Nefesh Habehamis (נפש הבהמית) — the animal soul

Core definition

The nefesh habehamis ("animal soul") is the soul's desiring, emotive power, rooted in the lower levels and drawn after chomrius (materiality) and physicality. In the Bechukosai 5689 maamar it is identified with ru'ach habehemah hayoredes lematah — "the spirit of the beast that descends below" — as against the nefesh ha'Elokis, ru'ach ha'adam ha'olah lema'alah, "the spirit of man that ascends above" [58837/maamar_047 :: Overview]. It is not evil in essence — "only the desiring power" — but middos (emotive traits) rather than seichel (intellect); the evil middos proper belong to the yetzer hara [58837/maamar_047 :: Overview]. A parallel teaching calls it "a strong lusting power, not per the intellect" — like clay in the former's hand, "picturable and clotheable for good as for evil," whose shtus (folly) can be overturned into shtus d'kedushah (folly of holiness) [58845/maamar_016 :: Overview].

How the Rebbeim develop it

The purpose of the neshama's descent. The soul descends into a body and a nefesh habehamis precisely to refine it: "the nefesh haseichlis the intermediary — to work in the nefesh habehamis," whose clarification is le'iskafya sitra achra ve'is'hapcha chashocha linehora — to subdue the other side and overturn darkness into light [58837/maamar_047 :: Overview]. Because the nefesh ha'Elokis and the nefesh habehamis are "utterly distant" from each other, a third soul mediates: the nefesh haseichlis (intellectual soul), from nogah's higher level, man's power to intellectualize — through it the nefesh ha'Elokis's seichel and middos clothe themselves and reach the nefesh habehamis [58837/maamar_047 :: Overview].

The korban and prayer. "אדם כי יקריב מכם" is read: the korban is mikem — from yourselves — the nefesh habehamis itself, the Ban name in man. In the Temple it was offered through the physical animal; today "תפלה כנגד תמידין תקנו" — prayer is the nefesh habehamis's offering, its overturning "from edge to edge" [58845/maamar_016 :: Overview]. Why the physical animal? Because "every spiritual ascent needs a 'held thing'" — the animal, whose root in Tohu precedes Tikkun, ascends through the Merkavah's p'nei shor until "ריח ניחוח להוי׳" fills all flaws; the nefesh habehamis ascends through it because both are from p'nei shor of the Merkavah — the animal from p'nei shor in p'nei shor, the nefesh habehamis from p'nei adam in p'nei shor — "and higher, since what falls lowest is rooted highest" [58845/maamar_016 :: Overview]. Inwardly, the offering is the burning of the chelev (pleasure) and zerikas hadam (the blood's boiling) into love for Havayah [58845/maamar_016 :: Overview].

Mesirus nefesh of the animal soul. Two modes of self-sacrifice are distinguished: that of the nefesh ha'Elokis, which is natural — "drawn to its source like the flame upward" — and that of the nefesh habehamis, which is "utterly against its nature." The animal soul's mesirus nefesh is reached only after its refinement — when its pleasure-sense, the strongest thing in it, tastes Divinity — through two causes: kiruv (drawing near, delighting in Divinity) and richuk (distance — the accounting of its remoteness, embitterment, and the cry from umka d'liba, the heart's depth) [58841/maamar_033 :: Overview]. Then "the nefesh habehamis's great arousal acts back on the nefesh ha'Elokis" — like a dam's heaviness hastening the flood once broken — bringing the Divine soul to rishpei eish (sparks of fire), opposite its water-nature; this is "the flame of Gehinnom" — "the general tziyur of the nefesh habehamis" — the high ascent of Torah and mitzvos performed below [58841/maamar_033 :: Overview].

"With all your heart" — even the yetzer hara. The command "בכל לבבך — בשני יצריך" (with both your inclinations) is read as the nefesh habehamis's inclusion in avodah: prayer moves through ahavas olam, krias Shema, and the nefesh habehamis is elevated and overturned in the process [58845/maamar_016 :: Overview].

Key distinctions

Related concepts

Sources