In order to protect our emunah, it is certainly helpful to live in a religious area that has an emphasis on keeping the Jewish tradition. But, as we mentioned before, in today’s world, everyone is being tested in a way that our ancestors were never tested in the past, and in some way or another we’re struggling with these tests, like Rebbe Nachman says: “And even though it appears to us that the general population [of religious Jews] are far away from questions and they don’t investigate at all, nevertheless, in truth, all of them are mixed up with questions, since each person has questions, and even people with a small intellect have questions and confusion that enters their thoughts.”
In other words, even the “general population of religious Jews” – simple people who work most of the day and don’t have so much time to think deeply about life – have questions in their hearts: “What happened in the Holocaust? Why do I have to suffer like this?” and so on. Many of us find it difficult not to believe that it is the doctor who heals us and the boss who gives us an income. These thoughts are the yetzer hara himself. They damage our fear of Heaven and take away our inspiration in avodas Hashem. They cause us to fall into a spiritual sleep of going through the routine of doing mitzvos without an attachment to the Creator that we serve.
Therefore, each day we should examine our hearts and strengthen ourselves to remember that Hashem created the entire universe and He renews His creation at every moment. He fills all of worlds and surrounds all of the worlds, and there is no place that is void of His Presence. He alone runs the world, and nothing happens without His direct involvement. And if we have any thoughts that question this reality, we must block them completely out of our awareness, as it says in this sichah: “Each person needs to be very careful to push away questions from his heart and throw them out of his heart completely – not to analyze at all.” Here, Rebbe Nachman reveals to us that these ideas don’t just enter our minds. Rather, they also go into our hearts and disrupt our emotions. These thoughts are the source of all depression and feelings of emptiness in life. So, we must follow the advice of Rebbe Nachman and strengthen our emunah every day, while at the same time uproot these false concepts from our hearts.
