Proceeding Together � Volume 2: Rosh HaShanah: A Healthy Nerve-Center for the Coming Year

The First Day of Selichos,

5710 [1950]

Brooklyn, N.Y.

It[777] is explained in various sources in Chassidus[778] that Rosh HaShanah is called the head of the year rather than the beginning of the year, because its relation to the other days of the year parallels the relation of the head to the torso and the other organs. Just as the vitality of all the organs is subsumed in the head, and this then finds overt expression in the fact that the vitality of every particular organ derives from the head,[779] so, too, Rosh HaShanah comprises within itself the vitality of all the days of the forthcoming year: they are all subsumed in it in potential form, and eventually their vitality separates out overtly into individual days.

It may be assumed that this is one of the reasons for the fact that we have been earnestly urged to be exceedingly vigilant in husbanding time on Rosh HaShanah -- for the hours and the minutes of these days are comprehensive; they are superior to those of the rest of the year not only in quantity[780] but also in quality, like the brain tissue in comparison with the other physical organs.

A man is healthy when the vitality centered in his head is intact, and channeled to each organ according to its nature. The same is true of the avodah of Rosh HaShanah. These days should match their content, as the head of the entire year. Moreover, they should be connected with the ensuing days of the year, imbuing them with vitality in the acceptance of G-d's sovereignty, in the study of Torah and in the fulfillment of the mitzvos.

One of the aids to avodah in general, and in particular to the avodah of connecting Rosh HaShanah with the following days of the year, is -- being connected with the head of the myriads of Israel, whose soul[781] is like a head and a brain relative to the souls of his contemporaries: through him they derive their nurture and vitality, and through him they are bound and unified with their original essence and root.

This is the case with the hiskashrus of every man and woman amongst us with the Nasi and head of our generation, namely, my revered father-in-law, the Rebbe [Rayatz], (May I serve as an atonement for his resting place!). As he has stated clearly, hiskashrus is attained by studying his teachings, and[782] by walking in a straight path, in one of his paths that he has shown us, and walking in his ways. It is this hiskashrus that will promote the avodah of the days of Rosh HaShanah[783] and their connection with the rest of the days of the year.

This will constitute the conduit through which people will be inscribed and sealed for a good year, with[784] good that is visible and manifest, both materially and spiritually -- during the days of Rosh HaShanah and later throughout the entire year.

Menachem Mendel ben Chanah Schneerson

Notes:

(Back to text) This letter appears in Sefer HaMaamarim 5710 [1951], p. 2, and in Likkutei Sichos, Vol. XIV, p. 375.

(Back to text) See Likkutei Torah, Parshas Ki Savo; beginning of Ateres Rosh; the maamarim of Rosh HaShanah, 5701 [1940] and 5702 [1941]; et al.

(Back to text) Cf. Tanya, ch. 51 (in Lessons In Tanya, Vol. II, p. 766ff.).

(Back to text) The two days of Rosh HaShanah are together called yoma arichta (Aram.; lit., "one long day").

(Back to text) Tanya, ch. 2 (in Lessons In Tanya, Vol. I, p. 53ff. and p. 59ff.); see also the Introduction to Kuntreis Yud-Beis Tammuz (which appears above on p. 26 above as a letter entitled "A Lifeline").

(Back to text) Cf. Tanya -- Iggeres HaKodesh, Epistle 27 (in Lessons In Tanya, Vol. V, p. 169).

(Back to text) Along the same lines, my revered father-in-law, the Rebbe [Rayatz], related on the Second Night of Rosh HaShanah, 5704 [1943], that from the year 5654 [1893] onwards, his father [the Rebbe Rashab] made a point of mentioning in the course of the day the Baal Shem Tov, the Maggid [of Mezritch], the Alter Rebbe, the Mitteler Rebbe, the Tzemach Tzedek and the Rebbe Maharash, and sometimes (in addition) his uncles, the [other] sons of the Tzemach Tzedek. He would recount some episode or repeat some brief Torah teaching relating to each of them. [-- Note by the Rebbe.]

(Back to text) In the original, b'tov hanireh v'haniglah.