Dvar Torah for Parshat Tetzaveh

Based on Likutey Moharan I, Lesson #52

"...a pleasing fragrance...." [God says,] "I am pleased; I said something and it was done" (Rashi on Exodus 29:18).

The purpose of this world, as Rebbe Nachman states it in this lesson, is for the Jews to re-attach themselves, and the rest of Creation, to God. How is this accomplished? By doing what God asks us to do.

Part of what this re-attachment accomplishes is making you necessary. Ordinarily, people think that to assert his existence a person needs to do what he wants. This will "announce his presence" unequivocally.

Rebbe Nachman says, no. Your existence isn't and wasn't ever guaranteed. Only God's is. For you to partake of genuine existence, His existence, you have to give up your ego and let God's wish override yours.

The only way to accomplish this, teaches Rebbe Nachman, is by the practice of hitbodedut, talking to God in your own words. By speaking to Him in your own words (ideally at night, when the world is asleep, and in a place where passers-by are none) you can focus on stripping away your negative habits and behaviors one-by-one. As they fall (and they will, if you stick to hitbodedut patiently and consistently), your doing God's will becomes less and less of a struggle.

Afraid that by giving up your ego you will vanish, lose your name and accomplish nothing? The name of Moshe Rabbeinu (Moses our teacher) appears nowhere in Parshat Tetzaveh. Yet, he is in God's immediate presence; "You will this" and "You will that" throughout the parshah. What did he do? He consecrated the Mishkan (Tabernacle), God's home on earth. He elevated a man and all of his descendants to another plane of existence, changing their spiritual genes—he was the instrument for making Aharon and Aharon's descendants kohanim.

Hitbodedut. Do it. Keep doing it.

agutn Shabbos!
Shabbat Shalom!