The Praises of Rabbi Nachman 4-7

HH

Shivchay Huran

4-7

4. Also in his childhood he began to study with very tremendous diligence in his studies, and he would pay the teacher from his (own) pocket three large coins for every daf (-two sides of a page) of Talmud that he would learn with him, besides for the tuition of the tutelage that is father paid the teacher, he himself of blessed memory would give the teacher from his own (money) three large coins for every single daf, in order that the teacher would force himself to learn with him many dafim (pages) of Talmud every day. And so it was, that the teacher would learn with him many, many dafim every single day, and he would pay him as mentioned previously three large coins for every single daf besides for the tuition of tutelage.

5. ‎And so he entered into the devotion of Hashem, and all his devotion was with very extremely great secrecy/modesty, to the extent that absolutely no one new of him at all, because he was very concealed and hidden. And all his devotion was in concealment with great privacy. And his main devotion at first was with great simplicity without any smarts whatsoever, just with absolute simplicity, and every single thing that he did, everything was with great exertion and with great force and mesiras nefesh (self-sacrifice). And there is no matter of devotion which came to him easily, just every single thing came to him with very great exertion, that he would exert himself many times for every single matter of the devotion of Hashem. And he had many, many ups and downs, thousands and myriads beyond measure and reckoning.

And it was very extremely difficult and heavy upon him to begin to enter the devotion of Hashem to accept upon himself the yolk of His devotion blessed He. And he would frequently begin for a few days to engage in the devotion of Hashem, and afterwards would fall from it, and would return to begin, and would return and fall. And so it was many, many times until one time (t.n. there is a dream regarding this) he gained conviction that he would be very strong, that he would hold to devotion of a Hashem forever, and he would not look upon anything in the world. And from then on his heart was strengthened in Hashem, but even still even afterwards he constantly had very, very many ups and downs, just that afterwards he was strong that he would not let up His devotion blessed He forever, even though at times he will have a descent, even still he would strengthen himself in the devotion of Hashem Yisburach as much as he can.

6. And he used to begin each time anew, that is when he would sometimes fall from his level he would not despair of himself because of this, rather he would say that he would start anew as if he did not begin yet at all to enter His devotion blessed He, just now he is starting new. So it was every single time, always he used to begin anew, and he had many beginnings in one day, for even in one day sometimes he fell from his devotion and would begin anew, and so forth many times in one day.

7. And he studied with tremendous diligence and he learned a very great deal; "shas (Talmud)," and "poskim (halachic deciders)," and "Ta.Na.Ch. (Torah, Neveim-prophets, Kesuvim-scriptures)," and "Ain Yaakov (an anthology of the agada of the Talmud with commentaries)," and the books of the Zohar, and Tikunay Zohar, and all the "Kisvay (writings of) Hu-Ari (The lion, also acronym Rabbi Isaac (Luria)) o.b.m., and a vast amount of the other books, and "sifray (books of) mussar (ethics)," very abundantly.

And he said: that all the small books that speak of mussar (ethics), all of them where in his father's house. And he studied from all of them. He also learned a lot of "Raishis Chuchmuh (Beginning of Knowledge, a work of ethics authored by a disciple of the Ramak, based on Kabbalah)," and he said explicitly: that he learned the book Raishis Chuchmuh countless times (t.n. see the Words of Yisroel Dov Odesser where he tells over about R' Tzvi Hersch Rosenthal who was very keen on this work).

And the greatness of his vast proficiency in all the books as can be seen ostensibly somewhat, was without limit, and especially in the books of Ta.Na.Ch. and Ain Yaakov and all the Kisvay Hu-Ari and the books of the Zohar and Tikunim there is no one in the world to be found of his caliber. Because the whole Torah in its entirety was ready before him, fluent in his mouth, like a set table mamash, like something placed before the person before his eyes so that he could take for himself what he desires, similarly all the holy books were mamash set before the eyes of his holy intellect whenever he desired. And a bit of this can be seen and discerned in his holy books.

Na Nach Nachma Nachman Meuman!