שוש תשיש ותגל העקרה בקבוץ בניה לתוכה בשמחה

The maamar opens with one of the seven wedding blessings, which asks that the “barren one,” Zion, rejoice as her children are gathered back into her. The Alter Rebbe notes that the verb tasis can be read in two ways; in the first it is intransitive and feminine, so the barren one rejoices by herself.

In the second reading tasis is transitive and addressed to G‑d: “You shall make the barren one rejoice,” and her exulting follows from His act. The parenthesis gives the grammar: in Hebrew the same prefix marks “you” (masculine) and “she,” so the one word can carry either meaning.

Before choosing between the readings, the maamar asks a question about the blessing itself: a barren woman has borne no children, so what children could be “gathered into her midst”? The answer will show how the Community of Israel can be “barren” in a spiritual sense and still have children.

The key is the Talmud’s teaching on the verse that opens the laws of Parshas Tazria (Leviticus 12:2): when the woman emits seed first the child is male, and when the man does so first it is female. The first discourse of Tazria in Likkutei Torah explains this rule through the inclusion of Chesed and Gevurah in each other; here the maamar applies it to the bond between the Community of Israel and G‑d.

The maamar now applies the Talmud’s rule to the service of G‑d. The Community of Israel, the collective soul of the Jewish people, is the “woman,” and G‑d is the “man,” as Hosea foretells that Israel will call G‑d Ishi, “my Husband,” literally “my man” (Hosea 2:18).

In the human analogy the child is male when the woman emits seed first. In the same way, when the Community of Israel, the “woman,” takes the first step toward G‑d, the result is a “male” birth.

The woman’s seeding first is the arousal from below: a person’s own striving upward, like the “desire toward your husband” in Genesis 3:16. Kabbalah calls it the raising of mayin nukvin, “feminine waters,” which calls forth mayin duchrin, “masculine waters,” the flow from above; when the arousal from above answers an arousal from below in this way, a male is born.

The “male” born of this union is a love in the souls of Israel called great love (ahavah rabbah). It speaks in the Psalmist’s words “Whom have I in heaven? And with You I desire nothing” (Psalms 73:25), which the Alter Rebbe reads as wanting nothing at all, not even what is “with You,” close to G‑d, but only G‑d Himself.

The verse “For with You is the source of life” (Psalms 36:10) shows what is “with You”: the life of the World to Come, the G‑dly delight that souls in Gan Eden enjoy through their wondrous comprehension of G‑d. In Likkutei Torah, Beshalach (1c), the Alter Rebbe explains that “with You” is not G‑d’s very essence but His Name, the Infinite Light, included in Him like the sun’s light within the sun.

However exalted, what the souls grasp reaches only the level of “with You”: something secondary to G‑d and nullified before Him, not G‑d Himself, for, as the Tikkunei Zohar says, “no thought can grasp Him at all.” What they grasp in Gan Eden is only the “radiance of the Shechinah,” a glow from G‑d’s presence.

The one who has great love therefore says, “With You I desire nothing”: he wants to be nullified and included in the Infinite Light itself, “to be absorbed into the body of the King,” in the Zohar’s phrase. “The body of the King” stands for G‑d’s very essence, far above any radiance; Likkutei Torah, Re’eh (25a), stresses the same words, “the body of the King specifically,” against the reward of Gan Eden, which is only a radiance.

At this level the soul cannot go on “sitting and enjoying the radiance,” as the Talmud describes the righteous in the World to Come (Berachos 17a); instead its very existence is nullified, like a candle’s flame swallowed up in a torch, as Tanya, chapter 19, explains.

In the words of Tanya, chapter 19, the soul longs for this even though it will become “nothing and naught” there. The souls who are “sitting and enjoying” in Gan Eden, by contrast, remain intact, their essence as it was.

Even so, the soul’s will and desire is to be nullified in G‑d’s own essence rather than to enjoy only His radiance. Tanya calls this longing part of the soul’s very nature.

The parenthesis refers to two maamarim of Likkutei Torah. “This matzah” (Parshas Tzav) contrasts the intellect (mochin) of Abba (Chochmah), revealed on Shabbos, with the intellect of Imma (Binah), revealed in the joy of the festivals; “When you come into the land” (Parshas Behar) speaks of the soul that offers itself in prayer, “When a soul brings an offering” (Leviticus 2:1).

Great love is called “male” because the male stands here for a firm mind. The Talmud’s phrase “women’s minds are light” (Shabbos 33b) is used as a category of the soul: the “female” mode is a mind easily swayed, the “male” a bar daas, one whose knowledge is settled.

Great love is “male” because it comes from a strong daas, a firm knowing that chooses what is essential, G‑d Himself, over what is secondary, His radiance, even though the person will then no longer exist as a yesh, a being in its own right; he does not want the secondary, though it would let him remain himself and enjoy the radiance. A Kehot note quotes the Rebbe (Sefer HaMaamarim Melukat, vol. 3, p. 104, note 47): the soul’s longing to be absorbed is a nature above intellect, and the “strong daas” here may mean that this nature acts upon the intellect.

Gan Eden is indeed called “the source of life,” and it is said that all the sufferings of Gehinnom are worth enduring to reach it, recalling Rabbi Meir’s wish for Acher in Chagigah 15b, that he be judged and then come to the World to Come. Even so, it is only “with You”; in Likkutei Torah, Nitzavim (48a), the Alter Rebbe draws the conclusion: if one weeps at losing the delight of the World to Come, which is only a radiance, how much more at the concealment of the Infinite Light itself.

Gan Eden bears no comparison to the Infinite Light. The Talmud (Menachos 29b) says the World to Come was created with the letter yud, the smallest letter, a mere point, and so the whole World to Come is only a “point” beside G‑d.

Since the one with great love wants G‑d Himself, he will not make the secondary, his own enjoyment, into the main thing for his own sake. The Mishnah (Avos 1:3) asks us to serve “not for the sake of receiving a reward (peras),” and the Alter Rebbe hears in peras the word prusah, a mere piece, as in Isaiah’s “to break (paros) your bread for the hungry” (Isaiah 58:7).

Enjoying G‑d’s radiance in Gan Eden is only a “piece” of His light. The one with great love wants instead to be absorbed into G‑d’s essence, where that piece counts as nothing at all, like a drop in the ocean.

By contrast, the “female” birth is ahavah zuta, the lesser love. It loves G‑d in order to receive a reward, the delight of Gan Eden.

The lesser love is a real desire for closeness to G‑d and to cleave to Him. But it wants the soul to remain itself, a distinct being cleaving to G‑d in Gan Eden, rather than to be nullified in Him.

The lesser love is described by “My soul, I have yearned for You” (Isaiah 26:9), which Tanya, chapter 44, explains as yearning for G‑d the way a person yearns for the life of his own soul. Because this love seeks life for oneself, it prefers the reward, the radiance of the World to Come, which was “created with the yud,” a mere point.

A person with this love wants to keep his own existence as a soul. He does not want to be absorbed and nullified in G‑d’s essence like a candle swallowed up in a torch.

The lesser love is therefore called “female,” whose mind is “light”: it makes the secondary, the reward, into the main thing. It serves for the sake of a reward, for its own sake (legarmeih).

The verse ends “in the night,” and the Alter Rebbe reads this as a description of the lesser love itself. It is still “night,” a love of darkness, compared with great love.

The maamar now explains the Talmud’s rule. All the love and awe a person arouses in himself are only an arousal from below, which calls forth love and awe from above, given as an arousal from above; the parenthesis refers to the explanation on “I appeared to Avraham” (Exodus 6:3) and to the Alter Rebbe’s note on Tikkun Chatzos, the midnight lament for the Temple, in his Siddur.

When the arousal from below comes first, a person toils to bring forth love and awe from “the spirit of his understanding,” through his own contemplation. Then the arousal from above comes from a high level: the inner dimension of the light with which the Infinite Light shines into the Community of Israel.

This is the “male” birth: “a spirit from on high is poured out” (Isaiah 32:15), and the love becomes great love, beyond the soul’s own grasp, a desire to be included and absorbed in G‑d.

Sometimes there is no arousal from below at all, and G‑d sends an arousal from above first, to awaken one. This is what the Talmud calls “the man emits seed first.”

An arousal from above that comes without any arousal from below comes only from the outer dimension (chitzoniyus) of the light with which the Infinite One shines.

Such an arousal does awaken some arousal from below in the person, and since both arousals are then present, a “birth” of love does take place; but what is born is only “female,” the lesser love, a love that wants to slake its own thirst for G‑d. It does not reach the point where the soul pours itself out and its comprehension is nullified, like a candle before a torch.

The Zohar on Tazria (3:45a) describes the same pattern: when the Community of Israel arouses her desire first, all is filled from the right side, and when the Holy One, blessed be He, arouses first, all is on the female side. In Likkutei Torah, Bamidbar (6c), on “And the number of the children of Israel shall be” (Hosea 2:1), the Alter Rebbe calls the heavenly voice that calls Israel to return a bas kol, a “daughter” of the voice, because it comes from an arousal from above alone, “the man emits seed first.” In Likkutei Torah, Yom Kippur, on “It is (hu) a Shabbos of complete rest,” the masculine hu is the revelation drawn down when Israel’s own teshuvah comes first, and the feminine hi, written elsewhere, the one drawn by an arousal from above alone.

When the Community of Israel is in the state of “the man emits seed first,” she is called “barren.” Although she does give birth to a “female,” the lesser love, it is as if she had given birth to nothing.

This love did not come from her own arousal from below; it came about only because the arousal from above came first. The birth is therefore not credited to her, and she is called barren.

This is the meaning of the blessing “And the barren one shall exult in the gathering of her children.” Even when the Community of Israel is “barren,” and the arousal from above comes first, she will still have children gathered to her.

Those “children” are a male birth, great love. The blessing’s last words, “in joy,” tell how: through the joy of a mitzvah she can give birth to a male even when “the man emits seed first.”

To explain the power of joy, the maamar cites the warning in the rebuke of Parshas Ki Savo: “Because you did not serve Havayah your G‑d with joy and with gladness of heart … you shall serve your enemies” (Deuteronomy 28:47–48).

Read simply, the verse seems to say that even someone who serves G‑d, only without joy, will be punished with servitude to his enemies. That is hard to understand: why should so bitter a punishment come merely for a lack of joy?

The answer is that the punishment is really for sins, since “there is no righteous man on earth who does good and does not sin” (Ecclesiastes 7:20).

Joy could have prevented it: had he served G‑d with the joy of a mitzvah, his joy would have aroused joy above, and joy above nullifies the judgments, as the verse says, “In the light of the King’s face is life” (Proverbs 16:15). The Zohar cited (2:184b) teaches that a person’s joy below draws down a supernal joy, and that the lower world receives from above according to the face it shows.

Without joy, the punishment for the sins that no one fully avoids takes effect: this is the meaning of “because you did not serve with joy.”

The same principle applies to the woman and the man. The difference described above, between “when a woman emits seed,” which yields a male, and “the man emits seed first,” which yields only a female, holds only under certain conditions.

That difference holds only when the Infinite Light comes down through the ordered, step-by-step chain of descending worlds (hishtalshelus). That order follows the “measuring line” (kav hamiddah), an exact measure in which what is given from above matches what is done below.

By that measure, when “the woman emits seed first” and the generations are worthy, so that there is an arousal from below, the arousal from above comes from a higher level and great love, a “male,” is born. When they are not worthy and there is no arousal from below, the arousal from above comes only from the outer dimension, and only a “female” is born.

The joy of a mitzvah works differently: it arouses the supernal joy, and joy brings revelation. A Kehot note points to Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim (23d, section 5), which returns to “Sos tasis” and explains it by linking two kinds of arousal from above to the difference between Torah and mitzvos, each of which has an advantage over the other.

The light that joy reveals comes down outside the ordinary order, from the very essence of the Emanator, G‑d as the source of all emanation, with great increase. The illustration is a human king whose joy carries him beyond his usual bounds and measured conduct.

In his joy such a king can show himself to the small person just as to the great, completely equally.

The same is true above: when supernal joy is revealed, all the supernal lights join and blend together, until there is no difference between above and below, right and left. In that state the rule of measure no longer decides what is born.

Joy brings about that even the “barren one” gathers her children: even when the man emits seed first, a male is born. Torah Ohr’s maamar on “Sing and rejoice, O daughter of Zion” (Zechariah 2:14) explains this as the meaning of “Man and man was born in her” (Psalms 87:5); there (Miketz, 37c) the “male” birth comes when rinah, the song that rises from below, precedes the joy, as the verses of praise come before prayer.

This is what the wedding blessing asks for. In the first reading of tasis, the barren one, the Community of Israel, herself rejoices and exults in the joy of a mitzvah below, and through this the revelation of joy above is aroused; the parenthesis refers to the explanation of “I will greatly rejoice in Havayah” (Isaiah 61:10), which in Likkutei Torah, Nitzavim (47a), distinguishes simchah, joy revealed outwardly, from gilah, joy still hidden within the heart.

Then the second reading is fulfilled: G‑d makes her rejoice, and the barren one exults, as the blessing closes, “who gladdens Zion through her children.”

Joy also protects against “you shall serve your enemies.”

The changes and falls in divine service, from an expanded state of mind (gadlus) to a constricted one (katnus), and even the fall into cravings, are what the verse means by serving one’s enemies. All of these come only “because you did not serve with joy”: one served as a yesh, a self that loves and comprehends, which is serving for one’s own sake (legarmeih), and from that sense of self comes the fall.

Joy in G‑d prevents these changes. The parenthesis cites the Zohar (Vayechi, folio 221; Emor, folio 107) on “a place that changes” (asar demishtanei).

That changing place is the lesser love, rooted in “women’s minds are light” and in self-concern, and so it changes, as Torah Ohr explains on “His eyes are red [with wine]” (Genesis 49:12); but the great love, the “male,” does not change and is called the Tree of Life, as explained on “Gathering wood” (Numbers 15:32). A Kehot note quotes the Rebbe (Likkutei Sichos, vol. 12, p. 69, note 37): great love has no changes because it stems from yechidah, the innermost level of the soul.

Joy in G‑d also keeps a person far from cravings, as explained on “Havayah is for me among my helpers” (Psalms 118:7). Further discussions are listed: the explanation on “Go forth and see” (Song of Songs 3:11), and Torah Ohr on “G‑d did not lead them by way of the land of the Philistines” (Exodus 13:17) and on “Binding to the vine” (Genesis 49:11); they teach that joy must be included in awe and self-nullification (bittul), for, as Torah Ohr, Beshalach (61d) warns, joy without self-nullification can turn into the unrestrained mirth of the “Philistines” of kelipah.