Wondrous New Things

by Rabbi Nachman of Breslov

If even a simple person sits before a holy book and gazes at the letters of the Torah, he will be able to see wondrous new things. When he gazes at the letters, they will begin to shine and combine, as did the letters upon the breastplate of the cohen gadol. Then he will see new things, wonders and combinations. He will even be able to see things that the author did not have in mind.

A great person can see this without effort. But even a totally simple person can come to and see such new things, if he will sit and gaze at the letters of the Torah.

But do not make this into a test, for then you might see nothing at all.
Likutei Moharan 281

If I Express Myself in Extravagant Terms

by Rav Avraham Yitzchak Kook

If I express myself in extravagant terms, if I speak exaggerations, do these really contain falsehood? I am revealing the thought of my soul, I am uncovering the lights of my spirit!

And the revelations of lights and the uncovering of the soul constitute a creation of great worth. I stand upon the peak of “the remnant of Israel shall not do injustice, and will not speak falsehood, and a deceitful tongue will not be found in their mouths.”

Chadarav, pp. 111-112

Angels, Nomads, Wolves

by Yaacov Dovid Shulman

You were digging the night like a grave.
Lights shone like distant camps
Of angels, nomads, wolves,
The day creeped up the dingy curtain of the eastern sky,
The sun pushed up its reluctant head,
The birds circled once, twice, testing the air,
The dawn was gummy in their mouths.
The air took a deep breath.
Constantinople—there was a city for you,
There the Baal Shem Tov’s daughter wept washing clothing at the seashore
(As her father stood in his inn in blissful wonder),
The wealthy couple passed her with their wondrous message,
Sailing ships floated across the horizon.

Creating a Container of Space and Time

by R. Nachman of Breslov

Looking at something creates a container—the container of space and time.

Before you look at something, it is indeterminate. But when you look at it, it gains definition….

And that is the meaning of “trust.” “Trust” is a type of looking: you look to and hope in God alone, and you trust in Him…

And when you look toward Him with trust, you create a container—the container of space and time. God’s energy flows down from above without cease, but it is outside the realm of time. So it could be that you need something now, but it will only come into the world in two or three years.

But when you look [toward God] with trust, you create a container of space and time for that energy, so that it will come when [and where] you need it. “The eyes of all look towards You”—and as a result, “You give them their food in its time” (Psalms 145:15).

from Likutei Moharan 76

Serious Obstacles

by Yaacov Dovid Shulman

Amazingly, Middle East talks are facing serious obstacles.
The discussions between Charlie Manson and Roman Polanski are also in danger of breaking down.
Meanwhile, there is little doubt that more will have to be done
To encourage a fruitful exchange of ideas between lions and antelope
(Of course the antelope must agree, once and for all, to take off their horns).

Do Not Be False To Your Spirit

by Rav Avraham Yitzchak Kook

A person should not be false to his spirit. He should not deny his inner feelings because of the stormy pressure of societal assumptions.

If he feels the elevation and holiness of idea in a particular field, he should be sure to satiate himself constantly with the richness of supernal pleasures from that place that his heart desires.

And I—who am so filled with the consolations of God when I learn the secrets of the Torah—even when I feel myself exceedingly bare, my hands will not weaken. I must strengthen myself, even though it is impossible not to give this-worldly concerns the attention that they require, both in regard to the aspect of this-worldly well-being and in regard to the aspect of the basic obligation to study the Torah and attain its knowledge in all fields.

Chadarav, pp. 102-103

A Man with a Scraggly Beard

by Yaacov Dovid Shulman

A man with a scraggly beard was sitting at his desk writing poetry
When a distracted citizen ran pell-mell into his room.
“Why are you sitting writing poetry?” asked this distracted reader,
“When there are demonstrations in the streets,
Not to mention that the rising sun is sending scarlet scarves of clouds across the sky?”
This was at any rate the substance of a poem that a reader sent to me,
In which he described a poem that his mother had written to arouse him from bed.
She had been looking at a green moth with folded wings, she said,
And imagined that it had been thinking,
“As green as I am against the window screen,
There is an apple more green than I
And a thought more green than that apple,
And a window more clear than the sight of the mountain.”
I was thinking of all this when my sister called.
She had a poem in her hand,
But I said, “Who has time for poetry?”
That was exactly how her poem went:
She had a poem in her hand,
But I said, “Who has time for poetry?
Only the gnarls of leaves, only the knots of bushes,
Only the crumpled roads,
Leading nowhere.”
“Leading nowhere?” I cried.
“That sounds so dismal;
Isn’t there a more cheerful way to end a poem?”
But I said (she said) you should listen to the entire thing.
That (she said, I said, he said) is the gist of it,
And the green moth dreamed its green moth dreams.

A Key to Return

by Rav Avraham Yitzchak Kook

I feel ashamed to involve myself in the secrets of Torah, because of the lowliness that I feel in my spirit.

This itself must serve as a key to return and grasp the great light of the Life of the world, Who encourages the lowly and enlivens those whose hearts are broken.

Chadarav, p. 108

When I Am Summoned

by Rav Avraham Yitzchak Kook

What do I feel when I am summoned to study matters of the spirit? A sickness of the heart and discomfort. Why is this so? Because as that spiritual demand grows stronger within me, my spirit grows especially aware of its moral poverty, and of its spiritual [poverty] in general.

But the spiritual weakness born of this phenomenon is an absolute imperfection, it is a stain upon the soul. One must battle against it with a stalwart heart. The spiritual gaze must be rich, constant and broad, powerful and straightforward.

The weakness and inner pain caused within the spirit by the conflagration of the fear of heaven is in itself an imperfection and sickness. One must acquire clear concepts in this area of holiness, until this uncultured aversion will decrease and be replaced with strength and a broad consciousness.

Chadarav, pp. 107-108

He Crawled Along the Avenues

by Yaacov Dovid Shulman

So Norman Mailer is dead.
He crawled along the avenues,
He broke the mirrors that he kept staring into.
Like plaque he has stuck to our brains.
When his face was thrown up against the horizon,
How could we not dream of him,
When his name was scrawled in every prayer book we opened?
Perhaps we need a root canal,
How dazzling our teeth of knowledge will gleam.
We will inhale the violet herbs of the fields,
The moon will burn our eyes white.

I Will Speak with My Heart

by Rav Avraham Yitzchak Kook

I will speak with my heart, and my spirit will seek, it will seek and it will find, it will seek with the lamp of Hashem, which is the human soul. And [God’s] thought of Israel, which preceded everything else, will illumine with the ultimate strength the source of all the letters of the Torah.

“Behold, a nation like a young lion will stand and like a lion will arise.”

“Behold I shall open your graves and take you up from your graves with me, and bring you to the land of Israel.”

“‘And I will place my spirit upon you and give you life’—in the past, I gave you Torah, in the future I will give you life.’”

The soul of Israel, the source of Torah, will find itself. And when it finds its essence, all of the letters of the Torah will gleam before it with their beautiful radiance of life, and they shall be called by a new name, a new name that the mouth of Hashem will designate.

From the brilliance of the sight of the salvation of the whole, the light of the individual— which has nothing besides that which is in the whole—will shine.

“And the survivor in Zion and the remnant in Jerusalem will be called holy, each one who is written for life in Jerusalem.”

Chadarav, p. 188

An Assumed Honor

by Rav Avraham Yitzchak Kook

I will not, for the sake of an assumed honor, abandon my yearning for the secrets of Torah.

The knowledge of Hashem, the God of truth, constantly raises me, even when I am in the house of my sojourning, in the land of my wandering, in exile and in lowliness—which is the greatest atonement, which grants atonement for everything, and which is therefore very bitter, depressing the spirit.

Even though the coarseness of the lowly physical does not allow a person to feel properly, nevertheless there is a sense of an inner smallness, lowliness and the abandoning of a haughty spirit, the donning of humility and purity, and the desire for repentance.

I will place my refuge in Hashem God. And the yearning for our return to our holy land, to dwell in the courtyards of Hashem, to gaze upon His pleasantness, lift me up and give me life.

And Hashem will give me a tongue of learning. He will lift up my spirit and purify my mind and heart and all of my plans, and reveal to me the light of the inner being of my soul.

And from the holy land He will send His help, and a ray of light will shine for me from the heights, the very highest mountain, from the holy and from Zion, the house of our desires selah.

And I must strengthen myself in my Mighty One. “My spirit has desired in the shadow of Your hand to know all the mystery of Your secret.”

If I am very lowly, if my will is weak, if I have been taken captive in the hands of lusts and weaknesses, behold, Hashem helps me, Hashem is among those who support my spirit.

I will not fear and I will not be afraid. I will not be abashed and I will not be shamed. The Torah of truth will lift me up. I will exalt the name of Hashem in song. In the midst of the masses I will praise Him.

Chadarav, pp. 105-107

How Gentlemen Earn Their Pensions

by Yaacov Dovid Shulman

The earth isn’t very new after all,
The leaders of Israel have been shrinking and shrinking,
Now they no longer care about their place in history,
They bring a shovel to the negotiating table
To bury their neighbors
So that they can take over their villas.

The Jew smiles at Goebbels, at Torquemada,
At Martin Luther, at Nebuchadnezzar,
Come in, did you bring Adolf?
Let’s negotiate the heads, the eyes of my people,
Their teeth, their children, their water,
Their sky,
In a decade we’ll meet again in southern France,
We’ll all be retired and gentlemen,
And this is how gentlemen earn their pensions.

The more clever these Jewish leaders become,
The shorter and stouter do they grow,
They scurry about, being realistic and clever,
And even as they do the ceiling comes down
And the office cubicles grow more and more narrow,
And the President of Syria and the Prince of Saudi Arabia
And the American Secretary of State
And many other curious onlookers
Jostle to gaze down on them,
As they squeak and twitch their whiskers.

At the End of the Holy Sabbath

by Rav Avraham Yitzchak Kook

Who can properly evaluate the great worth of the holy nation at the end of the holy Sabbath? Who can properly praise the radiance of the exalted holiness of the Jewish soul, which was already elevated in the radiance of its beauty by the holiness of the holy day, the most beloved of all days?

Who will gather the strength to sing about, describe and envisage the precious glory of the wondrous people, who rise to the heights of the world, who wear the sun as a necklace in its place, who fly to the heavens, who rise with the holiness of their desire to the heights of the canopy of the highest heavens, upon [each of] whom during the entire day of the Sabbath the light of Hashem shone, appeared and glowed at his meals, in his prayers, in his feelings, in his delights, in his tranquility and glory?

And who will speak even more of the great worth of the holy people and the righteous, those who know how to praise the Sabbath and to give it the honor that it deserves in accord with its elevated holiness, who they distribute riches to all their nation, the riches of heaven, the wealth of the blessings of holiness of elevated feelings and mighty desires? How precious they are to me!

“And as for me, how precious are Your companions, God, how mighty are their leaders.”

You are pleasant to me, Torah sages amongst Israel, sages of the Torah, men of rare quality.

You are pleasant to me, righteous men, straight in heart, faithful in spirit, faithful ones of a chosen nation.

You are precious to me, all of you, all of your masses, it is all holy.

In the inner being of their soul a holy fire burns.

I see your honor, I am crowned and beautified with the loveliness of the radiance of your spirit—beloved of [my] heart, children of holiness, you shall be a blessing in the land, in the beloved land shall you be blessed, upon the holy land shall you spread out [like] branches.

All of the nations will praise you, kings will fear your glory, and you shall be called the cohanim of Hashem, the servants of our God.

Every pure thought of yours will come forth, every clear idea shall be elevated and rectified through you, every soul will delight with you in your strength, everyone will become beautified through you, will grow greater because of you.

Chadarav, p. 185

At the End of Every Holy Sabbath

by Rav Avraham Yitzchak Kook

At the end of every holy Sabbath, Elijah sits beneath the Tree of Life and records the merits of the Jewish people.

Therefore, it is proper for anyone who possesses a connection to the desire for the secrets of the Torah—(which corresponds to a visitation of Elijah on some level) even if [that desire] exists only in some imaginary fashion or is an emotion or some product of human intellect; and certainly if he has risen (with the [help of God’s] supreme lovingkindness) to higher levels—that following each Sabbath, on Saturday night, he too emulate Elijah’s deeds and engage in [bringing to light] the merits of the Jewish people.

And he should recognize intellectually, and with a shining and clear insight, the holiness of the Jewish people and the preciousness of their qualities. And he should cling to the entirety of the holy nation, the nation of Hashem, which is the beloved jewel of [God’s] inheritance. Every single individual of that nation possesses an endless, infinite phenomenon of the light of [God’s] holiness, so that the entire world in its entirety is founded upon [these individuals], even on those [people of] Israel who are empty [of merit].

And he should tremble in holy awe at the holiness of the sublime, Godly holiness of the soul of every individual Jew. He should be filled with longing and endless love for the holiness of the exalted nature of the cornucopia of Israel in general, and for the success of each individual of Israel in all the work of his hands: in the physical, in the spiritual and in everything good.

Fortunate are you, O Israel: “fortunate are you, O Israel; who is like you, a nation saved by Hashem.”

I have loved you, my nation and my people, I have desired you with all my heart and with all my spirit. I have desired you with all the warmth of [my] heart, with all the fire of my bones.

I yearn to see your honor, your beauty and your glory, when you will be uplifted and elevated, when you will grow in the beauty of your nature, when all of your wondrous special traits hidden within you will come out of potential and into actuality, when you will be planted and titazrach in the land of your nature, in the land of your beauty, and the harmony of your might and the height of your horn will be revealed to all directions.

“The nations will see your righteousness and all of the kings you honor, and call you with a new name that the mouth of Hashem has chosen. And you will be a crown of beauty in the hand of Hashem, and a diadem of royalty in the palm of your God.”

Chadarav, p. 183

If You Take Down the Bricks

by Yaacov Dovid Shulman

If you take down the bricks of this flying tower one by one,
These bricks with which so many have been stoned,
These brickbats of thoughts concealed in windy towers,
These towers on sandy plains
Where princesses with great coils of hair cried,
Where princes climbed the narrow bridges of their tresses,
Where the kites of their imaginings whirled out of control in the sky,
Where the sun shone on the jerboa, who was hustling home with the news
Of new food to his mewling children,
Who writhed in the darkness like naked fingers,
Who basked in each others’ warmth and moistness.
The moistness in my bones causes my flesh to melt,
It causes the room to melt, that man with the pasty face
And my thoughts and my eyes and my ears and my shoes
And the whiteness behind the whiteness
And all the niggling boxes of my words
And the little cages where discontented gerbils mutter grievously.
Change just one eyeball every week,
One ear, one conscience, one brainpan,
One kneecap, one set of veins on the back of your hand,
Your children are sleeping in their warm small imaginations
And they seek the feel of your new limbs.

We Yearn to be Filled with Greatness

by Rav Avraham Yitzchak Kook

Our goal is always directed not only to be redeemed from the narrow straits, not only to be healed of wounds and to be saved from sicknesses, not only to emerge from the conditions of poverty and from the dark of blindness—no!

A thirst to [do away with the] negative in itself depresses the spirit and does not give satisfaction to life.

It is not for this that we were brought into being by the Creator, He who is good and does good, the compassionate Father, the Source of all lovingkindness, all love and all compassion.

Rather, we yearn to be filled with greatness, great contentment in the soul, a fresh life filled with illumination in every corners to which we turn, Eden and infinite pleasure in every breath that we breathe, a never-sufficient youthfulness from the Source of the life of all worlds.

You, only You, Hashem—I seek Your greatness, I hope for it and I aspire to it.
And we come to the land of Israel, and we hope for deliverance, and we long for the redemption of the soul—but not to be saved from the chains of exile, not to escape the deformities of its sufferings that cause us to wear away.

No! Infinitely more than that—[we come] for the sake of revealing all of the light, for the sake of causing the streams of eternal life to flow from the Source of the holy of holies, from the Source of Israel, from the Source of [Israel’s] supernal soul, from the Source of that delightful love, [which comes from] the Rock of Ages, Who illumines for us with rays of glory a lovely land, the holy land, the land of life and the land of light.

“My soul longs and indeed expires for the courtyards of Hashem, my heart and my flesh will sing to the living God.”

How fortunate we are, we are blessed and fortunate with an eternal happiness and an exalted eternity.

“Fortunate are you Israel, who is like you, a nation saved by Hashem.”

Fortunate are you, [nation of] Israel, fortunate are you, fortunate are you.

Chadarav, 200-201

"How Miniscule Are Your Works, Hashem!"

by Rav Avraham Yitzchak Kook

In the worldly fields of knowledge about our sensory environment, we see that just as it is correct to say, “How great are Your works, Hashem,” so also should we exclaim in astonishment, “How miniscule are Your works, Hashem!”

Yes, just as we are filled with wonder at the great astronomical lights, at the vast distances filled with wondrous stars, and marvelous forces of nature, so also are we struck with wonder when we look at the depth of creation on the microscopic level, at the details of the limbs of the smallest living creatures, of the fineness of matter and the most sensitive forces in the most inaccessible planes.

Then, with a full knowledge of these two opposite poles, of such great size and such smallness, the picture of the universe is filled in a person’s heart in its proper dimension.

And the same applies to the Torah.

The totality of supernal concepts within Torah, in its general principles, in its supernal paths of justice and in its exalted spiritual wisdom show us the Torah’s complete world of greatness, its general concepts that are like the stars of the sky.

But it is precisely from that elevated perspective that we must realize that just as we find great wealth in those great principles, so also will he find mountains upon mountains, masses of original and precious insights in its every jot and title, in its every smallest detail. The precise definitions and the breadth developed in every branch grow into all the details of its leaves and shoots, to an immeasurable degree.

So then, even a person who very much tends to enjoy the greatness of mind that comes from contemplating expansive ideas will find it pleasant to engage in Torah for its own sake in the very finest of details.

Then he will succeed in attaining both the great and the small. “A great thing—that is the study of the mystical chariot; a small thing—those are the halachic discussions of Abaye and Rava.”

Orot Hatorah 3:8

The Newness of the Earth

by Yaacov David Shulman

The newness of the earth crackles like a log in the fire,
Like a cellophane wrapper,
Like a nuclear conflagration.
Radio towers stick up out of the earth
Like worried, frizzy hair.
The dawn rises with a tired, dusty yawn,
And the hills breathe the somnolent sleep
Of a hundred thousand dreams of earth and slow-flowing rivers of lava
Across mountain brains of massive thought.
Like Mexican jumping beans, our cars pop along their highways,
Our airplanes skitter through the atmosphere,
Our newspapers land upon our porches,
Are brought into the house, read and put out,
Day and night flicker,
Our babies grow up, become grandparents, are buried,
A pack of birds flits along the air currents,
A baby nurses from her mother.

The Intellectual Process of the Torah

by R. Kalonymus Kalman Shapira (the Piaseszner rebbe)

A person is used to all kinds of intellectual processes the entirety of whose existence lacks intrinsic quality, essence and being, but only maintains an existence like the shadow of an object—which, even though it exists and it indicates the matter whose shadow it casts, itself is only of nothingness, without being.

After all, what being and essential quality does a person gain when he thinks that two times two equal four? True, his mind is now filled with knowledge and intellectual process—but what is the value of that knowledge and its existence? It is nothing—it has no strength and no being—it is like the existence of the shadow.

And if a person thinks, for instance, of a technique that someone discovered in mathematics, to calculate sums of fractions easily [paraphrase], does that bring him any closer to the person who devised this technique?

If the discoverer was wicked, will everyone who studies his techniques grow wicked? Or will a person purify himself and improve his ways if he studies the techniques of a pure and good person, since he is contemplating the intellectual achievements of that person?

He will gain nothing by doing this, for even though the existence of the intellectual process of the person who devised the technique is in his mind as he thinks of it, its existence is an existence of nothing, like a shadow.

And this understanding and habit that have become implanted in the minds of people regarding the mind and its actions are an understanding of a shadow and of nothingness.

There are some people who realize that the intellectual process of Torah is not like that of mundane matters (heaven forbid), that the Torah and its intellectual processes are the Holy of Holies, whereas other intellectual processes are trivial and mundane.

Nevertheless, in regard to how the intellectual process of the Torah affects a person at the time that he contemplates it, they err and think that it is comparable to that of the effect of any intellectual process. They do not purposely compare the effect of the intellectual process of the Torah to other intellectual processes.

However, they possess no other concept of the effect of the intellectual process on a person besides its trivial effect, the intellectual process of shadow and nothingness. Therefore, when they contemplate the effect of the intellectual process of the Torah on a person and fail to take into account its difference from the effect of other intellectual processes, they sin inadvertently, heaven forbid, since they think that the intellectual process of the Torah has the usual affect [of other intellectual processes] on the person who contemplates it.

That is to say, according to their concept of the effect of the intellectual process, its effect is one of nothingness.

That is like [the popular] conception of an angel. No matter how hard we may tell a simple person that [an angel] is not a man and does have a human image, when he thinks of an angel, he cannot help imagining it as looking like a person with wings. This is because his entire life his idea [of an angel] has been a messenger who speaks and acts. But [that kind of a description] only meant to give us some way of approaching the topic.

So even if we speak to them and explain that the light of the [divine] intellect is drawn down to a person who is engaged in contemplation, we will not make them any wiser, for they will pervert the very idea of this drawing down, as though it is like a more intelligent person who simplifies the description of a mathematical function so that a less intelligent person can understand it, and the like—which is, again, drawing down nothing.

This perverse error of equating all matters that are called “abstract” has cast down many victims.

If we call mathematics abstract, then everything abstract has a similar existence—so they think—and they do not stop to consider that mathematical concepts have no existence outside the human mind. A person thinks it [into being], and even in his mind its existence is no more than a shadow without tangibility.

Holy abstract matters, on the other hand, are like a soul, which has existence and tangibility—to the point that it vivifies and moves the body.

In this regard, we must proclaim that a person who errs in this matter, heaven forbid, does not believe in the holiness of the existence of the Torah and of how it is drawn down [into our lives].

The abstract quality of all holiness and Torah has intrinsic [being], unlike other things that are called abstract, but which are nothingness. The abstract quality, the spirituality, of the Torah and holiness has existence and being. Indeed, it is the essence of existence. Even the understanding of Torah that a person attains with his human understanding cannot be compared to any other understanding, heaven forbid. It transcends any human understanding.

The existence of the light of the intellectual process of the Torah and how it is drawn down are comparable to the existence and drawing down of the soul, which, even though the senses cannot feel it and it is abstract, nevertheless it is not abstract in the same manner as mathematics, which has no being, heaven forbid. To the contrary, it contains the essence of a person’s existence, and from it come his energy and all his being.

Mavo Hashaarim, pp. 194-196

The Cruelty to the Children of the Spirit

by Rav Avraham Yitzchak Kook

The cruelty to the children of the spirit that are lost because I do not give them life by clothing them in the appropriate expressions for them, via which they would be able to appear in all their character, that cruelty embitters my heart, and fills me with spiritual languor and great anger of the spirit.

This is an echo of the proclamation, “Woe to people for the insult to Torah,” which comes forth every day from Mt. Chorev, which every individual hears on the tablet of his heart. And everything depends on how deep is the impression that remains of that hearing.

Indeed, repentance comes from hearing [that]. And the great compassion for strangled ideas will bring me to repent. [It will bring me] to an inner quickness, to express myself at breadth, with exactitude, in detail, that my soul will use to spring forth at every moment from the mass of feelings and ideal yearnings, which contain blessing for the individual and for the many, for the Jewish people and for mankind.

I will no longer tell my heart to be astonished and desolate, or entirely taken up with plans that are not the essence of the yearning of my soul. But I will indeed return to that inner, pure content, which my spirit within me constantly awaits.

“And I will wed you to me forever, and I will bind you with justice and with justice, and with kindness and with compassion. And I will bind you to me with faith and you shall know Hashem.”

Chadarav, p. 64

The Mole of Responsibility

by Yaacov Dovid Shulman

The mole of responsibility came crawling along my marrow,
It sniffed with its inquisitive snout
The thick rich earth of my cerebrum,
It descended into the belly of self-satisfaction
And laid down its head on its paws and slept.
In the morning it had transformed itself into a glowing lion
That stood staring at me across the restaurant floor,
I could barely bring my spoon to my lips,
I left my croissant untasted.
All about me I saw people sitting at tables
With moles burrowing through their marrow,
Their faces looked pinched and they called for more coffee
And Kahlua.
That lion’s hair was glowing and he looked ready to eat me alive,
So I quickly leapt into his maw and I said,
“Gallop, mighty lion, gallop!”
And we are galloping still.

A Cloud Like a Buffalo

by Yaacov David Shulman

A cloud like a buffalo pushed its massive shoulders through the membranes of my dreams,
Dreams of valleys turned to liquid slow-motion torquing birds
And my heart went out
And came back into the street with its silence
Resonating the growl of morning car transmissions
And a dog bark of calligraphic yips
Springing against the swift stinging white paper.
No more falling into cotton mysteries,
Death has been gazing down from the high-rise apartment building
For two decades,
Sometimes we meet in the elevator.
Sometimes on the beach sandy pebbles press against my soles
And there is a rush of sound and chatter.

How Elevated It Is

by Rav Avraham Yitchak Kook

How elevated it is, how much concealed truth and song it is—the mystical thought that man affects all of existence from the aspect of his spiritual power.

The light of life within free will, which can rise when a person chooses good (with strength, might and wisdom), rises to an extremely elevated realm, whose worth no space [is large enough] to contain.

How wondrous is the moral perspective that emerges from such a form of great responsibility, a responsibility for all existence, for all worlds. [This responsibility comes] because a person has the power to increase within [those worlds] grace and light, life, joy and glory, when he walks upon a straight path, when he strengthens and girds himself with a pure might to master the ways of a good and mighty life, and rises from strength to strength.

But [on the other hand] it is within his power to cause pain in [life’s] every good portion if he lowers his spirit, if he corrupts his ways, if he darkens his spiritual light, if he ceases his moral purity.

The high moral peak [that a person] builds when he takes into account the [entire] world, so great and splendid—with its appearance, [that moral awareness] refines his spirit to the point that it can no longer be degraded. [His spirit then] rises upon over the walls and towers of all existence, of all being, of all the eternity and loveliness of all the worlds—so that, with their assistance, it is protected from all evil.

How could the quality of evil [possibly] rise up to take a portion of the life of [this] man and his deeds, when such an exalted and elevated awareness as this is spread out before him?

It is true that [this person’s] previous moral corruption can close his eye so that will not be able to gather the strength to see the clear light of that universal awareness, that his ear might be uncircumcised, dulled by sins, until it can by no means heed the voice of God calling powerfully from the midst of the elevated moral wealth, which encompasses the entirety of eternal worlds.

But if only a good thought of once more being sanctified and purified from all sin rises upon his heart, then his eye is opened and his ear grows keen. And the voice of God powerfully calls to him from the entire totality of worlds to transcend the dwelling places of darkness and to rise with that great spiritual elevation that is fitting for his great responsibility over all being, which is spread out before him.

**

The knowledge that man is the central meaning of all reality expands his moral responsibility and arouses his desire to do great things.

After the form of the physical world has been made great by means of many revelations, then [our] knowledge presents us with free rule in the form of man. And this revelation [within man] is the most elevated concentrated essence of being. This is because life is certainly the concentrated essence of insensible reality. And the concentrated essence of life is free rule, which comes to the height of its strength when it unifies with the absolute good, and as it appearance in actuality in the most possible form.

Orot Hakodesh, pp. 63-64

It Breaks Walls of Bronze...

by Rav Avraham Yitzchak Kook

Our soul is great, strong and mighty. It breaks walls of bronze, it bursts mountains and hills. It is infinitely broad, it must spread out. It is impossible for it to shrink.

Over all our twelve million Jewish souls on all their levels, in all their ascents and descents, on all the hills that they have climbed and in all the valleys into which they have descended, in all the heights of the city where they stand at the very pinnacle, in all the burrows where they hid from the oppression of disgrace and shame, toil and affliction, in all of them, in all of them our soul spreads, it embraces them all, it revives and encourages them all, it returns them all to the site of the house of our life.

“Who are these that fly like a cloud and like doves to their cotes” (Isaiah 60:8).

Chadarav, p. 190

The Avocado Sandwich of History

by Yaacov Dovid Shulman

The restaurant was serving
The avocado sandwich of history.
It was enriched by slices of hard-boiled egg.
Hard-boiled men came swaggering through the swinging doors,
They had neglected to wash their hands.
At the other tables
Families huddled in the dark
Around the light of lone candles,
With grips at their side.

Oh and there was one of the statesmen,
He was ready to order.
His diction was superb.
He asked for a slice of land,
The flank, without fat,
The south done rare,
The north fully broiled—
I could see his guests at the table
With eye patches and bandannas,
Their dinner knives already in their hands,…
What a meal!
They chewed so loudly,
You could hear the bones snapping
(At the curb, big white trucks with water cannon
Stood ready to clear the spinach from between their teeth).

A flood of sudsy water rolled out from the kitchen,
History is over, cried the janitor,
But they kept on eating,
Their eyes gleamed in the light that burned from candles
Made of scrolls and words and buried desires,
And the radio chattered so loudly
With static and brute phrases
And stale laughter and sports figures
That everyone else in the restaurant
Gazed with despair at their flambeaux.
And the hair of the statesmen grew thicker and whiter,
And whatever they said was transcribed onto paper napkins
And immediately transported to the kitchen,
As, in a corner of the restaurant,
Two health inspectors were wrestling on the ground
(Each one wanted to be in charge,
They disagreed vigorously with each other’s methods),
And one of the crew called for deviled eggs,
And from a dark table
A meek sheep-faced man sibilantly asked for angel food cake
And closed his eyes and chewed silently.

And to my immense surprise, the restaurant stayed open.
The sun had long since set,
It should have been time for breakfast.
Where were the truckers, bringing fresh eggs and fresh bread?

I am sitting in the restaurant still,
The statesmen are squabbling over scraps of squab,
They are leaning over and biting the corpse of a horse
Lying on a bed of rice,
They are dragging other patrons’ tables to themselves
And sweeping off the ratatouille.
More statesmen have been invited to the feast,
They keep pouring into the restaurant,
Mafiosi with shiny cheekbones,
Two sheiks riding camels,
The Queen of Spain (they had to exhume her,
And she is still brushing clumps of earth from her eye sockets),
Make room for Hugo (I love his smile),
There’s Ahmadinejad, he’s got his own table,
And three thousand centrifuges are wheeled out from the kitchen,
There’s the fellow without a chin, with the weak mustache,
He’s banging his fork and demanding service,
And the maitre d’, in a star-spangled top hat
Is racing back and forth, pointing out seats,
But no one is paying him any mind
(Except for the King of Saudi Arabia,
Who sticks a five dollar bill up his nose)
And the wine waiter comes out
With a map of the world folded over his arm
And a bottle of aquifer water
That he swiped from a silent table,
And there is Condi,
“I have organized this special evening!”
But no one paying any attention to her,
They are watching Ehud Olmert tap-dancing,
He is wearing a bear costume and singing mah yafit,
As the head of the Israeli Tax Authority is picking pockets,
The Minister of Defense is looking through capped binoculars,
The Minister of Justice has cornered one of the waitresses,
The Chief of Staff is on his cell phone, trading stock options,
The head of the opposition is giving a speech
(He is standing on top of his rivals to make himself taller),
Yosef Beilin is greeted warmly, he is wearing his rubber mask,
Stalin or Chirac (it’s hard to tell which),
Oh and there’s Shimon,
He’s casting handfuls of rose petals and singing of a new Middle—
Oof! That clumsy oaf Mubarak has knocked him down again!
Olmert is still dancing,
His big eyes are solemn, he is tired, he says, of winning dance contests,
But “Dance, varmint!” shouts that gun-slinger, Abbas,
Two million rounds of ammunition are slung around his neck.
The president of Malaysia has been invited as well,
And the washer women of Dubai,
The hat check girl from Casablanca shows up
And the plenipotentiary of Brazil,
For this dinner must not be allowed to fail,
Condoleeza Rice is still yelling in the corner,
For we all have a stake!

Ehud Olmert is being wheeled into the kitchen,
The crowd stares at the door
(The Minister for the Environment looks carefully around,
As he riffles through wallets).
Out pops Olmert, he is dragging a sacrificial lamb,
The hubbub starts up again.

When I sneak out of the restaurant, it is four in the morning,
The stars are still shining, the moon is waning and waxing like crazy,
I turn on the car radio, Shlomo Carlebach is singing.
Oh I hope this is a tune I haven’t heard before!

Who Are These That Fly

by Rav Avraham Yitzchak Kook

Our soul is great, strong and mighty. It breaks walls of bronze, it bursts mountains and hills. It is infinitely broad, it must spread out. It is impossible for it to shrink.

Over all our twelve million Jewish souls on all their levels, in all their ascents and descents, on all the hills upon they have ascended and in all the valleys into which they have descended, in all the heights of the city where they stand at the very pinnacle, in all the burrows where they hid from the oppression of disgrace and shame, toil and affliction, in all of them, in all of them our soul spreads, it embraces them all, it revives and encourages them all, it returns them all to the site of the house of our life.

“Who are these that fly like a cloud and like doves to their cotes” (Isaiah 60:8).

Chadarav, p. 190

The Statesmen of the World

by Yaacov Dovid Shulman

The statesmen of the world
Are a ragged alley
Where you die alone, without glory.

Our breath has been taken away from us,
Newspapers appear with blurred absences of our faces,
Pompous words parade across the horizon
And crush us with their comedic boots.

We are owls hypnotized by light,
We are sheep hypnotized by grass.

We would prefer to be eaten and torn on the hillside
Than make our arrows drunk with blood,
Our swords consume their prey.

These are our mountains,
These are our children.
They are not nurtured by our tears,
They will not understand our dying.

Each Man in His Tent

The holy R. Yosselle of Yampla served as a rebbe—a gutter yud—even in the lifetime of his father, Rabbeinu, the rebbe, R. Michele, the maggid of Zlotshov.

And it once happened that the news came that the Polish government had passed a decree to expel all of the Jews who resided in the villages.

And so the residents of the villages gathered together to take counsel, and they chose from amongst them two men to travel to the tzaddikim of the generation to pray on their behalf and soften the judgment against them, so that they would not be exiled, heaven forbid, from their income and their homes.

And the two men, the representatives of the village residents, traveled to the holy rebbe, R. Michele. And they put their request before him that he pray to God on their behalf, and they spent the Sabbath there with him. And no doubt the holy rabbi blessed them.

After the Sabbath, they traveled from there and came to the holy R. Yossele, his son. And they also placed their request before him. And they spent the Sabbath with him as well.

And at the Friday night meal, as he sat at his holy table and the other people sat before him, the messengers also sat at the table. And he began to recite the Sabbath song, Kol M’kadesh Sh’vi’i:

Whoever sanctifies the seventh, as is fitting for him,
Whoever keeps the Sabbath properly so as not to violate it,
His reward is exceedingly great, in accordance with his deed,
Each man in his tent, and each man alongside his pennant.

And he said, as if to himself, “What is the meaning of these words? We have to look at this carefully.

“One, why does the author repeat his idea in different words? First, ‘whoever sanctifies the seventh,’ and afterwards ‘whoever keeps the Sabbath’—they seem to be saying be the same thing. Why did he repeat the same idea in different words?

“The verse states ‘as is fitting for him,’ and then ‘whoever keeps the Sabbath properly so as not to violate it.’

“Then it states, ‘his reward is exceedingly great’—meaning, greater than if a person just keeps the law. But then it ends, ‘in accordance with his deed’—meaning that he did no more than keep the law. So that seems to be a contradiction.

“And as to the conclusion of the stanza too: ‘each man in his camp and each man alongside his pennant’—what does that have to do with the preceding lines?”

The holy rebbe explained that there are two levels. The first is a high and elevated level, when a person sanctifies even the seventh hour of the day. And just as the day of the Sabbath, the seventh day, sanctifies the six days of the week that precede it, so too this person sanctifies all of the hours of the day, for the seventh hour sanctifies the six hours that precede it. And on every day of the week he acts in this holy way, sanctifying the seventh hour in such a way that the seventh hour sanctifies the six preceding hours.

And there is a second, lower level: that a person sanctifies the Sabbath day itself so as not to violate it, heaven forbid, so that the seventh day is sanctified, in contrast to the six days of the week. And that level is of course lower.

And that is the meaning of the author of this song.

“Whoever sanctifies the seventh as is fitting for him.” By sanctifying the seventh hour, he sanctifies all the hours of the entire day. And that is of course “fitting for him.” To be on such a high level is certainly fitting for an individual—it is not expected of everyone.

“Whoever keeps the Sabbath properly so as not to violate it”—i.e., the second level, that this person keeps the day of the Sabbath so as not to violate it, which is the level of all good Jews.

“His reward is exceedingly great.” That refers to the person on the first level, who sanctifies everything and not just the Sabbath. “His reward is exceedingly great,” going beyond the letter of the law.

And so “in accordance with his deed.” That is, that whatever he says and decrees with his mouth, so will he accomplish. His voice will be heard in heaven that thus will it be.

And the rebbe concluded, “Thus, I say, ‘Each man in his camp and each man alongside his pennant’—meaning, that no Jew will move from his place.”

No one at the table understood what these words were about except for those two messengers, who understood clearly that he was speaking for them, and that he had issued his decree for them.

And after the Sabbath, when they came to the holy rebbe to take their leave, he blessed them and promised them that with God’s help, they would not be moved from their place, and that the government’s decree would be annulled, just as he had decreed on Friday night in speaking of the stanza of Kol M’kadesh.

And the messengers truly believed that his judgment of their case would stand in heaven.

And they returned and came to his honorable father, the holy rebbe, R. Michele, and told him all of this about his holy son.

He rejoiced greatly at this and said, ‘Behold, ‘greater is the power of the son than that of the father.’ His decree is accepted in the upper world. I did not give you a blessing, for at the time of my blessing, I was not completely sure. Now it is clear to me that his blessing has been accepted, with his judgment in heaven above, and so you may be assured that all of the judgments against you will be nullified, and you will not moved from the place of your sustenance, with the help of Hashem, be He blessed.”

And so it was.

Sipurei Tzaddikim, number 49

If You Take Down the Bricks

by Yaacov Dovid Shulman

If you take down the bricks of this flying tower one by one,
These bricks with which so many have been stoned,
These brickbats of thoughts concealed in windy towers,
These towers on sandy plains
Where princesses with great coils of hair cried,
Where princes climbed the narrow bridges of their tresses,
Where the kites of their imaginings whirled out of control in the sky,
Where the sun shone on the jerboa, who was hustling home with the news
Of new food to his mewling children,
Who writhed in the darkness like naked fingers,
Who basked in each others’ warmth and moistness.
The moistness in my bones causes my flesh to melt,
It causes the room to melt, that man with the pasty face
And my thoughts and my eyes and my ears and my shoes
And the whiteness behind the whiteness
And all the niggling boxes of my words
And the little cages where discontented gerbils mutter grievously.
Change just one eyeball every week,
One ear, one conscience, one brainpan,
One kneecap, one set of veins on the back of your hand,
Your children are sleeping in their warm small imaginations
And they seek the feel of your new limbs.

We Yearn to be Filled with Greatness

Our goal is always directed not only to be redeemed from the narrow straits, not only to be healed of wounds and to be saved from sicknesses, not only to emerge from the conditions of poverty and from the dark of blindness—no!

A thirst to [do away with the] negative in itself depresses the spirit and does not give satisfaction to life.

It is not for this that we were brought into being by the Creator, He who is good and does good, the compassionate Father, the Source of all lovingkindness, all love and all compassion.

Rather, we yearn to be filled with greatness, great contentment in the soul, a fresh life filled with illumination in every corners to which we turn, Eden and infinite pleasure in every breath that we breathe, a never-sufficient youthfulness from the Source of the life of all worlds.

You, only You, Hashem—I seek Your greatness, I hope for it and I aspire to it.
And we come to the land of Israel, and we hope for deliverance, and we long for the redemption of the soul—but not to be saved from the chains of exile, not to escape the deformities of its sufferings that cause us to wear away.

No! Infinitely more than that—[we come] for the sake of revealing all of the light, for the sake of causing the streams of eternal life to flow from the Source of the holy of holies, from the Source of Israel, from the Source of [Israel’s] supernal soul, from the Source of that delightful love, [which comes from] the Rock of Ages, Who illumines for us with rays of glory a lovely land, the holy land, the land of life and the land of light.

“My soul longs and indeed expires for the courtyards of Hashem, my heart and my flesh will sing to the living God.”

How fortunate we are, we are blessed and fortunate with an eternal happiness and an exalted eternity.

“Fortunate are you Israel, who is like you, a nation saved by Hashem.”

Fortunate are you, [nation of] Israel, fortunate are you, fortunate are you.

Chadarav, 200-201