אילו היה מאמין שמאת ה' הייתה זאת - לא היה כועס | הרב מנחם מיידנצ'יק, כ"ה תשרי | אגרות הקודש סימן כ"ה

20th of Tishrei. We are in Letter 20 ( Iggeret HaKodesh). The Rebbe is going to explain in this letter a book called Tzava'at HaRivash. "Rivash" is an acronym for: Rabbi Israel Baal Shem Tov .

It is not actually his will, but it is called Tzava'at HaRivash, as these are pure sayings of the Baal Shem Tov that his disciples collected. There are a few things here: there is the matter of the attributes of love and awe, how it can be that a person's love and awe are in exile; and also, when a person hears someone speaking to them, shouting at them, or doing something undesirable or bad to them—they must understand and be careful not to seek blame, but rather to seek

what I need to rectify, what message the Holy One, Blessed be He, is conveying through a certain person or a certain matter. In other words, everything that happens to me in life is Divine Providence, not to live in blame. There are people who live in blame all the time.

My parents are to blame, my friends are to blame, my uncles, here, there, all kinds of things—they did this to me in business, they did that to me. One must understand that nothing that happens in the world happens for no reason. And if a person, heaven forbid, needs to be harmed, then it is—it is he, how do you say? He is a messenger.

That person , that person must of course receive their punishment for their evil choice —that the evil passed through them, but the Almighty has many messengers, as we shall see inside. And how we must strengthen our faith in the Holy One, Blessed be He, and we will learn how anger is actually a very, very serious thing in Judaism. Let us look inside and understand with depth and insight what is written in the book, the book called Tzava'at HaRivash, even though it is not actually his will

at all—he did not leave a will at all before his passing, just collections of pure sayings. Yes, it is just pure sayings, yes, a matter of, as they say, about the soul: "The soul You have given..." and so on, which they collected, gathering after gathering, and they did not know how to accurately phrase the language of his original point.

That is to say, yes, because the Baal Shem Tov said it in Yiddish, and they...but the intent is the absolute truth. What was intended by those words is truly real. And it begins with what the Sages of blessed memory said, a very important point for life, that if a person lives by it then—how do you say?—they will have a truly happy and joyful life . The Sages say: Whoever gets angry is as if he worships idols— "Avodah Zarah"(foreign worship), yes.

And the reason why it is so severe that a person who gets angry is worshipping idols is understood with insight: because when one is angry, faith departs from them. A person who has faith—does not get angry, because they believe in the Holy One, Blessed be He, that everything is by Divine Providence. If he had believed that " this was from Hashem," no, that everything that happened to him—the words, the actions—was from Hashem, he would not be angry at all. Even though a person who has free will curses or hits another—if someone now strikes someone or curses them or damages their property—they are liable in the eyes of man and in the eyes of Heaven for the evil of their choice, and they receive punishment for it, yes.

So, ostensibly, one cannot say they are not acting, ostensibly, ostensibly they are an agent of the Holy One, Blessed be He, when they strike, but in any case, they are eyes of Heaven. The Admur Hazaken says: Nevertheless, the damage was already decreed from Heaven. The fact that a person committed the damage—they will receive the punishment from man and from Heaven—but the fact that the damage had to happen to you, that was already decreed from Heaven. And if not , if 'A' had not done it, then 'B' would have done it.

If a person is meant to lose money, there are many ways for the Holy One, Blessed be He, to bring something about; there are many ways and many messengers for the Almighty to carry out the decree, as Rashi brings on the verse written in the Torah: "And God caused it to come to his hand," yes, regarding a city of refuge. A person who killed inadvertently—in Judaism, in the house of the dog—a person who murders inadvertently goes to a city of refuge, until the death of the

High Priest, or until they check if it was inadvertent or intentional, etc. So it is written there: "From the wicked comes forth wickedness." Meaning, even though it was decreed for a person to receive damage, the Holy One, Blessed be He, orchestrates that it is a specific person who is supposed to cause the damage, who is supposed to receive the punishment—we won't get into that— but that they are the one who harms. Yes, even though the harmer does it by their own choice, the Holy One, Blessed

be He, effectively sent them.

And why do they harm 'A' and not 'B'? Things do not just happen for no reason, and more than that. But even at that moment, when they strike or curse, at that very moment that the person curses them, shames them, and so on, it is clothed in the power of Hashem. Because a person cannot speak without the power of Hashem.

What is it that is clothed in that person's mouth or that power? Nothing in the world happens without the will of Hashem. Everything, even the smallest things. It does not matter , everything that happens to a person —relationships, children, livelihood, life, everything, health—is all the power of Hashem.

As it is written: "For Hashem told him to curse." David said that the Holy One, Blessed be He, told Shimei ben Gera to curse David. Ostensibly, where did the Holy One, Blessed be He, tell Shimei to curse David? So how did David say that God told him: "Curse Shimei ben Gera"? It is written, yes, it is written that he received punishment, so Shimei ben Gera , but it is written: "And he cursed bitterly," it is written in the Bible, yes?

Rather, this thought that fell into Shimei's heart, his brain, where did that thought fall into him? In the brain and in the heart, and the curse came down from Hashem, and the breath of His mouth, which gives life to all their hosts, gave life to the spirit of Shimei when he spoke those words to David. What is the point? As if the breath of His mouth, may He be blessed, had withdrawn; if the Holy One, Blessed be He, did not give him power in his mouth, he could not curse.

One moment. From Shimei he could not speak a word, and that is because Hashem told him, " Go, curse David." Meaning, in the fact that the Holy One, blessed be He, brought him to life, yes, gave him the power to speak, and who told him to then? So here we actually see, and with Hashem's help we will continue this matter tomorrow, to live with the fact manages the world, and nothing in life that happens to us happens for no reason. And a person who has a problem needs to fix himself, and also not to be angry, because one must understand that everything that happens here in the world is all orchestrated by the Creator, blessed be His name.