A Discourse by Rav Dov Baer, The Great Maggid of Mezerich

Dear Friends,
Back from vacation. The Cape was great, Bob Dylan was awesome, and I don’t mean to brag, but the trees in Massachusetts were noble and vibrant. The Americans have many fine roads and many full shopping malls. But we have it all here in Israel, beautiful trees, fine roads, and shopping centers. Really the only difference is that in the US it is great, but it isn’t ours. Here in Israel, God gave it to us. He made it ours.


Parshas Ci Teitse


Teaching of the Great Maggid, , (Maggid Devarav L’Yaakov, “rimzei Torah”, page 110 [55b]) Everything in parenthesis are my own additions.

“You shall surely send away the mother bird, and take the chicks for yourself.”

Rav Yisrael Baal Shem Tov explained the Gemara “convert me on the condition that you teach me the entire Torah while I stand on one leg.” Man is a portion of God on high. (Man’s soul is Godly, and flows from the Eternal.) But concerning the Eyn Sof (the Eternal), you cannot describe it as being divided into parts. God fills all of the worlds, and this happens on its own accord and independent of the influence of man’s service. (In Hebrew we say, it happens, “mimeile,” or by itself.)

Sometimes a man descends into low and despicable states of being, and there he entertains vain fancies. “God tests the righteous,” (Tehilim, 11:5) meaning that God is giving man a test, a mission, and this mission involves sending him to evil states of being in order to raise the inner sustaining vitality hidden within such states back up the Holy One, blessed be He. God esteems this test and mission very highly. Therefore, even if a man gets to a place of evil, he needs to understand that it is all for the good.

When Rabbi Akiva was traveling in the wilderness, and his fire went out, and a lion ate his donkey, all he said was, “this is also only for the good.” And truly, all of his troubles were only for his benefit, as his “misfortunes” saved him from being attacked by bandits. This is, “convert me on the condition that you teach me the entire Torah while I stand on one leg.” “While I am standing on one leg,” means “while I am always on a good level.” (The potential convert wanted to know the mystery of the inner orientation of all experience. "Standing on one leg," meaning, "I want to see what my experience stands on, what supports it. I want to know as much as I am allowed to how God holds up my world." When one looks deep inside, usually when he views his experience in retrospect, or if his faith is strong it could even be in real time, he will see the deep purpose that God has in the situations God puts him in. The principle is that God always wants mans benefit and amelioration. Yet since God’s light is hidden and does not show His hand, we experience suffering. Even if the Chassid follows the path with a pure heart and indeed reaches enlightenment, he will still experience trials and tribulation, but he will know how to deal with them, and keep his mind and heart on the big picture. He will have, “mochin d’gadlut,” an expanded consciousness. This will allow him to see the purpose in everything that happens to him.)

Rabbi Akiva’s answer to the potential convert was, “that which you find evil, don’t do to someone else.” He was saying, “in life, you have to deal with descents into evil.” A good man has to fall in order to raise another up. (In Chassidus we say, “if you come upon a man whose wagon is stuck in the mud, you have to get into the mud in order to help him out.”) And Rabbi Akiva was the son of converts, and after all, he was, so to speak, “uprooting mountains and grinding them together,” with his avodah and his Torah. “Mountains,” hints at the middos. (These are the seven lower sefirot, the source of life’s contradictions, conflicts, as well as mediation and resolution.) Mountains are also hinting at the Patriarchs. (The Patriarchs – Avraham, Yitschak, and Yaakov – are compared to mountains, based on a similarity in the Hebrew words for mountains and parents, “hareem” and “horeem”. So the “mountains” are also the middos, the sefiros of love as exemplified by the attributes of Avraham, fear as exemplified by the attributes of Yitschak, and Tiferet – Beauty, Balance, and Pride, as exemplified by the attributes of Yaakov.) He raised the middos up on high. (This means he raised up all the behavioral contradictions in life up to the realm of Wisdom, Understanding, and Consciousness, where difficulties and judgments can be sweetened by the power of the intellect. “Uprooting mountains and grinding them together” means deep introspection into God’s final purpose in all events that He deals out to man in His infinite and hidden wisdom. ) It was a greater delight since he was the son of converts (Here the great Maggid says, “It is like the well-known parable,” but it is not known to me. Perhaps since Rabbi Akiva was the son of converts he saw how he was raising up the level of mankind by living the Torah.) This is, “be silent, for this is how it rose up in My mind.” That is to say, he brought everything up to the level of thought.

(The Great Maggid is referring to the following story from the Talmud, Menachot, 29b. Rab Judah said in the name of Rab, When Moses ascended on high he found the Holy One, blessed be He, engaged in affixing crowns to the letters. (“Crowns,” or “thorns,” are slight vertical ink strokes drawn on the top of many of the 22 Hebrew letters.) Said Moses, ‘Lord of the Universe, Who stays Thy hand?’ (Isn’t Your Torah already perfect? Why do You need to add crowns the letters?) He answered, ‘There will arise a man, at the end of many generations, Akiba son of Joseph by name, who will expound upon each crown heaps and heaps of laws’. ‘Lord of the Universe’, said Moses; ‘permit me to see him’. He replied, ‘Turn thee round’. Moses went (into the future,) and sat down behind eight rows (in Rabbi Akiva’s class.) Not being able to follow their arguments he was ill at ease, but when they came to a certain subject and the disciples said to the master ‘Whence do you know it?’ and the latter replied ‘It is a law given unto Moses at Sinai’ he was comforted. Thereupon he returned to the Holy One, blessed be He, and said, ‘Lord of the Universe, Thou hast such a man and Thou givest the Torah by me!’ He replied, ‘Be silent, for such is My decree’. Then said Moses, ‘Lord of the Universe, Thou hast shown me his Torah, show me his reward’. ‘Turn thee round’, said He; and Moses turned round and saw them weighing out his flesh at the market-stalls. (Rabbi Akiva was martyred by the Romans, his skin flayed from his bones while still alive.) ‘Lord of the Universe’, cried Moses, ‘such Torah, and such a reward!’ He replied, ‘Be silent, for this is how it arose in My thought.’)

This is, ‘send away the mother bird.” Even if the Shechinah (represented by the mother bird) is not hovering above your head. “And take the chicks for yourself,” that you should have the middos of love and fear (even in difficult times. The “offspring” of the Shechina are the real feelings of loving and fearing the Almighty.)