Weekly Dvar Torah: When the Rebbe Opened the Treasures — Again

There are moments in Jewish history that do not fade with time. On the contrary, the further we move from them, the more they reveal. Yud Shvat is one of those moments.

On the 10th of Shvat, 1950, the Frierdiker Rebbe, the sixth Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchock Schneerson, passed away. For those who lived through it, the day was heavy beyond words. A generation felt orphaned. A towering figure who had carried them through fire, persecution, exile, and rebirth was no longer physically present.

Yet even then, the Frierdiker Rebbe was preparing the way forward.

On the Friday before his passing, he distributed a Chassidic discourse — a Maamar — to be studied on that very day. It was no ordinary teaching. It was Basi L’Gani, a text of 20 chapters, about the purpose of creation itself: bringing the Divine Presence back into this lowest world.

One year later, on the night following Yud Shvat, the seventh Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, accepted the leadership. He revealed it by saying a Maamar. And not just any Maamar, but one that began with the opening words of Basi L’Gani.

That choice defined everything.

For twenty years, the Rebbe returned to that discourse, chapter by chapter, year after year. When the cycle ended, he began again. Today, decades later, we are learning it for the fourth time. The text has not changed — but we have.

In the early years, Yud Shvat felt like a Yahrzeit. Somber. Heavy. Serious. The Rebbe himself modeled that seriousness — leading the davening, observing Yahrzeit customs, preparing intensely in advance. For the elder Chassidim, it was the loss of their Rebbe.

As Lubavitch grew, Shlichus expanded, and generations who never knew the Frierdiker Rebbe personally grew up — Yud Shvat slowly transformed. It became not only a day of remembrance, but a day of renewal. A day of Hiskashrus.

By the twentieth anniversary, marked with the completion of the Sefer Torah for Moshiach, the tone had already begun to shift. By the thirtieth and fortieth anniversaries, Yud Shvat was clearly being experienced as the anniversary of the Rebbe’s leadership.

Even the Rebbe himself, though always measured, hinted to this shift.

And now — more than thirty years after Gimmel Tammuz — Yud Shvat is observed with an intensity that is impossible to miss.

Yes, every Yahrzeit custom is kept with care. But it is also a Rosh Hashanah of Hiskashrus. A day to renew and reinforce our bond with the Rebbe.

This is especially visible in the younger generation.

Young boys — born ten, fifteen, twenty years after Gimmel Tammuz — come from all over the world. Thousands gather. They prepared for thirty days. They learned the Maamarim of the Rebbe on this year’s chapter, chapter sixteen. And not casually. Intensely. With depth. With seriousness.

They Farbreng. They cling to older Chassidim. They listen to every word.
Tell us. Inspire us. How do we connect to a Rebbe we never saw?

I sit with them. I Farbreng with them. I speak to them. And I will say it honestly: I envy them. Their sincerity. Their simplicity. Their truth.

To understand what they are experiencing, we must understand what this year’s Maamar is teaching.

Basi L’Gani describes the Jewish mission as a war — the cosmic struggle to bring the Shechinah back into this world. And as the war reaches its final stage, the King does something extraordinary: he opens his hidden treasures accumulated over generations. Treasures that were never revealed — not even to the closest. And he splurges them for the foot soldiers, so that they can win the final battle.

The Maamar explains that these treasures reach from the lowest of the lows to the highest of the highs.

The lowest of the lows is familiar territory. This physical world. A world where G-dliness is concealed. Where holiness is not obvious. Where distraction and materiality dominate. Our task is to draw G-dliness downward — into daily life, into work, into technology, into every corner of existence — until the world itself becomes a dwelling place for G-d.

But what are the highest of the highs?

This is where chapter 16 teaches us something profound.

There are three kinds of relationships.

There is a relationship that is internal, like food, which becomes part of the body. There is a surrounding relationship — like clothing, which envelops, protects, and is fitted closely. And there is a more distant surrounding — like a house, which shelters and supports without direct contact.

We see the same pattern in the human soul. Some faculties require effort, preparation, and detail: thinking, speaking, acting. There is will, which moves the body instantly, without calculation. And there is life itself — not a function, not an action, but an essence.

Teaching works the same way. A teacher explains ideas by narrowing them, allowing the student to internalize them. Some depth remains hovering — accessible later, sometimes decades later. And some ideas are conveyed only through a Mashal, a parable.

But a Mashal is not superficial. When an idea is too high to be broken into parts, it comes down whole, clothed and concealed in the Mashal. The essence is present, even if the listener cannot unpack it fully.

This is the key.

The highest of the highs is an essential connection, best understood through the Mashal of a father and child. Not because the Mashal replaces the essence, but because it carries it inside fully.

A father’s bond with his child is not earned. It is not measured. It is not dependent on achievement. A child may grow, mature, learn, and act — but he never stops being a child.

And that is what the Rebbe is revealing now.

Connection to the Rebbe is not suspended if one feels inadequate. It is not lost if one has not learned enough or accomplished enough. Those things matter — deeply. But they do not define the bond.

The younger generation never saw the Rebbe. They have no external memories. No voice. No image. And yet, their connection is fierce. Simple. Absolute. They do not relate through nostalgia. They relate through essence.

When they struggle, they do not ask, “Do you love me?” They state, with certainty:
“Father, You love me. Please help me.”

And help comes.

One of the most powerful expressions of this relationship is writing to the Rebbe. Not as a ritual, not as a formality, but as a child speaking to a father. Writing regularly. Sharing details. Struggles. Questions. Joys. Bringing the letter to the Ohel. Reading it there.

A father wants to hear everything.

And responses come. Sometimes clearly. Sometimes quietly. But consistently, unmistakably.

I will add something personal.

More than thirty years after Gimmel Tammuz, I can say this honestly: although I lived through what we call the “good old times” — when I saw the Rebbe, heard him, stood before him, interacted with him — it is precisely after Gimmel Tammuz that I feel the essential connection more strongly than ever.

I experience responses regularly. Guidance. Direction. Clarity. Because of space, I will not enumerate them here — I have done so in the past, and I will do so again in the future. But they are real. And they are ongoing.

That is the treasure.

And with these weaponized children — these foot soldiers — the battle will be won. Moshiach will come. The Shechinah will return. G-dliness will be revealed. And the Rebbe will look upon his children and say:

“Look at My children — these are the children I raised.”

Have a Shabbos of Revelation and Connection,
Gut Shabbos

Rabbi Yosef Katzman