FROM THE RECENTLY PUBLISHED ‘REBBE NACHMAN’S SOUL’, ADAPTED FROM HIS AUDIO SHIUR ON SICHOS HARAN 174

It is possible to achieve Gan Eden in one moment (Sichos HaRan #174)

Parashat Vayigash teaches the secret of one true moment. The Torah does not say Yehuda prepared, calculated, or planned—it says simply: “Vayigash elav Yehuda”—he stepped forward. Rashi Hakadosh explains that this single approach contained everything: speech, tefillah, and even readiness for battle. In one decisive step, Yehuda placed himself entirely on the line for Binyamin. Rabbeinu zal teaches in Sichah 174 that a single moment of truth and mesirut nefesh can accomplish what years of effort could not – “yeish koneh olamo b’sha’ah achas.”

Rabbeinu zal said that if his accomplishments sound very difficult and unusual, every person should know that he could achieve something similar. There is a person who spends his whole lifetime performing mitzvos. He works hard, putting on tefillin every day, davening, learning, giving tzedakah. Along comes someone else who performs a single, incredible act of extraordinary self-sacrifice. For fifteen minutes he courageously goes out and does something that others would not dare to do. In that short time, he gets the same credit as somebody who worked for seventy years serving HaShem doing regular mitzvos, but who would never have dared to do what this person did. He may run into a fire to save the life of a Jew, or perform a different act of courage, sacrificing himself or his wealth. For example, there are stories of places where there was no mikveh and one person gave up his business and all of his wealth to build a mikveh there, providing a whole city with the means for taharah. One mitzvah of that sort could, at times, be as great as another person’s whole lifetime of mitzvos.

The Gemara tells several stories where Rebbe cried and said, “Yeish koneh olamo b’sha’ah achas” (Avodah Zarah 10b, 17a, 18a), a person can receive Gan Eden for one single action. Even a goy who jumped into the fire with Rabbi Chanina ben Teradiyon was compared to a person who worked seventy years of his lifetime to get Gan Eden. Rabbeinu zal points out that this is possible. A person has to look out for that opportunity, because he can never know which act will do it. For example, a person could spend a lifetime, or many lifetimes coming back again and again, and never accomplish what another person does just by going to Rabbeinu zal’s tziyun.

Rabbi Kokhav Lev (Rabbi Avraham Sternhartz [Kokhav Lev, 1862-1955], recognized as the outstanding Breslover elder of his generation) once said that there are people who are very rich, who give a lot of tzedakah in their lifetime; millionaires who give $100,000 or $1 million at a time to certain federations and different charities and appeals. By contrast, there is the simple person who dedicates his ma’aser, a few dollars, to Rabbeinu zal’s tzedakah. Nevertheless, the person who gave millions of dollars to tzedakah did not accomplish nearly as much as the poor man who gave just a few dollars from his meager salary. A person can achieve Gan Eden with tzedakah, even just a small amount, given to the right cause.

A person who dies outside of Eretz Yisrael (Ein Yaakov 56b)

The Gemara say that there is no comparison between a person who leaves and dies outside of Eretz Yisrael who comes to Eretz Yisrael to be buried, to one who lives in Eretz Yisrael. The question is, what about Yaakov Avinu who left Eretz Yisrael at time of famine to go to Egypt? What about Yosef Hatzaddik who wasin Egypt and did not return to Eretz Yisrael during his lifetime? The answer is, they did not go willingly; they went by force. Yosef Hatzadik was forced into slavery, sent to Egypt. Then he was kept, too, by the order of the king. It was not a voluntary act on his part. Yaakov Avinu had to come to Egypt in order to receive food or actually die of starvation in Eretz Yisrael. He could have, of course, lived in Eretz Yisrael and have food brought to him. There was a question of having the family kept together. For this reason he was forced to come to Egypt and remain there until after his passing.

The Gemara says again about the greatness of Eretz Yisrael that any person living in Eretz Yisrael is automatically assured of Olam Haba, of Gan Eden. Even the lowliest person, even the case of a non-Jewish slave owned by a Jew which means he is very slightly, partially Jewish as a non-Jewish slave is required to obey a limited number of mitzvot, which means that he has a trace of Jewishness in him. He’s more than the average goy. Even he is assured of Olam Haba. The Gemara says that even one who does not live in Eretz Yisrael, if he goes to Eretz Yisrael and takes only four steps, four amot in Eretz Yisrael he, too, is assured that he will eventually get to Gan Eden, he will get Olam Haba. The Gemara asks, what about those who live outside of Eretz Yisrael who do not get to Eretz Yisrael, and they are tzadikim? Would we say that they do not get Gan Eden? Would we say that they do not rise up when Mashiach comes at techiyat hameitim? The Gemara answers, when Mashiach comes, there will be techiyat hameitim and the dead will come back to life, but only in Eretz Yisrael. In chutz l’aretz, outside of Israel, the dead will not come back to life at all. The question is, you have tzadikim buried outside of Eretz Yisrael. What happens to them? The Gemara says there are tunnels in the ground, and these tzadikim will roll, they’ll travel through this tunnel to Eretz Yisrael and there they will rise up. The Gemara asks, isn’t this a tremendous suffering for these tzadikim? Imagine rolling along in the earth so far from outside of Israel. It’s going to be hundreds of miles, it can be thousands of miles rolling along, that’s torture. The Gemara answers that these tunnels will be made high enough that tzadikim will be able to walk from wherever they’re buried to Eretz Yisrael in this underground tunnel. And once they come there, they’ll rise up out of the ground alive. But they will rise up only in Eretz Yisrael, and not outside of it. The Gemara says again about Yaakov Avinu. Yaakov Avinu was very modest during his lifetime, but at the time of his passing he knew the truth, he was a tzadik gamur, which means one hundred percent complete tzadik. So knowing the truth, he knew that he was a tzadik gamur. He knew that he certainly would get Gan Eden, he certainly would get the top level of Gan Eden, and he certainly would be zoche to techiyat hameitim, to come back to life. Why was he so anxious that he commanded his sons that after he passed away they must carry his coffin from Egypt and bury him in Eretz Yisrael? Why did he need that? If he’s a complete tzadik, he’ll have Gan Eden, as far as his neshama goes, and he’ll be able to go through his tunnel to Eretz Yisrael when Mashiach comes, techiyat hameitim. So why did he have to bother his children to carry his coffin from Egypt to Eretz Yisrael, such a tremendous distance. The answer is that Yaakov Avinu did not want to take upon himself the suffering of this tunnel. Just even to walk through this tunnel is a degradation and a suffering. It shows that he is not among the tzadikim who rise up immediately at the time of techiyat hameitim. This would be very unfitting for Yaakov Avinu. The same thing held true with Yosef Hatzadik. Yosef Hatzadik was so pure that he received the title tzadik, the only one who had that title, and yet he, too, told the Jews that when Hashem will bless you that you will be able to go back to Eretz Yisrael, I insist that you take my coffin with you and bury me in Eretz Yisrael. Why burden the Jews to have to carry the coffin through the desert for so many years on this long trek to get to Eretz Yisrael when he could get to Eretz Yisrael himself when techiyat hameitim comes? He knew the suffering that a tzadik must go through in this long walk through this tunnel, and he wanted to avoid this, so he said better have me buried in Eretz Yisrael to be prepared. Then, the moment that techiyat hameitim comes, I can rise up immediately.