ששת ימים תאכל מצות וביום השביעי עצרת להוי׳…

The maamar opens with Deuteronomy 16:8, which calls the seventh day of Pesach an Atzeres, literally a day of “holding back” or of assembly, on which work is forbidden. The Alter Rebbe notes that three festivals bear this name: Shavuos, the day the Torah was given; Shemini Atzeres, which is celebrated as Simchas Torah; and the seventh day of Pesach.

Of the three, the seventh day of Pesach is described most highly: its Atzeres is “to Havayah your G‑d,” while of Shemini Atzeres the Torah says “an Atzeres shall be for you” (Numbers 29:35). From the contrast between these two verses the Sages derive that a festival is divided, “half for G‑d” in prayer and study “and half for you” in feasting, but this day is described as wholly G‑d’s. It is also the day the sea split.

Rashi (on Exodus 15:22) says that the plunder Israel found at the sea, the Egyptians’ gold, silver and precious stones, was greater than the plunder of Egypt itself. That plunder is “the raising of the sparks”: sparks of holiness are scattered in the material world, and the riches Israel took from the sea stand for holiness gathered up and elevated. Shir HaShirim Rabbah reads “We will make you circlets of gold” (Song of Songs 1:11) as the plunder of the sea, and the Alter Rebbe’s discourse on “Your cheeks are comely” treats the same phrase.

The Sages said that at the sea even a maidservant saw what the prophets Yeshayahu and Yechezkel did not see. Hosea 11:3, “taking them upon His arms,” explains how she could see so much: Israel at the sea was like a small child who cannot see far, whose father lifts him up so that he can see; the vision came from G‑d raising them, not from their own stature. The Alter Rebbe then notes that the Song at the Sea says “until … cross over” twice (Exodus 15:16), and the lines that follow point to two crossings, the one at the sea and one still to come.

Isaiah 11:15 describes the future redemption: G‑d will wave His hand over “the River,” which in Scripture usually means the Euphrates, strike it into seven streams and let people walk across in sandals, a second crossing like the first at the sea. Koheles Rabbah, at the end of its passage on “Vanity of vanities,” pairs the third day of Creation, “Let the waters gather,” with the opening of this verse, “And Havayah will destroy the tongue of the Egyptian sea.”

Isaiah 12:1, which follows directly, is the song of that future day: “I will thank You, Havayah, for You were angry with me.” Micah 7:15 promises that the redemption will repeat the wonders of the Exodus.

As Israel crossed Yam Suf, the Sea of Reeds, read as sof, “end,” the level called “the end of all levels,” Malchus, so in the future they will cross a higher boundary, the River, and come to be “beyond the River,” where, as Joshua 24:2 says, the forefathers dwelt; the Tzemach Tzedek (in Yahel Or, as the Kehot note quotes) adds that this future revelation is drawn down through the present exile, the exile of Edom, as the exile of Egypt led to the crossing of the sea. In the discourse on this verse later in Parshas Tzav, the Alter Rebbe explains that the Sea of Reeds is Malchus of Atzilus, the supernal speech, while the River, the river that “goes out of Eden” (Genesis 2:10), is thought, Binah, which flows on unceasingly. In Likkutei Torah, Bechukosai (the discourse “If in My statutes”), he explains that the forefathers’ root lies beyond that river, in the higher thought above Binah.

Eden is Chochmah, and the Talmud’s definition of the wise man, “one who sees what is born” (Tamid 32a), shows that Chochmah works like sight: it grasps a thing directly and whole. The river flowing out of Eden is Binah, which works like hearing: an understanding built up step by step through contemplating G‑d’s greatness. “Beyond the River” is therefore the level above Binah, the seeing of Chochmah.

Psalms 136:13 praises G‑d “who cut the Sea of Reeds into parts,” in the plural, and Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer (chapter 42) says that the waters became twelve sections, one for each tribe. So each tribe crossed on its own path and received the revelation at the sea “each according to his own measure.”

The Alter Rebbe refers to his discourse on “A psalm, a song for the dedication of the House” (Psalms 30:1), which explains why the princes’ dedication offerings are written out twelve times, once for each tribe, and compares this to the sea split into twelve paths. In the future, by contrast, the River will be struck into seven streams, matching the “seven shepherds,” counted here as the three Patriarchs and the four Matriarchs. So the sea was divided according to the tribes, into twelve paths, while the River will be divided according to the forefathers, into seven streams.

Two further cross-references: the discourse on Zechariah’s vision of a golden menorah with seven lamps (Zechariah 4:2), which explains the seven shepherds, and the discourse on “And the light of the moon shall be” (Isaiah 30:26), earlier in Parshas Tzav, on the future sunlight that will be “sevenfold, as the light of the seven days.” Both concern sevens: the seven lamps, which are the souls of the seven shepherds, and the sevenfold light promised for the future.

At present the level “beyond the River” is hidden. Of the future G‑d promises, in the words of the prophet Michah, “I will show him wonders,” and “show” is the language of sight, the mode of Chochmah, Eden, explained above.

Isaiah 12:1 is read as cause and effect. “You were angry with me” refers to the sufferings of exile, the hardship of subjugation and of earning a living; precisely because we have endured that poverty and pressure, “Your anger will turn away, and You will comfort me,” and we will merit the revelation of “beyond the River.”

Now the opening verse can be explained. It says “six days you shall eat matzos” although Pesach has seven, because it speaks of the future, when the seventh day will be the Atzeres “to Havayah your G‑d,” the level “beyond the River”; and of that level, as of the World to Come, it is said that there is no eating there (Berachos 17a).

Matzah is “the bread of poverty” (Deuteronomy 16:3), food for a state of lack, so on a day without eating there is no matzah. The same reading explains why the verse forbids “work” without qualification, whereas for the other festivals the Torah forbids only “laborious work,” leaving the preparation of food permitted.

On that future seventh day, the unqualified “you shall not do work” includes even work for preparing food, since there will be no eating at all. So two details of the verse’s wording, the six days and the unqualified ban, both point to the future.

On the first nights of Pesach, the Seder nights, a lofty revelation shines: the “mature intellect” (mochin degadlus), the divine intellect in its full state. But it comes as a “leap” (dilug), granted from above all at once and not through the gradual, natural order of growth, and so it lasts only for the moment.

That is why the Counting of the Omer follows that revelation: “Today is one day,” and so on, day after day. Its purpose is to draw the revelation down gradually, as the verse says of the conquest of the Land, “Little by little I will drive them out” (Exodus 23:30).

Each day of the count refines one of the emotive attributes (middos) of the animal soul, through the light that the day’s count draws down. In this way the revelation that came all at once is drawn into the person’s own attributes step by step.

The parable: a friend gives someone a purse full of gold coins. He receives it all at once, as one whole, and only afterwards counts the coins, little by little, one by one; so too, the revelation of Pesach is received at once, in general, and the Counting of the Omer takes it in particular.

The Alter Rebbe refers to the beginning of Parshas Shelach, where he discusses igulim and yosher, “circles” and “line,” two ways in which the divine light is arranged, which he says are also a matter of general and particular; and to the end of the discourse on “As an eagle stirs up its nest” (Deuteronomy 32:11).