Journal Mitzvah

Journal Mitzvah

Tuesday, July 8, 2014

Working for a civilized world




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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