We are in chapter 40. Last time we stopped on page 55a (page 109), on the very first line, at the words «אבל בתפילה בכוונה ותורה בכוונה לשמה» (but with prayer said with kavanah, and Torah studied with kavanah, for its own sake), right in the middle of the discussion. Let us briefly review what we have learned and then continue.
A summary of what we have learned so far:
In this chapter, continuing from the previous one, the Alter Rebbe explained that Torah study, the fulfillment of mitzvos and the service of prayer all need to be done with kavanah, which is their soul: prayer without kavanah is like a body without a soul. And kavanah means the feeling of love of G-d and fear of G-d that accompanies the deed, so that a person does not perform these things dryly but out of an inner vitality. It is just as it is between one person and another: when someone does something for his fellow out of love and genuine caring, the deed is a different deed entirely. So too with a Jew performing mitzvos. There are many ways a mitzvah can be done, but the fitting and desirable way is that it be done with an inner vitality of love and fear, with feeling and with a soul.
We learned that there are three levels in this:
Torah and mitzvos with kavanah: when they are done with feeling, they ascend upward and become united with the G-dliness of the upper worlds. And in detail:
Natural love and fear: the ascent is to the world of Yetzirah.
Intellectual love and fear: the ascent is to the world of Beriah.
Great and exceptionally lofty tzaddikim, who are in the category of a merkavah, a chariot: the ascent is to the world of Atzilus.
Plain Torah and mitzvos: with no feeling of love and fear at all, but rather as a matter of rote. He is not thinking about what he is doing; he simply knows that he is performing a mitzvah right now, and there is no inner feeling in it on any level. Such Torah and mitzvos do not rise up to the G-dliness within the worlds; rather, angels are created from them: from the performance of mitzvos, angels in the world of Asiyah, and from Torah study, angels in the world of Yetzirah, and no further than that.
Torah and mitzvos with a negative feeling: when a person does it with an ulterior motive, for the sake of honor or some other personal interest. Not only is there no ascent, but on the contrary, the deed is grasped and held by the kelipos, since it came along with negative thoughts. As long as he has not done teshuvah there is no ascent for it, and on the contrary, it nourishes the opposing side and accomplishes the reverse of what it should.
The Alter Rebbe's question:
It is understandable why Torah and mitzvos done with an ulterior motive do not ascend: the negative feeling holds them down below. But a person who performs mitzvos and studies Torah plainly, with no ulterior motive but also with no feeling of love and fear, what exactly is lacking? After all, «אורייתא וקודשא בריך הוא כולא חד» (the Torah and the Holy One, blessed be He, are entirely one). What is he studying right now? Not theory, not some external wisdom, but the Torah of G-d, which is His very wisdom. He fulfilled a mitzvah, which is the will of G-d; he studied Torah, which is the Torah of G-d. With that he has connected himself with the Holy One, blessed be He, and that should accomplish what it accomplishes. Why, then, is the inner kavanah so critical, so that without it the deed does not rise?
The core of the answer:
The Alter Rebbe returned to a principle we have already learned in earlier chapters. In what does the deficiency of this physical world, as compared with the upper worlds, actually express itself? There are two deficiencies in it:
Tzimtzum (contraction): the divine light that shines in the upper worlds is a broad light, without contraction, whereas the light that shines in the lower worlds is contracted. In this world the tzimtzum is greater still: in the inanimate it is the most contracted of all, in the vegetative somewhat less. And as a rule, the divine vitality that descends to bring into being and to enliven the physical world is a contracted vitality.
Concealment: not only is the vitality contracted, but even that contracted vitality is not revealed, and one does not see that this is G-dliness and holiness. There are many coverings, garments and screens, up to and including kelipas nogah, which covers and conceals everything. In the upper worlds, by contrast, everything is revealed and there is no concealment.
Now, when a Jew studies Torah, his physical mouth pronounces the letters of the Torah. Of these two deficiencies, which one has fallen away and which remains in place?
The deficiency of tzimtzum has not fallen away; it remains. Anything physical is contracted vitality, and that is precisely why it is physical. The mouth is a physical mouth and the voice is a physical voice, and even when he is saying words of Torah he remains physical. But the second deficiency has fallen away: the concealment of this world, that one does not see the G-dliness and does not feel the Creator, does not exist in Torah, for the Torah is the wisdom of the Holy One, blessed be He. It is obvious that this is G-dliness, and there is in it no muteness and no concealment.
And from here the question arises: we want the Torah of this Jew to rise upward and connect with the G-dliness of the upper worlds, but it is contracted, so how will it ascend? This is not a deficiency in the Torah itself, for «אורייתא וקודשא בריך הוא כולא חד»; rather, the Torah that the Jew speaks with his physical mouth and hears with his physical ears is contracted because of that physical mouth. How, then, will it rise and become united with G-dliness?
To this the Alter Rebbe says: «אבל בתפלה בכוונה ותורה בכוונה לשמה - הרי הכוונה מתלבשת באותיות הדבור» (but with prayer said with kavanah and Torah studied with kavanah for its own sake, the kavanah clothes itself in the letters of speech). Even though the letters are physical, the kavanah clothes itself in them.
And what does «clothes itself in the letters» mean? It is really quite simple. When a person speaks out of feeling, where is that feeling located? In the heart, but not only in the heart. Take one person who says something coldly and dryly, and his friend who says those very same words with vitality, with feeling and with caring: the letters sound entirely different, and the words affect the listener entirely differently, for words that come from the heart enter the heart. The words are the same words; it is that the feeling has clothed itself in the letters. And once the feeling is clothed in them, the physical letters lose their physicality, and their main content becomes the feeling itself. The listener does not hear mere letters; he hears the heart, he hears the inwardness.
This is why «הרי הכוונה מתלבשת באותיות הדבור הואיל והיא מקור ושרש להן, שמחמתה ובסיבתה הוא מדבר אותיות אלו» (the kavanah clothes itself in the letters of speech, since it is their source and root, for it is on account of it and because of it that he speaks these letters). The feeling is the root of the speech, for why is he studying and why is he praying? Because of the love for the Holy One, blessed be He, that is in his heart. And therefore «לכן היא מעלה אותן» (therefore it raises them up): the hiddenness and concealment already fell away by virtue of these being words of Torah, and the tzimtzum fell away through the feeling he invested in it. This is no longer physical speech, but speech that has lost its physicality, for the feeling has elevated it to be spiritual.
And to where does the feeling elevate the letters? «עד מקומה» (up to its own place), to the place of the feeling itself. And as we learned in the previous chapters, this depends on the level of the feeling: whether it is a feeling of natural love and fear, or of intellectual love and fear, or the feeling of a tzaddik who is in the category of a merkavah.
In summary: in this portion we reviewed the three levels in the fulfillment of Torah and mitzvos (with kavanah, plainly, and with an ulterior motive), and the Alter Rebbe's question as to why Torah and mitzvos without kavanah do not ascend upward. The answer rests on the two deficiencies of this world, tzimtzum and concealment: in Torah study the concealment falls away, since the Torah is His very wisdom, but the tzimtzum of the physical mouth and voice remains. The kavanah, which is the source and root of the letters, clothes itself in them, strips them of their physicality, and raises them up to its own place, according to the level of the feeling it contains.
In the next portion we will continue with the language of the chapter from this point onward.