Lech Lecha — Go Forth
Hebrew: לֶךְ לְךָ | Book: Bereishit (Genesis)
Summary
God commands Abram to leave his homeland; the covenant between the parts; the birth of Ishmael; circumcision and the renaming to Abraham.
Chabad Chassidic Teachings
Lech Lecha — The Inner Journey
The command “lech lecha” — literally “go to yourself” — is read by Chassidus as the prototype of all spiritual work: leaving behind the comfortable, the familiar, and the ego-defined, and journeying inward toward one’s true Divine self.
The three things Abraham must leave — “from your land, from your birthplace, from your father’s house” — correspond in inner terms to:
- Your land (artzecha) — your habitual desires (ratzon, from eretz = will)
- Your birthplace (moladetecha) — your inborn character traits, the nature you were born with
- Your father’s house (beit avicha) — the conditioned patterns of thought inherited from upbringing
The spiritual lech lecha is the journey beyond all these layers to the essential soul.
Abraham as the Archetype of Chesed
Abraham embodies chesed (loving-kindness) — the expansive outpouring of love. Every Jewish soul contains a spark of Abraham’s soul-root, and chesed is the primordial spiritual impulse that mirrors God’s act of creation (the world was created through chesed).
The Covenant and Circumcision
Brit milah (circumcision) in Chabad thought: the orlah (foreskin) represents the extra layer of materiality that covers the spiritual power of the yesod (foundation/channel). Circumcision — removing the orlah — is the act of revealing the inner spiritual point that channels Divine energy into the world.
Lech Lecha and Outreach
The Rebbe taught that lech lecha is the eternal command to every Jewish soul: don’t stay comfortable in your spiritual homeland — go out, engage the world, bring light to where it hasn’t yet reached.
Key Concepts
Sources Cited
Bereishit 12:1; Zohar I:78a; Tanya Chapter 2