A vort from the Rebbe on this week's parsha, Parshas Pinchas. In Parshas Pinchas, the Torah talks about the halachot of נחלה, of inheritance. And the way the Torah writes it is like this: Hashem said to Moshe Rabbeinu, \"ואל בני ישראל תדבר לאמר\", speak to the Yidden, \"איש כי ימות\", a person when he di- if he dies, \"ובן אין לו\", he doesn't have a son, \"והעברתם את נחלתו לבתו\", so his נחלה, his inheritance, goes over to his daughter. \"ואם אין לו בת\", if he doesn't have a daughter, \"ונתתם את נחלתו לאחיו\" - לאחיו - you should give his inheritance to his brothers. So it talks about the first thing is the children inherit, that's a son first, and if not, a daughter, but it's the children. If he has no children, then the brothers inherit. And the mefarshim ask, that's not the seder, the order of halacha. In halacha, if he has no children, the first thing it goes over is to the father. If he has no father, then it goes over to the brothers. So how come the Torah doesn't mention that it goes to the father first? And the mefarshim ask that kashya. So obviously, for some reason, the Torah is talking in a case where he has no father. Then the seder makes sense, that it goes to the children, if there are no children, it goes to the brothers, because the Torah is talking in a case that he has no father. But why is the Torah talking davka in a case where he has no father? So there are answers על פי פשט, על פי הלכה, but the Rebbe brings out a remez here. This is only a remez, only a hint. But this is an interesting hint על פי חסידות, or על פי דרוש, על פי פנימיות ענינים, the inner peshat. We know that the inyan of death, as the Torah starts here, \"איש כי ימות\", if a person dies, death בכלל represents a very low spiritual level of a person. The Gemara says, \"רשעים בחייהם קרויים מתים\", evil people, even when they're alive, they're called dead. Because death represents a very low level. It represents that a person is disconnected from Hashem. If a person is connected to Hashem, that's life. If he's disconnected, that's the concept of death. As the pasuk says, \"ואתם הדבקים בהשם אלקיכם חיים\". If you're connected to Hashem, then you're considered alive. But if you're not connected to Hashem, that's called the inyan of death. And this is what the pasuk is hinting here: that \"איש כי ימות\", if a person dies, automatically it means he has no father. Because if he'd be connected to the Eibershter, which is called the Father, אבינו שבשמים, our Father in Heaven, then he wouldn't have the inyan of מיתה, the inyan of death. So automatically, when the Torah starts \"איש כי ימות\", when a person dies, automatically we assume that he doesn't have his fath- he doesn't feel connected to his father, to his אבינו שבשמים, so he's considered that he has no father. And that's how the Torah continues, that this is a person has no father, then the Torah goes on with the דין if there is no father. So even though this is not פשוט פשט, but there's a remez here that the inyan of מיתה is connected to not having a father.

If we go a little deeper על פי חסידות, there's more remez here. We know in Chassidut it says in Tanya that חכמה שבנפש is called a father. In the beginning of Tanya it says that you have chochmah and binah, which is the mochin, the intellect, and then you have the middot. And it says the intellect is called the parents, and the middot, the emotions, are called the children, because the intellect gives birth to the emotions. Emotions are born, come out of the person's understanding. And it says that the father is chochmah, and the mother is binah, but the father is called chochmah. And it says in Tanya, in פרק י״ט, that the חכמה שבנפש also is the source of the bitul that the Yid has to Hashem. The word chochmah is made up of two words: כח מה. מה means what? What am I? Nothing. The koach of feeling nothing, feeling battel to Hashem, is connected to chochmah. I'm not going into the explanation of Chassidut, but that's what it says in Chassidus. That's why Moshe Rabbeinu, which על פי חסידות, על פי קבלה, is the sefirah of חכמה, and Moshe Rabbeinu said, \"ונחנו מה\", what are we? Moshe Rabbeinu was בתכלית הביטול, the greatest bitul, nullification to Hashem, and he was in the sefirah of חכמה, because חכמה represents the connection to Hashem, the bitul to Hashem. And חכמה is also, as I said, connected to the ענין of being the father. So in order to have the bitul to Hashem, that means you have the ענין of חכמה שבנפש, you have the father. If a person dies, which means he's disconnected, that means he's missing his חכמה. He's disconnected to Hashem means he's missing the חכמה. חכמה brings you connection to Hashem. Hashem, and חכמה ממילא brings a chayut, like there's a פסוק says, החכמה תחיה. There's another פסוק says, ימותו ולא בחכמה, that if you have חכמה, then you don't have the ענין of mitah. Why? Because חכמה is the ענין of bitul to Hashem. So mitah comes when you're missing the ספירת החכמה, means you're missing the feeling of חכמה, which is the bitul to Hashem. And that's connected to what we said before, that if you have bitul to השם, ואתם הדבקים בהשם אלוקיכם, then you're chayim. So what the pasuk is telling us, that when a person, איש כי ימות, if he dies, automatically he doesn't have the חכמה שבנפש, because if he'd have the חכמה שבנפש, he wouldn't be in that low מדרגה which would refer you refer to it as death, it would be the inyan of chayim. And that's why when the pasuk talks about the inyan of ירושה, which starts off with אדם, איש כי ימות, so that automatically means that he doesn't have the חכמה שבנפש, which is the אב, or in the simpler peshat, that he doesn't have the connection to the Father in Heaven, to the Oibershter, and that's the only time this could be איש כי ימות. And the lesson from here is that in order to have chayut, you have to have the אב, you have to have the deveikut to Hashem, you have to have the bitul to Hashem, and if you have the bitul to Hashem, החכמה תחיה, it brings you chayut.