Light a Candle in the Window

Opening There is a generation that is searching for itself. These are not people who have come back to Hashem. They are not people full of doubts either. They are simply searching. Such a person sits with himself. He listens to himself. He digs deep inside himself. “I’m empty. I’m broken. I need to heal myself.” But the more he digs, the deeper he sinks. The more he looks inward, the thicker the darkness grows. This is not weakness. It is not holiness either. It is simply a misunderstanding of what the inner self really needs. A Question But you might wonder: Is there no value in looking inward? Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi, author of the Tanya, the classic book of Hasidic thought, built a whole path of inner reflection! Chapter after chapter, the Tanya examines the soul. It asks us to know the soul’s place and understand its state. So what is wrong with this approach? Here we must be precise. The reflection the Tanya teaches is not self-psychology. It is not digging into the brokenness. Rabbi Schneur Zalman writes clearly in chapter 32 that sometimes the heart is “blocked” and cannot break out of its frozen state. When that happens, the advice is not to keep looking inside. The advice is to turn your mind away, toward things that bring the joy of doing a commandment. Don’t try to treat the feeling. Break it through action. This is a complete reversal. Not “Go deeper,” but “Go outside.” The Parable: The Hanukkah Candle Let us look at the commandment of the Hanukkah candle. The Talmud teaches: it is a commandment to place the Hanukkah candle at the entrance of one’s house, on the outside. Not in a room. Not in the space inside. At the doorway, outside, so that it lights up the public street. Its purpose is to publicize the miracle, to tell the world: there is light here. And this is amazing. With every other commandment of lighting a candle, the candle belongs to the home. That is true of the Sabbath candles, and of the candle lit when the Sabbath ends. But the Hanukkah candle cannot stay inside. As you have heard, it must go out. It is as if something in the very nature of this light pushes back against every attempt to lock it inside a small private space. The Lesson: The Soul Was Not Made to Fix Itself The lesson rises on its own. A person’s soul is like the Hanukkah candle. It was not made to shine inward. It did not come down into this world in order to fix itself. Rabbi Schneur Zalman writes in chapter 37 of the Tanya that the whole reason the soul comes down is to make for Hashem “a home in this lower world.” That means acting in the world, lighting up your surroundings and fulfilling a mission. The soul is not here to sit and study itself. It is here to be lived out. So inner healing is not the cause. It is the result. When a person finds a mission, when he finds one Jew who needs his light, he suddenly discovers that the darkness inside him is a little less strong. Our Sages teach: Whoever prays for mercy for his friend, while he himself needs that very same thing, is answered first. When you pray for someone else, you are the one who is opened first. The prophet Isaiah says it clearly as well: “Share your bread with the hungry… then your light will burst out like the dawn, and your healing will quickly spring up.” Notice the order. First, give to the hungry. Only then will your healing spring up. Not the other way around. Healing is the fruit of giving. It does not come before it. An Example Picture a young married man who feels stuck. He has already talked about it. He has already thought about it. He has already read about it. His heart is heavy. The same thoughts keep coming back. And every time he goes back to looking inside, there is something more to dig up. There is another layer to analyze, another pain waiting for his attention. Here is one piece of advice. Get up. Find a Jew who needs company: someone weak, someone elderly, or a child who needs someone to listen to him. Give him an hour of your time. Don’t do it because “it will help you.” Do it because this is how the candle is lit. Then see what happens inside you. Pain grows when you pay attention to yourself. Purpose grows when you pay attention to others. These are not slogans. These are laws.