Why Perform Mitzvos? Centrist Orthodoxy and Chabad Perspectives (Part I)

In 11^th grade, my high school arranged a special two-part lecture series on the “big Jewish questions” with a well-known speaker; among ourselves, we called it the “Just Stay Frum Talk.” I still remember the first question he asked us: “The Torah tells us there are a lot of things we have to do, and a lot of things we’re not allowed to do. Shabbos, kosher, davening three times a day, tefillin… The list goes on and on. What’s it all for? Why does G-d care about anything we do? He’s G-d!”

Silence. Thirty-five students, ranging from Modern Orthodox to Centrist to Religious Zionist to yeshivish, and not one answer.

Except for one person: Berel. Berel, my chavrusa for the year, was a Chabad chassid who went on mivtza’im (mitzvah campaigns) on Fridays and every so often tried to convince me to learn a sicha of the Rebbe with him. Berel confidently answered, “Because He wants a dirah b’tachtonim” – literally “a dwelling in the lower realm.”

While it happens to be that wasn’t the answer the lecturer was going for, it made it clear to me that Chabad was doing something right here.

Whereas the rest of us had no idea what the ultimate goal of our “brand” of Jewish practice was, Berel had an answer ready to go, and his practice was inspired in a way that ours wasn’t. Whereas the rest of us had our faces up against the trunks of many trees, knowing bits and pieces about the details but missing the bigger picture, Berel saw the entire forest.

 

Centrist Orthodoxy’s Answer

It took me a few years, but I’ve come to understand that according to the leading lights of Centrist Orthodoxy – Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch in the 19^th century and Rabbi Yosef Dov Soloveitchik in the 20^th century – the answer to the above question is the same as Berel’s: Hashem has tasked us with building him a dirah b’tachtonim, a place for Him to “live” together with us in this world, the physical world of Olam haZeh. (When I say “Centrist Orthodoxy,” I refer to Jews loosely identified as those who follow halacha and view involvement in the secular world and secular wisdom as an ideal.)

This concept did not originate with the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rav Hirsch, or Rav Soloveitchik. It comes from a midrash (in fact, there are a number of midrashim that all present versions of the same idea):

Rabbi Shmuel bar Nachman said: When Hashem created the world, He desired to have a dirah b’tachtonim, a place for Him to reside below the way He had above. He created Adam and commanded him, “Eat from all the trees of the Garden, but do not eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.” Adam transgressed… and G-d removed Himself to the first rakiya, layer of the heavens…

This midrash continues through the opening chapters of Bereishis and Noach; each subsequent sin causes Hashem to move one more level away from His ultimate goal of living here in this world. Once He reached the seventh level, Avraham appeared on the scene, instigating Hashem’s return. Yitzchak, Yaakov, Levi, Kehas, and Amram all make their contributions, bringing Hashem to the first rakiya. Finally, hundreds of years after Adam’s sin pushed Hashem away from this world, Hashem triumphantly returns. Intriguingly, the Midrash identifies the actual moment of return with two closely connected events:

Moshe came and brought Him back to Earth, as it says: “And Hashem descended onto Har Sinai.” And it says: “I came to my garden, my sister bride” – When was this? When the Mishkan was erected.”

This midrash is clearly a consequential one. It asks the biggest question possible: What was G-d’s intention in creating the world? In answering that question, it relates to the creation of man, and then to the giving of the Torah and the building of the Mishkan – arguably the centerpieces of the entire Torah. So it is not surprising that this midrash was picked up as a central organizing principle for understanding Judaism.

Esoteric and Exoteric – Hidden and Revealed

The concept of a “dwelling place below,” however, can mean very different things. Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi, Chabad’s founding rebbe and author of the Tanya, uses it in a mystical sense, relating to the Jewish mission of bringing Hashem’s light from the highest heavens all the way down into this lowest of worlds. According to this approach, the more people who do mitzvos (such as the famous Chabad mission – tefillin for men and Shabbos candles for women), and the more aspects of the physical world brought into Divine service, the more of G-d’s light is generated and the closer this world gets to hosting Hashem and bringing Mashiach.

Rav Hirsch and Rav Soloveitchik, while still centering this midrash and its this-worldly focus, understand it exoterically rather than esoterically. Instead of seeing every religious act as an infusion of Divine light into the world, and every physical object used for Divine service contributing to metaphysical “repair of the world,” Rav Hirsch and Rav Soloveitchik present the goal to be developing a G-d-centered society that reflects the Torah’s blueprint for how to live life in the most ideal way.

This leads to a number of significant “tactical” differences, such as Chabad’s focus on mitzvah campaigns even for those who are totally unaffiliated (without the explanation that mitzvah performance can serve to bring people closer to Judaism) on the one hand, and Rav Soloveitchik’s embrace of Eretz Yisrael, the most fitting site of this G-d-centered society, on the other.

Next week, I will cite some examples of where Rav Hirsch and Rav Soloveitchik reference this midrash and expound on the significance of the mission it expresses, and then identify some key differences between the Centrist and Chabad understandings of the dirah b’tachtonim concept.