Entering our Personal Geula
Compassion's Truth
Avraham embodied chesed, Yitzchok, gevura, and Yaakov, midas ha’Emes, rachamim. Truth is not merely seeing facts; it’s seeing facts with their full circumstance. Compassion is what that truth feels like in our hearts. When we notice someone’s pain, our compassion can be aroused. But it’s not their power, brilliance, or importance, that arouses our compassion; it’s the victim’s goodness and being undeserving of the pain. And the kinder and more undeserving of harm they are, the more deeply we'll feel it for them.
I think this sheds light on the Alter Rebbe's instructions in Iggeres HaTeshuva (CH 7) when he advises beginning tshuvah by arousing abundant compassion upon one's G-dly soul. To do this, he directs us to contemplate how Hashem's light fell from a high place to a very low one. I think us being aware of the pain of Hashem's descent does half the job for us to feel compassion, so the AR adds, " Especially when a thoughtful person meditates on the greatness of the Infinite One, Who permeates all worlds (memale) and encompasses all worlds (sovev)". These modes of light are not just descriptions of greatness. The Alter Rebbe points to contemplate the remaining quality that will awaken compassion.
In sovev, Hashem gives us of His infinitude, and with memale, He fills us with life and the joy of all our senses. With this gratuitous kindness upon us, how could He deserve harm? His Goodness is inseparable from His Greatness (and in fact, the word “Kail” indicates both.)
Likewise, when we think about details of our neshama, literally "a part of G-d Above," which was gifted to us, then shackled and submitted to follow any of our poor choices, our compassion for her can naturally emerge. It’s not simply from the fact that something exalted has fallen, but that something wholly undeserving of pain which yet provides us with the goodness of life itself, has.
Summary: Context informs Truth; compassion is emotional Truth; context thus informs compassion.
Meeting our Humanity
The Alter Rebbe broadens the focus in the next chapter, instructing a person to "awaken abundant compassion upon himself" (Iggeres HaTeshuvah, ch. 8). This shift is significant. The object of compassion is no longer described only as the G-dly soul, but as the person proper.
And how are we able to feel compassion for the rest of our parts? The above principle helps inform us: Context. Our base drives did not author their own nature. We did not choose to be created with self-concern, impulse or the limitations that make temptation powerful. Those inclinations are part of the Divine design of creation. While we are responsible for choices, we didn't create the inner and outer context for them. And so when we want to return, even “a sigh alone is a great tshuva” (Hayom Yom) and can touch Him who put us here. All this more empowers us to have self-compassion.
This compassion is not white-washing or enabling bad choices. It is honesty about the whole picture rather than fearful tunnel vision that condemns flaws.
Compassion then goes from sentimentality to intellectual integrity. It includes facts of responsibility and facts that excuse. Hashem created both souls, endowed each with their nature, and placed them into the challenge of this world. We synthesize justice and kindness to meet ourselves with truth, which is present on every level.
Summary: The animal soul can deserve compassion.
This also informs our perception of divine judgment.
Hope in Midst of Divine Judgment
In Parshas V’eschanan, there’s a promise Hashem makes:
“For Hashem your G-d is a merciful G-d; He will not abandon you (‘lo yarpicha’), nor destroy you, nor forget the covenant of your forefathers..." (Devarim 4:31)
Rashi says “lo yarpicha” means “He will not loosen His hold on you; He continues holding you with His hands.”
A simple question can be asked: The text already lets us know that Hashem is sticking around, so what is Rashi adding?
A Dark Cave
There is a real difference between an unchanging promise that someone won't leave you vs. an active reality of someone holding onto you to support. If Hashem merely promised ‘not to abandon us,’ there’s an implied chance of a distance in proximity or attention (I’m right here, but I’m on my phone). The Torah could mean He will keep a relationship, but His closeness changes with the hour.
Inside a pitch-black cave where you cannot see an inch in front of you, even if another person is there, you can’t see them or feel them. It’s easy to feel completely alone. The darkness makes it seem like you are.
But now imagine that person holding your shoulders with both hands. Feeling that pressure is unambiguous. ‘I’m being held.’
Rashi tells us that even when bad things happen, even when we go through exile, and even when God seems totally hidden, Hashem has never even removed His hands from holding us.
Summary: Hashem’s attention is constant.
Why Two Hands
Chesed and gevurah are classically the two hands.
When things go well, we experience chesed; when life becomes difficult, we experience gevurah. The thing is that both experiences come from the exact same Hashem (the name indicative of the midas tiferes), The painful experiences are not signs that God has walked away from us. He is holding tighter so that we do not slide completely away from Him. R. Abba Paltiel says, “he gives a poke to wake us, not punish.” (When I first heard this, I'll admit I was cynical and thought it was a nicety. But Rashi’s comment is one of many that communicate this.)
So, as the initial part of the pusuk (4:31) says by describing Gd as merciful, ‘lo yarpicha’ further teaches about compassion. When a healthy loving father redirects, he hopes the child will not misunderstand the discomfort he feels from that redirection as an intent to reject and lose faith in his father; Hashem, k'viyachel, does the same.
With Rashi's diyuk, we see more clearly that any of our difficulties are purposeful.
Summary: Hashem redirects us for our benefit.
Two Inner Movements
The Alter Rebbe advises (Tanya, CH. 26; Iggeret HaKodesh, Ch 11), that we accept pain, l'a, with joy. This is not advice to resign (i.e “Oh well, I guess I must just suffer."), it’s a blueprint of response that also hints to an ever-present bond.
We can help shift our perspective to joy by changing a classic question of ‘Why is this happening to me?’ (When we are in the cave and feel ‘pressure’ from God's hands and see darkness), to ‘Why is it happening for me?’ (I.e. ‘I’m stiff-necked in insisting that He desires a bond with me’ and push to see the goodness.)
Making the mental switch can change the despair of being alone to seeing you are connected and being guided in this moment.
Then following, The Alter Rebbe offers, I think one of the most novel contributions, that the mental shift doesn't just change how we feel; it can change the actual circumstance.
The AR writes that emuna “sweetens the gevuros at their root” and turns the difficulties into revealed good. The Alter Rebbe is thus teaching a contemplative approach to our painful challenges. With the focus and goal of seeing that Hashem is here too, we reach beyond our nature, to think as deeply as we can about our situation and experience the elokus within.
Hisbonenus on elokus is an essential part of the picture.
Summary: Insisting that Hashem is the one directing me, for my gain, expresses emuna.
Sweetening our Concerns
To perceive higher perspectives, refining midos alongside learning chassidus go together. Improving our character improves our thoughts, beliefs and understanding
One vital aspect of refining midos involves sweetening our fear rooted in self-concern, e.g. “Am I, my family, the Rebbe, the world, going to be ok?” (Any questions we have about having this fear can be answered when we think of speaking in public, getting a medical issue h’v, or sometimes looking at a bank statement).
It’s hard to have uninterrupted emunah when we have fearful drives opposing the contemplation. As a cut needs to be cleaned as much as it needs putting on a band-aid, cleaning our fears is its own sugya. We do this not by criticizing or yelling at ourselves to stop, nor by dismissing or denying our fears (which all the above would make a scared person more afraid for being told a valid fear is being ignored). Rather, compassion, patience and curiosity in asking the question of ourselves, “I wonder what that part of me is really afraid of?” can begin resolution.
(Fear for self is distinguished from fear of Hashem. The first clouds our intellectual insights and spontaneity, the second enhances. Compassion can soften and assuage our self-concerning fears.)
All the above is not just helping us feel better, it comprehensively improves our avoda. When my heart softens, my desire towards good strengthens rather than weakens towards permissiveness. Tshuva deepens and refines midos, then encourages sechel.
Summary: Don’t fear fear; it’s manageable with the right approach.
Tov Nira V’Nigla
Once, The Rebbe was walking into 770 and there were two young girls on opposite sides of the entrance speaking to each other. The Rebbe handed two coins to one of the girls and asked her to share one of the coins with her friend. The girl walked to the other side of the doorway and The Rebbe was then able to go through – without embarrassing anybody.
There's no consistent cookie-cutting response to life. Time is a live wire that inspires us to fill it with good solutions. To not miss a beat of life's presentation, we find the right move and keep a positive vibe going, because we ask for revealed good and act to help it happen. We pray for that not because hidden good is not good, but because obscure goodness isn’t the destination, it’s just part of the route. The Alter Rebbe gives us a tool; our Rebbe makes our goal more explicit. Because The Rebbe didn't just want us to become experts at living in adversity.
Summary: A Jews spontaneity is divine.
Choices
The Baal Shem Tov teaches that every moment presents a new avodah. With flexibility, the good choices we make heal our midos and incrementally reveal our soul. In healing our fears, we get to know the nuances of our struggle and choose the dialogue of our self-talks accordingly. Over time, this develops our familiarity to uniquely resolve each fear.
So, if your child is struggling in school or you hate a job that isn't bringing in enough money to pay bills, maybe Rashi reminds us of the promise that Hashem's holding us; The Alter Rebbe gives us an approach to respond to that grip and reveal the good hidden within it; and the Rebbe highlights what it’s really all about, and speaks to a fascination we may have with ‘mining the diamonds' of gulus; because now is the right time to come out of the cave.
As the Zohar’s promise, 'with this work (pnimius HaTorah), they will leave exile with compassion.' With compassion we will be comforted and maybe we can find it now for ourselves and klal Yisroel, for tov nira v'nigleh, l'olam va’ed.