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TALES OF THE BAAL SHEM TOV
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In the last edition of Parsha Devarim, the Baal Shem
Tov travelled to Brody with his wife and Alexei. He sent
a letter to his brother-in-law Gershon of Kitov that he
should return because the Baal Shem Tov was going
to
reveal himself.
Across the hills, the lengthening shadows showed
that the Almighty was ending the day and bringing on
the night. In the darkening hour of twilight, the Baal
Shem Tov returned from his journey to Brody. It was
the first trip he had taken with the young boy Alexei, the
non-Jewish shepherd whom the Baal
Shem Tov had chosen to be his wagon driver. Soon
after Alexei sat in the driver's seat, the Baal Shem Tov
told him to simply let go of the reins and turnaround to
face the back of the wagon, not looking at the horses
at all.
"Let the
horses go by themselves," he said. "They know where
I want them to go." And on this journey, for the first
time, the road became miraculously shortened for
them, so that they covered long distances in a short
amount of time.
While they were away, the two young pupils, Yitzhak
Dov and Meir, the sons of the Rabbi of Yozlovitz, were
out in the field, tending the sheep. As night
approached, they grew frightened and trembled with
fear. What if
they had to spend the night in the field with the sheep?
What would they do to save the sheep from the wild
animals and the robbers that Alexei had described to
them? Those fearful creatures and people would
came out of their hiding-places at night. But when
they saw the Baal Shem Tov returning, they
gave a sigh of relief.
"Rabbi," they exclaimed, "you have saved us!"
During the whole day they had been thinking and
talking about this journey of the Baal Shem Tov, on the
day
of Lag Ba'omer, when Rabbi Shimon ben Yochai's life
on earth ended and has spirit had gone to heaven.
Important things must be happening in the world,
they thought.
Now, as evening came on, the Baal Shem Tov sensed
what his two young pupils were thinking. They were
waiting to celebrate this day of Rabbi Shimon ben
Yochai in the forest, among the trees that would
remind them of the holy apple grove in
heaven.
Among the trees of the forest there was one apple tree
that grew small, beautiful, wild red fruit. Under this tree
the Baal Shem Tov was in the habit of sitting and
enjoying the beautiful world that the Almighty created.
Here the Baal Shem led his two pupils now. "Come,"
he said, "and sit beside me under this tree. On Lag
Ba'omer it is a Jewish custom to sit back and relax
under a tree."
"You know," he continued, "the important thing is for
every one among the Jewish people to live his life and
serve the Almighty according to his level, according to
how much he has learned and how much he knows. If
a person tried to jump and leap to another one's level,
to serve the Almighty like the other person, then he is
left with neither his level nor the other one's. He
remains nowhere at all.
"So you see, many acted like Rabbi Shimon ben
Yochai, and they did not succeed at all. They tried to
follow the Torah and serve the Almighty on his level,
and they failed - because they only acted like him.
They thought they knew what level he had reached,
and they believed they could reach it too. So they failed.
"Once my great teacher of the spiritual world (Achiya
HaShaloni) showed
me an interesting vision. I was taken to the region of
Paradise, and there I passed under the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil; and a great many Jews
were there. Then I was taken under the tree
of life, and only a few were there. Then I was
brought to the inner Garden of Eden, and a very very
few remained there, perhaps a handful."
The Baal Shem Tov finished the lesson by telling his
two
young pupils the stories of the Talmud about Rabbi
Shimon ben Yochai, which he explained in his own
wondrous way. In the moment that he ended, they
heard Alexei playing his shepherd's flute somewhere
nearby, so that all the sheep came gathering about
him.
When they saw this shepherd boy, the two
brothers felt a pang of jealousy. Why did Alexei have
the privilege to go traveling with the Baal Shem Tov on
a journey where the road became miraculously
shortened and they covered great distances so swiftly?
"Is it true," they asked their teacher, "that you were in
Brody and you came back today - all in one day?"
"Yes, my dear friends. You know, we read in the
Torah that Abraham sent his servant Eliezer to another
land to find a wife for his son Isaac. After Eliezer found
Rivka (Rebecca), he told her family about it, and he
said in Hebrew; Then I came today to the spring.
In the Hebrew words that he said, there is the key and
a clue to the secret of traveling long distances swiftly.
Those words contain a clue to the hidden mystic
name of the Almighty that makes this miracle happen."
"Good," said the two brothers, "we understand. But
why did Alexei, who is not even Jewish, have the
privilege of riding with you on this wondrous trip,
when you traveled at miracle speed?"
"If you want to know, Alexei gained this right on
account of his father. His father is the Wallachian
shepherd who made me able to receive the holy
writings of Rabbi Adam Baal Shem. This is what
happened between me and Alexei's father, Georgi the
shepherd.
"One Sunday, as I was walking from my home to be
alone here among the hills of Kitov, I suddenly heard a
voice call out, 'Come up this hill, my master Yisroli.
Come up to me, here on this hill.' I ascended the hill,
and there before me stood a Wallachian shepherd,
who spoke in Wallachian to me:
'I want you to know that about a month ago I was
pasturing my sheep on top of this hill, when off in the
distance I saw a Jewish man walking between two
mountains, looking for a certain place among the
large rocks and boulders that were lying there. Then
he took out a bundle from his knapsack and hid it
under one particular large rock, that I am going to
show you. You see, he had no idea that I was
standing and watching him. I thought he was certainly
hiding there some treasure, some precious hoard of
silver.
'As soon as I saw him leave, I went close, and I
wanted to roll away the huge stone that hid this
treasure, so that I could take it for myself. But the man
had not gone away at all. He had only hidden to see if
anyone had watched him and would now try to steal
the treasure. When he saw me trying to roll away the
stone, he shouted at the top of his voice in Polish, and
motioned to me with his finger that I should not dare
to move the rock. I was seized with a great fear, and I
simply stood there trembling.'
"Georgi continued: 'He came over to me and gave me
a strict warning: Beware of touching what I have
hidden there. Whoever touches it, his hand will wither,
and he won't be able to move it. I have hidden holy
writings there, and no one is to touch them, except
one holy man who goes his own unseen way here
among the hills. His name is Yisroli. Now I will ask
you to watch over this bundle that I have hidden; and if
anyone else wants to touch it, warn him away, for his
own safety.'"
To be continued next week. . . . .
Freely adapted by Tzvi Meir Cohn (Howard Cohn
Patent Attrorney) from Legends and Stories of
the Baal Shem Tov by Rabbi Menachem Gutman
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Sefer Baal Shem Tov
The Baal Shem Tov's Teachings on the Torah
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"Behold, I have taught you rules and laws, as the
L-rd G-d has commanded me, that
you should keep them, in the land to which you are
coming to possess. You shall observe them and do
them." (Devarim 4:60)
"Observe them" - this is Mishnah.1 "And
do them" as it implies. Rashi
You should be pure-hearted in your service of
G-d. The main thing is not to forget [the
essential] things, to study a certain amount of mussar
every day2, and to see that you are
always attached to good character traits and proper
behavior. Do not let a day go by without doing a
mitzvah, whether it is easy or difficult to perform. This
is alluded to in [the Mishnah]: Be as careful (zahir) in
the performance of a minor mitzvah as of a major
one."3 "Zahir" as in the words:"And the
wise shall shine (yaZhiRu) as the brightness of the
firmament."(Daniel 12:3) That is, the soul should
shine and radiate [in the performance] of a minor
mitzvah just as it does with a major one. For
G-d desires the heart.4
Tzivos HaRivash, p. 2a
1I.e. the study of the Oral Torah, so as
not to forget it.
2A general term for inspirational and
ethical literature, such as Sha¡arei Teshuva or Reishis
Chochmah. (The Baal Shem Tov predated the mussar
movement of R. Yisroel Salant by about a hundred
years.)
3Pirkei Avos 2:1.
4Sanhedrin 105b.
Translation and Commentary by Rabbi Dr.
Eliezer Shore
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HEART OF PRAYER
The Baal Shem Tov's Teachings on Prayer
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4.b3 Prayer sweetens the judgment of Malchus so
that G-d's decree can be changed from bad to
good.
Nachmanides asks about the nature of
prayer: How
can it improve a Divine decree? Can G-d's
Will be changed? If a person were praying for
themself, we could understand how His Will can be
changed. For just as they changed their own behavior
from bad to good, so G-d's decree can be
changed from bad to good. But this principle should
not apply to prayers offered on someone else's
behalf.
The Baal Shem Tov explained, in the
name of his Heavenly teacher, Achiya HaShaloni, that
prayer sweetens
the judgment of Malchus, which is called Din , in its
root in Binah. When you pray in this way for a friend,
you bind them to their Supernal root, and they become
a different person.
To explain this further, it is known that the
Divine decree is a drop of seed in the womb of
Malchus, and that it is composed of letters. As the
Talmud says: "Betzalel knew how to combine the
letters that went into the creation of heaven and
earth." Now, the King of Kings surely does not carry
out His decrees Himself. He appoints an emissary,
who makes use of the word-combinations that convey
the decree. However, the emissary can rearrange the
first letters of the words so that they imply something
else.
Now, the Tzaddik is the emissary of the
Shechinah, who knows how to sweeten the
judgments and bind the drop that is in Malchus to
Binah, thus transforming it into something else.
Katones Passim, p. 47b
Translation
and
Commentary by Rabbi Dr.
Eliezer Shore
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DIVINE LIGHT
The Mystical Light of the Baal Shem Tov
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Section 19.
ONCE, the Baal
Shem Tov was outside the city of Mezibush with his
students, and the time for Mincha 1 arrived. His
disciples said to him, "Rebbe, there is no water to
wash our hands for Mincha." The Baal Shem Tov took
his walking stick and struck the earth and a spring of
water burst from the ground. It flows until today, near
Mezibush, and is called the Baal Shem Tov's well.
The Baal Shem Tov did many miraculous acts, the
likes of which had not been seen since the days of the
Tannaim, Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai and Rabbi
Chanina ben Dosa. All the miracles were as a result
of his constant attachment to G-d.
1The afternoon prayer service
2Rabbinic Sages (700 CE-2000
CE)
3Author of Zohar
41st century
5Notzer Chesed, Chap. 6
Translation
and
Commentary by Rabbi Dr.
Eliezer Shore
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KESER SHEM TOV
Anthology of the Teachings of the Baal Shem Tov
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KST 33.
The Baal Shem Tov taught:
"A person should always be accustomed to
say, 'Everything that G-d does is for the best',"1
as did Rabbi Akiba, whereas Nachum Ish
Gamzu would always say, "This too is for the
good."2
The Baal Shem Tov taught:
Nachum said, "This too is for the good," because he
was able to actually transform the strict judgments at
their source by finding some purposeful kindness in
those specific judgments, and then everything was
immediately transformed to an act of Divine kindness.
The average person, though, who is unable to find the
Divine kindness hidden in the source of judgment,
should nevertheless always be accustomed to say in
general, "Everything that G-d does is for the
best," even though he does not understand how this
is true.
1Tractate Berakhoth 60b.
2Tractate Taanith 21a.
Translation and commentary by Rabbi
Yehoshua Starrett.
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