Rare edition of Tanya
Rare edition of TanyaKedem, Jerusalem

For previous classes, click the link below. Each class, however, can be learned independent of the others.

Tanya/Shaar Hayichud V’haEmunah, Chapter 7, Class 9.

tanyaonline.com/?p=1764

From this point of view, the creation of the lower worlds is even more telling, for their creation required a greater degree of tzimtzum and enclothement. Nevertheless, they cause absolutely no change in Him: they too do not “grasp” Him. In the Alter Rebbe’s words:

וגם בתחתונים, אף על גב דאיהו ממלא כל עלמין

And even in the lower worlds there are none that “grasp” Him, even though “He permeates all worlds” and animates them with a life-force suited to each individual created being in particular,

אינו כנשמת האדם תוך גופו, שהיא נתפסת תוך הגוף עד שמתפעלת ומקבלת שינויים משינויי הגוף וצערו, מהכאות או קרירות או חמימות האש וכיוצא

[for this vestment] is not like [that of] the soul of a man which clothes itself within his body, and is grasped within [it] to the extent that it is affected and influenced by changes involving the body and its pain, such as from blows or cold or the heat of fire and the like.

מה שאין כן בהקב״ה, שאינו מקבל שום שינוי משינויי עולם הזה, מקיץ לחורף ומיום ללילה

The Holy One, blessed be He, however, is not affected by any of the changes of this world, from summer to winter and from day to night,

כדכתיב: גם חשך לא יחשיך ממך, ולילה כיום יאיר

as it is written,21 “Even darkness does not obscure for You, and the night illuminates like the day,”

לפי שאינו נתפס כלל תוך העולמות, אף על גב דממלא לון

for He is not grasped within the worlds at all, even though He fills them.

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FOOTNOTES

21.Tehillim 139:12.