We are in the closing section of chapter 32 of Tanya, on page 41b. We finished at the line beginning with the words "the reward for the mitzvah of loving one's fellow," and now we turn to the passage that opens "And even those who are close to him." We will begin with a brief review of what we have learned and then continue.
Chapter 32 lives up to its name: "lamed-beis" spells lev, heart. This is the heart of Tanya, the chapter devoted to the mitzvah that is bound up with the heart, the mitzvah of ahavas Yisrael. As we mentioned when we began the chapter, it comes as a kind of parenthesis in the sefer's original plan: in the first edition of Tanya it did not appear at all, and only in the second edition was it inserted, between chapter 31 and chapter 33.
And here is how it follows from chapter 31: we learned there that a person's avodah has to be built so that the soul is primary for him and the body secondary. When a person works that way, that is the straight and easy path to fulfilling the mitzvah of "you shall love your fellow as yourself," as we discussed at length in the first lessons of this chapter.
After explaining how great a thing it is to love every Jew, and the various levels in that love as we detailed them, the Alter Rebbe opened the second half of the chapter with a question: the Gemara states that there are Jews about whom it is said that it is a mitzvah to hate them, and even to report them to their teacher so that the teacher too should hate them. How can it be said of a Jew that it is a mitzvah to hate him, and how does this fit with the principle that one must love every Jew?
In the previous lesson we learned that this statement of the Gemara is unique and specific to one very particular case: it speaks of your companion in Torah and mitzvos, a Jew who keeps Torah and mitzvos just as you do, who is careful with a light mitzvah as with a severe one, who knows how serious these matters are and wants to fulfill them. That Jew stumbled in some particular matter, you rebuked him and said to him, how can you do such a thing, and he does not turn back from his sin and continues in it. Only in this unique case does the Gemara say it is a mitzvah to hate him. But someone who is not close to you and is not your companion in Torah and mitzvos is not in this category at all, and just the opposite: with him one must be "of the disciples of Aharon, loving the creatures and bringing them close to Torah."
And the conclusion of that whole subject: toward a Jew who is not your companion you have no personal obligation of rebuke, no obligation to respond to what he does. Your obligation is to bring him close. On this the Alter Rebbe concluded that Hillel, in speaking about loving every Jew, ended his statement with the words "ומקרבן לתורה" ("and brings them close to Torah"): when a person draws a Jew close, he should hope that perhaps through the closeness, the love and the affection he shows him, he will succeed in bringing him close to Torah and to serving Hashem. "ואם לא - הן לא" ("and if not, then not") - if you did not succeed in bringing him close to the service of Hashem, but only awakened love toward him, helped him with this and that and gave him a good word, yet did not move him even a millimeter in matters of Torah and mitzvos, you have still not forfeited the reward for the mitzvah of loving one's fellow. The mitzvah of ahavas Yisrael is not conditional on your ability to bring him close.
To round off this subject it is worth adding a point the Rebbe makes in one of his sichos. The Alter Rebbe writes in Tanya that with Jews whom you did not manage to bring close to Torah and mitzvos you have not forfeited the mitzvah of ahavas Yisrael, and once these words were written in Tanya they became for us a directive and a guide for how to act. Therefore, when a person draws a Jew close, and even though he did not actually succeed in bringing him to Torah and mitzvos but did show him love, not only has he not forfeited the reward for the mitzvah of loving one's fellow, he has gained a great gain: he has thereby fulfilled the Alter Rebbe's directive in Tanya, and that is one of the ways to become connected to him, by carrying out his instructions. For us, then, this is not merely a matter of "you have not lost out," as it was written in the Alter Rebbe's generation, but a great gain, and from the outset one should do it without any conditions attached. With this we have completed what we learned in the previous lesson.
"And even those who are close to him":
So far we have summed up that there are Jews about whom it is said that it is a mitzvah to hate them, namely those close to him whom he rebuked and who did not turn back. And here the Alter Rebbe says something fascinating: "וגם המקורבים אליו והוכיחם ולא שבו מעוונותיהם" ("and also those who are close to him, whom he has rebuked and who have not turned back from their sins") - a Jew who is close to you, who is your companion in Torah and mitzvos, whom you rebuked properly and according to halachah, and who, even though he knows how serious the matter is, has no interest at all in leaving the sin he committed. Even though it is a mitzvah to hate him, that does not mean that the mitzvah of "you shall love your fellow as yourself" has been erased with regard to him. You have a mitzvah to hate him, and you also have a mitzvah to love him - "ושתיהן הן אמת" ("and both of them are true"): the love has to be genuine, and the hatred has to be genuine.
And how is it possible to love him genuinely and hate him genuinely at one and the same time?
"שנאה מצד הרע שבהם" ("hatred on account of the evil in them") - the hatred is not directed at him himself, but at the evil in him: at the evil deed he did, at the yetzer hara pulsing inside him and sealing his heart against returning. It is that evil part that one hates.
"ואהבה מצד בחינת הטוב הגנוז שבהם" ("and love on account of the aspect of hidden good in them") - even though there is evil in him, since he does not turn back from his sin, there is also good in him, and in every single person there is hidden good: "שהוא ניצוץ אלוקות שבתוכם המחיה נפשם האלוקית" ("which is the spark of G-dliness within them that animates their divine soul"). And that good in him, his nefesh ha'elokis, you are to love.
It turns out that toward that Jew, your companion in Torah and mitzvos whom you rebuked and who did not turn back, the mitzvah is to hate only the evil in him, and G-d forbid not the good in him. Even reporting him to his teacher is only about the evil in him, and this is not lashon hara, since it was said only in this one specific situation. So let us sharpen the point: with this person it is a mitzvah to hate the evil in him and to love the good in him.
To whom was all this said?
All of this was said only about your companion in Torah and mitzvos. But another Jew, who is not your companion in Torah and mitzvos, a Jew who sins and transgresses the Torah and does not grasp the seriousness of it, with regard to him not only is there no mitzvah to hate him, it is forbidden to hate even the evil in him. For what was said, that "it is a mitzvah to hate," refers only to the evil part, and with such a Jew even that is forbidden to hate. Toward such a person there is only love, love for the good in him, and the evil in him is simply none of your business.
At first glance, what would be so terrible if he did hate the evil in him? After all, he is not hating the good in him, only the evil. So what is the difference between his companion in Torah and mitzvos and another Jew?
To understand this we need the help of another subject, somewhat different but definitely related, which will give us a clear picture: when is a person called upon to deal with the evil of another, that is, to hate it, and when is the other's evil none of his business at all, and how is this done.
Help from parshas Noach:
In parshas Noach we read the well known story: Noach lay in his tent in an immodest state, and his son Cham saw his father's nakedness and immediately went and told his two brothers, Shem and Yefes. The verse says: "And Shem and Yefes took the garment and laid it upon both their shoulders and went backward and covered their father's nakedness, and their faces were turned backward." Shem and Yefes took the garment, placed it on their shoulders, and walked to their father's tent with their backs to the bed and the garment draped over their backs.
Now at first glance, why does the verse say again "and their faces were turned backward"? Rashi explains on the spot: the whole way to the bed they walked backward, and the moment they reached him and had to cover him they needed to turn so that it would be manageable for them, and when the body turns toward the father, the face turns backward of itself, so that they should not see.
Had the verse stopped there, any child reading it would have worked out the result on his own: if their backs were to the bed the whole way, and when they reached it their faces were turned backward, then obviously they saw nothing. It is self-understood. And yet the Torah does not spare us words and does not rely on our understanding, and adds another phrase: "וערוות אביהם לא ראו" ("and they did not see their father's nakedness"). This phrase looks completely superfluous, since it is obvious that someone walking backward with his face turned behind him does not see. And if the Torah writes it, there is surely something added here, a wondrous and deep idea that the Torah comes to teach. It is not merely a technical detail, because the technical side we understand on our own.
In the next section we will explain what the Torah is adding with the words "and they did not see their father's nakedness," and what we learn from here about our question: when must a person relate to the evil in another, and when is the evil in another simply not his concern.