Part 8 · Chapter 1

The Order of the Levels (Madrigot) 0:02

ונמצא סדר המדריגות כך הן, so comes out that based on what we said, that this is the order of all of the levels. First there's בינה of בינה, and then חכמה of בינה, and then כתר of בינה, and then בינה of חכמה, and חכמה of חכמה, כתר of חכמה. So now we're going to explain a little a little קיצור, a little summary, how do you say, sum up everything we've been saying.

ונמצא סדר המדריגות כך הן, this is the order of the levels, בחינת עיון הנ״ל, the first thing is this עיון, this analysis, this in-depth study, לעמוד על בוריו וכולי, to clear get get the idea very clear.

נקרא בינה שבבינה, and that's called בינה of בינה. בינה means to analyze or to make הבחנות, להבחין תכלית הבחנה בפנימיות וחיצוניות, to make the best possible distinctions on the inside and the outside, to recognize everything in for what, you know, what it is, and the difference between it and everything else, so you have every single part clearly clear and it stands alone.

And it's not confused with something else, it's not blurry. Everything is very sharp and clearly defined, that's the idea of בינה of בינה. וגם מזה יוכל להיות בחינת האורך להוריד ההשגה בלבושים רבים, once you have the idea very clear like that and very well-ordered in your mind, then you also begin to have the אורך, the ability to explain it simply, to put it into like משלים and things like that, עד שתתגשם להשגת התינוק כנ״ל, until you can also bring it down to the understanding of a small child.

From Clarity to Length (אורך) – Simple Explanations 1:20

אבל לא בחינת הרוחב, but you do not yet have the the width, בהסברים שונים, to explain it in many ways. You can only take the one explanation that you learned and explain it very simply and very well, but you cannot start, you know, bringing in other explanations or make new explanations, לכל צד וכולי, many explanations to each side, to every, you know, or like an explanation for each aspect.

ואחר כך מבחינת חכמה שבבינה, and then from the level of חכמה of בינה, להמציא חדשות בהשגה אחת, then you reached the level of חכמה of בינה, which is the ability to come up with חידושים, to new ideas and new understanding within this idea that you understand כנ״ל.

Expanding Width (רוחב) – The Power of חכמה 2:28

הוא הנקרא רוחב, that is the width. When you have חכמה of בינה, then you're not limited to the explanation that you were given or the one in the book in front of you, but you can, from that explanation, you can see how you could explain the same idea in many many different ways, and that's the חכמה of בינה,

which that's called the width, because then you have a lot of explanations. וממנו כח דבינה שבבינה העושה בחינת האורך, and really, in a hidden way, the power of בינה of בינה to make the length, to be able to bring it down to another idea and to bring the same explanation, but into different words to explain it to like a small child and give like examples and analogies and things like that, that's a little bit of an exercise already in חכמה, because in order to put even the same explanation in different words, that's a little bit of a חידוש, it's a little bit of a new idea.

And in order to do that, you have to already start get a picture of the חכמה, and then once you do that and bring it down, then you start to have the ability of the חכמה of בינה itself, where you can make completely new explanations.

אבל שיעור האורך והרוחב דחכמה ובינה שבבינה הוא תלוי בבחינת עומק המושג, but the the proportions of the length and the width, the חכמה and בינה of בינה, depends on the depth of your understanding. The more you have the depth, automatically your understanding will become longer and wider, שנקרא כתר דבינה, which that's called the כתר of בינה. So כתר of בינה is the depth, and the more that you open up the כתר, automatically you open up the חכמה and בינה of בינה more.

Depth and the Crown (כתר) of Understanding 3:42

וכנראה בחוש, as you see tangibly, שלפי ערך העומק, according to the depth of a person's understanding, כך יהיה ערך הרוחב והאורך, so too will be the proportion of the width and the length בכל השגת דבר מה ודע, in the understanding of anything, and this is enough to understand.

ולפי זה, מה שקוראים העולם העמקת הדעת, based on what we explained until now, this that the world calls העמקת הדעת, deepening your דעת,

אין זה גופה של העמקה. This is not the actual learning process, this is not actually the delving into an idea. העמקת הדעת does not bring you deeper into the understanding of the idea. Based on what we explained, that is accomplished through התבוננות. All the way up, so first of all, that's what brings you to the to the עומק המושג, to the depth of בינה, and it even brings you all the way up to חכמה, it even brings you to the depth the depth of חכמה, and brings you חידושים.

So all of those things of understanding, even to the highest level, and even bringing it all the way back to בינה, like being a מבין, all these things are dependent on התבוננות, not העמקת הדעת. So העמקת הדעת definitely is not that actual learning process, כמו עומק המושג דבינה, like reaching the עומק המושג דבינה. It's not going deeper in that way when you say you're going deeper to the idea.

It doesn't mean going deeper like to go from the חיצוניות הבינה to the עומק הבינה to get the עומק המושג. That's not what we mean when we say you do העמקת הדעת, שלזה לא יש שייכות לדעת, for this learning process has no connection to דעת. So what is דעת? Now we're going to explain: אך הדעת הוא בחינת התקשרות הרגשתו במושג ביותר. דעת means to connect your feeling very deeply to the idea that you understand.

What is דעת? Connecting Feeling to the Concept 5:43

Means to have a feel a very deep personal relevance and a very to really connect to it, to really associate with it, to really sympathize with it, you know, whatever any type of a way that that you're being very sensitive to the idea, like emotionally, and that you associate with it, and you connect to it, and you feel that it's connected to you and relevant to you.

Like the היום יום it's this היום יום, it says the main thing for understanding חסידות is that you have to have have a דעת for it. It says that, you know, that basically if you feel it's personally relevant to you, then you'll understand, even if it's something that's like very difficult intellectually. And he gives brings an example from the גמרא about this this whole discussion that that רבי מאיר brought up in the I think it was רבי מאיר.

He brought up in the בית מדרש about chicken and all these you know, if it's כשר, or not, and he kept bringing all these genius arguments to try to make it כשר, and they said, you know, "Listen, רבי מאיר, it's not כשר, you know, what what are you Just leave leave it, you know." And so he said, "All of these arguments were said to me by a simple, like peasant woman that was not, you know, on par to normally be picking up all these arguments, but since it was her chicken and it was bother It really bothered her, so therefore therefore, she, you know, was able to make these arguments that even the תנאים and אמוראים would be discussing, even though they were much more advanced, and you know, in in talmudic law and everything."

So, that's the example that's brought to show how if there's a will, there's a way. If you really feel that it's important to you, then you'll understand.

So, this is why דעת is important, not because it actually makes you understand, but it makes you care, and if you care, then you'll do the התבוננות automatically, and you'll understand.

והוא, and so this העמקת הדעת, this deep personal relevance that you feel to the idea, הוא שמביא לידי בחינת העמקה במושג אחר בחינת העיון הנ"ל, this is what causes you to

study the idea deeper after you did the initial עיון. So after you just learned the basic the basics, and you just got it clear, what's going to make you really like push your mind to think about the idea deeper, and bring up חידושים, and and get the עומק of חכמה, and everything like that? You need the motivation for that.

So, you know, if you're in school, and you need a you're just learning something, so you'll do your עיון, you'll memorize the the material, and that's it, and you'll pass your test. So that just requires עיון.

But to go past that, and start making חידושים, that means you have to be interested in it, and it's something that you're going to do on your free time, really care about.

You're not just going to, you know, you can't be made to do that for a test, really. שהוא רק כמו בחינת כלי לעומק ההשגה כנ"ל. So this העמקת הדעת is only a tool, a way of like getting yourself to activate, to influence yourself to use your בינה to analyze more deeply, which will give you the depth of understanding. So it doesn't actually bring you the depth of understanding itself, but it's just a a means to get you to study it deeper so that you'll understand it deeper.

So that's the idea of העמקת הדעת.