The bris and the sanctity of marriage
This brings us back to the bris. The body's power to create life can be used within a mitzvah. Marriage and family life can express kedushah at a very high level. The same power can also draw a person into destructive desire. The way it is used matters.
The Torah describes the union of husband and wife:
עַל־כֵּן יַעֲזָב־אִישׁ אֶת־אָבִיו וְאֶת־אִמּוֹ וְדָבַק בְּאִשְׁתּוֹ וְהָיוּ לְבָשָׂר אֶחָד׃
Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother, cleave to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. (Bereishis 2:24)
Tikkun in this area includes bringing a permitted bodily power into the kedushah of marriage, according to the Torah's laws. A person needs the ability to give that power its proper place.
The rav contrasts this with a religious ideal that places the highest spirituality in celibacy. In the Torah's account, marriage and the mitzvah of bringing life into the world can themselves be profoundly holy. Complete abstention would miss the purpose he is describing. The Torah gives laws that direct this bodily power, and serving Hashem includes living within them.
Likutey Moharan 11 describes two levels of shemiras habris. One involves relations during the working week, while remaining within the laws of the Torah. The other is described as miShabbos leShabbos, from Shabbos to Shabbos. These are levels discussed in the sefer. The distinction gives Reb Noson a way to explain the movement from the permitted toward kedushah. The teaching expressly recognizes the person who observes the Torah's laws during the week as a shomer habris. Its discussion of a further level does not erase that recognition or supply one timing rule for every marriage.
In Likutey Halachos, he connects this to kadesh atzmecha bemutar lach, sanctify yourself within what is permitted to you. A permitted act still needs its proper purpose, measure, and manner. The person works to bring the good within it into kedushah. The weekday and Shabbos express these different levels in the teaching.
Reb Noson also connects Chol Hamoed to Targum. Chol Hamoed stands between the ordinary weekday and the full kedushah of Yom Tov. It gives us language for the work of bringing kedushah into the days of ordinary activity. A weekday retains its halachic identity, while a person's avodah brings its activities closer to Hashem.
Shnayim mikra and Yosef's work
The weekly practice of shnayim mikra ve'echad Targum brings together two readings of the Torah text and one reading of Targum. Rebbe Nachman connects the practice to the completion of lashon hakodesh through the good within Targum. The holy text directs the whole activity, and Targum is drawn into it.
The two-to-one relationship can also be understood through bittul, the subordination of one part within two. Targum is being joined to the Torah text. The Arizal's practice of reading shnayim mikra on Erev Shabbos fits the same movement: the working week is being connected to Shabbos. Friday is precisely the point at which weekday activity is being directed toward Shabbos.
Yosef Hatzaddik lived with this task in a particularly demanding way. His brothers were shepherds, a life that allowed long periods of relative separation from public affairs. The rav cites the explanation that caring for a flock allows solitude and attention to Hashem. Kli Yakar on Shemos 3:1 gives this explanation for the connection between shepherding, hisbodedus, and prophecy. Yosef was involved in governing Egypt and its economy. He had to remain connected to Hashem while dealing with the physical needs and business of a country.
His knowledge of the seventy languages belongs to this account of his avodah. The Gemara describes his learning those languages and his knowledge of lashon hakodesh, which Pharaoh lacked. Yosef could operate in the surrounding world while remaining attached to kedushah. He brought the activity of that world into his service of Hashem.
Bringing a power back to its proper use
An example from recovery programs makes the distinction easier to follow. Alcoholics Anonymous describes sobriety through abstinence from alcohol. In eating, the person must continue to eat. The work concerns the compulsive behavior and the way food controls his life. Overeaters Anonymous uses abstinence to refer to abstaining from compulsive eating and compulsive food behaviors.
Sexaholics Anonymous provides a similar comparison: for a married participant, its definition of sobriety preserves marital relations within its stated boundaries. The rav uses this comparison to distinguish removing an activity completely from bringing a necessary or permitted human activity into its proper place. These are the programs' own particular definitions, used here as an illustration of the Torah teaching.
The rav returns to meshakel, the destructive reading of these letters, and explicitly connects it to the spiritual force associated with the death of young children. That severe claim belongs to the kabbalistic account of harm being discussed; the shiur does not identify the cause of any particular child's death. The same discussion concerns rescuing the life-giving power that has been drawn into that destructive side.
He applies this framework to mikreh laylah, an involuntary emission during sleep, and the work of Tikkun HaKlali. The distinction made earlier in the series remains relevant: an involuntary bodily event is not automatically a deliberate sin. Here the rav is explaining the sefer's account of spiritual repair.
When we say Tehillim, maskil belongs to the effort to recover that power and bring it into a life directed by the Torah. The rav intended to discuss another form of song as well, but remains with this one word for the whole shiur. The next teaching takes up the next form.