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The Yanuka’s own words in this shiur, translated into English by Lehallel · 2,351 words · 10:49. Press a time to hear it said.
0:00 There is a Gemara in Tractate Nedarim, page 39, where the Gemara says that a person who goes to visit a sick person, if he is his ben gil, born under the same mazal, takes from him one sixtieth of his illness. One sixtieth he takes from him each day. Up to this point. When it said, 'Behold, your son Yosef', right? 'Hineh', behold, is sixty in gematria. 'Hineh' is sixty. So he was his ben gil. Yosef and Yaakov, with everything that they went through... Yaakov and Yosef are the same one, the same mazal, the same thing.
0:29 So 'hineh' is sixty in gematria. That is why it is written, 'and he sat up on the bed'. 'Hamitah', the bed, is 59. 59, because he took from him the one sixtieth, which he took from him. Now, the secret of the sixty. What is the secret of the sixty? The samech. The shape of the samech corresponds to the Ein Sof, the Infinite. Its end is set in its beginning; it has no edges. This hints at the sick person, who is close to being absorbed into his root.
0:54 As the flame wants to be absorbed into its root, so too a person who is sick is close to it, Heaven forbid; he could die. So at every moment the attribute of strict judgment is stretched over him. He could be nullified and die and depart into his root, rise up above. In a moment, as it were, he could rise into his root, with the attribute of judgment stretched over him. That is why, when a person is sick, it is not good for him to change his place of work, it is not good for him to change where he lives, it is not good for him to move himself about, if he is in illness.
1:21 One must be careful. One must ask a wise man and see whether it is right for him to move or not, because a sick person, Heaven forbid, is in danger. Always consult a true talmid chacham who understands; he will tell him whether it is good for him to move or not. Why? Because while he is sick, the attribute of judgment is stretched over him, and then it may be that this could arouse accusers. So it is better to truly know what to do and how to help. Because he is close to the Ein Sof; he is close to being nullified into his root. He is truly about to be nullified. Now he is nullified in sixty, truly to be nullified into his root.
1:48 Now, the secret of his nourishment: that is why one must also be careful with a sick person not to change his name. Changing the name of a sick person, if one does not know how to do it, is very, very dangerous for the sick. One must know the letters, where he draws from. Because he takes his life-force and his nourishment from letters, the holy life-force. In all the letters there is a life-force of kedushah, which is found inside; in every letter there is a world. And in a person's name, in his root, he receives his life-force and all his nourishment from the 'face', the inner side, of the letters.
2:18 Take Pharaoh: he is 'ha'oref', the back of the neck. Our master the Arizal explains that his nourishment came from the back side. He did not merit to receive illumination face to face. But the illuminations of the Jewish people, who went out of Egypt, they attained face to face. 'Face to face Hashem spoke with you.' They had a revelation of G-dliness: the Stand at Mount Sinai, the receiving of the Torah. That is the revealing of the face. The revealing of the face is the face of the letters. The face of the letters: there are the letters, and there is the inner face of the letters. That is why there is Tanta: te'amim, nekudos, tagin, osiyos, corresponding to Atzilus, Beriah, Yetzirah, Asiyah.
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2:46 The te'amim, the cantillation notes, are in Atzilus, above; that is the highest. Tanta: te'amim. After that, nekudos, the vowel points; that is yet more of an absorption into the Essence. You cannot clothe the Essence; it is higher above high. After that, tagin, the crowns, and at the end are the osiyos, the letters; that is in Asiyah, the form of the letters. We are in fact speaking about a person's life-force: he draws from the root of the inner side of the letters. The inner root of the letters, from it he draws.
3:12 And every name has its own meaning, its own life-force. Now, the letters: among the letters themselves there are letters of chesed, kindness, and letters of bestowal, and there are letters of din, strict judgment. For example, 'shemesh', the sun: shin, shin. Shin: wherever there is the letter shin, it is gevuros and dinim, severities and judgments. 'Shemesh', the sun, is heat; it burns. 'Shemesh', sun. 'Esh', fire. That is, where there is a shin, it always burns. Fire consumes.
3:40 The letter shin in 'esh': fire burns, consumes. 'Esh.' Tell me more things with a shin, go on. It bites: 'nachash', a snake. 'Nachash', 'nachash', the one that bites. 'Shemesh', sun. 'Sheker', falsehood. 'Sheker.' All the harsh things. 'Shalom'? Right, 'shalom'. Why 'shalom'? 'Shalom' in gematria is 376. Why? Within shalom, peace, there is war. And one must know how to turn it around and make peace between rivals. Shalom is not when the two of them shake hands.
4:05 It is not that the state of Iran says, 'We will not fire on Israel.' That is not called shalom. Shalom is when the opinions dissolve into one opinion. That is, if until now there were two opinions, now there is one opinion. If a husband and wife quarreled, then: the wife had an opinion, the husband had an opinion; now it has become one opinion, and they agree on it. That is shalom. There are opposites. But there is 'Shechinah'. 'Shechinah' too?
4:30 That is, in Responsa Rav Pe'alim, part 1, siman 32, Rabbeinu Yosef Chaim writes about the Shechinah, what the Shechinah is, in detail. That is the thing, the importance of it. See what he explains there. That is, every aspect of the essence of a person's name, of anything, has at its root the... the... the nourishment of its gevuros. He draws from gevuros, gevuros. Now, the sick person: they add a name for him, or change his name, and that name nonetheless carries dinim, or something, or they take his own name from him, in whatever way. This is dangerous for one who does not understand it. It could, Heaven forbid, even cause him to pass away.
5:05 Very dangerous. You know, of course, it does not happen exactly like that, so fast. But there are also those, sometimes, who do not understand, and I have heard, such things have happened, things people were not careful with. One has to be careful with this. This is written about, in the commentary on the Rav HaMaggid, and by many more holy ones. Now, I will show you something beautiful. Now see: the letter shin, we said it is gevuros, right?
5:31 Pay attention: there are a few letters that are very, very harsh gevuros, that are of din. They are the letter shin, and the letter tes, and nun. These are the letters of...? 'Kera.' What are we asking here? To tear the Satan apart. Why tear? To separate the letters, so that these letters will not be whole. The moment you tear, 'kera', you tear: you tear the shin, you tear the nun, so that they are not whole, and then the chitzonim, the outside forces, and the Samech-Mem and his female counterpart will have no nourishment and no hold.
6:05 It is written that at the time when... in the Zohar, Acharei Mos, and Zohar Kedoshim too, that at the time when, Heaven forbid, a person passes away, it writes there, in the opening on the parashah, about the chitzonim and the accusers: the moment a person passes away, they are like dogs. They come to seize him, they want to devour him, the person. And only when they bring the bier of the dead into the cemetery, the 'house of the living', when they bring him in, they immediately go quiet, they calm down. As long as the bier of the dead has not been brought through the gate of the cemetery, they are not quiet. They clamor, they make noise, and they want it really fast.
6:39 Is that what they do for them, honored Rav, after the taharah? That is why they do them, but... Yes, but here, among the Jewish people, it is not so much of a thing. As for the Jewish people, there is protection in this matter among the Jewish people. But this should awaken us. Therefore, at the time when a person... one must arouse very great mercy. We see: 'kera', we ask Hashem to tear apart the attribute of judgment, that side, at its source.
7:05 So look at this thing: when a person is sick, it is one sixtieth. When you take... and give him the sixty, which is 'hineh', so this 'hineh' is the sixty. He takes from him the one sixtieth, and it becomes 'hamitah', the bed. 'Hamitah' is nun-tes, 59. And then, the moment he is at nun-tes, he has moved him to nun-tes. The sixty is closer to his root. It is as if he is already about to be absorbed into his root. The purpose of the Satan... The Satan is a holy angel. The Samech-Mem is a holy angel.
7:32 He does the will of his Maker. He does not come on his own; he is not against Hashem. He is a holy angel who serves in Heaven, and his level and his rank are holy and most awesome. That is the Samech-Mem. Everyone thinks he is some power of his own. It is heresy to say that, Heaven forbid. People who see him as some kind of... Whoever thinks otherwise is a heretic and an apikores. He does the will of his Maker, the will of Hashem. Can one say he is against Hashem? And he does the... He is also in Iyov, where the Holy One, blessed be He, speaks with him.
8:00 Why is he not a rasha? Because he does more than... that people become wicked because of him, that they lose their minds, that people fall into places that are not good, and so on. All well and good; he was, so to speak, given a role here in the world. We need this. Every person is here in the world, a holy soul is in the world; but a wicked person takes the soul and the levels, his middos, to things that are not good. So, as a great rasha, he is punished also for what he overdid, beyond what was needed, and for not acting properly.
8:28 Like the one called a 'naval birshus haTorah', a scoundrel within what the Torah permits, who sleeps all day. He commits no sin; he is a scoundrel within what the Torah permits, for he takes something like this, which is permitted, and goes past its time, past its allotment, past its measure. That is called a 'naval birshus haTorah'. And so, look at this thing: he gives one sixtieth. How much is left for us? Nun-tes, 59. Nun-tes: those are the same letters as in 'Satan'. Because now, the moment he brought him back to nun-tes, he took him down from the samech.
8:56 'Satan': if you write it samech-tes-nun, as it were, you turn the samech into a shin, for they interchange in their pronunciation. I took this samech; I went to visit the sick person... And likewise in Nedarim, page 49, Rashi says at the end of the page that talmidei chachamim are weak, as they toil over the Torah. The Torah wears down one's strength. That is, they are weak, they are sick, the talmidei chachamim. Rashi says they are sick because they are all the time with the holy Torah, with all their strength. But why?
9:22 Because they are all the time separating the letters; they nullify the Satan, they do 'kera Satan', tearing the Satan. So one must pray each time that, Heaven forbid, there be no weakening of the power on high, of the holy ones and the angels, to bestow upon His world all kinds of Torah teachings. All kinds of Torah teachings flow down as ink. The moment he gave one sixtieth, and the samech gave one sixtieth, the nun-tes remains. So the nun-tes, the letters of din, are nullified. And then, since they also do not have the shin, the flow, the samech or the shin, they are void, and then the sick person is healed.
9:54 That is why: 'And Yisrael strengthened himself and sat up on the bed.' 'He strengthened himself', 'he strengthened himself': he received strength. Rabbeinu, Rabbeinu, Rabbeinu Rabbi Shlomo Yehudah... Nun-tes bar nun-tes. The secret of nullification in sixty, as well. Nullification in sixty. At nun-tes it is not nullified. Now it is nullified, by nullification in sixty. Our teacher and Rebbe, Rabbi Shlomo Yehudah ben Dalia: blessing and success for him in all the work of his hands.
10:22 Like a flowing wellspring, with Hashem's help, may he bestow on all His people Israel an abundance of blessing and success. May all his wishes be fulfilled, for good and for blessing, and may he merit a good and long life, joy and gladness, wealth and happiness, all salvations, miracles and wonders, amen. Whatever the Rav wants to do in the world, all his wishes, with Hashem's help may He hasten it; may He grant him, with Hashem's help, all his wishes for good and for blessing, amen. May He give him Heavenly help in Torah, in music and in all the work of his hands, amen. 'Whatever he does shall succeed', amen.
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