The two hundred and fifty-second "room" in the palace of the Hayom Yom.
Friday, 5 Menachem Av, 5703.
Chumash: Devarim, Shishi, with Rashi's commentary.
Tehillim, on the 5th of the month, we recite from chapter 29 through and including chapter 34.
Tanya: On this day one concludes chapter 11 of Iggeret HaTeshuvah. The daily lesson begins on page 200 with the words "uma shekatuv vechatati," until the conclusion of the chapter with the word ending "pish'o."
The source of the daily teaching is a Chassidus maamar delivered by the Rebbe Rayatz, the discourse beginning "Ani LeDodi" (5702). As is known, our Rebbeim delivered the maamarim in Yiddish, but generally the maamarim were written down in Lashon HaKodesh. Nevertheless, there are maamarim — primarily by the Rebbe Rayatz — that were also written in Yiddish, generally maamarim that he wanted to be understood even by the simpler people as well. This maamar too, the discourse beginning "Ani LeDodi" (5702), is printed in Yiddish and appears in Sefer HaMaamarim Yiddish.
In the second chapter of the maamar, the Rebbe Rayatz speaks about the month of Elul, and writes that Elul is a time for cheshbon nefesh, a spiritual accounting. About what must one make this accounting? About the past — both if he fell short in something regarding "asei tov," in that he did not do what he should have done on the side of "asei tov," and also if he stumbled in something on the side of "sur mera"; about this one must make a cheshbon nefesh.
Continuing this theme, the Rebbe Rayatz brings a saying in the name of the Baal Shem Tov on the inner meaning of the concept "turn away from evil and do good" — that beyond its plain meaning, it also contains a deeper, inner meaning. And as noted, the words are originally in Yiddish. On the verse "Turn away from evil and do good, seek peace and pursue it," the Baal Shem Tov explained: In every physical thing among the permitted things there is good and evil.
What is the good part of a thing and what is the bad part? The Rebbe Rayatz specifies: "the physical" — the physical pleasure you derive from it, the physical craving it arouses in you, and the physical-technical use of it — "is evil, and the divine vitality that animates the physical - is good." Consequently, the spiritual use one can make of it and the benefit for the purpose of mitzvos that can be derived from it — this is the good within the physical thing.
And what is the meaning of "turn away from evil and do good"? It is demanded of the Jew who makes use of the physical thing that he be "turn away from evil": they tell him — use the physical thing, but use it in a manner of "turn away from evil." What does this mean? That one should not desire the pleasure of the physical for its own sake, disconnected from holiness — do not desire this pleasure; this is "turn away from evil," that you turn away from the evil that is in the physical.
"And do good" — with that very physical thing you are using, emphasize the "do good" within it, so that you derive from it nourishment and assistance from the Divine vitality contained in that physical thing. That is to say, if a person eats, for example, he should not desire the pleasure in the food, but rather the strength it gives him to study and to pray and the like — this is seeking the Divine good within the thing. This is the first part of the verse.
And what is the continuation? "Seek peace and pursue it." After it was explained that good and evil are two perspectives within the very same thing, the second part of the verse comes and tells us what "seek peace and pursue it" means. "The person who is 'turn away from evil and do good'" — that person, who understood the goal and instilled within himself the orientation to be "turn away from evil" and not to desire the material aspect of a thing, and to be "do good" and to desire the spiritual aspect of a thing "must pursue and seek to make peace between the material and the Divine life-force that animates it" — we tell him that he must search, pursue, and desire to make peace between them. That is to say, when in actual practice he uses the material thing for a Divine purpose, this is what makes peace between the material and the Divine, between the evil part and the good part, and he uses the material for a Divine matter. This is the point.
Later in the maamar, the Rebbe Rayatz adds another statement, saying that this is the very purpose of the creation of man; it was for this that his soul descended into the world — to perform the avodah of birurim (refinements). The avodah of birurim is that peace which a person makes between the two parts; and the entire inner cheshbon hanefesh (soul-accounting) during the month of Elul must center on this point: to what extent did we make peace in the world between the physical and the spiritual, and to what extent was the avodah of birurim as it ought to be. This is the essence of the daily teaching.