Contrary to popular convention, it is not the wonderful in an event that determines its "miraculousness" but the value and significance that that event holds for us.

A given occurrence can be most wondrous and still not be considered a miracle, but merely a natural "curiosity."

The fact that somewhere out there in a barren wilderness, a stone has rolled to the foot of a mountain, remaining upright all the while, is strange and astonishing, a wonder in itself.

In the absence of significance, however, it is not a miracle.

On the other hand, a perfectly natural occurrence can, under certain cir­cumstances, be considered a miracle because of its significance to the human condition. 

–Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz

From The Strife of the Spirit, p. 32, by Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz

Judaism asserts that evil exists in everyone, not to exclude the smallest child. 

So evil is a part of our being.

But we must keep in mind that creation is not something complete.

If something is com­plete it has no way to go on.

Creation is something that goes from a certain point on.

So while evil is a part of our existence it doesn't mean that it should be like this.

There is a very, very old story about circumcision that deals with this same problem.

The Roman gover­nor of Judea asked Rabbi Akiva, "If God wanted a person to be cir­cumcised, why didn't he create him that way?"

And he answered, "If the Lord wanted, let us say, cakes, why did he not create them?"

He creates certain incomplete things and allows men to perfect them.

–Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz

From The Strife of the Spirit, p.225, by Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz

Rabbi Yechiel Michal from Zlotchov, one of the disciples of the Baal Shem Tov, was known as a complete tzaddik who possessed ruach hakodesh ("the holy spirit," a level of divine perception akin to prophecy), which reputedly had been in his family for ten generations.

A wagon driver in his town once committed a violation of the Shab­bat, regretted his sin, and approached the local rabbi to see what amends he could make.

The rabbi saw that the man's penitence was sincere and told him that he should donate a pound of candles to the synagogue and his sin would be forgiven.

When Rabbi Michal heard of this, he did not approve: How could a pound of candles compen­sate for a breach of the Shabbat?

That Friday afternoon, when the wagon driver came and placed his candles in the appropriate place, a big dog came into the synagogue, snatched the candles, and ate them before they could be used.

Seeing what had happened, the wagon driver was brokenhearted.

He went back to the rabbi and told him that God has not accepted his atonement.

The rabbi assured that it was just an unfortunate coincidence; if he would again bring can­dles to the synagogue the following week, his sin would be forgiven.

On the following week, another mishap occurred, and again the week following, until the rabbi, too, conceded that something was amiss.

He sent the penitent to the Baal Shem Tov, who realized that Rabbi Michal had a hand in it, and sent for him.

The Baal Shem Tov's home in Medzibezh was only a few hours' journey away, but the horses pulling Reb Michal's wagon turned off the road and got lost in the forest; then an axle broke; and one trouble followed another, so that when Rabbi Michal entered Medzibezh, it was late Friday afternoon, and the sun was setting, and the tzaddik feared that he had violated the Shabbat by traveling on the holy day.

When he came to the Baal Shem Tov, crushed and broken in spirit and beside himself, his rebbe called to him, "Come here, sinner! Until now you did not know how a Jew who has sinned feels, how brokenhearted he is. Now, you will realize that a pound of candles is sufficient!"

Rabbi Michal, who had ascended all the rungs in the ladder of holiness, could not compre­hend how anyone could sin, how one could possibly rebel against God.

What others know from within themselves, the tzaddik has to be taught.

–Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz

 From Opening the Tanya, p. 256, by Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz

There are extraordinary people who can conceive an idea in more than one kind of symbolic ingredient or "letters" and can even choose their own formulation, in whatever com­prehensive structure they feel at ease with, whether words, numbers, colors, tones, or whatever.

Rabbi Nachman of Breslav is said to have declared that if people were able really to hear his teaching, the melody as well as the words, the dance of it, they would be released from the bondage of reality.

In other words, the same idea can be expressed in words, in music, in movement.

There is a basic ground for correspondence of things, a fundamental unity behind the variety of modes of expression or symbols.

–Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz

From In the Beginning, p. 188, by Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz 

The Talmud is unique in that no student can master it fully without taking an active part in the creative process.

He must be responsive to questions and answers, be able to sense instinctively how a subject will develop, and be ready at any time to move the discussion in a certain direction.

A true scholar is therefore always part of the Talmud, himself creating through his study and his own innovations.

There was good cause for the demand made of every scholar that he not only study but also introduce new interpretations, since in creating something new he increases his understanding of the source and becomes capable of continuing it.

Not every scholar is capable of independent interpretation.

The solitary scholar who makes his own discoveries will very often find that his views have already been recorded by the scholars of previous generations.

But, unlike other spheres of knowledge, talmudic study does not insist that interpretations be original and innovative.

To a certain extent every scholar tries to prove that his own revelations are not totally new but are implied in the remarks of his predecessors.

There is no greater glory for a scholar than to find that the thought he has developed independently has already been formulated by others before him, since this constitutes sound proof that his methods of study have not exceeded the bounds of true knowledge and are a continuation of talmudic thought itself.

The talmudic saying that "Everything that the distinguished scholar creates anew has already been said to Moses on Sinai" was not aimed at discouraging the scholar but rather at stressing that all true innovations are inherent in the Torah itself and merely need to be uncovered.

Here too the analogy of Torah study with scientific methods is valid.

The man who studies the nature of the material world feels that he is not seeking new facts, but rather unveiling existing reality.

This is also true of the talmudic scholar who strives to uncover, develop, and emphasize aspects already present in the Talmud.

The predilection of the great scholars throughout the centuries for seeking similarities between their theories and those of other scholars is expressed in the saying: "Blessed is He that I have expressed the same view as the great scholars."

Innovation and substantiation are therefore complementary rather than conflicting, and each scholar tries, in his own way, to arrive at "Torah from Sinai."

 –Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz

 From The Essential Talmud, p. 264, by Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz

Knesset Israel is composed of 600,000 souls, corresponding to which the world is composed of 600,000 segments.

This reckoning is not so simple, because the nation of Israel has always consisted of more than 600,000 people.

The soul of a Jew at a particular time and place is not generally speaking one of the 600,000 original souls but only a part of it, a spark.

This division of the root souls explains why on occasion two people who apparently have nothing in common—family ties, educational background, or shared viewpoints—feel a bond between them.

The underlying reason for this mysterious closeness is the essence of their inner souls.

They feel close to each other because their souls are close; they feel suited to each other because they are no more than two branches of one soul. 

The fact that they are not necessarily similar is because the root soul does not always branch out in a symmetrical fashion. 

One person may be more intellectual and another more emotional. 

Yet they will feel an inexplicable connection, for they are fragments of one soul.

That general soul has an identity that is shared by its sparks.

And just as the essence of all Israel is divided into 600,000 parts, so is each general soul divided into 600,000 sparks—each of which is an aspect of the totality of Israel and each of which becomes an individual Jew.

–Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz 

From Understanding the Tanya, p. 267, by Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz 

Faith begins where knowledge leaves off, where knowledge cannot go.

If one can know something properly, there is no need to exercise faith (although what is apparent to one person may not be so to another who will have to exercise faith in order to reach the same conviction).

As Rabbi Nachman of Breslav is reputed to have said concerning the verse, "For I know that the Lord is great" (Psalms 135:5), the emphasis is on "my" knowing, on "my" being absolutely sure, and yet unable to convey this certainty.

This difference is perhaps true for all men, as implicit in the declaration "know this day and consider it in your heart."

What is prescribed here is a progression from faith to knowledge; that which one accepts as an emotionally vivid belief in the Divine has to become an intellectually clear conviction.

It is a matter of making one's faith ever more lucid and unequivocal, getting rid of the obfuscations.

Knowledge requires clarity.

As we have mentioned, almost all knowledge is quite naturally a combination of that which is sensorily perceived by oneself and of credible information received from others.

Just as on hearing a report from a traveler returning from an unknown country, one allows oneself to believe in the plausible and to entertain doubt about the rest.

The difference lies in the degree of clarity and coherence of the information, which depends also on the scope of one's previous knowledge.

But, ultimately, there always remains a certain amount of the unknown, the "mysterious."

And it is this that requires penetration and inquiry until it becomes acceptable, credible, so to speak, and is resolved into the certainty of which it is written, "And you shall know this day…. "

–Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz

From The Candle of God, p. 153, by Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz

Family that is based on a foundation of emotion, how­ever strong and durable that emotion may be, is actually built on fiction.

Romantic love may be an enormous drive; people think and dream about it, sometimes even die for it.

However, a great part of that romantic love is based on cultural clichés and ephemeral chemical reac­tions.

A love that is triggered, and sometimes sustained, by a certain turn of the nose or a pair of beautiful legs is not real enough to endure.

La Rochefoucauld wrote that had it not been for romantic novels, many people would never fall in love.

When people base their families on love alone, that family relationship reflects a fictionalized picture of each other and of the mutual relationship.

In the fortunate cases, romantic love is replaced by a more enduring (though less glamorous) love for the other person, which also includes the difficult elements of accepting the other person's faults, and taking on obligations.

However, when such love does not develop, the family remains a piece of fiction that will not last.

A family that was built from the outset on fictitious ideas will not withstand financial, emotional, or social stress, or the spouses will imagine that they love others, outside the family.

–Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz

From Simple Words, p. 183, by Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz

The blessing that is recited on the occasion of reading from the Torah scrolls, “Blessed art Thou . . . who gives us the Torah,” is in the present tense, “gives,” not the past, “gave.”

The Torah itself is always forming and expanding.

It is a constant growth.

The event at Mount Sinai is an ongoing Revelation that repeats itself whenever one studies Torah.

One may not be aware of standing before the Holy Mountain, but God is still uttering the Ten Commandments.

Even if one does not hear them, the standing itself, in awe and terror, is enough to establish the correct relationship to Torah.

The realization of this is, in turn, something acquired by study.

–Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz

From Pebbles of Wisdom from Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz

"The giving of the Torah is like God's gift of Himself to man.

It may be regarded as the permeation of the inconceivably great into the circumscribed domain of the human.

But the only way for men to comprehend it is through allegory and metaphor.

By such means, the human mind can make leaps and build bridges to overcome the abyss in some pragmatic way."

–Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz

From The Sustaining Utterance , p. 108, by Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz

Pesach—the festival of redemption and freedom—is completed only on Shavuot, which is the festival of the giv­ing the Torah.

Thus, Pesach without Shavuot is incomplete and lacking.

And, in the same way, Shavuot needs Pesach in order to have a foundation in real life.

The two festivals are interconnected.

Whoever severs them remains with a par­tial entity, with only one aspect of things.

–Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz

From On Being Free, P. 28, by Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz