לשון אדמו״ר נ״ע בעצמו

The heading tells the reader that what follows is not a listener’s transcript of a spoken maamar but a note in the author’s own wording (“our master” here is the Alter Rebbe, whose Torah Ohr this is). It is a dense Kabbalistic gloss, built almost entirely from references to the Arizal’s writings (Etz Chaim, Pri Etz Chaim, Sha’ar HaGilgulim) and the Zohar.

The Zohar (Parshas Vayechi) speaks of garments the soul wears in the World to Come, made from its Torah and mitzvos. Etz Chaim clarifies that the mitzvos do not create these garments from nothing: the garments already exist, fallen and mixed with evil, and the mitzvos “refine” (sift) them, separating the good from the bad.

¶5 Hold this term "garments": paragraphs 5–6 explain what they are.

A second passage of Etz Chaim says the mitzvos only draw light down to repair the garments, and likens their fallen state to the exile of the Shechinah. A third (Sha’ar (Gate) 39) says the nefesh, ruach and neshamah (the soul’s three levels) are refined through prayer; the Alter Rebbe explains that this is a different process: the souls’ rise out of the kelipos to become mayin nukvin, the “feminine waters” that rise from below and arouse a union above.

The soul’s descent into a physical body, by contrast, is for the sake of the Torah and the practical mitzvos, not merely for prayer, which is a rabbinic obligation. That descent is itself a kind of exile, like the exile of the Shechinah.

Its only purpose is for each soul to refine its own garments. Since no one else can do this for it, each soul carries a greater obligation to do the mitzvos itself.

Raising souls out of the kelipos as mayin nukvin can be done by others, as Sha’ar HaGilgulim ch. 1 explains; refining one’s own garments cannot. The quoted words add that how high a mitzvah raises depends on its greatness and the alacrity with which it is done, up to “the supernal Female,” the Nukva of Atzilus.

Two more places in the Arizal’s writings say that mitzvos, and not only prayers, do this raising. The Alter Rebbe lines up the passages to show the point holds across the sources.

Pri Etz Chaim adds that refinement comes “especially from the prayers, for they are the main thing and the root.” The Alter Rebbe reads this through Etz Chaim Sha’ar (Gate) 40: prayer acts on the inner dimension (pnimiyus) of the higher levels and a mitzvah on their outer dimension (chitzoniyus), even though mitzvos also reach the intellect (mochin) in some way.

So the union of Z’eir Anpin and Nukva that the mitzvos’ mayin nukvin bring about, as Ta’amei HaMitzvos describes, is an outer union, reached through deeds. Prayer is “root” because it reaches inward; the mitzvos are still indispensable, because they reach the outer vessels from which the soul’s garments are made.

Etz Chaim says a certain refinement comes specifically through prayer. The Alter Rebbe limits this to the Nukva’s own mayin nukvin that fell into the kelipos through Adam’s sin, not the souls that were already part of Adam.

The souls raised by prayer are those that were not included in Adam: the levels of Beriah, Yetzirah and Asiyah as they were before the sin (Sha’ar HaGilgulim ch. 7). Nearly all human souls come from those that were included in Adam, and they are drawn down through the union of husband and wife, the mitzvah of “be fruitful and multiply” (chs. 14 and 2).

Sha’ar HaGilgulim, in the passage after ch. 35 about the bond the Arizal’s disciples made, says a soul rising out of the kelipos must spend at least forty days in Malchus. The Alter Rebbe explains that there it serves as mayin nukvin, raised through the mitzvah of marital union.

Even someone who does not have the mitzvah in mind can still draw down life-force from above. The Arizal’s Likkutei Torah makes the point on the verse “Man does not live by bread alone,” which teaches that what sustains a person is the divine word within the bread.

Bread nourishes even someone who eats it without a blessing; so too this process works without intent. The Alter Rebbe then states a principle: true repair and refinement come only through mayin dechurin, the “masculine waters” that flow down from above, because only the giving, masculine side has the power to refine.

So the refinement of the garments through mitzvos comes through the mayin dechurin of Z’eir Anpin, light drawn down from above. These are the “five chasadim” (five kindnesses) of Z’eir Anpin, on which all 248 positive commandments depend.

Etz Chaim identifies the garments: they are the inner tzelem (“image”) of Imma, the configuration of Binah, which clothes a person’s nefesh, ruach and neshamah. The Alter Rebbe notes that the Shklov printing numbers this gate differently.

¶2 This explains the garments mentioned in paragraph 2.

Besides the inner garment there is an encompassing one called Chashmal (a word from Ezekiel’s vision), refined out of kelipas nogah, the “glowing husk” that borders holiness and holds good mixed with evil. Etz Chaim says the good of nogah is purified and joins the inner Chashmal. In Yechezkel’s vision (Yechezkel 1:4), a stormwind, a great cloud and a flaring fire come with a “nogah,” a brightness, around them, and within it all glows “the Chashmal.” The Kabbalists read this verse as the layers around holiness, with nogah just outside Chashmal; that is why the maamar calls kelipas nogah “adjacent” to it.

Etz Chaim Sha’ar (Gate) 42 calls this level Chashmal and identifies it with the tzelem, the havla degarmei, the lingering breath or vitality in the bones, beneath the skin. But Sha’ar (Gate) 26 calls the inner tzelem havla degarmei as well, which raises the question of how one term names two garments.

The inner tzelem is a “seal” and garment formed from the Netzach, Hod and Yesod of Abba and Imma. The answer, from ch. 2 there: both are one light, one side of it inner and the other encompassing.

Sha’ar (Gate) 39, Derush 12 also discusses this garment and connects it with the raising of mayin nukvin. The Alter Rebbe quotes only key phrases, each followed by “etc.”

Sha’ar HaChashmal says the same thing is called both kelipas nogah and Chashmal. The Alter Rebbe explains from the chapter’s end that every “Chashmal” is the good within kelipas nogah, the part of nogah that can be refined and joined to holiness.

The Mikdash Melech, a commentary on the Zohar, says three Chashmals fell into nogah through Adam’s sin, which is why they now need refining. Sha’ar HaChashmal adds that as far as the vessels of Tevunah (the lower part of Binah) enter within, so far does its light clothe from without.

The whole repair is to drive away the external forces with the light of Binah from inside and from outside. The Alter Rebbe suggests that the inner light comes through the mitzvos of speech and the outer through the mitzvos of action, since the outer dimension is “encompassing” relative to the inner. The closing reference is to the “chash” of Chashmal: the Gemara (Chagigah 13a–b) reads the word as two, chash and mal, for the fiery beings are “at times silent (chashos), at times speaking (memalelos).” In the Arizal’s teaching the chash is the outer part of the Chashmal, which surrounds, and the mal the inner part within it, its essence (Etz Chaim, Sha’ar 49, ch. 2); so the outer is “encompassing” relative to the inner.

This explains the teaching that the reward of the mitzvos is a garment for the soul: the garment is drawn from Imma, and Imma is the source of the World to Come. The comparison with bread follows.

Bread sustains a person, even though what truly gives life is G‑d’s word clothed within it. In food that life comes from the outer dimension of Imma, which stands above Z’eir Anpin, the level called “Adam” (man), as the Arizal’s kavanos for the eve of Yom Kippur explain; so what nourishes man comes from a level higher than “man.”

More precisely, the garment is not the World to Come itself but what allows the soul to bear and enjoy the light of Imma, which is the World to Come. It can do so because that light is clothed in Imma’s own Netzach, Hod and Yesod: its inner light is like food, its encompassing light like a garment.

The principle behind this: angels cannot come down into this world without a garment from below, and souls cannot rise above without a garment from above. A garment is what makes contact between levels possible.

The Zohar in Pekudei and Vayakhel says so outright: without that garment the souls could not bear the light.

So a soul whose garments are incomplete, because it did not refine all the evil through mitzvos, must first pass through Gehinnom, where the soul is cleansed after death. Here Gehinnom’s purpose is repair: to rectify the evil first, so that the soul can enter.

The Zohar in Vayechi is cited for this. Without a complete garment a soul could not be in the World to Come at all, just as an angel cannot come down into this world without a complete garment.

The Saba of Mishpatim, a section of the Zohar, speaks of a soul clothing itself in the nefesh, and of the neshamah clothing itself in the ruach. The Alter Rebbe clarifies what kind of clothing that is.

Zohar HaRakia (a Kabbalistic commentary on the Zohar), citing Rabbi Chaim Vital, the Arizal’s chief disciple, explains that this clothing is for descending below one’s own level, which is different from the garments made by mitzvos. Then a new point: the Upper Gan Eden derives from the World of Beriah.

This explains the Mishnah “Better is one hour of teshuvah and good deeds in this world than all the life of the World to Come.” Gan Eden is in Beriah, but the union of Z’eir Anpin and Nukva is in Atzilus and the mitzvos draw down the mayin dechurin of Atzilus; their root is higher still, the mocha stima’ah (hidden mind) of Arich Anpin (the “Long Face,” the inner level of Keser, the divine will), which shines into the thirteen “whitenesses” of the Gulgalta, the root of the 613 mitzvos.

Even a person whose soul is only a nefesh from Asiyah raises mayin nukvin through his mitzvos to the Malchus of Yetzirah.

There the ruchos (spirit-level souls) of the tzaddikim carry his offering together with theirs up to the Malchus of Beriah, and there the neshamos of all the tzaddikim carry everything up to the Malchus of Atzilus. Even the simplest person’s mitzvah is lifted, stage by stage, to Atzilus.

The reason: all refinement takes place only in Atzilus, because Atzilus is the Chochmah of the whole order of worlds, and “through Chochmah they are refined.” Refinement comes through a union, and there is no union that begets souls in Beriah, Yetzirah and Asiyah.

Though the practical mitzvos make a garment only for the nefesh of Asiyah, the union they bring about is in Atzilus. That is why on weekdays the vessels of Z’eir Anpin and Nukva of Atzilus descend into their counterparts in Beriah, Yetzirah and Asiyah: to carry out the refinement below throughout the six working days.

The parenthesis explains: the vessels of Atzilus come down to Asiyah to give the nefesh of Asiyah power to raise sparks out of the kelipos; the verse “a time when man rules over man” is cited for this. The lower beings help through the mitzvah, which is the G‑dliness hidden within nogah.

The raising itself is done not by the person’s own nefesh, ruach and neshamah but by the Atzilus that has come down into Beriah, Yetzirah and Asiyah, which lifts the offering all the way to the Nukva of the upper Atzilus. That is why Atzilus descends on weekdays, and also to strengthen the person’s own soul to lift sparks out of the kelipos.

Shabbos, when the worlds ascend rather than descend, needs further study. In parentheses the Alter Rebbe suggests that in Beriah it is “Yaakov and Rachel” (configurations of Z’eir Anpin and Nukva) that descend on weekdays, and he notes that even the Infinite Light is drawn down there.

Sha’ar HaGilgulim ch. 2 adds that the nefesh-level of Atzilus as it is found in Asiyah is infinitely greater than the neshamah-level of Beriah within Beriah. So even the lowest level of Atzilus, found in Asiyah, outranks the highest level of Beriah.

The Arizal says tzitzis act in Yetzirah and the hand-tefillin in Beriah. The Alter Rebbe explains that this tells us where the repair takes place, driving the external forces away from the three lower Sefiros of those worlds, while the light that does the repair is drawn from Atzilus.

Similarly, the Shema brings about a union of Abba and Imma of Atzilus that extends into Beriah, which is why it is said sitting, unlike the Shemoneh Esreh (the Eighteen Blessings), which is said standing. The washing of the hands proves the point: it repairs only the three lower Sefiros of Asiyah, even though the hands themselves correspond to Chesed, Gevurah and Tiferes.

So too the tallis, which wraps a person from the head to the chest, and the hand-tefillin, which are “encompassing mochin”: all of them repair only the three lower Sefiros of Beriah, Yetzirah and Asiyah.

Though these are mitzvos of action, they draw from “Asiyah within Atzilus,” the outer dimension of Atzilus itself. The three correspond to stages of growth: the small tallis to gestation (ibbur), the tallis to nursing (yenikah), and the hand-tefillin to mature intellect (mochin degadlus).

Another proof that mitzvos and Torah study reach Atzilus: the kavanos (meditations on divine Names) for the blessings over mitzvos are directed to Tiferes of Atzilus, not to the lower worlds. Likewise, Scripture is said to be “in Asiyah,” yet its kavanos are in Names of Z’eir Anpin of Atzilus: the Torah and Prophets in Netzach and Hod, the Writings in Yesod; the sentence continues with the Mishnah, said to be “in Yetzirah.”

For the Mishnah the kavanah is in Names of the middle vessels of the six emotive Sefiros (the “six extremities”) of the Nukva of Z’eir Anpin of Atzilus; for the Talmud, in the outer vessels of the same. So although the Talmud is said to be “in Beriah,” its kavanah is in Atzilus.

Pri Etz Chaim gives the reason: it cannot be that the Written Torah stands lower, in Asiyah, than the Oral Torah. Rather, all of them are in Atzilus; Scripture simply reaches down as far as Asiyah and clothes itself there.

Each part of the Torah reaches down only so far: the Mishnah to Yetzirah, the Talmud to Beriah, and the Kabbalah only to Atzilus, with no garment at all. The Alter Rebbe offers two readings of the Kabbalah’s place: for one who knows how to strip it of its garments up to Atzilus; or, alternatively, it is Atzilus itself as it is present within Asiyah.

The proof that all of them are rooted in Atzilus: the kavanah for Scripture is in the Name Mah (the spelling of Havayah whose letters add up to 45), the Name of the inner vessel of Tiferes of Z’eir Anpin of Atzilus, and those Names are not clothed in Asiyah at all. So Scripture is truly in the upper Atzilus and only clothed in Asiyah, while the Kabbalah is not clothed at all.

In the same way, the Mishnah and the Talmud are in the upper Atzilus and clothed in Beriah and upper Yetzirah, because a person comprises all the worlds. The Alter Rebbe then takes up the statement that the intent in Torah study is in Beriah and the Torah itself in Yetzirah.

The same statement puts a mitzvah without intent in Asiyah (Etz Chaim Sha’ar (Gate) 49 ch. 5). The Alter Rebbe explains: the Talmud itself is in “Yetzirah” in the sense of the ruach-level within Beriah, the Mishnah without intent is in Yetzirah of Yetzirah, and the intent is like a neshamah (soul) for both.

Read closely, that passage also shows that the Talmud is in upper Beriah. One might say this applies only to someone whose soul comes from Beriah, while for a nefesh of Asiyah the Talmud would be only “Beriah within Asiyah”; the Alter Rebbe leaves this as a question.

He then rejects that answer: nefesh and neshamah differ only in their intent, which rises higher for a neshamah, not in the plain study itself. Simple study of the plain meaning of the Talmud reaches the same place whatever the level of the soul that studies.