Chapter 20

Yud-Beis Tammuz: A Fragment

From the talks of Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak of Lubavitch; translated by Uri Kaploun

1 2 At this farbrengen, the Rebbe shared many recollections of his imprisonment, though not of its outward manifestations. Rather, he spoke of his spiritual experiences at the time. As he explained, a person in such a predicament taps into his latent potentials, namely, the capacity for self-sacrifice.3

At this farbrengen the Rebbe Rayatz also delivered a maamar on the words, Maayan ganim, be’er mayim chaim.4 The maamar points out that even the cosmic Divine power that is revealed by the constantly-renewed creation of worlds does not match the lofty degree of Divine power that is drawn down by avodah that is fueled by mesirus nefesh.

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Footnotes

Anniversary of the miraculous liberation of the Rebbe Rayatz from incarceration and capital sentence in Leningrad in 1927. He had been sentenced for his “counterrevolutionary activities,” i.e., for initiating and maintaining a countrywide network of underground melamdim, shochtim, mikvaos, and the like. (See his Likkutei Dibburim in Eng. translation, Vol. 4, p. 141ff.)

To this day, the twelfth of Tammuz is celebrated by chassidim as a festival of thanksgiving and reinvigoration.

From a letter written by R. Yechezkel (“Chatshe”) Feigin.

Another letter by the same writer adds that the Rebbe Rayatz spoke about the avodah that grows out of this uncovering of one’s potential for mesirus nefesh. It was this, he said, that the Baal Shem Tov had in mind, in the classic teaching that the Alter Rebbe relayed in his name. [In Tehillim 63:2 it is written, צָמְאָה לְךָ נַפְשִׁי – “My soul thirsts for You….”] The Baal Shem understands the first phrase in the following verse – כֵּן בַּקֹּדֶשׁ חֲזִיתִיךָ – as a wish of yearning: “If only when in the Holy [Sanctuary] I would be able to behold You as one can now behold You, by reason of the intense yearning (ratzo) of the soul that is embodied (as the verse goes on to say) “in a parched and weary land, without water.”

On this teaching, see Likkutei Torah on Shemini Atzeres, p. 92b, et al.

Shir HaShirim 4:15.