Glossary · Torah Ohr · Likkutei Torah
Levush malchus
לבוש מלכות
The royal garment (levush malchus)
The royal garment: G‑d’s kingship (Malchus) as a garment, covering and surrounding the worlds rather than entering them; drawn down onto the world and the soul through the deeds of the mitzvos.
The word In Esther 6:8 “royal garment” is the king’s robe given to Mordechai; the maamarim read that verse, and “Havayah reigns, He is clothed in majesty,” as Malchus being a garment.
Where it’s explained
- Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim 15, ¶10“Havayah reigns, He is clothed in majesty”: kingship is essentially a garment, a covering. Heaven and earth appear physical now because of a concealment that comes from His Malchus, since there is no king without a people. What draws this garment down are the mitzvos, “the King’s commands”; this is “my fair one” (yafasi), who makes beautiful garments.
שעיקר בחינת מלוכה היא כמו לבוש עד״מ שהיא כיסוי עשוי לכסות בו את הגוף שלא יהי׳ בגילוי
- Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim 16, ¶11From Keser, before which darkness and light are alike, even the external forces could draw nourishment. The royal garment drawn by the deeds of the mitzvos lets the flow reach only the side of holiness, those who accept the yoke of heaven, as a garment shields a person from heat and rain. Torah alone can at times be clothed in “blackness,” so the mitzvos are needed.
וכמו הלבוש שמגין על האדם להצילו מהשרב והגשמים כך לבוש הנ״ל הוא המגין מיניקת החיצונים
- Torah Ohr, Vayakhel 1, ¶17His Malchus is called a royal garment because it is not clothed fully and inwardly in the worlds; it clothes itself as a garment that surrounds them from above, through the deeds of the mitzvos. Each mitzvah draws a garment of Malchus onto the person as an Or Makif, as tefillin draw the four upper mochin.
רק שמתלבשת בבחי׳ לבוש ומקיף עליהם מלמעלה והיינו ע״י מעשה המצות
- Torah Ohr, Megillas Esther 1, ¶16He clothed Himself in the attribute of majesty and exaltation in order to be King over the world. This exaltation shines and spreads so that the worlds come from nothing into being, and it is the cause of the existence of the physical.
ה׳ מלך גאות לבש שנתלבש במדת גאות והתנשאות להיות בבחי׳ מלך על העולם
Stated differently
What the royal garment is: Malchus, G‑d’s attribute of kingship; the encompassing garment of Or Ein Sof itself, from Malchus of Ein Sof; or the Torah and mitzvos
שמדת מלכותו היא בחי׳ לבוש לחכמתו ורצונו ומדותיו ית׳His attribute of Malchus is a garment for His wisdom, will and middos, revealed in an added light above the order of hishtalshelus.
לבוש מלכות הוא לבוש אוא״ס עצמו המקיף את כולם בהשוואה אחתThe royal garment is the garment of Or Ein Sof itself, surrounding all equally, from which physical action came into being; it is called “royal” because it is from Malchus of Ein Sof, the last level, which clothes and surrounds all the worlds.
והענין כי הנה לבוש מלכות היינו בחי׳ תורה ומצותThe royal garment is Torah and mitzvos: the Torah, from Chochmah, is a garment for Or Ein Sof, and the mitzvos are garments in which Chesed is clothed.
Whether the garment conceals the divine light or reveals Or Ein Sof openly
ומה שכהיום נראו שמים וארץ גשמיים הוא מבחינת עולם מלשון העלם והעלם זה הוא מבחי׳ מלכותו ית׳Kingship, the garment, is a covering: the concealment that makes heaven and earth appear physical comes from His Malchus.
שיומשך ויאיר אור א״ס ב״ה הסוכ״ע בגלוי ממש בדברים הנעשים בהם המצותThe royal garment is the exaltation of Or Ein Sof; through the arousal from below, Or Ein Sof sovev kol almin shines openly in the physical things with which mitzvos are done, so that they become nullified to His light.
Main sources
Torah Ohr, Megillas Esther 1, ¶1Torah Ohr, Megillas Esther 1, ¶16Torah Ohr, Megillas Esther 1, ¶17Torah Ohr, Megillas Esther 2, ¶8Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim 15, ¶10Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim 16, ¶11Torah Ohr, Vayakhel 1, ¶17
Where it appears
In 69 paragraphs of 52 maamarim.
- Likkutei Torah, Behar 2 ¶16
- Likkutei Torah, Korach 1 ¶4 ¶7
- Likkutei Torah, Nasso 3 ¶5
- Likkutei Torah, Nitzavim 3 ¶8 ¶16
- Likkutei Torah, Pinchas 3 ¶15
- Likkutei Torah, Re’eh 3 ¶2 ¶3 ¶7
- Likkutei Torah, Rosh Hashanah 4 ¶2 ¶7
- Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim 16 ¶6 ¶11 ¶13
- Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim 18 ¶3
- Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim 19 ¶12
- Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim 23 ¶2
- Likkutei Torah, Tazria 4 ¶15
- Likkutei Torah, Tazria 6 ¶27
- Likkutei Torah, Tzav 10 ¶4
- Likkutei Torah, V’Zos HaBerachah 6 ¶4
- Likkutei Torah, Va’eschanan 4 ¶5
- Torah Ohr, Megillas Esther 1 ¶1 ¶16 ¶17 ¶28 ¶33 ¶34
- Torah Ohr, Megillas Esther 2 ¶8
- Torah Ohr, Megillas Esther 11 ¶19
- Likkutei Torah, Acharei 3 ¶5
- Likkutei Torah, Ki Seitzei 3 ¶3
- Likkutei Torah, Rosh Hashanah 3 ¶2 ¶7
- Likkutei Torah, Shelach 17 ¶1
- Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim 9 ¶6
- Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim 29 ¶9
- Likkutei Torah, Va’eschanan 9 ¶8
- Torah Ohr, Mikeitz 11 ¶12
- Torah Ohr, Vayakhel 1 ¶17 ¶21
- Likkutei Torah, Nasso 1 ¶22
- Likkutei Torah, Bamidbar 5 ¶22
- Likkutei Torah, Bamidbar 15 ¶20
- Likkutei Torah, Bamidbar 17 ¶1
- Likkutei Torah, Matos 6 ¶15
- Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim 15 ¶2 ¶10
- Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim 17 ¶11
- Torah Ohr, Tetzaveh 2 ¶21 ¶23
- Torah Ohr, Tetzaveh 4 ¶4
- Likkutei Torah, Shemini Atzeres 9 ¶5
- Likkutei Torah, Haazinu 1 ¶18
- Likkutei Torah, Masei 8 ¶9
- Likkutei Torah, Shelach 2 ¶14 ¶25
- Likkutei Torah, Tzav 2 ¶1
- Likkutei Torah, Haazinu 2 ¶6
- Likkutei Torah, Sukkos 4 ¶8
- Torah Ohr, Megillas Esther 10 ¶10
- Likkutei Torah, Beshalach 1 ¶35
- Likkutei Torah, Emor 2 ¶27
- Likkutei Torah, Nitzavim 6 ¶16
- Likkutei Torah, Shelach 14 ¶12
- Likkutei Torah, Shemini Atzeres 4 ¶10
- Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim 8 ¶6
- Torah Ohr, Megillas Esther 3 ¶1
Written with AI from the paragraphs of Torah Ohr and Likkutei Torah, each entry checked by a second AI reader and every Hebrew quote checked by code; not yet reviewed by a person. Our English: CC BY-NC 4.0.