Kedoshim

The sicha for parshas Kedoshim is in Vol. 1 of Likkutei Sichos.

The first three commandments in the parsha of Kedoshim are “kedoshim ti’ehu”, you should be holy, every man must fear is his mother and father, and observe Shabbos. Since everything in Torah is perfect, we must assume that there is a connection between these three mitzvahs when they are stated together in a sequence in the Torah.

Kedushah means separation, as it says in the end of the parsha, “you will be to Me a holy nation, and you will be separated from the other nations” meaning Jews have to be different. But it refers to being different in those areas in which we could be the same. When it comes to Torah and mitzvahs, we can’t say that a Jew should be different from a non-Jew, by doing the mitzvah of for example putting on tefillin, because the non-Jew has no such mitzvah, and therefore there is no similarity that G-d would have to tell us to be different because G-d gives us His commandments to Yakov and not to other nations.

So why the need to be told to be different?

It must mean that we should be different in those areas that are common to all people like eating, drinking, business and so on. Although on the surface everyone does this the same, yet here we are told that even in these areas, we should be unique and different.

How can it be that in a time of golus, a time of such darkness, where holiness is so difficult to come by, we should be holy even in areas that are not mitzvahs? The answer is, as it says further in the posuk, “ you should be holy, because I am holy”, a Jew wherever and whenever he is, is bound up with G-d Himself. Of G-d we say “Ata kodesh” You are holy and we being His people have to be holy to the point of being holy like G-d. The Rebbe is saying that we can be literally the same holiness as that of G-d because that is where our holiness comes from. That is the mitzvah to be holy – kedoshim ti’ehu.

Then comes the mitzvah to fear one’s mother and father, because the ultimate purpose is not for the Jew to personally become holy but rather that he has to influence others as well, his children and family. As with Avraham, G-d says, I chose Avraham because he will instruct his children and they will go in the way of G-d. That is why the second mitzvah to fear one’s mother and father follows, suggesting the idea of chinuch, of education and transmitting of Torah from generation to generation.The earliest educators a person has are his mother and father, because parents have to instill in the child this feeling of being different, of belonging to a unique and holy people. The Torah says mother and then father, because the mother is the primary educator and sets the tone for the entire home.

Then the question becomes – how do we do this? How do we instill in others and our children as well as in ourselves, this feeling of uniqueness, this specialness of being a Jew?

That is where the third mitzvah comes, to keep G-d’s Shabbos.

Shabbos is in the category of mitzvahs called adus, signs. Shabbos is a sign that testifies that G-d created the world. By keeping Shabbos we strengthen our emunah in the fact that Hashem constantly creates the world and doesn’t have an existence of its own. In this also Jews are unique and different from all other nations. All other nations believe that G-d created the world but then gave the world away to the forces of nature, now it is the law of nature that guides the world and causes the events of the world. But Jews through their emunah remain connected directly to G-d, by-passing the laws of nature.

And that is the difference between Shabbos and the six days of the week. Concerning the six days of the week in the creation of the world the Torah mentions thirty two times G-d’s name, Elokim, which refers to G-d in nature. (Elokim has the numerical equivalent of the word hateva, nature.) But Shabbos is Shabbos laHashem, not l’Elokim, and Hashem refers to that part of G-d that doesn’t engage in creation, nor involve nor limit itself to nature. And the mitzvah of Shabbos is given only to the Jews and not the other nations, because the relationship the nations of the world have with G-d is through the name Elokim, which is nature, and not Shabbos, corresponding to the name Hashem, which is above nature.

There is also in Shabbos a reminder of yetziras Mitzraim, of coming out of the limitations and restriction of nature. It is through the observance of Shabbos, by observing this sign which connects Jews with G-d in a unique fashion, different from all other nations, above and beyond nature, and by strengthening this emunah, we become independent of nature and depend directly on the hashgacha protis from G-d Himself.

And through this we are able to bring an influence on our children that they too should feel that they belong to a holy people. Even in their physical affairs, their eating, drinking, and business, they express a holiness and a separateness, because the strength of their emunah binds them to the holiness of G-d, even when they are engaged in physical activity.

And as the Rebbe goes on to say further in the parsha, G-d puts together the mitzvah of Shabbos with the respect of the Bais HaMikdash, and by mentioning Shabbos together with the Bais HaMikdash, this is where we learn which activities are prohibited on Shabbos. All those labors necessary in the building of the Mishkan or the Mikdash are prohibited on Shabbos.

The Rebbe says, through the observance of the Shabbos, we have the effect on the world that everything in the world becomes like the Mishkan and the Mikdash - a dwelling place for G-d.

As we said before, the idea of kedushah means separation even in those areas, which we are similar to other nations, in our physical activity, there we need to be different, separate and holy. So this is the meaning of what it says further in the parsha, that there are two instructions, “you should sanctify yourself, and you should be holy” and from this we learn “that we make ourselves holy from refraining from that which is permissible”. Even in that which is permissible and kosher, but not necessarily a mitzvah, there we have to find and instill holiness, as it says, in all your ways know Him, meaning in your ways, in the activities that G-d does not command or obligate you to do, in those things you should also find the holiness and the G-dliness.

Now this mitzvah to sanctify ourselves in areas that are permissible is not any different than any other mitzvah. It has the same power and authority and importance as all other mitzvahs.

According to Chassidus, this avodah of serving G-d by sanctifying ourselves in the permissible is particularly relevant and important to bringing the geulah and the coming of Moshiach.

Studying Torah and doing mitzvahs, being careful to avoid things that are prohibited is not enough to bring the geulah, the redemption. What is necessary is to sanctify ourselves in the permissible. The Gemarrah says that in the future tzaddikim will be called kadosh, holy, just as G-d is called holy. This means that all the G-dliness and holiness that will be revealed in the times of Moshiach, depends on how we serve G-d today, and will be the result of our deeds and our service in the time of golus.

So this G-dliness that is described here in the Gemarrah, that in future tzaddikim, which refers to all Jews because all Jews are called tzaddikim, will be described as holy, this is the end result that will come at the end of days, and it must be that we prepare for it by being holy even before Moshiach comes, and that is the holiness in what is permissible.

To understand this better, there is a general principle in creation that the higher the G-dliness, the higher the degree of holiness, the more significant every detail becomes, as it says, that those around G-d are judged very strictly, that even a single hair that is out of place for a tzaddik is a great violation, because the holier you are, the more detail counts. As we find in the  mitzvah  of  milah, Avraham  was told to circumcise himself in order for
G-d to be able to reveal Himself through the name Shad-dai. But then by Matan Torah, when G-d says, until now, I have reveal only My name Shad-dai, and now I am going to reveal My name Hashem, for there needs to be preparation and that is to circumcise again all those who were born in Egypt, which refers to the removal of an even more subtle evil, a more thorough circumcision, in order to be able to receive a higher G-dliness.

And so before the coming of Moshiach, it says that G-d will remove the uncircumcised heart, which is the subtlest of unholiness, in order to be able to receive the G-dliness that will be revealed with the coming of Moshiach, which is even higher than that which was revealed at the Giving of the Torah.

The revelation that will come with the coming of Moshiach is the revelation of G-d Himself. This is the idea of making a dwelling place for G-d. A dwelling place is the place where for example a king comes and is himself. A home, a dwelling place, is not a place that serves a particular function. The king doesn’t go to his home in order to do a particular service or act. It is where he simply is. In the palace there are rooms for every occasion: where he greets guests, where he passes laws, where he meets with his ministers and so on. Each room serves a particular function. But a home is where he belongs. It is where his essence can be revealed, not only his functions.

So by sanctifying that which is permissible, making ourselves holy even in the areas that are permissible, this is the groundwork to prepare the world, to make it a dwelling place for G-d Himself, and not only for a G-dly function.

In order to bring about this dwelling place for G-d, the service and the person who is doing the service have to be in such a way that they address the essence of G-d. This is accomplished, as will be explained later, by sanctifying oneself in the permissible. If a person is doing a mitzvah, then it is a particular function, whereas if a person sanctifies himself in areas that are not commandments, then it is oneself, the essence of the person that is being sanctified, which reflects the essence of G-d being comfortable in this world, a dwelling place for G-d.

In observing Torah and mitzvahs, it is possible that a person studies the Torah and does the mitzvahs, and yet he himself remains separate and distinct from the mitzvah. He does it because G-d commands and in a sense forces the person to comply with G-d’s will. But the person’s will remains different and separate from G-d. In such a case, the effect of the mitzvah is only on that part of the soul that performs the mitzvah, in other words, the function of the soul.

But when a person sanctifies himself even in that which is permissible, in his own affairs and activities, and there he behaves in a holy fashion, this means that he knows that even in these areas, he has to abide by the dictates of holiness and not by his own dictates and so this reaches his very essence of his neshama, the essence of who he is.

And this is also the meaning of “you shall be holy”. The Mechilta says on the posuk, “you will be chosen”, means that you will belong to Me, you will devote yourself to the study of Torah and not to worldly affairs. In this way, when a person devotes even his worldly affairs to the service of G-d, and even there finds holiness, even that which is permissible becomes holy, then he belongs to G-d completely, his entire existence is one of G-dliness. By serving G-d with his essence, this elicits from G-d a response from His essence, and that is the meaning of the Gemarrah mentioned before, that in the future tzaddikim will be referred to with the word kadosh, just as G-d is referred to as kadosh. What effect does this have in the avodah itself? Not in the person, but in the type of avodah of sanctifying oneself in the permissible.

The Rebbe says that in the Receiving of the Torah we attained a higher level of holiness in our mitzvahs than that of the Avos, the Patriarchs, who fulfilled mitzvahs before the Torah was given. They fulfilled mitzvahs in the spiritual, and  after  the Giving  of the  Torah we were able to fulfill and serve
G-d in the physical. Chassidus explains that when the Avos observed the mitzvahs, the holiness reached only that part of G-d, which is the source of all creation. And the source of all creation, creation being limited, also has a certain limitation. Therefore in the spiritual, there is a greater capacity for containing this holiness than in the physical.

But once G-d gave the Torah which means He gave Himself, not His ability to create the worlds, but His essence and Himself, to us in the Torah and in the mitzvahs, now relative to the essence of G-d that is revealed in the Torah, here the spiritual and the physical become completely neutralized. They are equally insignificant. The spiritual is not in any way better or more capable of containing G-d Himself than the physical, and in fact, the physical has an advantage over the spiritual in that the higher something is the lower it comes. So the essence of G-d being the highest of the high expresses itself better in the physical because it is the lowest of the low.

Yet even after the Giving of the Torah, there is still some limits - the limits of Torah itself, in that G-d expresses Himself through mitzvahs and not through other ways. This is why it is a mitzvah, to stand up in the presence of a person who excels in the performance of mitzvahs, because G-d dwells and is clothed in their soul when they are doing the mitzvah. But a person who is doing things that are not mitzvahs we don’t stand up for them because we don’t see the G-dliness there.

However in the future in the time to come, with the coming of Moshiach, when the world will have reached its ultimate perfection, and G-d Himself, the essence of G-d will be revealed, then there will be no such distinction nor restriction – G-dliness will be expressed everywhere, not only in mitzvahs. And then we will see with our eyes, that there is no place devoid of Him, and there is nothing besides Him.

To make this even clearer, the Zohar says that there are three levels – G-d and Torah and Jews and each of them has a revealed part and a hidden part.

In G-d, the revealed part is the G-dliness that creates the world and is involved with the world, from which the laws of nature, the conduct of nature are derived. The hidden part of G-d is that part that is higher than creation, not involved in nature, and not expressed through nature, but rather through miracles that overrule nature. On an even deeper level, a miracle is also part of the revealed holiness of G-d, because although it is higher than the world, it affects the world and deals with the world. Even though it cancels the law of nature and the world is conducted in a miraculous way, it is still related to the world. So the hidden part of G-d would then be those miracles that are not obvious and not revealed, but clothed in nature. It is said about the time of golus that a person for whom G-d performs a miracle does not even recognize the miracle, because the miracle is so high, so much higher than the world that it doesn’t even interfere with the conduct of the world.

And this is what is meant in the verse that says that He performs miracles that only He Himself knows. When Moshiach comes, these miracles will be revealed as it says, areinu niflaos, “I will show you,” I, G-d Himself, I will show you the miracles. A miracle that interrupts nature, like the splitting of the Sea, is not the highest revelation because it has its own restrictions. The revelation of the hidden miracles is what will be revealed with the coming of Moshiach

And so it is also now that the revelation of G-dliness which came after Matan Torah, that expresses itself in the study of Torah and in the mitzvahs, but not in the world itself, not in the permissible worldly affairs, and that is why the G-dliness doesn’t show unless the laws of nature are interrupted, but in the G-dliness that is hidden, the holiness that is hidden in nature, that will be revealed in the future as a result of our making ourselves holy in our physical affairs.

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