People
should make it their business to talk to others about the purpose of life. For “He
did not create (the world) to be desolate, He formed it to be inhabited” (Isaiah
45:18). We all have an obligation to try to make this world a civilized place –
a world filled with people who are true humans, Children of Adam, as the Torah
says: “And fill the earth” (Genesis 1:28). The world is a civilized place only
when filled with true Children of Adam, people who possess awareness and
knowledge of God. A world without people who know God is a world of desolation
and emptiness. Those who do not have this awareness cannot be called Children
of Adam.
Just as
it is a commandment to have children in order for the world to survive, so it
is a commandment to instill awareness and knowledge of God in our children and
anyone else whom we are in a position to influence. Teaching our children to
know God is the essence of the commandment to have children. It is vital to
ensure that future generations will be true Children of Adam and not wild animals
who merely look human on the outside. Those who have no knowledge of God and do
not feel His power cannot be called Children of Adam, because the ability to
know God is the defining feature of the Children of Adam.
Everyone
should make an effort to bring his friends to greater knowledge of God and fear
of heaven, thereby making his friends his “students”. This way, when
his days are complete and his time comes to leave the world, he will be clothed
in the words he spoke to his friends, and it will be as if he himself is
literally still in this world.
Likutey Moharan II, 7
THE
ESSENTIAL RABBI NACHMAN
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