"Room" one hundred and four in the palace of Hayom Yom.
Thursday, 4 Adar II 5703.
Shiurim: Chumash, Pekudei, Chamishi, with Rashi's commentary.
Tehillim, 4th of the month, from chapter 23 to chapter 28 inclusive.
Tanya, we begin chapter 35 today, from the beginning of the chapter with the word "Vehinei", and the shiur concludes on page 44 with the word "va'avodatam".
The daily shiur describes a certain practice that took place during the recitation of chassidus by the Mitteler Rebbe, along with the explanation given by the Rebbe Rashab. This practice appears in several places in the sichos of the Rebbe Rayatz, and we will bring an interesting addition found in the source - in Sefer Hasichos, the second night of the festival of Sukkos 5697.
The Rebbe Rayatz begins and describes, as stated here in the first sentence: "During the recitation of chassidus by the Mitteler Rebbe, absolute silence prevailed" - absolute silence in the audience.
[Before continuing, there is an interesting parenthetical remark there: Once a famous professor named Eichental arrived in Lubavitch, as an honored guest of the gentile poritz of Lubavitch. On his way to the poritz, he passed right by the beis midrash, at the time the Mitteler Rebbe was in the middle of reciting a maamar chassidus. He entered and saw hundreds of people standing, and noticed that there was something special here - they stood motionless: whoever had his eyes open did not close them, and whoever had his eyes closed did not open them, everyone stood in silence and with complete concentration listening to the words. He did not understand a single word, nor did he understand the situation, and the matter aroused his curiosity greatly.
When he reached the poritz, his host, he asked him: "Tell me, what was the thing I saw on the way?". The poritz of Lubavitch answered him: "That is a rebbe who constantly speaks words of Torah, and what you saw were the chassidim standing and listening to his words of Torah". This made a tremendous impression on that Professor Eichental, and afterwards he even helped immensely.
How did he help? In another place, the Rebbe Rayatz continues to describe that when the Mitteler Rebbe was taken to prison, it is known that there was an interesting detail - they allowed a minyan of Jews into the prison, so that the Mitteler Rebbe could recite chassidus before them while incarcerated. And how did this happen? Because that Professor Eichental testified on his part and recorded his recognition of the Rebbe, that for him, chassidus is his life; and just as one must bring a doctor to a prisoner, so too must one bring him chassidim to hear chassidus - since he himself had witnessed the experience. This was one of the things that helped later on].
Let us return to the description. As that professor saw, when the Mitteler Rebbe recited chassidus, silence prevailed. And what does the description continue to say? "Nevertheless, he would call out: Sha! Sha!".
In a certain place in the year 5700, the Rebbe Rayatz adds that he would do this while making a motion over his shtreimel - he would pass his hand over the shtreimel and say "Sha" towards his head. Now, we just prefaced that there was absolute silence, and there was no need to quiet anyone, since no one was making a noise. If so, why did he occasionally say "Sha", quiet, quiet?
And this is the continuation: "Father", the father of the Rebbe Rayatz, the Rebbe Rashab, explained what was happening here, what the concept of the Mitteler Rebbe saying "Sha" meant - that he "saw this as an act done to quiet the neviyas mochin". It was to quiet the welling up of his intellect (neviyas mochin). That is, when the Mitteler Rebbe recited chassidus, his mind was welling up so immensely that at every moment a deeper concept arose in his mind than the previous one, and even opposite to it, as he reached a deeper level; and the mochin, which were welling up so tremendously, he could not manage. Therefore, he would say to himself, to his mind, from time to time "Sha, sha", quiet - so that the neviyas mochin would be quieted and there could be full concentration on the matter at hand.
It is interesting to add a similar occurrence with the Rebbe. At the beginning of his nesius, the Rebbe delivered maamarei chassidus, and he would begin the maamar at a regular pace, and during the delivery the pace would become much faster, until the chozrim - those who listen and later write down the maamarim, since the Rebbe did not write them himself - could not grasp all the depth, because the pace was too fast and they could not keep up with it.
And it is told, as Reb Yoel Kahn related, that this was in 5713, before the farbrengen of 13 Tammuz. They knew there would be a farbrengen which would include a maamar, and they knew it was possible they would not be able to keep up with the pace and grasp everything, and therefore they requested permission - something that later became standard, to the point that we almost cannot fathom the meaning of this sentence - to record the maamar. Their reasoning was that the recording would assist those writing the maamar afterwards, so they could listen and write, since the delivery was rapid. The Rebbe gave them permission to record - an unusual thing - with the added commitment (since the Rebbe did not want a situation of publicity at the time), that they would destroy the recording after finishing their work with it. The Rebbe agreed, and they recorded it.
After they listened to the entire recording and transcribed the whole maamar, they did not destroy the recording, but rather brought it to the Rebbe's secretary, Rabbi Hodakov, and gave it to him. Rabbi Hodakov asked them: "It was agreed that you would destroy this, so why did you bring it?". He replied: "I brought it because I thought, perhaps the Rebbe himself would want to listen; if the Rebbe wants to - good, and if not - I will destroy it". Rabbi Hodakov accepted this and said: "Alright, we will ask". He brought the matter to the Rebbe and told him that there was a recording here, if the Rebbe himself wanted to listen to the maamar he delivered. The Rebbe said: "Yes, I would like to listen".
The Rebbe listened with great attention to the entire maamar, and at the conclusion he said an interesting thing. He told the secretary, Rabbi Hodakov, to pass on a big yasher koach to the recorders; and he said that now he understands the multitude of questions he is asked afterwards about the maamarim he delivers. Because, in his words, "due to the neviyas mochin during the delivery of the maamar, he cannot limit himself and explain everything expansively during the delivery". Only now, having personally heard his own maamar, did he understand what transpires during the delivery of the maamar, that there is no ability to limit himself. And this is essentially the same concept stated here about the Mitteler Rebbe - that the neviyas mochin was so intense that he needed to quiet himself in the middle and say "Sha, sha", so there would not be such a neviyas mochin.
Let us continue with the conclusion of the teaching. "And with this he explained a statement in the Zohar" - while the Rebbe Rashab explained that this was intended to quiet the mochin, he concluded and said that based on this, he explained an expression in the Zohar. The Zohar explains the depth of the wisdom of the wisest of men, and the conclusion of the statement there is: "Sava" - referring to the elder and wise man; "sava" in the Zohar is a title for a person of the utmost depth. "Da'ato satim ushchiach" - "his mind (da'ato)", meaning his lofty wisdom, what is called in maamarim "chochmah stima'ah"; "satim", meaning concealed and hidden, highly exalted.
For, as we described the Mitteler Rebbe, his neviyas mochin and depth were so great that constantly another idea and yet another idea entered his mind. [In parentheses: The Rebbe brings down that when one examines the maamarim of the Mitteler Rebbe as he wrote them, after an entire passage there suddenly comes another possibility, at the end of which it says "v'lo k'nal" - not like the previous understanding, but rather a new depth. Meaning "satim", extremely deep].
"Ushchiach" - there is a state where the matter calms down and quiets without excitement. The ability of the "sava", the deep thinker, to grant calm and quiet to the depth of his wisdom - is essentially what the Mitteler Rebbe did by saying "Sha", in order to grant quiet and calm to the depth of his wisdom.
A similar thing is written in the sefer "Emek Hamelech" describing the holy Ari. It is known that all the teachings of the Arizal were not written by him but rather by his disciples. And why did he not write them himself? It is written there that the Arizal could not constrict himself in writing, because his neviyas mochin was so intense that he could not draw it down into writing; and even in speech it was difficult for him - due to the great abundance of his neviyas mochin, it was hard for him to constrict it into organized, comprehensible speech.
This is the greatness of the greatest men. Thus the Arizal was described, thus we read about the Mitteler Rebbe, and thus we related about the Rebbe. We are speaking of the Nesi'im of Israel, whose neviyas mochin is on an exceedingly high, G-dly level.