The two hundred sixty-fourth "room" in the palace of Hayom Yom.
Wednesday, 17 Menachem Av, 5703.
Lessons: Chumash, Eikev, Revi'i, with the commentary of Rashi.
Tehillim, on the 17th of the month, one recites from chapter 83 through chapter 87 inclusive.
Tanya: on this day we continue the "Iggeret HaKodesh" section. We begin on page 108 with the words "Ach biur," and on that same page 108 the shiur concludes with the words "chochmah ila'ah kanal."
Today's teaching is a continuation of the saying from the previous day, 16 Menachem Av. On the previous day it was told that the Baal Shem Tov would travel himself and would not wait for people to come to him, and the Mitteler Rebbe explained that the reason for this is because the inner dimension of Torah is called "fire," and from fire one flees; therefore he had to go himself.
Here the continuation of the discussion from that very talk appears. And the continuation does not come to provide an additional explanation of why the Baal Shem Tov traveled to everyone, but rather to explain why the inner dimension of the Torah is indeed compared to fire — what is the resemblance between the inner dimension of the Torah and fire.
The teaching reads as follows: "The Alter Rebbe explains why fire is associated with the innermost dimension of the Torah" — why is the innermost dimension of the Torah called "fire"? The Alter Rebbe explained, "because it is what gives vitality to the revealed dimension of the Torah"; since the innermost dimension of the Torah gives vitality to the revealed dimension of the Torah, it is therefore called by the name "fire."
This point is taken from the farbrengen talk of the last day of Pesach 5700. In the talk as printed before us there appears a different explanation than what is written here, for from that same farbrengen there is an additional transcription of the talk, which is presently in the Rebbe's library, and the Rebbe took the saying from that additional transcription and not from the one before us. In the one before us a different explanation is written: that a person who studies only the revealed part of Torah — water is cold and is liable to cool him and distance him, and therefore he must also bring in pnimiyus haTorah, which is fire, that warms him.
But here comes the other point. Why is the innermost dimension of the Torah called "fire"? "When one studies a halachah and knows that he will study that very same halachah after a hundred and twenty years in Gan Eden" — for when a person arrives in Gan Eden, he studies the very same things that he studied in this world, except that in Gan Eden he studies the secret of those matters and not their plain meaning.
When a person studies today, in this world, the revealed teachings — the halachah and the plain meaning of the matters — and he knows that after a hundred and twenty years he will study that very same halachah in Gan Eden in an inner way, this very knowledge "brings fire," and it instills in him fire and vitality in his learning. The Jew says: this study that I am learning does not conclude now; right now I am learning only the outer wrapping, but there is within it a far greater depth, and that I will receive in Gan Eden, when I will study that same halachah on another level of depth.
This knowledge and this connection introduce fire, warmth, and vitality into the person who studies the revealed part of the Torah. This is the reason, says the Rebbe Rayatz, that the inner dimension of the Torah is called by the name "fire."