Tefillah - 113 Bitachon In Spiritual Success

Spiritual Success: Humanly Impossible

“ותן שכר טוב לכל הבוטחים בשמך” Previously, we explained that there are three areas where we need to have Bitachon [which span our whole life]: bitachon in our material needs, bitachon is matters that aid our spirituality, and bitachon in spiritual success.

There are 3 sins which a Jew is obligated to give his life up for rather than commit (murder, illicit relations, and idol worship). Other than these 3 sins, we are obligated to go at all lengths to fulfill any of the mitzvos rather than neglect the mitzvah. One is obligated to give up to a fifth of his money rather than neglect any of the positive commandments, but when it comes to the three cardinal sins, one is obligated to give up all his money rather than commit the sin.

When a person is trying hard learning Torah, or doing chessed, or davening – these are all the pillars of the world – he must try, but it is not called “hishtadlus” (effort), because when it comes to matters that are directly spiritual, there is less of a need to make hishtadlus. Rather, because these matters are so important to survive spiritually, they are more spiritual in their nature, thus they require less human effort. They thrive much more on how much bitachon we have to succeed, in these areas.

When it comes to our ruchniyus (spirituality), there is no concept of hishtadlus. Of course, when it comes to Torah learning, we are required to put in ameilus (exertion) and yegiah (toil), but even with all our efforts, our achievements in Torah do not come from our own efforts. They are always considered a metziah, something we “find”, rather than something we acquire on our own. Spirituality works differently than our material needs.

When it comes to spirituality, each person has different aspirations. One person’s main aspiration is to finish the entire Talmud Bavli. Another person wants to finish it all in-depth. Another person aspires to daven with a lot of kavanah, and another person aspires to have a chessed gemach at night. These are wonderful aspirations, but we must know one thing: because these are all spiritual matters, we really cannot plan it out!

When we enter spiritual work, we really cannot know where we are going. All spiritual success is something we “find” and come across, no matter how hard we work to get it. As one of the Sages said[1], “I toiled and I found” – even after we toil in Torah study, it is always something we “find”. It is not acquired in the regular sense of working hard to get it.

We are really outside of spirituality [initially], and these matters cannot really be “acquired.” The inner, spiritual world is a whole different life than the one you see on this external world. It is nothing like the outside world; it is a completely new world. In order to work your way through it, you need to acquire a whole new perspective.

Of course, we must still have aspirations to have success in spiritual matters, but, we must realize that it is not acquired in the same way that you acquire success in your material needs.

The inner world of spirituality is the world the soul, a hidden world, a world that is very concealed. Our physical eyes cannot see it. Therefore, you can’t plan out how you’re going to get through it, in whatever matter you are trying to acquire, because we do not know what it will entail. We have never seen it before and we do not recognize it.

However, since all people have some revealed sparks of spirituality to a certain extent, there is a bit of recognition that we have towards spiritual matters. For this reason, we feel ambitions to have spiritual success. But in the end of the day, we do not recognize what our inner spiritual world is. We have definitions and terms that describe it, but they are very general, and it is impossible to describe anything precise about it. Therefore, it is impossible for a person to be exacting in his aspirations when it comes to spirituality.

People are aware of tidbits of information from Chazal that describe spirituality, but there is always a lot more to it. For example, Chazal say that “If one sanctifies himself down below, he is sanctified in Heaven.” There is a kind of person who will feel that this is all there is to spirituality. Just because this statement of Chazal is true doesn’t mean that this is all there is to it! There is a lot, lot more.

One kind of person mainly aspires to become close to Hashem. Another kind of person mainly wants success in Torah. But it is impossible to know exactly what a person needs to acquire, based on human logic. We really have no idea where we are going, when we just use our human logic alone, when we try to navigate our way through our spirituality.

Thus, a spiritual matter can only be “found” – we can discover it and come across it, after we try to get to it, but there is no exact path we can take to acquire it.

When it comes to our material needs, we can conceptualize our needs, thus, it is possible for us to daven for what we need and make effort to get them. But when it comes to our spiritual needs, we do not clearly know what we want.

A person might feel that he has acquired spiritual success – he might feel that he understands his learning – but in reality, he has not really reached it, because he didn’t yet penetrate into the inner layer of his learning. If a person thinks that he understands his learning simply because he knows that he worked hard in trying to understand, you can know for sure that he is still far from the true understanding of Torah.

Acquiring spirituality is nothing like how we understand acquiring something physical. Just like a child has an immature perspective when we compare his perspective to an adult, so is the perspective towards the world of the soul a completely different perspective than how we are used to viewing the outside world.

When we put in effort to our Torah learning, we need to put in efforts as much as we can handle, but we also need to push a little beyond our normal capabilities. Our body conceals our soul. Through exertion in Torah study, we are able to remove the body’s hold on the soul and reveal our soul more. Thus, exertion in Torah study is really meant to remove the darkness of the body, by purifying it; and this needs to be done together with keeping all the mitzvos.

When a person puts in all his efforts into learning Torah, he is able to then reach a point that is above his actual capabilities.  This is also true with regards to improving other spiritual areas, such as to fix our middos of our nefesh habehaimis (animal soul)[2]: that in order to remove the darkness of the body on us which conceals our soul, we need to exert ourselves and push ourselves a little more than our normal capabilities.

We need to exert ourselves in spiritual matters, and if we exert ourselves, we can become a maayan hamisgaber (mighty wellspring). Exertion in learning is what brings you success in your learning; success in learning does not depend on being very smart or having a good memory. The main Torah comes to a person through exertion in one’s learning, for it is only exertion that removes the body’s hold on a person which, in turn, reveals the soul’s light. Exertion in learning is what lets the soul’s light shine upon the body and penetrate its darkness. When a person merits this, he merits the ohr chadash, the “new light” of Hashem.

Hashem is not asking of us more than we can handle. It is a very superficial perspective when a person thinks that Hashem asks of us so much in our spirituality. Rather, our entire inner avodah in spirituality is to purify our body, and this is the depth of the concept, “I toiled and I found.”

This does not mean that we have to make “hishtadlus” in our spirituality. It is not hishtadlus, because our efforts in our learning are not meant to counter our inner kefirah [see previous shiur]. Trying hard in our spirituality is a different concept of effort and it is not the regular “hishtadlus” that we know of when it comes to making a living.

Our entire inner avodah is based on exerting ourselves so that we can purify the body and thus reveal the soul’s light onto us. Therefore, it is not enough to try according to our capabilities – we need to push ourselves a little more than our usual capabilities, in order to succeed in spiritual matters.

Of course, a person will still get reward if he tries his hardest, even if he doesn’t push himself beyond what he can normally do, but, he will never get to his inner world like that. In order to access our inner world, we need to try a little harder than our natural abilities.

A person really cannot reach anything on his own, no matter how he tries. This is especially true when it comes to spiritual matters. So it’s not enough for a person to try his hardest. He has to go a little beyond the normal amount of trying.

Thus, only through bitachon and tefillah can a person accomplish this feat of going the extra mile (in addition to trying as much as he can handle) when it comes to progress in our ruchniyus\spirituality, because bitachon and tefillah can give a person strength beyond his normal capabilities. We cannot get to any spiritual accomplishment through our own effort – we need supernatural strength granted to us by Hashem. The yetzer hora gets stronger every day, so it is impossible; we need Hashem’s help.

Why We Need Bitachon In Our Ruchniyus\Spirituality

This is not an intellectual idea – you need to feel it in your heart. This is the key to entering the inner world. Try your hardest, daven from your heart to Hashem for success. The key to success in spirituality is to realize that we are utterly dependent on Hashem for success.

The words of the Vilna Gaon – that we need bitachon in ruchniyus – are not a novelty. We need bitachon in Hashem, ultimately, in order to have success in any area of our ruchniyus.

The Goal of Increasing Our Bitachon

Thus, we daven in Shemoneh Esrei that Hashem give reward to those who trust in Him with emes, truth: ותן שכר טוב לכל הבוטחים בשמך באמת. Emes\truth means that we have bitachon in Hashem not so that we will get the results, but because we want the very connection with Hashem we have through the bitachon.

Sometimes a person has bitachon, but only because he uses it to get what he wants from Hashem. A person in business might use emunah and bitachon in order to get what he wants from Hashem…so too, a person who wants to improve in his spirituality might also develop emunah and bitachon solely so he can get his success, and he misses the point!

The true reason of why we need bitachon in our ruchniyus is because through that, we become closer to Hashem, and that is what we should mainly be striving for. It’s not about what we “get” from Hashem as a result of having bitachon.

In Conclusion

Thus, we ask of Hashem, ותן שכר טוב לכל הבוטחים בשמך באמת  - that only those who truly have bitachon in Hashem, those who seek it with emes because they want to become closer to Hashem through it – those should be the ones who merit help from Hashem, as opposed to those who only use bitachon as a way to get what they want from Hashem.