Time in the Teachings of Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi

ma’amar
to the Slavs as the 
gentiles who will not merit a place in the world-to-come. Still, the 
ma’amar 
itself does not provide 
any clues that would help anchor it in Rashaz’s immediate surroundings. He may be drawing here on 
the zoharic take on Noah’s curse of Canaan in Gen 9:25, which associates Canaan with filth, evil and 
death (see Zi, 73a) without supplying any topographical reference.
73
TO 102b. See also MAHZ 
5563
, 81, and an elaboration on the same motif by the Tsemah Tsedek in 
Or ha-Torah
, Bereshit, vi, 1127a. The status of one gentile nation, Amalek – Israel’s traditional 
archenemy, in the redeemed world is not easy to determine. In contrast to the Biblical call for the total 

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135 
There is another reason for the anticipated change in the status of the gentiles, 
which stems from the prospect of change in the perception of space. Following the 
purification of the world in the messianic future, the intensity of the divine light will 
be such that it will raise the lands of the non-Jews and idolaters to the level of the 
Land of Israel, so that “the Land of Israel will spread all over the entire world,” 
while at the same time itself being elevated to the level of Jerusalem, which in turn 
will spread throughout the Land, to encompass its full scope.
74
One can speculate 
that Rashaz’s implicit position is that these new boundaries of the Land of Israel, 
which would stretch to the extent of incorporating even the impure lands of the 
idolaters, would grant their gentile inhabitants the right to acquire the protected 
status of 
ger toshav
, and thus to become the 
‘erev rav
who participate in the 
redemption, as discussed above.
annihilation of Amalek [see Dt 25:17-19, 1 Sm 15:3], coupled with the rabbinic tradition whereby 
God’s name and His throne will remain incomplete until the name of Amalek is obliterated [see 
Midrash Tanhuma
, Tetse, 11], Rashaz seems to assume the possibility that even Amalek will be 
redeemed after the resurrection. See MAHZ 
5572
, 169, discussed in Wolfson, 
Open Secret
, 253-4. In 
this 
ma’amar 
Rashaz explains that because Amalek is rooted in the metaphysical domain that lies 
above the breaking of the vessels, where the purification of sparks does not obtain, Amalek will not 
be rectified by way of purification, but it will be included in the redemption when its name is 
completely blotted out. Wolfson reads this 
ma’amar 
as an example of Rashaz’s inconsistency, arising 
from the clash between his notion of a universal redemption that would include even Israel’s arch-
enemy, and the “scriptural mandate […] to erase [Amalek’s] name to the point of ‘complete 
extermination’ [
bitul le-gamre
]” (Wolfson, 
Open Secret
, 254). My own interpretation differs from 
Wolfson’s. I am inclined to read the Hebrew expression 
bitul le-gamre
, not as a reference to actual 
extermination but rather as a technical term denoting complete self-nullification, which is comparable 
to the transformation of ‘being’ [
yesh
] into naught [
ayin
]. This reading is reinforced by Rashaz’s 
description of Amalek’s 
bitul
as “hearkening” [
shemo
‘
a
], which is preferable to “sacrifice” [zevah] 
(based on 1 Sm 15:15 and 22: “Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of 
rams”], where the sacrifices symbolize purification of sparks while hearkening to God’s voice is 
compared to the the Israelites’