Yom Kippur 5645 First Ma'amar

Yom Kippur, in addition to being a day of atonement, is also a day of purification.  Just as mitzvos have positive effects on us, sins have negative effects on us and on our surroundings.  They sully our souls and distance us from the Creator.  We can fulfill the mitzvah of repentance by admitting our transgression, regretting it and committing not to repeat the wrong.  God will forgive us our sin and we will not be punished  However, does this automatically wipe the slate clean and purify us?

 

Chazal[1] teach us that when the sinners of Israel repent, the power of the Torah purifies them.  Chazal understand this from a pasuk in Yechezkeil (36:25), “וְזָרַקְתִּי עֲלֵיכֶם מַיִם טְהוֹרִים וּטְהַרְתֶּם מִכֹּל טֻמְאוֹתֵיכֶם .../I will throw upon you purifying waters and you will be purified from your impure state …”  Chazal[2] teach us, too, that water is a metaphor for Torah.  Sin causes an impure state but when we repent, Torah causes purification.  Significantly, Moshe Rabbeinu brought down the second luchos on Yom Kippur.[3]

The Sfas Emes teaches the difference between the first luchos and the second.  Preparations for the first time stressed holiness and separation from the mundane.  “... וְקִדַּשְׁתָּם הַיּוֹם וּמָחָר .../… prepare them today and tomorrow …” (Shmos 19:10)  The word that we translate as prepare comes from the root kodesh/holy.  The pasuk can thus be translated, “make them holy today and tomorrow.”

The stress of the second luchos was purification.  God was prepared to purify the nation after the idolatry of the golden calf.  While we can certainly repent, showing remorse for our actions, Chazal teach us that only God can wipe the slate clean and purify us.  Chazal learn this from a pasuk in Iyov (14:4), “מִי־יִתֵּן טָהוֹר מִטָּמֵא לֹא אֶחָד/Who can produce purity from impurity.  No one!”  Chazal[4], though, read this pasuk as, “Who can produce purity from impurity.  Is it not the One?”  Reaching this state of purification is the ultimate goal of the ba’al teshuva/penitent and God grants it through Torah.

We see from the two sets of luchos that the Torah provides one approach of serving God for the righteous – separation from the mundane, holiness – and a different approach for the ba’al teshuva – purification.  It is important to recognize this because not everything that is appropriate for one group is appropriate for the other.  It is important to understand that as ba’alei teshuva, our goal is purification through keeping and learning Torah, may we merit it!

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[1] Tanna deVei Eliyahu Rabba 18

[2] Bava Kama 17a

[3] Seder Olam Rabba 6

[4] Bamidbar R. 19:1

Yom Kippur 5655 First Ma'amar

Chazal[1] relate that the children of Israel fasted each day of the forty days preceding Yom Kippur, when Moshe Rabbeinu was on Mount Sinai to receive the second tablets.  On the fortieth day, the day that was to become Yom Kippur, they fasted the entire twenty-four hour period.  God was appeased and established that day as the day of forgiveness for all time.  The Sfas Emes teaches that certainly Aharon HaCohen, who was involved in the sin of the golden calf, also helped the nation to return to God to rectify that sin.  This is the reason that God's forgiveness each year is dependent upon the service of the High Priest.

Certainly fasting each day is a way of rectifying sin.  What, however, was the significance of fasting for the entire twenty-four hours of the last day?  Chazal[2] teach us that the nation was on a particularly high level of faith because we said, "נעשה ונשמע/We will do and we will listen." (Shmos 24:7)  We committed to whatever God commanded even before we knew what He would require of us.  This special level of commitment and faith was broken with the sin of the golden calf.  The Midrash[3] says, "You broke, 'נעשה/we will do.'  Be careful with 'נשמע/we will listen."

The nation understood that in order to rectify this, they would have to prove once again that they would do even without being required.  They therefore fasted on the entire day that would become Yom Kippur even before being required to do so.

As a result the luchos habris were given on Yom Kippur.  The words of the ten  commandments were engraved in the stone tablets.  As well, they were engraved in our own hearts, "כתבם על לוח לבך/Write them on the tablet of your heart." (Mishlei 3:3)  However, the sin prevented us from receiving the tablets both physically and in the spiritual sense.  As long as the sin was not rectified, we were not ready to receive the physical tablets and their words could not be engraved in our hearts.

However, after we were forgiven on Yom Kippur this all changed.  Chazal[4] teach us, though, that notwithstanding the repentance for the sin of the golden calf, the consequences of that sin are nevertheless included in every punishment that God metes on the nation in every generation.  The Sfas Emes teaches us that each year on Yom Kippur a small part of that sin is forgiven.  As a result every one of us, the entire nation merits entering the gates of holiness where a bit more of the holiness of the luchos is engraved in our hearts.

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[1] Tanna D'Bei Eliyahu Zuta 4

[2] Shabbos 88a

[3] Shmos R. 27:9

[4] Sanhedrin 102a

Yom Kippur 5640 First Ma'amar

It is a mitzvah to eat and drink on the day before Yom Kippur in preparation for the fast.  Chazal teach us that whoever eats and drinks on the ninth of Tishrei is considered to have fasted on both the ninth and tenth of Tishrei.[1]  It is certainly a good idea to eat before a fast.  But why is this not simply good advice?  Why is it actually a mitzvah, a biblical requirement?  A mitzvah implies that the activity has value in and of itself.  What value does the activity of eating on Erev Yom Kippur have aside from preparing for the fast?

Chassidic masters[2] write that eating on Erev Yom Kippur rectifies all the eating of the entire year.  The masters are not referring to eating non-kosher food.  Rather they are referring to eating kosher food.  Why does our eating need rectification?  Chazal tell us that this world is likened to a hallway leading to a hall.[3]  Chazal teach us that we need to prepare ourselves in the hallway of this world in order to merit entering the hall of the next world.  We need to use this world to prepare for entering the next world.  Eating and drinking are essentially neutral activities.  Our intent imbues the activity with meaning.  If we partake of the pleasures of this world represented by eating and drinking, for the sole purpose of preparing ourselves for the next world, we’ve performed a mitzvah.  If we partake of this world’s pleasures merely to satisfy our desires and lusts, we are using this world in an inappropriate way and we have sinned.

The Sfas Emes explains that this physical world enclothes the next world, which is spiritual, similar to the way our physical bodies enclothe our souls.  Just as our actions affect our souls, physical activity in this world has spiritual ramifications in the next.  We find, for example, a pasuk in Iyov (27:17), “יָכִין וְצַדִּיק יִלְבָּשׁ .../(The wicked) will prepare and the righteous will wear it …”  This refers to the gross physicality that enclothes the spirituality of the righteous.  Our sinful actions therefore require rectification.  They have caused damage that needs to be and can be fixed. 

Eating and drinking with improper intent require rectification.  In order to help our repentance on Yom Kippur we need to reenact the deed by eating and drinking on Erev Yom Kippur.  Why?  Chazal teach us that repentance is denied the one who sins rationalizing that he will eventually repent.[4]  The Sfas Emes explains that this is because the repentance is flawed.  The sin is in the repentance itself.  During the act of the sin, the sinner is thinking about the eventual repentance.  From this we learn that the opposite is the case as well.  Thinking about the act of the sin during the repentance rectifies that act.  We reenact the activity of the sin with proper intentions in order to remind us of the sinful act during repentance.   

Yom Kippur represents the next world.[5]  Just as in the next world so too on Yom Kippur there is no eating or drinking.[6]  Eating and drinking on Erev Yom Kippur in preparation for Yom Kippur reminds us that we are supposed to partake of this world’s pleasures to prepare for the next world.

The act of eating and drinking in preparation for the fast reminds us of the correct approach to eating and drinking during the entire year and in fact rectifies the eating and drinking that we did during the year merely to satisfy our desires.  Experiencing the proper approach to eating and drinking on Erev Yom Kippur is a powerful tool to ensure a complete repentance on Yom Kippur.  May we merit it!

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[1] Yoma 81b

[2] Tiferes Shlomo 43a

[3] Avos 4:16

[4] Yoma Mishna 8:9

[5] Shelah Pesachim 110 in addendum

[6] Brachos 17a