Siman 361

(22.) I heard in his name that he said he already has Torah discourses without garments — meaning he cannot clothe them in any garment. And he said: "The verse is merely an asmachta [textual support] — he leans the Torah discourse on the verse as one leans on something. Certainly the one leaning is greater than the one leaned upon. So too his Torah is very exalted — to the point where it cannot be clothed except by way of mere asmachta." And he said that the reason he labors so greatly before the Torah discourse is because it is very difficult for him to bring down the attainments of his Torah into garments... of words in which he could state it and reveal it; therefore he needs great exertions for this. See elsewhere on this (above, 15): his way o.b.m. before the Torah discourse was that he would sit with us for an hour or two and labor greatly with many movements and sighs. And although he sat in silence, his movements showed that he had very great exertions. And afterward he would open his mouth and begin to speak. And once I saw with my own eyes, at the moment he began to say the Torah discourse "Nine beloved rectifications, etc." (Likutey Moharan 20), that he repeated those words "nine beloved rectifications, etc." several times. And each time he grasped his beard with both hands, on both sides of the beard on his cheeks, almost tearing them out — the Tower of awe and self-sacrifice, boundless, that he had then. And it is already recorded (Sichos HaRan 210) that he said that anything he does in public is very, very hard upon him, and when he says a Torah discourse it seems to him that as soon as he produces the first utterance from his mouth his soul will depart; and likewise at the Kedusha it also seems to him that as soon as he produces the first utterance from his mouth and says it, his soul will depart: