This week I formally completed a three-year course in Chabad Chassidus I started in November 2018 at Torat Hanefesh School of Jewish Psychology in Jerusalem. This is by far the most meaningful and lifec-changing learning experience I've ever had in my entire life so far. When I started this course, I couldn't imagine that it would have such a profound effect upon me not only intellectually but also spiritually.
It was in December 2017 that I first encountered a teaching of Chabad Chassidus when I started tasting Jewish life coaching in Jerusalem as a client. I was introduced to one of the most fundamental teachings of the Tanya, which is often called the "Oral Torah" of Chabad Chassidus and was written by its founder Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi also known as the Alter Rebbe - we have the animal soul and the Divine soul, and life is an incessant war between them. I was fascinated by this teaching and took an interest in Chassidus in general and Chabad Chassidus in particular, and told myself I would like to study this and other teachings systematically in parallel with Jewish life coaching.
After asking a number of people I decided to study at the above menioned school as one of the few schools in Israel where those who haven't become Chabadniks can study Chabad Chassidus systematically. My initial plan was to taste it for one year. But by the end of this one year it was clear to me that I would like to complete this three-year course.
Now that I have completed it, I have a sense of accomplishment, but his completion is only formal. I feel I've just started to scratch the surface of this vast sea of Chassidus in general and Chabad Chassidus in particular. During these three years of formal study I also built a rather big personal library of Chabad Chassidus thanks to three bookstores in Jerusalem: Heichal Menachem, Pomeranz, and Yahad. So the new challenge as an independent student now is not the lack of learning materials but their abundance. There are so many profound books written by the seven rebbes of Chabad as well as other Chabad rabbis.
I have also been encouraged to start spreading these foundains of Jewish wisdom to others as one of the best ways to deepen my own learning. I'm planning to start this soon. Perhaps the most important change this study has brought into my life is joy, and this is what I would like to share with others most.
Chassisus can be characterized as nondual Judaism, and Chabad Chassidus is intellectually the most sophisticated nondual Judaism. I've read quite a few books by teachers-cum-practitioners of other nondual traditions and teachings, including Advaita Vedanta and Zen as well indivitual nondual masters. So there are a number of similarities between the two, but there is one fundamental difference between the two - the nature of joy and its manifestation. The joy that engulfs the whole being of a true Chabadnik is dynamic rather than static. This dynamic joy is what I haven't felt so far in those practitioners of other nondual teachings I've encountered. But this doesn't mean that joy à la Chabad is not something frivolous but something serious. Yes, serious dynamic joy, which you canwithness, especially, in the so-called farbrengens.