אַאַמוּ"ר אָמַר: אַ חֲסִידִישׁעֶר וואָרט מאַכט קלאָר דִי קאָפּ אוּן רֵיין דִי האַרץ. אַ חֲסִידִישׁעֶ הַנְהָגָה טוֹבָה מאַכט לִיכטִיג אִין שׁטוּבּ. אַ חֲסִידִישׁעֶר נִגּוּן שְׁטאַרקט דִי תִּקְוָה וּבִטָחוֹן בְּרֵיינגט שִׂמְחָה אוּן שְׁטעֶלט אַוועֶק דִי הוֹיז מִיט דעֶר הוֹיז געֶזִינד אִין קֶרֶן אוֹרָה.

My revered father, the Rebbe [Rashab], once said: “A chassidic teaching1 clears one’s mind and cleanses one’s heart. A positive chassidic practice lights up one’s home. A chassidic melody2 strengthens one’s hope and trust, brings joy, and positions the home and the entire household in a ray of light.”3

To Fill In the Background

A wholesome environment provides the soil in which spiritual development can flourish. In 5734 (1974), the Rebbe actively began to encourage people to enrich their homes by filling them with Torah works. Thus was born a new addition to the growing list of mitzvah-campaigns that are known as mivtza’im. Now, the mitzvah of Torah study had already been designated as one of the mivtza’im. The intent of the new initiative was to light up the spiritual environment within the home.

The Rebbe initially named this campaign bayis maleh sefarim — “a house full of books.” Soon after, he added two words to this name — Yavneh vechachameha (“Yavneh and its sages”). The message was clear. When Jerusalem was languishing under Roman siege, one of the requests that R. Yochanan ben Zakkai made of Vespasian was that the scholarly town of Yavneh and its sages be spared from extinction.4 And indeed, despite the destruction of the Beis HaMikdash soon after, the tradition of Torah scholarship survived the Roman exile.

When we fill our homes with positive influences such as those mentioned above, we create a setting that enables us to express the latent goodness that we all possess.