One Mitzvah Can Change the World — The Rebbe's Vision of History

What if history isn’t random — and your smallest act carries more weight than you think? In this shiur, delivered on 13 Tammuz (the anniversary of the Previous Rebbe’s liberation from Soviet exile), Rabbi Heschel Greenberg unpacks the Lubavitcher Rebbe’s “State of the Universe”: a Chassidic framework for understanding why the world was created, why it so often looks dark, and why a single mitzvah can carry the weight of an entire universe. Through classical sources and five remarkable true stories, this talk offers a way to see purpose in the ordinary and hope in difficult times — without ever minimizing how real suffering is.

🕰️ Detailed Navigation:

📖 Primary Sources & References:

• Ethics of the Fathers (Pirkei Avot) 2:1 — “Know what is above you”
• Midrashic teaching on God desiring “a dwelling place in the lowest of worlds”
• Genesis 1:1 and the Genesis narrative of Joseph (Genesis 39–41)
• Song of Songs 5:1 — “I have come back to my garden”
• Tanya (Likkutei Amarim) — on suffering, catharsis, and hidden divine love
• Talmud and Rambam (Maimonides) — on the world’s “balanced scales”
• A teaching of the Baal Shem Tov on the soul’s singular purpose