“Just the Fact of the Presence” p: 69

AyinBase with R' Paltiel ThursdayNight 2 Shvat 5772 

Page 68– last 3 lines of the page (line starts, 'bebano...')

See link (top right) for link to all pages of the text.

There is no mashal/metaphor for essence. One can think of the host when you are a guest. His presence is beyond qualities and features. There is no transmission – just the fact of the presence is all it is.

The human being attests to the fact that this is His creation. He bears witness to His presence.

There is no way to measure a man – just his presence here supersedes anything. It there is a human life involved everything is done to save him. 

The souls of Israel are rooted in Essence. There is no way to express this except in the negative, by saying, 'it is impossible to substitute them for another!'

you can describe 'being rooted in the essence' – you can't explain or identify 'what the soul receives from being rooted in Essence'.

Just as the host provides a 'reality' element to a gathering, an aspect that cannot be identified, so too, but more so with Essence and the souls of Israel.

The father provides his son with total independence. There is no quality, it is his very presence that is provided.

This is where you see the difference between the father and the mother, with her the 'relationship' counts much more. The father provides the essential element. 

Inside the text: How is choice involved in the relationship between Essence and the souls of Israel? They represent His pleasure – so how is it choice? It is because Essence itself – is completely separate even from the essential pleasure. So at the level of essential pleasure 'choice' is not a factor – they have a relationship. At actual essence, which is completely removed from qualities and relationship and hence room for 'choice' seem to exist...

but in real truth... (which is outside the real of concept/understanding) even the Actual Essence is united with the souls of Israel.

So first we said actual essence is removed from pleasure and hence the element of 'choice' has a place...

But now we see a 'change of heart' – 'yes', says the Rebbe, 'what I told you does hold, but still in truth, also the actual element of essence is a place where the souls of Israel are rooted'.

And hence it is says, 'to substitute them with a different nation is impossible'. This cannot be understood.

All we can say is 'the souls of Israel are rooted in Essence, and this does not detract in any way from the pure unity of Essence...!'

We're having it both ways, it is His choice, and it is not based on qualities.

When we say in the negative, 'to substitute them with a different nation is impossible' it's because there is nothing there. This is different to what we have been discussing previously of being rooted in His pleasure.

This is a paradoxical presentation – at the level of nothingness, that's where the root of the souls exist.

Ownership is an extension of your own reality. Ownership does not make the human being. The human being makes ownership.