The ninth chapter of the Tanya maps the battlefield inside every human being.
The animal soul—the nefesh (the vital soul) habehamit (נפש הבהמית)—lives in the left ventricle of the heart. This is the seat of desire: lust, pride, anger, and every craving for worldly pleasure. From the heart, these passions spread throughout the body and rise to the brain, where they generate thoughts and schemes to satisfy them.
The divine soul—the nefesh ha'elokit (נפש האלוקית)—lives in the brain. Its home base is the intellect. From the brain, it extends downward into the right side of the heart, where it manifests as the burning love of God, the yearning to cleave to the Infinite.
Rabbi Schneur Zalman uses a verse from (Genesis 25:23) to frame the conflict: "One nation shall prevail over the other." The body is a "small city" (Ecclesiastes 9:14). Two kings are fighting over it. Each wants to rule its inhabitants—the limbs, the mouth, the eyes—according to his will.
The divine soul wants the body to study Torah, pray, perform commandments, and contemplate God's greatness. The animal soul wants pleasure, status, comfort, and distraction. They cannot coexist peacefully because their goals are mutually exclusive. When one gains territory, the other loses it.
The key insight: the divine soul's stronghold is the brain, and the animal soul's stronghold is the heart. This means the war is fought on the bridge between thinking and feeling. When a person uses intellectual contemplation of God's greatness to generate love and awe, the divine soul advances into the heart. When desires and passions cloud the mind, the animal soul conquers the brain.
The Tanya says this war is not a defect. It is the entire purpose of human existence. The body was designed as a contested space. The struggle itself—the daily, hourly effort to keep the divine soul in command—is what creates spiritual light. A city at peace has no need for soldiers. A city under siege produces heroes.
The abode1 In the sense of its principal area of manifestation. of the animal soul (nefesh habahamit), derived from the kelipat nogah in every Jew, is in the heart, in the left ventricle that is filled with blood. It is written, “For the blood is the nefesh.”2 Deuteronomy 12:23. Cf. above, end of ch. 1, nefesh means “life” and also “desire” (Genesis 23:8). Hence all lusts and boasting and anger and similar passions are in the heart, and from the heart they spread throughout the whole body, rising also to the brain in the head, so as to think and meditate about them and become cunning in them,3 The animal soul is mainly moved by passion, while the intelligence reacts to it. just as the blood has its source in the heart, and from the heart it circulates into every limb, rising also to the brain in the head. But the abode of the divine soul is in the brains4 The divine soul is essentially intellective. that are in the head, and from there it extends to all the limbs; and also in the heart, in the right ventricle wherein there is no blood, as is written, “The heart of the wise man is on his right.”5 Ecclesiastes 10:2. It is [the source of] man’s fervent love toward G–d which, like flaming coals, flares up in the heart of discerning men who understand and reflect, with the [faculty of] knowledge6 For the term daat (“knowledge”), see above, end ch. 3. of their brain, on matters that arouse this love;7 In the divine soul, the relation between mind and heart is reversed from that of the animal soul. (See above, note 3.) also [of] the gladness of the heart in the beauty of G–d and the majesty of His glory [which is aroused] when the eyes of the wise man, that are in his head,8 Comp. Ecclesiastes 2:14. i.e., in the brain harboring his wisdom and understanding, gaze at the glory of the King and beauty of His greatness that are unfathomable and without end or limit, as explained elsewhere; as also the other holy affections (middot) in the heart originate from chabad [wisdom, understanding, knowledge] in the brains. It is written, however, “One nation shall prevail over the other nation.”9 Genesis 25:23. The body is called a “small city.”10 Ecclesiastes 9:14; Nedarim 32b. Just as two kings wage war over a town, which each wishes to capture and rule, that is to say, to dominate its inhabitants according to his will so that they obey him in all that he decrees for them, so do the two souls—the Divine and the vitalizing animal soul that comes from the kelipah—wage war against each other over the body and all its limbs. It is the desire and will of the Divine soul that she alone rule over the person and direct him, and that all his limbs should obey her and surrender themselves completely to her and become a vehicle11 An instrument without independent will. for her, as well as a robe [instrument] for her ten faculties and three garments mentioned above,12 Chs. 3 and 4. all of which should pervade the organs of the body, and the entire body should be permeated with them alone, to the exclusion of any alien influence, G–d forbid. That is to say that the three brains13 The three intellectual faculties chochmah, binah, and daat—chabad—have their corresponding physical brains. that are in the head shall be permeated with chabad of the Divine soul, namely, the wisdom of G–d and the understanding of Him, by pondering on His unfathomable and infinite greatness, and from them shall be born, through the daat (knowledge),14 See above, note 6. awe in his mind, and dread of G–d in his heart,15 Awe is regarded as a preliminary to love. There is, however, a higher category of reverence which can be attained only after having attained love. See below, chs. 23, 40-43. as well as love of G–d that shall flare up like a glowing fire in his heart, like flaming coals, so that his soul shall yearn and long, with passion and desire, to cleave to the En Sof, blessed is He, with his whole heart, soul and might, from the very depths of the right ventricle of the heart. The latter would be so thoroughly permeated with love to overflowing, as to inundate the left side as well, to the extent of subduing the sitra achara with its element of the “evil waters,” namely, the lust stemming from kelipat nogah, changing it and transforming it from seeking the pleasures of this world to the love of G–d. Thus it is written, “‘With all your heart’16 Deuteronomy 6:5.—with both your natures.”17 Berachot 54a. That is to say that the person shall steadily rise to attain to the degree of “abundant love,” a supreme affection surpassing that of “ardent love” that is comparable to burning coals.18 The author distinguishes various degrees of love: ahavah azah (ardent love)—a passionate love, and ahavah rabbah (abundant or great love) or ahavah betaanugim (delightful love)—a serene love of fulfilment. The first is likened to a burning flame; the second—to calm waters. These and other distinctions of love are later discussed at greater length. Cf. chs. 15, 16, 18, 40, 41, 46, 49. This is what is called in Scripture “love of delights,”19 Song of Songs 7:7. which is the experience of delight in G–dliness, of the nature of the World to Come. This delight is in the brain of wisdom, in the intellectual pleasure of comprehending and knowing G–d, to the extent that one’s intellect and wisdom can grasp [Him]. This is the element of “water” and “seed,” i.e., light that is sown in the holiness of the divine soul that converts to good the element of “water” in the animal soul, from which the lust for mundane pleasures had been previously derived.20 Thus the divine soul is conceived as being potentially capable of not only suppressing the evil impulse, but also completely “sublimating” it. Thus it is written in Etz Chaim, Portal 50, ch. 3, on the authority of the Zohar, that the evil is converted into, and becomes, completely good, like the good nature itself, through the shedding of the soiled garments, the pleasures of this world, in which it had been clothed. So, too, shall the other middot in the heart, the offshoots of awe and love, be dedicated to G–d alone; and the faculty of speech that is in his mouth, and the thought that is in his mind, shall be entirely and solely the instruments of the “garments” of thought and speech of the divine soul alone, namely, meditation on G–d and His Torah, which shall be the theme of his speech throughout the day, his mouth ceaselessly studying [it]; and the faculty of action centered in his hands, as also in the rest of the 248 organs, shall function exclusively in the performance of the commandments, which is the third garment of the divine soul. However, the desire of the animal soul which is derived from the kelipah is the very opposite—and it is for the good of man that he may prevail over her and vanquish her, as in the parable of the harlot in the holy Zohar.21 See also end of ch. 29. The parable: A king desired to test the moral strength of his only son. He had a most charming and clever woman brought before him. Explaining to her the purpose of the test, he ordered her to try her best to seduce the crown-prince. For the test to be valid, the harlot had to use all her charms and guile, without betraying her mission in the slightest way. Any imperfection on her part would mean disobedience and failure of her mission. While the harlot uses all her seductive powers, she inwardly desires that the crown-prince should not succumb to them. Cf. Zohar II:163a.This parable is intended to explain the ultimate function of the animal soul, with its inherent evil and complete license and independence. Yet although the forces of evil must be real enough for the purpose of which they have been created, their origin and purpose is rooted in good, and they can, in fact, be so converted. Herein lies the underlying principle of the problem of evil.
