Parashat Balak - The Language of Hints in Creation and the War of Teshuvah

The Mouth of the Donkey: All of Creation is Speaking to Us

Hashem speaks to us twenty-four hours a day without interruption. Hashem speaks to us every single second through thousands of hints. There is no person whose soul is not teaching them what to do at every given moment. The soul is alive and enduring, and it constantly guides a person. Every second, there are endless hints directed at each and every individual, showing them what they must do and how they must behave.

"Ten things were created on the eve of Shabbat at twilight, and they are: the mouth of the earth, the mouth of the well, and the mouth of the donkey..." (Pirkei Avot 5:6).

Hashem created the donkey specifically to rebuke Bilaam. This is because when a person is on their way to commit a sin, all of creation rises up against them!

"The heavens will reveal his iniquity, and the earth will rise up against him" (Iyov 20:27).

The heavens and the earth all rise up against him! From Heaven, they send a person hints so that they will not stumble into sin! The Shechinah (Divine Presence) hints to a person so they will not fail! Sometimes the hint comes through a donkey, sometimes through a non-Jew. The Shechinah dresses itself in all sorts of forms to hint to a person not to commit a sin. Even the donkey rises up! She crushes him against the wall, and crushes him again and again, telling him: Start understanding the hints! They want to save you!

What is the concept of the mouth of the donkey? When a person is going to commit a sin, the donkey shouts, "Where are you going?" And she is shouting all the time! Not just at Bilaam! She shouts at everyone, "Where are you going? What are you doing?" The donkey shouts! The animals shout! All of creation shouts! "Why are you going to a bad friend?"

A person can feel as if the ceiling is literally falling when they are about to do something wrong. Everything is shouting! He hears sirens outside, the sound of alarms. The donkey stands in his way. Suddenly, he sees a car blocking him. Suddenly, the door is locked. Nothing is working out; everything is against him! When he is heading toward a sin, alarms immediately go off! Sirens! Alarm after alarm! Suddenly there are police cars, ambulances, fire trucks—the whole world is in an uproar! The moment a person sets out to do something wrong, Hashem has already planned from the Six Days of Creation exactly how to hint to that person not to commit the sin. All of creation is arranged for the sake of the person, to prevent them from ever committing a sin in their life.

The Hints in the Routine of Daily Life

Everything a person goes through—here his wife rebukes him, here a friend rebukes him, here the bus driver yells at him—these are all hints! The bus driver tells him, "Move forward, move forward, move already! Get on faster!" These are all hints! Everywhere he goes, people are rebuking him, yelling at him, and all the shouting he hears are actually hints from Heaven!

When the bus driver yells at you, "Move inside! Further inside! Move! Move forward already! Go even further inside!" you should know that these are all hints for you to enter into the inner dimension of things. It is a hint to enter into the inner depth of the Torah and the mitzvot, and not to remain outside, stuck in the superficiality of things. Because whatever a person hears, every single word they hear, are hints from Hashem.

Hashem speaks to us through every person in the world. Hashem is urging us to start entering into the inner dimension of things, into the profound depth of matters. Once, some Torah scholars were walking through the central bus station and saw a man standing at a sunglasses stand. He was shouting, "It's a pity on the eyes! It's a pity on the eyes!" He shouted this for eight hours straight in the middle of the central bus station. What more do we need? These are all hints! "It's a pity on the eyes"—sanctify your eyes! Guard your eyes! Everything we see and hear are all hints to draw closer to Hashem.

Understanding the Hints Correctly

A person needs to know how to understand what these hints are. The hints that awaken him to draw closer to Hashem, the hints that rouse him from his spiritual slumber—that is the true purpose of the hints. If someone calls me in the middle of my Torah study session and I just get up and go with him, that is not a hint; that is foolishness! If you need to go because it is something truly important, then you go.

"However, the expansion of the intellect in this must be measured; only according to his human intellect should he expand his thoughts in this... 'Hashem, my God, You are very great...' 'You are very great' means that the expansion of the intellect must be with measure and constriction." (Likutei Moharan, Torah 54).

Rebbe Nachman is saying that these are not just crazy, irrational hints! True hints are messages to study Torah, to pray with intention, to attend regular Torah classes, to learn Gemara—these are called hints. A person is given hints every second, and they must understand what these hints are. Because there are hints that a person might misunderstand. Hints are a Bas Kol (heavenly voice) from Above, and one must not abandon logic.

Because even within a hint, there must be a certain logic. "A wise man is preferable to a prophet"—logic takes precedence over prophecy. Therefore, the hints must never contradict the Torah or Halacha (Jewish Law).

A War of a Hundred and Twenty Years

A person thinks, "Look, I have done teshuvah (repentance). That's it. Now I will have rest from the Yetzer Hara (evil inclination). I am holy, I have no bad thoughts, everything is fine." But afterward, everything starts coming back to him all over again. He starts dressing less strictly, he begins to compromise a little, he is already in a spiritual decline, and then he experiences a crisis. And why does all this happen? Because he does not realize that the war lasts for a hundred and twenty years! For his entire life!

If a person knows that he has a war for a hundred and twenty years, and that his teshuvah (repentance) is not yet complete, and that he remains the same animalistic person he was, the same person driven by desires, with the same bad character traits and corrupt habits—if he knows that everything within him has remained the same and nothing has truly changed, then he will not fall into a crisis.

But since he doesn't know that nothing has changed, suddenly he experiences a crisis! When he goes to sleep, he sees that he has bad thoughts; during the day as he walks around, he is filled with forbidden sights. He sees that he is full of desires, burning within him like billions of bonfires, and he breaks down.

A person needs to know that the moment he does teshuvah (repentance), everything he was until today remains with him! Whatever he stole, robbed, murdered, desecrated the Shabbos, drove to the beach on Shabbos, smoked on Shabbos—it all comes back to him! It doesn't suddenly disappear in one day! Suddenly, after some time, he gets an urge to smoke on Shabbos, suddenly he wants to drive to the beach, Heaven forbid, suddenly he becomes bored.

His body is not used to Torah; his body is not used to the pleasures of holiness, to the pleasures of the holy Shabbos. He does not yet have the vessels to receive holiness. And if someone took drugs, the drugs pursue him in the harshest way. For someone who took drugs, may Hashem have mercy, it takes years to get out of it.

A person asks, "What... I did teshuvah, I was in Uman!" In truth, it doesn't work like that; it's not so simple. Things that the body has grown accustomed to for forty years, twenty years, thirty years—you don't get out of them easily! So, from the intensity of the desires, from the bonfires burning within him, he breaks down completely! He says, "How much can I cope? How much can I take? Maybe this isn't for me?"

It's not for you!? Of course it's for you! For whom was the Torah written? For the Christians!? For the Muslims!? What... was the Torah written for the Pope!? This is exactly why one needs to draw close to the great tzaddik.

Because when a person draws close to the tzaddik, he begins to receive hints. He begins to understand the hints; he receives hints not to despair! He receives hints to fight, to cope. He begins to understand that the battle is for a hundred and twenty years (a lifetime). He understands that this is the path; he understands that this is the natural order of things.

He understands that he still has years of work ahead to purify himself. He understands that he must fight his spirit of folly all day long. They hint to him constantly—another hint, and another hint: Struggle!! Overcome!! Keep fighting! Keep struggling! Until you emerge from your spirit of folly.

Hints of Love from Within the Concealment

Everything is drawn from Hashem; everything is drawn from the Infinite (Ein Sof). A person must be connected to the Infinite Light, to be connected to Hashem. Hashem hints to a person every second with infinite hints. When Jews are killed everywhere, in every corner, and all of the Jewish people are in terrible anxiety, and no one knows what will happen to them or what will happen to their household—these are hints from Hashem.

Now we have reached the worst situation the Jewish people have ever faced. Missiles are flying, people are running to shelters, murders, killings, may the Merciful One save us. No one knows what will happen in the next second. The Jewish people see that nothing can protect them. In truth, everything is drawn from Hashem! It is all hints from Hashem so that we will return in teshuvah.

We have reached a situation where everyone already wants to do teshuvah. Every day, Hashem hints to us through speech, thought, and action. Every day, Hashem constricts His Godliness and hints to us so that we will awaken in teshuvah. And Hashem does all of this to us out of the immense love He has for us. He can no longer tolerate the immodesty! Hashem can no longer tolerate the lashon hara (evil speech)! The desecrations of Shabbos! He wants the Jewish people to return in teshuvah.

The Face of the King: Seeing the Inner Grace

When they received the Torah, it is stated:

"And Israel encamped (vayichan) there opposite the mountain" (Exodus 19:2).

What does vayichan mean? It shares a root with chen (grace). Everyone saw the grace of the other. Today, this is very difficult because people fall into depression, because they do not see their own grace. First of all, see your own grace; then you will have the strength to see the grace of the other. You have to work from the beginning, from the root.

We need to know what a portion of God from above we are, and how Hashem loves us, and how wonderful we are, and what a Divine light exists within each and every one of us. This must be the starting point, and afterward, we will also see the grace found in the other.

"Had He brought us before Mount Sinai, and not given us the Torah, dayenu (it would have been enough for us)."

What is the meaning of "dayenu"? Without the Torah, it would be enough?! How could it be enough without the Torah? If you have seen the grace of the other, you don't even need the Torah! We have already said, this is the entire Torah! When a person sees the grace of the other, it is a sign that he is connected to Godliness all the time; he has reached the highest level.

But since the Holy One, blessed be He, knew that afterward this would disappear from us, we need some book in our hands. The grace can disappear, and you will be left with nothing; you need something in your hands. Therefore, even though they were on this high level, the Holy One, blessed be He, knew they would descend from this level, and He needed to give them something in their hands, so they would have a grasp on something tangible.

A Story for the Parashah: The Kindness of the Separation Between Israel and the Nations

"Behold, it is a nation that will dwell alone, and will not be reckoned among the nations."

The holy Rabbi Yisrael, the "Baal Shem Tov," was once returning on Friday afternoon with a group of chassidim from the mikveh, where he had immersed in honor of Shabbos. Suddenly, a loud noise was heard at the corner of the street, and several non-Jews immediately appeared, marching cheerfully across the width of the street toward the chassidim, who were walking arm-in-arm with their Rebbe.

The Baal Shem Tov was concerned that one of the non-Jews might touch him, and he began to step aside with his companions to the edge of the road. At that moment, the tzaddik heard one of the non-Jews say to his friend, "Be careful of this Jew, lest he touch you and defile you."

The Baal Shem Tov smiled with joy and said to the chassidim around him: "Now the meaning of the verse in Bilaam's blessing has become clear to me: 'Behold, it is a nation that will dwell alone, and will not be reckoned among the nations.' For the fact that the people of Israel can remain 'alone'—in their uniqueness and holiness—even though they dwell for many days among the nations, is a result of 'will not be reckoned among the nations.'"

"That the nations of the world do not consider them as one of their own, but rather look upon them as a foreign entity, from which they must distance themselves and separate."

All this—added the Baal Shem Tov—is part of the charity that Hashem does with Israel, who are scattered among the exiles, in order to preserve a name and a remnant for them among the nations, until the complete Geulah (Redemption)... (Bnei Tzion).