Tzedakah — Simple yet Profound

Another example of this may be found in the mitzvah of tzedakah.

The mitzvah of tzedakah represents a basic and simple good deed. It is an act which anyone may perform and it is certainly one of the initial steps in a person’s Divine service. One can easily help a downtrodden individual by giving him some money, food or some object of minimal value. This seemingly easy and basic good act is alluded to in Chassidic philosophy as “...truly the mitzvah of the L‑rd1,” for it is the act which G‑d performs in giving life to all existence. Therefore it is G‑d’s tzedakah which serves as the source to all Divine radiation and generation. The loftiest influences and the lowliest influences all stem from the tzedakah of the Holy One, Blessed be He, and that comes from the Jew’s observance of tzedakah, when he helps a poor person by giving him [as little as]the amount equivalent to the Biblical perutah coin (a minute amount).

We may draw another illustration from Torah — let us look to the Aleph-Beit which we teach young children. Even before they are able to understand any wisdom of Torah, the letters of Aleph-Beit are taught to toddlers. These same letters combine to form all the words of Torah and all the paths of the devolvement of the world which emerge from the words of creation. More specifically, the letters of the alphabet build words, they are thus a step below the terms that they form, just as bricks are less significant than the building that is formed from bricks, yet at the same time there is an all-encompassing aspect in the letters which transcends words.

We may apply this analogy to the Kaddish phenomenon. It is a form of tzedakah for the soul — to redeem the soul from punishment. The sinful soul is raised only by the pronouncement of the word “Yisgadal...” and this accomplishes a great lift for the soul even though sometimes it is delayed and concealed.