The Rebbe's century was a time in which truly astounding things happened. The world has changed more in this century than in the thousand years before... Taking a closer look at Jewish life, we also see great changes... The Rebbe was a part of all those changes, and he was also a person who created and worked within them... He predicted and warned against some of them.

From a speech by Rav Adin Even Israel (Steinsaltz) marking the Rebbe's 100th birthday, held at the Library of Congress, Washington DC, March 11, 2000

The Rebbe was very aware of the past - his own past, the past of his people, and the past of humanity. But he was never a man of the past. In so many ways, he was a man of the next century, a man who belonged far more to the future than to the past. And that will explain what was so very important to the Rebbe…

The Rebbe watched the world and saw and felt so much happening, so much quivering and shaking all over the world, but he did not see these developments as final effects; he saw them as preliminary tremors preceding a big upheaval. The Rebbe saw all the change and distress throughout the century as labor pains that herald an impending birth. And that was what the Rebbe had in mind when he talked about Moshiach.

He saw all the past... The preparatory rumblings before the Occurrence of a huge upheaval. This is the message he tried to communicate. As the years passed, he became more and more intense, more and more emphatic, about the idea that Moshiach was about to come. He saw it not only through some heavenly vision: he perceived it in observing how the world was moving, in the changes he had witnessed. He saw the movement, the suffering and the pain as presaging a major event. a major change...

Clearly, the coming of Moshiach is not a mere happening within the world: it is far more important, far more profound. In the words of the prophets, Moshiach signifies the end of days - that is, the end of history. It marks the end of ordinary days, and the beginning of a completely new era, an era so new that nothing in the past is parallel to it. Moshiach will change history permanehat part contly, change human life permanently, and usher in a future that will be very different from the past.

The Rebbe spoke about Moshiach because he understood that the coming of Moshiach is a process in which we must be both active participants and passive beneficiaries. It is a dual process, like birth, where you cannot specify what part comes from Above and wmes from the inner working of the human body.

This synthesis is what the Rebbe referred to when he spoke about Moshiach. Therefore, the Rebbe did not see "Moshiach" as a mantra to say six times or ten times a day to overcome difficult times. For the Rebbe Moshiach was something to work on, to deal with, to fight for.

In this context, let me address the notion of the Rebbe's "legacy." One should not use that word in talking about the Rebbe. The Rebbe did not leave a legacy. The Rebbe left marching orders. He left a task to be completed, and the books and other resources provide the understanding that will enable people to carry it out.

I will try to outline some of the ideas that are in those orders, properly and correctly, and render his lofty words in simple, down-to-earth language.

When we speak about the coming of Moshiach, we speak about a mega-event, a major phenomenon that changes everything. We may not be fully prepared and we don't know, the how, what, or when of this event, but we are talking about major changes. One of the consequences of this statement is that if we are expecting things to change in a major way we will have to make major changes, too. And one of these changes is that we have to cast away a huge number of petty quarrels and petty issues; Insignificant clashes that are not just vicious and unprofitable, but ludicrous.

Next to the truly momentous changes we are anticipating, all of our trivial arguments shrink into trifles: our disputes are comic, not just painful. Not personal quarrels only, but about the whole notion of political trappings that you deal with in this country, and that we deal with in Israel, my country. Many of the things that people fight about are the sheerest, shallowest nonsense, especially if we compare these quarrels to the establishment of an entirely different order. Who will remember all these foolish people who were fighting about such things?

So, the coming of Moshiach means, among other things, the casting away of internal fights. We must talk to people about what Moshiach means. We must abandon, for example, the Jewish interdenominational quarrels, many of which are associated with small, short-term calculations and evaluations: What will be better for my organization, for my little group, for my little thing in the next two, three, or five years? How will gain a little bit more support from... Compared to the big things, all these are nonsensical.

It is even more important to talk about the future, what people are going to do, when the time will come... and the time is coming, whether we want it or not. The status quo will change, and all these petty issues will be wiped away. That means, also, there are lots of things we must do. So what do we do...?

We have to start talking now about changing, not just about turning, but about returning on a big scale. "On a big scale" means that it is not sufficient to make token gestures. Rather, this is about reaching people in a deeper and more meaningful way, getting them to change their lives, to set their priorities where they should be set and to put their priorities where they should be put, because a time is coming when these are the things that will count, and most of the rest will not matter at all. We have to te1l people about it. We have to say it again and again in a most emphatic way. This does not mean that we must invalidate what we are doing: we must just work on a much grander scale. We have to act in a much more urgent way. These ideas have to be expressed not only to individuals, but also to organizations, to groups, to the Jewish community at large... Whatever has been done is not enough. It is never enough. It has to be done ten times as much, if we want to be ready for the time.

There is something else, we must say, something that has to do with our attitude about the world. The Rebbe began, but we have to continue to say it, not only to our own Jewish brothers and sisters, but to all of humanity: We have to talk about what are called the Seven Noahide Commandments, the seven laws that the Almighty gave Noah after the Flood. These commandments are for all humanity, for every human being. We should speak about these commandments not just to one individual, as if we were selling merchandise, but to all the peoples and the nations of the world, so that we can change the world.

Our goal is not to give a compliment to the Rebbe. A new and different world will come in a short time, and we have to address it. We have to tell people that a different time is coming, a time when different things will count. We must get everyone to keep the basic Noahide laws, the laws of nature and the laws of the Divine, and we must bring the people together. This is what we have to tell individuals and nations.

How can we do it? Because the Rebbe is behind us, in a sense doing and saying these things. It means recognizing that now is the time to go to others and to ourselves, and pay attention to the big things and the important things and to let the small details go.

Our sages tell us, in reading Genesis 49:33, that "Our father Jacob did not die." The idea is that, as long as there are Jews in the world, the seed of Jacob is alive, living within us. In everything we do in our lives, a small minuscule part of him lives within us. We say in our prayers "David, the King of Israel, is alive and enduring," which means the kingship of David never died. Someone could kill the last Jewish king, but no one can destroy the kingship of the Jewish people. The kingship is still alive, still here. We may be downtrodden, but the kingship of Israel continues. In that sense, I would say that the Rebbe implanted his spirit in so many people, that his dreams, his visions, his insight, and his tremendous desire continue. If we sustain his utmost desire to bring about that big change, then we can say that the Rebbe lives on. The Rebbe is here, when we are here and we are doing all the things that he left in his marching orders. He said we should advance. He said we should not walk, but we should run. We should at1ack. He said we should go further.

We should do it, and we will do it. 

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