The Secret of Concealment: The Power of the Name Havayah and the Inner Work of the Tzaddikim
Lesson No. 40 | Friday, Parashas Ki Savo, 20 Elul 5755
An in-depth discourse on the obligation to constantly place Hashem's Name before one's eyes, the awe required when standing before the King of kings, and the secret of the concealment of Hashem and the tzaddikim (righteous ones) who walk in His ways.
A person who stays awake all night must hold on until the very end, and not go to sleep right before dawn, thereby missing the time for prayer. He must wait until the Shacharis (morning) prayer at vasikin (sunrise), because if he misses the proper time for the recitation of the Shema and the prayer, "his bread has fallen into the pit" (he has lost the main thing). The constant spiritual work of a Jew must be in the aspect of:
"I have set Hashem always before me" (Psalms 16:8).
The Name Havayah (the Tetragrammaton), blessed be He, must be before one's eyes twenty-four hours a day. Today, we pronounce the Name as Adnus (Lord), but in the future to come, just as it was in the Holy Temple, we will mention the Name Havayah exactly as it is written, face to face. Today, Hashem is in a state of hiddenness and concealment, but in the future to come, He will be completely revealed.
The Power of the Ineffable Name
All the secrets of true Kabbalah are founded upon this great and holy Name. When a person acts with the Name Havayah constantly before his eyes, he will succeed in all his ways. All the inner, hidden, and concealed powers, and all the salvations he never even dreamed of, are revealed through this Name.
"If a person constantly places the Name Havayah before his eyes, slowly but surely all the secrets of the Torah will be revealed to him, and he will merit prophecy."
Fortunate is the one who merits to place the Name of Hashem before his eyes always. He is guaranteed that secrets and hints will be revealed to him that were never revealed to any tzaddik before him, because Hashem is ready to reveal entirely new things in every generation and on every single day, for He is Infinite.
Awe and Fear Before the King of Kings
When a person sees the Name of Hashem before his eyes, he understands that he is standing before the Great King, whose glory fills the entire earth. In such a state, he must not make any unnecessary movements—not in how he sits, not in his gestures, and not in opening his mouth too wide.
The Talmud in Tractate Pesachim (57b) tells of a Kohen Gadol (High Priest) named Yissachar of Kefar Barkai, who was highly fastidious and performed the sacrificial service wearing silk gloves so as not to dirty his hands with blood. Once, a dispute arose between the king and the queen regarding which meat was tastier—lamb or goat. They decided to summon the Kohen Gadol, who offers the sacrifices, to decide the matter.
When asked, the Kohen made a dismissive gesture with his hand and said, "If goat were better, they would offer it for the daily Tamid sacrifice, rather than a lamb." Because of that dismissive gesture before the king, it was decreed that his hand be cut off. From this, we can learn a kal vachomer (a fortiori argument): If before a flesh-and-blood king a person is punished so severely for a slight gesture of disrespect, how much more so before the King of kings. "For every single movement, a person will have to give a strict accounting." The only movements permitted before Hashem are gestures of mercy and supplication.
The Secret of Concealment: Emulating the Creator
The tzaddik Rabbi Shalom Yosef, the son of Rabbi Yisroel of Ruzhin zt"l, explained the verse:
"For You have made him a little lower than the angels, and You have crowned him with glory and honor" (Psalms 8:6).
Hashem is "hidden and concealed, the most hidden of all hidden things." Therefore, the entire spiritual work of the tzaddikim is to emulate their Creator—to be as concealed as possible. "As long as a person is hidden and concealed in the ultimate state of concealment, he is emulating his Creator."
If a person is a true tzaddik, every day he is more concealed than the day before. "Any publicity that a person has, even a tiny bit, is a sign that he now has some disconnection and distancing from Hashem." A person's entire purpose is to always remain in concealment. Therefore, a person must pray endlessly that people should not know of him, and that he should have no publicity whatsoever.
The Seal of Hashem: The Parable of the Certificate
To understand just how concealed Hashem is and how He does not seek to prove Himself, a story is told about Rabbi Yisroel Salanter zt"l, who was once staying at an inn. The innkeeper was a simple Jew, and suddenly a heretic entered and began to mock faith. That heretic took a piece of treif (non-kosher) meat and declared, "If it is truly forbidden to eat treif, I am ready to die right now! Look, I am swallowing the meat, and let's see if Hashem will kill me." He ate it, and of course, nothing happened to him. The innkeeper saw this and began to become confused in his emunah (faith).
Rabbi Yisrael of Salant sat there and did not answer him a word. A few hours passed, and at noon, the innkeeper's son returned from school bringing a report card full of high praise: "Excellent in playing music," "Excellent in singing," and so on.
Rabbi Yisrael turned to the boy and said, "Come sing me something, play for me. I want to test you to see if this report card is genuine. Maybe you paid a bribe? Maybe the principal is your cousin?" The boy refused, but Rabbi Yisrael continued to press him. The father, the innkeeper, intervened angrily: "What do you want from the boy? You don't believe the report card? It has the official stamp of the principal and the school right here!"
Rabbi Yisrael answered him, "Now you have received the answer to the question that bothered you this morning. Hashem took us out of Egypt with miracles and wonders, and gave us the Torah before the eyes of six hundred thousand Jews. The Torah is sealed with the signatures of thousands of entire generations. So just because some apikoros (heretic) commits a foolish act, you expect Hashem to start proving Himself all over again? That He should collapse the ceiling on him?"
Hashem is hidden in the ultimate concealment, and He is not bothered that heretics may arise and deny Him. Our spiritual work, and that of the true tzaddikim (righteous ones), is to walk in His ways:
"Just as He is merciful—so too must you be merciful... Just as He is hidden—so too must you be hidden."
The ultimate purpose is "for the creation to resemble its Creator" and to walk in the path of "walking humbly," without any desire for publicity or recognition, but rather acting solely with humility and absolute concealment.
Part 1 of 2 — Lesson No. 40
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