VICTORY

Dear Family,

I hope that everyone is well.

MAZAL TOV TO ZALMY ON HIS ENGAGEMENT TO NECHAMA DINA PIPERNO. We are overjoyed at this wonderful news! The wedding should be at a good and auspicious time, and wishing you to build an everlasting home together! The Lechaim will be at 1349 President Street, Crown Heights, NY at 8pm, this coming Sunday 21st Jan.

Mazal Tov to Sharon Davidoff (Brian's wife) on her upcoming birthday next week. Wishing you a wonderful, happy year with good health Sharon!

Wishing long life to Avi and his Family on the yohrtzeit of his father today. His Neshama h should have an Aliyah, and there should be only simchos in the future BEH.

This Shabbos is the 10th of Shvat (Yud Shvat)

It is the day that the Frierdike (Previous) Rebbe - Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneerson, passed away in 1950, and it is also the day, one year later, when the Rebbe (Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson) seceded him as the new leader of Lubavitch in 1951.

The last Maamer recorded by the Previous Rebbe was called Baasi Legani, which was made up of 20 sections, and every Yud Shvat, the Rebbe would explain one of these sections as a 20 year sequence.

We continue learning these sections of the cycle every year, and this year we have been learning the 14th section

So I thought I would try to summarize the current stage of this deep and beautiful Maamer

• The Jewish People are called Tzivos Hashem (Army of Hashem) based on one of the Names of Hashem (Tzevakos) which is a Name of War, and refers to the Sefira of NETZACH and Hod (VICTORY and Glory)
• The king has great stature, and therefore, the greater is his power to seek victory
• To achieve victory, he will spend great and precious resources of his wealth, and will squander even his rare treasures, because the attribute of victory is rooted at a very high level in his soul. He will even risk his life for this.
• The Jewish People are the soldiers of the King, trying to fulfill G-d's will to achieve victory against the opposing forces, and therefore the Heavenly stores of treasures are opened up for them.
• These treasures are explained by the Zohar as being G-d's Infinite Light, which extends upwards without any bound, and descends below without any end.
• As G-dliness descends downwards through many contractions, it becomes more and more concealed, becoming enclothed in creation, which outwardly has an appearance the very opposite of G-dliness. Therefore beings in the physical realm may no longer recognizes Him (and even oppose Him c"v)
• Practically, even though we believe in Hashem, this hiddenness can result with ourselves, in excessive ego on the one hand or depression on the other. Both are not true
• Much discussion in the Maamer takes place around the nature of this Light
• Relating to ourselves, we need to understand that we are part of Hashems army, and we have been provided with the hidden treasures of Hashem. And with this we go to war in this world at many levels. We start by going to war with our own difficult inclinations (yetzer hara) within ourselves. The victory is the establishment of Yerushalayim (as is explained in the Medrash that Yerushalayim is yirah shalem - complete fear (of Hashem). We reach this victory by extending ourselves with strenuous effort, (mesirat nefesh) to reach this level within ourselves. Through this effort of spending, and even sqandering, all our resources to attain victory, we reach to the infinite light high above, and below without limit.
• To illustrate this from the Medrash with a story: a king entered a country accompanied by dukes, prefects and commanders. One person said "I will choose a duke as my patron". Another said I will choose a prefect as my patron". And still another said " I will choose a commander as my patron". (ie they wanted particular benefits from these people). There was a clever person among them who said " I will choose the king, because the others are all subject to replacement, while the king is not subject to replacement".

Gut Shabbos to all, and with victory in our battle!