We have reached the final part of chapter 40, on folio 55a (page 109). We stopped at the last six lines of the chapter, at the words «ובזה יובן היטב». It is worth noting that chapter 40 brings a whole subject to its conclusion: chapter 41 does continue it to a certain degree, but it can also be opened as a unit of its own. Before we go on with the Alter Rebbe's words, let us briefly review the sequence we are standing in.
Chapters 35-37: the superiority of the deed, «המעשה הוא העיקר» (the deed is what matters most), and the theme of dirah betachtonim, making a dwelling for G-d in the lower worlds.
From chapter 38 onward: the deed has a soul, and that soul is the kavanah, the intention of the mitzvah. With all the power and prominence given to the deed, one must know that there is also a kavanah, and its advantage is that it is like a soul to the deed: when the act is done with kavanah, a soul has been placed inside it, and once it has a soul the deed is something else entirely. On this foundation the Alter Rebbe elaborated on the various levels within kavanah: there is a kavanah of great power, which lifts the deed to higher levels, and there are kavanos of a lower level, exactly as within the nefesh and the neshamah themselves there are levels and types: the soul of an animal, the soul of a human being who speaks, and so on.
The essence of it: the deed is limited and confined, while the kavanah and the feeling are not confined. That is why the kavanah has the power to enter into the limited deed as a soul and a vitality within it, and to lift it to far higher levels. From here we continue.
«ובזה יובן היטב הא דדחילו ורחימו נקראים גדפין דרך משל» (and with this one can well understand why fear and love are called, by way of analogy, wings): on the basis of this principle we will understand why yiras Hashem and ahavas Hashem, which are the soul and the feeling inside the mitzvah, are called «גדפין». «Gadfin» is Aramaic, and in Hebrew it means wings: the two wings are love of G-d and fear of G-d. The reason: the wings are what lift everything, what give it vitality and a soul.
Where do we find that love and fear are called wings? The Alter Rebbe brings «כדכתיב» (as it is written), from the verse in Yeshayahu describing the serafim he saw in the supernal chariot, who have wings, and the verse even states their function: «ובשתים יעופף» (and with two it would fly). Obviously one must not take the images written in the verses physically; they are said as an analogy, and they carry an idea and a meaning. So what is the meaning of those two wings with which the saraf flies?
«וכמו שכתב הרב חיים ויטאל ז"ל בשער היחודים פרק י"א שהכנפים בעוף הן זרועות האדם כו'» (as Rav Chaim Vital wrote in Shaar HaYichudim, chapter 11, that the wings of a bird correspond to the arms of a human being): what is called wings in a bird is called arms in a person. And from here the meaning emerges. In the words of Pasach Eliyahu we mention, by way of analogy, how this exists Above in G-dliness: «חסד זרוע ימין וגבורה זרוע שמאל» (chesed is the right arm and gevurah is the left arm), and chesed and gevurah, in other words, are love and fear. It follows that the arms, the right arm and the left arm, are love and fear, and what is called an arm in a person is called wings in a bird. In other words, the spiritual meaning of a bird's wings, as it expresses itself in a Jew's avodas Hashem, is the emotions: love and fear are called wings, and they are the arms.
Another source: «ובתיקונים פירשו» (and in the Tikkunim they explained). In Tikkunei Zohar the matter is explained in a different manner and style, and although the term «גדפין» does not appear there, the meaning is the same:
«שהעוסקים בתורה ומצות בדחילו ורחימו» (that those who occupy themselves with Torah and mitzvos with fear and love): those who learn Torah and fulfill mitzvos with a soul, with feeling and with vitality, «נקראים בנים» (are called sons), as we saw in the opening chapters of Tanya, that love and fear are called a son and a daughter. One whose feeling is alive does not merely carry out the practical side of the thing; the mitzvah flows for him out of love of G-d and fear of G-d.
«ואם לאו» (and if not): one who lacks love of G-d and fear of G-d, and fulfills the mitzvos without the inner dimension and without the soul of the matter, «נקראים אפרוחים, דלא יכלין לפרחא» (they are called fledglings, who cannot fly), since a fledgling has no wings.
So this image of Tikkunei Zohar too, which calls the absence of feeling a «fledgling», fits exactly with the words of Rabbi Chaim Vital in Shaar HaYichudim, that love and fear are the «gadfin».
What is this elevation? The idea that love and fear are called «gadfin» sums up what we have learned at length in the recent lessons: when a Jew performs a mitzvah with feeling, with love of G-d and fear of G-d, he brings about an elevation within it. When a Jew performs a mitzvah he is fulfilling the will of the Holy One, except that this will is not always revealed in the person's mitzvah, even though it is present in it. And when the mitzvah is done with feeling and vitality, the person brings about, in the language of the Tanya, which he drew from the sifrei Kabbalah, that the mitzvah ascends to the world of Yetzirah or to the world of Beriah, and even to Atzilus, meaning that the divine will and the supernal yichudim become revealed within it.
And without the feeling, we must distinguish between two situations:
If the performance comes with a personal motive, such as one who learns Torah for his own honor, to feel superior and the like, as we learned at the end of chapter 39, it is seized by the kelipos.
And if the performance is simply neutral, without any such motive, it is not seized by the kelipos, but it remains in a state in which it does not ascend.
Regarding all this it is said, «לעולם יעסוק אדם בתורה ומצוות אפילו שלא לשמה, שמתוך שלא לשמה בא לשמה» (a person should always occupy himself with Torah and mitzvos even not for their own sake, for out of doing so not for their own sake he will come to do so for their own sake). And the whole point of «lishmah» is that in the end the performance should come from feeling, for it is the feeling that gives the mitzvah wings and vitality, and it is what lifts it upward.
The gloss in the margin, to complete the subject:
Before we look at the explanation and the analogy in the body of the text, let us read the middle gloss on the left side of the page, whose asterisk stands precisely at the point where we stopped. In this gloss the Alter Rebbe brings another expression, one that seemingly speaks of an angel, and it reinforces the theme of the «gadfin», the two emotions of love and fear. It too comes from the words of Tikkunei Zohar, as he mentioned in the body of the text, «ובתיקונים».
In the words of the gloss: «ובתיקון מ"ה» (and in Tikkun 45), in Tikkunei Zohar, Tikkun 45, it says «דעופא» (that the bird), that same bird of which it is said «ובשתים יעופף», «הוא מט"ט» (is Mattat). This name appears in many places as a designation for an angel, and it is an abbreviation of a full name, but here the Alter Rebbe immediately clarifies in what follows that it does not refer to the name of an angel; it is a designation for the world of Yetzirah. And the meaning of this name is an expression of exaltedness, like the Aramaic word «matronisa», which means a queen.
And in the bird itself there are these components: the head, the body and the two wings, four parts. And these four parts of the physical bird correspond to the four letters of the name Havayah, for in the world of Yetzirah there is a revelation of the four letters of the name Havayah that shines in each and every world, and the four letters are alluded to in the head, the body and the two wings.
In summary: in this section we examined the Alter Rebbe's words «ובזה יובן היטב הא דדחילו ורחימו נקראים גדפין דרך משל»: love and fear are the wings that lift the limited deed. We saw the source in the serafim of Yeshayahu, «ובשתים יעופף»; the explanation of Rabbi Chaim Vital in Shaar HaYichudim that the wings of a bird are the arms of a person, chesed and gevurah, love and fear; and the words of Tikkunei Zohar, that those who occupy themselves with Torah and mitzvos with fear and love are called «בנים», and without them «אפרוחים דלא יכלין לפרחא». We also reviewed the meaning of that elevation: the ascent of the mitzvah to the upper worlds, as opposed to one whose performance carries a personal motive (which is seized by the kelipos) or is simply neutral (which does not ascend). Therefore, «לעולם יעסוק אדם בתורה ומצוות אפילו שלא לשמה, שמתוך שלא לשמה בא לשמה». And finally we learned the gloss from Tikkun 45, that the bird is a designation for the world of Yetzirah, and that its four parts, head, body and two wings, correspond to the four letters of the name Havayah that shines in each and every world.
In the next section we will return to the words in the body of the chapter, and see how the Alter Rebbe explains the analogy itself and how the discussion continues until the end of the chapter.