The Hebrew month of Elul is a time of special closeness to G-d. The Sages describe it as an opportunity to prepare for the intense and powerful spiritual atmosphere of Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur, in the following month, Tishrei.
The link between the two months is expressed in a phrase from the Song of Songs (6:3): “I am to my Beloved, and my Beloved is to me”. The word Elul forms an acronym for the Hebrew original of this phrase. Chassidic teachings explain that ‘I am to my Beloved’, means ‘I am (trying to be) close to G-d’, meaning in the month of Elul. That is when each person can try to move forward spiritually, towards G-d, the Beloved.
Then comes the response from G-d, described as ‘my Beloved is to me’, that G-d turns towards each individual and towards the Jewish people as a whole. This is on Rosh Hashana and the Ten days of Penitence, with the climax of Yom Kippur. These special days of the Jewish calendar are explained as a time of ‘Divine revelation’, when there is a unique sense of the closeness of the Divine in the tangible and dramatic details of the Festivals.
Rabbi Shneur Zalman points out that in order for the individual to make his or her movement towards G-d during the month of Elul, there needs to be an initial step from G-d, giving the person a sense of the accessibility of the Divine. Kabbalistic teachings describe this as a revelation of the Thirteen Attributes of Mercy. The special quality of this turn from G-d to Man is expressed by Rabbi Shneur Zalman in the Mashal (parable) of ‘the King in the Field’.
G-d is often thought of as a King, but a King in his Palace is not very accessible to ordinary members of the public. However, says Rabbi Shneur Zalman, sometimes the King leaves his palace and goes out into the fields of the countryside.
This initiates a completely different kind of relationship with his subjects. The simple folk who live in the countryside are able to come freely to meet the King, and he greets them warmly with a smiling face. This sense of welcome persists, for even when the King finally begins to return to his capital city and royal palace, the crowd of country-folk are able to follow him. In at least one version of this discourse, by the Rebbe, it says that the people are now able to elevate themselves to a higher level so that they are able to enter the palace with Him.
The Rebbe suggests that the reason why Rabbi Shneur Zalman put a discourse on this theme in the section of Likkutei Torah with Sedra Re’eh, is because that Sedra begins ‘See, I am giving you today a blessing...’. The blessing is the spiritual empowerment from G-d, the radiance of the month of Elul, which encourages the individual to make a move towards the Divine.
The Rebbe quotes a discourse by the Maharash taught in 1867, on Sedra Re’eh, which adds a further dimension to this idea. The Maharash begins by asking why Sedra Re’eh begins by saying that G-d is giving a blessing ‘since you will obey’ His teachings. Wouldn’t we expect it to say ‘if you will obey’, as in many other instances? To answer this question the Maharash explains the difference between a blessing and a prayer. A blessing, Berachah, reveals and draws into the world that which is already there in a spiritual ‘source’. Indeed, this flow is very exalted: as in the phrase ‘blessed be G-d from world to world’, meaning from the Hidden World (the higher spiritual levels) to the Revealed World. But it does not create something new.
A prayer on the other hand, Tefilah, reaches to the Divine Will and changes it. There might have been a Divine decree concerning some issue. But the prayer, expressed as ‘May it be Thy will..’, tries to change the Divine decree. The prayer is actually disclosing something new.
The Maharash continues, explaining the nature of prayer, with the idea expressed in the Zohar that certain angels ‘bind crowns for the Holy One, from the prayers of the Jewish people’. A crown is made with diamonds, which are a form of stone which shines. Letters and words are also called ‘stones’ (in the Book of Creation), and the input of the angels is to ensure that they ‘shine’. In that sense they become a Crown for the Holy One. This process also applies to the letters and words of Torah study.
The Crown of the Holy One expresses the Divine Will (among the Sefirot, Keter, Crown, is explained as signifying Will). The fashioning of the Crown through the prayers of the individual or the entire people is in fact the revealing of a new aspect of the Divine Will.
While this suggests that prayer is higher than blessing, there is also a sense in which the opposite is true, blessing is higher than prayer. This is because prayer is uncertain. The one praying beseeches G-d: perhaps his prayer will be accepted, perhaps not. A Blessing, by contrast, is already present in its source and just has to be made manifest.
However, there is also a superior kind of blessing which combines both qualities. That is the blessing from G-d described at the beginning of Sedra Re’eh. This has the certainty of blessing – which is why the text continues, ‘since’ you will obey, for it is certain that the Jewish people will obey – and also, like prayer, has the quality of revealing something new.
The beginning of the Sedra Re’eh speaks also of a curse, if the Jewish people will not obey. The Discourse explains that because the blessing is from such a high realm, from Keter, the Crown, the curse is transformed into blessing...
Now we can see the connection between Sedra Re’eh and the month of Elul. The Talmud tells us that during the Ten days of Penitence, the ‘individual’ is granted as much spiritual power as a community. Individual, in Hebrew, is Yachid, and Chassidic teachings extend this idea: during the Ten Days of Penitence, the innermost quality of Soul, Yechidah, is revealed. Since that is the case at the beginning of Tishrei, it must also be an aspect of the service of Elul.
The effect of this revelation of Yechidah is that it dissipates all opposition. Indeed, the opposition itself is transformed and elevated...
The revealing of the innermost dimension of the soul, Yechidah, is because there is a similar level of revelation from Above. This is the ‘Anochi’, the ‘I’, in which G-d says ‘see, I am putting before you a blessing..’. The blessing is from the Anochi, from the Essence of the Divine. And putting it ‘before you’, lifneichem, means that this flow from the Essence enters the inwardness, the penimiut, of the Jew.
This is achieved in the month of Elul, when the King is in the field, empowering each individual that the inner essence of his or her soul should be revealed...
This process is intensified at the conclusion of the Exile, when every Jew will finally obey G-d’s teachings. Similarly with Elul which is at the end of the year, and also, at the end of the Exile, it must be that every Jew will at last obey the Torah teachings of the Divine [leading to the Redemption].
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