"Room" two hundred and nine in the hall of Hayom Yom.
Thursday, 21 Sivan 5703.
Shiurim: Chumash, Shlach, Chamishi, with Rashi's commentary.
Tehillim, 21 of the month, we say two chapters - chapter 104 and chapter 105.
Tanya, on this day we continue chapter 7 in "Shaar Yichud Vehaemunah". The daily shiur is on page 82, from the words "bnei geder" until the shiur concludes with the word "sitrin".
The daily teaching is a continuation of the letter we read on the previous day, on 20 Sivan - a letter from 18 Tammuz 5599. Later in that letter, the Rebbe Rayatz explains at length to that girl the difference between a makif power and a pnimi power, the power of haskalah and the power of hasagah - a complete elaboration - and subsequently appears the quote that the Rebbe brings here.
In this passage we learn that in the neshamah illuminating the body there are generally two types of revelations. There are the inner powers of the neshamah - the ten powers of the neshamah, which divide as is known into two: intellect and emotion - chochmah, binah, daas, and chesed, gevurah, tiferes and so on. And there is the supernal power, which is above all the ten powers, from which comes the movement that a person is ready to have mesiras nefesh, above all reason and knowledge.
Let us read the text: "Rabbeinu in the Sefer Shel Beinonim" - "Sefer Shel Beinonim" refers to the Tanya, and "Rabbeinu" refers to the Admor Hazaken - "chapter 3 says, that the 3 mochin chochmah binah daas", the three parts of the intellect, "and the 7 middos" - chesed, gevurah, tiferes, netzach, hod, yesod and malchus - "are an hishtalshelus from the ten supernal sefiros".
What is the reason that in our soul there are ten powers? Because the soul is an hishtalshelus from the supernal worlds; and since in each and every world in the supernal worlds there are ten sefiros, consequently this is expressed in the fact that also in the nefesh, ruach and neshamah - the three levels that are an hishtalshelus from there - there are the same ten powers.
"For all this" - the structure of the ten powers in the division of mochin and middos - "is in the nefesh ruach and neshamah, which are enclothed in the body of man". Those parts of the neshamah that are enclothed internally in the body, in them is the orderly division of the ten powers, which include mochin and middos, and they are all the forms of expression of the soul. If we are speaking of the nefesh Elokis contemplating the greatness of Hashem and being awakened in love for Hashem, this depends in a very orderly manner according to these ten powers.
"However," there is a part in the neshamah that illuminates much higher than the ten powers - "the matter of mesiras nefesh for Elokus". There is a Jew in whom awakens the readiness for mesiras nefesh for Elokus, above reason and knowledge, above emotion, above any calculation - ready to have mesiras nefesh for Elokus.
And he brings a quote here in Yiddish: "That a Jew neither wants to nor can be separated, chas veshalom, from Elokus". The moment a Jew feels that a certain action disconnects him, chalilah, from Elokus, he will have mesiras nefesh - even if from the perspective of his revealed powers he is not connected at all, and is even called a "kal shebekalim". But when a point is awakened in him that he feels is the red line for him that must not be crossed, he will be ready for mesiras nefesh.
Where does this come from? After all, the ten powers in that Jew might not illuminate at all - if so, from where does the power of mesiras nefesh suddenly awaken in him, and from what level does it arrive? "This is from the Atzmus Ein Sof, Baruch Hu, which is above the matter of the sefiros". The ten inner powers in the soul come from the ten sefiros, since, as stated, the neshamah is an hishtalshelus from the supernal worlds, from the ten sefiros. But in every neshamah there is a point that expresses the Essence of the Creator, which is above the sefiros. The sefiros can be in concealment, and can even not be at all, but Atzmus Ein Sof - the Essence of the Creator - is found everywhere, and therefore illuminates in every neshamah. And when does it awaken? When a Jew feels that he might, chalilah, become disconnected from the Essence of the Creator - then, whatever his state in his revealed powers may be, the inner desire awakens in him and he has mesiras nefesh.
"Since their beginning is the sefirah of chochmah" - even though the first sefirah is the sefirah of chochmah, which as is known is written in Tanya that it has a closeness to the Ein Sof more than all the sefiros - with all its great virtue, as is written in the gloss in chapter 35 of Tanya, it still has some definition: it is a sefirah in which Elokus illuminates, but it is still within the parameters of a sefirah. Even though it is the first sefirah, the highest of the ten sefiros with all its virtues - the revelation of Atzmus Ein Sof that illuminates in a Jew who is ready to have mesiras nefesh does not come from the sefirah of chochmah, but from Atzmus Ein Sof, which is exalted above all, and even exalted above the sefirah of chochmah. This is the inner point that exists in the neshamah of every Jew.