The Alter Rebbe (אדמו״ר הזקן) — Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi

Core definition

The Alter Rebbe — Rabbi Shneur Zalman, the son of the hidden tzaddik R. Baruch, "a master of a new soul" — was the founder of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement and the first of its Rebbeim [31621/sicha_001 :: עב׳ 155–156]. The Baal Shem Tov revealed to the Maggid of Mezritch that this soul would come to him, and the Maggid handed over the mission: "to teach the ways of Chassidus" — "although the way is very dangerous in its beginning — its end shall be very great" [31621/sicha_001 :: page summary].

How the Rebbeim develop it

The Alter Rebbe's distinction from the earlier Chassidic masters is the era he opened. The corpus maps the dawn of the sixth millennium (5500 = dawn, the Baal Shem Tov — "only select individuals woke") to sunrise (5590 — the Alter Rebbe): "in the Alter Rebbe's days... there were awakened from their sleep even low souls, as is known" [15911/maamar_018 :: עב׳ 174–181; architecture summary]. Through Chassidus, souls that could not be reached by the earlier revelation were awakened. "In this time there were an Divinity's revelation as in the Baal Shem Tov's days and the Alter Rebbe's... — the separation and refinement, the evil's portion from the good" [15911/maamar_018 :: עב׳ 106–107].

His defining dictum, transmitted by the Tzemach Tzedek: "that the Rebbe — meaning the Alter Rebbe — used to 'live' Chassidus. He would say that Chassidus is higher than Kabbalah" [15962/maamar_036 :: עב׳ 16–17]. The reason: "Kabbalah deals with Names, while Chassidus is 'נגילה ונשמחה בך' (we will rejoice and be glad in You) — in the Essence of Ein Sof, which is above Names" [15962/maamar_036 :: overview]. The Tzemach Tzedek adds: after forty years of inward, essential receiving, "the Alter Rebbe began to reveal the Tanya in maamarim on Shabbos Mevarchim and the festival days" [31621/sicha_001 :: page summary].

His maamarim are cited throughout this corpus as the ground of the later Rebbeim's teachings — e.g., "as written in Pardes, Sha'ar Erech Chaim, and in the maamarim of the Alter Rebbe, ma'arechet Chet, letter kaf" [15911/maamar_004 :: עב׳ 5] — and the Rebbe Rashab retold "a wondrous discourse of the Alter Rebbe, written before the Petersburg journey," on the theme "wine reveals the inwardness" [15962/maamar_032 :: architecture summary].

Two stories reveal his manner. Rabbi Yackov ben Rabbi Yosef of Shklov came to him; the Alter Rebbe "made for him a righteous accounting of what is made in spirituality; when he heard this, he began weeping in mighty bitterness" [15962/maamar_032 :: עב׳ 414–421]. The teaching drawn from it: "a sigh over the physical reaches deep but not the soul's essence; weeping over the spiritual reaches the soul's essence — after true bitterness comes joy" [15962/maamar_032 :: summary]. And: walking with Rabbi Abba of Faslav, when they came to enter the doorway, the Alter Rebbe said to him, "Go" — "he went immediately, without any settling at all" — the paradigm of nullification before the giver [15962/maamar_010 :: עב׳ 333–340].

The sichos recall his imprisonment and his return: "what the Alter Rebbe said on his return from prison" — the Maggid's word to him in the Baal Shem Tov's name: "that I shall suffer mighty afflictions from the opposers to the way of Chassidus — and if I shall strengthen myself in all kinds of strength — to restrain upon my afflictions in body and soul — then I shall succeed in the holy way to my generations" [31621/sicha_001 :: page summary]. The Tzemach Tzedek's journal records the orders of his journeys — the first imprisonment and the redemption; the second imprisonment; the move from Liozna to Liadi; the flight from Napoleon [31621/sicha_001 :: page summary].

Key distinctions

Related concepts

The Baal Shem Tov, the Maggid of Mezritch, the Tanya, the Mitteler Rebbe, the Tzemach Tzedek, Chassidus vs. Kabbalah, the Petersburg discourse ("wine reveals the inwardness").

Sources