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The purpose of creation – To know G-d:

It states in the Zohar that the purpose of creation of man was in order for him to know G-d. The intent of this statement is as follows: Our physical world was created in a way that G-dliness is completely concealed and darkened. In essence, one does not naturally know G-d upon living in this world. This is due to the many contractions and descents of the Divine light of G-d below into the lowly and utterly dark world. This concealment and darkness however is all for the sake of searching for G-d and finding Him within the darkness. Once found, then the darkness shines with a much greater light, similar to a dark room that has many candles lit inside of it. It is for this purpose that G-d created man, to serve as the light of the candle to shine the darkness of the world and turn darkness into light.

Every Jew is a candle: More particularly, every G-dly soul of a Jew serves as another candle to light the darkness of the world as each Jew is tasked with a mission of lighting some of the world’s darkness. Hence, the more Jewish people we have in this world, the more candles we have shining the darkness of the world. The 600,000 Jewish souls represent 600,000 candles. The amount of candles necessary is in accordance to the depth of the darkness, and hence the darker the world the more candles that are required to shine it.

How to accomplish knowing G-d: The Jewish soul ends up shining the darkness of the world through knowing G-d. In other words, achieving knowledge of G-d as stated in the Zohar is the way that one lights the candle and shines the darkness. Now, what is the meaning of knowing G-d? This doesn’t just mean that one believes in His existence, or even brings His existence to a point of factual knowledge, but that one arouses a love and passion to cleave to G-d to the point of expiry of the soul. Accordingly, it does not suffice to have a mere fleeting thought and contemplation about G-d and how He fills and encompasses all worlds, and rather one must contemplate matters that touch the essence of the soul to the point that he wants to leave the darkness of the world and all of its lusts in order to cleave to G-d. This is the true meaning of the Zoharic statement, “for the sake of knowing Him,” as knowledge in Hebrew doesn’t refer only to intellectual knowledge but to a complete penetration within one’s heart and emotions.

• The Divine lesson: First and foremost, one can learn from the above teaching the value and significance of the divine service of every single Jew. Every Jew contains both the ability and obligation to light a specific candle to shine the darkness of the world. This cannot be accomplished by anyone else other than you. Hence, every Jew has a purpose and is an essential part of bringing the world to perfection and redemption. The second lesson that we can learn from the above  is the importance in one exercising his mind and heart in loving G-d, as this is the light that shines the darkness of the world.

Channeling one’s passions and lusts for G-d:

Above we mentioned the concept of turning darkness into light. What does this actually mean? So, here is a tangible example of turning darkness into light within one’s own soul. One of the central elements of every animal soul is the element of fire. It is this element that is responsible for one’s lusts and passions for all the physical pleasures of the world, which are considered mundane and dark, being empty of holiness. The way it works is as follows: The element of fire within the animal soul becomes naturally heated which leads to the creation of a flame of passion. This flame of passion that comes from this element of fire needs to be quenched, and it hence begins lusting after all matters that give a person pleasure. Unfortunately, this often leads to one falling prey to pleasures that are either forbidden in their essence, or are superfluous and not for the sake of serving G-d, which is also a level of evil. This is the natural darkness that the soul lives with in this world. However, the good news is that this darkness can be turned to light. How? Through quenching one’s lust for pleasure of his element of fire with service of G-d, with igniting a powerful and intense passion to cleave to G-d. Cleaving to G-d is no less pleasurable than whatever physical pleasures one enjoys, and on the contrary, the pleasure in cleaving to G-d is infinitely greater than any worldly pleasure that one can experience. To accomplish this however one must first remove his passion from the physical pleasures of this world through cooling off his excitement for them and repulsing evil. This will naturally cause the passion that results from the heating up of his element of fire to be channeled towards G-dliness.

• The Divine lesson: The above teaching is most insightful. It explains why in life there are times that we are emotionless and apathetic, lacking excitement for anything including its pleasures, and other times we are filled with excitement and passion. This has to do with the element of fire in our animal souls being heated versus being dormant. What subconsciously heats it is beyond our control and understanding, and it could be based on mystical changes taking place on high regarding our soul, or based on a specific mission that we need to accomplish that day as known only to G-d. However, there also exists conscious ways of heating one’s spiritual element of fire, such as by drinking red wine, or speaking of, or observing, those things from which one receives pleasure. This explains why on Yom Kippur we ask for forgiveness for sinning with our evil inclination, as although all sin is with the evil inclination, at times we’re the ones who consciously arouse it. Now, the greatest part of the above teaching is that from it we learn that one is not expected to suppress and extinguish his heat and flame of passion that comes from the element of fire in his soul, but rather simply to re-channel it to a different pleasure, a pleasure of holiness that is experienced through cleaving to G-d. Hence, next time one is aroused with a passion for one of the worldly pleasures, try taking out a book of Tehillim and reading some of the passages with great emotion knowing that by reading it one is cleaving to G-d.

A robber crying to G-d for help in his robbery:

A repeated theme that we find in the discourses of the Alter Rebbe, including Parshas Devarim, is the saying of the Talmud “Ganva Apum Machtarta Rachmana Karya.” That a robber calls on to G-d for help when he is in the midst of robbery. Now, while at face value this statement can be viewed as one which praises the Jewish people as being believers the son of believers, and that even a robber who transgresses G-d’s commands does not let go of his belief in G-d, in truth there is a deeper message in this statement which became a central philosophy of the Alter Rebbe and Chabad Chassidus. Rather than viewing the statement as saying that even a robber can call to G-d, one can view it as saying that even one who calls to G-d can be a robber. Meaning, it is possible for one to externally and superficially be very close to G-d, and pray with ecstatic fervor and concentration, and still transgress G-d’s commands. It is for this reason, states the Alter Rebbe, that superficial and external service of G-d does not suffice, and one is required to truly penetrate one’s heart and soul with knowledge of G-d to the point that he will not sin and to fulfill this deep intellectual contemplation of G-d is necessary. One must internalize the existence of G-d into his mind and heart to the point that he will no longer live in hypocrisy with a disconnect between his faith and feelings, acting in a way that is contrary to his faith. This is the entire purpose of Chabad Chassidus in contrast to that of Chagas Chassidus. Chagas suffice as with one voicing his belief in G-d and acting superficially with love of G-d. Chabad demands internalization of this belief to the point that it reaches Yedia Shebileiv, a knowledge of the heart. It is for this purpose that the Alter Rebbe recited so many Chassidic discourses traveling through the depths of Kaballah and mysticism in order to give one the content  for him to contemplate in his mind to penetrate his heart with the knowledge and love of G-d.

1. Yishmael Kohen Gadol blessing G-d:

A most famous and cryptic story is recorded in the Talmud[1] with Rebbe Yishamel Kohen Gadol, that G-d Himself asked Rebbe Yishmael to give him a blessing. To quote from the Talmud: “I entered the holy of holies and I saw the divine presence sitting on a very high and exalted throne. He said to me, Yishamel my son blessed me. And I said to Him, may it be your will that Your compassion should overcome Your anger and that You should reveal Your mercy on Your attributes and that you should act with Your children with the attitude of mercy and treat them above the letter of the law.” The obvious question on the story is why does G-d need a blessing from anyone? Isn’t G-d the owner and source of blessing for others and hence how can He be the one requiring a blessing? The explanation is as follows: The concept of a blessing is not the idea of giving someone something that they don’t have, but rather the concept of revealing and drawing below something that is already theirs. The term Bracha refers to Revelation, and is the revealing of a matter that was previously concealed. Of course G-d is not in need of blessing, however, G-d does not reveal His attributes to his creations on His own initiative, and waits for their service of G-d to ignite their Revelation below. This was the purpose of the blessing of Rebbe Yishamel to the divine presence, to bring the attribute of mercy of G-d into Revelation. This is the inner meaning behind all the blessings that we recite.

[1] Brachos 7a

1. A great rule service of G-d – The need for a Rebbe:

The opening verse of this week’s portion begins with the words “and these are the journeys of the Jewish people who left Egypt in the hands of Moshe and Aaron.” A further verse of Scripture states “and you lead the flock of your nation in the hands of Moshe and Aaron.” The following is a great rule in the service of G-d, that anyone who desires to become close to G-d then he must make sure that his heart is completely cleansed without any blemishes, following the verse “who shall go up to the mountain of G-d, those who are of clean hands and clear hearts, one who doesn’t elevate his soul for no purpose.” Hence, one should not attempt to elevate his soul in the ways of G-d for vanity and falsehood, G-d forbid. [Meaning, that if one has yet to achieve a completely cleansed heart, then he should not attempt to elevate himself to areas and levels that he cannot reach, as this will be an elevation of vanity and falsehood. Likewise, that he should not try to elevate himself in service of G-d for reasons of vanity and falsehood.] Now, certainly this level of service of G-d is very deep, and hence who is able to achieve it? So, the answer is that indeed on one’s own it is impossible for one to reach such a level, however, it is able to be reached through the help of Moshe and Aaron. This is the inner meaning behind the above verse of Scripture, that is not possible for the Jewish people to leave their personal Egypt, which are the constraints of evil within his soul, without the help and leadership of Moshe and Aaron. If a person attempts to elevate himself above without Moshe and Aaron he will never be successful.

Moshe Shushvinin Dimalka: How do Moshe and Aaron assist the person in reaching G-d and elevating his soul? This is through them feeding the soul of the individual with the aspect of Moshe and Aaron which refers to the Torah and Mitzvah’s. Moshe is the escort of the king, which refer to the attributes in the world of Atzilus, from which the 248 positive commands derive. Likewise, Moshe comes from Daas and Chochmah of Atzilus, which is from where the Torah derives. Hence, one must first introduce the aspect of Moshe, Torah and Mitzvah’s, for the sake of then elevating his soul to G-d in prayer. Now, how does Moshe being in the escort of the king connect with the idea of Mitzvos? So the purpose of an escort by a wedding is to escort the groom to unite with his bride. This is likewise the function of the Torah and Mitzvah’s, to draw down the light of G-d to below to make for them a dwelling place below. For example, when a person wears a Tallis and Tzitzis in the morning he draws upon himself the G-dly energy that is found within the Mitzvah, and causes the encompassing light of G-d to surround him.

Aaron Shushvinisa Dimatronisa: Aaron is the escort of the Queen which refers to the attribute of Malchus, and represents the love of G-d that is aroused during prayer. Accordingly one needs both the level of Moshe and Aaron in order to accomplish elevation and service of G-d.

Which comes first: Just like in scripture at times the name of Moshe is written before the name of Aaron and at times name of Aaron are mentioned before the name of Moshe, so too it is regarding service of G-d. At times one must precede Torah and Mitzvah’s to one’s prayer, in order to be able to pray with love, while at other times one must first arouse love in his prayer and only then is he to proceed with the study of Torah and Mitzvah’s.

• The Divine lesson: A most glaring lesson shines from the above teaching. Although Moshe and Aaron in the above teaching are interpreted to refer to Torah and Mitzvah’s and prayer, certainly, it does not leave the simple explanation which is the personalities of Moshe and Aaron as leaders. Thus, the teaching is saying that it is not possible for one to truly elevate himself to the mountain of G-d without the assistance of a Moshe, and Rebbe. The Rebbe escorts his followers in service of G-d and helps them leave their personal Egypt and skeletons of their heart. This is a most fundamental aspect in the teachings of Chassidus and one of the great revolutions of Judaism infiltrated by the Baal Shem Tov, the concept of a Rebbe.

1. Israel will spread to the whole world and Jerusalem to the entire Israel:

Our sages relate a most strange matter that will occur in the future, that the holy land of Israel will become spread upon the entire world and that the city of Jerusalem will spread throughout all of the land of Israel. [What does this mean? Will all of the settlements and buildings and houses of the Diaspora be squashed and destroyed under the land of Israel which spreads over them? What about all the cities outside Jerusalem, will they be squashed and destroyed under the spread of Jerusalem? So, obviously the above does not refer to a physical spreading of the land of Israel or the city of Jerusalem to the above locations which would bring destruction to the world, but rather to its spiritual concept.] The intent of the statement is that in the future era the entire world will be on the level of the holy land of Israel of today and that the holy land of Israel of the future era will be of the holy level of Jerusalem of today. From this it can be deduced that the level of holiness that Jerusalem will contain in the future era is much greater and higher than its current level. All this is a result of the fact that in the future era there will be an elevation of the worlds. To understand this matter deeper we must first introduce the greatness of the holy land of Israel and Jerusalem of today versus the land of the Diaspora.

The impurity of the Diaspora: It is explained in the writings of the Arizal that the land of the Diaspora receives its divine energy from the level of Malchus of Atzilus through it becoming invested within the level of Malchus of each of the four worlds, Beriya, Yetzira, Assiya. This causes a contraction and concealment of the Divine light and makes it be subject to the laws of nature, making it appear as if it is not coming from G-d, hence giving room for idolatry and apostasy. It is for this reason that the sages decreed impurity upon the air of the land of the Diaspora as the world of Assiya is the ultimate of concealment of G-dliness from which the forces of evil nurture from and lead to belief in idolatry.

The holiness of Israel: In the holy land of Israel the divine energy that is drawn from the level of Malchus of Atzilus enters into the land after it becomes invested within the level of Malchus of only Beriya and Yetzira, and is not invested within the Malchus of Assiya. [This causes the Divine light to arrive in a less adulterated fashion, hence giving special divine providence and an above nature feature to the land.] It is for this reason that the sages did not decree impurity upon the air of the holy land of Israel, as its air and earth is holy, as it does not conceal the G-dly energy as much. Now, although certainly even the land of Israel must have its divine energy pass through the minister of the world of Assiya who rules over the holy land in order for it to be delivered to it, nonetheless, this is a mere package delivery which does not change or modify at all the divine energy which arrived from Yetzira. In the jargon of Kabbalah and Chassidus this is known as Derech Havara in contrast to Derech Hislavshus.

The Diaspora of the future: In the future era the entire world will become refined and there will no longer be any concealment at all of G-dliness, as the verse states “and I will remove the spirit of impurity from the land.” At that time, even the land of the idol worshipers will become refined, as it states that at that time G-d will transform the speech of the nations to call the name of G-d and serve Him with one shoulder. At that time, even the land in the Diaspora will receive their divine energy from the level of Yetzira just like the land of Israel of today, although then too it will need to be delivered through the level of Assiya. This is the inner meaning behind the statement that in the future era the land of Israel will spread throughout the entire world, as it refers to the level of holiness that it will receive from which will be similar to Israel of today.

Israel of the future: In the future era the land of Israel will receive from a higher level than it is today [and will be on par with the level of Jerusalem of today, while Jerusalem itself will receive an even higher level than today].

The purpose of the travels of the Jewish people in the desert for 40 years: The purpose of the Jewish people traveling for 40 years in the desert together with the Aron Habris was to vacuum and banish the evil forces from the desert in order so the world can eventually become capable of receiving from the level of Malchus of Yetzira in the future era.