Utilizing Your Da'as - Chapter 10 Three Dimensions of Da'as

Lengthening, Widening and Deepening Da’as

Different Kinds of Da’as

The Mishnah in Avos (5,11) states that there are four kinds of de’os (behaviors) when it comes to anger. Here we can see that anger is a kind of da’as. Someone might be slow to anger, or he might be short-tempered. If someone is easily appeased, he is called oirech apayaim – slow to anger. If he is easily angered, he is called kotzer ruach – short-tempered.

Chazal state that there are different levels of da’as. Women have “light” da’as. Deaf people have “weak” da’as. A fragrance can settle give a person yishuv hada’as, a “settling” of the mind (this is when one returns his da’as to the way it originally was). There are also three things which “expand” one’s da’as: beautiful utensils, a beautiful wife, and a beautiful home.

We need to understand this. What does it mean to have “light” da’as, “weak” da’as, “settled” da’as and “expanded” da’as? These four kinds of da’as really represent the four de’os in anger that is stated in the Mishnah. There is da’as which is deep, da’as which is wide, and da’as which is long.

Lengthened Da’as and Widened Da’as

What is width, and what is length? Width is the expansion of a boundary, while length is to stick out past a boundary. When a person is angry, it is called maarich af – “lengthening of the nose.” When a person is angry at another person, he is going past his boundaries.

The Beis Hamikdash is called “a dwelling in between shoulders.” This represents a widened da’as, just like there is a wide space in between the shoulders. That is also why the width of the Beis Hamikdash is compared to the sea.

When a person has “lengthened” da’as, the da’as is endless, just like length has no end. When a person has “widened” da’as, he has increased his da’as, but this causes destruction. Why? This is because width, which is rochav in Hebrew, has the same letters as the word cherev (sword), a connotation to destruction. These are two kinds of da’as in creation: widened da’as, which is a da’as that is confined to the limits of creation, and lengthened da’as, which is the kind of da’as a person uses to know the da’as of his Creator. Lengthened da’as cannot be destroyed; only widened da’as can be destroyed, and that is how the Beis Hamikdash was able to become destroyed – because it contained widened da’as, not lengthened da’as.

What is widened da’as? This is when a person adds onto his knowledge, but only within the confines of the knowledge. But lengthened da’as is when a person adds on more and more knowledge, until eventually he comes to know his Creator. What is the difference?

Widened da’as is when a person increases his knowledge, but the knowledge here is only another garment of the same da’as. It’s not really more information. Lengthened da’as is when a person receives more knowledge and more knowledge.

Widened da’as is like imagination, because the person imagines that he is expanding his knowledge. Lengthened da’as is real, actual knowledge – Chochmah—because the person is receiving actual new information that he didn’t have before.

Deep Da’as

The third kind of da’as we mentioned is “deep” da’as.

Depth is not length and it is not width, so what it is? What is the very concept of depth? Depth is when one grasps how everything connects – when one connects the length and the width.

Da’as is really a tool; it is not a purpose unto itself. The purpose of our da’as is to be a receptacle that will hold the ohr, spiritual light, that we want to put into it.

From the viewpoint of just length or width, da’as seems to look like the actual light we want to have. But such an understanding is superficial, and this is a kind of understanding that came about through the eitz hada’as. The viewpoint from depth sees how da’as is but a tool; this is the real understanding, which comes from the knowledge of the eitz hachaim.

If a person sees his Da’as as a receptacle to achieve a greater means, then he will be able to receive the light that will go into that receptacle. He will be able to expand his knowledge. But if a person that his Da’as itself is the spiritual light that he wants to receive, then he doesn’t have the receptacle to hold the light, and he won’t get the light.

Deep Da’as is when a person realizes that all his Da’as is only to be used as a tool to receive spiritual light, and that is not the spiritual light itself. It is the perception that Da’as is only a tool to achieve a greater means.

Let’s take any knowledge that we know about. Do we look at our knowledge as a tool, or as an actual spiritual light? To illustrate the question better, when a person learns Torah, does he think that his knowledge in Torah is just a tool to help him understand, or that it is the actual spiritual light itself? If a person has the deep kind of Da’as, he is aware that any knowledge he has is only a tool to help him learn. One’s knowledge is not the end goal.

If someone’s heart has been opened, and he always receives new understanding in areas, he has lengthened his Da’as. If someone keeps expanding the same piece of information but he doesn’t really add onto the knowledge, he has widened his Da’as – either in the lower usage, which is imagination, or for a higher purpose, which is Binah. If someone realizes that both his lengthened Da’as and widened Da’as are just tools, he has deepened his Da’as.

Without deepening the Da’as, a person thinks that his Da’as is actual spiritual light, not a tool. Only through deepening the Da’as can a person see how everything in the universe is to be used just as a tool to achieve a greater means.

That is the reason why beautiful utensils expand one’s mind. It is because a person knows that utensils are just utensils (tools).

We need all three kinds of Da’as – lengthened Da’as, widened Da’as, and deep Da’as.

If a person only has lengthened Da’as, he is always stepping over his limits. Although there is a positive in a person to break his limits, this ability itself needs limits as well; everything must have its limits, even the power to go over limits. For this a person needs to balance it with widened Da’as.

If a person only has widened Da’as, he will just widen his knowledge and think that his knowledge is the goal.

But with deep Da’as, a person can understand that both lengthened Da’as and widened Da’as are only a tool to receive the endless light of Hashem. Deep Da’as balances the lengthened Da’as and widened Da’as and enables one to receive the light of the Ein Sof of Hashem.