- Every Act of Tzedakah Rises Above
- Every act of charity performed by a Jew ascends spiritually as an “Itaruta D’Letata” (awakening from below).
- In Kabbalistic terms, this is called “Ha’alat Mayin Nukvin”.
- It rises to the root of Jewish souls, known as:
- Knesset Yisrael
- Shechinah
- Ima Tata’ah (the Lower Mother)
- Tzedakah Awakens Divine Chesed
- Since the Shechinah contains all the Divine attributes, beginning with Chesed, charity awakens:
“Chesed Hashem mamash”
- This causes a revelation of Divine light to descend and illuminate Jewish souls.
- The Greatest Revelation Occurs During Prayer
- The Divine light awakened by tzedakah shines especially during prayer.
- Prayer becomes a moment of powerful spiritual disclosure, where the soul experiences a deeper awareness of Hashem.
- Greatness and Humility Together
- Although:
“To His greatness there is no limit”
and all creation is insignificant before Him,
- Chazal teach:
“Where you find His greatness, there you find His humility.”
- Like water flowing downward, Divine kindness descends from the highest levels to the lowest.
- “Light Shines in the Darkness”
- The verse:
“Light shines in the darkness for the upright, gracious, compassionate, and righteous.”
- When a person acts with compassion and righteousness, he causes Divine light to shine within his soul even while it is clothed in a physical body, which the Alter Rebbe calls the mashcha d’chivya (“serpent’s skin”).
- What Is True Salvation?
- Salvation (yeshuah) is not only physical rescue.
- It is:
The transformation of darkness into light.
- When Godliness becomes revealed within a person’s inner darkness, that itself is salvation.
- “Matzmiach Yeshuot”
- This explains the phrase:
“Who causes salvation to grow.”
- Salvation grows from the seed of tzedakah, just as a seed planted in the earth grows into something vastly greater than itself.
- The “Upper Earth”
- The charity is spiritually planted in the heavenly “Eretz Cheifetz”:
- The Shechinah
- Knesset Yisrael
- From there, Divine kindness and revelation emerge.
- The Unique Power of Eretz Yisrael
- The Alter Rebbe concludes that charity given for Eretz HaKodesh possesses special power.
- The physical Land of Israel corresponds directly to the spiritual “upper earth.”
- Therefore the spiritual effect of such giving is received immediately, without the barriers that exist elsewhere.
Key Takeaway
Tzedakah is a spiritual seed planted in the Shechinah. It awakens Divine kindness above, draws God’s light into the soul during prayer, transforms darkness into light, and thereby becomes the source of true “yeshuah”—the revelation of Godliness within the world and within the person.