By the Grace of G‑d, Chai Elul, 5653 (1893)1
“Fifty Gates of Understanding were created in the world, and they were all given, except for one” (Rosh HaShanah 21b). This statement calls for an explanation: What is it intended to teach us?
The root ((ברא of the verb נִבְרְאוּ, which means “were created,” also implies revelation. (This additional meaning of the above root appears in the course of a Talmudic discussion as to which blemishes invalidate shechitah. The Gemara writes there2 that if a thorn is found inside the esophagus of a slaughtered animal, there is no need to be afraid that it perforated the esophagus and found its way outside, [thus revealing its presence].) Our opening quotation above is thus intended to teach us that the revelation – the understanding – of Divine wisdom must be brought about by avodas ha’adam, by mortal effort.
This is also seen in a teaching of the Sages on the verse, [“G‑d blessed the seventh day and made it holy, for on that day He rested from all His work which G‑d created to perfect.”3 [The last few words of that verse in the Holy Tongue – אֲשֶׁר בָּרָא אֱלֹקִים לַעֲשׂוֹת – literally mean “which G‑d created to make,” or “which G‑d created to do.”] The above understanding of the last word (which means “to perfect”) is given by the Sages,4 for every created thing in the world needs to be perfected.
The two words in the opening statement – nivre’u ba’olam (“were created in the world”) – can thus be understood to mean that the things of This World should be revealed by mortal avodah, by the revelation of the Fifty Gates of Understanding which comes about by toiling in one’s study of the Torah.
Let us consider this in depth. The Sages teach: “R. Yannai said that the Torah’s words were not given in a clear-cut [and uncompounded] manner;5 rather, they comprise 49 ‘pure’ levels and 49 ‘impure’ levels.”6 Accordingly, the Sages taught that “if one is found worthy,7 the Torah serves him as an elixir of life; if he is not found worthy, for him it becomes a potion of death.”8 When a person is aware that the Torah is the Word of G‑d and hence is precious, he is privileged to attain the “seventy levels of the Torah.”9 (If, by contrast, he is not found worthy,7 but regards the Torah merely as an intellectual exercise, without considering that it is G‑d’s Torah,10 for him it becomes a potion of death.) By mastering the 49 levels of the Torah, one links the 49 (mem-tes) Gates of Understanding with the nun, the Fiftieth Gate.
To examine this more closely: The 49 Gates of Understanding and the Fiftieth Gate correspond respectively to the two levels of the Torah that are alluded to metaphorically in the verse, “May my teaching come down like rain, may my speech drip like dew.”11 The 49 Gates of Understanding are attainable by means of an arousal that a mortal initiates from below, which in turn calls forth an arousal from Above12 – like rain.13 The Fiftieth Gate, by contrast, is the dew of the Torah,14 [for “dew is never withheld”15]. These two levels appear in a certain sequence. As a result of one’s avodah in mastering the 49 levels of the Torah, which are the 49 Gates of Understanding, the Fiftieth Gate is linked to them as a gift from Above. If one does not engage in studying Torah he is ailing, for want of the Fiftieth Gate, and the reason it is lacking is that he did not draw down the 49 Gates to his full capacity. True, the numerical value of חוֹלֶה (“ailing”) is 49.16 Nevertheless, that numerical equivalence suffices to make the point that since the 50 is incomplete, this means that something was also lacking in the preceding 49. If not, why is the 50 incomplete? After all, it should have followed spontaneously.
This can be understood in terms of avodah. As is well known, the Fiftieth Gate links Chochmah17 and Binah,18 which represent Ayin19 and Yesh20 respectively, and also correspond to the faculties of sight and hearing. The connection between Chochmah and sight is hinted at in the teaching of the Sages, “Who is wise? He who sees [the consequences of his actions].”21 The connection between Chochmah22 and sight is also hinted at in the verse, “[The Tribe of Gad] saw to it that it should receive the first [portion of the inheritance of the Land].”23 The connection between Binah and hearing is hinted at in the verse, “The ear discerns [i.e., understands] words.”24
Accordingly, the bittul of a person who has attained the level of Chochmah is a sense of utter self-nullification, untrammeled by any awareness of his own existence, of his own metzius.25 This is the level of Ayin. In contrast, the [lesser] bittul of a person who has attained the level of Binah is the nullification of one’s sense of Yesh to a perception of Ayin.
Here, too, lies the distinction between the bittul attained by studying Torah and the bittul attained by davenen. Prayer is basically meditation, hisbonenus, which brings about only a nullification of one’s Yesh. The Torah, by contrast, is the very Word of G‑d, as in the phrase, “My words which I have placed in your mouth.”26 If, by way of analogy, one sees words that had proceeded from the mouth of his king, he feels utterly nullified, as if he were actually standing in the royal presence, because these are words that proceeded from the king’s mouth. The same is true of the utter nullification of a person’s very essence27 that he experiences when he studies Torah, for the Torah is the very Word of G‑d. This degree of bittul resembles the actual perception of G‑d’s Being28 that is attained by Chochmah.
This recalls a teaching of the Sages: “Just as there, [at Sinai, we received the Torah] in dread and awe, trembling and quaking,”29 because [the first two commandments,] ‘I am the L‑rd your G‑d…’ and ‘You shall have no other…,’ we heard from the Mouth of the Mighty One, so too now [should we receive the Torah] in dread and awe, trembling and quaking.”30 This Torah that we now study is the Word of G‑d, which Moshe received at Sinai, and which reached us via the tanna’im and amora’im. Thus, a basic principle in the study of the Torah is that it should be studied without being conscious of oneself, in the spirit of the verse, “May my tongue echo Your speech”31 – “like a person who [merely] repeats what the Reader [of the Torah] has read aloud.”32
If, by contrast, the Torah is not studied in this manner – that is, when it is not studied with the bittul, the self-effacement, that proceeds from sight – the Fiftieth Gate is lacking. And a person whose study suffers from that lack is ailing: he is a חוֹלֶה, for the gematria of that word is 49.
The ailment of a person in that state is mild, though a person can also be grossly ill. As the Sages teach, “Illness – that is the Evil Inclination.”33 If a person follows the counsel of his Yetzer Hara, then even if he does so within the realm of that which is permitted, he is nevertheless even more seriously ill inasmuch as he does not nullify his preoccupation with his ego.34 By following the whims of his heart and being drawn towards material things which become so important to him that he eventually perceives them as absolute essentials, he comes to regard himself as a self-sufficient and egocentric entity,35 until he becomes really coarsened.
This, too, indicates that something is lacking in his Torah study, for the Torah is called “strength” and “counsel,”36 strength for the G‑dly soul and counsel for the animal soul. In the words [that the Sages cite in the first person, as if spoken by G‑d], “I created the Evil Inclination, and I also created a remedy37 to temper it – the Torah.”38 Likewise, “If that contemptible individual (i.e., the Evil Inclination) encounters you, draw him along to the beis midrash, to the house of Torah study. Then, even if he is made of stone, he will disintegrate,”39 meaning that even if a person’s heart is as blocked as a heart of stone, it will be softened [by the light of the Torah].
In this spirit, the Torah is also likened to water, as in the verse, “Ho, all you who are thirsty, go to the water!”40 Just as successive drops of water eventually pierce a stone, so too the study of Torah secures the fulfillment of the Divine promise that “I shall remove the heart of stone from your body and give you a heart of flesh.”41 And since the study of Torah is able to remove the Evil Inclination from a person, it is obvious that if from the outset he had studied as he ought to have studied, he would not have been trapped in its net. If, instead of studying with the proper mindset, he was (G‑d forbid) drawn after the Evil Inclination even with regard to permissible matters – indulging in food, for example, only because he yearns for the physical pleasure that it provides – he thereby deteriorates from one downfall to the next, to wherever the Evil Inclination leads him.
To begin with, it chills a person’s ardor in various ways, so that he catches cold, so to speak.42 This ailment is the frigidity that [the kelipah of] Amalek brings upon his soul,43 so that he begins to question, “Who says that such-and-such is the case?” This in turn weakens his observance of the Torah and the mitzvos. His frigidity can take him even further, so that he considers that a particular occurrence just happened, and was not determined by hashgachah peratis, Divine Providence. This path can lead him to being caught up in desiring forbidden things – and at this stage he is dangerously ill.
It can happen that even people who engage in the study of Torah and in avodah do not devote due attention to distancing themselves from material pursuits that are not necessities. The outcome is that frigidity can tackle them, too, in their context. To cite the metaphor of the Sages, “A donkey, even in the Tammuz season, feels chilly.”44 Tammuz is the month in which the heat of the sun is felt most intensely, and hence, in terms of avodah, it stands for yichuda ila’ah,45in the spirit of the verse, “For Havayah Elokim is a sun and a shield.”46 The sun represents the Name Havayah, as in the verse, “And the truth of Havayah is everlasting.”47 This implies true knowledge. After all, it is possible that a person can meditate on the concept of yichuda ila’ah, contemplating how “everything before Him is as naught,”48 and how, [citing the Word of G‑d,49] “I am the first and I am the last, and apart from Me there is [absolutely] no G‑d,” and how “I am G‑d: I have not changed [at all], yet you, the sons of Yaakov, have not expired [out of a sheer love of G‑d]!”50 [And this is surprising,] because all the worlds, including even the loftiest, are a mere reflection [of their Maker], and in fact have no real existence of their own, because “everything before Him is as naught.”
Nevertheless, even though this person has meditated on all the above concepts, he still, [like the above donkey in the summer,] feels chilly. All of his meditation has no effect on him: it leaves him cold. And precisely this is what amazes the prophet: Since “I am G‑d: I have not changed,” how is it possible that “you, the sons of Yaakov, have not expired [out of your all-consuming love of G‑d]?”
This is the message of the metaphor – that a donkey, even in the peak heat of the Tammuz season, feels chilly. All of this can happen to a person because he allowed himself to be led along by the Evil Inclination. If instead he studies Torah as it ought to be studied – like Yissachar who, like a strong-boned donkey, bent his shoulder to bear the yoke of studying Torah51 – he will not become (so to speak) the donkey of “the Other Side,”52 the donkey that personifies frigidity [in response to spiritual stimuli].
Spiritual decline53 becomes possible when a person is drawn after the incitement of his Evil Inclination, and thereby becomes either a loser, a yored,54 or worse, an utter failure, a nofel.55 The yored loses ground level by level, and at least realizes that he is losing ground; the nofel, by contrast, relapses utterly. The yored at least observes certain positive mitzvos – he puts on tefillin and observes Shabbos and kashrus and so on, and likewise keeps his distance from certain prohibitions. Moreover, even though his lapses in the observance of positive and prohibitive mitzvos become more frequent, he has occasional moments of regret – except that he lacks the strength that is needed to stand his ground, to flee from the snare of his Evil Inclination, and to throw off its yoke. His decline thus proceeds from stage to stage.
The relapse of the nofel, by contrast, casts him down utterly, “from a lofty roof to a deep pit.”56 He utterly casts off the yoke of the mitzvos, and sometimes even acts in intentional defiance of the Torah. This all began from his failure to set limits to the growing influence of the Evil Inclination over permitted matters, for had he done so, he would never have become a yored or a nofel. The reason that he neglected to do so is that he was more preoccupied with bodily matters and with business than with Torah study. This would apply even more strongly if he engaged in the study of secular disciplines,57 which effectively cool the soul’s ardor for G‑dly matters.
His remedy is first to do teshuvah, and thereafter to become involved in Torah and mitzvos. In his case, teshuvah requires that he persuade himself to undertake a comprehensive reprogramming58 that will enable him to take leave of his former situation, that is, to take leave of all the things to which he had been bound. This is required even if they were not forbidden matters (G‑d forbid), but were merely not geared for the sake of Heaven;59 that is, they were not intended to enable him to better engage in the service of the Creator. Moreover, they prevent him from sensing the Divine light in the Torah and the mitzvos. All in all, he must muster the strength to break free of the restraints imposed by This-Worldly matters.
The above sequence echoes the phrase, “[The King of Egypt was told] that the people had fled.”60 This took place at the very moment of the Exodus. Previously, when they were in Egypt, they were deeply sunk in “the 49 Gates of Impurity.”61 They began their Exodus by fleeing from the evil of Egypt, and only then did they embark on the avodah of sorting and refining62 the neutral materiality of This World. This is the spiritual meaning of the Counting of the Omer and the successive journeys that followed it.
Likewise, an individual must first of all undertake a comprehensive reprogramming and break free of all preceding evil. This will enable him to come close to Elokus by studying Torah and observing mitzvos with the exuberance of his Divine soul’s sensitivity to Elokus, and to monitor and refine his animal soul and his natural attributes. He must thus begin with teshuvah in order to break free of the restraints that hold him back – and everyone knows within himself what obstacles inhibit his progress in the avodah of davenen and Torah and mitzvos.
When, after having done teshuvah, a person studies Torah, the light of G‑d will shine within him, to refine his soul. Likewise with his performance of mitzvos, which are called “garments.” Like a physical garment that protects a person from the cold, each mitzvah that he performs causes a transcendent light63 to illumine his soul, and brings him closer to Elokus. In this spirit it is written, “Your righteousness will proceed before you, and the glory of G‑d will gather you in.”64 This implies that as a result of a person’s avodah he is subsumed in Elokus, and is thus the very opposite of being chilled. The same happens when he studies Torah, which itself is a mitzvah, and which also generates an or pnimi, an immanent Divine light. This is why Torah and mitzvos protect one from the cold – provided that they are preceded by teshuvah.
We can now better appreciate the above teaching that “Fifty Gates of Understanding were created in the world.” True, the Torah comprises only 49 “pure” levels and 49 “impure” levels. However, the above-mentioned “seventy levels of the Torah” include its innermost, mystical (literally, “secret”) dimension.65 This calculation is hinted at by the numerical value of the word סוֹ"ד (“secret”), which is 70. The revealed level of the Torah has 49 aspects, and since the world was created by means of the Torah, there should have been only 49 Gates of Understanding in the world. This is whyour opening teaching66 seeks to make the point that although “fifty Gates of Understanding were created in the world,” even the loftiest tzaddikim were granted no more than 49 – while the fiftieth Gate of Understanding can be drawn down only by means of one’s avodah.
