In the previous section we learned how grasping the wisdom of Torah unites a person with the Holy One, blessed be He, to the point that Torah becomes actual food for the soul. Now we complete the end of chapter 5: how Torah becomes "blood and flesh like his flesh," what it means to learn Torah lishmah, and why talmud Torah is equal to all the mitzvos.
"And Your Torah is within my innards":
This is what David HaMelech says in Tehillim: "ותורתך בתוך מעי", "and Your Torah is within my innards." At first glance the place of Torah is in the mind, not in the innards. Why choose this expression?
The answer is that in a single phrase David captured the entire theme of our chapter: Torah becomes like bread, uniting with a person until it is blood and flesh of his own flesh. Food enters the innards, but it does not remain there; it spreads through the entire body. So too Torah penetrates every one of a person's faculties.
On a lighter note: it is told that once, still before the nesius, the Rebbe was searching for a certain sefer that was supposed to be in the bookcase, and could not find it. After a long search he said with a smile: apparently here they fulfill "ותורתך בתוך מעי" quite literally...
"Man does not live by bread alone":
The verse states: "Man does not live by bread alone, but by everything that issues from the mouth of Hashem does man live." When a person eats bread, from what is he actually nourished? Not from the physical bread as such, but from the divine life force within it. After all, it makes no sense that a human being, who belongs to the category of medaber, the speaking creature, should be sustained by the vegetable and inanimate that stand beneath him in the order of levels. Rather, a person takes hold of the word of Hashem, the exceedingly lofty divine spark concealed in the bread, and it is from that life force that he lives.
Exactly the same principle applies to Torah: one lives not from the intellect in it alone, but from "everything that issues from the mouth of Hashem," from the wisdom of Hashem within it, from its holiness and G-dliness. When a person learns in this way, the Torah becomes flesh of his flesh.
Food and garments for the soul:
"כמו שכתוב בעץ חיים (שער מד פרק ג) שלבושי הנשמות בגן עדן הן המצוות", "as is written in Etz Chaim (Shaar 44, ch. 3), that the garments of souls in Gan Eden are the mitzvos." That is, a soul that ascends to Gan Eden needs garments in order to receive all the comprehension available there, and those garments are the mitzvos it performed while it was a soul in a body below. And Torah is the food for those souls that occupied themselves in this world with Torah lishmah.
What is learning "Torah lishmah"?
Learning lishmah means learning out of a desire to be bound to the Creator of the world. A person who learns Torah only in order to appreciate the beautiful logic in it is like someone eating raw dough, which does not become blood and flesh of his flesh.
As the Alter Rebbe cites from Pri Etz Chaim, that "'לשמה' היינו כדי לקשר נפשו לה' על ידי השגת התורה, איש כפי שכלו", "'lishmah' means in order to bind one's soul to Hashem through grasping the Torah, each person according to his intellect." It is worth being precise here: the intention is not that Torah becomes food by virtue of some separate quality contained in the intent of "lishmah." The Torah itself is the quality. "Lishmah" means that a person learns for this purpose alone: that the Torah should enter his mind and unite with his intellect, until his mind is one with the wisdom of Hashem.
A story told by the Rebbe Rashab:
Once, when he came to explain the concept of "Torah lishmah" and the union it brings about, the Rebbe Rashab told of Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Lublin, who later served as rav in Chevron and authored the sefer "Toras Chesed." He was a chassid of the Tzemach Tzedek, a Jew head and shoulders above the rest, deeply versed in Torah and a man of stature, and the Tzemach Tzedek drew him close and cherished him greatly. Every time he came to visit his Rebbe he would prepare a gift of nachas ruach for him: a deep pilpul with chiddushim in Torah. Upon entering he would pour out all his novellae, and the Rebbe would listen with pleasure.
On one occasion he prepared a long pilpul, packed with chiddushim. He came in, saw the Tzemach Tzedek listening and smiling, and was certain his words were giving the Rebbe nachas ruach. When he finished, the Rebbe said to him: "The sevaros are very fine and the idea is wonderful, but the foundation on which you built the whole structure is not accurate, since it contradicts an explicit mishnah."
The author of "Toras Chesed" knew all six orders of Mishnah like the palm of his hand, and could run through the entire Mishnah in his head with ease. He stopped for long moments and passed all six orders through his memory, not merely reviewing them but checking which mishnah did not fit, and he found nothing. He asked: "Rebbe, in which order?" The Rebbe answered: "In Seder Kodshim." He went back and concentrated on all of Kodshim, and still could not find it. The gaon asked: "In which masechta?" The Rebbe answered: "Masechta Bechoros." He thought about Bechoros alone and still could not find it, until he asked the Rebbe to tell him. The Tzemach Tzedek began repeating the mishnah word for word and explaining it, and after two sentences the author of "Toras Chesed" stopped and said: "Rebbe, I understand," because he had immediately grasped that his words could not be reconciled with it.
And then the author of "Toras Chesed" said: this is what learning Torah lishmah means. However much a person may know and however much he may learn, with the Rebbe it is simply not possible that something should fail to fit with the wisdom of Torah, because his union with Torah is complete, and whatever he says must fit with the Torah.
Something similar happened with the Rebbe. Once he said something at a farbrengen that seemingly did not fit with explicit sources, and someone wrote to him about it. In his reply the Rebbe wrote that he did not remember whether he had said it, but if he did say it, it will fit with every part of Torah and everything will work out. Once it left his mouth, in the end it must fit, for with one who learns Torah lishmah the mind becomes a mind of Torah, and that is true union.
Obviously there are levels upon levels in learning Torah lishmah, and we should be so fortunate as to reach the ankles of the author of "Toras Chesed"; the story was brought only to sharpen the point.
The gloss at the end of the chapter: food and garment in one:
To close the chapter the Alter Rebbe adds a few lines in a gloss set in parentheses. From all the preceding statements, which stressed the difference between Torah and mitzvos (Torah is food, mitzvos are garments), a student might have concluded that each has its own advantage, "this one has what the other lacks and the other has what this one lacks." If so, why do we say that Torah is equal to them all? To this the Alter Rebbe comes and clarifies that in Torah itself both advantages are present together.
"והמזון היא בחינת אור פנימי", "the food is an aspect of ohr penimi, internal light": when Torah becomes food for the soul, the divine light enters the inner dimension of the person and unites with him, in the language used of physical bread, "blood and flesh like his flesh." "והלבושים בחינת מקיפים. ולכן אמרו רבותינו ז"ל שתלמוד תורה שקול כנגד כל המצוות", "and the garments are the aspect of makifim, encompassing lights. This is why our Sages said that talmud Torah is equal to all the mitzvos":
The mitzvos: "לפי שהמצוות הם לבושים לבד", "because the mitzvos are garments only." The Jew who performs them does not internalize them, and therefore they carry only the quality of a garment, of a makif.
The Torah: "והתורה היא מזון וגם לבוש לנפש המשכלת שמתלבשת בה בעיונה ולימודה", "and the Torah is food and also a garment for the intellectual soul, which clothes itself in it through its contemplation and study." While a person is immersed in learning, the Torah encompasses him with divine light; and when he grasps and understands, it penetrates his inner being as food.
The advantage of speaking words of Torah:
"וכל שכן כשמוציא בפיו בדיבור", "and all the more so when he articulates it with his mouth in speech." One who learns through intellectual contemplation alone, with his eyes and his thought, without uttering a word, already has both advantages: he is immersed in the learning, so the Torah encompasses him, and he understands it, so it penetrates within him. But when he brings the words out in speech, as it says, "חיים הם למוציאיהם בפה" ("they are life to those who express them with the mouth"), the light that encompasses him is incomparably loftier. The breath that leaves a person's mouth as he speaks is physical breath, but once it is formed into words of Torah and holiness it becomes "הבל הדיבור בחינת אור מקיף," the breath of speech becomes an encompassing light, "as is written in Pri Etz Chaim."
The breath of speech does not simply dissipate into the air of the world, nor does it act upon the person alone. The Rebbe dwelt on this in connection with the teaching of Chazal that when a teaching is repeated in the name of someone who has passed away, his lips move in the grave. The Rebbe asked: what difference does it make to us? If this is his own private matter, between him and himself, what benefit is there in knowing that something is happening right now in the cemetery?
The Rebbe explained: by the laws of nature, when a person utters a word, sound waves carry it through the air to the ear of the listener, and even to a distant place, and the effect keeps spreading until the end of the entire world. Even if the effect is not visible, it exists, exactly like a long house of cards where one light push at one end topples them all, one after another. If so, when the lips of that tzaddik move in the grave, it affects the whole world, and by way of ohr chozer, reflected light, the one who is learning also receives from that tzaddik. Here we see the tremendous power of the breath of speech, and so it is with every person: the breath he emits from his mouth in words of Torah carries within it a divine power, an encompassing light of holiness that acts upon him.
Chapter 5 is almost a parenthesis within the flow of the chapters of Tanya: a chapter devoted entirely to the importance of Torah study, its power and its great stature. There is no sefer, not even among the mussar works that speak of the preciousness of Torah study, that elevates Torah study the way chapter 5 of Tanya elevates it.
In summary: in this section we learned that for one who learns Torah properly, the Torah becomes literal food for him, blood and flesh of his flesh, and his mind unites with the Ein Sof, blessed be He, who is clothed in His wisdom. We looked at "ותורתך בתוך מעי" and at "man does not live by bread alone," that the life force is received from the divine spark within the bread, and so too from the wisdom of Hashem within the Torah. We saw from Etz Chaim that the mitzvos are the garments of souls in Gan Eden while the Torah is food for the souls that engaged in it lishmah, and that lishmah means binding one's soul to Hashem through grasping the Torah. And finally, in the gloss: the mitzvos are a garment only, while the Torah is both food and garment, which is why it is equal to all the mitzvos, and especially when one articulates it with his mouth, for the breath of speech becomes an encompassing light that acts upon the entire world.
In the next section we will begin chapter 6 of Tanya.