Room one hundred and seventy-eight in the hall of Hayom Yom.
Monday, 19 Iyar, 34th of the Omer, 5703.
Shiurim: Chumash, Bechukosai, Sheni, with Rashi's commentary.
Tehillim, 19th of the month, we recite chapter 90 up to and including chapter 96.
Tanya, we learn chapter 49. The daily shiur begins with the words "V'achar kach" on page 138, and ends on page 70 with the words "yisbarech kanazal".
The daily teaching is short. Its source is from when the Rebbe Rayatz was on his first visit to the United States, and among other places, he was in the city of Milwaukee; in the month of Adar, on the night of 12 Adar, he delivered a maamar of chassidus there in a language understood even by the simple people of the place. The maamar is printed in Yiddish in the Sefer Hamaamarim Kuntreisim of the Rebbe Rayatz; it is the dibbur hamatchil "Rava Chazayeih Lerabbanan", and its content explains the difference between the study of Torah and the avodah of prayer.
At the conclusion of the maamar, the Rebbe Rayatz presents four points regarding what chassidus accomplishes, and the daily teaching is the second of the four points. For the completeness of the matter, we will first mention the first point: Chassidus illuminates everything - meaning, everything a Jew does, every Torah and mitzvah he fulfills and everything he learns, receives a special vitality when he learns chassidus. This is the first point.
The second point is the daily teaching. And so he writes: "Chassidus is G-dly intellect, the intellect that proves to a person his smallness, and on the other hand - to what extent he can elevate himself" - and chassidus is what gives him the strength for this. This is the second teaching in the maamar.
For the completeness of the matter, we will also mention the two additional teachings there. The third teaching states that the Torah of chassidus teaches a person how to break bad habits and how to accustom himself to good character traits. And the fourth point - that the Torah of chassidus awakens the heart to teshuvah and brings a person to return to our Father in Heaven.
In relation to the teaching that appears today, we see the connection to the Rambam according to its order. In recent days we saw the connection of all the teachings to the Sefer Korbanos in the Rambam: Hilchos Korban Pesach, Hilchos Chagigah, Hilchos Bechoros, Hilchos Shegagos and Hilchos Mechusarey Kapparah - these are the five teachings we saw in the previous days. And today we are corresponding to the final halachos of Sefer Korbanos, which are the laws of Temurah.
Let us read the wording of the Rambam in the final halachah of the laws of Temurah, and how it aligns with the daily teaching. The Rambam writes there, that "most of the laws of the Torah are but distant counsels from the Great Counselor" - meaning, all the laws of the Torah are great counsels that the Holy One, blessed be He, who is "the Great Counselor", gives "to correct mindsets and straighten all actions". The entire Torah comes to give a person counsel on how he can correct his mindsets and straighten all his actions so that they will be proper. And this is essentially the message of the daily teaching - that the Torah of chassidus has this path and this understanding, to show a person how small he is, and to what heights he can elevate himself.