The Hidden Head

1 · Adam HaElyon and the Missing Head

“And G‑d said: Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness… And G‑d created the man in His image, in the image of G‑d He created him” (Bereishis 1:26–27).

Behold, the Torah itself places at the very beginning of Maaseh Bereishis this wondrous declaration, that the tzurah of adam is in some manner betzelem Elokim. And it is known from the Zohar and from the writings of the Mekubalim, that this is not merely a statement regarding the virtue of the human soul, but also a revelation that “Adam” is the name of the supernal configuration—Adam HaElyon, Adam Kadmon—within which all the Sefiros are arranged “be’diyukna de’Adam,” in the likeness of the human form.

For the Zohar speaks at length of “Adam de’le’eila,” of “Adam Kadmon,” and describes that all the Sefiros are be’ishtalshelus in the seder of eivarim: Chochmah, Binah, Daas as mochin; Chesed and Gevurah as the two arms; Tiferes as the guf, the torso; Netzach and Hod as the two thighs; Yesod as the organ of connection; Malchus as the mouth or as the feet, according to the known divisions. And this is the seder ha’partzufim in general, that the ten Sefiros are not a mere list, but a structured organism, a “tree of life” standing as a human-like form.

However, when we contemplate this more deeply, there arises here an inner question.

For if the Torah states “na’aseh adam betzalmeinu kidmuseinu,” and the Zohar explains that the tzelem is the seder ha’Sefiros be’diyukna de’Adam, then it would follow that all those details which in the adam ha’tachton define the very inyan of “head” and “face” must have their shoresh in Adam HaElyon as well. And in the lower man, the ikar mailah of the head is not merely that it contains a brain, but that in it are situated the chushim ha’ikarim: the eyes that see, the ears that hear, the nose that smells, the mouth and throat that taste and speak. These are the kelim through which the nefesh perceives, receives, and articulates.

Moreover, Chazal have already emphasized that the mailah of adam is expressed specifically in those aspects that relate to his rosh. They said “adam nikar be‑koso, be‑kiso, be‑ka’aso”—a man is recognized in his cup, in his pocket, and in his anger. And although at first glance these three—how he drinks, how he spends, how he reacts—seem to be middos and hanhagos of the heart, nevertheless their revelation is primarily in the rosh and in what is connected to it: in the eyes and facial expression that change with anger or simchah, in the mouth that speaks with restraint or with coarseness, in the way he relates and responds. Likewise it is said of man “gavoha mikol ha‑beruim”—he stands upright, his head held high. The head is not simply physically above the limbs; it is the place of the human panim, his recognizable countenance, the seat of daas and of all the chushim that define his relationship to the world.

Yet when we turn to the standard hisbonenus in Seder HaSefiros as they are portrayed in the form of Adam HaElyon, especially as these matters are commonly depicted and diagrammed, what do we find? The head of this supernal Adam is represented as three general Sefiros—Chochmah, Binah, and Daas, the mochin. Beneath them, the middos: Chesed and Gevurah as arms, Tiferes as torso, Netzach and Hod as legs, and so forth. But where, in this supernal Adam, are the detailed kelim of perception and articulation—the eyes, the ears, the nose, the peh and garon?

True, we know from many places in Zohar that there is mention of “einei Hashem,” “oznei Hashem,” “af,” “peh,” and the like. However, in the basic seder ha’Sefiros as they are taught be’ofen klali—as the simple “tree” drawn in seforim and etched also in the imagination of those who learn—these details are not set forth as a distinct, organized head-structure. The rosh is presented more as a domain of seichel stam, as three circles of intellect. The concrete, differentiated head that we know in ourselves—with its multiplicity of openings, of gateways through which light enters and words emerge—appears to be missing.

And this requires understanding.

For if the tzelem Elokim in man is such that “kulam be’diyukna de’Adam,” that everything below is a dim reflection of above, then the fact that the lower head is not merely a container of intellect but a complex interface of senses and expression must signify that in Adam HaElyon, too, there is a corresponding seder, a spiritual “head” that is not exhausted by the inyan of mochin alone. It would seem that there must be, within the Rosh of the partzuf, a further articulation into “organs” of seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, and speaking in their supernal form.

Yet, as mentioned, in the standard mapping—Chochmah-Binah-Daas as brain, Chesed-Gevurah as arms, and so on—no place is assigned for these. The diagrams are content with drawing three Sephiros in the head, without eyes or ears, without nose or mouth. The human head is thereby simplified and abstracted into “intellect,” as though the panim and the chushim are merely external, incidental garments and not themselves a fundamental seder.

One might attempt to answer that since the Sefiros are penimiyus ha’nefesh, therefore the external organs have no exact correspondence above; that the eyes and ears are only chitzoniyus kelim, physical tools serving the inner faculties of Chochmah and Binah, and that to assign them independent Sefiros would be to over-materialize the nimshal. But this is difficult for several reasons.

Firstly, in man himself we see that the chushim are not merely neutral tubes, but have a specific teva and quality; seeing is not hearing, smelling is not tasting. The way a matter is apprehended through sight is categorically different from how it is apprehended through hearing. And Chassidus already explains at length the difference between “re’iyah” and “shemi’ah” even in spiritual terms—so that we see that the very modes of knowing and relating have distinct forms that are rooted in the nefesh itself, not only in its external tools.

Secondly, the dignity and uniqueness of man is recognized “be‑koso, be‑kiso, be‑ka’aso”—in ways that are revealed through the face and its expressions. The inner middos and mochin are thus manifested specifically through the panim. If so, if in the lower man the ikar gilui of the nefesh, both in receiving and in giving, is through the head and face with its detailed apparatus, how can it be that in the very Adam HaElyon, whose image this is, we are left with a “head” that is only intellect in the abstract, without a structured system of panim and chushim?

Thirdly, according to the Zohar, the entire seder of “tzelem Elokim” is specifically that the supernal Adam is “diyukna de’Adam mamash,” in precise likeness. If so, it is not sufficient to say that the material details below are incidental; rather, the very fact that the Creator formed such details indicates that their shoresh exists in holiness in a refined, spiritual fashion. The omission of these details in our usual depiction of the Sefiros is therefore not a sign that they have no place above, but rather an indication that there is here a level not yet properly articulated in our comprehension.

And one could deepen the question yet more: the rosh of man is not only the place of perception but also the place of articulation and command. From the brain and the senses there extend pathways of influence that direct the entire body; the words formed in the mouth and emerging through the throat become the very garments of thought, affecting other beings and even worlds. If so, in the supernal Adam, where the Sefiros are the roots of all existence, the “head” must all the more so be the locus of all perception of Elokus and the origin of all Divine “speech” and hashpaa. To confine this entire complex to three mochin alone appears, at least be’derech hisbonenus, insufficient.

Thus we are brought to the central kushya that will stand at the heart of our entire discourse: If the Sefiros indeed map to the human form, where is the true “head” of the Tree of Life? Where, within Adam HaElyon, are the spiritual archetypes of the eyes that see Elokus, the ears that hear the Dvar Hashem, the nose that discerns ruach, the mouth that tastes and speaks, the throat that channels life from head to body? How are these to be understood within the seder of the Sefiros and partzufim?

The known mapping—Chochmah-Binah-Daas as mochin, Chesed-Gevurah as arms, Tiferes as torso, etc.—leaves this unaddressed. It gives us a head of intellect, but not a head of panim and chushim. From this it is understood that we are compelled to search for a deeper inyan in the very concept of “Rosh” in Elokus, to uncover within or above the familiar structure of Chabad and middos another configuration, a more concealed “head,” in which the differentiated spiritual senses are rooted.

The investigation of that higher head, and of the teachings already found in Kabbalah regarding Kesser and the Reishin, will be the next step in clarifying this matter.

2 · Kesser and the Three Hidden Heads

In seeking this deeper inyan of Rosh, the path of the Mekubalim appears at first glance to provide an immediate answer. For it is explained in Etz Chaim that above the ten Sefiros of Atzilus stands Kesser, and that in the partzuf of Arich Anpin there are three Reishin, three “heads,” which are the source and root of all that is subsequently revealed in the mochin and middos. If so, one might suppose that our entire kushya is already addressed: the “missing head” is simply Kesser and its Reishin; the higher Rosh above Chabad.

However, when one contemplates more precisely the nature of these heads as described there, the question not only remains, but becomes more refined.

For it is known that Kesser is explained in Chassidus as the makif of the ten Sefiros, the encompassing crown which stands above Chabad. More particularly, Kesser is divided into two bechinos: Ratzon and Taanug—will and delight. The lower aspect of Kesser, Ratzon, is the source of all the detailed inclinations and hashpaos that later descend into Chabad and middos; the higher aspect, Taanug, is the inner pleasure of the nefesh which underlies and animates all. And it is in this sense that the expression “Keser al rosh” is understood—Kesser rests upon the head, as a crown above the intellect, encompassing it from without.

Similarly, in several maamarim the distinction is drawn between Chabad and Kesser in terms of skull and brain: Chochmah-Binah-Daas are the mochin themselves, the content of understanding; Kesser is likened to the gulgoiles, the skull that surrounds and protects, the encompassing bone that encases the brain and from which the hair emerges as a multitude of tenuous hamshachos. Thus the inner head is Chabad; Kesser is not the head itself but that which is upon the head.

Now, according to this, it would seem that the language of “Rosh” regarding Kesser is only be’derach mashal—head-like in the sense of superiority and encompassingness, as the crown is above the head. But the detailed inyanim which constitute a head in the human—organs of perception and articulation, panim and chushim—are all assigned, in that model, to the mochin themselves and to the lower partzufim that emerge from them. Kesser remains a simple makif of will and delight, not a differentiated Rosh.

And even when we ascend from the general Kesser to the great depth of Etz Chaim concerning Arich Anpin, where three Reishin are spoken of—Reisha d’lo Ityada, Reisha d’Ayin, Reisha d’Arich—at first glance we have indeed found three “heads.” Yet when we examine their content as elaborated by the Arizal and as explained in Chassidus, we again encounter a certain simplicity, a concealment, that does not yet bring us to the articulated, sensory “face” we are seeking.

For Reisha d’lo Ityada is the head that is not known, the utterly hidden root of the divine will, beyond any grasp, even of the highest mochin. It is the bechina of Kesser sheb’Kesser, the absolute peshitus of Elokus as it rises in a will to emanate. Reisha d’Ayin is the head of Ayin, the no-thingness, wherein the light already inclines toward revelation yet is still in a state of total bittul and ayin, before tziyur of sechel. Reisha d’Arich is the extended head of Arich Anpin as it already inclines toward being a source for the inner partzufim, the root of the mochin of Atik and Arich as they will later be revealed.

All three Reishin, then, describe gradations in the hiddenness and revelation of Ratzon and Taanug, of the simple divine desire and pleasure in creation, as they are in their own realm before entering into the vessels of intellect and emotion. They are indeed called “heads,” but their inyan is not yet the inyan of eyes that see, ears that hear, and so forth; rather, they are the supernal source of the very possibility that there be any perception at all.

And this is further emphasized when Chassidus explains that Kesser, even with its three heads, is fundamentally inyan hamakif—the encompassing plane. Ratzon is extended in a straight line upon all the kochos equally; pleasure is a simple, non-differentiated inner delight that precedes any consideration of particular content. True, from Kesser there extend “hairs,” tzinoros de-dikna, conduits to all the limbs and faculties; but these are described as extremely tenuous, as revelations of ohr that has already passed through numerous tzimtzumim and is only a faint residue of the original will and delight. The detailed tziyur of the faculties themselves is assigned to the mochin and middos.

If so, we are brought to a new form of our kushya. On the one hand, the Torah of the Arizal speaks clearly of a “head above the head,” of Kesser and the three Reishin, and Chassidus reveals in them lofty inyanim of Ratzon and Taanug, the true super-conscious root of all the revealed kochos. On the other hand, all of this speaks in a language of peshitus and makif; it gives us higher and higher strata of “general headship,” but not the articulated inner head of sensory and expressive organs.

In other words: Kesser and its Reishin explain how there can be a head above intellect—how there can be a level in the soul, and in Elokus, which is superior to sechel and encompasses it. They explain the superiority of will over intellect, of delight over comprehension, and even the way in which these higher levels radiate into the mochin through the metaphor of skull and hair. But they do not yet answer: where is the eye as a distinct power of re’iyah, the ear as a distinct power of shemi’ah, the nose as ruach, the mouth and throat as precise instruments of dibbur—within the supernal Rosh?

For even in the human, when we say that the skull is higher than the brain, that the will is higher than intellect, we have not yet touched the secret of the face. The skull is a simple encasement, the will is a simple inclination; the face, by contrast, is a complex arrangement of openings and gates, each with its own dinim and tziyur, through which the inner nefesh is revealed and by which it engages with the world. The skull is above the face, but it is not the face.

Thus, to say that Kesser is the “skull” of Atzilus, and the three Reishin are its supernal strata, gives us indeed a higher Rosh—but only in the sense of gulgoiles, not in the sense of panim. It tells us what is above the eyes and ears, not what they are in their root.

And this point becomes sharper when we recall that the classic identification of Chabad as “inner head” speaks primarily of sechel: Chochmah as the flash of insight, Binah as the expansion and articulation, Daas as the bond that unites knower and known. These three are called mochin; the discussion there revolves around modes of knowledge and understanding. The subtle morphologies of perception—seeing versus hearing, the discernment of ruach, the tasting and speaking that reveal and sweeten middos—are hinted to only be’ofen makif, as general statements about “higher” and “lower” modes of daas, but not mapped as a distinct supernal anatomy.

In summary: from the side of Kesser and Arich Anpin, our question is not yet answered; from the side of Chabad as inner head, our question is also not yet answered. Above the intellect we have heads that are hidden and simple, whose language is Ratzon and Taanug; within the intellect we have mochin whose language is chochmah-binah-daas. Neither of these strata, as they are usually explicated, yields a structured system of spiritual senses corresponding to the differentiated human panim.

Therefore it seems we are compelled to say, at least be’derech hisbonenus, that within the general inyan of Rosh—both in Kesser and in Chabad—there must be yet another seder, more concealed, which is not identical either with the simple makif of will and delight, nor with the abstract mochin of sechel. A seder that speaks not only of “head” as superiority, but of “face” as revelation; not only of pnimiyus and makif, but of the specific channels through which pnimiyus becomes panim.

And this is hinted already in the very language of Torah and Chazal, which as we will see emphasize not only rosh but panim—“Ya’er Hashem panav eilecha,” “Yisa Hashem panav eilecha,” “Panim el panim diber Hashem imachem.” These expressions indicate that beyond the categories of skull and brain, of crown and mochin, there is a further inyan: that of Panim, which is neither the simple makif of Kesser nor the pure sechel of Chabad, but a distinct configuration by which the soul turns outward and encounters.

The clarification of this inyan, and the investigation whether there is, be’emet, a supernal “face-system” parallel to and rooted in these higher heads, will be the next step in resolving our kushya.

3 · The Secret of Panim

If so, we must now turn from the general notion of “Rosh” to the more precise inyan of “Panim.” For in the Holy Tongue these are not interchangeable terms. Rosh indicates chiefly height, beginning, superiority—“rosh kol ha‑devarim”—whereas panim indicates revelation, facing, encounter. And, as is known, in loshon ha‑kodesh every term is exact; if the Torah chose to speak so often of “Panim” with regard to Elokus, this itself is a remez that here lies the shoresh of that which we seek.

We find: “Yisa Hashem panav eilecha veyasem lecha shalom”—“Hashem will lift His face toward you.” Likewise, “Panim el panim diber Hashem imachem”—“Face to face Hashem spoke with you.” And “Be’or panecha nitanu chayim”—“In the light of Your face life was given to us.” These are not merely poetic expressions for favor or nearness; they define a particular seder ha‑gilui: there is such a thing as “Pnei Hashem,” a mode of Elokus that is described not as Rosh, nor as Shem, nor as Kavod alone, but precisely as Panim.

And we must understand: if, as explained, the mochin are already the pnimiyus of the partzuf, why then does the Torah and Chazal not suffice with “Hashem bechol chochmo so” or “da’as Elokim,” but rather insist on language of panim—“or panecha,” “yisa Hashem panav”? Evidently there is a chelek in Elokus whose ikar description is not intellect, not will, not delight, but panim davka.

Moreover, we see that in the giving of the Torah, which is the greatest gilui of Elokus in this world, the lashon used is “panim el panim diber Hashem imachem.” Now dibur stems from mochin through middos into Malchus, and yet the Torah describes the metzius of the gilui not as “sechel el sechel,” nor “ratzon el ratzon,” but as “panim el panim”—face to face. This indicates that at the core of the maamad Har Sinai stood not only the union of divine and created intellect, but a direct correspondence of “faces,” a supernal Panim meeting the panim of Yisrael.

To approach this, we must recall a klal in Chassidus concerning “Panim” and “Achoraim.” It is known from the Zohar that “Panim hu pnimiyus”—the face is the pnimiyus. That is, when the inner content of a thing is revealed and attended to for its own sake, this is called Panim; when the revelation is only for a side‑purpose, or in a manner of externality, this is called Achoraim, the “back.” Yet here we encounter a seeming contradiction: if Panim means pnimiyus, then why is it not simply identified with the pnimiyus of mochin or middos? What compels the Torah to set apart “Panim” as a distinct description?

The explanation is that there are two levels in pnimiyus. There is pnimiyus as it is for itself, inward, turned “in,” and there is pnimiyus as it is already standing in a relation of “facing”—turned outward toward another. The first is the inyan of Or Pnimi in its root: light that fills the keli, uniting with it, but not yet emerging as a countenance. The second is pnimiyus that has taken on a certain tziyur of panim, such that it can be “seen,” “met,” “spoken with.” This is already a seder of interface.

And this is the distinction we find in Chassidus between Or Pnimi and Or Makif, and the intermediate inyan through which they meet. Or Pnimi is the light that is measured and limited according to the recipient; Or Makif surrounds and does not enclothe. But the gilui of Panim is neither merely the inward­ness as it is for itself, nor the surrounding makif. Rather, Panim is the very “border” where the pnimiyus comes to the edge of the self and presents itself to the other, while still carrying within itself the truth of the inward. It is the point where pnimiyus becomes gilui without ceasing to be pnimiyus.

This, in the nefesh ha’adam, is illustrated in the simplest way by the physical face. The mochin may be in the skull, and the middos in the heart, yet where does one meet the human being? Not in the brain directly, nor in the heart directly, but in the panim. The face gathers together all the chushim—eyes, ears, nose, mouth—and through them the pnimiyus ha‑nefesh is expressed. Therefore Chazal say that “kol ha‑mechabed es haTorah gufo mechubad al ha‑briyos”—one who honors the Torah, his very body is honored by the creations; and where is this honor seen? In the shining of the panim. The dignity of a person is recognized in his face, in its composure, its refinement, its radiance.

From this we understand that the panim is not simply another limb among the limbs. It is a klal ha‑merkaz, a central gathering point, in which the inner life of the person is revealed in a “form” that is encounterable. The brain may know, but the eye lets another see that he knows. The heart may feel, but the cheek flushes, the expression softens or hardens, and thus another senses his inner state. The mouth may be the organ of speech, yet the entire face participates when words are spoken. Thus the panim is the interface between pnimiyus and chitzoniyus, between nefesh and olam.

And if so below, all the more so above. When the Torah speaks of “or panecha,” “the light of Your face,” it is pointing not only to a general illumination, but to the inyan that the pnimiyus of Elokus is shining in a manner that is “face,” that can be met, that stands in relation of “panim el panim” with the recipient. “Be’or panecha nitanu chayim”—life itself is given not from the mere existence of Elokus, nor from the hidden Ratzon and Taanug of Kesser, but from the light of His Face, from that place where the pnimiyus is already in a mode of turning toward the other.

Here we begin to discern that beyond the mochin there must be, within the inyan of Rosh, a distinct seder of Panim—a configuration whose essence is not “thinking” but “facing.” For although the mochin are the source of consciousness, they are, by their nature, inward; their activity is in comprehension. The face, by contrast, is from the outset structured as relation: it has sides (right and left), it has eyes that look outward, ears that receive from without, a nose that senses the subtlest ruach, a mouth that both receives (taste) and gives (speech). The very tziyur of the panim is encounter and exchange.

And this is why the Zohar equates Panim with Pnimiyus: not because face is identical with innerness, but because true facing is only when the innerness is what is revealed. If the outer does not carry the inner, it is not called Panim, but mask, levush, achoraim. Thus, when the Torah says “Yisa Hashem panav eilecha,” it means that the Holy One, blessed be He, lifts and turns His pnimiyus toward the Jew, that His inner favor and delight should be manifest in a way that can be apprehended. Likewise, “Panim el panim diber Hashem imachem”—the dibbur was in such a way that the pnimiyus of Elokus stood openly facing the pnimiyus of Yisrael, without any achoraim in between.

According to this, we may say that the “missing head” we sought is not to be found by multiplying intellects or by positing ever higher crowns, but by recognizing that between the simple head of Ratzon and Taanug and the detailed head of Chabad there is a distinct seder of Panim, a “face‑system,” whose whole inyan is to mediate between pnimiyus and chitzoniyus. It is this Panim‑system that houses, in its shoresh, the spiritual chushim: seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, and speaking. For the senses themselves are nothing other than the modes by which the soul faces the world and the world faces the soul.

In other words: the chushim are not incidental tools appended to an otherwise complete head of intellect; they are the very tziyun of panim, the architecture of interface. Therefore they must have their corresponding root in the supernal Panim. And because the Torah’s language about Elokus so emphasizes “Panim,” we are justified to say that there exists, in Elokus, a structured inyan of Panim beyond the general categories of Rosh and mochin.

All this, however, remains yet bechlal—an outline. To resolve our original kushya in detail, we must now seek within this inyan of Panim a more precise structure: a “head of the face,” in which these spiritual senses are ordered as specific patterns of Sefiros. This will be, im yirtzeh Hashem, the clarification of the concept we will call “Rosh HaPanim”—the head within the head, where the encounter of Panim is formed and from which it extends into all the limbs of the worlds.

4 · Rosh HaPanim – The Head Within the Head

If so, in order that this seder of Panim not remain a mere name, but be a true “tzelem Adam” through which Elokus is revealed and relates, we are compelled to say that within the Panim itself there is also a Rosh—a “head of the face”—which orders and governs all the particulars of the face. For just as in the general Adam‑configuration there is a Rosh that includes and directs all the limbs, and within that Rosh there are mochin and middos and so on in their own seder, so too it is understood that the Panim, being an entire world of interface, must have within itself its own inner head, in which the powers of interface are rooted in a collected and concentrated way.

And this, be‑derech efshar, is what we will designate as “Rosh HaPanim”—the head within the head. Not another crown above Kesser, nor another set of seichel within Chabad, but a sub‑configuration, a partzuf within a partzuf, whose particular inyan is not the generation of ideas nor the simple arousal of will, but the constitution of the chushim themselves in their supernal form.

For we already find in the writings of the Mekubalim that within every level there is a further subdivision: mochin de‑mochin, middos de‑mochin, mochin de‑middos, and so forth. Meaning, that within the general category of mochin there is a more inner mochin, and a more external which already tend toward middos; likewise within middos themselves there are aspects of intellect, and so on. From this we see that it is the way of Elokus that a general partzuf, once established, contains within itself particular partzufim according to its inner content.

If so, since we have recognized Panim as a distinct seder whose inner content is gilui pnimiyus in a mode of encounter—face to face—it follows that within this Panim there must be a Rosh which is the most collected point of that encounter, the place where the power to reveal and to be revealed is first formed before it spreads into the details of the world. This is the Rosh HaPanim.

Now, that such a thing exists is already alluded to in many places in Torah where the language of anthropomorphism is used not merely in a general way—“Hashem spoke,” “Hashem remembered,” and so on—but in a very specific bodily imagery of facial organs, and particularly in relation to hashgachah and gilui Elokus.

Regarding the eyes it is said, “Einei Hashem meshoteitim b’chol ha’aretz”—“the eyes of Hashem roam throughout the earth,” and elsewhere, “Einei Hashem el tzaddikim”—His eyes are to the righteous. This is not only a mashal for knowledge in general, for then it would have sufficed to say simply “Hashem knows,” or “before Him all is revealed.” Rather, the Torah chooses the tziyun of eyes that roam and gaze, implying a specific mode of daas—vision‑like, all‑encompassing, surveying, discriminating—which is distinct from a mere inner seichel. Eyes are already the beginning of Panim.

Likewise with the oznaim: the Torah and the Nevi’im speak in many places of “ozno hiktiv”—“He inclined His ear,” “oznecha keshovah”—“Your ear is attentive,” and our Sages elucidate that “the gate that is closest to Him is the gate of tears,” for “He does not despise the prayer of the poor”—all described in terms of Hashem hearing. And in the Zohar there is detailed exposition on “oznaim” as channels of Torah and tefillah, receiving the kol from below. Here too we see that the gilui of Rotzon and Chesed in the form of kabbalah, of receiving and attending, is given the tziyun of an ear, not only the tziyun of an inner ratzon or chochmah.

Concerning the af, the nose, the Torah speaks of “charon af Hashem,” the flaring of His nose as anger, and on the other side “vayarach Hashem es re’ach ha’nichoach,” He smelled the pleasing fragrance. And in many places in Zohar the af is the place where din is aroused and from where it is also sweetened and appeased. Smell, breath, ruach—these are all associated with subtle inner discernment and with the passage between din and rachamim. Thus the af stands in Torah not as a mere poetic image but as a specific organ‑quality of Elokus, related to an inner evaluation that is finer than sight and hearing.

And regarding the mouth, the peh, it is explicit in the words of the Nevi’im and in the Kabbalah that “Malchus peh Torah she’b’al peh”—Malchus is the mouth, the power of dibbur, through which “bidvar Hashem shamayim na’asu.” Here already the image is not only Panim but the point where Panim turns outward into creation. Nevertheless, the peh is still in the face and is counted among its organs, and thus belongs to the complex which we are calling Rosh HaPanim.

From all this it is clear that the Torah itself insists on a structured “face of Hashem” in which there are eyes, ears, nose, and mouth, each with its own inyan of gilui. These are not the mochin themselves, for we do not say “the chochmah sees” or “the binah hears,” but rather “the eyes of Hashem,” “the ears of Hashem.” Nor are they the limbs and middos, for the middos are measured in the heart and in the extension of the arms and body. Rather, they are an intermediate, supra‑limbic system: faculties of perception and articulation that stand between the inner head and the outer limbs.

This is precisely the place we have identified as Panim, and the collected root of these faculties is what we are calling Rosh HaPanim.

And according to this we can also understand that which is explained in Chassidus concerning the five Gevuros of the head. It is known that in the head there are five gevurot which later emerge as the five Gevuros of the mouth, the five tzinoros through which dibbur is articulated. In many maamarim it is explained that these five are the inner root of constriction and differentiation, by which the simple flow of seichel and chayus is divided into specific letters and words, and likewise into specific perceptions.

Yet, as long as we speak of them only as “Gevuros of the head” in a general way, their tziyon remains abstract. By positing Rosh HaPanim we may say that these five Gevuros are in truth seated in the Panim‑system: they are the inner din‑structure that carves the simple light of the mochin into the distinct chushim of re’iyah, shemi’ah, re’ach, ta’am, and dibbur. Each sense is a particular gevurah‑path, a measured opening, through which the light of Chabad and Kesser is allowed to face the other, whether the other is the lower worlds or the nefesh of a Yid.

For example, sight is not a general revelation of chochmah, but a specific gevurah that limits chochmah into a narrow ray that can be apprehended at once, in a surrounding way. Hearing is a different gevurah, that permits the content to be absorbed gradually and inwardly. Smell is more subtle still, tasting is more inward, and speech is the gevurah that makes the inner into an outward, articulated thing. All these gevurot derive from the Rosh HaPanim, from that inner “head of face” in which the pathways of divine encounter are first engraved.

This also illuminates the inyan of chushim ruchniyim spoken of in Tanya and later maamarim. When it is said that a Jew has a “spiritual eye” to see Elokus, or a “spiritual ear” to hear the words of Torah in their inner sense, and so on, the intent is not only that the seichel is sensitive or that the middos are refined, but that there is in the nefesh a miniaturized reflection of Rosh HaPanim—a spiritual face within his own head. Just as in the supernal Adam there is a Rosh HaPanim nested within the general Rosh of Kesser and Chabad, so in the soul of man there is a panimiyus‑face nested within the general faculties, in which the chushim ruchniyim are seated.

We may thus say, in the language of seder hishtalshelus, that within the partzuf of the Rosh there is a pratzuf‑katan of Panim, and within that there is yet a more inner Rosh—the Rosh HaPanim—which parallels the relation of mochin de‑mochin in other contexts. The general Rosh (Kesser and Chabad) is the source of consciousness and will; the Panim is the mode of conscious encounter; and the Rosh HaPanim is the concentrated origin of the instruments of encounter, the spiritual organs by which encounter becomes possible.

Through this we begin to resolve the original kushya. The “missing head” is not missing; it was hidden within the head, as Rosh HaPanim, and its limbs are the supernal eyes, ears, nose, and mouth described throughout Torah and Zohar. They do not simply coincide with Chabad, nor are they identical with Malchus in its general aspect, but they are a distinct ensemble of faculties, seated in the upper face, which mediate between the simple mochin and the extension of middos and actions into the worlds.

However, all this is still only a general description of the place and function of Rosh HaPanim. To truly understand its depth, and how each chush is a unique Sefiritic pattern within this head‑within‑the‑head, we must now, with the help of Hashem, enter into the particulars: to gaze upon the inyan of the spiritual eye, the spiritual ear, the ruach of smell, the ta’am of delight, and the dibbur of Malchus, each in its own order and its own avodah.

5 · The Spiritual Eye – Seeing the Infinite

And the first of these instruments of encounter, the foremost of the chushim of Rosh HaPanim, is the spiritual eye.

For it is known in the teachings of Chassidus that the beginning of all gilui in the soul is in the nekudah of Chochmah, which is called koach ha‑re’iyah, the power of sight. Chochmah is not the expansion and explanation of the matter—that is Binah—but the simple flash, the barak ha‑mavrik, in which the truth of the inyan is seen in one glance. And this is why Chochmah is associated with ayin, with nothingness, for in that moment the metzius of the maskil is not felt; he is only a transparent window through which the inyan itself is seen.

However, if we would say that the spiritual eye is only Chochmah, then we would still be speaking about mochin in their usual sense. Our intent here is to define the eye as a particular configuration within Rosh HaPanim, which is more than the general koach ha‑sechel. We must therefore understand how Chochmah is drawn into Panim and formed as an organ of sight, and what is the role of Tiferes in this.

To begin with, we must recall the nature of sight as opposed to hearing. In many maamarim it is explained that re’iyah is a mode of certainty, whereas shemi’ah is a mode of emunah and havanah. One who sees does not require proofs; the very presence of the thing before his eyes compels him. Hearing, by contrast, is subject to questions, to pilpul, to acceptance or rejection. Thus in Elokus there is re’iyah be‑Elokus—a perception of G‑dliness as something seen—and shemi’ah be‑Elokus—a taking in of G‑dliness through words, explanations, and acceptance.

And this is the meaning of “Ki be’orcha nireh or”—“for in Your light we shall see light.” The pasuk is not satisfied to say merely that we know light, or hear of light, but that we see light, and moreover, that this seeing is “in Your light.” The seeing of Elokus is not an autonomous power of the nefesh; it is the nefesh becoming a vessel for the Ohr Ein Sof itself, such that the light of Hashem is the very medium and content of the sight. Thus spiritual vision is an immediate, pre‑verbal apprehension of truth; it precedes dibbur, precedes even the articulation of sechel in mochin de’Binah. It is a seeing that is itself an extension of the Divine Or into the eye of Rosh HaPanim.

Yet, even this is still only the side of Chochmah. Where then enters Tiferes?

The inyan of Tiferes is explained as tiferes ha’yofi—the harmony and beauty that comes from the integration of Chesed and Gevurah, of expansion and limitation, into a single, proportionate whole. Tiferes is also identified with rachamim, compassion, which sees the emes of the metzius and draws down elokus into it in a measured, beautiful manner. In the person, Tiferes is the midah that gazes at the other not only with strict truth nor only with indiscriminate kindness, but with a harmonious perception that recognizes the inner point, the chelek Eloka mi’ma’al, even when it is concealed.

We may therefore say that the spiritual eye of Rosh HaPanim is the yichud of Chochmah and Tiferes—a configuration wherein the Chochmah‑flash of pure Elokus is immediately clothed in the harmonizing, compassionate midah of Tiferes. Chochmah alone would see only the absolute Ein Sof, in which the worlds are as naught. Tiferes alone would perceive the splendor and pathos of the worlds, the drama of souls and their journeys. The spiritual eye must see both at once: the Ein Sof and its beauty as expressed in seder hishtalshelus, the nullity of creation and its preciousness. This is the einayim of Rosh HaPanim.

And according to this we can understand the Zohar’s description of “einei ha‑da’ina”—the eyes of judgment and compassion. For sight is not a neutral registering of data; the way the eye sees already contains a psak, a verdict, a leaning toward din or rachamim. When the eye of Rosh HaPanim is configured more in the side of Gevurah, it is an eye of din, “eineha megalgelos ba’aretz” in the sense of searching out iniquity. When it is revealed through Tiferes, it is an eye of rachamim, “Einei Hashem heima meshotetim b’chol ha’aretz”—the eyes of Hashem roam all the earth not only to expose but to arouse mercy, to find the nekudah tovah even in a fallen place. The very roaming of the Divine eyes is a diffusion of compassion, a spreading of the awareness of Elokus into all corners of existence.

This also explains why the eye is intrinsically bound up with yirah and bittul. For when a person truly sees something infinitely greater than himself, he cannot remain in his previous metzius. The immediate result of re’iyah be‑Elokus is hisbatlus—his sense of independent “I” withdraws, like a candle before a torch. The more intense the vision, the deeper the yirah: not fear in the simple sense, but yiras ha’romemus, the awe of the exaltedness of Hashem. And this is hinted in the words “Sa’u marom eineichem u’re’u mi bara eileh”—“Lift your eyes on high and see Who created these.” The passtuk does not command one merely to meditate with sechel, but to lift the eyes, to draw the koach ha‑re’iyah upward, so that through the contemplation of the worlds—“eileh”—one comes to see the “Mi,” the hidden source, which is the level of Chochmah (as is known that Mi is gematria 50, the nun sha’arei Binah, and refers to the concealed source of understanding).

In such vision, the worlds do not disappear, nor does the person collapse; rather, the eye of Tiferes beholds them in their true proportion, as beautiful vessels of Divine expression, and the bittul that is born is not annihilation but alignment. The person stands in awe, but he stands. He lives and acts, but his living and acting are suffused with the clarity of sight.

And with this we can distinguish more precisely between the eye as it is in the general head, and the eye as it is in Rosh HaPanim. The physical eye sees physical forms; the intellectual eye of Chochmah sees concepts; the eye of Rosh HaPanim sees Elokus in and through both. It is a re’iyah that is not limited to what is graspable within the kelim of sechel. Rather, because it is a vessel for the very ohr of “Ki be’orcha,” it can receive a ha’arah of Ohr Ein Sof itself. This is why spiritual sight is pre‑verbal and pre‑conceptual: it apprehends the simple truth of Elokus, and only afterward does Binah descend to explain and articulate what has been seen.

One can observe this even in the nefesh ha’adam when he experiences a sudden, encompassing recognition of Hashem’s reality that cannot yet be put into words. He may stand by the sea, or hear the cry of a child, or encounter a maamar Chassidus, and in an instant everything is different: the world is transparent, his worries fall away, a quiet awe fills him. He cannot explain it; explanations will come later. That instant is the awakening of the spiritual eye: Chochmah receiving a glimmer of Ein Sof, clothed immediately in Tiferes as a sense of beauty and compassion, and this engenders yirah and bittul.

It emerges, then, that the spiritual eye has three defining inyanim: (a) it is a vessel for direct ha’arah of Ohr Ein Sof, “be’orcha”; (b) it unites Chochmah’s absolute seeing with Tiferes’s harmonious, compassionate perception of the worlds; and (c) its natural fruit is yirah and hisbatlus, together with clarity and yishuv ha’daas in avodah.

According to this we can also better understand the expression “Einei Hashem heima meshotetim”—the eyes of Hashem roam. Roaming implies movement from place to place, from level to level. The spiritual eye of Rosh HaPanim is not static; it is the dynamic extension of Divine vision into ever‑lower realms. In each world, in each level of the soul, the same pattern repeats: Chochmah receives a new glimmer; Tiferes harmonizes it with the local metzius; yirah and bittul are born anew. Thus the “roaming eyes” are in truth the gradual revelation of Rosh HaPanim within seder hishtalshelus and within the inner life of man.

And this now prepares the way to understand the complement and counterpart of the eye—the spiritual ear. For if the eye is the koach ha‑re’iyah of Chochmah‑Tiferes, the ear will be the koach ha‑shemi’ah of Binah‑Hod. Sight seizes the truth in one instant and compels bittul; hearing receives, unpacks, and submits over time. Both are needed in Elokus‑perception: the lightning flash of vision and the steady rain of understanding; the awe born of seeing and the kabbalas ol born of listening. To this we now turn.

6 · The Spiritual Ear – Hearing the Word

If so, after the above, we may understand that in Rosh HaPanim there must also be a faculty that is not of the nature of sudden vision, but of drawn‑out reception; not the flash that compels, but the word that is heard, waited for, borne, and allowed to penetrate. This is the inyan of shemi’ah ruchnis, the spiritual ear.

For it is known in many maamarim the distinction between seeing and hearing: that re’iyah gives a person absolute certainty (as is explained at length, that “a witness who saw cannot be refuted”), whereas hearing is of the side of emunah and of understanding, that he did not see with his own eyes, but he receives from another and labours to grasp. Nevertheless, this very deficiency in immediacy is itself its superiority in pnimiyus. Sight overwhelms and leaves little room for the metzius of the mekabel; hearing, by contrast, demands patience, toil, and a certain submission of self to what is being spoken, and through this the matter becomes pnimiyus mamash within him.

This is the inner content of the command “Shema Yisrael.” It does not say “Re’eh Yisrael,” though in truth there is also “Re’eh anochi nosein lifneichem,” but the essential proclamation of Elokus in Kabbalas Ol Malchus Shamayim is through “Shema”—hear, accept, bend your ear and your heart. Hearing here does not mean merely the technical act of sound striking the drum of the ear; it means to receive the word to the point that it defines one’s being. As is known, “Shema” is from the expression of “havana ve’haskalah,” to understand and internalise, and yet the pnimiyus of “Shema Yisrael” is not intellectual comprehension alone but the kabbalas ol of “Hashem Echad”—that the person’s whole existence is surrendered to the unity he has heard declared.

From this we see that the spiritual ear in Rosh HaPanim must be rooted in Binah and Hod. For Binah is called “koach ha‑hergesh ve‑ha‑harchava”—the power of feeling and expansion. Unlike Chochmah which is the lightning flash, Binah is the faculty that spreads the point into breadth, into details, into an understanding that can be felt in the heart. This is precisely the nature of hearing: a word is drawn out in time, syllable after syllable; the listener follows, distinguishes, connects, and allows the meaning to unfold within him. The more he listens, the more the inyan widens and deepens. This is Binah in the mode of shemi’ah.

But Binah alone, as seichel, could still remain in the domain of abstract comprehension without necessarily obligating the person in kabbalas ol. Therefore the ear must also be configured with Hod. For Hod is hoda’ah—acknowledgment, and kabbalah—acceptance; it is the mode of agreeing and yielding even where one does not fully grasp. Hod is the midah that bows. In Rosh HaPanim, Hod gives the spiritual ear the capacity not only to understand the words of the Speaker but to stand in submission before them, to be mekabel them as Dvar Hashem, not as an interesting concept.

Thus the spiritual ear is a yichud of Binah and Hod: Binah draws the word into pnimiyus through hergesh and harchava; Hod bends and receives it as absolute authority. This is the inner anatomy of “Shema Yisrael”: the mind listens and expands (Binah), the soul says “amen”—so it is, even where it transcends my grasp (Hod).

And according to this we can understand the Zohar which speaks of “oznaim” as channels of Torah. For Torah is called “dibur,” as it is written, “Ha’azinu ha‑shamayim va’adabeirah”—“Give ear, O heavens, and I will speak.” The inyan of ha’azinu is that the heavens themselves must bend like an ear, to receive the word that is being spoken. Here “oznaim” are not passive holes but formed conduits that draw the supernal dibur into the worlds. In the language we are using: Rosh HaPanim extends into seder hishtalshelus as a set of spiritual ears—configurations of Binah‑Hod at each level—that receive the Dvar Hashem of Torah and translate it into a form graspable to that world.

For this reason the Zohar connects oznaim to Torah specifically: because the nature of Torah is not only revelation (which would be more of the side of the eye and of Chochmah), but instruction and command. Torah speaks; it addresses the other and demands a response. This requires a faculty whose whole inyan is to be addressed—to listen, to be commanded, to be fashioned by what is heard. That is the spiritual ear.

And this is also the secret of what is said in Tehillim and in the words of Chazal regarding teshuvah, “oznaim karisa lahem”—“You have dug ears for them.” The simple meaning is that Hashem created ears with which man can hear reproof and return. But the expression “karisa,” to dig, is very precise. An ear is not added externally like a ring on the body; it is a hollowing out, an opening in the thickness. To create an ear in the soul is to carve a space of receptivity, to remove self‑thickness so there can be room for the voice of the Other.

Teshuvah therefore depends essentially on the ear. As it is said, “Ozen shama’a tochacha”—“An ear that hears reproof.” Reproof by its nature is not something one wishes to see but something one does not wish to hear. To look at oneself as one is may be tolerable; but to hear a word that contradicts one’s present stance, that calls him to change, requires a special koach. This koach is Hod within the ear: the capacity to say, “I submit to the truth I hear, even against my current self.” And when this Hod is connected with Binah, the reproof does not remain outside as a blow, but enters and is understood and felt, until it gives birth to genuine remorse and resolution. This is shemi’ah ruchnis in the mode of teshuvah.

Here we also see another difference between the eye and the ear. The eye, as explained, tends to produce yirah and bittul through a revelation from above—he sees the greatness of the Ein Sof and is nullified. The ear, by contrast, is the vehicle of kabbalas ol from below. The person stands as a listener; he does not see, he does not control; he simply hears words that come to him and chooses to receive them. Therefore shemi’ah is connected with emunah more than re’iyah: he believes the one who speaks, and on that basis he forms his world. This is why, in the order of avodah, “Shema Yisrael” precedes “Re’eh anochi”—kabbalas ol and emunah precede and are the vessel for later higher vision.

In terms of Rosh HaPanim, we may say that whereas the eye is more from above to below—Ohr Ein Sof shining into Chochmah and Tiferes—the ear is more from below to above: the soul placing itself in a posture of listening, so that the Dvar Hashem can descend. The “oznaim” of Zohar as channels of Torah are two‑way conduits: from above to below, the dibur of Torah flows through them into the worlds; from below to above, the kabbalas ol and emunah of the souls rise through them as a sweet hoda’ah.

This explains also why the language of “Ha’azinu ha‑shamayim” is used regarding Moshe Rabbeinu’s song at the end of the Torah. There the heavens and earth are called as witnesses; they must serve as the enduring ears through which the words of Torah and the warnings of the bris are constantly heard in creation. In the inner dimension, “shamayim” and “aretz” correspond to different levels in the soul; each must develop its own oznaim—its Binah and its Hod—to be constantly hearing the ongoing “va’adabeirah,” the present tense speaking of Hashem in Torah.

And all this is the configuration of the spiritual ear already as it is in the supernal Rosh HaPanim. In the next inyan, when we will speak of the nose and smell, we will see how there exists an even subtler chush—rooted in Daas and Yesod—that mediates between this hearing and the earlier seeing, uniting the flash of vision and the submission of listening into a deeper ruach of discernment.

7 · The Spiritual Nose – Scent of the Soul

If so, after the eye and the ear have been clarified as the primary chushim of Rosh HaPanim, there yet remains between them an inner, more hidden faculty, which is not fully of the order of seeing, nor fully of the order of hearing, but stands as a middle ruach between them. And this is the inyan of the nose and smell.

For we observe in the guf that the nose is positioned exactly between the two eyes and above the mouth, and it shares also with the ears that it is doubled—two nostrils—yet these doubles converge into a single inner channel of breath. And this very structure is a remez to its spiritual root, that it mediates between right and left, between re’iyah and shemi’ah, uniting them into one inner ruach.

Now, the chush ha‑re’ach is itself a wondrous thing. Of all the senses, it is the most subtle; it does not grasp a coarse body but only a vapor, a scent so tenuous that it is almost nothing, and nevertheless from this almost‑nothing it knows the something: it can distinguish between life and decay, between freshness and corruption, between a close friend and a stranger. Moreover, the sense of smell is deeply bound with the ruach ha‑chiyus of a person; a faint scent can revive a fainting soul, as is known. And this is reflected also in the language, that “ruach,” “re’ach,” and “noach” are interrelated roots; smell is bound with spirit and with menuchas ha‑ruach.

Therefore the Torah says, “Vayarach Hashem es re’ach ha‑nichoach”—“And Hashem smelled the pleasing aroma.” On the surface, this is an anthropomorphism regarding the korbanos, but in the inner dimension it teaches that there is in Elokus a mode of gilui called “re’ach,” and specifically “re’ach nichoach”—a scent that brings nachas ruach. It is not yet the word that is spoken (dibbur), nor the taste that is savored (taam), nor the visible light; it is the inner quality of the avodah, its ruach, as it rises like a vapor before Hashem, and in that ruach He “smells” and knows its truth.

And regarding Melech HaMashiach it is said, “V’haricho be‑yiras Hashem”—he will “smell” in the fear of Hashem. Chazal explain that he will not judge “according to the sight of his eyes and the hearing of his ears,” but will smell and know who is guilty and who is innocent. That is, his primary faculty of mishpat will be neither re’iyah nor shemi’ah but a higher, more inward ruach of discernment, a chush ha‑re’ach that penetrates the inner truth of a thing beyond what appears and beyond what is said. This is a supra‑rational daas, which does not calculate arguments but “smells” the nekudas ha‑pnimiyus.

To understand this in the seder of Rosh HaPanim, we must preface the inyan of Daas and Yesod. It is known that Chochmah and Binah are the father and mother of mochin, but Daas is the hiskashrus, the binding of the soul to the inyan; not merely knowing something, but being attached to it, tied to it, such that it affects the heart and being. And Yesod is the midah of connection and bonding, the power to join and attach, to “unite” mashpia and mekabel. In many maamarim it is explained that Daas is Yesod of the mochin, and Yesod is Daas of the middos; both are one inyan—hiskashrus and chibur, above in sechel and below in feeling and expression.

Thus, Daas in Rosh HaPanim is not another intellectual sight or hearing; it is the inner glue that binds what is seen and what is heard into one certain, lived reality. And Yesod in Rosh HaPanim is not yet the Yesod of the guf that extends into reproduction; here it is the first, most refined capacity to connect inwardly to an inyan or to a soul. Together, Daas and Yesod form the ruach of attachment and discernment.

We may therefore say that the spiritual nose, in Rosh HaPanim, is precisely this yichud of Daas and Yesod: Daas as the inward recognition and hiskashrus to the pnimiyus of a matter, and Yesod as the channel of inner bonding whereby the soul joins itself or distances itself. And this is the secret of smell: the soul “smells” something, and even before it can explain or articulate, it already knows—this is close to me, this is distant; this is pure, this is foul; here I can connect, here I must recoil.

This is why Chazal say that the sense of smell alone was not involved in the chet of the Eitz HaDaas. The eyes saw, the ears heard the words of the nachash, the hands touched, the mouth tasted; but smell is not mentioned. The deepest ruach ha‑daas of Adam was not corrupted. The simple meaning is that smell was not used; in pnimius, this indicates that the inner faculty of Daas‑Yesod, the pure chush ha‑re’ach that discerns truth beyond appearances, remained untouched by the admixture of good and evil. Therefore smell remains the most refined of the senses, and through it we awaken that pristine ruach—like the smelling of besamim on Motzaei Shabbos, which revives the neshama yeseirah.

In this light we can return to “Vayarach Hashem es re’ach ha‑nichoach.” The korban is an act in the realm of action, with fire and flesh; one could see it and hear its sounds. But the main thing is its re’ach—the ruach that rises from it. From the external perspective, many korbanos might appear the same; from the inner perspective, Hashem “smells” the heart, the kavannah, the daas and hiskashrus of the makriv. The re’ach is the Daas‑Yesod of the avodah as it ascends to bond above, and therefore it is specifically the re’ach that brings nachas ruach.

Correspondingly, in the Zohar the “af”—the nose—is used both for anger and for appeasement. “Charon af”—burning of the nose—is anger; “harichas af”—lengthening of the nose—is patience and forbearance. For the nose is the place of ruach; when the ruach is disturbed and flares, this is anger; when the ruach is settled and extended, this is appeasement and nachas. In terms of Rosh HaPanim, when the Daas‑Yesod of the soul bonds to evil, to falseness, the ruach is twisted and there is charon af; when it bonds to truth and good, the ruach is pacified, and there is re’ach nichoach.

We see this also in nefesh ha’adam: often a person will say, “I have a feeling in my gut,” but more precisely it is a re’ach ha‑ruach—a subtle sensing that this thing is not clean, or that this person is true and trustworthy, beyond all arguments. This is not Chochmah’s flash of higher vision, nor Binah’s explication and understanding, but Daas: an inner, wordless knowing that grips the soul. And this Daas, when healthy, expresses itself as Yesod—either drawing near and cleaving, or separating and holding back. The spiritual nose is this power of ruach‑discernment, lodged between the eye and the ear, taking from both and transcending both.

For the eye can be deceived by appearance, and the ear by rhetoric; but the pure chush ha‑re’ach of Daas‑Yesod, when it is not corrupted, can “smell” through these garments. Therefore Mashiach will judge not “by the sight of his eyes nor by the hearing of his ears,” but by smell: his Daas will be so united with Elokus, and his Yesod so perfectly attached to truth, that he will sense immediately the inner standing of each soul and each matter, without need for witnesses and arguments. This is “V’haricho be‑yiras Hashem”—his ruach will be saturated with fear of Hashem, and from that yirah his re’ach will be infallible.

And behold, this power of smell as it is in Mashiach is the full revelation of the spiritual nose of Rosh HaPanim. For there, above, Daas‑Yesod is utterly attached only to Elokus; it knows nothing but Him, and therefore its discernment is absolute. In our present state, this chush is concealed and mixed; our ruach is affected by many factors, by middos not yet rectified, by impressions from the world. Nevertheless, the etzem ha‑koach is present in every Jewish soul, as a spark of “lo nishtaneh”—that which did not change in the chet. And in avodah, we are empowered to refine this Daas‑Yesod, to restore the nose of the soul to its proper function: to smell Elokus, to sense the re’ach ha‑nichoach of Torah and mitzvos, and to recoil from the foul scent of kelipah, even when the eyes see beauty and the ears hear pleasing words.

Thus the spiritual nose becomes the true bridge between the eye and the ear: from the eye it takes the capacity to receive a non‑verbal ha’arah, an immediate impression; from the ear it takes the involvement of ruach and hargash, the feeling dimension; and it unites them in Daas‑Yesod, in an attached knowing that either bonds or separates. Through this inner re’ach we are prepared to understand the mouth and taste, and afterwards speech: for first the soul must discern, must know in its ruach what is sweet and what is bitter, what is fragrant and what is foul; only then can it taste Torah with taanug and speak with words that are a re’ach nichoach before Hashem.

8 · Taste and the Inner Delight of Torah

And after all the above, concerning re’iyah, shemi’ah and re’ach in Rosh HaPanim, it is now understood that there must be also the inner faculty of the mouth itself, not in its aspect of dibbur which turns outward, but in its aspect of קבלה פנימית, of tasting and receiving inwardly. For the eye receives by light, the ear by sound, the nose by ruach; the mouth, however, receives in the mode of taam, taste. And this is a different inyan altogether, for taste is not merely information but oneg and revayah, a saturation of delight.

This is the meaning of that which is stated, “טַעֲמוּ וּרְאוּ כִּי־טוֹב יְהֹוָה – taste and see that Hashem is good.” The verse first says “taamu,” and afterwards “u’re’u,” that through tasting there comes a new mode of seeing. For there is a re’iyah that comes from Chochmah alone, as explained earlier, and there is a re’iyah that comes after taam, a vision of “ki tov Hashem,” of the goodness and pleasantness of Elokus as it is experienced in pnimiyus. Likewise it is said, “אִמְרוּ צַדִּיק כִּי־טוֹב – say of the tzaddik that he is good”; the revelation of “ki tov” depends on an utterance, on “imru,” but that utterance itself is grounded in a prior taam, in the inner sensation of this goodness.

To understand this, we must preface that it is known in Chassidus that taanug is the pnimiyus of Keser. Ratzon is the chitzoniyus of Keser, that which extends outward as a directive, “I want thus and not otherwise.” Taanug, delight, is the inner content of that will, the quiet being‑pleased that precedes and pervades all expression. And because taanug is pnimiyus ha‑Keser, it is the very life of all the kochos; without an inner delight, even intellect and middos become dry and cannot endure.

Now, this taanug in its source is utterly beyond hishtalshelus; it is a simple pnimiyus that no keli can grasp. Nevertheless, it is the way of Elokus that the highest must be drawn into the lowest, and thus taanug finds its expression in the lowest keli, in Malchus, and specifically in the mouth of Rosh HaPanim, in the faculty of taste. For taste is the point where that which is outside enters within and becomes united with the soul’s vitality, and this union is sensed as taanug or, G‑d forbid, the opposite. Thus, in the configuration of Rosh HaPanim, taste is the interface of Taanug and Malchus: Taanug as the inner light that seeks expression, Malchus as the mouth that receives and internalises, and the chush ha‑taam as the keli that binds them.

According to this it will be understood why the inner dimension of Torah is called “טעמי תורה – the tastes of Torah.” There are, of course, also “taamim” in the simple sense, the grammatical cantillation‑signs that guide the tune of the reading; but in penimiyus, taamei Torah means the inner reasons, the pnimiyus ha‑sevara and the sweetness of the Divine chochmah. These are not merely explanations that satisfy the mind’s demand for clarity; they are the places where the neshamah tastes Elokus and is delighted. When a Jew learns Torah only in the manner of din and pilpul, without feeling the goodness of “ki tov Hashem” clothed in the halachah, his Torah is like food chewed but not tasted. It sustains, but it does not gladden. When he merits a glimmer of taamei Torah, then the same halachah becomes sweet, his heart is warmed, and a subtle oneg permeates his learning. This is the revelation of Taanug in Malchus, of Keser within the mouth.

And here is the connection to the Kabbalistic teaching that taste is associated with the palate and with the five Gevuros of the mouth. For it is known that dibbur emerges through five general groups of letters, corresponding to the five places of articulation, and these are rooted in five Gevuros that carve the simple breath into articulated sound. Likewise, in the inner side of the mouth there are five Gevuros which carve and differentiate taanug, so that the simple delight of the soul should be experienced in various “flavours” of Torah and mitzvos. Just as in food there are sweet, sour, bitter, sharp, savoury, and the palate receives and distinguishes them all, so in Torah there are many taamim: the taam of understanding a sugya after toil, the taam of fulfilling a mitzvah with love, the taam of davening with dveikus. All these are particularisations of the simple taanug of Elokus as it meets the soul.

Yet, being Gevuros, they can also conceal. The same faculty which allows the soul to taste Elokus can, if inverted, find taanug in matters of kelipah, in vain speech, in pleasures that oppose Ratzon HaElyon. Then the palate that was created to distinguish and elevate becomes coarse, and spiritual food is felt as tasteless while forbidden or empty things are felt as delicious. This is the inner bitterness described in Chassidus, that a person’s “palate” has become distorted, so that he calls bitter sweet and sweet bitter.

Here we come to the avodah of transforming bitterness to sweetness. For the novelty of taam over the other senses is that it is the sense most openly bound with the middos; it is impossible to taste without love and hate, attraction and repulsion. And therefore, when the soul tastes bitterness in its distance from Hashem, in its own coarseness, and this causes marirus, a broken‑heartedness that is alive and seeking, then this very bitterness becomes a keli for the highest taanug. For from the depth of marirus there is born a yearning for “ki tov Hashem,” and when a person then tastes even a small sweetness of Elokus, it is infinitely precious to him. Thus, “מרירות נהפכת למתיקות – bitterness is transformed to sweetness,” not only that the bad is removed and the good revealed, but that the very experience of bitterness becomes the spice of the higher taanug.

And this is hinted in “טעמ֥וּ וּרְא֗וּ כִּי־ט֥וֹב יְהֹוָ֑ה”: first there is “taamu” – even if at first the taste is sharp and bitter, the tasting itself, the willingness to bring the matter into pnimiyus, prepares the vessel; afterwards there is “u’re’u,” one comes to see that “ki tov Hashem,” that all was for the sake of a deeper goodness. Likewise “אִמְרוּ צַדִּיק כִּי־טוֹב” – the tzaddik is he who has already transformed all his inner Gevuros to sweetness, his palate is refined; he can say, in truth and from pnimiyus, “ki tov,” he senses the goodness in every decree and every avodah. But the command “imru tzaddik” is also to each of us: begin to speak in the mode of tzaddik, to articulate that there is goodness in Elokus, and through this dibbur you will open your own mouth to taste that goodness.

Thus, in Rosh HaPanim, the mouth in its inward‑facing aspect is the place where all the preceding senses are gathered. The eye has seen, the ear has heard, the nose has smelled and discerned; but only when the soul dares to “put it in its mouth,” to internalise Elokus in the mode of taam, does Taanug descend into Malchus and become life. Then the Torah is not only believed and understood, but tasted; mitzvos are not only obeyed, but relished; the relationship with Hashem is not only known, but enjoyed. This completes the seder of the receptive senses.

Afterwards comes the second aspect of the mouth, which is already a turning outward: dibbur, the articulation that creates and reveals, as will be explained in the continuation, that the same place which tastes inwardly becomes a channel through which Malchus speaks worlds into being and reveals the inner taanug in the lower realms.

9 · Speech and the Throat – Channel of Malchus

If so, we must say that from this same mouth of Rosh HaPanim, in which Taanug is received inwardly in the mode of taam, there is immediately drawn forth a second bechinah which is the opposite in direction: not kabbalah but hashpa’ah; not absorption but emission; not silence of tasting but the sound of speech. For Malchus is not only “kli ha‑taam,” the vessel that internalises delight, but is principally “Peh,” the mouth that speaks.

This is the meaning of what is said, “בִּדְבַר ה’ שָׁמַיִם נַעֲשׂוּ, וּבְרוּחַ פִּיו כָּל צְבָאָם” – “By the word of Hashem the heavens were made, and by the breath of His mouth all their host.” The making of heavens and their hosts is not described as an act of the hands or a thought of the mind, but as dibbur and ruach piv. And it is explained in Chassidus that “dibbur” here is not a borrowed term, but refers to the essential inyan of Malchus: the descent of the simple light into letters, into divided forms that can be heard by an other.

For thought, even though it too is composed of letters, remains entirely inward in the nefesh; it does not create a separate matzui. Speech, however, leaves the speaker, enclothes itself in air, and becomes a davar nifrad that can be received by distance and by many receivers. Thus the essential chidush of Malchus, relative to the higher midddos and mochin, is that it clothes the light in letters that stand on their own. And this is the sod of “shamayim na’asu” – the heavens are a world that appears as something, and nevertheless their entire metzius is only “bidvar Hashem,” letters of Malchus.

However, this brings us to a new point. If Malchus is Peh, the mouth, and the worlds are “dibbur,” then the whole seder of Rosh HaPanim must be completed not only with senses of reception but with an organised system of articulation – the five organs of speech, the throat that carries them, and the ruach memalela that animates them. For if in the supernal Adam the senses we have described are true structures and not mere metaphors, then likewise the “speaking” of the Divine, through which “kol tzeva’am” comes to be, must also have its spiritual anatomy in the head.

And indeed, we see in the halachos of lashon ha‑kodesh that there are five makomos ha‑hotza’ah, five places in the body from which letters emerge: the gutturals from the throat, the palatals from the palate, the linguals from the tongue, the dentals from the teeth, and the labials from the lips. The Mekubalim have explained that these correspond to five gevurot of dibbur, tzinoros through which the simple hevel ha‑dibbur is carved into distinct otiyos. Above, in Rosh HaPanim, these five gevurot are rooted as five inner dinim, measuring and partitioning the light of Malchus so that it may descend in orderly letters to vivify the worlds.

But here there is a difference from the five gevurot of the palate in taam. There, the gevurot remained inward, distinguishing tastes within the same food of Elokus, and their entire tachlis was pnimiyus – to intensify the delight of the one who eats. In dibbur, by contrast, the gevurot are already oriented outward: they hold back the hevel from pouring forth in one simple cry, restraining and shaping it into discrete sounds, so that others can receive it and be built by it. Thus the five organs of speech are Chesed and Gevurah joined – gevurot that carve and limit, and within them a hidden chesed that wishes to bestow understanding and life upon the listener.

To understand this more, we must interpose an inyan concerning the “garon,” the throat. For all organs of speech, from palate to lips, are situated in the mouth area, but the ruach itself, the hevel that carries the letters, rises from the lungs and heart through the throat. The throat is therefore a tzinor between the inner worlds of the person – heart and brain – and the outer world into which his words go forth. It is known that the “garon” is a narrow, sensitive place; a slight constriction there chokes all speech, a slight opening releases sound. In Chassidus this is used as a mashal to Malchus as the “tzinor” from the mochin to the lower worlds – the point where abundance can be closed or opened.

Now, since Rosh HaPanim is the inner head that mediates between the mochin and the guf, it follows that its throat – the spiritual garon – is the inner source of all such tzimtzum and hispashtus of hashpa’ah. When the inner eye sees, when the inner ear hears, when the inner nose smells and the inner mouth tastes, all this remains concealed within, unless and until it is allowed to pass through the spiritual throat into letters of dibbur. The throat, therefore, is the bechinah in which Malchus unites with Chesed and Gevurah: Gevurah, insofar as it narrows and measures; Chesed, insofar as it allows passage and sends forth.

And this is the depth of what is said, “וַיִּפַּח בְּאַפָּיו נִשְׁמַת חַיִּים, וַיְהִי הָאָדָם לְנֶפֶשׁ חַיָּה,” and Onkelos translates, “לְרוּחַ מְמַלְּלָא” – “a speaking spirit.” The very definition of “nefesh chayah” in man is that he becomes ruach memalela. Not merely that he lives and breathes, but that his breath becomes speech. The tikun of Adam, as “tzelem Elokim,” is that he carries within himself a miniature of this Divine inyan: he too has a Peh which is Malchus, a throat which is tzinor, and a ruach ha‑dibbur that can either be bitul to “bidvar Hashem” or, chalilah, can oppose it.

From here we understand the dread and greatness of speech. For just as above “bidvar Hashem shamayim na’asu,” that the heavens stand only by virtue of His utterance, so too in the microcosm, through the words a person utters he builds heavens and hosts in his own inner worlds. A word of Torah, a word of tefillah, a word of emes and chizuk – these are letters of Malchus de’kedushah; they draw down the inner taanug tasted in the heart into a form that can dwell in the body and the environment. Conversely, a word of sheker, of lashon hara, of mockery, is also Malchus, but used as a destructive gevurah; it carves letters that conceal Elokus and give hold to opposite worlds.

And this is why Chassidus emphasises that Malchus is called “alma de’itgalya” – the world of revelation. Not only because it reveals to the lower, but because it reveals the speaker himself. One sees from a person’s speech what he has tasted within. If his words are coarse and empty, it is a sign that his inner palate has not tasted Elokus; his Rosh HaPanim is as yet dark. If his speech is measured, kind, filled with Torah and yir’ah, then even without inner vision one perceives that his inner head is illuminated. Thus, dibbur is the test and the channel of all that precedes it.

According to this we may now understand another subtlety. Earlier it was explained that taam is the drawing of Taanug of Keser into Malchus; now we see that dibbur is the drawing of Malchus outward into “shamayim” and “kol tzeva’am.” In other words: there are two descents. From Keser into Malchus – this is taste, pnimiyus; from Malchus into the worlds – this is speech, chitzoniyus. And the two must be bound: speech without taste is empty, dry letters without soul; taste without speech remains locked within the individual and does not fulfil the kavanas ha’bri’ah, that Elokus should be revealed below.

Therefore the complete tikun of Rosh HaPanim is when the inner mouth has already tasted “ki tov Hashem,” and then the same mouth, through its five organs of articulation, speaks words that carry this goodness into reality. Then the garon is a clear tzinor, unblocked by fear or pride; ruach memalela flows freely, but in measured gevurah; the otiyos are many, but their content is one – “Hashem Echad.” In such a state, every word becomes a small “bidvar Hashem,” every breath a “ruach piv” that gives life to its surroundings.

On the other hand, this very greatness creates danger. For since Malchus is the lowest, it can descend to the place of concealment; and the same power that creates can destroy, the same letters that reveal Elokus can, chas v’shalom, hide Him. This is the sod of “מוֹת וְחַיִּים בְּיַד לָשׁוֹן” – death and life are in the hand of the tongue. Speech is the “yad” of Malchus; by it, worlds of holiness or of the opposite are formed.

However, the explanation of this in avodah – how this spiritual Peh and garon of Rosh HaPanim find expression in the nefesh ha’adam, and how a person is to guard and channel his ruach memalela so that it be a vehicle only to “bidvar Hashem” – this will be understood in the continuation, when we descend from the seder of partzufim in Elokus to the structure of the ten kochos in the human soul.

10 · The Spiritual Senses in the Human Soul

With this we may return to that which was mentioned above, that “the explanation of this in avodah… will be understood in the continuation, when we descend from the seder of partzufim in Elokus to the structure of the ten kochos in the human soul.” For it is known from the beginning of Tanya, that “k’mo she’yesh esor sefiros l’maalah, kach yesh esor kochos b’nefesh” – the ten powers of the soul correspond precisely to the ten Sefiros, they are their tzelem in man. And not only in a general way, that there is sechel and middos, Rosh and guf, but in detail: every prat of the supernal Adam HaElyon has its reflection as a prat in the nefesh ha’adam.

However, at first glance this seems distant from our inyan. For in Tanya, the ten kochos are explained as Chochmah–Binah–Daas, the seven middos, and their three levushim – machshavah, dibbur, maaseh. Where is there mention of a Rosh HaPanim, of spiritual eye, ear, nose, taste, and speech? It would seem that these belong only to the physical body and its chushim, whereas the nefesh is a simple, intellective and emotive entity.

But according to all the above it is understood that such a separation is impossible. Since the external panim of the body is clearly an instrument of revelation, gathering all the chushim and expressing the penimiyus ha’nefesh, it must be that within the nefesh itself there is an inner “face” – a configuration of kochos corresponding to spiritual sight, hearing, smell, taste, and speech. Only that, in the language of Tanya, these are included and hidden within the general kochos of sechel and middos, and are not yet brought out b’shem mufrash.

And indeed, we find in many places in Chassidus that expressions like “re’iyas Elokus,” “shemi’as Elokus,” “re’ach ha’mitzvos,” “taam ha’Torah,” “dibbur ha’nefesh” are used as clear descriptions of chushim ruchniyim. When it is said that a tzaddik “sees G‑dliness,” it does not mean only that he understands with his brain, but that there is by him a mode of perception that is like sight – immediate, compelling, beyond doubt. Likewise, when the Alter Rebbe writes (Tanya, beg. ch. 3) that the middos are “toldos ha’sechel,” born from contemplation in Elokus, it is understood that this birth requires an inner ear that can hear the “kol Hashem” within the words of Torah, an inner nose that can sense the ruach of a mitzvah, and so forth.

Only that, in most souls these chushim are in a state of helem and galus. This is the inyan of galus ha’Shechinah b’pnimius ha’adam. For the Shechinah is called “dibbur,” “Peh,” “Panim,” and when she is in exile it means that her Rosh HaPanim is concealed within the animalistic consciousness of man. The eye of the soul does not look at Elokus, the ear of the soul does not incline to Dvar Hashem, the nose of the soul does not recoil from ruach tum’ah, the palate of the soul does not taste the sweetness of Torah, and the inner speech of the soul does not articulate “ein od milvado,” but is occupied with its own self‑conscious narratives.

This galus comes about specifically through the misuse of the corresponding physical chushim. For as is explained in Tanya (end ch. 1, ch. 6–7), the garments of the nefesh – machshavah, dibbur, maaseh – when they are invested in matters of kelipah, they draw the kochos themselves into captivity. Similarly here: when the physical eye is accustomed to look at forbidden sights, or even at permissible vanities with craving and envy, this habituates the internal eye to seek only chitzoniyus and to turn away from penimiyus. The spiritual eye then becomes dulled; when it is presented with a page of Gemara, or with the sight of a Jew davening with emes, it does not “see” anything; it remains unmoved, for its calibration has been inverted.

The same with the ear. When a person lends his ear to lashon hara, rechilus, narishkeit, to songs and sounds that arouse coarse middos, then the inner ear of Binah–Hod, which was created to listen for “Shema Yisrael,” to hear the inner taamim of Torah, becomes blocked. Even when he does sit in a shiur and words of Chassidus are spoken, he does not hear “the word of Hashem” within them, but only external information. The spiritual ear is there, but in galus.

And similarly with re’ach. It is explained that “re’ach nichoach” is the ruach of a mitzvah, the subtle atmosphere of ratzon Hashem that hovers around an act of kedushah. When a person habituates his inner ruach to seek the “smell” of worldly honor, of taavos, to be drawn after atmospheres of frivolity and cynicism, his inner nose loses the capacity to distinguish between the scent of life and the scent of death. He can stand in a place of kedushah and feel nothing, and conversely, he can be at ease in an environment that stinks of spiritual decay. This is a perversion of Daas–Yesod in Rosh HaPanim.

Taste, too, is subject to inversion. Tanya (ch. 7) distinguishes between the “klipas nogah” that can be elevated and the shalosh kelipos ha’tmeios that are irredeemable; and it is explained that worldly pleasures, when taken l’shem Shamayim, can become a taam in avodas Hashem. But when one habituates his palate to the pleasures of the world for their own sake, then his inner palate comes to associate sweetness only with gashmiyus. Torah and mitzvos are then experienced as dry obligation, without taam. He may know much, but he does not taste, and therefore does not live with it.

And with speech – the most obvious. When the mouth becomes a tool for falsehood, derision, divisiveness, when it pours out idle chatter without measure, then the ruach memalela of the nefesh Elokis is driven into hiding. Even his words of Torah and tefillah then lack inner life, for the channel is polluted. This is the deepest form of galus ha’Shechinah: that Malchus of Rosh HaPanim, which was meant to be “bidvar Hashem shamayim na’asu,” becomes, so to speak, an instrument of the opposite.

From all this it is understood that these spiritual senses are not absent; they are present, but either dulled, inverted, or misaligned. For every koach in the nefesh is essentially neutral as a tool; its definition as holy or profane depends on its hiskashrus – on what it is bound to and for what kavannah it is employed. The same faculty of sight that can be used to gaze upon the greatness of Hashem in the world, upon the beauty of a mitzvah performed, can be used to gaze at that which arouses taavah. The same power of hearing that can be used to absorb divrei Torah and the pain of another Jew can be used to absorb gossip. The same sensitivity to ruach that can discern the fine difference between kedushah and kelipah can be coarsened to sniff out only opportunities for ego. The same palate that can taste Elokus within Torah can be trained to find only physical delicacies appealing. The same power of speech that can build, encourage, and reveal Hashem in the world can be turned into a tool of concealment.

This is the inner meaning of galus ha’Shechinah b’guf ha’adam, as explained in many maamarim: that the Divine Presence is not only exiled in the general world, but within the very kochos of every Jew. The Rosh HaPanim of Atzilus, which in its root is the face of the Shechinah, is clothed and hidden within the panim of the nefesh ha’elokis in every individual. When the person attaches his chushim only to the external world, he imprisons this inner face behind the mask of the animal soul.

Accordingly, the avodah is not to acquire new faculties, but to redeem and realign those that already exist. To turn the eye toward Elokus, the ear toward Dvar Hashem, the nose toward the subtle ruach of mitzvah, the palate toward the taamim of Torah, the mouth toward dibbur shel kedushah. This is the inner work of teshuvah described in Tanya – not only regret for particular deeds, but a return of the nefesh to its source, which in our terms means returning each sense to its true orientation: from self to Hashem.

Yet this tikkun of Rosh HaPanim in the nefesh cannot be in isolation. For as is explained there (ch. 3), the middos are the offspring of the mochin, and the levushim of thought, speech, and action are their extended garments. A distorted midah of anger, desire, or pride will necessarily blind the eye, deafen the ear, and so on. Therefore, in order that the spiritual senses be restored to clarity, there must precede and accompany this an avodah of tikkun ha’middos – to purify the heart, refine the character, so that the instruments of perception may be fit to receive.

And this is the inyan that will be explained in the continuation: how the refinement of Chesed, Gevurah, Tiferes, Netzach, Hod, Yesod, and Malchus in the heart and in behavior becomes the necessary hachana for the opening of the inner eye and ear of Rosh HaPanim in the nefesh ha’adam.

11 · Refining Middos as Preparation for Spiritual Perception

From all the above it is understood that the inner eye and ear, and the other spiritual chushim of Rosh HaPanim, are not detached kochos hovering above the lived life of the person, but are enclosed and bound within his mochin and middos, and that the lev – the heart with its seven middos – is the immediate field in which their clarity or concealment is determined. Hence, before one seeks “techniques” to open re’iyah and shemi’ah ruchnis, there must be an avodah more basic and more demanding: the cleansing and straightening of the middos themselves.

For the nature of middos is that they are not neutral colours added after the seichel, but they seize the seichel itself and bend it toward their own direction. Chesed sheb’nefesh when unrefined will love what is unlovable and justify it; Gevurah when coarse will hate what is lovable and find reasons; Tiferes when mixed with self will seek beauty that reflects its own image; Netzach and Hod will fight and concede according to ego; Yesod will bond to what is unworthy; Malchus will speak what should never be pronounced. In such a state, even if the mochin above are in order conceptually, the Rosh HaPanim cannot reveal its true seeing and hearing, for the light that would descend is immediately refracted and distorted in the turbid waters of the heart.

This is hinted in the known association of the middos with the limbs of the body. Chesed and Gevurah are the two arms, Tiferes the torso, Netzach and Hod the thighs, Yesod the organ of connection, Malchus the feet and mouth. The limbs are the instruments through which the head’s will is carried into action; yet, as is observable in the mashal, the condition of the limbs feeds back upon the head. A limb that is wounded sends pain upward; a limb that is habituated to a certain movement engraves a path in the brain itself. So too in avodah: middos expressed through thought, speech and action imprint themselves upon the mochin and, by consequence, upon Rosh HaPanim.

Therefore our Sages emphasized “lev tahor bera li Elokim” – that the request of David HaMelech is not for additional seichel alone, but for a new heart, a purified emotional field, such that the seichel already possessed should be able to reveal itself without distortion. And in maamarim it is explained that this “beriah” of a pure heart is effected through constant avodah in the seder clarified in Tanya, peirakim 12–15, concerning the beinoni.

For the beinoni, as is known, is not one whose middos are entirely transformed; the animal soul remains in its full strength in the left chamber of the heart. Yet he is called tzaddik in the garments – machshavah, dibbur, maaseh – for he never allows the middos of the animal soul to enter expression. At first glance this seems merely negative – a constant suppression, a life of tension – and one might ask how from such avodah can arise the revelation of subtle spiritual senses. But the Alter Rebbe reveals that this steady discipline establishes a new seder in the person, in which the G‑dly soul becomes the only ruler in the levushim, and that through this, over time, there is a softening and refinement even within the middos themselves.

And this is connected with the rule of “acharei ha‑peulos nimshachim ha‑levavos” – after the actions are drawn the hearts. The heart, by nature, follows the habitual direction of the limbs and garments. When the person, like the beinoni, rigorously chooses in every thought, speech, and action to align with Torah and avodah, even if inwardly he still feels conflicting desires, the heart is slowly drawn after these peulos until the middos themselves begin to love what they once resisted and recoil from what they once craved. Thus, tikkun ha’middos is not accomplished only by inward contemplation, but through a long sequence of repeated, concrete deeds – each deed a small incision by which the coarse hide of the heart is thinned, until it becomes translucent enough for the light of Rosh HaPanim to pass.

This also explains why anger blinds, desire deafens, arrogance distorts smell, and the like. Anger is Gevurah that has separated from its root in chesed; it becomes a fire that rises to the head and darkens the inner eye, so that in the moment of rage the person literally does not see reality as it is. Desire is Chesed that has detached from wisdom; the lustful craving floods the inner ear with its own noise, so that the person cannot hear rebuke, cannot hear even his own better understanding. Arrogance is a perversion of Tiferes and Yesod; the sense of self-importance emits a foul inner re’ach that confuses his ruach, so that he “smells” only his own virtues and is insensitive to the refined scent of Elokus. In all these, we see that the middos, when unrefined, deform the senses; in their rectification lies the restoration of perception.

How then is this rectification begun, in a path accessible to each person according to his measure? Here enters the avodah of cheshbon ha’nefesh, as outlined in Chovos HaLevavos and adopted into the seder of Chassidus. A person must set aside fixed times, each day or at least periodically, to review not only his deeds but the states of his middos: where did anger flare, where did jealousy stir, where did desire pull, where did pride inflate. This is not in order to brood, chas v’shalom, but to recognize pattern and root. By naming a midah and seeing its fruits in thought, speech, action, he begins to detach himself from its absolute rule and to place it under seichel and under Torah.

Through such cheshbon, combined with the discipline of the beinoni – to hold the garments under constant guard – the person fashions vessels in which to ask authentically, “lev tahor bera li Elokim.” For this tefillah is not a request for a miracle without preparation; it is the cry of one who has already ploughed the field of his heart, who has already laboured to uproot the thorns of open transgression, and now seeks a higher purity so that his inner sight and hearing may be true. Then from Above they assist him, giving a hashpa’ah of taharah that he could not have earned alone, and this is the beginning of the birur of middos in a deeper sense.

When Chesed is refined, it ceases to be a blind outpouring toward whatever is pleasant, and becomes a love aligned with seichel and Torah – chesed shel emes. Such a heart of chesed allows the eye to see the good in another Jew, to see the tzelem Elokim beneath coarse garments, which is itself a revelation of re’iyas Elokus in the world. When Gevurah is refined, it is no longer anger at personal insult, but firmness against evil and inner discipline; such Gevurah gives the ear the capacity to hear tochachah, to receive criticism without defence, which is an essential form of shemi’ah ruchnis. When Tiferes is rectified, its seeking of beauty is no longer self-referential but drawn to harmony of Torah and mitzvos; then the “nose” of the soul begins to smell the subtle re’ach hanicho’ach of a mitzvah, and is repulsed by the foul odour of false “beauty” in kelipah.

So too with Netzach and Hod: when Netzach is purified from the urge to win for ego, it becomes perseverance in avodah, the capacity to continue despite concealments; this steadiness clears the eye from the flickering of moods. Hod, when cleansed of false humility and of conceding to the world, becomes true hoda’ah – acknowledgment of Hashem; then the ear can bow to the word of Hashem without inner resistance. Yesod, when its bond is removed from inappropriate ties and turned to connect only with kedushah, restores the inner sense of ruach, so that the soul can “smell out” where to attach and where to withdraw. Malchus, when its speech and action are guarded from lashon hara, falsehood, and arrogance, becomes a mouth that speaks truth; such dibbur in turn refines the entire Rosh HaPanim, for as the maamarim explain, speech is the mirror in which the inner face appears.

Thus, the path is circular and ascending. The middos as limbs are influenced by the head; but the head’s senses cannot shine until the limbs are disciplined. The beinoni’s avodah in Tanya describes the first circle: to place the garments under the exclusive rulership of the nefesh ha’elokis. Cheshbon ha’nefesh and “lev tahor bera li” describe the second circle: to refine the middos themselves. Through repeated, concrete peulos in thought, speech, and action – “acharei ha‑peulos nimshachim ha‑levavos” – the heart is gently drawn into new form, and as the heart becomes more transparent, the concealed faculties of Rosh HaPanim begin, almost imperceptibly at first, to awaken.

And this is the preparation necessary before speaking of direct work with the senses themselves. For if one were to practice shmiras einayim or shmiras ha’oznaim only as isolated disciplines, without concurrent tikkun ha’middos, the heart would remain agitated and the inner eye and ear would remain clouded, merely suppressed. But when middos are under cultivation, then the guarding and training of each sense becomes not repression but revelation: each chush returning to its proper object, which is Elokus. In the continuation will be explained how this is effected in prat – the avodah of guarding and educating each physical sense so that its spiritual root in Rosh HaPanim is strengthened and drawn into gilui within the nefesh ha’adam.

12 · Guarding and Training Each Sense

From all the above it is understood, that once the heart is in a state of hiskabbus and hiskalelus in the nefesh ha’elokis, then the work with the chushim themselves is no longer merely a negation – “do not see, do not hear, do not taste” – but becomes a positive seder of chinuch, of educating each sense to become a kli for Elokus. And this is the inner content of what is called in nigleh and mussar “shmiras ha’einayim, shmiras ha’oznaim, shmiras ha’lashon,” and the like. For these are not only fences against aveirah, but the very ladder by which the hidden Rosh HaPanim is drawn into gilui in machshavah, dibbur, u’maaseh.

To explain this, we must preface that the garments of the soul – thought, speech, and action – are in Chassidus not only external expressions but the immediate place of hislabshus of the kochos. The inner eye clothes itself in machshavah and in the physical seeing; the inner ear clothes itself in machshavos ha’Torah that we “listen” to and in the physical hearing of words; the inner mouth and throat clothe themselves in dibbur. Therefore, the discipline and positive use of these garments is the direct avodah on the corresponding spiritual faculty in Rosh HaPanim. When the garment is refined and habituated in kedushah, it becomes transparent, and the pnimiyus clothed within it shines.

Beginning with sight. Iyov says, “Bris karati le’einai” – “A covenant I have made with my eyes.” A bris is not only a one‑time decision but an enduring pact that binds both sides: the eye below and the Rosh HaPanim above. Shmiras einayim is usually understood in the negative: to turn away from forbidden images, from sights that arouse taavos or gaavah, from the empty glitter of the world. This is the first step, for as long as the eye is filled with images of kelipah it cannot be a vessel for re’iyas Elokus.

But the inyan of bris with the eye is deeper. Just as a bris milah does not only cut away but reveals the pnimiyus ha’orlah, so too with the eye: shmira is in order to reveal a new mode of seeing. Therefore, the bris must be fulfilled in positive looking. To look at words of Torah, so that the shapes of the letters, the osiyos of Kesav Ashuris, become the constant landscape before the eye; to look into a sefer with kavanas halev, until the physical re’iyah itself is suffused with yirah and one feels that through these black letters on white parchment “ki be’orcha nireh or.” To look upon a fellow Jew with ayin tova, to search for his maalos, until the habit of the eye is to see tzelem Elokim and not chitzoniyus. Such looking does not only reflect a refined midas ha’chesed; it actively trains the physical eye to become a conduit for the spiritual eye of Chochmah‑Tiferes.

When a person habituates himself that whenever he lifts his eyes, he seeks Torah, seeks a mitzvah, seeks the good in another, then in time his inner re’iyah begins to awaken: he “sees” G‑dliness in the events of his life; he discerns the beauty of hashgachah pratis. The more he closes the eye to hefkerut, the more it opens to Elokus. Thus the discipline of sight is not repression but the engraving of a new covenant in the organ, through which the Rosh HaPanim’s eye clothes itself in a revealed way.

Similarly with hearing. Although there is no fixed phrase in halachah of “shmiras ha’oznaim” as there is for eyes and tongue, nevertheless the inyan is clear: the ear must be guarded from lashon hara, nivul peh, scoffing, and all speech that drags the heart down. For as long as the physical ear is a sewer collecting all noises of kelipah, shemi’ah ruchnis cannot be heard.

But here too the main point is not only negation. The ear must be educated to listen to kedushah. To listen to divrei Torah with koved rosh, not as entertainment but as kabbalas ol – “Shema Yisrael,” to hear and to accept. To listen attentively to the reading of the Torah, to the words of davening, until the very physical experience of sound entering the ear is felt as a hashra’as ha’dibur ha’eloki. And not only to Hashem’s words, but to a Yid’s words: to listen to another’s pain, to hear a broken heart without haste or self‑absorption. This is also avodah in Hod, for to grant one’s ear to another is an act of hachna’ah and hoda’ah.

When a person accustoms himself that his ear is not available for gossip and futility, but is reserved for Torah and for the cries of a fellow Jew, then the inner ear of Binah‑Hod is strengthened. He begins to “hear” messages from above in the events of his life; he senses the tochachah that Hashem is whispering through circumstances, and the consolations that descend in quiet. Thus shmiras ha’oznaim and positive shemi’ah become the ladder by which the spiritual ear ascends from concealment to revelation.

The sense of smell is more hidden in the halachos of shmira, yet its avodah is hinted in the minhagim of besamim, especially on Motzaei Shabbos. Chazal explain that on Shabbos an extra soul, neshama yeseira, rests upon a person, and when Shabbos departs we comfort the soul with fragrance. The simple meaning is that scent brings delight. But in pnimius, the besamim are an exercise of the inner ruach, the Daas‑Yesod of Rosh HaPanim, to “smell” holiness.

When one takes the besamim and breathes in with kavannah that this re’ach tov is a mashal for the re’ach ha’nicho’ach of mitzvos, he is training his nose to distinguish between kedushah and kelipah. Likewise during the year, to honor mitzvos with scent – to smell the hadassim of the lulav, to delight in the fragrance of esrog, to regard the aroma of Shabbos food as a remez to the oneg shel maalah – these are not trivialities but concrete avodos of chush ha’re’ach. And the more one recoils inwardly from foul smell associated with tumah and aveirah, the more his inner ruach learns to recoil from spiritual stench. In this way, the physical nose becomes a teacher to the spiritual nose, and the faculty of subtle discernment, of “V’haricho be’yiras Hashem,” begins to awaken.

Taste and eating are the most tangible of the senses, and on them the Torah and Chazal have placed many halachos, for here the danger of animalization is great, and here too the possibility of elevation is highest. The avodah of shmiras ha’taam is bound with achilah be’kedushah. To eat only what is permitted, with proper brachos before and after; to eat for the sake of having strength to serve Hashem; to avoid gluttony and delicacy‑seeking for their own sake – all this is known from mussar sefarim. But according to what was explained about taam as the pnimiyus ha’taanug of Keser, it is understood that in every act of eating there is an opportunity to refine the inner palate of the soul.

When a Jew pauses before eating and truly thinks, “Ta’amu u’re’u ki tov Hashem – I desire to taste the goodness of Hashem through this food, to feel that He is the One sustaining me,” then the physical taste becomes a garment for taanug eloki. Likewise, when one learns Torah and seeks its taamim, its inner reasons and sweetness, not for intellectual pride but to delight in Hashem’s wisdom, he is exercising the mouth of Rosh HaPanim inwardly. Even simple eating on Shabbos, when done with the awareness that the oneg is a mitzvah and a zeicher to the future banquet of Leviathan, becomes a training of the sense of taste to seek spiritual sweetness. In proportion to this, the soul’s capacity to “taste” the inner delight of a mitzvah, even without physical food, is strengthened.

Speech and the guarding of the tongue are the climax of this seder, for dibbur is Malchus, the revelation of all that is within. David HaMelech cries, “Mi ha’ish he‑chafetz chayim, ohev yamim lirot tov? Netzor leshoncha mera u’sefasecha midaber mirma” – “Who is the man who desires life…? Guard your tongue from evil, and your lips from speaking deceit.” Here too, the negative shmira is the foundation: to refrain from lashon hara, from gossip, from shaming, from falsehood, from empty and coarse talk. Without this, the ruach memalela remains a weapon of destruction, and the Rosh HaPanim cannot be revealed.

However, just as life is not only the absence of death, so too dibbur shel kedushah is not only silence from evil but the positive use of speech. To speak words of Torah regularly, so that the mouth is habituated to be a kli for Dvar Hashem. To utter words of tefillah with kavannah, so that the throat feels itself as a tzinor through which the soul’s yearning rises and the shefa descends. To use one’s speech to give chizuk, to comfort, to bless, to thank; to say a kind word that lifts another’s spirit. Every such word refines the midas ha’Malchus and engraves in the tongue the form of a “peh malchus.” Then, as was explained, the speech becomes a mirror in which the inner face is reflected; the more the speech is truthful and kind, the more the Rosh HaPanim’s dibbur ha’pnimi can clothe itself in the audible voice.

All these modes of shmira and positive usage operate through the garments of machshavah, dibbur, u’maaseh. For to look, to listen, to smell, to eat, to speak – these are all actions. When they are done with kavannah, the thought garment is also engaged; and when one learns and speaks about these avodos, the garment of speech is sanctified further. In this way, the three garments become woven with the five senses, and together they construct a vessel for the inner head.

Thus, the daily, seemingly simple disciplines of what one allows himself to see, to hear, to inhale, to taste, and to say, are in truth a profound avodah in revealing the hidden Rosh HaPanim. Each guarded and educated sense becomes like a rung in a ladder, by which the nefesh ascends from mere physical experience to spiritual perception. And this is the proper hachana for the avodah of hisbonenus that will be explained in the continuation: for when the garments and senses are already somewhat purified and habituated to kedushah, then the contemplative work with machshavah can directly address the inner eye and ear, opening them in a stable and holy way.

13 · Hisbonenus and the Opening of Inner Vision and Hearing

However, all that was explained until now with regard to guarding and educating the garments and the external organs is still only in the category of hachana and keli. For the main inyan of revealing the Rosh HaPanim is not merely that the doors of the senses be closed to ra and opened to tov, but that within the inner chamber there should be a gilui of Elokus that has upon what to rest. And this gilui is drawn, primarily, through the avodah of hisbonenus.

For it is explained at length in Tanya, especially from the beginning of perek mem‑alef and onwards, that the heart’s arousal in ahavah and yirah which is the life of all avodah, does not suffice to be a momentary hisorerus, but must be a yis’yashvus ha’daas—an established daas—such that the greatness of Hashem is fixed in the mind and engraved in the heart “tamid,” in a way of “da es Elokei avicha ve’avdeihu.” And this “da”—knowledge—is not mere intellectual information, but a tying and binding of the mochin to the heart, which in our language here is: that the Rosh HaPanim’s eye and ear should be opened and should look and listen in a continuous manner.

Yet, to reach such daas there must first be structured hisbonenus. That is, not a passing thought of Elokus in between other thoughts, but settled contemplation according to seder and shiur: that a person sets for himself a certain time before tefillah, or at another fixed time, to think deeply into the greatness of Hashem and the inner meaning of Torah and mitzvos.

And the way of hisbonenus which the Alter Rebbe established for all generations is known: to contemplate how “mimalei kol almin” and “sovev kol almin,” and how “kulah kamei kelach chashiv.” That is, first to fix in the mind that the life of all worlds, from the highest to the lowest, is the Dvar Hashem and the ruach piv that constantly vivifies them, and that every detail of existence is nothing else than this Elokus enclothed and contracted; this is the contemplation of mimalei kol almin. And afterwards, or together with it, to contemplate that beyond this measured life‑force, there is an infinite light that surrounds all worlds equally, which is not grasped in any vessel and before whom all worlds are truly as naught and void; this is the contemplation of sovev kol almin and “kulah kamei kelach chashiv.”

Now, when a person practices such hisbonenus with yishuv ha’daas, according to his ability, and returns to these contemplations day after day, then this is not only a toil of the sechel stam, but it is an exercise—like one who trains a limb—in the spiritual eye and ear. For the eye of Rosh HaPanim is the faculty that apprehends at once the reality of Elokus, that “ein od milvado,” in a manner of re’iyah; and the ear of Rosh HaPanim is the faculty that receives the word of Hashem as a living address to him, in a manner of shemi’ah. And when the mind dwells again and again on “mimalei” and “sovev,” with the intention to know and to live by this, the inner eye is learning to see Elokus in every detail of the worlds, and the inner ear is learning to hear the Dvar Hashem within every event and circumstance.

This is the inner content of the command “Da es Elokei avicha ve’avdeihu.” For the simple meaning is that first there must be daas, knowledge of Elokus, and only then avodah. But in pnimiyus, the “da” is itself an avodah: the toil of hisbonenus until the Elokus is “nikvah b’libo,” fixed in the heart, and then the heart naturally serves. And this daas, as explained in Tanya perek mem‑gimel, is the middle line between Chochmah and Binah that binds them to the middos; in our context, daas is the inner axis that stabilizes sight and hearing so they should not remain flashes and echoes, but a constant orientation of the soul.

According to this, we can understand the inner meaning of “Shema Yisrael Havayah Elokeinu Havayah Echad.” For it is explained in maamarim that “Shema” is not only a command to hear with the physical ear, but to internalize through hisbonenus, to draw into Binah and Hod the unity of Havayah and Elokim, of sovev and mimalei, until it is heard in the depth of the heart. Thus, the recital of Shema with hisbonenus is the archetypal avodah of opening the spiritual ear. And since the pasuk concludes “Echad,” the absolute unity, this same avodah also clarifies the eye, that it should see through the multiplicity and behold the One.

This distinction between a fleeting hisorerus and established daas is very great. For sometimes a person will hear a vort, or a niggun, or see a sight of nature or of a Jew davening with truth, and his heart will be aroused. In that moment he “sees” Elokus somewhat, he “hears” a calling from above. But since there was no prior hisbonenus, no ordering of the mind, this vision and hearing do not have keilim to dwell in; they pass quickly, leaving only a faint trace. This is what is called “giluyim de’rega,” a lightning flash that illuminates and disappears.

Whereas hisbonenus is the avodah of building the vessels beforehand. When the mind has already labored to picture—according to the mashalim of Chassidus—the chain of worlds, the tzimtzum, the enclothing of the Dvar Hashem in every detail of creation, then when a moment of gilui comes, the inner eye recognizes at once what it sees and holds it; the inner ear understands the tone of the message. The inspiration is then integrated into daas; it becomes part of the person’s standing perception.

This is also expressed in the change that hisbonenus brings to what a person “sees” in the world. Before such avodah, the world appears as an independent reality, and Elokus is something added in seichel or emunah. After consistent contemplation, the same eyes behold a different world: business, nature, people, all are seen as levushim and keilim for Elokus. A difficulty in parnassah is “seen” as a particular tzimtzum from above, a demand for more bitachon; a success is “seen” as a channel for hashpa’ah, not as self‑achievement. There is a transformation in the very gestalt of vision.

Similarly in hearing. Before hisbonenus, a person hears only the external sounds of life: words of people, news, chance occurrences. After hisbonenus, he begins to “hear” in events a Dvar Hashem that is speaking to him personally: a pasuk that comes to mind in a certain situation, a story heard that awakens him to teshuvah, a pain that calls him to refine a certain midah. The world becomes a sefer that is being read aloud to him, and his inner ear is attuned to its content.

However, with all this praise of hisbonenus, it is necessary to affix strong boundaries, for there is a great danger that instead of opening the true spiritual eye and ear, a person should only excite his dimyon—his imagination—and will mistake fantasy for perception. Indeed, the Alter Rebbe already warns (in the end of perek chaf‑ches and in other places) against allowing the mind to roam in unstructured imaginations during davening, for this is a trick of the nefesh ha’bahamis.

Therefore, the path of hisbonenus in Chassidus is always bound to seichel and to yiras Shamayim. It is not a free meditation on any image that arises, but a disciplined contemplation of inyonim of Elokus as they are explained in Torah, in the maamarim of the Rebbeim. One contemplates only those ideas that are rooted in pesukim, in Chazal, in the explanations of Chassidus on mimalei and sovev and the like, and he does so with bittul, knowing that his mind cannot truly grasp the essence of Elokus, only the external form as it is drawn down for comprehension.

And together with this intellectual discipline, there must be yiras Shamayim preceding wisdom, as Tanya perek mem‑alef sets down: to place upon one’s mind at the very beginning the simple fear of the King who stands over him and sees him, and the shame before His greatness. Without this, hisbonenus can become an intellectual play or even a spiritual self‑indulgence, which only inflates the yeshus and obscures the true face.

Thus, the holy extra‑sensory awareness that will be discussed further on—that a person senses in a subtle way what is demanded of him from above, or feels the inner state of another, or recognizes a hashgachah pratis in fine detail—must come only as a by‑product of kosher hisbonenus, which is moored in Torah and in fear of Heaven. Where there is no such anchoring, and one seeks sensations and “perceptions” for their own sake, the eye that opens is not the eye of Rosh HaPanim but the eye of dimyon, and the ear that hears is not shemi’as Elokus but the echo of his own desires.

On the other hand, when the avodah is according to seder: first tikkun ha’middos and shmiras ha’chushim, then steady hisbonenus on mimalei and sovev, on “Da es Elokei avicha” and “Shema Yisrael,” with constant return and with humility, then little by little there is born within the person a new mode of seeing and hearing. It is quiet, it is not spectacular, but it is firm and holy. He begins to live with Hashem in a way of re’iyah and shemi’ah: “Ki imcha mekor chayim, be’orcha nireh or”—in Your light, by the light of contemplation You have given through Torah, we see light; and through the Shema that we recite and contemplate, we hear Your unity in all that befalls us.

This is the backbone and inner path of all kosher “extra‑sensory” perception, as will be explained. For what the world calls an additional sense is, in kedushah, nothing other than the maturation of the Rosh HaPanim through Torah‑true hisbonenus, until the soul’s eye and ear, trained by many days and years of daas Elokus, become sensitive to the most subtle traces of His presence in the worlds and in the heart.

14 · Holy Extra‑Sensory Perception and Its Safeguards

It is known that in all generations there were by Yisrael men of G‑d and holy shepherds, who perceived matters that were far from their physical eyes and ears, who felt the pain of a Jew in a distant city, who knew the thoughts of those who came before them, who spoke with souls after their histalkus. And these inyanim are related and told, not as wondrous tales to satisfy curiosity, but as part of Torah she‑be’al peh itself, as nigleh and nistar, for by them is revealed something of the conduct of a nefesh Elokis when it is truly united with Elokus.

Thus we find regarding the Baal Shem Tov that he would suddenly say to his chassidim to say Tehillim for such‑and‑such a Jew, or to prepare a pidyon nefesh for a distant community, and afterwards it was revealed that at that very hour there had been a decree, or a danger, or a need, and the Baal Shem Tov had sensed it and sweetened it. Likewise it is known of the Alter Rebbe that he would answer questions that were never spoken aloud, that he would respond to a thought which arose in the mind of a chossid standing in far corner of the room, and that he knew of events taking place in other cities, as is related in detail in the stories of the days of his imprisonment and redemption. And similarly with very many tzaddikim: they saw what another does not see and heard what another does not hear.

Now, if one were to speak in the language of the world, this would be called “extra‑sensory perception,” a sixth sense, clairvoyance, and the like. However, the Torah does not use such expressions, and in fact, the Torah warns very strongly against all such pursuits in their worldly form, calling them nichush, kesamim, doresh el ha‑meisim and the like, and stating explicitly “tamim tihyeh im Hashem Elokecha.” So we must understand: what is the true definition, in kedushah, of these giluyim by tzaddikim? In what are they similar to what the world calls a “sixth sense,” and in what are they the exact opposite? And how can it be that the same inyan of sensing what is beyond the ordinary senses is in one case the highest level of ruach ha‑kodesh, and in another case an issur chamur of kesem and nichush?

To understand this, we must first fix in mind the clear boundary which the Torah and Chassidus set: that all forms of trying to draw knowledge “from the side,” not through the channels of Torah, tefillah, and kedushah, are absolutely forbidden. When a person seeks to know the future, or to know the hidden, through signs and omens (nichush), or through actions that are meant to compel or manipulate supernal forces (kesamim), through calling to the dead or to forces of the sitra achara, this is a descent of his nefesh from the side of holiness to the other side. For the entire root of these things is not bitul to Hashem but the opposite, that the person wishes to have daas and koach not as a servant but as a balebos, to rule and to secure himself; and therefore even if at times such practices yield a certain “knowledge,” this knowledge is of the side of impurity, and it darkens and confuses the true eye and ear of Rosh HaPanim.

Ruach ha‑kodesh, by contrast, is defined in the Sifrei Kodesh as a gilui of Elokus within the nefesh, a hashra’ah of a light from above which rests only where there is bitul and kedushah. The Navi says “ruach Hashem dibeir bi,” and the Rambam explains that nevua and ruach ha‑kodesh require great wisdom in Torah, rectified middos, and separation from the vanities of the world. The one who receives ruach ha‑kodesh does not draw it to himself by techniques, but rather makes himself into a merkavah through Torah and mitzvos, and then, when Hashem so desires, there shines within him a knowing that he did not reach through seichel alone.

And even more: Chazal say “chacham adif mi’navi”—a chacham, a Torah sage, is superior to a prophet. For nevua is a particular gilui which comes and goes, whereas the chacham’s Torah‑daas is constant, and through his daas haTorah he can at times perceive matters that are hidden from others, not as a nes but as the natural fruit of his daas Elokus. This, too, is a form of “sixth sense” in kedushah; but its entire metzius is that it is not a separate sense at all, rather it is daas haTorah itself, when it fills and permeates all the senses of Rosh HaPanim until they begin to respond to the most subtle nuances of Elokus and of the soul.

An example of this we see in the inyan of “neshama yeseira” on Shabbos, which Chazal speak about in plain language. On Shabbos a Jew receives an additional soul. The simple meaning is that he has more room for delight and for calm, as is known from the Gemara in Beitzah. But Chassidus explains that this neshama yeseira is a certain expansion of mochin and of Rosh HaPanim: the eye sees more Elokus in the world, the ear hears more pnimiyus in Torah, the heart feels more subtlety in another’s pain and joy. This is a “sixth sense” which comes not from any technique, but from Shabbos itself, from the fact that Hashem gave a special or of kedushah at that time; and the vessel for it is only bitul—rest from melachah, withdrawal from weekday involvement, immersion in Torah and tefillah.

Similarly, when we say “chacham adif mi’navi,” part of the meaning is that there is by the chacham a certain refined sensitivity to the ratzon Hashem in each prat of reality. Having laboured in Torah, having purified his middos, having trained his Rosh HaPanim by hisbonenus, he often “knows” without being told explicitly, what is appropriate here according to Torah, what is the inner matzav of the soul standing before him, what is demanded from above in this sha’ah. This knowledge is not magical, nor is it a violation of privacy; it is the natural expansion of daas when it becomes truly pnimiyus.

We can now say that there are two general ways of extra‑ordinary perception. One is where the person reaches outward, with an egocentric ratzon, to grab hold of hidden information, to control, to secure, to satisfy curiosity. This is the root of nichush and kesamim, and even if he wraps it in holy language, its inner point is yeshus. The other way is where the person nullifies himself entirely to Hashem, to His Torah, to His ratzon, and through this bitul there settles upon him an or of daas Elokus which sometimes includes also daas in the affairs of this world beyond his ordinary senses. This is the side of ruach ha‑kodesh and chacham adif mi’navi. Outwardly both involve “knowing something hidden”; inwardly they are opposites.

And this is also the explanation why the stories of tzaddikim are told with such stress on their avodah of bitul. Of the Baal Shem Tov it is known that before any gilui he would say “I do not want anything, only You alone,” and that his entire metzius was to arouse Ahavas Yisrael and Yiras Shamayim. Of the Alter Rebbe we know from his own words in Tanya that the whole tachlis of his hisbonenus and his avodah was that a Jew should have true love and fear of Hashem, that he should be a beinoni, controlling his thought, speech and action according to Torah. It is precisely such a vessel, emptied of self‑seeking, that can receive subtle daas from above without it becoming distorted. When a tzaddik feels from afar the need of a Jew, it is because his Rosh HaPanim is so refined and his empathy so pure that the other’s tza’ar is literally felt in his own nefesh; this is not “curiosity satisfied,” it is “nose” and “ear” of kedushah that cannot fail to smell and to hear the cry of a Jew.

From this it is understood that, in our own avodah, any desire for “extra‑sensory perception” as such is already a danger sign. For the very wanting of sensation, of experience, of power, tends to thicken the yeshus and to cloud the inner eye and ear. The correct kavvanah, as explained before, is only to know Hashem, to serve Him with a complete heart, to love and to fear Him, and to do His will in this world. If in the course of such avodah a person becomes more sensitive—he feels more quickly when he has hurt another, he senses more readily a hashgachah pratis in events, he sometimes has a quiet intuition about what is required—that is a matanah from above, a by‑product of daas and bitachon.

Indeed, heightened daas Elokus, joined with true empathy and trust in Hashem, must naturally express itself as subtle knowing. For daas, as was explained, is hiskashrus; when a person’s daas is bound to Elokus, and his heart is open to another Jew, then the movement of that other soul can be felt within his own daas. Bitachon, too, refines the sense of reality; the more a Jew truly relies on Hashem, the more quickly he discerns which thoughts and impulses are from kedushah and which are from fear and dimyon, which opportunities are an invitation from above and which are distractions. All this belongs to the holy development of the inner senses, and is part of the seder ha‑avodah described above.

But precisely because of this, the safeguards must be very clear and strong. First, that one never acts in halachic or life‑decisions on the basis of “feelings” that contradict Torah or daas Torah; rather, all such intuitions must be measured against Shulchan Aruch and the counsel of true chachamim. Second, that one does not seek or cultivate images, voices, and the like, but occupies himself in Torah, tefillah, and mitzvos, and allows whatever inner sensitivity arises to remain quiet and modest, without making of it a banner or a title. Third, that one flees completely from all practices that resemble nichush and kesamim, even in “kosher,” softened forms, for “s’u marom eineichem”—lift your eyes to Hashem alone, and be “tamim im Hashem Elokecha.”

When these boundaries are kept, then the awakening of the spiritual senses which comes through tikkun ha‑middos, shmiras ha’chushim, and hisbonenus, is not only permitted but desired. For in truth it is a microcosmic foretaste of what will be in the time when “eshpoch es ruchi al kol basar,” when all flesh will sense Elokus openly. The Rosh HaPanim that becomes somewhat revealed now, in a hidden and individual way, through holy avodah, is a spark of that future head, as will be explained; and therefore it must be approached with awe and with humility, as a preparation for the Head of the Eighth Day which is drawing near.

15 · The Head of the Eighth Day – Future Vision in Present Avodah

And with this we can return to the beginning, to the kushya from which the whole seder ha‑maamar was born.

There we asked: if the Sefiros are be’diyukna de’Adam, and if the Torah testifies that “בְּצֶלֶם אֱלֹקִים בָּרָא אֹתוֹ,” then where is the head as we know it—eyes that see, ears that hear, a nose that senses ruach, a mouth that tastes and speaks, a throat that channels? For the usual tziur of Adam HaElyon showed us only mochin and middos, a simple Rosh of Chochmah–Binah–Daas, and above that Kesser as makif; but the detailed face, the panim with its chushim, seemed to be missing.

According to all that was explained, the matter stands otherwise. It is not that the head is missing, chas veshalom, but that the head is hidden. The true Rosh HaPanim of Adam HaElyon is a Rosh of the future, the head of the Eighth Day. Its tziur is present be’helem in the seder of the partzufim, and even more, it is engraved in the nefesh of every Yehudi; but its full giluy is reserved for the zman when “וְנִגְלָה כְּבוֹד ה’, וְרָאוּ כָּל בָּשָׂר יַחְדָּו,” when the very flesh will become a kli for re’iyah in Elokus.

For we must understand: what is this that the Navi promises, “וְרָאוּ כָּל בָּשָׂר”? Vision until now is a koach of the neshamah enclothed in the body; even the spiritual eye of Rosh HaPanim that was explained is an inward re’iyah of Chochmah–Tiferes in the nefesh. But “kol basar yachdav”—that the very basar itself should see Elokus—this is a new seder entirely. And similarly the promise “לֹא יִרְעָבוּ וְלֹא יִצְמָאוּ… כִּי אִם לִשְׁמֹעַ אֶת דִּבְרֵי ה’,” that the only hunger and thirst will be to hear the Dvar Hashem, indicates that the chush ha’shemi’ah will then be the true life of the body. Likewise “וְלֹא יִכָּנֵף עוֹד מוֹרֶיךָ וְהָיוּ עֵינֶיךָ רֹאוֹת אֶת מוֹרֶיךָ”—that the Moreh, the Teacher, will no longer be covered, and the eyes will see their Teacher.

From all this it is understood that Yemos HaMashiach is defined not only by a change in hanhagah (no more war, no more famine, etc.), but by a change in the very seder of perception. The spiritual senses of Rosh HaPanim, which now are mostly be’helem, enclothed and mixed within the coarse garments of this world, will then stand be’giluy gamur and be’hisgalus in the basar itself; the body will become transparent to the neshamah, and the neshamah transparent to Elokus. This is the pshat that “kol basar” will see, and that the only taavah will be “lishmoa es divrei Hashem.”

And this is connected with the inyan of “eighth.” For it is explained in many maamarim that the number seven is the seder of teva—seven days of creation, seven middos, seven heavens, seven lands; whereas the “eighth” is l’maalah min ha’teva, the giluy of Atzmus Ein Sof that stands above the hishtalshelus of sevens. Therefore milah is on the eighth day, the completion of the bris in the basar; therefore Shmini Atzeres is the atzeres to the seven days of Sukkos, a day that is “lechem levadchem,” a private rejoicing between Yisrael and the Melech. The “eighth” is the revelation of that which until now was makif and concealed, entering into pnimiyus.

Thus we can say that the head we have been seeking, the Rosh HaPanim with its fully aligned spiritual chushim, is essentially the Rosh of the eighth, the head of that l’maalah min ha’teva revelation. For as long as the world stands in the mode of seven, the main giluy is in mochin and middos as they relate to avodah within teva; the Rosh as such is a Rosh of seichel and ratzon. The panim, the detailed face of Adam HaElyon, remains be’ofen of helem, hinted in verses and in sodos of Zohar, but not fully drawn.

However, when the “eighth” will shine within the “seven,” when Atzmus Yisgaleh in a way of “V’niglah kevod Hashem,” then automatically the Rosh HaPanim will be revealed; for the whole inyan of panim is giluy pnimiyus. Then the eye of Chochmah–Tiferes will see Atzmus in every nivra, the ear of Binah–Hod will hear the Dvar Hashem in every sound, the nose of Daas–Yesod will smell the re’ach hanicho’ach in every ruch, the mouth will taste “כי טוב ה’” in every taam, and the dibbur of Malchus will speak only words that are chelek Elokah mimaal.

And this is also the pnimiyus of the vision of the Merkavah, “וּפְנֵיהֶם אִישׁ אֶל אָחִיו,” that their faces were a man toward his brother. In the simple pshat, it speaks of the faces of the Chayos ha’Kodesh, that each faced the other. But in pnimiyus, “pneihem ish el achiv” is the tziur of Yisrael in the time to come, when each Jew’s panim will be turned to his brother, for the Rosh HaPanim in every one will recognize the Rosh HaPanim in the other, and the inner eye will see the tzelem Elokim in every panim. For now, because our senses are dimmed and the inner panim is covered, the face often becomes a mask, a place of concealment, of chein sheker and yofi hevel; but then the face will be only panim, only pnimiyus, “ish el achiv”—each one’s inner face revealed to the other in love and in achdus.

According to this it is understood that the Rosh HaPanim which we have described throughout the maamar has a double standing. On the one hand, it exists now be’pnimiyus in every nefesh, and it is the object of our avodah: to refine the middos, to guard and train the physical senses, to engage in hisbonenus, to conduct life in a way of bitul and kedushah, so that the spiritual eye, ear, nose, taste and speech should awaken and become a little revealed. On the other hand, the shleimus of this Rosh HaPanim is in the future, when the “eighth” will be revealed. The present avodah is therefore not only a personal refinement, but a hachanah and a hakdamah for that future Rosh.

This allows us to reinterpret the original kushya in a deeper way. We thought to ask: why is the head missing from the Tree of Life? Now we can say: the head was not drawn because it belongs to the future sefer; its full tziur is written in the Sefer shel Mashiach. In Etz Chaim and in the earlier diagrams we are given the seder that is necessary for the time of seven—the mochin and middos that relate to avodah in a world where Elokus is be’helem. The Rosh HaPanim, which is the head of direct perception, of “ra’u kol basar,” could not be fully drawn before the time, for its drawing itself would already be a certain giluy. It is hinted, it is alluded to, it is present be’ofen of sod; but its explicit revelation is held back for “yom shekulo Shabbos u’menucha lechayei ha’olamim.”

Yet, and this is the chiddush of the seder ha’avodah explained, that a Jew is empowered to taste already now from that future head. “טַעֲמוּ וּרְאוּ כִּי טוֹב ה’”—first taamu, taste, and then u’reu, you will see. This tasting is in Torah and mitzvos with pnimiyus: learning Torah not only as chochmah but as Toras Chayim, fulfilling mitzvos not only as kabbalas ol but with taanug ha’mitzvah. Through this, the inner taste of the future is drawn into the present; the Rosh HaPanim of the Eighth Day shines a little through the cracks of the seven.

And the same in shemi’ah: the promise “לֹא יִרְעָבוּ וְלֹא יִצְמָאוּ… כִּי אִם לִשְׁמֹעַ אֶת דִּבְרֵי ה’” describes a world where the only hunger is to hear Hashem’s word. But already now, when a Jew makes for himself set times of Torah, and listens to the Dvar Hashem with his whole being, until he feels that without those moments he is mamash hungry and thirsty—this is a microcosm of that future state. His spiritual ear begins to resemble the ear of the Eighth Day.

So too with re’iyah: “וְהָיוּ עֵינֶיךָ רֹאוֹת אֶת מוֹרֶיךָ” is fulfilled now, in a hidden form, when a Jew looks to his Moreh, to his Rebbe, to the tzaddikim and to the Torah itself, and seeks to see in them not merely wisdom but Morecha—the One Who teaches you, the living Hashem speaking through their Torah. His inner eye learns to see the Morah within the morim, and this is a preparation for the day when “lo yichaneif od Morecha,” when the concealment will fall away and all will see the true Moreh face to face.

From this emerges a great chizuk in avodah. For sometimes a person can think: what is the point of my small efforts in tikkun ha’middos, in shmiras ha’einayim and ha’oznaim, in quiet hisbonenus, in guarding my speech? It seems to him that the world remains the same coarse world, and his head remains filled with confusion. But according to the above, every such effort is not only a personal improvement; it is a brick in the building of the future head. Each time he turns his eyes away from vanity and looks instead into a sefer of Torah, he slightly straightens the inner optic nerve of Rosh HaPanim. Each time he closes his ear to lashon hara and opens it to divrei Elokim chayim, he carves a little deeper the hollow of the supernal ear. Each time he bites back a word of anger and chooses instead a word of chizuk, he refines the ruach memalela so that it will be a keili for “V’ra’u kol basar yachdav.”

And because “kol Yisrael areivim zeh bazeh,” all Israel are mutually bound, the awakening of the Rosh HaPanim in one Jew helps reveal it in another, until a certain communal panim is formed—“u’pneihem ish el achiv”—faces turned toward each other in kedushah. This itself hastens the time when the collective Rosh HaPanim of Knesses Yisrael will be revealed, in the coming of Mashiach Tzidkeinu.

Therefore the avodah of our generation, the ikvesa d’Meshicha, is especially bound with this inyan. For on the one hand, the helem is greater than ever; the world’s chitzoniyus is thick, images and sounds crowd the eye and the ear, and the taste and speech of the world are coarse. On the other hand, precisely because we are close to the Eighth Day, sparks of that future head are already falling into our avodah; there is a certain ease and quickness with which a Jew today can suddenly see Elokus in something, or hear a hint from Above in the events of his life. Our task is to receive these sparks in the vessels of Torah and mitzvos, to guard them with the safeguards mentioned, and to weave them into a stable Rosh HaPanim through consistent avodah pnimis.

And thus the kushya with which we began becomes itself a besorah tova. The missing head is not a lack but a promise. The fact that the diagrams of Adam HaElyon do not yet show the full panim means that the story is not finished; the Sefer Ha’Adam is still being written through our deeds. When a Jew awakens in the morning and says “Modeh Ani,” washes his hands, prays with kavvanah, learns, does a favor for another, guards his senses, contemplates Elokus