Four Paths on Shemini Atzeret | Zohar on Shemini Atzeret and Simchat Torah, Hoshana Rabbah 5787 (Auto Translated)

Shemini Atzeret and Simchat Torah in the Holy Zohar: The Secret of the Seventy Bulls and the One Bull

Introduction: The Order of the Shiur

Rabbosai, good evening. Today is the eve of Shemini Atzeret, the afternoon of Hoshana Rabbah, and it’s a busy time for everyone. I too am occupied now, and among my other occupations I am occupied with learning this shiur. We have a fixed schedule every erev Shabbos, and today is also erev Shabbos, erev yom tov, but the main fixture of our shiur is on erev Shabbos, and even when yom tov falls out — and on Sukkos there are always two erev Shabboses somewhere — we continue our order in the holy Zohar, in the order of mitzvos and the order of the moadim, in honor of the day.

And what I wish to explain are about three approaches that stand in the Zohar, or are built upon the foundation of the Zohar, in order to understand the sugya of Shemini Atzeret and Simchat Torah. In truth it is one sugya, and although there are chiddushim and special points in Hoshana Rabbah that are not of Shemini Atzeret and Simchat Torah, nevertheless in general it’s all one topic. These are what are called ‘the last days of the chag’, the last days, in which we make two yamim tovim. Hoshana Rabbah itself is also the last day of the entire series of the first days of the chag, the seventh day, the day of the aravah, and all these things are connected to each other.

The Zohar’s View on Shemini Atzeret

Now I wish to expand somewhat on the view of this matter, and why — because in the holy Zohar there is no one place where the entire matter is concentrated. I myself made a collection at one time on the Zohar regarding Shemini Atzeret and Simchat Torah, and today the tzaddikim sent, Rav Fogel and his colleagues, who send every week from the Ramak, and they also sent the collection from the various places where the Zohar speaks about Shemini Atzeret. All those passages of Zohar that deal with Shemini Atzeret we find like a tail, like the end of other derashos, and generally these are derashos on Sukkos. Sometimes there are derashos that are in a general way about all of Rosh Hashanah, about all of the seventh month, about all of Tishrei.

There is also one derasha that is a continuation of a derasha on Pesach, which mentions Shemini Atzeret, for there is a certain connection and gezeirah shavah of ‘atzeret’. For what is ‘atzeret’? It is the atzeret of Pesach, meaning the seventh day of Pesach, and besides this there is the atzeret of Shavuos, which is also called ‘atzeret’. And there is a connection to the Torah, that both are like Simchat Torah: on Shavuos we rejoice in the Torah that the Holy One, blessed be He, gave us, and on Simchat Torah we rejoice in the Torah that we completed. We spoke last year whether these are two Torahs and what the difference is between them, but in any case there is a connection, and the derasha of the Zohar on Shemini Atzeret always revolves around this conversation.

Two Approaches: The Conclusion of Pesach and the Atzeret of Malchus

At the conclusion of a certain approach that the Zohar explains — let’s say, one approach that is mainly an approach of the seventh month, of the month of Tishrei — the Zohar has a fixed approach that always leads to its climax, to its purpose, to the completion of the matter, and that is Shemini Atzeret. And in another place there is also an approach of the first month, of the month of Nissan, and there too the matter concludes with ‘atzeret’, where there is also an approach of Shemini Atzeret.

In general, these two approaches are directed toward two aspects that exist in Shemini Atzeret. One aspect is from the perspective of it being like the conclusion of Pesach, where we say in it a kind of conclusion with all the moadim; for Nissan is the head of the regalim, and thus the end of the regalim, the tail of all the regalim, is Shemini Atzeret. And regarding this, Shemini Atzeret is called ‘Tiferet’. And so it says in the Zohar in Parshas Emor, that the food of Shemini Atzeret is Yaakov, meaning that all seven days are the seven sefiros that emerge from Binah, and sukkah is Binah — for sukkah is the aspect of ‘and seven days’, the mother with her seven children, ‘the mother of children rejoices’ (Psalms 113:9). And Shemini Atzeret is the aspect of Yaakov, which is the joy of Tiferet itself, rejoicing with his mate, with the Shechinah.

And this is the second point that is generally spoken of in the Zohar regarding the seventh month, regarding Shemini Atzeret, that it is the day of atzeret. ‘Atzeret’ has the connotation of malchus, as it says ‘this one shall rule over my people’ (I Samuel 9:17) — the king is like a ruler; and likewise ‘and there is no ruler’ (Deuteronomy 32:36), for ‘ruler’ or ‘treasure’, which is the same thing with the letter ayin, is a king. And Shemini Atzeret has the connotation of malchus, the day of malchus, the day of Knesses Yisrael.

Simchat Torah: The Great Feast of the Year

Now, almost all the derashos — and I already mentioned that there is a second point in them regarding the atzeret concerning the Simchas Torah in it — are all connected to each other. They are not separate things by themselves, one point, but always one continuation. Meaning that it’s impossible to begin hearing the Torah by a person coming to shul on Simchat Torah; for no one comes to shul on Simchat Torah, and this can be seen with one’s own eyes — no one starts from there.

And although indeed Simchat Torah is the great yom tov, the greatest joy of the entire year, as is known and as is the custom of Israel. Today this custom has weakened somewhat, and it needs to be strengthened with strength; but the custom of Israel throughout all generations was to get drunk twice a year, on Purim and on Simchat Torah, and in most places the custom on Simchat Torah was even more than on Purim. Simchat Torah was a time of feasting and joy, and there is a complete derasha on this in the Aruch LaNer, where he says that there are places where modern people, who didn’t like this, cancelled the drunkenness of Simchat Torah, and the Aruch LaNer proves against this with great sharpness, and the matter is brought in the Mishnah Berurah.

That is, the Mishnah Berurah speaks in the Shulchan Aruch, regarding the matter of birkas kohanim of the Torah reading of Simchat Torah, and it says there that the custom is that they don’t do birkas kohanim at Musaf, because the congregation is already drunk by then. And it’s clear that even every kohen — you won’t find one kohen who isn’t drunk, and a drunk person is not permitted to do birkas kohanim, and therefore the custom is to do birkas kohanim at Shacharis. And so is the custom in most Jewish communities that I know, that they do birkas kohanim at Shacharis of Simchat Torah, and why — because at Musaf they are already drunk.

And from the poskim there are those on one hand who say that certainly there is joy, great joy, but the intention is not to break all boundaries; and indeed there were many places where on Simchat Torah they didn’t hit so much. Everyone knows that at a time of joy, at a party, many times when people don’t behave properly it turns into a fight. I also saw in one person who described that in some city, in some distant town, among the Jews in the mountains of Russia somewhere, he said that there was a town there about which they said that at one time two hundred Jews lived there, but the beatings on Simchat Torah were so numerous, until one killed another, and only one hundred Jews remained in the city. I hope it wasn’t really so. They tended to hit, in the language of the Mishnah Berurah in the name of the earlier poskim, that ‘joy was turned to mourning’, and this should not be done.

But on the other hand, afterward modern people came, and it seems to me that most shuls that exist today are a bit like this — and one needs to stop from this — and they said: if so, we’ll make hakafos and that’s it, and they no longer do it properly, and they fulfilled their obligation in some way. The Mishnah Berurah brings in the name of the Kli Yakar that this is not the way, but rather one must fulfill the feast, in the language of ‘feasting and joy’ of Simchat Torah. The custom of Israel is from many generations, that one must drink and make a great feast, that Simchat Torah is the great party of the year. This is clear.

The Innovation: No One Comes to Simchat Torah

And on the other hand — and this is the innovation — to Simchat Torah no one comes. There are times when Jews come to shul, and this is a very interesting thing. The Chassidic sefarim speak about this, for the Chassidic sefarim believe that what Israel does is with intention. Everyone knows that there are times in the year when a Jew comes to shul: on such a day he comes. For example Kol Nidrei, Ne’ilah, Rosh Hashanah, and perhaps other times in the year. On the night of the Seder they don’t come to shul, but come home, for there a Jew can come, ‘a distant deed is close to him’. From a distant place Jews come, and this is a time when it’s possible to start, possible with teshuvah, possible that a Jew will start from there.

But Simchat Torah — from almost all I see, people travel to their Rebbe on Simchat Torah, but it’s understood that the avodah doesn’t begin then for anyone. To Simchat Torah no one comes to shul, a new Jew. New Jews don’t come on Simchat Torah. Simchat Torah is the second yom tov, and within the second yom tov, according to the true and original custom, in any case in chutz la’aretz — the second day within the second day is ‘V’zos HaBerachah’, Simchat Torah. The last days within the last days. Meaning that Simchat Torah is not something that one can arrive at; there is no one maamar that can be said. And this is the explanation of Shemini Atzeret and Simchat Torah: you are a Jew all year, and so you arrived at Klal Yisrael, you went down to the beis medrash and arrived; on Hoshana Rabbah, through this and through that, you arrived. Now you can make the siyum of the Torah.

Hoshana Rabbah: A Special ‘Late Yom Kippur’

There is a new pshat in this as to why the congregation exerts itself on Hoshana Rabbah. They make there a kind of state of Yamim Noraim, they wear the kittel, they cry out a bit ‘Hoshana’, and they say a bit of the nusach of Yamim Noraim, in their melody. And people say: what is this? This is a time of joy, and it’s not separated at all from the entire sefer of Hoshana Rabbah. It’s impossible! But it says that this is the day of judgment, the sealing of judgment. How can both be maintained?

And I have a new answer, and one of the answers — and it seems to me that this is in Midrash Tehillim, which is one of the early sources regarding Hoshana Rabbah — says thus: The Jews, the goal is that they should arrive at Shemini Atzeret, and it’s impossible to arrive at Shemini Atzeret. On Shemini Atzeret they dance with the Torah; this is not something one comes to, but rather it’s the end of something — from within something one arrives at it. And so most Jews already arrived already in Elul, at Selichos, like that midrash. The great ones of Israel, the important ones who already went out to greet the King, to greet the messenger, already from Elul they did teshuvah at Selichos; this is the good Jew.

Afterward there are other Jews who arrived on erev Rosh Hashanah. And there are Jews who came only on the holy day, on Yom Kippur, to shul. And for those who didn’t want to — after Yom Kippur comes Simchas Torah; and there are Jews who even then don’t come. So the Jews thought of a plan and said thus: On erev Shemini Atzeret we’ll make a special ‘late Yom Kippur’ for all those Jews who still have some measure left in Yom Kippur, or who didn’t arrive at Yom Kippur at all — for Yom Kippur is too severe. With lulav, with hoshanos, indeed there is some white kittel here, but it’s not that same level of Yom Kippur, and it’s impossible for everyone to convince himself. And then he does come to shul, comes on erev Shemini Atzeret, and cries his cry, and says ‘Hoshana for Your sake our God hoshana’. And now from this Simchas Torah is made, it makes itself. Simchas Torah makes itself.

And if one needs to say a derasha — why do we rejoice? One can say derashos even on Tishah B’Av; why do we cry? I don’t know, and even then I say a derasha that has no reason. But why do we rejoice? There is no logic in it. And so is the reality, everything is a derasha.

And so what? For each person his own aspect, his own point, what he struggled and toiled with on Rosh Hashanah, what he toiled with all year, what he learned in his Torah all year — from this his Simchas Torah is made, the siyum of the Torah, the end, which is different for each and every person.

The Midrash of the Pesikta: ‘You Have Increased the Nation, You Have Made it Honorable’

One point that many derashos speak about, many already in the midrash, and I wish to expand on it somewhat — namely the midrash, the Pesikta, upon which everything is built on this yom tov. The Pesikta of Shemini Atzeret opens with the verse ‘You have increased the nation, Hashem, You have increased the nation, You have made it honorable’ (Isaiah 26:15). The Holy One, blessed be He, added to the nation, He added something to it, ‘You have made it honorable’ — He honored it. And the midrash elaborates in various ways.

And the point that is at the head of all the ways is that the midrash understands that Shemini Atzeret is an addition. They already rejoiced seven days, everything is already there; they already brought lulav, they already offered seventy bulls, they already did — meaning they already did what one can describe as the greatest party that can be, the greatest joy that can be, the greatest celebration, everything that could possibly be they already did. And afterward, ‘and I will add to all Your praise’ (Psalms 71:14), the Torah came and said ‘on the eighth day it shall be an atzeret for you’ (Numbers 29:35), one more piece.

This is the essence: all those Torahs that are built on the basic dynamic, on the basic approach — why is Shemini Atzeret a thing in itself? Because Shemini Atzeret is that He added one more, ‘one more day’, He added one more thing. And what is the pshat? The midrash says, first of all — this is the first point — one needs to understand a simple thing: one needs to be a person of such a type, that when you are given one more time of joy, you know what you want to do with it, and you rejoice in a good thing.

The Story of the Gentile in Radin

The midrash elaborates: The Holy One, blessed be He, gave good things to Pharaoh — what did Pharaoh do? Did he say anything, or dance in hakafos? When the Holy One, blessed be He, gives a yom tov, and they say that today will be the great party of the year — by another person, and even by those Jews who are so many, it’s not that same level.

I told the story: In Radin, in the yeshiva, there was a gentile who worked there in maintenance, in the labors of the yeshiva. On erev Simchas Torah this was the custom, by the way, also in all the yeshivos — it too has weakened greatly until our days, and not so much remained until our days — that they distribute whiskey, complete hakafos, I don’t know if they actually get drunk, but they fulfill the custom of drinking at hakafos. And so was the custom in all of Lithuania and among the Chassidim, that the Rebbe Reb Elimelech wanted to cancel it from the side of abstinence, but in most places this was the custom.

And see — the gentile of Radin, of the yeshiva there, saw what they bought for Simchas Torah, kinds of boxes of food and drink like these. And when they came in the morning to Simchas Torah, the congregation came to shul, and the gentile was supposed to light, and behold the gentile is not there, ‘and the child is not’ (Genesis 37:30). He’s not there, and I had to light myself, I don’t know. After yom tov the gentile returned. They asked him: what happened? You work here, you simply left from your place of work? The gentile said that he doesn’t know: he saw on erev yom tov what they bought there, and he knows that by them, from that type of package, from that order from the liquor stores, people don’t come out alive from such a party. About half of the party comes out dead. He didn’t want to take a risk, and therefore he left.

And it’s understood that at the Jewish party not only did nothing happen to anyone, but on the contrary — they danced with the Torah, they made all the awakening that Jews make on Simchas Torah. It’s very difficult to grasp even the edges of the matters, and there are many levels in this. A Jew is of such a type, the midrash says, ‘You have increased the nation, You have made it honorable’ (Isaiah 26:15). When the Holy One, blessed be He, adds — it depends on which nation. To a nation, to one who doesn’t understand. And the intention is not specifically to a gentile, but rather to one who doesn’t understand, for this is the essence — one who doesn’t understand what is done at such a joy.

And therefore there are those whose entire joy is strange to certain people, who don’t know what to do on such a day when they get drunk all day; they don’t know what to do. ‘You have increased the nation, You have made it honorable’. And what does a Jew do? In Volozhin the custom was — what do they do on Simchas Torah? They fall prostrate. I don’t know why not; let it be the best day, let me have no more memory. As one can see by us on Purim: this is what a Jew does on Purim in the afternoon, he begins to say Yom Kippur. Indeed I questioned this at a farbrengen the night before, but this shows that one needs to be the type of person who knows what to do with one more day. This is the essence: one more day, one more day, not because something is needed, but one more day. This comes from the power of this. This is the basic dynamic of Shemini Atzeret.

One Thing of the Zohar in Three Ways

Now, clothed upon this dynamic, upon this foundation, upon this skeleton, there are several derashos in the midrashim, and several ways in the Zohar. The Zohar generally takes one thing from among them — in almost all places the Zohar takes this one thing, and I am saying this one thing in three ways. And in truth it would be proper to speak in more ways, but it seems to me that I have already given somewhat expanded matters.

The one thing that the Zohar brings is the midrash that Rashi brings. Rashi brings it in his version, and the congregation knows it in Rashi’s version: that it is a parable of a king who invited all kinds of guests, and he already finished with his guests, the Holy One, blessed be He, or the king, or the host in the parable, said to his children: make me a small party, ‘and let us rejoice, I and you’, ‘your departure is difficult for me’ (Rashi on Numbers 29:36) — we’re still not going, we still need to rejoice a bit. This is the simple pshat that Rashi brings.

And the Zohar understood the language. So is the midrash — it is one midrash, and there are seven, eight, ten midrashim on the same idea, but not on exactly the same idea, but rather on the same dynamic in other Torahs. But the Zohar took this thing very much. This is the Yiddish translation, the simple pshat of the Zohar in this.

The Seventy Bulls Corresponding to the Seventy Nations

And one needs to understand both sides of the matter, the matter is not so simple. I think that the Zohar emphasizes only one side, but one needs to understand. Israel offers seventy bulls. On Sukkos where we don’t offer seventy bulls, I received from a great tzaddik that one needs to have this intention in the wavings, that there needs to be the aspect of decreasing and going. And therefore one who knows that the first day when one waves lulav is very joyful, and afterward it decreases and goes — and people think: “if I were a proper Jew, everything would be equal” — what is this? Even in the Beis HaMikdash it was so: on the first day they offered thirteen bulls, and already they stand at seven. It doesn’t remain the same, and it cannot remain, for this is the order.

And what is the pshat in this? The Gemara says a wonderful thing. Indeed it bothers a person: how is it possible that his awakening in the wavings goes down a bit each day? They say to him: come here, you need to understand this awakening — for whom do they offer seventy bulls? Not corresponding to Israel, but corresponding to the seventy nations. And what does it mean corresponding to the seventy nations? On this the midrash says, ‘in return for my love they oppose me, but I am prayer’ (Psalms 109:4). We love the nations, we pray for them.

A person — and we already spoke about this on Rosh Hashanah — is part of the entire world, and all seventy nations are placed within a person. The Zohar, and the Tikkunei Zohar, and the Shaar HaOros explain that the leaves of the lulav — the lulav has a spine, the spinal column, which is the central soul, but what it has in leaves, and it has other things that are not taken with the lulav, leaves and fruits — this indicates the seventy nations. The branches of the lulav indicate all seventy nations, all the angels, all the princes. And a Jew needs to take responsibility for all of them.

What does a Jew do when he is in a good state? He goes to his Beis HaMikdash, goes on Sukkos to the beis medrash, prays for all seventy nations, that they should all have a good year. And the nations, for some reason — a bit we owe them, a bit they owe us — don’t get along with this. They are not pleased, there is no such thing, they are angry. ‘In return for my love they oppose me’, so says the midrash. And therefore the Holy One, blessed be He, says, ‘and on the eighth day it shall be an atzeret for you’. ‘For you’ — an atzeret shall be for you. On the eighth day you will not bring bulls, thousands of bulls, but rather there remains ‘one bull, one ram’ (Numbers 29:36) corresponding to you.

Second Version: You Forgot to Pray for Yourself

But there are more versions. Another version of the midrash is that Israel says, or the Holy One, blessed be He, says to Israel: “You already prayed for everyone, and you forgot to pray for yourself.” There is such an aspect, and there also needs to be such a perspective. A person comes to a great state, and prays for everything, and in the end one needs to remind him: “Ahh, put to your heart also yourself, also your children”, because he is in the greatness of the mind and is no longer thinking about himself. And this is ‘an atzeret shall be for you’.

The Reality of Israel in Exile

The Zohar emphasized very much in most of the derashos this point, which is everything surrounding it. The simple pshat is that the Zohar understood — and certainly this is the state of Israel in exile, and there is no need to apologize for this. We want — and there is always the conversation, how much one needs to speak and prove to the nations, and to say that the chosenness, ‘You have chosen us from all the nations’, is an investigation that needs to be taken seriously. And one doesn’t need to be ashamed, and one doesn’t need to justify that the reality of Israel as ‘a scattered sheep’ (Jeremiah 50:17) among the seventy nations, which has already been for a long time, and is still so in various ways — this is the reality.

And Israel feel automatically, and so they explain in the midrashim, and the Zohar explains almost everything: As if on Rosh Hashanah there is a din Torah, ‘to do justice with His people’ (I Kings 8:59). And what is the din Torah? There are Israel and there are the nations; who will win? Will Israel win the war this year, or will the nations win. This is the pshat. ‘Victory in battle’ — all this, as if they emerge meritorious in judgment, what is revealed, they win in judgment, that Israel should win this year.

And with all this they offer — and the Zohar has various approaches to understand why, if so, they offer seventy bulls for the seventy nations. But the essence I already said, and there are more matters in this, like the goat to Azazel, on the contrary — that they should have abundance, as it says in the midrash, that the nations should play ball all day, for as long as he plays ball he doesn’t quarrel with Jews. He has nothing to do, problems begin. And this is one thing, that it’s always better this way.

People think that one needs to pray that the nations shouldn’t have money. But when the nations are wealthy, when it’s good for them — it’s better for everyone, and it’s better when we dwell in America, and one needs to pray for this; for when there is a recession in America, and when there is less money, when they lose a war, in everything — Israel are always the victim. This is the reality.

And so, one of the reasons — and perhaps this is already a selfish reason, not as great a level as we said before — but by a Jew this is not the way to pray that it should be good for Israel and bad for the nations. When it’s bad for the nations, it’s also bad for Israel, because they are part of the same world. And on the contrary, it’s worse for Israel when it’s bad for the nations, because they take it out on us. One needs to pray for this.

And after the whole thing — that we pray for them from these reasons and from additional reasons — they say: fine, but there still remains ‘when shall I also make for my own house’ (Genesis 30:30), as Yaakov Avinu said, he takes a bit also for himself. This is the secret of Shemini Atzeret, ‘on the eighth day an atzeret shall be for you’, and then this is like the completion of the victory. As the Zohar speaks about the joy, that it is a time of joy. ‘Time of joy’ means altogether an elevated time, and this is the point — an elevated time in which we rejoice, rejoice, give abundance to the entire world. But one needs to also rejoice with the Holy One, blessed be He, Israel themselves. This is Israel for us. We already took responsibility for everything surrounding us. This is the simple pshat of the Zohar, one pshat, the simplest, the one thing.

The Deep Levels in the Chassidic Sefarim

And it’s understood that the Chassidic sefarim, which always elevate something deeper in the same matter, reveal in it two more levels. And I will say the two levels — and this will be my shiur for today — two more levels in the point, in the point of the seventy nations and one nation, in the seventy bulls and the one bull. There are in this two more hints, two more explanations that are in the Chassidic sefarim, both of them deeper structures of the same thing itself.

First Level: Turn from Evil and Do Good

The first thing, and I’ll say it in the practical way — and I don’t remember where the thing is written, I think this way myself that this is how it fits, but I don’t have a clear source to tell the congregation where to look into the approach — the first pshat according to Chassidus is that there are many avodahs. We spoke a bit on erev Rosh Hashanah, that there is ‘turn from evil and do good’. ‘Turn from evil’ is that we push away the kelippos, ‘do good’ is that we draw down the light of holiness, the light of good. And as a person begins, so is the order, that ‘turn from evil’ is said before ‘and do good’ (Psalms 34:15). And it’s not specifically because this is the order, but rather that this is better, and this is the reality.

When people begin, there is an order. There is the king, ‘an old and foolish king’ (Ecclesiastes 4:13) of the yetzer hara, and a person is ‘a wild donkey of a man is born’ (Job 11:12), and generally they begin with many kelippos. A person begins to know himself, and grasps how many yetzer haras, how many foolishnesses are placed in his head, and tries to shake himself from them. And this is a very large part of the avodah, and this is the avodah of tekias shofar that we spoke about a bit on erev Rosh Hashanah — one avodah, ‘to confuse the Satan’. We fight, we shout at him, we anger the yetzer hara, we learn Torah, we draw him to the beis medrash, in all kinds of ways. But we fight, we deal with the evil, with the negativity, with the gevuros in the world. And so it is at the beginning of the avodah, and this is a very large part of the avodah.

And the meaning of this according to pnimiyus is that we fight with the seventy nations. The seventy nations are seventy types of yetzer hara. These are not the seventy nations of now that are spoken about in the politics of the world, but in pnimiyus — and certainly the thing has a connection, that each one has his own yetzer hara — in pnimiyus there are seventy types of yetzer hara, which we hope will go and become smaller and go and become smaller. And how do the yetzer haras go and become small and small? At first we fight with them directly: we blow shofar at them, we fast and subjugate the body, we subjugate the body on Yom Kippur, and the yetzer hara goes down a bit. But Sukkos — this is the true way of bringing down the yetzer hara — is to offer oneself and to rejoice. And the end of this thing is Shemini Atzeret.

Meaning that instead of going and speaking how bad the thing is, this kelipah and another kelipah, this madness and another madness — we speak how good the thing is, and how good it is for us, and even in the kelippos that we spoke about. Instead of saying how many bad things there are on the internet, one needs to say how good the internet itself is, and how the Holy One, blessed be He, made it possible to learn so much Torah, and artificial intelligence, and in all the ways that there are

and artificial intelligence, and in all the ways that there are more, the technology, and the cars, and the buses, and the airplanes, and the rockets. All this improves life so much, ‘on a good day be in good’ (Ecclesiastes 7:14), how good the thing is.

And the more a person rejoices in this, the evil falls — the Rashba, that the nature of evil is sadness, ‘in all sadness there will be profit’ (Proverbs 14:23), for evil is sadness, ‘their idols are silver and gold’ (Psalms 115:4), their sadness; the reality of evil is a reality of sadness, and the reality of evil is the opposite, ingratitude, the opposite of recognizing the good. And when we rejoice, we rejoice in the gift of Hashem, ‘each man according to the gift of his hand, according to the blessing of Hashem your God which He gave you’ (Deuteronomy 16:17), we rejoice in the blessing of Hashem. The blessing of Hashem is the internet, and the technology, and the money, and the children, everything that a person has — this is the blessing of Hashem.

This is the first thing. And one who has inner comprehension, one who knows a bit something and has understanding, how much more so that he rejoices in this. And the more we rejoice, the thing goes down, and this is the conclusion. Meaning that at first we go directly — in the ten days of teshuvah we deal directly with the gevuros, and afterward, as you grasp a thing, we deal with it by increasing the joy each day, and the more we increase the joy, the kelipah goes down a bit.

Second Level: Good Because It’s Good

Until we arrive at Shemini Atzeret, which is the true and complete way of avodah. Indeed Sukkos is already the way of avodah in truth, but the completion of the matter is the other way of avodah, in which a person says — now, when he prays on Shemini Atzeret, when he dances with the Torah on Shemini Atzeret, when he eats a meal on Shemini Atzeret, when he converses with his friends, when he takes responsibility for his children on Shemini Atzeret, every mitzvah that he does — he doesn’t do it because thereby he will go from a kelipah, because he will go from some crookedness, some ‘to straighten the crookedness in the heart’. He does it simply because it’s good.

This is a joy of such a type that is very difficult to explain, because in order to explain an action one always needs opposition. Everyone knows that an action comes with conflict — there was a bad thing, and now it’s good. Not so: this is not good because it was once bad, but rather this is good because it is good. What is good because it is good — this is the meaning of ‘the unification of the Holy One, blessed be He, and His Shechinah’. Generally the unification that we make is like an exit from exile, the Shechinah exits from exile — good because it was once bad. This is Pesach, and also a bit the first days of Sukkos. But Shemini Atzeret means that it’s good because it is good. The midrash says, ‘on a good day be in good’ (Ecclesiastes 7:14) — when it’s good, it is good. One doesn’t need to add anything to this. This is the second aspect.

Third Level: Within the Good Part — Removing the Garments

The third aspect, even deeper — and this is written in the Bnei Yissaschar at length, and in other Chassidic sefarim, but the Bnei Yissaschar is the one who elaborates most in this way — is an even deeper aspect. We are already speaking within the good part, we are not speaking at all from the evil, but rather we are speaking within the good part: that everything we comprehend, everything in which we do rejoice — we rejoice in Torah, we rejoice in the Shechinah, we rejoice in mitzvos, we rejoice in our comprehensions, we rejoice in our physical abundance — all this is only like parables, we are only grasping garments.

And the parable of the Bnei Yissaschar is like ‘one small meal’, like the parable of a bride: that before the chuppah, around the chuppah, when the friends, the bridesmaids, dress her in beautiful clothes with jewelry, and make a whole situation, and dance around her, and all kinds of external things bring the joy. But at the time of yichud, at the time of the point of yichud, that ‘everyone knows why the bride enters the chuppah’ (Kesubos 8b), at the time of yichud she removes, no friend enters, no person enters, no one comes to dance there, she removes even the clothes, she removes even the jewelry, nothing remains, but rather ‘let us rejoice, I and you’.

And the nimshal of this — and one needs to detail it in our actual avodah, and one needs to think about this, and there are pesukim that say this — the nimshal of this is that one doesn’t need explanations, simple pshat. When one says, “Why are you so happy at the wedding?” he says a Chassidic thing, “This is a garment, this is beautiful jewelry.” ‘The adornments of the bride’, ‘the breaking of the tablets are the adornments of the bride’, when the twenty-four books are the adornments of the bride — the thing is beautiful. But the thing itself is the thing that the adornments are for it, the thing that the explanations are for it, the thing that all that awakening is for it. This is not awakening, this is not joy, this is not Torah, these are not kavanos — this is simple. It’s called naked, it’s called pure, it is stripped. This is the deep pshat in the Chassidic sefarim on the eighth day of atzeret.