Likutei Moharan 36:3/ליקוטי מוהר"ן ל״ו:ג׳

13. Therefore, when reciting the first verse of the Keriat Shema, a person has to shut his eyes, corresponding to “a beautiful maiden who has no eyes.” This is because the rectification for the lustful thoughts that come to a person is for him to recite Shema and Barukh shem < kvod malkhuto l’olam va’ed with great concentration>.

2This is because the desire for adultery comes from a turbidity of the blood—i.e., from the spleen, which is Lilit, the evil maidservant, the mother of the mixed multitude, who is the Kingdom of Evil.

3But the Kingdom of <Holiness> corresponds to a mistress, “a God-fearing woman” (Proverbs 31:30). She is an aspect of the sea of Shlomo that stands on twelve oxen, who are the Twelve Tribes of God.

4So when a person accepts upon himself the yoke of the Kingdom of Heaven with these verses, through which his soul is encompassed in the Twelve Tribes of God, he separates his soul from the soul of the mixed multitude, who stem from the promiscuous woman, the evil maidservant. <Then, he> is in the aspect of “I am running away from my mistress Sarai” (Genesis 16:8) —the desire runs away and disengages from her. But if he does not labor to expel the promiscuous woman, then <God forbid, he brings about> the aspect of “a maidservant who usurps her mistress” (Proverbs 30:23).

5For in these two verses there are twelve words, paralleling the Twelve Tribes of God. And there are forty-nine letters, paralleling the forty-nine letters in the names of the Tribes of God. By accepting the yoke of the Kingdom of Heaven <with the two verses that are> an aspect of the sea of Shlomo, he disengages from the souls of the mixed multitude/evil maidservant/promiscuous woman, and is encompassed in the souls of the Tribes of God, an aspect of “a God-fearing woman.”

6This is an aspect of closing the eyes when accepting the yoke of the Kingdom of Heaven, to show that by accepting the yoke of the Kingdom of Heaven he is in the aspect of “a beautiful maiden who has no eyes”—[the eyes being] the desire that encompasses the evil traits of the seventy languages.