In the previous section we looked at the words of our Sages, "A person sanctifies himself a little, he is sanctified a great deal; from below, he is sanctified from Above." Now let us see how the commentaries on the Gemara understood this statement, chief among them the Maharsha, and how the Alter Rebbe's reading differs from theirs.
The Maharsha's explanation:
The commentaries on the Gemara, including the more straightforward among them such as the Maharsha, explain that the Gemara is describing a sequence of stages. A person who sanctifies himself a little merits that he is sanctified a great deal; only once that stage is complete, and he has sanctified himself a great deal from below, does he merit to be sanctified from Above. In other words, one does not move on to "from below, he is sanctified from Above" before the earlier stage has been finished. First he must reach the point where he is sanctified a great deal, with Heavenly assistance to be very holy, and only then does he advance to the sanctification that comes from Above.
The Alter Rebbe's explanation:
The Alter Rebbe does not read the Gemara this way at all. He joins the two halves of the statement into one: "A person sanctifies himself a little below, he is sanctified a great deal from Above." One does not wait until he has sanctified himself a great deal below in order to merit the sanctification from Above. Even if he has sanctified himself only a little, he is already fit to be sanctified a great deal from Above.
Where does the Alter Rebbe get this principle, that a little below earns a person a great deal, and specifically from Above? Here in Tanya he states it briefly, but elsewhere he develops it at length. In Iggeres HaTeshuvah he brings this very same verse, "You shall sanctify yourselves and you shall be holy," uses this very same wording, "a person sanctifies himself a little from below," and there he adds a mashal that makes the source of the idea clear.
The mashal from Iggeres HaTeshuvah:
At the end of Iggeres HaTeshuvah (chapter 12) the Alter Rebbe discusses a person who accepts suffering upon himself. He writes that the Holy One created the world to be a world of kindness, and therefore through light suffering in this world a person is spared harsh judgments in the World to Come. A little suffering here erases a large account up there. On this the Alter Rebbe brings a mashal, and it will help us here as well: "like the analogy of the movement and shifting of a shadow." When you measure the movement of a shadow on the ground and find that it has shifted one handbreadth, what caused that movement? The movement of the sphere of the sun in the heavens. And how far did the sun move up there? Not a handbreadth, but thousands of miles. An enormous movement above produces one handbreadth below.
From the mashal we learn the reverse as well: when a person performs a small act below, he should know that above it has an effect beyond all comparison. Accordingly, when the Gemara says that one who sanctifies himself a little is sanctified a great deal, it does not mean that he will merit to succeed and accomplish a great deal below, but that through the little he did below he is sanctified a great deal from Above. And indeed, further on in Iggeres HaTeshuvah the Alter Rebbe explicitly connects the mashal to this very idea, and cites the words of our Sages on the verse "You shall sanctify yourselves and you shall be holy" in the same wording he uses here. This is why the Alter Rebbe explains the Gemara differently from the other commentaries.
A positive mitzvah that the tzaddik cannot fulfill:
At the opening of the chapter the Alter Rebbe came to explain to a Jew who is wrestling with these thoughts why he ought to be joyful: every time he overcomes them he has an opportunity to fulfill the prohibition of "Do not stray after your heart," a mitzvah that the tzaddik cannot fulfill. Now the Alter Rebbe adds that the distinction of the beinoni who struggles is not limited to the negative side, the fulfillment of a prohibition. He also has in hand a positive mitzvah, on the affirmative side, which only he can fulfill and which the tzaddik cannot.
In his words: "לבד מה שמקיים מצות עשה של תורה - והתקדשתם", "apart from the fact that he fulfills the Torah's positive commandment, 'You shall sanctify yourselves.'" The tzaddik cannot fulfill this mitzvah, for he is already holy and separated from worldly matters, and there is nothing to say to him about "sanctify yourself with what is permitted to you," since from the outset he has no connection to it at all and is set apart from it. But the beinoni, who does have a connection to worldly matters, when he sanctifies himself in what is permitted to him is fulfilling the positive mitzvah of "You shall sanctify yourselves," a mitzvah the tzaddik cannot fulfill.
"You shall sanctify yourselves - that you make yourselves holy":
"או פירוש והתקדשתם - שתעשו עצמכם קדושים", "or the meaning of 'You shall sanctify yourselves' is that you should make yourselves holy," that a person should make himself holy. In this connection there is the well known story of people who came to the Alter Rebbe and told him that his chassidim were being accused of putting on an act, of making themselves out to be holy. The Alter Rebbe answered them: if so, excellent! For the Mishnah says of one who pretends to be lame or crippled, "he will not die of old age until he becomes like one of them." One who feigns lameness will become lame, one who feigns being crippled will become crippled, and the same with blindness. And if this is so with something negative, surely the measure of good is greater than the measure of punishment; if they are putting on an act of "You shall sanctify yourselves," they will certainly become that in truth.
And what does this "making" look like in practice? When a craving for some indulgence stirs in a person, he tells himself that he will have it in another ten minutes. And when the yetzer hara raises its voice and argues, "Are you holy? Are you a tzaddik?", he answers that he is making himself as if, in the sense of "that you make yourselves holy."
In the previous lesson, when we studied these lines, we raised the question of why the Alter Rebbe writes that during the very time he delays, he occupies himself with Torah study:
In one of his notes on this chapter the Rebbe writes "needs further examination" regarding the connection between the learning and the delay, since pushing off the craving is in itself a complete matter on its own.
On the other hand, some explain that if during the time of the delay a person busies himself with other cravings, he has merely exchanged one craving for another and there is no sanctification in that. Precisely when he learns or occupies himself with something holy during those minutes, the restraint becomes a restraint of holiness and has value.
Both are true: pushing off the craving is itself a great thing, and the involvement with holiness at that moment is what gives the restraint its force.
"אף שבאמת אינו קדוש ומובדל מהסטרא אחרא", "even though in truth he is not holy and separated from the sitra achra." The person who makes himself holy is not truly separated from the sitra achra; he remains in the category we mentioned, in the sense that he is still bound up with worldly matters. "בתוקפה וגבורתה כתולדתה", "in its full strength and power, as from birth." The craving has remained with the same intensity and force it had when he was born; and there is a place in Tanya where it says that, on the contrary, the evil grows stronger over time, so that it is not merely "as from birth" but actually intensifies. "רק שכובש יצרו ומקדש עצמו", "only that he subdues his yetzer and sanctifies himself." And this is precisely the content of the positive mitzvah: that a person be master of himself, the landlord, that he rule over the craving and not it over him.
"The one who takes from his fellow bears the burden of proof":
What is the reward for this? Before we get to that, it is worth dwelling on a powerful point the Rebbe explained in one of the farbrengens: why does chassidus place such heavy emphasis on ruling over one's cravings and holding oneself back even in permitted things? The Rebbe explained that something very deep is happening here, something that touches the very foundation of a Jew's faith in the Holy One.
There is a rule in halachah that appears in the Gemara in many contexts: "The one who takes from his fellow bears the burden of proof." If a person is in possession of an object, and another comes and demands it from him claiming it is his, the burden of proof falls on the one making the claim, while the one in possession need not prove anything. From here, says the Rebbe, we must ask: who is in possession of this world, and who is the guest?
If the Holy One is the landlord, as the well known expression in chassidus has it, that G-dliness is the simple reality and the world our eyes see is renewed every moment and is nothing more than a guest here, then the Holy One is the one in possession. Therefore, whoever wishes to enjoy the world bears the burden of proof: let him bring proof that he is permitted to enjoy it, and absent proof, let him not enjoy it.
And if a person lives by "whatever I feel like, I do," then he is looking at it the other way around: the world is the one in possession and the Holy One is, as it were, the guest. On this approach, when he is told something is forbidden, the burden of proof is on the other side: prove that it is forbidden, and if the Torah does not say explicitly that it is forbidden, he takes it.
It emerges that at its depth, the question of whether a person lives by "sanctify yourself with what is permitted to you" is not some side question about pushing off a craving for an hour. It is a fundamental question of faith: who is the landlord here, who is in possession and who is the claimant. And when a person knows that the Holy One is the landlord, he must find proof for everything. Not to ask, "Where is it written in Shulchan Aruch that this is forbidden?" but the reverse: "Where is it written in Shulchan Aruch that this is required?" And if there is no proof that the Torah obligates him in it, let him not do it. This is the content of "You shall sanctify yourselves," and one who lives this way begins to think about things correctly rather than backwards.
"And you shall be holy" - the promise:
"והייתם קדושים", "and you shall be holy." This is already a promise: if you fulfill "You shall sanctify yourselves," the Holy One promises "and you shall be holy." "כלומר סופו להיות קדוש ומובדל באמת מהסטרא אחרא", "that is, he will ultimately be holy and truly separated from the sitra achra." A person who lives with this matter of "You shall sanctify yourselves" will in the end be truly separated from the sitra achra. This does not mean he will turn into a tzaddik, but that he will be somewhat more separated: his cravings and his struggles will be of a different sort.
For there are levels within cravings. There is one whose cravings are for forbidden things, and one whose cravings are for permitted things; and even within permitted things themselves, one person's cravings are coarser and another's are finer. There are people who envy other people's cravings and say: if only those were my cravings. This is what it means that a person will be holy and truly separated, at least to a certain degree: the Holy One will sanctify him a little, and his struggles will be easier.
"על ידי שמקדשים אותו הרבה מלמעלה ומסייעים אותו לגרשם מליבו מעט מעט", "because he is sanctified a great deal from Above, and he is helped to drive them out of his heart little by little." The Holy One assists him in driving the evil and the cravings out of his heart bit by bit, and then it becomes far easier and more natural for him to be close and connected to matters of Torah and mitzvos, to be a friend of the yetzer tov and to push off the yetzer hara even in permitted things: in thought, in speech, in action, in eating, in every area.
This should be the main avodah of a chassid: the permitted things. About the forbidden things there is nothing to discuss at all, forbidden is forbidden and there is no argument. This section of Tanya should be a basic line running through a chassid's life. What is actually being asked of him? That he push off permitted things a little, that he sanctify himself somewhat. And whoever sanctifies himself in this will find a thousand and one other things far easier.
In summary: in this section we studied the Maharsha's explanation of the statement of our Sages, which divides it into stages, and the Alter Rebbe's different explanation, which joins the two halves together: even a little sanctification below brings about great sanctification from Above. This principle is developed in Iggeres HaTeshuvah through the mashal of the movement and shifting of a shadow, where one handbreadth below results from thousands of miles above. We also learned that the beinoni who struggles fulfills the positive mitzvah of "You shall sanctify yourselves," which the tzaddik cannot fulfill, and whose meaning is "that you make yourselves holy," even though the evil remains in its full strength and power. We dwelt on the Rebbe's explanation, that the law of "the one who takes from his fellow bears the burden of proof" teaches that "sanctify yourself with what is permitted to you" touches the foundation of faith, who is the landlord in this world. And finally, the promise of "and you shall be holy," that the Holy One sanctifies a person from Above and helps him drive the evil out of his heart little by little.
In the next section we will continue with the Alter Rebbe's words in chapter 27.