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Chapter 25
And this is what is written (Deuteronomy 30:14), “For the matter is exceedingly near to you,” and so on: that at every time and every hour it is in a person’s hand and in his power to drive out from within him the spirit of foolishness and of forgetfulness, and to remember and to rouse his love for Hashem (God), the One, which is surely hidden in his heart, without any doubt. And this is what is said, “and in your heart.” And fear is included in it as well. That is, not to be separated in any manner from His oneness and His unity, blessed be He, even in an actual surrender of life, without any reason or any intellect that can be grasped, but by a divine nature. And all the more so in the breaking of the desires, which is lighter than the pains of death, so that the matter is even nearer to him, to subdue the yetzer (the urge). It holds in the mode of “Turn aside from evil,” even from a light transgression of the words of the scribes, so as not to cross His will, blessed be He, since by it one is separated from His oneness and His unity, just as by actual foreign worship at the time of the deed. And indeed, for foreign worship too, one can repent afterwards. And although one who says “I will sin and I will return,” they do not enable him, and so on (Yoma 85b), that is, they do not hold his hand so that he should have a fitting hour to repent; but if he pressed the hour and he did repent, there is no thing that stands in the face of repentance. And nevertheless every man of Israel is ready and prepared to hand over his life for the holiness of the Name, so as not to bow down to foreign worship even for the moment, and to repent afterwards. And this is because of the light of Hashem that is clothed in their soul, as stated above, which is not in the mode of time and hour at all, but above time, and it rules and governs over it, as is known.
And it holds in the mode of “And do good,” to prevail like a lion, with might and with firmness of heart, against the yetzer, which makes his body heavy and casts laziness upon it, from the mode of the element of dust in the nefesh bahamit (the life-soul of the body), a laziness away from burdening his body with quickness in every kind of exertion and of load-bearing labor, in the service of Hashem in which there is exertion and toil. For example, to labor in the Torah in deep study and with the mouth, his mouth not ceasing from the recitation, and as the saying of the sages of blessed memory (Avodah Zarah 5b): “A person should always set himself upon the words of Torah like an ox to a yoke and like a donkey to a load.” And likewise prayer with concentration, with all his strength, actually. And likewise in the service of Hashem that is a matter of money, such as the service of charity. And the like of these, among the wars of the yetzer and its stratagems, to cool a person’s soul so that he will not abandon his money and the health of his body. For to stand against it and to conquer it is very near to a person, when he sets this upon his heart: that to defeat the yetzer in all this, and in more than this, and to do its very opposite, is very easy beside the pains of death, may Hashem guard us. And the pains of death, may Hashem guard us, he would accept with love and with willingness, so as not to be separated from His oneness and His unity, blessed be He, even for the moment, by bowing down to foreign worship, God spare us. And all the more so he ought to accept it with love and with willingness, in order to cling to Him for ever and ever. That is, when he does His will, blessed be He, in this service, the inwardness of the exalted will is revealed in it, in a mode of face and of great disclosure, and not in hiding at all. And when there is no hiding of the face at all in the exalted will, then nothing is separate in any way whatsoever, so as to be an independent being and a thing on its own. And therefore his nefesh elokit (the soul from God) and his vital soul, and their garments, will all of them be united in the utmost union with the exalted will and with the light of Ein Sof (the Endless), blessed be He, as stated above.
And this union above is eternal, for ever and ever. For He, blessed be He, and His will, are above time. And so too the disclosure of His will that is in His speech, which is the Torah, is eternal, and as it is written (Isaiah 40:8): “and the word of our Elohim will endure for the age,” and His words are living and lasting, and so on, and He will not exchange and He will not replace His law for ever, and so on.
Only, below, it is under time, and only in that hour alone in which he is occupied in it, in the Torah or in a mitzvah (a commanded deed). For afterwards, if he occupies himself with another matter, he is separated, below, from the higher union. And that is when he occupies himself with matters that are wholly idle, in which there is no need at all for the service of Hashem. And nevertheless, when he turns back and returns afterwards to the service of Hashem, to the Torah and to prayer, and he asks pardon from Hashem because it was possible for him to occupy himself then in the Torah and he did not occupy himself, Hashem will pardon him, as the saying of the sages of blessed memory (Yoma 86a): “One who crossed a positive command and returned does not move from there until they pardon him.” And for this they fixed the blessing “Pardon us” three times each day, for the offense of leaving off from the Torah, from which no person is spared on any day. And like the continual offering, which would atone for positive commands. And this is not “I will sin and I will return,” unless at the very time of the sin itself he relies on the repentance, and for that reason he sins, as has been explained in another place.
And with this it will be understood why Moses our teacher, peace be upon him, commanded in the Repetition of the Torah, to the generation that entered the Land, to recite the Shema twice each day, to take upon himself the kingship of Heaven with a surrender of life. And did He not promise them (Deuteronomy 11:25), “Your fear and your dread Hashem will give,” and so on? Rather, because the keeping of the Torah and of its commands depends on this: that he always remember the matter of surrendering his life to Hashem for His oneness, so that it be fixed in his heart always, actually, by day and by night, and not depart from his memory. For by this he will be able to stand against his yetzer, to defeat it always, at every time and every hour, as stated above.
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