(Insights from Chief Rabbi Goldstein’s Teachings on the Divine Spark Within Us)

In his profound exploration of Jewish wisdom, Chief Rabbi Goldstein illuminates a fundamental human tension: the deep, natural love we have for ourselves versus the Torah’s insistent call to love our neighbor as ourselves. The Torah also calls us to give selflessly and to connect with the Divine through acts of kindness. This is not a contradiction but an invitation to growth.

As Rabbi Goldstein explains around the 17:17–19:20 mark of his lecture, self-love is baked into our very essence—“Love your neighbor as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18) acknowledges that loving the self is the baseline, the core from which all other love flows. Yet this same self-awareness can tip into selfishness. This happens if our definition of “I” remains narrow.

The real struggle, he teaches, is learning to expand that “I” until it encompasses not just our body or even our soul. It must also include family, community, the Jewish people, all of humanity, and ultimately our unbreakable bond with God.

Expand I Unto The Whole World

This struggle is beautifully framed in Pirkei Avot 1:14, where Hillel declares:

“If I am not for myself, who will be for me? But if I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when?”

Rabbi Goldstein draws on the commentary of the great Talmudic scholar Rabbeinu Yonah (often referred to in the tradition as illuminating this Mishna) to show that the answer lies in how we define “self.” A person at the lowest level sees “I” as merely the body.

A slightly higher soul understands “I” as body and neshama—the divine soul. But the truly great soul expands further: “I” includes spouse, children, parents, community, and ultimately every human being created in God’s image. As Rabbi Goldstein notes around the 20:34–21:59 timestamp:

“The greater the person, the greater the expanded definition of the ‘I.’ … God placed within us the love of ‘I,’ the awareness of self. The greater the human being, the more they expand that sense of ‘I’ to make space for all of the other human beings. And that is the journey of growth.”

Please Hashem and Please Man

This expansion is the antidote to prejudice, racism, and division. It echoes another key teaching from Pirkei Avot 3:14, where Rabbi Akiva states:

“Beloved is man for he was created in the image [of God]. It is a sign of even greater love that it was made known to him that he was created in the image.”

And Pirkei Avot 3:10 reinforces the unity: one who pleases his fellow human beings pleases God Himself, because the soul of every person is a direct, intimate breath from the Divine—the same spirit God blew into the first human being, Adam.

Here is where reincarnation—gilgul neshamot, the cycling of souls—enters as the profound mechanism that allows this journey to continue beyond a single lifetime. Reincarnation is the only way to fully experience the soul’s never-ending life. The soul is eternal, a divine spark that cannot be extinguished.

Yet one short lifetime is rarely enough to complete its mission of tikkun (rectification), self-mastery, and the full expansion of the “I” to embrace all of creation. This is why some souls, upon understanding the reality of gilgul, find the courage to save another person’s life. Sometimes they do this even at great personal cost.

Save Your Life First

The classic desert scenario in the Talmud (where two travelers have only enough water for one) illustrates the tension: Torah law says “your life comes first.” But when a soul grasps reincarnation, the calculation shifts. Knowing that this life is but one chapter in an eternal story frees one from the narrowest form of self-preservation.

Saving the other becomes an act of expanding the “I” across lifetimes—because that other soul is part of the greater self, part of the collective Adamic blueprint. In this way, reincarnation transforms the struggle. It gives the soul multiple opportunities to choose generosity over selfishness, to love the neighbor as the self, and to fulfill the mitzvot that bind us to God and to one another.

This truth is hinted at in the powerful verses of Job 33:26-30 (especially 29-30):

“He prays to God, and He is favorable to him; he sees His face with joy, and He restores to man His righteousness. He looks upon men, and says, ‘I have sinned, and perverted what was right, and it profited me not.’ He has redeemed my soul from going into the pit, and my life shall see the light.” “Behold, God does all these things, twice, three times with a man, to bring back his soul from the pit, that he may be enlightened with the light of the living.”

To Learn The Light Of Life

Jewish mystical tradition, from the Zohar to the Arizal’s Sha’ar HaGilgulim, has long read these verses as a direct allusion to gilgul: God gives the soul two, three—or more—chances to return, to be pulled back from spiritual destruction, and to bask once more in the light of life. Each incarnation offers another opportunity to expand the self. It also gives a chance to repair what was left unfinished, and to live out the vision Rabbi Goldstein describes: seeing the godly soul in every person we meet.

For those writing on Adam as the Blueprint, Rabbi Goldstein’s teaching offers rich material. Adam HaRishon was not merely the first man; he was the primordial container of all souls. When God breathed the neshama into him with that intimate act of “blowing,”

He embedded the divine spark into the very prototype of humanity. Every subsequent soul carries a fragment of that original blueprint. Reincarnation allows these sparks to reunite, to heal, and to expand collectively across generations—turning the individual “I” into the cosmic “We.”

And for reflections on the Tree of Life, consider how the Torah itself is called the Tree of Life (Proverbs 3:18). The “details” of mitzvot—Shabbat, prayer, acts of kindness—that Rabbi Goldstein calls “the commentary” on the core vision of the godly soul are the branches and leaves that sustain eternal life. Reincarnation is the soul’s ascent up that Tree: lifetime after lifetime, climbing toward full rectification until every soul can declare, with Job, that it has been redeemed from the pit and now sees the light.

In the end, Rabbi Goldstein’s message is one of profound hope. The struggle between self and other is not a flaw—it is the very path to greatness. By expanding our “I,” recognizing the divine spark in every human being, and embracing the soul’s eternal journey through reincarnation, we tap into a transformative power. This can change not only our own lives but also the entire world. As Hillel taught: if not now—when?

May these words, drawn from Rabbi Goldstein’s wisdom and the eternal teachings of Torah, inspire us all to live with a greater, more inclusive sense of self—today, and across every lifetime our souls are granted.

Hazan Gavriel ben David