Every year, HaRav Ginsburgh teaches from a particular Chasidic work and many of these classes are published in Nifla’ot, the Hebrew language counterpart to Wonders. This year he has been teaching from Rebbe Menachem Nachum of Chernobyl’s collected teachings titled Ma’or Einayim.
This particular very relevant and inspiring teaching from the Ma’or Einayim in parashat Emor encourages us to pay attention to the instances in which we suddenly seem to think of a family member, a friend, or an acquaintance and treat them as opportunities for doing good.
This article is an excerpt from the full class that was given on Shabbat Acharei-Kedoshim 5786 and was originally published in Hebrew in the Emor 5786 issue of Nifla’ot.
Benefitting People We Think Of
Our thoughts are always skipping around. It seems that if we pay a bit of attention to them, we notice that so many things are constantly simmering to its surface, somehow making their way from our subconscious, to our preconscious, then trying to get their 15 fractions of a second in our conscious mind. The Ma’or Einayim (Rebbe Menachem Nachum of Chernobyl) writes on parashat Emor,
It is a known fact that there are souls that have experienced a decline and that need to be raised and connected to their source, and this is done by the tzaddik, who connects everything and raises it all.
We might think that ideas like this one are not relevant to us. After all, we are not tzaddikim who elevate people’s souls. We are common, simple Jews. But in truth, one must not think that he is talking about a topic that is irrelevant to us personally. The prophet says, “Your people are all tzaddikim [righteous].”[1] Every individual is a tzaddik, and the only thing needed to reveal it is willpower. Therefore, we too should engage in the practices of the true tzaddik, at least minutely.[2]
The Ma’or Einayim continues that the tzaddik can do this because his consciousness is constantly connected with the Creator. At the same time, the Divine spark of that soul that is experiencing a decline yearns to be lifted and so enters the tzaddik’s consciousness. That itself is a sign for the tzaddik that indeed it his duty to elevate this soul.
Our mind is constantly wandering, perusing various thoughts. Oftentimes, we think of people, some here living with us, and some already in the afterlife. Sometimes these are even the faces of people we do not know. When someone enters your consciousness, whether they are in this world or the afterlife, that is a sign that you are being asked to do them a favor. In what way? First, you should think good of that person. The prophet warns us, “Do not think negatively of another.”[3] Following the principle that a measure of good is greater than its opposite,[4] it follows that one should think only positively of others. The more important thing is in prayer, to pray to God that the person one sees in their thoughts be given all that they need, physically, and spiritually. The pillar of the Ba’al Shem Tov’s teachings is that everything happens by Divine Providence, so even a thought that enters one’s mind is by Divine Providence. God is telling me that He wants me to pray for that person.
This is a deep interpretation of what the sages mean in their statement, “Would it be that a person would pray all day long.”[5] The meaning is not to repeat the Amidah over and over again, all day long, but rather to be aware of one’s thoughts and the mind’s wanderings, and to be moved to pray because of them, when they involve others, thus being moved to constantly pray. Prayer is described as the service of the heart,[6] which means that it derives from thought.
Still, the Ma’or Einayim issues a warning. One should not be pulled down by these thoughts. What he means to say is that since the person we see in our mind needs our positive thoughts because he or she is in a state of decline, perhaps because of some evil that has clung to them. And so, they are in a state of mixed good and evil, and the evil is dangerous and might even awaken negative thoughts in us. It might be that seeing them in our thoughts, and knowing their declining situation, will cause us to fill with anger at them (instead of leading us to pray for them or to just think good of them). If thinking of someone drags us down, our descent, may in fact, even cause harm to that person. In essence, when the image of someone who is in decline enters a tzaddik’s mind, either the tzaddik will elevate him (by thinking good things and praying for him) or he will drag the tzaddik down from his level, and he will no longer be a tzaddik.
What then is the advice that can be given to prevent this from happening? How can the tzaddik, and we ourselves, when acting in the same way, protect ourselves from being dragged down by the other person’s decline? The Ma’or Einayim says that that is why the true tzaddik is one who constantly clings to God. Because of his cleaving to God through his fear of being disconnected from God, he will not be dragged down by others in decline. He will stay connected and be able to lift them up too.
This is famously illustrated by Rebbe Meir of Premishlan who was known to say that whoever is attached Above will not fall below.[7] To prevent ourselves from falling, we must cling strongly to God and to the fear of being disconnected from God. This is wondrous advice. To be able to save someone else from drowning, we must ensure that we ourselves are on the boat, so that we can pull him to safety without fear of him pulling us under water. To successfully affect someone else who enters our thoughts in a positive way, we have to ensure that we ourselves are strongly attached above so that we will not come to criticize this individual instead of pray for him. On the face of a mountain, one climber can only save his friend from falling off if he himself is strongly attached with pins and bolts to the mountain. Only then can he ensure that his friend does not pull him down and be able to pull his friend up.
[1]. Isaiah 60:21.
[2]. See Tanya, ch. 44.
[3]. Zechariah 8:17.
[4]. Yoma 76a.
[5]. Berachot 21a.
[6]. Ta’anit 2a.
[7]. Sefer HaSichot 5696, pp. 95ff.
