~Thoughts on the Parsha~
Yom Kippur
And
Vezos Haberachah
Note: Vezos Haberachah is not read this Shabbos
Callous Confessions
By: Daniel Listhaus
יְחִי
רְאוּבֵן וְאַל יָמֹת וִיהִי מְתָיו מִסְפָּר: וְזֹאת לִיהוּדָה וַיֹּאמַר שְׁמַע ה' קוֹל
יְהוּדָה וְאֶל עַמּוֹ תְּבִיאֶנּוּ יָדָיו רָב לוֹ וְעֵזֶר מִצָּרָיו תִּהְיֶה
“May Reuvein live and not die, and may his men be in the count. And this
to Yehuda, and he said: Listen Hashem, to the voice of Yehuda, and to his
people shall You bring him; may his hands fight for him and may You be a Helper
against his enemies.”
-Vezos Haberachah 33:6-7
The mishna[1]
describes the process that the Beis Din HaGadol (The Supreme Court)
would go through with a woman who is a sotah. Before having her drink
the mei hamarim (literally- bitter waters), the beis din would
try to convince the suspected sotah to just admit that she indeed was
with the man that her husband warned her not to be with. After all, the mei
hamarim itself as well as its potential effect was no laughing matter. The
vital ingredient of the mei hamarim was that they would dissolve the parsha
of sotah into it – which contains Hashem's name. A sotah who
would not admit would have to drink this
water as a test. If indeed she had done what we suspect her of doing, her
insides would blow up and she would die.
The gemara[2]
elaborates that one of the steps of the persuasion process was that beis
din would tell her stories of people in Chumash who did improper
things (similar to the sotah) but were not embarrassed to admit to them.
So too, they try to tell her, she should learn from them and not let her
embarrassment overpower her to stop her from admitting what she did. The two
examples of stories that the gemara says that beis din would use
to illustrate their point are the ones which involves Reuvein and Yehuda.
Reuvein switched the beds in Yaakov's tent after Rachel died, deciding to take
action when he saw that Yaakov had chosen Bilhah (Rachel's maidservant) to take
her place instead of Leah. Beis din would relate this story to the sotah
and then say that Reuvein stood up to his actions, did teshuva (repentance),
and admitted to his father that it as he that switched the beds. Beis
din would then mention the episode of Yehuda and Tamar. Yehuda was mezaneh
(had marital relations) with Tamar without knowing who she was. When Yehuda
was later informed that Tamar had zenus with someone, his reaction was
that she should be put to death, However, when he realized that she had the
items that Yehuda had used to pay for her services, he admitted “tzadkah
me'meh'nee” - declaring that Tamar was righteous. Beis din would
then again suggest to the sotah that she too should admit to her actions
like Yehudah did.
The gemara continues to
mention that we see from the juxtaposition of passukim (verses) in this
week's parsha that it was Yehudah who actually caused Reuvein to admit
what he did. Rashi[3]
elaborates that Moshe was davening that the shevet (tribe) of Reuvein
should live in this world and “not die” in the next world – meaning that the
incident of him switching the beds in Yaakov's tent should not be remembered to
his detriment, because, as we see from the juxtaposition of the aforementioned passukim,
when Reuvein saw that Yehuda stood up and admitted, he took the opportunity to
do so as well.[4]
The important thing to keep in mind
though is that admitting one's sins to people is not something that is so
obvious that could be done. Unlike other religions, confessions to a Rabbi is
not a part of our teshuva process. We must confess personally to Hashem.
As a matter of fact it is not simple at all for someone to admit to his own
sins in public. After all, one is not allowed to say lashon harah even
about oneself unless it is serving a constructive purpose which falls
within the guidelines of hilchos lashon harah or if he is speaking to
someone he trusts who could help him conquer his nisyonos (moral tests).
Furthermore, as the gemara itself points out, we are not
permitted to go around announcing our aveiros – doing so would demonstrate
that we do not take our aveiros seriously. The gemara therefore
asks that granted Yehuda was allowed to admit what he did because in the
absence of doing so, Tamar would have been killed. However, how was Reuvein
able to admit? What he had done was long over with no such severe
ramifications, so what purpose did Reuvein's admitting serve? The gemara answers
that Reuvein admitted in order that Yaakov should not suspect his other
brothers. In other words, until Reuvein publicly admitted there was a little
thing that bothered Yaakov every time he spoke to one of his sons because in
the back of his mind he would wonder if perhaps this was the son who had
switched the beds. Therefore after Yehuda stood up to admit, Reuvein followed
suit.
We could see from this whole gemara
a fantastic concept. Here we have a sotah who will face a most unpleasant death by not admitting what she
did, as well as be responsible for having the Name of Hashem be erased. The beis
din, tries to convince her to admit and does so by bringing stories of
people who admitted even in order to save someone else's life and even to save
others from merely being suspect in their father's eyes. Indeed admitting
publicly is an incredibly scary thing. Yet, during the y'mei slichos, aseres
y'mei teshuva and especially on Yom Kippur itself, we find ourselves
admitting to whole lists of things that we have done. How could it be that a sotah,
who is already in all the headlines as a suspect having been warned by her
husband and witnessed by eidim (witnesses), and who is now facing death,
needs to be persuaded to admit in order not to have a Name of Hashem be erased
but yet we are able to show up comfortably in Shul alongside our friends
and spend all day asking forgiveness for aveiros we have done? The gemara
had said that one who is able to just admit his sins is someone shameless
and a mechatzef. So how could we come before Hashem in public and admit
to the things we have done?
There is no question that indeed
this is the method that must be used, we have so little of our own zechusim
(merits) and depend so heavily on Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov and the 13 Middos
of Rachamim (attributes of mercy), which Hashem promises He will never
return empty, as well as the power of coming as a tzibbur (community) to
ask Hashem to help us do teshuva. However, the big question is on us who
when we admit to the things we have done, it is with such callousness. Such an
absence of feeling while admitting to such horrible things could only be
because of one of three reasons: One reason could be that we look around us and
see that everyone is saying the same words. Yom Kippur is part of our
yearly calendar. It is not like we were caught “red handed”, rather we are
doing this on our own, just part of the routine of being a Jew. Therefore,
perhaps it does not seem as personal to us. A second possible explanation is
that we do not feel that the things we are saying are relevant to us. After
all, some of the things we admit to seem a bit extreme and we may think to
ourselves, “well, I may have done 'x', and given the opportunity I would
probably be willing to do 'y', but 'z' I would never go so far to do.” The
distance we may feel to the aveiros we are admitting to may make us feel
more relaxed and think that the tefillos and viduy are not so
relevant to us. A third possible explanation is that perhaps we have given up.
We stand in Shul and do a drum-roll on our chest by “ashamnu” and
the “al-cheit's” as we think to ourselves – I am who I am and there is
no way for me to change now.
However, these three fatal diseases
– for that is precisely what they are – as causes for our callous teshuva,
could not be further from the truth. First, the Chovos Halevavos[5]
writes that beyond what we could term as “chovas ha'eivarim” -
the responsibilities we have in using our bodies to do mitzvos, there is
another area of avodas Hashem which is chovas ha'leiv – what we
are expected to feel inside us constantly. The Chovos Halevavos offers
the following parable: The personal servant of a king is expected to take care
of every single need in the kings house at all times. It happens to be that
sometimes he is required to take care of the gardening, mowing the lawn, raking
leaves, etc. but those are not chores which are constantly present, but rather
tasks which are seasonal. So too we have mitzvos we do once a year, we
have mitzvos we do once a month, we have mitzvos we do once a
week, we have mitzvos we do once a day, and we have mitzvos we do
multiple times a day. However, there is also a category of mitzvos in
the heart which must be active every second. This is the realization that
Hashem exists and is the Ruler of the world, and that he knows our thoughts. So
as much as we could convince ourselves that we were not caught “red-handed” and
that we are just joining together in Shul for our yearly ritual, we are
dead wrong. Hashem knows what we did and what our intentions were. Therefore
when we admit to having done aveiros, it should feel real to us
and we should try to get at least a small feeling that we were really caught
red-handed, but are now given the chance to repent.
Second, although it may be true that
some of the parts of viduy sound extreme, it was intentionally designed
this way to include any aveirah we may have done. Every aveirah fits
into one of the categories in the al cheit's. Additionally, the Orchos
Tzadikkim[6]
writes that when we say “ashamnu...” and go through the aleph-beis,
we have the ability to personalize the viduy
and insert our own aveiros according to the aleph-beis, that
we are aware of and want to do specific teshuva for.
In response to the third cause of
callous confession, there is no such thing as giving up. As a Jew there is no
option to stay at a stagnant level. A person who stops growing hurts himself
exponentially because not only does he stop growing, but he starts falling. So
the one who convinces himself that he cannot change is lying because either way
he is changing – just for the worse and not for the better. What he really
means to say is that he is not capable of improving as a person according to
the Torah. However, such a despair is completely false. In Netzavim the
Torah[7]
states, “ For this commandment that I command you today, it is not hidden from
you and is not distant. It is not in the heavens...nor is it across the
sea....Rather, the matter is very near to you, in your mouth and in your heart,
to perform it.” The Ramban[8]
learns that these passukim refer to the mitzva of teshuva.
It is very near to us. We just have to make sure that we are doing it with more
than our mouth alone, but rather as the passuk describes, “with your
mouth and with your heart”.
Hashem has given us the opportunity
to join together as a tzibbur and do teshuva. Let us utilize the
opportunity to also make it more personal, even if it means taking just one
thing that we have done and think about it, regret it, admit to it, and to wok
hard on not doing it again. Perhaps in this way we will have a productive and
real Yom Kippur.
May Hashem help us not fall into the
traps of thinking that it is part of the routine, that it is not relevant, or
that it is too late. With this new focus may k'lal yisroel be zocheh to
do teshuva sh'leimah this Yom Kippur and may Hashem
respond by bringing Mashiach as we blow the shofar after Ne'ilah.
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