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it is not pure, it remains and is polluted among them and his sleep, because he will have good dreams and he will he is overcome by weariness. Sleep begins to carry him away with
clings to them, and it does not rise any higher. There, see holy sights. That is because he is involved with [his counterfeit sweetness. Then it is inevitable that the urge to sleep
it is told only about matters that were decreed above mindfulness] throughout the day and he does not cease will steal into his heart, until it seizes him and casts him into
that will occur in the near future. And sometimes (when clinging to it. That sweetens his sleep. That is why the the net of sleep. A person is perfected when, as he goes to sleep,
it is more polluted) it is mocked in a dream and told verse says, repetitiously, “You will lie down and your he gathers together an amount of force to battle intensely against
falsehoods. sleep will be sweet.” Not only does he not fear—in having any urge to sleep. He only wants to serve Hashem and
cling to Hashem. As a result of his clinging to Hashem and his
contrast to people who do not attain such clinging, and forceful intent, his soul is bound to its Creator.
In this way, the nefesh soars every night until the who do fear—but he takes delight from the midst
person wakes up from his sleep and it returns to its place. of his sleep in all of those delights caused by holy Do Not Pray for Anything
Fortunate are the tzaddikim to whom the Holy One, clinging [to Hashem].
blessed be He, reveals His secrets in a dream so that they
Therefore, the truth is that a person who wants to attain holy
will be guarded from judgment. Woe to those wicked At Midnight I Will Rise sleep must know that when he lies down, he must not learn Torah
people of the world who pollute their body and nefesh. or pray, but only cling to Hashem. The proof for this lies in common
It is impossible to discuss the service of Hashem associated with experience. A person wants to learn Torah before going to sleep.
Come, see. When those who have not been polluted going to sleep and waking up without mentioning the crucial and He dozes off next to the table in the midst of his learning, and he
go to bed, their nefesh rises and enters among all of fundamental service of rising at midnight. This way of serving sleeps poorly, and even suffers. This is of no help to his physical and
those unclean levels. It rises [further] and does not cling Hashem has been engaged in by many Jews in all generations and psychological health, and he does not really learn. At some point,
to them. Afterwards, it soars and rises in keeping with its in all countries across the world—whether Russia, Morocco, Yemen he gets up exhausted, broken and twisted, with only one overriding
way and [degree of] merit. This nefesh that has the merit or Iran—great and small, householders and Torah sages, simple, desire: to throw himself into bed and to complete his sleep and
to rise comes before a holy angel—[Metat, the guardian sincere people and brilliant scholars. They all meticulously kept the make up for his suffering.
of the entrance]—who receives that pure nefesh with a first halachot in the Shulchan Aruch (Orach Chaim 1:2-3):
welcoming expression. [Therefore, Metat is called The One would think that a person who falls asleep in the midst of
Face of Days or The Minister of the Face]). A person who gets up early to plead before his Creator learning Torah with utter dedication will get up with yearning and
should have in mind the times of the changing of the vitality to serve Hashem. But what do we see? When such a person
From there, it rises with supernal yearning and guards: the end of the first third of the night, the end of gets up, all he wants is to go back to sleep. There is not a drop
clings with intent to appear before and to see the the second third of the night, and the end of the night. of life in him. That is a proof that he experienced no holy sleep
whatsoever. Therefore, our sages comment on the verse, “Slumber
pleasantness of the King and visit His palace. That That is because the prayer that a person recites at those will clothe [you] with tatters” (Proverbs 23:21), that if a person
is [the nefesh of a] person who has a portion always times regarding the Destruction [of the Temple] and the sleeps in the study hall, his Torah is torn into tatters (Sanhedrin
in the world-to-come. And that is the nefesh whose exile is accepted [by Hashem]…. 71a). The same applies to a person who falls asleep while doing
entire desire and yearning when it rises at night is hitbodedut. When he gets up, the entire next day he feels that his
to rise and cling to the Holy One, blessed be He. It is proper for every person who possesses the fear of sleep was far from being holy.
Therefore, it merits to rise and reach the place of heaven to be distressed and upset by the Destruction of
its desire, and it does not cling to the category of the Temple. A person must understand that experiencing holy sleep requires
the lights of the husks. It continues to a holy level, And thus Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi states in his Shulchan him to prevail in a war—a war of life and death. The essence of his
to its root—which is the place from which it emerged. Aruch Harav (second edition 1): strength at the time that he is sleeping is to intensify his might as
much as possible, not to allow anything to hold back his intent and
Thus, the verse states, “With my spirit, I have yearned yearning until he clings absolutely to Hashem. Only that is called