To Do Only One Thing in Life Without Time to Sin | Zohar Pekudei Introduction Nitzavim-Vayelech 5786 (Auto Translated)

Zachor and Shamor in One Utterance – Wisdom and Not Labor

Today is erev Shabbos kodesh, parshas Nitzavim-Vayeilech, Shabbos Selichos. I would like to continue where we left off. I believe we finished in the recent shiurim understanding truly the introduction to the section of Pekudin in the Zohar, which is built on the verse ‘u’shmartem va’asisem’, for the Zohar embedded within it the topic of shamor and zachor.

The Three Topics We Will Expand Upon

I wish to expand somewhat on two matters. The first, on the last thing we discussed, that from the side of Elokus, from the side of comprehending Elokus, and when a Jew is at the level of Shabbos, then ‘zachor and shamor were said in one utterance’. This is a comprehension that the Gemara in Rosh Hashanah brings regarding the blowing of the shofar, that because of it a person cannot hear two sounds simultaneously, and if two people blow, a person cannot hear both of them — except that on Rosh Hashanah there is a special law, that since it is something beloved, a person gives his mind to it, ‘yahiv da’atei v’yahiv libei’ and he hears. One must contemplate this and find in it a hint.

And the second matter, if we manage to reach it, is what the Zohar expounds that ‘va’asisem’ is zachor, because the remembrance creates action above. We spoke last week primarily about the point of why zachor is not always said, why action is generally said, and why specifically here, when they divide the remembrance from the action, this is a novelty — because it speaks from the perspective of man, for whom these are not the same reality. But in truth we must go deeper, for this is certainly one of the foundations of the Zohar, a very great foundation, the topic called ‘b’is’arusa d’lesata is’ar l’eila’. We must clarify what it truly means and what it means for us — two matters, and both need to be clarified for us clearly.

The Third Matter – Zachor and Shamor in the Continuation of the Drashos

And there is another third matter that I wish to speak about if I have time. The topic of zachor and shamor that the Zohar continues with in the drasha that follows, in the drasha of the first mitzvah, the positive commandment of knowing Hashem, and also in the mitzvah that follows, the second mitzvah of serving Hashem, and then afterward in the mitzvah of fearing Hashem, and in my opinion even in the mitzvah of remembering the Shabbos day. It’s possible to expand this matter to the topic of Yom HaZikaron, that Rosh Hashanah is Yom HaZikaron, and certainly it has relevance to the zachor we are dealing with. So we’ll see how many of these topics we can encompass.

And in this third matter, the Zohar connects the topic of zachor and shamor — as we discussed that it connects the positive commandments with the negative commandments — and it emerges that if zachor is the positive commandment, then the remembrance, in the language of the Zohar, has relevance to the 248 positive commandments, and shamor has relevance to the 365 negative commandments in time, and we must understand a person’s connection to time, and so forth.

And through this we would understand the topic of Rosh Hashanah, which is the beginning of the year. Even though the years we have are not always exactly three hundred sixty-five days, nevertheless the concept of a year is three hundred sixty-five days, and on Rosh Hashanah the entire year gathers together, and from them is formed a kind of remembrance — from all 365 days a remembrance is formed. This is seemingly the topic of Rosh Hashanah according to the drush as we hold by it.

The First Matter – Zachor and Shamor Were Said in One Utterance

Let us begin then with the first matter, and perhaps it is the most important of them, and it also relates to Rosh Hashanah, and it is the discussion to understand what is the meaning of ‘zachor and shamor were said in one utterance’. This is the first of the three things I will speak about.

Positive and Negative Commandments Are One Thing by the Creator

We say that its meaning is that positive and negative commandments are one thing by the Creator, because by the Creator there is no toil between doing and not-doing, and therefore His ‘doing’ is so to speak the same rest that a person has in ‘not doing’. And likewise the rest itself is not because He is weary and tired, for does He need rest? Rather ‘He wrote rest for Himself’, so the Holy One Blessed be He ‘and He rested on the seventh day’ — not because He needs to rest, but on the contrary, because He wants to teach us to rest, as they said ‘He wrote rest for Himself’. And there are other explanations in this, like the saying ‘What was the world lacking? Rest’, that the Holy One Blessed be He created rest.

But in other words, in truth from the side of the Holy One Blessed be He, Shabbos and all the weekdays are equal. Rest and action simultaneously. But for us the matter changes, for us it divides, and when Shabbos comes then it is the time when we make rest without action. However, in truth even on Shabbos there is action, but a higher action. And the Shabbos action is of the type of action of ‘zachor and shamor in one utterance’. This is the topic I wish to explain, and I wish to express it in the way of avodah, in a practical way, for there is found the way how a person begins to merit true comprehension of things, and from there I will begin to explain.

The Human Problem – The Day is Short and the Work is Great

In order to understand this, it’s better to first explain what is the meaning of work, what is the meaning of labor, and what is the meaning of rest. In other words, this is the solution to a human problem. And what is the human problem? The human problem is that one who knows what is incumbent upon him to do — and every person has very many things to do — one who is somewhat in the category of a person knows that ‘the day is short and the work is great’ (Avos 2). The time is short, and the work is great, there is much work in a day.

What does this mean? I wish to explain, what is the meaning of ‘the day is short and the work is great’? For a person cannot work more than the length of the day, so what is your complaint? Do according to the length of the day. But the meaning is not so, for the person has grasped what it means to be a person. He has grasped what is so to speak the task, what is the obligation, what is the purpose, what kind of perfection lies in being a person.

Examples of Great Work

One can say by way of example, a person who is a Jew, he must learn the Torah. The Torah is the wisdom given to Israel, the way of Torah, the way of instruction, the way of life. And to learn all the Torah takes a very long time. Let’s say it requires a hundred years to learn all the Torah. I don’t know, maybe that’s too much or too little, and when it’s not so — it’s not called Torah. But in any case it’s a very long thing. And less than this is impossible, for he won’t know, won’t be a person, won’t be a Jew, won’t be a Jewish human being.

Or a person who understands what is the rectification of character traits and clarification of character traits, that he must be a person, and most people at least are not born complete people, but they must do teshuvah, they must rectify themselves to be people. And this takes time, everything takes a person time to do. There is an astonishingly long time in it.

Or another task, another action that a person grasps is incumbent upon him to do — not just a nice thing, that the Rebbe asks of him and therefore he does it, for about that one can certainly say he is exempt, and ‘makes an accounting’. Rather a person who grasps what is incumbent upon him to do, and enters himself into a certain wisdom to understand it properly, will see that hundreds of years are needed to understand a wisdom properly. And the proof is that people have already been learning that wisdom for hundreds, perhaps thousands of years, and still haven’t reached its purpose. Still they don’t understand clearly how the world works, how the Torah works — about every small thing.

And likewise one can say the same thing about what are called physical things. A person wants to earn money, and not just — there are those who need money to make Shabbos, and have no difficulty learning ‘bread to eat and garment to wear’, for they don’t see a goal in the building they are building, that they are building a business and doing tikkun olam with it. But one who sees that his matter is to earn money, to build buildings, to sell things, to buy things, to accomplish something in the world — when he enters into each and every thing, and what is its meaning, and what is truly required to do the thing in perfection, to do it properly, he sees that this is an enormous enterprise. Perhaps thousands of people in thousands of years have already labored at this, and with all of them they barely reached something.

And so when a person contemplates this, each and every one — this one wants to engage in avodas Hashem, to do chassidic things, to establish yichudim, to do hisbodedus, to clarify certain beliefs, to live lofty concepts — the same thing itself he grasps: he begins for a minute, and it’s quite pleasant, but the thing grasps him properly, and he is required. As the tzaddikim tell such wondrous stories, that one sat three hundred years in a cave. Three hundred years? A person cannot sit three hundred years at once. Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai sat twelve complete years in a cave, to learn the Torah, to reveal some of the secrets of the Torah. And do you have time to sit twelve years in a cave? For in those twelve years you must also marry a wife and have children. The thing is not relevant.

But this is what I’m saying: here there is work that a person sees is indeed his work, and he is not exempt from it, but it is incumbent upon him to do it. I don’t mean one who has no aspirations and no ideas and no perspectives on the nature of the world and the nature of man. But this one who indeed sees that he has things he must do, that he must know all the Torah, that he must merit that clarity that one merits from sitting thirteen years in a cave, that he must accomplish that tikkun olam that requires several hundred years for a machine to understand how the thing works. This is what is required of him. And then he has work, great work, very great work, great labor.

The Positive Side – What is the Potential

And this knowledge, one can also say it in a positive way: what is the potential? What can a person accomplish? And what he can — must he do? A person’s aspiration is sometimes to actualize, to bring to deed, all the powers lying within him, all the possibilities hidden in him. This is the perfection of everything. And when we see how much a person can accomplish, or when we hear stories about successful people, great people who accomplished so much, or who established entire systems — Avraham Avinu established all of Klal Yisrael, and to this very day they still speak and tell about that Avraham, this is an enormous thing. This is what a person can accomplish, the type of things a person can accomplish. And where are you holding? How much have you accomplished like Avraham Avinu? I’m not saying this by way of mussar, but to say: you see that there is work, there is great work.

The Other Side – Time Constrains

This then is the first side of that feeling that every person has. And on the other hand he sees that time constrains him, ‘the day is short’. I can at most do twenty-four hours each day, and in truth not even that, for eight of the hours I must sleep, and besides that I have other tasks I must do. In short, perhaps half an hour a day I can engage in this thing, in the work. Here a person enters, and this is the true work. That is, what is called work is only when it is great work. This is what I wish to say.

The Conflict – Lack of Peace of Mind

That is, a person lives in such a conflict, lives in such a lack of rest, in such a lack of perfection. And I’m not speaking of lack of rest in toil, whether he works and sweats or not. I’m speaking that he feels a very strong conflict, feels a lack of clarity, a lack of rest, a lack of peace of mind. He is not as he wants to be, he sees that there is work, and he would desire to work on the entire world at once, he would desire to accomplish the entire world, and meanwhile he can barely manage one day, barely one hour, barely one moment.

And even if he chose — for every person has such things that bring him to choose certain parts, let’s say within all the Torah. He says: there is nigleh, there is nistar, there is chassidus, there is kabbalah, there is Choshen Mishpat, there is Ohr HaChaim, and there are so many other things, and he cannot do everything. Good, he chooses, and his portion will be in this thing, his portion in Torah will be this portion. Very sad is the choice, tragic it is. And every choice a person makes, and says, good, this takes a whole life, takes seventy years. Let’s say, how many years can a person truly learn in his life, for example? Perhaps twenty, thirty years, I don’t know, at most. I give my thirty years of work to this topic, to this field. And then he will be, let’s say, the world’s expert in that field, will truly accomplish the work. Indeed a person accomplished something.

And even then, is there not something tragic in this? For very sad is the thing, because as much as you dedicate yourself to one thing, so you have taken yourself from the other things, so you have cut yourself off, so you have said that you will never do other things. That if one says he will be a great doctor, that he will engage in medicine, that he will know how to heal a person’s heart — automatically he won’t know how to heal a person’s brain. And isn’t this part of the work of medicine, and he wants it, for it’s part of what follows from what he understands that a doctor is one who understands how the human body works, and his responsibility so to speak, and his matter, to understand the entire body and heal it from all kinds of problems.

But in this itself there is endless great work. One can learn from every system, from every part, from every mechanism that exists in the human body, learn endlessly, and to this very day they still don’t understand everything, for there is still what to research, what to investigate, to try to discover.

Why a Person Must Choose

And whatever choice he chooses, let’s say he chooses, and a person must choose. For as we spoke at length in other shiurim (about the nature of the yetzer hara and this is not its place), one of the great evil inclinations that exists is that because a person sees that the work is great, and he is not obligated to any specific thing, he remains always open, for then he always dreams that he will do everything. But this very thing that a person cannot do everything — this is ‘the day is short’, this is ‘the days of our years are seventy years’ (Tehillim 90), a person doesn’t have infinite time, he must. If he wants to do anything at all, he must cut, must cut himself off from many other things and say: this is what I’m doing.

The Advice of the Baal Shem Tov – One Thought

And how does one find? This is the greatest question, indeed the greatest personal question that can be for a person in his life. Which thing must I give up? And then every single day. Even if a person can know in a general way, that he sees he is drawn to a certain thing, that he sees that Providence, whatever the situation may be, has led him to do a certain task — nevertheless, every day he has many choices, he can do more of this, and can do more of that, but he cannot do everything, it’s not possible. There will always be the work greater than the short day, forever, until we reach the language I will tell you.

That is, this is only philosophy, this is an internal thing. But externally, in practice, it will be necessary for it to be so, for he will be forced to come to my solution if he wants to merit some rest. And this is the matter: he will be forced, and every day a person rises, and the Baal Shem Tov said, and this is an enormous instruction to prepare with for the holy days and for every single day. The Baal Shem Tov said, one advice for avodas Hashem is that a person should have only one thought. And by one thought he means, so he begins, one thought each day. He rises in the morning, and thinks: what will I do today? One thing. And if afterward he does other things, they will all be included in that one thing. For thus the person is not confused, thus he doesn’t live in the world of tohu, which is the pleasure of Amalek, that every measure comes and tells him, perhaps you’ll do this, perhaps you’ll do that.

All Sins Come from Confusion of Mind

And the truth is that all sins, all confusions of mind, all the confusions that exist — from here they come. Why? Because when a person begins, sat to learn, let’s say, he decided: today I will learn tractate Bava Basra. And then comes to him, let’s say, the yetzer hara, and says: perhaps Bava Kamma? Good, he goes and learns Bava Kamma. This everyone already understands is a kind of aspect of ‘distinguishing between holy and holy’, for the difference between Bava Kamma and Bava Basra — both are still good things, both are still holy things. He is learning Torah and remembers that he must do chesed — both are mitzvos, both are good things. The question is only that each has its matter. And if one does everything, one does nothing. This is the problem because of which he must choose.

Why Not to Sin – The Kotzker’s Teaching

But in truth, even what a person sits to learn, and a thought comes to him, perhaps he’ll go a whole day idle, perhaps he’ll go transgress a sin, perhaps he’ll go gluttonize. Even gluttony has some place, it too is a thing. It’s possible there is no such task at all for a person to be the glutton, I’m not saying there is such a task. But the depth at the root of the thing, what brings him a thought that perhaps he’ll go gluttonize, that perhaps he’ll go do some foolishness, that perhaps he’ll waste time, that perhaps he’ll be idle — this too is possible only because he still left open some possibility that he’ll do other things.

And there is gluttony in the world, and it has some place, and there is such a kind of life in the world, there is such a task in the world, there is such a reality in the world. And as we see, the people who enter themselves into the thing have that same great work. There is ‘a lover of money will not be satisfied with money’ (Koheles 5), there is ‘a person doesn’t die with half his desire in his hand’ (Koheles Rabbah 1), and everything that one enters into, it too will be great work. There is in it a whole world, there is in it infinity, like the pleasure of Amalek, there is in it spreading and going, there is infinity in how much one can eat, how much one can understand and eat. And let’s not only say in the good part of it — indeed there is in it a truly good part — but even not in the good part, this itself is a whole world.

The Teaching of the Kotzker Rebbe

And in truth, as the Kotzker Rebbe said, and I have contemplated this recently, the Kotzker Rebbe said something very wise, an astonishingly wise thing. He said — and people don’t learn it properly — that he wants his chassidim not to sin, not because they don’t want to sin and not because they fear sin for any reason, but they won’t sin because they don’t have time.

People think, good, this is an interesting thing, that he says to engage so much in avodas Hashem, in learning and prayer, that no time will remain to sin. But what’s the difference? Either way they don’t sin. What is he trying to say? It seems to me that what he is trying to say is perhaps that depth that I’m saying here, that sin is a thing, there is such a thing, ‘as is the good so is the sinner’ (Koheles 9), before the Holy One Blessed be He there are good people and sinners, both have some matter in the world. If so, why shouldn’t a person sin? Only because he doesn’t have so much time. For if he had infinite time, he could sin and then return in teshuvah, and so repeat God forbid, for there will always come an end, there is always time, time for everything, ‘for everything there is a season’ (Koheles 3), he will have time for everything.

The True Answer – Because There is No Time

What is truly the true answer why a person shouldn’t sin? He says, it’s bad. But there is nothing that is absolutely bad, right? Bad means that it’s bad because it doesn’t fit here. But why is it truly bad to sin? One must remember, grasp, this is the true answer. And the true answer — and perhaps it’s not proper to say this, for people will think I’m saying there is a good reason to sin and it’s only the reason — but it seems to me that in the depth of the matter this is truly so.

The true reason, and this is a better answer: a person rises in the morning and says ‘what will I do today?’, and he grasps and makes a kind of accounting of the soul for all his life, and says ‘for what is my life? and what will it be?’ — he must grasp that all his life won’t suffice for this. This is what my life is, and I must dedicate all the time to this. Therefore I do only one thing.

And now, again, this I’m saying in a negative way, and one can say it in a positive way. Today I want to do only the one thing, what I’m going to do, and this will take all my time. Now the yetzer hara comes to him and says: ‘perhaps you’ll do another thing? Perhaps go for a walk, I don’t know what, go do something somewhere.’ He says to him: very good, you have a nice argument. There is such a thing, I don’t deny there is such a thing in the world. For there are those who deny, as we learned many times, one says ‘it’s impossible with pig’s unripe fruit’ — and he says a false thing, for it’s not impossible, there is pig’s unripe fruit in the world. And why do you argue with the Creator who created pig’s unripe fruit? Rather he says ‘it’s possible in your Torah’.

What does this mean? For our way it means: he says, very good, you’re right little righteous one, you yetzer hara, it’s a nice matter to do sins, a great matter. But I don’t have time. What does it mean I don’t have time? ‘The day is short’, I must do one thing. Do you agree that I’ll do one thing in a day? One thing today — can you establish for me that I’ll do? A person cannot do more than one thing. ‘The day is short’, if only one thing. If only I succeed in completing the one shiur I have today, if only. I cannot do more than one thing in a day. If so, the other thing, please let them divide it until time is found for it. And it won’t be found, for there is no time, ‘that he won’t have day and night’, there is no time.

The Holy One Blessed be He is Omnipotent, and Man is Not

The same thing itself is all of a person’s life. A person must grasp that what we cannot do sins is mostly because there is no time. For if he were ‘above time’ — the Holy One Blessed be He made you an order, good order, but He is ‘above time’, He can include everything, and He is omnipotent, and every day together. And man is not omnipotent, man is the complete opposite of omnipotent. Man is short, ‘short of spirit and full of anger’. Man is very small, and has little time, short of spirit, short of time, the time is short, the day is short, he has no time.

What then is the advice for this? He must. Again, the great principle, and especially in this time — and it was always so — is that if a person doesn’t decide, automatically he is scattered and dispersed. He does a thousand things every day, but not even one thing truly, for he begins everything and doesn’t finish it. This is the deficiency, this is the great mistake we are constantly fighting.

One Thing is the Answer to All Questions

But when a person does one thing, this is the answer to all questions. He doesn’t need to enter into investigation, he doesn’t need to enter into investigation whether to do the sins, whether there was good in it, whether there wasn’t good in it. I know that I already have the choice I must make today.

And it seems to me this is what he means, that he lowers there his being a Jew. For what people say, why do people get confused about this, he says: why must a person be good? He says, perhaps because the Torah forbade it. I’m a Jew, and a Jew doesn’t do. One asks: what does it mean, does a non-Jew not need to be good? A non-Jew must also be a person. On the contrary and on the contrary. But it seems to me that what he says is a very deep thing. He says, let’s say, there are seventy nations in the world, go know how many people. The Holy One Blessed be He made everything, everything has an accounting, ‘Hashem made everything for His purpose, even the wicked for the day of evil’ (Mishlei 16). The Holy One Blessed be He made all kinds of people, each for his matter. And I don’t even need to say ‘this for his matter’, that there is great work, there is infinite work in every type of part, and perhaps the clarification, the perfection of gluttony, it too is some matter, there is need for it in the world. And very good that there should be some nation, some type of non-Jew, some type of person, appointed to work all the kinds of gluttony in the world. So be it, I don’t know, it’s possible there is an argument here.

We are Jews – We are Limited

What we are Jews, meaning that we have choice, that the Holy One Blessed be He chose us and Israel chose the Holy One Blessed be He, ‘Yaakov He chose for Himself’ (Tehillim 135), and we don’t do certain things because we are Jews — this is a way of saying: I’m already limited, I’m already in a certain choice. A certain choice that I’m a Jew, and a Jew is from the people who are ‘do not commit adultery’, ‘do not murder’, ‘do not covet’ (Shemos 20). And Eisav says he is ‘do not murder’. You know what? Perhaps it’s needed that there be in the world a bit more ‘do not murder’? I don’t know. Perhaps there is such a need. And I don’t need to enter into investigation from the broadest perspective, that there is need for all things, for I’m already limited, I’m already a Torah person, I’m already a Jew who goes with the Torah.

What the Torah says isn’t everything? True. There cannot be everything there, for there are other people. And all the Torah wasn’t given to them — whether this is their fault, whether this is the fault of the Holy One Blessed be He, whether for some reason — again, not everything can enter at once, for whatever reason. But certainly there is something besides being a Jew. For one who thinks that the entire world is all Jews is nothing but a fool, for there are thousands of billions of people besides this. But I’m a Jew, and Jews are limited to do these things, for they need to do something. For if everyone were everything, no one would be anything.

The Basic Experience of a Person

It emerges then, we’ll move from matter to matter, that this is the experience, the basic experience of a person. He wants very many things. Anyone who is somewhat a person — and I’m not speaking of one who is nothing, just masses, who does every day what they tell him — but one who has some aspiration, who understands the perfection and the beauty of one thing, and then sees so also in another thing. And even after they must choose, and the main thing — and according to what I’m standing on — the very being of a person, the very being of an adult, to merit mochin d’gadlus, is to a very great extent to know that a person grasps and becomes reconciled with this. I’m a Jew, and a Jew does thus, or I am — and especially in Israel there are many tasks, this is not enough — I am thus, and what I am, and is it good to do other things? This is already the reason for the thing they said in the story-tales, this is a deed, and this is his deed. What shall I do? Can I be everything? I cannot be everything. I can be a person, can be one person, barely. I try to be that one person that I am, properly. This is the first thing.

The Sorrow in Limitation – In the Making of a Year

And with all this there is here a kind of sorrow, there is great sorrow in it. When born there was great sorrow, for the soul was previously in heaven. Or every year that begins — there is in it a kind of gevurah, a kind of tzimtzum. For before the year came to the world it was together with all the years, so to speak in heaven, where there are all the days, ‘long days’, Arich Anpin, above above is called length of days, this is the perspective of the Holy One Blessed be He. And we’re not speaking of this, that the attribute of mercy is connected to length of days (we already spoke of this, and this is not its place). This is the perspective of the Holy One Blessed be He.

But in the making of a year, that is when it becomes a year, when the year comes — and the year cries, the beginning of the year always cries. It says: why must I be 5787? I could have been all the years at once. When I was so to speak with ‘my mother’ in Binah, before where all the years emerge, all the years were together, everything was one, each was everything. And here it descends and they limit it, they tell it: be 5787, and not just 5787, but such a type of 5787, after all the choices that people made until then, that cause that there must be such a type of year or there won’t be such a type of year.

There is great pain in this, in other words great work, a kind of work that I call toil, great toil, great sorrow, ‘things in sorrow, and I earn my living in sorrow’. It says in the Gemara in Kiddushin that people earn their living in sorrow, the first sorrow, ‘by the sweat of your brow’ (Bereishis 3), the generality of Adam HaRishon. What does it mean that he earns his living in sorrow? What’s bad that a person needs to plow, I don’t know? Because he could have in that time done other things. For there are other things to do, but one cannot do everything.

A person also has livelihood, the same thing itself, each one seeks his livelihood, and the main thing is that a person should clarify what is his work, in what he is good, how he can earn money. Each has his matter, and he cannot do everything. And shall I do other businesses? For you can only do one business at once, or two, I don’t know how many people can do ten. He cannot do everything, for he is limited, he is flesh and blood, he is ‘the day is short’, he is ‘the work is great’. There are therefore orders in this.

The Order of the Week – Every Day a Limitation

This is an order of a whole week. The order of Sunday is not Monday, and Monday is not Tuesday. Every day that a new day comes there is in it a certain shortening. One literally feels that the day begins, and on one hand certainly very nice, a new day begins, ‘new every morning, great is Your faithfulness’ (Eichah 3). And on the other hand a great limitation is felt, that it’s only one day. And in one day one cannot do anything. One must do only one day at once, and one cannot do everything. And even when one does all that’s possible to do in one day, it’s not all the other days.

The Way Out – All of Them You Made in Wisdom

But there is a way to exit from this. And the way to exit from this, so it seems to me, is called ‘all of them You made in wisdom’. It says in the verse ‘How manifold are Your works, Hashem, all of them You made in wisdom’ (Tehillim 104). How many are Your works? The Holy One Blessed be He does very many works, a multitude of works, a multitude of things. There are very many, for the work is great, very many other things, this work and that work — the work of Sunday is not the work of Monday, the work of

this nation is not the work of another nation. But ‘all of them’, all this multitude together, in His wisdom. What does this mean? What does this mean? Action in wisdom.

Human Action Versus the Action of the Holy One Blessed be He

Let us begin a bit earlier and return to speak. There is a great difference between the action of people, which is action with tools, action with actual deeds literally, and the action of the Holy One Blessed be He. ‘All of them You made in wisdom’ — one of the interpretations of the verse is that the Holy One Blessed be He acts directly with wisdom. ‘For He spoke and it was, He commanded and it stood’ (Tehillim 33). Hashem’s actions are not from the actions that He needs — the Holy One Blessed be He doesn’t need a hammer to build a person. ‘He who planted the ear, shall He not hear? He who formed the eye, shall He not see?’ (Tehillim 94). The Holy One Blessed be He made an ear, will He hear with an ear? The Holy One Blessed be He made people’s eyes, and people can see only with eyes, but the Holy One Blessed be He sees without eyes. He sees as the thing is in itself, not through the tool, not through the medium of the eye.

And so all the other actions, the Holy One Blessed be He acts without hands, and directs the world without feet, and so forth. And even when we say such things, they are a parable, for these are clear things that everyone understands. It says in the verse ‘all of them You made in wisdom’. And the verse in parshas Bereishis expresses this in that the Holy One Blessed be He made the world with speech. And in the holy books it says that with speech means truly in thought. The Holy One Blessed be He doesn’t even need speech, for speech is only a parable, like a king. A king lives in rest, and he commands, ‘where the word of the king is, there is power’ (Koheles 8), he tells other people what to do and they listen to him. But the Holy One Blessed be He doesn’t tell anyone, doesn’t need to tell anyone what to do except by way of parable. And after there are already things, He tells the angels and so forth — but who made the angels? Directly.

Thought Like Action

The Holy One Blessed be He acts so to speak with His thought, and from here the halachah: ‘saying to the Most High is like giving to a common person’, that in matters of holiness thought is like action. Because thought, from the side of the Creator, from the side of holiness, has such value, can act like action. In order for something to be in action, that it should become holy, that it should be made, let’s say, to make a vessel in a certain way, a person needs to toil, to take a saw and cut, and so forth. But in order to make the thought in it, in order for a person to designate something as holy, truly only thought suffices. For a common person it doesn’t suffice, one needs to make a transfer, for in the mundane world they don’t see that it’s in the possession of another until they make a kinyan, until they move it. But in the true world, in the world of wisdom — for holiness is called the world of wisdom, the world of thought — what is thought already becomes.

And what is thought, in other words let’s say clearly thus: the Holy One Blessed be He when He thinks, so to speak — and thought too, for when we say thought we mean so to speak thought in the brain, in the intellect, and the Holy One Blessed be He thinks even without a brain, as the Rambam says ‘He and His knowledge are one’ (Rambam Hilchos Yesodei HaTorah 2). The Holy One Blessed be He thinks, and when we say thought this is only a parable we’re saying. In any case, the Holy One Blessed be He thinks even without a brain, without intellect so to speak, and the intellect is He. But since from the side of the Holy One Blessed be He, from the side of the way that the Holy One Blessed be He makes the world — which is the true way that the world truly is, how it appears when the Holy One Blessed be He looks at us, how it truly is — thought is like action. The Holy One Blessed be He made the entire world with thought, with speech, with will, the same thing, without any action.

A Person Can Be Similar to His Creator

In that same way there is a person, that a person can be similar to his Creator. When a person thinks, when a person understands things from the side of thought, when a person acts from the side of thought, there too thought is like action. This is the novelty, the novelty of a person, the novelty of flesh and blood, a person who has his own mind. And a person’s mind can also — when he acts, when a person acts in deed, he indeed acts in deed, and the deed is outside his thoughts. But when he engages in the world of thought, when he acts from the side of wisdom, when he is wise.

The Wise Person Lives in the Aspect of Shabbos

A wise person is a type of person who is ‘a day that is entirely Shabbos’. For a wise person it’s always Shabbos. Why? Because a wise person acts in thought. So to speak, one can understand in the simplest way, that there is one whose work is to do the deeds of the world, and he must work, plow his 39 labors, which he does in deed. Certainly, this comes from some thought, he also has some plan in what he does, but his thought is separate from his deeds.

And then there is one whose work is that he is the wise person of the generation, the wise person of the world, he understands, he produces thoughts, the ideas of how to do things. Now, his ideas don’t act directly, for he is not a god, he is not the Holy One Blessed be He, he doesn’t act directly. But from his thoughts even deeds are made. One must remember, ‘action is included in thought but thought is not included in action’. When a person has clear thoughts, deeds are made from them. Either ‘strangers will stand and pasture your flocks’ (Yeshayah 61), that another is made who actualizes his thoughts, if he knows how to express his thoughts — and this is speech.

The Power of Speech

When a person — this is nature, an interesting nature of people, one must contemplate it — a person can do things also with speech. Anyone who has a certain power, this is what it means, more or less: when a person has power, when he has influence, when he is the Rebbe. The Rebbe is a type of person who does things with speech, he says and his students do. Why? Because he convinces them. He doesn’t even do this by forcing them, but he explains to them, teaches them what is correct, and they do it.

And the same thing itself is a person regarding his own body, regarding his own situation, regarding the parts of his soul that are not thought. When one begins from thought, the thing reaches the level of deed, according to the measure of the thought’s ability to communicate well — which is certainly a matter in itself, that a great separation was made between thought and deed, which is the sin of Adam HaRishon, who separated between thought and deed, etc. etc. But when a person is truly wise, his thought reaches to deed, either in the privacy of his soul, that the thing is done through his thought, or in his relationship to other people, that he speaks and it is done, and behold he acts so to speak like a god.

The Secret of Man – The Toil of Your Hands and Not the Toil of Your Mind

It emerges then, that when a person acts in thought, then he is like a person, and it seems to me this is the secret of man. One can speak of the simple thing: what is difficult for a person — we spoke at first about another level of a person who has difficulty that the deed is not all deeds, and immediately we’ll see that this too is fulfilled in my opinion — but even the first thing, what is difficult for a person? What is labor? What is toil? What is ‘the toil of your hands’? ‘The toil of your hands’ (Tehillim 128), and not the toil of your mind. For his head wants him to have his bread, but in order for bread to be made he must exert himself, sweat with his hands, ‘by the sweat of your brow’, his nose and his body need to sweat.

But if a person clarifies how to do things in thought, and understands that he has enough clarity that he can express it in thought, can bring it out in thought, he will see that suddenly he lives in rest, suddenly the thought is so to speak automatically. I don’t know if it’s truly by itself, for he is in a body, but it’s almost by itself. A person who has clarity in what he does, and understands his deed, has no toil in what he does. Why? Because his thought teaches his deed what to do. And the same thing itself teaches other people what to do. And this is part of his being the wise person.

Shabbos Thoughts Act

A wise person lives in the aspect of Shabbos. Now people think that this means he doesn’t do anything. But this is only what appears from our time, that our thoughts, the human thoughts of weekdays, don’t accomplish anything. But Shabbos thoughts certainly accomplish, true thoughts. When people think they’re doing teshuvah — it’s all in thought. Except that they say, this is as long as the thought is not correct, is not holy thought. And when it becomes holy thought, thought that is clear enough, true enough thought, divine thought, like the thought of the Creator — it acts.

And one can see this: those people who have clarity in what they do, whether in Judaism, whether in worldly matters, in matters of the world, whatever it may be — they don’t feel toil in what they do. It’s done by itself. And many times when a person sees that he is confused, has difficulty, lives in the aspect of a path, lives in the aspect of labor — the advice is not just that he should find another labor. Sometimes this is the advice, to find. But another advice is that he should do more thought, that he should delve more into thought, more, so to speak it appears as if he is turning away from his deed. One who doesn’t see ‘zachor and shamor in one utterance’, it appears to him as if he is turning away, as if he is abandoning the world of action. But no, he is not abandoning the world of action, but rather becomes clearer, and from this the deeds are done by themselves, are done — as they say, it’s called ‘flow’ in foreign language — they begin to be done by themselves, and he doesn’t feel that he is doing something.

The State of ‘Flow’ – Above Time

So to speak, and this is also the experience, as everyone knows, a whole enjoyable book was written about ‘the flow experience’, ‘the flow state’. When a person is in a flow state, time stops, suddenly he doesn’t grasp that time is passing. Why? Because ‘the day is short’ disappears from him, in his thought there is no little time and much time. Many times one can do very many things — in a normal state it would take him a very long time, whereas here it takes him very quickly, or conversely, he can do very many things, and doesn’t grasp that time is passing. He is so to speak above time, and to everyone he is still in this world, but his mind, his action, are already not working in time, and there is no ‘short day’ as he had before.

Blowing the Shofar – Wisdom and Not Labor

And this is the secret we spoke about several times on erev Rosh Hashanah regarding blowing the shofar, ‘wisdom and not labor’, ‘praiseworthy is the people who know the teruah’ (Tehillim 89), and not ‘who blow the teruah’. For blowing the shofar is not labor, but it is wisdom. People think it’s labor, because it appears that it’s difficult. The simple meaning of the Gemara there, ‘blowing the shofar is wisdom and not labor’ (Rosh Hashanah 29), it says: did you think it was labor? They make a great noise, it’s simple, it appears this is complete labor. But one who understands what they’re doing, understands that this is wisdom, that one must learn it. He waits, and it seems he’s not doing anything, but indeed he is doing something. Except that this is not labor, this is not weekday labor, but Shabbos labor. And this is specifically what one must do on Shabbos. Labor of this type is wisdom and not labor.

Rosh Hashanah That Falls on Shabbos – Remembrance of Teruah

And with this, it’s possible that the thing becomes in the aspect of remembrance. Everyone understands that we spoke about the matter of zachor and shamor. Everyone knows that the Gemara says that when Rosh Hashanah falls on Shabbos it is in the aspect of ‘remembrance of teruah’ (Vayikra 23), and not ‘day of teruah’ (Bamidbar 29), meaning zachor without shamor, only the remembrance. And because of this, in truth, if we were at a true level, like in the Beis HaMikdash and in the place of the Beis Din — and Beis Din is the place of wisdom — then a deed would be made from this, the shofar would be blown, by itself so to speak, through the wisdom. But today when this is not so, we don’t have Beis Din, we don’t have wisdom that comes to the level of deed, we have only the wisdom. But we need to receive from the wisdom. It’s important that there be a day that engages entirely in the wisdom of the blowings, and not in the blowings themselves. This is the secret of Shabbos.

And people say, that in practice, as the Aruch LaNer says, that we see there are many troubles in years when Rosh Hashanah doesn’t fall on Shabbos, and this is because most people don’t do the wisdom, for we have no idea how to delve a whole day in wisdom, and the next day we blow the shofar much more easily on Sunday and the second day of Rosh Hashanah, or a supernal shofar is made by itself, a great shofar. And all this is the topic of wisdom that has no labor in it.

All Forms Are Connected – You Shall Lack Nothing in It

And the same thing itself — and I’ll finish with this — that difficulty that a person is limited, that it’s only one year, it’s only him, this is from the side of action. But from the side of the wisdom in the thing, this is a very interesting thing. For if one thinks from the side of wisdom, or as it’s sometimes called from the side of the form of the thing, then all forms truly include all forms. For when one contemplates one sees that this is so even in practice, but in wisdom the thing is even clearer: there is not one thing in the world that is not connected with all the other things in the world. In order for there to truly be a true form, let’s say, of a person, there must be in it the form of an animal, the form of a bird, the form of fish. And if a person truly understood one thing, he understands everything. I don’t mean that he understands everything from this — as a person is a small world, and I don’t mean that he can understand everything completely. But I do mean that nothing is lacking, ‘you shall lack nothing in it’ (Devarim 8), there is no deficiency in it. It is everything. And one can say, as we spoke about this in Sefiras HaOmer, that everything is from the side of the perspective of man, as it appears from the side of man, that there is deficiency. That is, the Holy One Blessed be He has everything from everything, and we have only everything from one thing.

The Aspect of Wisdom and the Aspect of Faith

But when a person lives in the aspect of wisdom, and one can say this in the way of faith, he knows that he is doing what is incumbent upon him, and this includes everything, for it is divine. Not that he himself does what is incumbent upon him, for he is a small, insignificant person, and can only do one thing. But rather because the supernal wisdom made him to do one thing. And the supernal wisdom is a general thing, the supernal wisdom, the Holy One Blessed be He knows the entire world. And therefore perhaps he, when he is in the aspect of body, looks from below, and sees that it’s only one year and it’s only one day — but this is truly all the days.

The Rectification – To Diminish in Action and Not to Add to It

And the way to do this is also to do fewer things, not by doing more things. This is the secret of the negative commandments, which correspond to the 365 days of the sun. That is, the rectification of the short time is to diminish in action and not to increase it, for as we learned that the reason not to do a sin is that there is no time. There are only three hundred sixty-five days in a year, no more. Where is there time to do a sin? There isn’t. Every day tells you: don’t do the sin, for you don’t have so much time. From this that a person doesn’t do many things.

When a person does one thing, and in the middle his mind is distracted, he wants to do another thing and another thing and another thing, he becomes lost. And then he doesn’t only become lost, but also suffers that he’s not doing the other things, because he didn’t enter properly into that one thing.

The Perfection of the One Thing

In a certain sense, the way not to feel the sorrow of the limitation of one thing is to do only that one thing even better. For then, when he does one thing in perfection — behold there is already here the word ‘in perfection’, that he does the perfection — he sees the omnipotence, the generality, the perfection that exists in that one thing, and in it is reflected the perfection of the entire world. Whether he knows this in perfection, or whether he knows this because he is wise and can see a bit how everything connects in it, or whether he doesn’t know this except in the way of faith — as the Tanya says, that wisdom is as it lies in faith — and says: I do the one thing not only because I can only do one thing, but I do the one thing because the Holy One Blessed be He made that each part should have its portion, ‘Hashem’s portion is His people’ (Devarim 32), the Holy One Blessed be He made this portion for me. Even though in such a portion lies everything. These are two ways how one can do this.

But this is the time of ‘zachor and shamor were said in one utterance’, and because of this one can return in teshuvah this way, one can do Torah that guards wisdom that has no labor in it. And I hope the thing is clear enough, and if not we’ll delve into it more with Hashem’s help.