The following is based on a Hebrew Text from Reb Zalman’s Sefer, Yishmiru Daat.  Click here for Reb Zalman’s text in Hebrew. (Freely translated by Gabbai Seth Fishman)

(Leviticus 23: 15):

You shall count Sefirot for  yourselves / וספרתם לכם

i.e., your preoccupation should be one of bringing within qualities of inner light for inner shining,

following the example of Shabbos / ממחרת השבת

i.e. the kind of holiness you have on Pesach should spill forth into the days that follow,

from the day you bring the Omer as a wave offering
/ מיום הביאכם את עומר התנופה

to raise up the cattle food (meaning you’re raising up your Nefesh HaBehamit / animal soul), – whoever does this gives something of a brightness to the inner self.  From the day (Pesach) on which you raise yourselves from the world to Him Yitbarach,

there will be seven weeks with qualities of simple wholeness,
                                                        / שבע שבתות תמימות תהיינה

the weeks will become seven shabbosim which are going to spill over into the other days of the week,

until the day after the seventh week then you’re counting fifty days
                                         / עד ממחרת השבת השביעית תספרו חמישים יום

it’s likely that you will catch a glimpse of the fiftieth gate and then you will have acquired a receptivity for the holy Torah (on Shavuot).

The following is based on a Hebrew Text from Reb Zalman’s Sefer, Yishmiru Daat. Click here for Reb Zalman’s text in Hebrew. (Freely translated by Gabbai Seth Fishman)

(Leviticus 21:1) While the Torah frequently uses language such as DaBeR / speak to the Children of Israel – in this week’s Parashah it says EMoR / talk gently to the priests. (According to the Talmud, if you can talk gently to God the impact you will have on this plane is increased to such an extent that you will accomplish what you said you would Nedarim 29). To a priest, who already comes from a place of chesed / lovingkindness, (for this comes with the territory), you can just say it simply and quietly with a gentle tone, (cf Rashi, Exodus 19:3 where he says that you sometimes need to speak harshly and the implication is perhaps that this is required if the people are not from a place of chesed). But the essential element of saying something is the content of the message you are trying to get across which is not what is emphasized in (Psalms 47:4) “yaDBeR / He is speaking to the nations as though they are below us.” This latter is more about ordering around and dominating those who are stubborn. (But even for the stubborn ones, if you want to cut below their defenses and make a lasting impression, you are better off going to the deeper level, letting them open to change and this will only happen if you are gentle in the way you say your angry or critical message.)

The following is based on a Hebrew Text from Reb Zalman’s Sefer, Yishmiru Daat.  Click here for Reb Zalman’s text in Hebrew.  Rebuking a person can help him onto a path of Teshuvah, which begins to effect repair for the sin.  (Freely translated by Gabbai Seth Fishman)

The Torah states: “Be sure to rebuke et amitecha / your fellow group member and don’t bear a sin through him.” (Leviticus 19:17)

When a person does something wrong and we witness it, then the person is to be rebuked.  When we close our eyes to the sins of others and avoid dealing with the anxiety or stress we may feel in taking a stand, then we are being passive to the situation.  The rebuking can be a very important thing to the person, the group and the world. Let’s look more closely at how it can help.

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The following is based on a Hebrew Text from Reb Zalman’s Sefer, Yishmiru Daat.  Click here for Reb Zalman’s text in Hebrew.  (Freely translated by Gabbai Seth Fishman)

In the ritual for cleansing a leper who has now been healed and, in the ritual for cleansing a house that is no longer with leprous signs, a living creature is released unharmed as a means for purification (cf., Leviticus 14:7).  So, too, with the goat for Azazel, (Leviticus 16:8) the goat is sent forth alive. In these cases, the animal is not killed; it is set free. The release functions in Shamanic fashion with the priest serving in a Shaman-role by releasing the animal back to its source and thereby effecting changes in Spirit World in a way that is similar to the function of chukim, mitzvot for which there is no logical reason according to the predominant way that we have come to think about them.

For the former cases, the priest sends forth into the wild, a living creature that is bearing the impurity of the leprosy of the person or the house. And in the case of the goat which is sent forth, there’s also a similar dynamic of impurity, because the Tabernacle (and later on the holy Temple) was all year long absorbing uncleanness from the sins and the transgressions of those bringing the sacrifices, as it is written (Isaiah 53:5), “it is pierced by our iniquities.”  Through the blemishes caused by the transgressions, there are breaches made to the containers of holiness.  By means of the breaches, some of the holy shefa, the holiness will escape outside.

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Here is a teaching for Parashat Vayakhel from Reb Zalman’s Sefer Yishmiru Daat: (Click here to read the text in its original Hebrew, which is translated below by Gabbai Seth Fishman.)

In Parashat Vayakhel, (cf., Exodus 35:30), Moshe tells the children of Israel that Hashem has called Bezalel by name.

When we think about this, we might feel disconnected from the experience of being the one who is called.  After all, which of us is a “Bezalel,” i.e., a master craftsman and leading artisan of our generation.  And how can we relate to the text’s stating that it is Hashem who called him to build the Mishkan?

We have an indication in the Aramaic translation of the text as to what constitutes Hashem calling somebody because the Hebrew word used, (קרא), is not translated with an Aramaic verb that means “to call” but rather, it’s translated by a verb  that means “to raise a person up,” (‘חזו דרבי ה) as when a person is promoted in his job.  So when Hashem calls a person the person is raised by it.

When we are young and in school, if we do what we’re asked we progress from grade to grade.  When we do something that causes us to be promoted at work, when we have shown what we can do and someone gives us something new, harder, of greater importance or impact — all of these are tied to the “calling”.

Along with the promotion or advancement comes healthy growth and a feeling of competence and accomplishment.

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ספר מפתחי חכמת האמת
Keys to the Wisdom of Truth
Rabbi Saul Baumann
Introduction and Commentaries by Reb Zalman Schachter-Shalomi
Editor: Rabbi Shaya Isenberg

http://www.alephcanada.ca/store/#!/Reb-Zalman-Writings/c/5437258/offset=0&sort=normal

This book contains Reb Zalman’s lectures on a small Sefer written by a twenty-three year old genius named Saul Baumann.

Baumann was a Chabad Chossid who lived in Warsaw, Poland and was killed in the Holocaust.  He was educated at both Chabad and Slobodka (a mitnagdishe Yeshivah).  Through the lens of Kabbalah, Baumann brings harmony to the opposing traditions of the two communities in which he was trained, i.e. the spiritual heirs to the Vilna Gaon and Reb Shneur Zalman of Liadi.

In his lectures, Reb Zalman shares his thoughts on Paradigm Shift and required updates for spiritual connection to remain alive and relevant within the context of traditional Judaism.  Kabbalah is a framework we can build upon to take us into a renewed Judaism.

Zalman shows us how the tradition can help us to reach to the places of discovering Judaism’s path into the future and how we can integrate from those places of shifted paradigms.  The updates can connect us in new ways to traditional understandings of Jewish Mysticism.

Gabbai Seth

Sefer ha-Hasidut (Rafael, Yitzhak, ed., Tel Aviv: Avraham Zioni, 1972), with around one hundred Rebbes, is arranged according to Yahrzeit. Now the material has been scanned with OCR.

Here are the Shvat sections in Hebrew only. (Please click the Rebbe to see a section):
2 Shvat: Reb Zusha of Anipoli
4 Shvat: Rabbi Yisroel of Polotzk
4 Shvat: Rabbi Abraham Kalisker
4 Shvat: Rabbi Moshe Leib Erblich of Sassov
5 Shvat: Reb Yehudah Aryeh Leib Alter (“Sefat Emet”)
7 Shvat: Rabbi Dovid Biederman of Lelov
10 Shvat: Reb Shlomo Lutzker
21 Shvat: Reb Yitzchak of Neshchiz
22 Shvat: Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Kotzk (“Kotzker”)
22 Shvat: Reb Leibele Eiger

ספר החסידות
הרב משולם זלמן חייא הכהן
שחטר-שלומי שליט”א

שבט יאָהר-צייטען

ב’ שבט רבי זושה מהאניפולי
ד’ שבט רבי ישראל מפולוצק
ד’ שבט רבי אברהם מקאליסק
ד’ שבט רבי משה ליב מסאסוב
ה’ שבט רבי יהודה אריה ליב מגור
ז’ שבט רבי דוד מלילוב
י’ שבט רבי שלמה מלוצק
כ”א שבט רבי יצחק מנישכיז
כ”ב שבט רבי מנחם מנדל מקוצק
כ”ב שבט רבי יהודה ליב אייגר מלובלין