from the Rebbe on this week's parsha, Parshat Eikev. The parsha starts with the words והיה עקב תשמעון את המשפטים האלה ושמרתם ועשיתם אותם. Because you will listen to the mishpatim and you will do them, which means you will keep the mitzvot. Therefore, the Aibershter says, ואהבך, I will love you, וברכך, I will bless you, והרבך, he will make you multiply, וברך פרי בטנך, he will bless the your children, ופרי אדמתך, and the fruit of your earth, of your ground, דגנך ותירשך ויצהרך, your grain and your wine and your oil, שגר אלפיך ועשתרות צאנך, and your animals, etc, etc. So this is the reward a Yid will get for keeping Torah u'mitzvot. Now, we know that reward is according to the job that you do. If you do something very special, you get a special reward. If you do something not so special, ordinary, you get an ordinary reward. Everything has to fit. So how does it make sense that for keeping Torah u'mitzvot, which is so special and so holy and so great, the reward is going to be that you will get gashmiyut? Your fruit will be behatzlacha, your your animals will be behatzlacha. That is the reward for something so special as mitzvot? And

therefore, the Rebbe says, it is not so, especially according to the Rambam. And the Rebbe explains like this. Really, the real reward is not this. This is not the reward. The real reward reward of the mitzvah is the ruchniyusdike reward, and even more than just the ruchniyusdike reward, but like the it says in the Mishnah in פרקי אבות, שכר מצוה מצוה. The reward of the mitzvah is a mitzvah. So some learn it means the reward of one mitzvah is that you'll be able to do another mitzvah. That's the real reward. But there is a deeper pshat, the Chasidut says, the reward of a mitzvah is the mitzvah itself that you did. The word mitzvah, besides the meaning of commandment, also has a meaning of connection, from the word צוותא וחיבור, connection. So what Pirkei Avot means to say is שכר מצוה, the reward of a mitzvah is the fact that through the mitzvah you are connected to Hashem. That's the pshat שכר מצוה, the reward of the mitzvah is the mitzvah, mitzvah the words means the meaning of the word is connection, you connect yourself to Hashem. That is the real reward for a mitzvah. So it's obviously a ruchniyusdike reward which is fit for doing something so special, you get connected to Hashem. It's the greatest thing that can happen. But what does the pasuk here mean and the same in other places where it seems to be saying that if you do mitzvot Hashem promises he'll give you all the physical inyanim, you'll have hatzlacha in all the gashmiyusdike things when we ask lichora that doesn't fit to be reward? So the Rambam takeh explains that that's not really the reward, and this is the way the Rambam explains it.

What Hashem is saying, if you do mitzvot, I will give you all the your gashmiyusdike needs in order for you to be able to continue doing more mitzvot. We know that if a person doesn't have gashmiyut, it makes it hard for him. If a person is poor, not only he cannot give tzedakah, he has a hard time in other things too. If a person is sick, he can't learn Torah, he can't do mitzvot properly, etc, etc. So what Hashem says, עקב תשמעון, if you're going to listen to the mitzvot, I'll give you all the gashmiyusdike things, but that's not the reward. I'm giving you these gashmiyusdike things in order to make it possible for you to do even more. And that's a result of the mitzvot you're doing, but that's not the reward for the mitzvah. So the reward for the mitzvah is is takeh ruchniyusdike things. As the Gemara takeh says, שכר מצוה בהאי עלמא ליכא. The real reward for mitzvot in this world doesn't exist. That's this is all not reward. The real reward is ruchniyusdike reward or even more, the fact that you're connected to Hashem, that's the greatest reward. But the Torah also says, promised Hashem promises, if you do Torah umitzvot, I'll make sure that you have everything in order to be able to do more Torah umitzvot and your connection to Hashem will become stronger.