If You Could See What G-d Sees in You, Would You Ever Feel Worthless Again? | Mayim Rabim 5738 #4

Summary

Rabbi YY Jacobson’s central message is that a person’s worth is not measured by their current mistakes, pain, or sense of failure. The lecture presents a Chassidic interpretation of the teaching that G-d “consulted with the souls of the righteous” before creating the world. This is not understood as a literal meeting before souls existed, but as an image of G-d’s timeless awareness of the relationship each soul would eventually choose with Him.

Main ideas

• Creation is rooted in relationship. Drawing on the idea that G-d desired a dwelling place in the lower worlds, the lecture describes creation as arising from a divine desire for connection with human beings. The world’s difficulties and concealments make room for a relationship that can be experienced and chosen, rather than existing only as an idea or possibility.

• G-d’s vision includes the real person, not an idealized version. The soul G-d “saw” is not a flawless, constantly cheerful version of a person. It is the person as they actually live—with vulnerability, fear, wounds, uncertainty, and mistakes—and the choices and growth that can emerge from that reality. This vision is offered as a foundation for dignity and hope, not as a denial of suffering.

• Struggle can become part of return and growth. The lecture invokes the teaching that sincere repentance motivated by love can transform sins into merits. This does not mean that wrongdoing should be sought or excused. Rather, even a painful or misguided path can, through repentance and change, become part of a person’s return to truth and connection.

• Potential and lived experience are different. G-d’s timeless knowledge of a person’s eventual return is compared to knowing a book, house, symphony, or play before it is experienced by others. The meaningful moment is when what existed in potential becomes real in lived experience. In the lecture’s framing, a person’s choice in the present is therefore significant, even if G-d is described as knowing the whole story beyond time.

• Human choice and divine knowledge are held together as a paradox. The lecture discusses the tension between divine foreknowledge and free choice. It presents Chassidic approaches that can hold both divine providence and genuine human decision-making together, rather than reducing one to the other. G-d’s self-limitation (tzimtzum) is described as making space for a real relationship in which a person can choose.

• The mind is a guide, not the destination. The lecture uses the image of a map and territory: Chassidic concepts and intellectual study can orient a person, but they are not the same as experiencing connection. The mind should help make a person more receptive to the soul and to authentic life, rather than becoming a barrier or the sole measure of what is real.

• Authenticity must not require suppressing pain. Faith is not presented as a command to pretend everything is fine or to bypass distress. The speaker argues that healing requires acknowledging one’s real experience while also discovering a deeper source of care and connection within it. The lecture warns that religion or social approval can become damaging when they require a person to deny their genuine self.

• The deepest experience is connection. The lecture places relationship and care deeper than abstract explanation. It characterizes divine love not merely as a response to need or deficiency, but as an expression of what is most fundamental. A person’s vulnerability and capacity to choose connection are treated as central to that relationship.

• The present moment has cosmic significance. Drawing on Maimonides’ teaching that one action can tip the balance of a person and the world, the speaker emphasizes the importance of ordinary choices. A small decision—such as how to respond to a message, a conflict, or a loved one—can embody the larger purpose of creation.

Practical lesson

When facing a difficult moment:

1. Pause before reacting automatically.
2. Notice whether the impulse is driven by fear, defensiveness, shame, or self-protection.
3. Ask what a more truthful and present response would be.
4. Choose, where possible, courage, care, honesty, and connection over rupture or indifference.
5. Treat the choice as meaningful without pretending the pain or difficulty is unreal.

The lecture’s closing message is that a person should not equate their current struggle with their ultimate identity. The possibility of returning to connection—and the choices that make that return real—are central to the person’s worth.

Speakers and sources featured

Speakers

• Rabbi YY Jacobson — the main lecturer.
• Audience members — several brief questions and comments; they are not individually identifiable from the subtitles.

Sources and authorities cited or discussed

• Midrash Rabbah on Ruth — the teaching that G-d consulted the souls of the righteous.
• Midrash on Parashat Naso — the teaching about G-d’s desire for a dwelling in the lower worlds.
• The Maggid of Mezeritch — especially the teaching that Israel “arose in thought” before creation.
• The Alter Rebbe — teachings from Tanya and Chassidic discourses, including the roles of Chochmah, Binah, and Da’at.
• The Lubavitcher Rebbe — described as frequently repeating the Maggid’s teaching.
• The Baal Shem Tov — cited in connection with divine knowledge, love, and human choice.
• The Arizal — cited in discussing the paradox of divine providence and human choice.
• Maimonides (Rambam) — Laws of Repentance, on the significance of a person’s actions.
• The Talmud — tractates Yoma (repentance from love) and Kiddushin (the balance of merit and liability).
• The Torah and the Targum Jonathan — including references to creation and “Let us make man.”
• Ecclesiastes — the verse about the spirit returning to G-d.
• The Izhbitzer tradition and Rabbi Tzadok of Lublin — cited regarding divine providence and human wrongdoing.
• Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin — mentioned in an anecdote about pure faith.
• Rabbi Baruch Kaplan — named as the source of a metaphor relayed by Moishe.
• Quantum mechanics and Schrödinger’s cat — used as analogies for holding apparently opposing possibilities together, not as religious authorities.