From: murray.bbs@cybernet.cse.fau.edu
Newsgroups: soc.culture.jewish
Subject: Tanya, Epistle 8, 1 of 3
Date: 23 Aug 92 01:57:38 GMT
Organization: Florida Atlantic University, Boca Raton

Tanya Epistle 8    1/3
 
Epistle Eight
 
[It is written:]  "He sows  tzedakot and causes  deliverance to  sprout
forth." (1) [Tzedakot, the plural form of tzedakah, can mean both "acts
of righteousness" and "acts of charity."]
 
The  use  of  the idiom  "sowing"  in  relation to  the  commandment of
charity,  and  likewise  in the  verse,  (2)  "Sow  for yourselves  for
tzedakah,  [and reap  according  to the  measure  of Chesed],"  may  be
understood in  the light of a teaching of our Sages: (3) "Rabbi Eliezer
would  give a coin  to a poor  person, and  would then pray,  for it is
written,  (4) "Through  tzedek will  I behold  Your face,"  [and tzedek
("righteousness") is closely related to tzedakah ("charity").]
 
This means, [i.e., the reason prayer is deemed "seeing G-d's face," and
the reason why  this is attained by prefacing  prayer with charity is:]
that the manifestation of Divinity  - which is revealed in  the thought
of man and in  his devotion during prayer, in each individual according
to his own measure - is [granted to man] by way of Divine  charity, and
by [the descent of] (5) "G-d's lovingkindness from  world to world upon
those who fear Him...."
 
This means that the light of G-d, the [infinite] Ein Sof, radiates with
so   [quantitatively]  great   and   so   [qualitatively]   intense   a
manifestation in the  higher worlds  above, that they  [and the  beings
which inhabit them]  are truly  in a state  of self-nullification,  and
considered as truly naught before Him, and are absorbed in His light.
 
These  [higher worlds]  are the  heichalot, with  the angels  and souls
within them, that are spoken of in the sacred Zohar by their  names and
according  to their places  [and levels, as alluded  to] in the liturgy
arranged for us by the Men of the Great Assembly.
 
Now, this (6) "light, which is good," radiates from there to this lowly
world,  upon (7) "those that fear G-d  and meditate upon His Name," who
desire  to  worship Him  with the  (8) "service  of the  heart, meaning
prayer."
 
As it  is written, (9)  "And G-d  will enlighten my darkness," [even in
this world, which is  so lowly that G-dliness is generally not manifest
here.]
 
Now,  the  descent of  this illumination  downwards  to this  world, is
called "G-d's kindness,"   [For though this illumination is  drawn down
as a response to the  divine service of the Jew, it outshines it out of
all proportion. Its bestowal upon the lower worlds is thus truly an act
of  "G-d's  kindness,"] which  is  referred to  as water,  (10)  for it
descends from a high place to a low place... (11)
 
["G-d's kindness"  is drawn down through man's  "arousal initiated from
below." It  is thus the  coin that one  gives a pauper  that grants the
giver the  gift of "beholding  G-d's face"  -  the  internal aspect  of
G-dliness - during  prayer. In  this way, man's  kindness and  tzedakah
elicit G-d's kindness and tzedakah.]
 
However,   the  following   must  be   understood:  Since   the  Divine
illumination must  inevitably result  from G-d's attribute  of kindness
and His tzedakah, why is man's service necessary at all?
 
The  Alter Rebbe answers this  question by explaining  that parallel to
the above attribute, there  also exists a Divine attribute  of severity
and contraction, that seeks  to limit and screen  the diffusion of  the
G-dly light. It is man's practice of kindness and tzedakah that ensures
that the attribute of severity and Gevurah will not hinder  the flow of
Divine radiance that is to be revealed to him during prayer.]
 
Now it is well known  that Above there is also an attribute  of Gevurah
and tzimtzum that  serves to contract and  conceal the Divine light  so
that it will not become revealed to the lower worlds.
 
[How  is it,  then,  that this  illumination  is nevertheless  revealed
below?]
 
However, everything depends on [man's] arousal from below. For if a man
conducts  himself  with  kindness,  by bestowing  life  and  Chesed...,
[through  acts of charity that sustain the unfortunate,] he arouses its
equivalent  Above,  [so  that  Divine  kindness  and  illumination  are
bestowed upon him as well.]
 
For, as  our Sages, of blessed  memory, said, (12) "With  the measure a
man metes, it shall be measured to him."  [When an individual acts in a
kindly manner towards his fellow, he will be treated with kindness from
Above.]
 
It  would appear, however,  that this [Divine  response] is  not of the
same  measure. [Such an individual  would appear to  deserve] only that
the  life of the World to Come be  granted to him, corresponding to his
bestowal  of  life in  this world,  [The  appropriate reward  for man's
bestowal of physical life in his world should surely be a corresponding
bestowal of spiritual life in  a higher world, the World to  Come.] but
not that he be granted the life that comes from the illumination of the
actual  light of G-d,  (13) to illumine  and enlighten his  darkness in
"the service of the heart, meaning prayer."
 
For  the latter  is  a grade  and  level of  "higher-level  repentance"
(teshuvah ilaah), as is well  known, (14) [and as such is  far superior
to his actions,] inasmuch as it far surpasses all the life of the World
to Come.
 
As  our Sages,  of blessed  memory, taught:  (15) "Better  one hour  of
repentance and good deeds [in this world than all the life of the World
to Come],"  as explained elsewhere (16)  at length - that  the World to
Come is but a gleam and reflection [of the Divine Presence].
 
[This  leaves us with an apparent disproportion  - that the practice of
tzedakah before  one's prayers  should  result in  the vastly  superior
revelation of teshuvah ilaah during prayer.]
 
The  above concept, however, can be understood by the analogy of sowing
seeds of  grain or  planting kernels of  fruit: the shoot  that sprouts
from  the seed, and the  tree with its fruits from  the kernel, are not
the very essence and being of the seed or the kernel at all,  for their
essence and being has been spent and is decayed in the  soil, [and they
are thus not the source of the vegetative property.]
 
It  is the  vegetative property  in the  soil itself  [rather  than the
particular  vegetative power] that resulted  in the seed  or the kernel
which brings about the growth of the  shoot or the tree and its  fruit;
[The  vegetative power  of  growth is  a  Divine faculty  that  enables
physical growth  to result from  a spiritual property,  in a manner  of
creation  ex nihilo.  But if the  actual growth  of any  grain or fruit
results from  the universal power of  vegetative growth and not  from a
particular seed  or kernel, then why plant them in the first place? The
answer is:]  it is only  that [the earth's  vegetative power]  does not
manifest  its power outwardly, from the potential to the actual, except
by  means of the seed  or the kernel  that are decayed in  the soil and
whose whole power - [the power of growth that originated in the earth's
vegetative property that was implanted in them as they grew] - has been
consumed by the vegetative property in the soil, so that they unite and
become one. [I.e., the particular power of growth, that resulted in the
seed or kernel, unites with the earth's universal vegetative property.]
 
In  this  way the  vegetative  property actualizes  its  potential, and
effuses vitality that  makes possible  the growth  of a  shoot that  is
related to the seed that was sown, though with a very great increase in
any single shoot, [so that one ear of corn comprises  many grains,] and
likewise, there are many fruits on a single tree.
 
Moreover,  the very nature and  essence of the  fruits immensely excels
the nature  and essence of  the planted kernel,  in that the  bland and
tasteless kernel serves as the source for delicious fruit.
 
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