One day one of the grandsons of Rebbe Menachem Mendel of Lubavitch fell into deep despondency. His friends noticed this and, to shake him up and cheer him up, they asked:
- Why are you so sad?
“Aleph-beis,” was the answer.
- Alphabet? - exclaimed the friends. “We all learned the alphabet when we were still just kids, but none of us were sad about it. What do you know that we don’t know?
“It’s not the entire alphabet that makes me sad,” the young Hasid clarified, “but only the first two letters, aleph and beis.”
Seeing that his friends did not understand him, he continued:
— The word anokhi, that is, “I”, begins with aleph; with beis - breshiitp, that is, “in the beginning.” Now do you understand why I am so sad?
The friends looked at each other, realized that none of them had the slightest idea what they were talking about, and shrugged their shoulders.
“What worries me,” finished the young Hasid, “is that “I” always stands “at the beginning” of any of our actions. Every undertaking, every enterprise, is preceded by an “I.” How can I act selflessly if all my efforts are flawed to begin with?
Commentary by Rami Shapiro The grandson of Rebbe Menachem Mendel faced a classic contradiction that may be the key to spiritual awakening. He knows: only by renouncing the “I” can one know God; and at the same time knows that such a refusal, since it is carried out by the ego itself, cannot be genuine. If the self comes first and is the initiator of all actions, including self-denial, there is no possibility of escaping the ego, and therefore no hope of knowing God.
However, the Torah offers us a completely different picture of reality. The first words of the book of Genesis are: Breishit bara Elohim - “In the beginning God created...” Here God undoubtedly comes first. So who is right - the grandson of the rebbe or the Torah? There seems to be some truth in both positions, although they seem to be mutually exclusive. This is the insoluble contradiction. But there is a way out. We need to accept both approaches - this is what the Torah tells us: Anokhi Adonai Elohea - “I am the Lord your God” (Exodus 20:2).
Anokhi itself is God! When you realize that God is in everything, the true nature of your self is revealed; there is no more selfishness that comes from the delusion that you are not God. God and ego are not mutually exclusive; the ego is simply one of the ways in which God is present in the world.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru