These are my own gleanings from a book by Zalman Shachter-Shalomi & Netanel Miles-Yepez, A Merciful God: stories and teachings of the holy rebbe, Levi Yitzhak of Berditchev – translated and retold with commentary (2010, Albion-Andalus). I hope they encourage you to buy the book. I have paraphrased in order to clarify my own understanding, but there are also direct quotations from the book. The notes in square brackets are my own thoughts and responses, rather than ideas gleaned from the book itself.
- iv “The old shall be renewed, and the new shall be made holy.” Rav Avraham Yotzhak Kook
- xi “[LYB’s] expansive personality was able to forgive the fiercest enemies, to bring factions together, and to say the unsayable of his time.”
- xiii “As much as possible, we have … attempted to use gender-inclusive language throughout, even bending the rules of grammar and historical accuracy on occasion to do so. These stories and teachings come from a culture and time of patriarchal dominance, when the masculine ‘he’ was thought to include and encompass the feminine ‘she’. Without making any value judgments about that time, we must nevertheless speak to the more diverse audience of today and for the needs of our own time.”
[The story chapters]
Beginnings
Divine games
- 6 Joy is central to Hasidism.
- 7 “And God descended” à God [transformed] to a version that we can handle [does this for each of us in every moment]
- 7 God’s truth is present in all things
- [If God is present in all things, we can maintain God-connection in everything, even when telling jokes.]
A Hasid for a son-in-law
- [Act from the purest motives possible. Have the humility to know that the yetzer ra is present in all our motives.]
- [It takes dedicated study and prayer to know deeply the truth that there is a God who created the world.]
Wisdom maketh the face to shine
- [Our reading of Torah can be deepened by making God-connection first, and treating it as an act of d’veikut / sh’viti.]
The trouble of the tzaddik
- 18 suffering was bearable, as long as it served God
Levi Yitzhak, the Merciful
Head and heels
- 24 CHaBaD = chochmah, binah, da’at à mind and intellect; CHaGaT = chesed, gevurah, tiferet à faith & heart. The mind is valuable and necessary, sometimes as a way in, sometimes fortifies a weak emotional notion. But faith and heart are ultimately stronger foundations.
The darkened shell
- [T’shuvah is possible even from the darkest and most distant places.]
Whole-hearted prayer
- [The field that we generate through our prayer can positively affect others’ states.]
- [To pray with an expanded self, we have to work up to it—remove distractions, practice, use focusing techniques for the body, emotion and mind.]
- 32 Harness yirah-awe, d’veikut-cleaving, kavanah-intention, body and speech
- 33 Name and celebrate key positive attributes of God. This helps activate and attune the same ones in ourselves.
- 34 “Be holy, as I am holy.” (Lev. 11:44) [ Enter d’veikut, and trust that goodness will follow, in that you will become a move conscious vessel for God’s good action in the world. Connect to God’s goodness, kindness, compassion, healing, enlightenment, peace-making, joy-bringing.]
The parable of the King’s joy
- 36 Beware letting your joyful state dull your discernment.
Spiritual audacity
- 37 Serve God with boldness.
- [theurgy]
- 40 That we believe our actions can make a difference to God gives us dignity in the grand design [but could also be hubris …]
The advocate
- 42 Advocate for people to God.
- 43 Abraham fed angels to remind them of human needs.
- 43 God gave us capacity to sin, so is complicit in our wrongs.
- 44 Story: not greasing wheels in a tallit, but praying while greasing the wheels.
Thrice he won
- [Good fortune comes from God, and nowhere / no one else.]
- 55 turn a receiver into a giver
New laws
- 59 increase kindness
- 59 develop personal relationships with those who beg
- 59 LYB suggested communal pot for beggars was like Sodom and Gemorah. [I disagree. This is not about pushing the problem out of sight, but preventing us from unwittingly ‘enabling’ self-destructive lifestyles when help is available. But how to encourage beggars to avail themselves of opportunities that can improve their lives? How to offer kindness and relationship without giving food and money that sustains existence? How to distinguish between homeless and beggars who aren’t homeless. Oxford’s local community police say that almost all the street people actual have a home and somewhere to sleep; they come out on the street to get extra cash. They advised me that it would be okay to buy a person a sandwich or hot drink.]
The test
- 64 greater depth of spiritual life comes from abandoning hope of reward
For the sake of heaven
- 65 “when this person is occupied with business, it is as if Torah was the real occupation”. Torah-consciousness can be at the heart of our work and daily activities.
- 66 “the Berditchever knew that kavanah was the great leveler” – he wanted to “disabuse the learned of their inflated sense of superiority, and the ignorant of their spiritual roughness and sense of inferiority”. Achievement and status can separate people, as can attitude and self-image, but kavanah can be a straight arrow regardless of these.
- 68 “we must activate our kavanah like never before in the space of our work and ordinary lives, making every inch of it an offering to God.”
The white letters of the Torah
- 69 “a cultivated receptivity to ruach hakodesh”
- 70 Black letters of Torah [‘masculine’ teaching] mustn’t touch, but leave room for white space / letters [‘feminine’ wisdom] – the hidden Torah that’s always present, and slowly being revealed over time.
- 71 flipping focus between black and white fire keeps a narrow focus on ‘figure’ or ‘ground’, sometimes simply making the ground the figure – our deeper task is to see the figure and the ground, and both equally and simultaneously.
- 73 we must update our Torah understanding with multi-gendered readings
- 74 “It seems to me that the Messiah is always coming, being that quality of progressive redemption that we can see in history. Thus, the ‘white letters’ are slowly being revealed over time.” 74 Arthur Waskow: “If you want the Messiah to come, then you have to keep behaving as if the Messiah had already come.” [Are these Christian perspectives?]
The rebbetzin’s kavanah
- [Food preparation can include kavanot – as can anything else.]
Teyk’u
- 79 different readings of a text or situation can be true, according to the frame they are given; and each frame has its own purpose and value.
- 80 “only one who is alive in our world can know the mode in which our world needs to be governed”
- 81 only contemporary responses can speak to contemporary needs and concerns which is why Torah must be new every day.
Sweetening one last judgment
- 83 “sweetening judgments, bringing leniency to a harsh situation”
Dudeleh
- 87 Focus always on God surrounding and permeating all things
- 87 Ps. 139:7 “Where can I flee from Your presence?”
Notes
- 91 “The Maggid chose to read the sentence, ‘God said, ‘Take your son up for a sacrifice,’, not ‘Go and sacrifice your son.’ This is a wonderful teaching, for this is always the issue about divine guidance. What did you hear? When we hear God we must listen well and actively discern the truth of what is being asked of us.”