T5 (Tinyana) PNC - Tiku Vachodesh — Ha'Ikar Hu HaEmunah (Blow the Shofar in the Month — The Essence is Faith)

The verse 'Blow the shofar at the new month, at the concealed time for the day of our festival, for it is a statute for Israel, a judgment for the G-d of Yaakov' (Tehillim 81:4-5). The opening verse of Tinyana T1 returns here, but now the focus shifts: this entire long teaching will treat what makes Rosh HaShanah possible — emunah and the gathering of faith through the tzaddik's yeshivah.

The principal is faith — emunah — and everyone must examine themselves and strengthen themselves in it. There are those who suffer wondrous plagues (makkos pli'os) — strange, extraordinary afflictions — only because their emunah is weak. Faith is not a private spiritual luxury but the foundational health of the whole person; its lack manifests as illnesses that medicine cannot name.

The remedy is to strive and find the waters from which emunah grows — and these waters are the aspect of etzah (advice, spiritual counsel). The proper counsel from a true tzaddik is the water that nourishes faith. Without etzah, faith withers; with it, faith blossoms. One must seek the tzaddik whose advice is itself living water.

Likewise, the merit of the avos: 'Before their fathers He did wonders' (Tehillim 78:12). And: 'And I trained Ephraim' (Hoshea 11:3) — the aspect of giving advice. As the verse says, 'The people at your feet' (Shemot 11:8) — those who follow your advice. The avos and the tzaddikim train Israel by giving them the very etzah that becomes their water of emunah.

'They did not know that I healed them' (Hoshea 11:3) — for in truth, through this very giving of etzah, healing is achieved. This is the aspect of the creation of the world: first darkness, then light. Darkness = absence of advice; light = revelation of advice. Healing the wondrous plagues follows the same primordial sequence: from chaos to counsel, from darkness to light.

Through the revelation of advice, which is the revelation of light from darkness — the night pushed away, the day revealed — emunah grows. The growth of emunah is itself the dawning of light. Where one stood in confusion (darkness), the tzaddik's etzah breaks through, and emunah grows in the same instant the light arrives.

He replied (when asked the order of healing): like the creation of the world, first darkness and then light. The primary growth of emunah is through etzah, which is the aspect of revealing depths from darkness — for emunah is precisely the seeing-through of obscurity, the recognition of HaShem behind the cover.

Through this comes 'And abundant silver for you' — the increase of livelihood. Through livelihood the tzaddik refines his soul, for the eating of the tzaddik is only for the sake of the soul: 'The tzaddik eats to satisfy his soul' (Mishlei 13:25). The wicked eat to fill the body; the tzaddik eats to clarify the soul. Parnasah, in the tzaddik's hands, becomes a tool of soul-clarification.

Sometimes converts are made in potential, sometimes in actuality — either gentiles literally convert, or, only in potential: by raising the fallen holy faith and weakening their false beliefs, the holy emunah is revealed to them where they are. Even when they do not formally convert, the emunah at their core is awakened, and the world's emunah-balance shifts.

When the false beliefs were not initially so strong, then when they are broken and turned to holiness, only converts in potential are made. The principle: by raising the fallen faith — by uplifting the sparks of holy emunah scattered in nokhri belief-systems — converts are produced (in potential or actuality) according to the depth of the prior fall.

Because these converts are made from gathering the fallen emunah, they harm Israel — as the Sages teach, 'Converts are as difficult for Israel as a sappachat' (Kiddushin 70a). A sappachat is a sore, the aspect of plagues — the wondrous plagues mentioned above. The converts carry residual heaviness from the unfit beliefs they came through; this heaviness afflicts Israel until fully refined.

Through these converts, the leaders of the generation receive the sword of pride — 'And He who is the sword of your pride' (Devarim 33:29) misappropriated. The verse should refer to HaShem's pride defending Israel; the corrupt leaders take that very pride and turn it into self-aggrandizement, ruling over a poor people without cause and even punishing them.

In truth, this should not be called 'punishing' but 'harming' — they are the world's harmers to Israel, like a sore. They are the aspect of after-growths (sefichim) that grow on their own, without being planted properly: through the converts, the leaders of the generation grow haughtily without legitimate root, like aftergrowths on a fallow field — vigorous, but unrooted.

The verse 'The sayings of HaShem are pure sayings, refined sevenfold' (Tehillim 12:7) — these are pure sayings made through the purification of intellect, the aspect of tefillin, which are the aspect of the seven shepherds (Avraham, Yitzchak, Yaakov, Moshe, Aharon, Yosef, David). Through them seven 'restorers of mind' are made, capable of repairing the disturbances of intellect.

This is the aspect of 'HaShem gives a saying, the bearers of tidings are a great host' (Tehillim 68:12). The 'saying HaShem gives' = the pure sayings, the impression of intellect, the aspect of an angel. The bearers of tidings = those whose mouths carry the angelic message because their intellect has been purified through the seven shepherds (the tefillin).

When there is no strength in the angel, the dream is corrupted by foods — the aspect of a 'dream through a shed' (an impure intermediary), ch"v. There are seven climates (cosmic regions) and over each climate is appointed a different angel; in each climate different fruits grow according to the appointed angel. When the angel above the eater is weak, the food itself becomes a corrupting messenger to the dream-faculty.

Therefore in each climate different fruits grow, according to the appointed angel, and the seven climates correspond to the seven shepherds, which are the seven tefillin (the kabbalistic dimension of the tefillin, paralleling the Avos and the chesed-gevurah-tiferes-netzach-hod-yesod-malchus). Geography itself is the visible expression of an angelic-shepherd hierarchy; food connects the eater to that hierarchy.

This is the aspect of the angel — 'And the angel of His face saved them' (Yeshayahu 63:9) — strengthened through a joyful heart. Therefore the place of the angels is called Shamayim — from sham-mayim (there waters), and the Sages link it to laughter and joy (sin-mem-ches), for the primary strengthening of angels is through joy. Sad service produces weak angels; joyful service strengthens them.

Through fasting, joy is made; through joy, strength is given to the angel; through the strengthened angel, the bad dream is rectified — for the bad dream came precisely from the angel's weakness. Therefore one who fears bad dreams should fast (Ta'anit Chalom), for the fast itself produces the joy that strengthens the angel that purifies the dream. The chain runs: fast → joy → angel → dream.

But the primary renewal of will is in Nisan, and then is the primary strengthening of angels. Then in Nisan, it would have been fitting that the impurity be completely nullified, since the angel's power was rectified and strengthened. However, the regalim cycle through the year, and Tishrei carries its own task: the rectification of the heart through the shofar, which the rest of the teaching now develops.

This is the aspect of tekiah, teruah, shevarim. Tekiah — the long sustained blast — is awe, the aspect of 'Will a shofar be blown in a city and the people not tremble?' (Amos 3:6). Teruah — the rapid wail — is the holy intellect (linked to the Aramaic targum 'and tomorrow' — yebavah, the trumpeting that signals royal proclamation, the call to mind). Shevarim — the broken sobs — is the rectification of justice through the broken heart.

Shevarim is the aspect of true and just dreams — 'the count of the dream and its solving' (Shoftim 7:13) — meaning true and just dreams. Also, shevarim is the rectification of justice through the broken heart — 'a broken heart' (Tehillim 51:19) (Tikkunei Zohar). When the heart is broken in proper teshuvah, the corrupted dream-stream is righted at its source: the heart that produced bad dreams becomes the heart that produces true ones.

The heart is the place of mishpat, as the verse says, 'And Aharon shall bear the mishpat of the children of Israel upon his heart' (Shemot 28:30) — the choshen mishpat is on the kohen gadol's heart. When mishpat is corrupted, fallen loves heat the heart. One must extinguish the heart's wrong heat through shevarim — through breaking it open in tearful teshuvah.

And this is Rosh HaShanah — specifically Rosh (Head) — because the aspect of the mind is made and rectified, as mentioned. This is the aspect of the five senses of the mind (chamishah chushei hamoach), all present at Rosh HaShanah, for there are five senses in the mind: sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch — but in their inner, mochin form, where each sense corresponds to a specific cognitive act. Rosh HaShanah engages all five at once.

Through the gathering of the talmidim to the tzaddik, the portions of emunah are gathered. The very word 'yeshivah' is named after the gathering (yeshiva from yashav — to sit-and-gather): the tzaddik's study with his talmidim is called a yeshiva because it is the place where the dispersed sparks of holy emunah are reassembled into wholeness through the shared act of learning.

This is the seal of holiness rectified through them: 'Seal the Torah among My students' (Yeshayahu 8:16). And this is the aspect of what the Sages said: 'When the Rabbis arose from the yeshiva of Rav Huna, they shook out their cloaks and the dust rose to the heavens' (Ketubot 106) — the dust of their gathering reached the heavens because the gathering itself reassembled emunah at every level above and below.

Sometimes the mind is withdrawn from the tzaddik and also from the talmidim, for the mind is not always constant. During the withdrawal, this is the aspect of the withdrawal of Moshe (the daas), the aspect of sleep. Through the rectification of the mind through the gathering of disciples, the withdrawal is overcome and Moshe's daas returns. The yeshiva is the awakening from the slumber of withdrawn mochin.

Even one who truly has a great mind, when he comes to perform any avodah, must cast aside all chochmah and engage in the service of HaShem in pure simplicity. He must even act and do things that appear as madness for the sake of serving HaShem — as the verse hints (and the Rebbe will speak of this elsewhere as 'kabel et kol haTorah b'tmimut'). Sophistication, in the moment of avodah, is the enemy of avodah.

When the lung is in its perfection, this is the rectification of sleep, for sleep happens through the lung — the lung being cold and moist, and through cold and moist the essence of sleep is achieved. Therefore in the season of rains it is a time of sleep (the world rests, animals hibernate, humans grow drowsy). The lung's health is the body's permission to rest properly; rest, in turn, restores mind.

And this is the meaning of: Rav Ashi said, 'Huna bar Natan told me: Once we were traveling in the desert, and we had a thigh of meat with us. We opened it, removed its sinews, placed it on grass until we brought firewood. It dried up, and we roasted it.' (Bava Batra 74). The Rebbe will now decode this as a parable of how the heart's heat (fallen loves) can be safely contained and turned to holy use through hidden tzaddikim of the desert.

When we returned after twelve months, we saw those coals still smoldering. When I came before Ameimar, he said: 'That grass was samtri, and those coals were of ritma' (Bava Batra 74). Ameimar revealed that the grass and the coals were not ordinary — they were specific holy plants whose nature is to retain fire across a year. The Rebbe interprets: ritma is precisely the place where heart-heat can be safely held without consuming itself.

Ritma (רתמא) is the acronym of: 'Resafav rispeh ahavah, mibanot Yerushalayim' — its interior is paved with love from the daughters of Yerushalayim (a phrase from Shir HaShirim 3:10 read kabbalistically). From the fall of this love came the heart's heating — for the heart was made to burn with love of HaShem, but when that love falls, it becomes love of the wrong things. The rectification: 'Harness the chariot' (esor hamerkavah) — the binding of the merkavah, the binding of the heart's loves back to their root.

'For it is a chok for Israel' (Tehillim 81:5) — a chok is for the year of sustenance (Beitzah 16a) — the rectification of foods, mentioned earlier (the seven climates, the eating that purifies the soul). 'A judgment for the G-d of Yaakov' — this is the rectification of mishpat through the broken heart of shevarim. The opening verse closes the entire teaching: chok of food rectified → mishpat of heart rectified → tekiah-teruah-shevarim → Rosh HaShanah.