In the previous section we examined the avodah of tzaddikim whose dechilu urechimu (fear and love) are drawn from understanding and contemplating G-d's greatness. In this section we rise higher still: to the revelation of the world of Atzilus, and to the avodah of the great tzaddikim, which is on the level of «merkavah», a chariot.
An unlimited intellect cannot be contained in a created being:
How much more so when we speak of abstract intellect, of intellect that has no limits: it is simply impossible for a limited creature to grasp and comprehend an intellect that is boundless. It has no such capacity at all. Therefore, in a world as lofty as Atzilus, even though it contains chochmah, binah and daas, these are united with G-dliness, with the Creator's abstractness and His infinity, in a way that no created being can grasp them within the framework of understanding and comprehension. The limitless does not settle inside the bounds of the limited.
For a created being to be able to grasp anything, the chochmah, binah and daas must be far more contracted and limited, and that begins only from the world of Beriah downward. Atzilus simply does not belong to this category. In Beriah they are contracted, so that created intellects, which are bounded and finite, can understand without their very existence dissolving.
For had there been no tzimtzum (contraction) in the divine chochmah, and an unlimited revelation were to shine upon a creature, that creature would no longer exist in the world at all; it would be utterly nullified. When something loftier shines, the recipient loses itself. And not only that, but "לא יהיו בגדר נבראים כלל, רק יחזרו למקורם ושורשם" ("they would not be in the category of created beings at all, but would return to their source and root"). The moment a creature were shown its own limitless root and source, which it cannot contain, it would be drawn back into it and vanish.
The parable of the flame and the wick:
To what may this be compared? To the fire burning in a lamp: when the flame separates from the wick, where has the fire gone? The wick is no longer, but the fire itself, where did it go? About this the Alter Rebbe writes in chapter 19 that the fire is not lost; rather it returns and reunites with its root and source above, "beneath the sphere of the moon," and this is precisely why fire always strains upward. And since it has been absorbed back into its source, it no longer exists as any discernible entity.
So too with any creature: the moment its divine root were revealed and perceptible to it, it would turn into nothing at all. Its very existence as a discrete reality stems from the fact that its root is hidden from it, that is, that the Creator concealed Himself and contracted His light to the point where a limited created reality could come into being.
This is true of every creature, including the neshamah: the soul too has limits, and it is incapable of comprehending the chochmah of the world of Atzilus. This is not a matter of understanding at all, but of bittul, self-nullification, as will be explained further. And so we can distinguish the kind of connection appropriate to each world:
The world of Beriah: in the category of understanding.
The world of Yetzirah: in the category of feeling.
The world of Atzilus: not a communication of understanding at all, but a far loftier bond, as will become clear from the wording in the lines ahead.
In the Alter Rebbe's words: "והנה צמצום זה היא סיבת ההארה שמאירות שם חכמה בינה ודעת של אין סוף ברוך הוא לנשמות אלו בעולם הבריאה" ("And this tzimtzum is the cause of the illumination whereby the chochmah, binah and daas of the Infinite One shine there to these souls in the world of Beriah"). Precisely because the Creator contracted His lights, the lower creatures are able to understand. A person can study about the Creator and grasp an idea, and one who is lofty and belongs to the level of Beriah understands what is being spoken of, can explain it, and is aroused with the emotion born of that very understanding, all because the matter passed through tzimtzum.
But on a higher level, even a great tzaddik who connects to it does not connect through understanding. For «understanding» means that one party understands another: there is the one and there is the other, each a separate reality, and A understands B. When a person understands something, by definition he is not nothing and not nullified; he is an entity that comprehends the matter. The revelation of Atzilus is not on the level of "I understand Atzilus," because understanding is itself a contraction and itself a reality, while Atzilus is not contraction but absolute abstractness. It emerges that everything we have learned in this chapter until now, whether feeling or understanding, belongs to the level of Yetzirah or Beriah.
"Not so in Atzilus":
We are at the first line of page 53: "מה שאין כן באצילות, שאינם בבחינת צמצום כל כך - אי אפשר לשכלים נבראים לקבל מהן" ("Not so in Atzilus, where they are not in a state of such great tzimtzum, and it is impossible for created intellects to receive from them"). The precision lies in the phrase "such great": there is tzimtzum there, but not in the same manner and not to the same degree as in the worlds below it, and therefore no created intellect can receive the level that shines in Atzilus. And so the Alter Rebbe continues: "ולכן "לית מחשבה דילהון תפיסא שם כלל"" ("and therefore 'no thought of theirs can grasp there at all'"). Their thought cannot grasp there at all, and even the word "grasp" is itself borrowed language, a metaphor, as the Alter Rebbe explains at length at the beginning of Tanya. When Atzilus shines to a tzaddik, it does not mean that he understands Atzilus, for "understands" implies a contracted entity doing the understanding, and that is not the kind of connection that belongs to Atzilus, which is G-dliness in open revelation.
And for this reason "הוא מדור לצדיקים הגדולים" ("it is the abode of the great tzaddikim"). The world of Atzilus is an abode belonging exclusively to the great tzaddikim, the select few of the generation, "tzaddik yesod olam," "שעבודתם למעלה מעלה אפילו מבחינת דחילו ורחימו הנמשכות מן הבינה ודעת בגדולתו יתברך" ("whose avodah is far higher even than the dechilu urechimu drawn from understanding and contemplating His greatness"). Their level is incomparably higher even than that tzaddik we spoke of in the previous section, whose love and fear were born of deep comprehension of lofty levels of G-dliness. This is a different essence and an entirely different domain.
The meaning of the word «Atzilus»:
Several explanations have been given for the word «Atzilus», and one of them is from the word «etzlo», "next to Him": next to the Creator, close to Him, that which is most intimately His, the loftiest and most abstract revelation. Accordingly, the gap between the great tzaddikim and the tzaddikim below them is as vast as the gap between Atzilus and the binah and daas of a created intellect.
For this reason, when chassidus speaks of the four worlds it sometimes uses the acronym ABiYA: Atzilus, Beriah, Yetzirah, Asiyah. But very often they are divided into two groups: Atzilus on one side, and the worlds of BiYA (Beriah, Yetzirah, Asiyah) on the other, for these are two completely different domains. From Beriah downward is the contracted world, the world of limitation, not physical limitation, but a world that a created intellect can grasp and comprehend. In Atzilus, by contrast, even though it contains ten sefiros, and seemingly the very concept of "ten" is itself a definition and a limit, nevertheless, as explained in the lines we have just read, they are united with G-dliness in the ultimate unity, in a way that one does not perceive any tzimtzum or limitation in them. Hence, "they are not in a state of such great tzimtzum."
"Literally a chariot":
What, then, defines the avodah of those tzaddikim who belong to this lofty world? "אלא עבודתם היתה בבחינת מרכבה ממש לאין סוף ברוך הוא" ("rather their avodah was in the aspect of being literally a chariot to the Infinite One, blessed be He"). This expression is generally used about Avraham, Yitzchak and Yaakov, and it denotes a level at which the creature's union with the Creator is absolute, like the bittul of a car to its driver, and not like the bittul of a horse to its coachman:
The horse to the coachman: certainly it is subservient to him and goes wherever he leads it, but only because of the whip and the reins. In itself it has its own desires, and if left alone it would wander wherever its heart pulls it and would not bring the coachman to his destination. For it to go where it is meant to go, its desires must be fought and redirected.
The car to the driver: it has no desires of its own whatsoever. The car travels to wherever the driver takes it, and as long as it is a car there is no other will in it.
This is the level of that lofty tzaddik, whose bittul to the Creator does not stem from understanding. For if a person nullifies himself because he understands or because he feels, then he himself is still a «yesh», an entity, a reality that consents to nullify itself «because»; and the moment there is a «because», however lofty the level, there is still a reality standing there. But «merkavah» is the highest bittul of all, one in which no other reality is even possible, absolute bittul, which is the level of the world of Atzilus.
In summary: in this section we learned that an unlimited intellect cannot settle within a limited creature, and therefore a tzimtzum of chochmah, binah and daas is required from the world of Beriah downward. Were it not so, the creature would be nullified and would return to its source and root, like a flame that reunites with its root the moment it separates from the wick. We saw that Beriah is in the category of understanding and Yetzirah in the category of feeling, whereas Atzilus, which is "not in a state of such great tzimtzum," is not in the category of understanding at all, "no thought can grasp there at all," and is the abode of the great tzaddikim, whose avodah is far higher even than dechilu urechimu drawn from binah and daas. Their avodah is "literally a chariot": not a bittul born of understanding and feeling, in which the person remains an entity nullifying itself «because», but absolute bittul, like a vehicle that has no will of its own.
In the next section we will continue with the Alter Rebbe's words in chapter 39.