Some mitzvos are time-based; we eat matzah on Pesach, and sit in the sukkah on Sukkos. Other mitzvos are specific to the time of day, such as putting on tefillin specifically during the daytime. We generally see Talmud Torah as being a 24/7 mitzvah: “V’hagisa bo yomam valayla — and you shall toil in it day and night.”
Although everyone agrees that we should learn whenever we can, day or night, there are actually two opinions in the Rishonim that suggest that there is still a “primary” time for the mitzvah of Talmud Torah.
Rabbeinu Tam and the Ra”n quote a Yerushalmi that says that when you hire a worker, a normal hire is for a day job, when it makes the most practical sense to work because there is light, people are awake, and so on. Reb Yochanan then says, “We, talmidei chachamim, are also like hired workers, who work during the day.” He explains that when talmidei chachamim learn at night, it’s only a matter of making up for lost time for learning that wasn’t able to be completed by day. It seems clear from these Rishonim, based on this Gemara, that the primary mitzvah of learning is during the day.
The Rambam appears to hold the exact opposite, and he writes in Hilchos Talmud Torah:
“Even though it is a mitzvah to study during the day and at night, it is only at night that a person acquires most of his wisdom… our Sages have said, ‘The song of Torah can be heard only at night.’”
[The halachic ramifications of this machlokes have to do with saying Birchos HaTorah in certain situations, but that’s not our topic for now.]
When it comes to nigleh, whenever you have a disagreement in halacha, we need to choose one side to pasken like. But in Chassidus and from the lens of pnimiyus, we can always find a unifying point between the two opinions. What is the point of unity between these two opposing opinions?
When Hashem created the world, the passuk says that the world was chaotic and empty (tohu va’vohu), and then Hashem started to fix the world. He created light and transformed the world into an organized place that could be lived in, replacing the chaos with harmony.
But the truth is that although Hashem sent harmony and peace into the world, making the world a functional place we can inhabit, Hashem did not get rid of all the chaos. Every single one of us comes into the world and is given a little corner of the world that is chaotic, with a mission to bring tikkun and light into our unique corner. Whenever the yetzer hara shows up and tries to tempt us away from Hashem, Hashem is presenting us with the opportunity to bring harmony to that corner of chaos.
We all have tohu va’vohu inside us, nisyonos that represent chaos. Our mission is to reflect what Hashem did at creation, to fight those battles and bring order and harmony to the chaos within. Just as Hashem said, “Yehi ohr,” let there be light, so too we need to bring light into the chaos and not allow it to dominate us. This is how we settle our world within, and bring order to our inner life, inner struggles, and middos.
Such inner work corresponds to “day work.” Daytime is the time for fixing, so overcoming the yetzer hara and bringing light to a chaotic place is an avodah represented by daytime.
Nighttime is a time when we can find tranquility, peacefulness, and transcendence. We get a bit of a break from the battlefield of the chaos of life. With less of a battle against the tohu va’vohu inside, we can escape to a higher place. This is the avodah represented by nighttime.
In Chassidus, we learn that when we sit down to learn, whether it is Gemara, Chumash, mussar, Chassidus, or any other sefer, at that moment we enter into a portal through which we escape the world. It transports us into a place of peace and transcendence, away from the chaos. Just like when one goes to sleep at night, the neshamah escapes the physical world, this is also what happens every time we learn. This corresponds to the avodah of nighttime.
But the mystery of learning is that the “escape” of learning, which corresponds to nighttime, also contains within it the function of daytime, which is to fix one’s chaos. Usually, in order to fix chaos, in order to overcome the yetzer hara and bring harmony within, you have to deal with the chaos by struggling with the nisayon and overcoming it. This is called the work of daytime. Disengaging from that inner work and escaping from it would be nighttime work.
The chiddush of learning Torah is that it represents both avodos at once! Torah is an exercise of bringing harmony to the world and of daytime working, but this is accomplished through learning, which is, in fact, a portal through which we escape the chaos, which is the avodah of the night. When it comes to Torah, we fix the chaos by escaping from it, and not by engaging with it directly.
In Chassidus, this is called milchamah b’derech menuchah — war through peace and tranquility. Usually conquering an enemy means war, by fighting our enemy head-on. Then we have other times of menuchah, when we are off the battlefield and take a break from the fighting. Although such breaks are needed in order to recharge, we aren’t defeating the enemy and conquering new territory when we are off the battlefield.
The chiddush of Torah is that it is both a time of day and night, milchamah and menuchah, an escape that brings order to chaos.
This is the pnimiyus connection between these two opinions in the Rishonim. In nigleh there can only be one primary time for learning, but in pnimiyus, both opinions are coming from a deep truth: that the chiddush of Torah is the ability to bring tikkun to one’s inner chaos (which is a daytime avodah) through transcending and escaping the chaos (which is a nighttime avodah).
This is the secret of Talmud Torah: milchamah b’derech menuchah.
On Shavuos, we rededicate ourselves to the mitzvah of Talmud Torah, and to Yiddishkeit in general. We should remember that one of the greatest ways we can bring more fixing and order within, to improve our middos, yiras shamayim, and adherence to mitzvos, is through learning Torah. By learning we can accomplish this inner growth in a peaceful way, without even needing to deal with the enemy head-on. We should dedicate ourselves to learning as much as we can, and specifically through learning lishmah, which means to learn for the sake of coming closer to Hashem. Through this we can fight with tranquility: milchamah b’derech menuchah.
Hashem should help us, that just as we commit ourselves to this inner war, to claim victory from the enemy within, the yetzer hara, in a menuchah’dike way through learning, so too Hashem should also bring the Geulah sheleimah, and victory over all the enemies of the Jewish people, in a way of rachamim and menuchah — in a way that no bullet needs to be shot and no sword raised, and the whole world will be conquered with Hashem’s light, with menuchah, tranquility, and peace, b’vias goel tzedek b’rachamim, bimheirah b’yameinu amen.
This article was found in Nekuda Tova Issue 82 – Shavuos.
