The thirty-third "cheder" in the palace of Hayom Yom.
Wednesday, 22 Teves 5703.
Shiurim: Chumash, sefer and parshas Shemos, Wednesday, with Rashi's commentary.
Tehillim, the 22nd of the month, chapter 106 and chapter 107.
Tanya, we are in the middle of chapter 12, from the word "v'af al pi chein" until page 34, at the words "tefillah etc."
Today's teaching is very important and fundamental, a teaching that the Rebbe repeated over the years dozens of times, perhaps even hundreds, and there are fascinating explanations on it in which the Rebbe clarifies its various expressions. The content of the teaching is that a person must devote half an hour each day to thinking about how he can accomplish something in the chinuch of his children, that they should go in the way that the Holy One, blessed be He, wants. But let us learn and read the teaching as it is.
It opens with the words "The declaration of my father and teacher [the Rebbe] at one of the farbrengens". This is a sort of quotation from a letter of the Rebbe Rayatz, who relates a declaration made by his father, the Rebbe Rashab, at one of the farbrengens. The reference is to a farbrengen of the Rebbe Rashab on Simchas Torah, apparently in the year 5660, at which he made this declaration. But that was not the first time he declared it: if one looks through the letters of the Rebbe Rashab, one can find a letter he wrote seven years earlier, in 5653 - a letter of consolation to his sister-in-law who was left alone after her husband passed away - in which he strongly aroused her to invest her time and to be both a mother and a father, and to attend to the chinuch of the children. There he opens with the expression "I have always said", and states the idea that one must devote time each day to the chinuch of the children. It emerges that this was a declaration that the Rebbe Rashab would always repeat on various occasions, but at that Simchas Torah farbrengen it was a public declaration before everyone.
And what does he say? Let us read the wording: "Just as putting on tefillin every day is a mitzvah from the Torah incumbent on every Jew, without distinction as to whether he is a great Torah scholar or a simple person - so too it is an absolute obligation upon every Jew to devote about half an hour of thought each day to the chinuch of his children, and to do all that is in his power, and even more than his powers". There is no difference in the mitzvah of putting on tefillin every day between a person who is a great Torah scholar and a simple person; everyone is obligated in this mitzvah from the Torah. And to the same degree it is an absolute obligation upon every Jew to think for half an hour every day about the chinuch of the children.
This statement was sometimes said with certain variations, and I will note a few of the interesting ones: there is a letter in which the Rebbe Rayatz says "at least half an hour" - once a day, or even once every two or three days; here it is written "every day half an hour" to think about the chinuch of the children; and there is a place where the Rebbe writes "every day an hour" to speak with the children, to take an interest in their situation and to guide them.
Let us look at a few interesting fine points that the Rebbe explained. The Rebbe Rashab compares the obligation of involvement in chinuch to the mitzvah of tefillin: just as the mitzvah of tefillin is a mitzvah from the Torah, so too one must devote time each day to chinuch. And why did the Rebbe Rashab choose specifically the mitzvah of tefillin as the example for chinuch needing to resemble it? I will ask it in my own words: tefillin is not a mitzvah of literally every day - if we deduct Shabbosos, festivals and Chol Hamoed, there are dozens of days over the course of the year on which tefillin are not put on; if so, why did he choose specifically the mitzvah of tefillin as a daily mitzvah?
The Rebbe gave a number of explanations over the years, and I will note them. One explanation: what is unique about the mitzvah of tefillin is that in putting them on - one of the hand and one of the head - it is written in halachah that a person must subjugate his mind and heart to the content of the tefillin, to faith in the Holy One, blessed be He, and to Shema Yisrael. And this is what the Rebbe Rashab comes to compare: devoting attention to chinuch must be done every day, not as a matter of discharging an obligation, but with a genuine investment of heart and mind - how does one bring the children to the way in which the Holy One, blessed be He, wants them to go. That is one point that we see in the mitzvah of tefillin.
A further point: on another occasion the Rebbe spoke about the fact that the mitzvah of tefillin has a special quality, about which our Sages say that it is equivalent to the entire Torah. Even though tefillin is one of the 613 mitzvos, its power is equivalent to the entire Torah. It is known that from among the ten mivtzaim the Rebbe chose certain mitzvos, and one of them in which he invested a great deal was putting on tefillin with Jews - a mitzvah that is equivalent to the entire Torah. And the Rebbe Rashab wanted to emphasize this as well: that the day-to-day involvement in the chinuch of the children is not a trivial matter, but rather something whose importance is equivalent to the entire Torah. The time you spend on it is time that has no substitute, and there is nothing more important than it, for it is literally the entire Torah.
A third point that the Rebbe spoke about: the mitzvah of tefillin is called "a mitzvah on his body". That is, you cannot send another person and tell him to put on tefillin today in your place. There are mitzvos for which you can send an agent to do them in your place and it is considered as if you did them yourself - such as blowing the shofar on Rosh Hashanah, where if you did not blow yourself you can fulfill your obligation through someone who blows on your behalf; but with tefillin you cannot tell another to put them on and have in mind for you, and have it considered as if you put them on, for this is a mitzvah on his body. The same applies to involvement in the chinuch of the children: this is not something a person can ask another to do, to be involved in the chinuch of his children and devote time to them; this is a personal obligation of each person, an obligation on his body, and every person must invest his time in it. And this is a further point that the Rebbe wanted to compare specifically to tefillin.
A fourth point: in the tefillin is written the passage "Shema Yisrael Hashem Elokeinu Hashem Echad, v'ahavta", and in it is said "with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might" - that is, to reach love of Hashem at the highest level. And when a person thinks about what goals he must lead the children toward and educate them to, and what is the limit and the ultimate purpose - he is told that it must reach the state of "and you shall love Hashem your G-d with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might", that is, to lead them to the highest level. In other words, as long as you have not reached this maximum, you have not yet completed your task in this matter. We see, then, how many wonderful hints the Rebbe found in this comparison specifically to tefillin.
Another interesting point in the teaching: just as there is a mitzvah from the Torah to put on tefillin every day, he concludes by saying that there is an "absolute obligation" upon every Jew to think every day about the children. What is the expression "absolute obligation"? If it is an obligation, it would seem it ought to be written in our book of obligations - the Shulchan Aruch. Is there a clause in the Shulchan Aruch establishing an obligation upon every Jew to think half an hour every day about the chinuch of his children? We will not find this written in any halachah in the Shulchan Aruch. And if so, why did the Rebbe express himself that this is an "absolute obligation"? "Absolute obligation" means that there is no possibility of escaping it.
The Rebbe explained on one occasion, on Shavuos 5747, that there are obligations in Yiddishkeit that are not of the type of obligations written in a book, but rather human obligations that run very deep in the soul, far more than what is written in a book. There are obligations regarding which a person merely needs to "check the box" that he fulfilled them, and there are obligations greater than that. For example, the Rebbe brings the obligation of parents to feed their children: the halachah, as the Rambam brings in Hilchos Ishus, says that parents are obligated to feed their children until the age of six, and after the age of six there is no obligation. However, the Rambam continues and brings from the Gemara that if parents neglect their children after the age of six and do not give them food - claiming that there is no obligation, since the obligation is only until the age of six - it is publicly announced about them how cruel they are, that they are worse even than impure birds; for even an impure bird by its nature takes care to bring food to its chicks, so how can it be that a father would not take care of food for his children?
The Rebbe brings this as an example that there is certainly an obligation to provide food for children even after the age of six. But what is the difference? Until the age of six it is an obligation written in the Shulchan Aruch and in the Gemara, and after the age of six it is a human obligation - and if a person does not fulfill it, something is lacking in his humanity. Along these lines, when the Rebbe Rashab said that there is an absolute obligation to invest every day in the chinuch of the children, this is of the type of obligations that one should not look for where they are written in a book; they need to be written on the tablet of the heart and in the person's very personality, to the point that it is inconceivable that he would not think every day about the chinuch of the children.
Let us look at the conclusion of the teaching. He says: "to care and to work on his children that they go in the way in which they are being guided", even to do more than his powers - to see how he can influence the children to go in the way in which they are being guided, to lead them and guide them in the way in which one wants to guide them. In one of his letters the Rebbe Rayatz describes a chassidic home in which the parents - the fathers and mothers - invest in the chassidic chinuch of the children; one must see and invest much thought in how this way continues and is drawn onward to the children as well, and remains in an eternal manner. This is the wonderful teaching, and indeed it is an absolute obligation upon each and every one to live with this matter.