In the previous section we learned about the souls of the chassidei umos ha'olam, the pious of the nations, and about the distinction between the nefesh habahamis, whose source is in kelipah, and the levels of good that exist among the nations. Now we turn to the divine soul of a Jew and how it is joined to the body.
A story from the interrogation during the imprisonment of Yud-Tes Kislev:
During the Alter Rebbe's famous imprisonment, whose day of liberation we celebrate as Yud-Tes Kislev, he was put through a formal interrogation with questions touching on the content of his teachings in the seforim of chassidus. The informing against him came, sadly, from our own brethren, fellow Jews, who copied out pages and portions of his maamarim and handed them over to the Russian government, knowing full well that the authorities would either not grasp what they meant or would misread them, and that this would become grounds for a case against him.
The entire interrogation file was recovered in recent years from the archives in Russia, and it contains the questions and answers in detail: some twenty-two questions, to each of which the Alter Rebbe gave a full response, pitched even to the level of a gentile investigator. The final question concerned the end of chapter 1, which we have just learned: how could he write in Tanya that a gentile has no good in him at all, and that whatever he does is only for his own sake and out of fear? In their eyes this was a severe affront to the standing of the non-Jew.
When he reached this question, the Alter Rebbe looked at them and gave a wise smile. They caught the smile, and with that the matter ended; they did not ask for an explanation. Afterward the Alter Rebbe explained what that smile had conveyed. Through it he was telling them: "I have answered all the previous questions and you were convinced. Do you really want to be convinced that this one is true as well? Better that it remain a question mark for you, and we move on." And indeed they preferred not to hear the explanation of this matter. We, however, can explain it and understand why it is so.
The opening of chapter 2:
Until now we have dealt with the first soul, the one that comes from kelipah and sitra achra. We will still return to it, since we have not finished with it: we said that the word "nefesh" defines an entire system, and we managed to describe it in only a few lines. With Hashem's help, when we reach chapter 6, we will come back and spell out its meanings and its standing. For now we move on to the second soul.
The Alter Rebbe writes: "ונפש השנית בישראל היא חלק אלוקה ממעל ממש", "And the second soul of a Jew is literally a part of G-d above." This second soul exists in a Jew alone: a gentile has one soul, while a Jew has a second soul, and it is literally a part of G-d above. There are several precise points in this wording that call for explanation.
Why is it called the "second" soul? Does "second" imply that it is lower in rank, that it merely arrived second? This precise term carries several meanings:
From the standpoint of its root: Kabbalah teaches that the root of the nefesh habahamis is in the world of Tohu, while the root of the divine soul is in the world of Tikkun. And it is known that Tohu is higher and loftier than Tikkun. In that respect the divine soul is "second": although the animal soul is low, its root is higher, for whatever is highest, when it falls, falls lowest.
From the standpoint of its mission: The whole reason this soul was brought down into a Jewish body is that it has work to do with the nefesh habahamis. Its mission in this world is to refine, to labor with and engage the animal soul. As it were, an animal soul was sent down into the world first, and only afterward the divine soul, to set it right.
From the standpoint of the order in which it enters the body (and this is the simplest explanation): the verse says "כי יצר לב האדם רע מנעוריו", "for the inclination of a person's heart is evil from his youth," and Rashi explains "mine'urav" as referring to the moment he stirs to emerge from his mother's womb. From the instant he comes out into the air of the world, the first thing he comes out with is the yetzer hara. The divine soul, by contrast, enters in stages: one stage at age three, another when he reaches the age of chinuch, and the completion of its entry at thirteen, at bar mitzvah, as explained in Shulchan Aruch that this is when the entry of the holy soul is finished. It follows that it comes second.
Shlomo HaMelech's language is equally precise on this point. The yetzer hara, the animal soul, he calls "מלך זקן וכסיל", "an old and foolish king," and the yetzer tov, the divine soul, "ילד מסכן וחכם", "a poor but wise child." The animal soul entered long ago and has seniority, so it is the "old one"; the divine soul is like a child, having entered young. Hence the Alter Rebbe's wording, "and the second soul of a Jew."
"A part of G-d above, literally":
Now the Alter Rebbe defines the origin and root of this soul. Let us begin with the word "chelek," "part," which carries two meanings:
Only a part: the essence remains above, and as it were a part was detached and the Holy One brought it down into a physical body. It is only a part.
A part that contains everything: as in the well-known saying of the Baal Shem Tov, "העצם כשאתה תופס במקצתו אתה תופס בכולו", "when you grasp part of the essence, you grasp all of it." A small match cut from an enormous log is not its equal in quantity, but in the quality of the wood there is no difference between the small piece and the large one. Though it is only a part, in that part there is everything.
The three words "chelek Eloka mima'al" are not the Alter Rebbe's innovation in Tanya; they are the language of Iyov, who uses this phrase for the neshamah and the divine power that enters a person's body: "ומה חלק אלוקה ממעל ונחלת שדי ממרומים", "and what is the portion of G-d from above, and the heritage of Shakkai from on high." The Alter Rebbe quotes Iyov's language but adds one word: "mamash," literally. Why?
To tell us this is no exaggeration: the Torah sometimes speaks in exaggerated terms, as the Gemara puts it, "דיברה תורה לשון הבאי", "the Torah spoke in the language of hyperbole." So in the verse in Devarim describing the spies who were terrified of "cities great and fortified in the heavens": were they literally in the heavens? Rather it is hyperbole, a figurative style meant to convey an astonishing, staggering height, and it is not to be taken literally in physical terms. The Gemara there brings that the Sages and the prophets also employ such language, and cites a source for each. Once we know that the Torah sometimes speaks in hyperbole, one might have thought that "chelek Eloka mima'al" too was said as an exaggeration, that Iyov wished to exalt his divine soul so highly that he called it a part of G-d above, but not literally. The Alter Rebbe therefore adds "mamash": literally, and not as a metaphor or an overstatement.
That "mima'al" and "mamash" are two opposites: in the Hayom Yom entry for the 23rd of Menachem Av, the Rebbe Rayatz relates that in the winter of 5652, when he was about twelve, before his bar mitzvah, he was learning chapter 2 with his father, the Rebbe Rashab, and they came to the phrase "ונפש השנית בישראל היא חלק אלוקה ממעל ממש". His father explained to him that "mima'al" means the most spiritual, exceedingly lofty, while "mamash" means tangible, the most physical of the physical. This is the greatness of the second soul of a Jew: although its source is the most spiritual of the spiritual, it acts in the realm of "mamash," in the most physical of the physical. There are lofty spiritual matters whose influence is not seen in any physical, tangible place, since it is exceedingly difficult to join the spiritual to the physical; the second soul of a Jew, by contrast, is felt even in the tangible, even in actual physicality.
Further on, the Alter Rebbe will bring the sources from the verses and demonstrate that this is not Iyov's innovation alone but is explicit in the Torah, words we say every morning in Shacharis, right at the start of the day. As we continue we will explore the meaning of "mima'al mamash," that each of us lives and breathes with the divine soul that is here with us, and the wondrous power that joins the soul to the physical, and how one arranges matters between the two.
In summary: in this section we learned about the standing of the second soul of a Jew, which is literally a part of G-d above. We saw three explanations for the term "second": from the standpoint of its root in the world of Tikkun, from the standpoint of its mission to refine the animal soul, and from the standpoint of the order of its entry into the body in stages until bar mitzvah. We examined the two meanings of the word "chelek," part, and the two explanations for the word "mamash" that the Alter Rebbe added to Iyov's language: that this is no exaggeration but literally so, and that the divine soul, though its source is the most spiritual of the spiritual, acts and is felt in the most physical of the physical.
In the next section we will continue with chapter 2, taking up the root of Jewish souls that arose in the divine thought, and the sources from the verses that establish the greatness of the divine soul and its bond with the body.