing: the Alter Rebbe opened the chapter with the words "מודעת זאת" ("this is known") - known to everyone, without any distinction. This is not something that belongs specifically to one who has come to study Tanya; it is one of the foundations of faith. The mitzvah of the oneness of G-d is one of the six constant mitzvos, which a Jew is obligated to live with and believe at every moment. It is a basic premise, not something one can skip over and say "I learned it" or "I did not learn it."
Why is this matter so hard to grasp? Because in the natural order as we know it in this world, every influencer is himself also influenced, whether on the spiritual plane or the physical one:
A teacher and a student: the teacher influences the student, and yet he himself is influenced in return. First, while he is giving over, he is taken up and occupied with this and cannot be immersed in anything else, so the very act of influencing has placed him within a certain framework. More than that, as our Sages put it, "and from my students more than from them all": the student sharpens his teacher with his questions, so the one who gives ends up becoming a receiver, one who is influenced.
A craftsman and a tool: the craftsman produces a tool, and the tool supports him, or helps him work at other things. Not only is the tool influenced by him; he himself benefits from the tool and is bound up with it, for without it he would be lacking.
And here we come to say that there is an influencer who is not influenced: the Holy One, blessed be He, created, and continues to create at every single moment, and nevertheless He is not affected in the slightest and remains single and unique. How can this be grasped?
[From here comes the answer to the natural question that arises: what, as it were, was the Holy One, blessed be He, doing before the world was created, and with what is He occupied today? The question itself assumes a change, as if before creation He was alone and afterward He is busy, and that is precisely the assumption we are coming to negate. And fundamentally it is not in our hands to examine the Creator and speak of Him in our own terms; but let us lay out the matter in order and it will become clear.]
To understand this, a preface is needed: the divine power that creates and brings into being at every moment is in the category of tzimtzum, contraction. The Holy One, blessed be He, contracts Himself, as it were, in order to create, while He Himself is above all of this.
With this preface we can also resolve a variation in the text of the prayers. The version brought in Tanya is "אתה הוא עד שלא נברא העולם, אתה הוא משנברא העולם" ("You are He before the world was created, You are He since the world was created"), while there is another version: "אתה הוא עד שלא בראת את העולם, ואתה הוא משבראת את העולם" ("You are He before You created the world, and You are He since You created the world"). In Likkutei Torah on Shir HaShirim the Alter Rebbe cites the version "בראת" in the name of an older text, and notes that the essential version is "נברא" (whoever wishes should look there inside).
And this is not merely a change in wording but a change in meaning: "בראת" ("You created") implies that You became involved with the creation, whereas "נברא" ("it was created") implies that it came about, as it were, on its own. In truth both expressions are used regarding the Holy One, blessed be He: "בראשית ברא אלוקים את השמים ואת הארץ" ("In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth") - "ברא," He created, He involved Himself in creating; and in contrast, "יהללו את שם ה' . . כי הוא ציווה ונבראו" ("Let them praise the Name of Havayah . . for He commanded and they were created") - "ונבראו," they were created, as it were on their own.
And here is the precision: wherever it says "ברא," the Name Elokim appears, and wherever it says "ונבראו," the Name Havayah appears:
The Name Elokim is a Name of tzimtzum. When we speak of the divine power that contracted itself in order to become involved with creation, the term used is "ברא," He created.
The Name Havayah is above tzimtzum. With regard to it one cannot say "ברא," for it did not contract itself and did not become involved in this; with regard to it, rather, "נברא," it was created.
To illustrate with a physical analogy: a king, and under him officers and workers and servants and simple people who carry out the simple tasks. Who empties the garbage bin, who paves the roads and who installs the lighting along them? The workers do. And the king, is he the one doing it? With regard to him, the thing "was done." Certainly he rules over the entire system, and in the end the accomplishment is credited to him, and one cannot say that he is not the one who did it; but neither can one say that he is the one who did it. With regard to him it "was done," while the one actually doing it is the lowly worker busy with the small tasks.
Now it is understood: the version "עד שלא בראת" speaks with regard to the Name Elokim, while the version "עד שלא נברא" speaks with regard to the Name Havayah, which is the loftier level.
With this the matter is completed through a beautiful precision in the language of Tanya, in the third line from the top on page 26, where a change of a single letter captures both extremes: "הוא לבדו הוא יחיד ומיוחד קודם הבראם" - "הבראם," as though they came into being on their own, which refers to Him as He is above all tzimtzum; "כן הוא לבדו הוא יחיד ומיוחד אחר שבראם" - "שבראם," after He involved Himself, as it were, in creating them. The Alter Rebbe wants to capture both extremes: relative to the very highest level He alone is, and even after the very lowest level He remains alone, the very same "הוא."
It emerges, then, that just as He alone is before their coming into being, before any tzimtzum at all, so too after the tzimtzum and the involvement in creation He remains the same "הוא," entirely untouched by it. The influencer is not influenced; He remains He, single and unique, and the entire world relative to Him is literally nothing at all.
In summary: in this section we learned that the whole of creation, this world and all the upper worlds, effects no change whatsoever in His blessed oneness, "אני ה' לא שניתי," and that just as He was single and unique before they came into being, so He is single and unique after He created them. We noted that this knowledge is incumbent upon every Jew as one of the foundations of faith, and that it must be internalized until it seeps into the emotions and finds expression in fulfilling "אנכי" and "לא יהיה לך" in every single detail. We also explained why this is hard to grasp: in the natural order every influencer is influenced in return, as a teacher is by his student and a craftsman by the tool of his hands, whereas here we are speaking of an influencer who is not influenced. From this we came to the difference between the Name Elokim, the Name of tzimtzum, regarding which it says "ברא," and the Name Havayah, regarding which it says "נברא," and to the precision of "קודם הבראם" and "אחר שבראם," which captures both extremes.
In the next section we will continue with the Alter Rebbe's words in chapter 20 and with their explanation.