Daily Tanya

The cause of this deficiency is the arrogance of the kelipah of the animal soul, which exalts itself above the holiness of the light of the divine soul so that it obscures and darkens its light.

Therefore, one must crush it and cast it down to the ground, just as in the previously quoted analogy, the beam is splintered so that it will catch fire.

This means that one must crush the sitra achara and cast it to the ground by setting aside appointed times for humbling oneself and considering himself “despicable and contemptible,”4 as it is written.

Now “a broken heart [leads to] a broken spirit,”5 the “spirit” being the sitra achara, which, in the case of beinonim, is the very man himself.

For in his heart, the vital soul which animates the body is in its full strength as it was at birth; hence, it is indeed the very man himself.

With regard to the divine soul within him, it is said: “The soul which You gave within me is pure.”6 The word “(within) me” cannot be understood as referring to the body alone: the body cannot speak for itself as a complete man. Thus, it must refer also to the (animating) soul. Therefore, the words “(which You gave) within me” imply that the man himself who is saying these words is not identified with the “pure soul,” i.e., the divine soul is a thing apart, which has been “placed within” this “me”—the body and animal soul—except in the case of tzaddikim.

With them, the contrary is true: the man himself is the “pure soul,” i.e, the divine soul, while their body is called “the flesh of man,” i.e., secondary to the man himself—the divine soul.