Rabbi Yosef Yitzhok Schneersohn zt"l, the previous Lubavitcher Rebbe, was one of the most intimate and poetic writers in the history of Chassidus. The following is an excerpt from Likkutei Dibburim, his collected talks, Vol. 1. He speaks here about the Baal HaTanya, the first Lubavitcher Rebbe, and of his incarceration in the infamous St. Petersburg Prison.

Likkutei Dibburim Rabbi Yosef Yitzhok Schneersohn


Astonishing stories are recorded there [in the notebooks of the Rebbe Maharash] of the Alter Rebbe s stay in the Peter-Paul Fortress, stories that have been handed down from generation to generation in hallowed purity.

When my father used to speak of the Alter Rebbe he would say that quite apart from the remarkable spiritual level of his soul, he was an atzmi [i.e., one who is absolutely true to his true self, or etzem], and wherever an atzmi may be, he is an atzmi.

The concept of being an atzmi involves two points: (a) an atzmi is what he is; (b) whatever at atzmi is, he is that at all times and in all places equally; changes in space and time are immaterial to him.

The light of the sun, the heat of the sun, and the influence of the sun -- whether in relation to the vegetable kingdom, the animal kingdom, or humanity -- are each only hispashtus, an extension of the sun, and not atzmus, the self of the sun. This is why they vary under the influence of changes in time and space. That which is at the level of hispashtus can be delimited, obscured, withheld or hindered.

With an atzmi, however, changes of space and time are of no consequence. The etzem of the sun is equal in all places and at all times. As to the Divine command, They shall be luminaries in the firmament of heaven to give light upon the earth (Genesis 1:15), signifying that the realm of this one shall be daytime and the realm of the other shall be nighttime, -- this delineation refers only to the hispashtus of the luminaries. That which is atzmi, by contrast, is unbounded, for the realm of atzmi is unaffected by changes of time and space.

The Alter Rebbe was an atzmi, and an atzmi, as we have said above, is unaffected by changes of time and space. Once inside the office of the Peter-Paul Fortress where he was to be cross-examined, as soon as dawn came (for he had been brought there before daybreak) he took out his tallis and began to examine its tzitzis, whereupon all the clerks there were overwhelmed by dread -- for wherever an atzmi may be, he is an atzmi.


(C) Kehot Publications. Translated by R. Uri Kaploun


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