This letter was sent to a youth — and afterwards to several others — who reached the age of bar mitzvah at that time.

B”H, 28Tammuz, 5710

Greetings and blessings,

Your father wrote that on 11 Tammuz, you became bar mitzvah and requested a blessing. I am granting my blessing — echoing the blessing that would be given by my revered father-in-law, the Rebbe, הכ"מ — that you become a G‑d-fearing person, a chassid, and a scholar. May your parents derive much satisfaction — chassidic satisfaction — from you and their other children amidst prosperity .

My revered father-in-law, the Rebbe, הכ"מ, related that the maamarim recited in association with a bar mitzvah (by the Nesiim) would begin Naaseh Adam (“Let us make man”).1 (At times, when they would give the maamarim to be copied, they would delete the opening.)

Implied is that a bar mitzvah [boy] must know that it is incumbent upon him to attain the distinction of adam, which is the most elevated of the four names for man: adam, ish, gever, and enosh (see HaYom Yom, the entry for 4 Elul, 5703; and sec. 2 of the maamar entitled VaYavo Amalek, 5709, Kuntres 622). One must begin working toward this [objective] immediately rather than leaving it for a later date. [If one applies himself in this manner,] he is granted help [from Above] that he will become an adam. (See Sefer HaToldos, [Admur HaMaharash], p. 64.)3

Certainly you reviewed a chassidic discourse on the day of your bar mitzvah and you recite the Rebbe’s kapitle in Tehillim, which is now kapitle 71 every day, and will continue doing so — without committing yourself to a vow — at least until Rosh HaShanah, 5711.

Signing with blessing,

Rabbi Menachem Schneerson