The Rebbe Rashab begins the maamar by raising a number of questions regarding the war against Midian, as described at the end of the Book of Bamidbar. On this backdrop, the maamar launches a discussion of Midian in a mystical sense, identifying it as the spiritual force that spawns strife and disunity. The Rebbe Rashab then focuses on the counterpart of that concept in the personal realm, associating Midian with the feelings of baseless hatred that some people harbor in their hearts. Such hatred arises for no real reason and prevents people from uniting with others.
The force that opposes the spiritual Midian is G‑d’s name Havayah, the Divine power that generates unity and cohesiveness throughout existence. True unity is not uniformity, whereby differing entities come together only because they are alike. Instead, genuine unity inspires harmony and cohesion among diverse entities and even among opposites. The Rebbe Rashab explains that unity and disunity stem respectively from the two opposite mindsets of bittul, self-transcendence, and yeshus, preoccupation with oneself. Something preoccupied with its own yeshus is too self-absorbed to connect with anything else. Only by rising above the self can a person or an entity make room for a person or an entity of a different nature and find their common ground. Broadly speaking, bittul is the defining feature of holiness, while yeshus is the defining feature of kelipah, which is the Kabbalistic term for evil.
The Rebbe Rashab illustrates the contrast between bittul and yeshus by comparing the spiritual worlds of Tohu and Tikkun. Tohu was a mystical realm characterized by powerful spiritual forces driven by a deep yearning for G‑d. However, because each of those component forces was ultimately defined by its sense of self, there was no cooperation between them; they were unable to relate to one another or to function as a cohesive unit.
Ultimately, this malfunction climaxed in a crash; the entire cosmos collapsed in a spiritual cataclysm that gave rise to the disparate, self-driven realm of evil. By contrast, the world of Tikkun is characterized by bittul. Accordingly, the spiritual forces that comprise Tikkun complement one another, producing a stable and balanced environment.
