According to Rav Yosef Ber Soloveitchik, Chazal saw prayer as a an audience between the King and a prominent individual thus requiring us to stand straight, dress in good clothes and address Hashem directly. Hashem has given us this special privilege to approach him three times a day, only because we have a precedent from the Avos who approached Him this way.

In Selichos, we approach Hashem, not from the greatness of a man before a King, but from the opposite assumption, based on man’s weakness, loneliness and helplessness. Selichos are filled with one idea, how can lowly man possibly approach G-d? Our right to approach Hashem in Selichos is based on the Gemora in Rosh Hashanah (17b) where it is recorded that Hashem told Moshe that “Every time that Israel sins, let them perform this service (13 Attributes of Mercy) and I will pardon them.” .

These two approaches to prayer perhaps provide another answer to the question of why we don’t say viduy (confession), which is an essential component of Teshuva (along with regret and commitment to avoid transgression in the future) on Rosh Hoshana. Three of the approaches to this question are 1) on the Day of Judgement, we don’t want to mention our transgressions; 2) on this day we practice Hirhur Teshuva, which is a preparation for actual Teshuva; 3) we are actually performing the commitment to the future aspect of Teshuva. But at the end of the day, this is one of the ten days of Teshuva, when Hashem is especially accessible to grant atonement for our sins, so why don’t we take advantage with full Teshuva?

Another possible answer is that based on the two types of prayer, there are actually two types of Teshuva. The first is a general return to the ways of Hashem, the Teshuva mentioned in Parsha Nitzavim. The theme of Rosh Hoshana is that Hashem is King and He has a plan from the beginning of creation through the giving of the Torah at Sinai and culminating with the coming of Moshiach. The mitzvah of the day, the Shofar, is to tell us to pay attention to the plan, just as we were notified of the plan with the Shofar at Sinai and will be notified with the coming of Moshiach. This is our day to choose to be an integral part of the plan, to approach G-d from our potential greatness, just as we approach the King in the Shemoneh Esrai.

The second type of Teshuva is the atonement for the mistakes of the past. To achieve this atonement we need the full battery of viduy, regret and future committment. We must come to Hashem and admit that we have serious deficiencies as a result of our thoughts and actions and we are asking Hashem to help eliminate the stains we have created. This Teshuva requires the prayer of Selichos with our admission of weakness and helplessness, and the turning towards Hashem for help, as He directed us when he gave us the 13 Middos.

On Rosh Hoshana we are focused on the coming before the King, the positive commitment to Teshuva, drawing on the potential greatness of man. We sing and pray about the King, His plan and our commitment to our role. On the rest of the days of Teshuva we have to clean up our deficiencies, it’s the Teshuva of atonement, with its Viduy, regret, commitment, and Selichos.

As Baalei Teshuva we are well aware of these two types of Teshuva. We know we have many deficiencies in areas such as Torah knowledge, Torah non-compliant acts, and the many character traits we must work on. But at the same time we have all had the opportunity to explicitly sign on to the plan. When we decided to accept the yoke of Mitzvos and change significant parts of our lives, we demonstrated our striving for greatness in our service of the King.

When we held the Beyond BT Passaic Shabbaton many years ago, I mentioned these two aspects of Baalei Teshuva, our many deficiencies and our growth orientation and commitment to Torah. One speaker, a Baal Teshuva, jokingly remarked that until today he didn’t realize he had so many problems, while another speaker, who is frum from birth, remarked that the reason he came to the Shabbaton and “religiously” reads Beyond BT is because he wants to be part of a group that is so committed to their own and each other’s growth.

As we approach the Yomin Noraim we need to focus on both types of Teshuva. We have to accept and understand that we have our deficiencies, our stains, our areas to improve – and here we need the Teshuva of viduy and of atonement. We also have to realize that although we may have signed up for the plan many years ago, we have to re-enlist on a yearly basis.

Rosh Hoshana is the day when we get a clear picture and the need to strive for the greatness that the picture offers. We must try to work up to the same enthusiasm we had in our original commitment. These dual messages of Teshuva have the potential to unite all Jews as we are all Baalei Teshuva when we commit to our potential greatness, while at the same time recognizing, admitting and continuing to work on our deficiencies.

May we all have a Kesiva V’Chasima Tova.

Elul is coming which means that the Teshuva season is about to begin. If we want to have a successful Rosh Hoshana and Yom Kippur, seforim strongly advise us to start early in the month. It’s a tremendous opportunity for growth and we’d be foolish not to take advantage of it.

Most of the current day Rebbeim advise us to pick something small. Maybe saying Asher Yotzar with Kavanna, or pausing before we speak on occasion or perhaps starting an extra 10 minute seder in Mussar, Mishnah or Tanach. The sky is truly the limit, but we have to start reaching for it when Elul begins.

Being that our goal is to get closer to Hashem and we’re doing mitzvos to accomplish that goal, it might make sense to try to do the mitzvos with a little more Kavanna. There are three simple thoughts we can have before doing any mitzvah:

1) Hashem commanded us to do the mitzvah
2) We are the ones being commanded
3) And the specific mitzvah, whose commandment we are fullfilling is …. (whatever mitzvah you are doing)

It’s really pretty simple and it will help us get so much more mileage out of the mitzvos we already do.

Here’s a few resources for extra motivation:

Stepping Stones to Repentance: A thirty-day program based on Ohr Yisrael the classic writings of Rav Yisrael Salanter By: Rabbi Zvi Miller here’s an excerpt

DAY ONE: “BOUNDLESS BLESSINGS”
“There is no enterprise that yields profit like preparation for the Day of Atonement. Through studying Mussar and reflecting on how to improve one’s ways, a person is inspired on Yom Kippur to make resolutions for the future. Even the smallest, most minute preparation to enhance one’s Yom Kippur experience is invaluable, bringing boundless blessings of success. It saves one from many troubles — and there is no greater profit than this.” (Ohr Yisrael, Letter Seven, p. 193)

Rebbetzin Tzipora Heller – Three Steps to Genuine Change. An excerpt:

In the course of our lives, we close doors to higher and deeper selves and sometimes forget that we, too, are more than earners, spenders, and travelers through life. Our thoughtless enslavement to mindless routine can leave us without much of a relationship to our souls. In a materialistic society, it is all too easy to view others as competitors. As toddlers we observed that when you have three cookies and give one away, all you have left are two. From that point onward we are afraid to give.

R’ Dovid Schwartz – Rabbi Yonah of Gerona – Guilt is Good – mp3

R’ Daniel Stein – Hilchos Teshuva Introduction – mp3

R’ Moshe Schwerd – Din V’Cheshbon – mp3

R’ Yakov Haber on Rosh Hoshana and Hirhur Teshuva according to Rav Soloveitchik can be downloaded here.

R’ Yakov Haber on Rosh Hoshana davening can be downloaded here.

Originally posted August 14, 2007

As a person enters the Yommim Noraim there are two, possible paths and feelings that they may experience:

Path #1:

The teshuvah process starts with our supplications during Slichos the week before Rosh Hashannah with prayers such as “To us Hashem is shame-facedness; unto You is Tzedukah”. The days of Slichos pass with deep introspection as the “Day of Judgment” looms ever closer. A sense of trepidation envelops us as we consider how will the scales of Judgment on this day be balanced? Will there be enough mitzvos to tip the scale of merit or the opposite, chas v’Shalom? Will we be written on the book of Life or ……

Rosh HaShannah arrives. While we partake of apples dipped in honey, angles tremble in the celestial spheres above – the world is being judged. Our prayers reflect their trembling and we fill them with supplication. Who can be found without flaws on this awesome day? We beseech Hashem to silence the Accuser and to bless our year with an abundance of life, children and sustenance. The shofar cries forth mirroring the sounds of the soul’s sobbing for deliverance.

The Ten Days of Teshuvah are spent with a keen awareness of how “Teshuvah, Tefillah and Tzedukah avert the severity of the decree!”. We work to add merit to ourselves so that any accusations can be erased and these merits can seal us in the Book of Life for a good and sweet year. We seek the forgiveness of those whom we may have wronged so that we may also be forgiven by Hashem in turn.

Yom Kippur is spent with tears of remorse as our prayers recount our sins and we lament our past. Neliah offers the last opportunity for teshuvah as “the gates of prayer are closing”.

Path #2:

Rosh Chodesh Elul ushers in the “month of accounting”. We take stock and reflect on how the past year was spent in avodas Hashem. It marks the second ascension of Moshe Rebbainnu on Har Sinai to receive the Second Tablets; “Just as the first 40 days were days of auspiciousness, so too are the days from Rosh Chodesh Elul until Yom HaKippor”….. We take advantage of Elul representing an “Ari Miklat”, a “city of refuge” where we utilized our time to complete any lacking in our avodas Hashem and to propel us forward to a state of “All of you are standing this day….”

With three weeks of introspection as well as increasing in Torah, prayer and gemilas chassudim – we turn to Hashem during Slichos and pray “The merciful Judge who answers the poor – answer us!”. While we indeed pray “To us Hashem is shame-facedness; unto You is Tzedukah” – our “shamefacedness” is from recognizing Your greatness. We feel transparent like a candle flickering under the blinding light of the sun at high noon. “unto You is Tzedukah” – we do not request to be judged measure for measure and receive only a limited shining of Your countenance [which would be “Tzedek”, “judgment”] but rather we pine for Your tedukah – an unearned and unlimited radiance of Your Shechinah [“Tzedukah”]. The month of Elul and the week of Slichos provides us the general preparation needed to enter into the coronation of our King:

The Shofar blasts forth as we completely submit to Your will. Yes, we request an abundance of blessings for life, children and sustenance but only so that we may fulfill Hashem’s ultimate desire to have a dwelling place in this material world.

The Ten Days of Teshuvah are spent striving for deeper levels of intimacy with Hashem through our teshuvah, tefillah and tedukah. We seek to repair our relationships since those who are beloved to the one we love, become beloved to us.

Finally, Yom Kippur arrives. We sing our viduy as we are cleansed with the sweat of our mitzvos and tears of joy – we have returned to who we really are and are united completely with our Heavenly Father. Yes, the gates are closing with Neliah – let them close – so that Hashem can be completely alone with His beloved bride – Klal Yisrael.

Two paths – each a 100% “kosher” derek in avodas Hashem. One emphasizes fear of Hashem; the other – love of Hashem. One emphasizes the lowliness of a person; the other – the greatness of Hashem. Each has an advantage the other doesn’t but:

Whereas tears unlock the gates of Heaven, joy bursts through its very walls….

May our teshuvah merit that we experience the sound of the Shofar HaGadol and surely we will be blessed with the ultimate of blessings – the return of our exiles to Zion and the building of the final Beis Hamikdash with the heralding of the complete Redemption.

Originally Posted Sept 21, 2006

As BT’s we’ve made some pretty amazing changes in our lives. And we all know it was very difficult.

But if you’ve been Shomer Shabbos for 10+ years, you know that teshuva becomes more difficult. The changes have to go beyond behavioral and deep into the character.

So what keeps you going?

What tools and techniques have you found useful?

Are you using a different tools, than you did we you first became frum?

Do you know anyone who relates to the idea of repentance with joy and happiness? Looking forward to that sore tuchas from sitting so long in synagogue? Can there be trepidation for the Day of Judgment and awe for the Day of Atonement and also an uplifted positive spirit? You bet your sore tuchas.

It’s all a matter of focus. When you are doing teshuva, repentance before the High Holy Days, every effort you make is rewarded. You are placed in a win/win situation. If you are able to better yourself in anyway, you will reap infinite rewards in this world and the next. When a law student is up for the Bar Exam it is either pass or fail. There is no credit given for the years of law school or the late nights preparing. You are either confirmed a lawyer or not. One gentleman in Los Angeles worked as a law clerk for 24 years taking the exam twice a year and failing each time until finally he was able to pass. Of course, you have to admire his persistence. But in the physical world, there is no real reward for preparing for the Bar Exam. In the spiritual world it is the opposite. You can feel joy every time you make the smallest effort on behalf of your soul.

The word “repentance” brings up concepts of Heaven and Hell, reward and punishment, which makes many people uncomfortable. If you are one of these people, you need to change the words. Don’t think about repenting; think about spiritual growth. You can use any words you want – “I’m giving myself a mental floss.” Or “I’m getting a moral upgrade with more speed and more memory.” Does it really matter what words you use? The main thing is to do something, anything to effect a better person.

When you think about it, each one of us is like a sculpture. We are created as raw material and our job in this life is to mold, shape, sculpt a more perfect you. Hopefully, every new year you are a tiny bit wiser and have the ability to look over all of your values and principles. Make a list of your goals. Ask yourself if you want to have more or better friends. Ask yourself if any one of your close relationships could be better. Work on controlling anger. Work on being more forgiving. Work on being less materialistic. Whatever you want. This is the time period that is ripe for introspection and self-growth. Now is the time that the spiritual world opens up to aid you in your quest to be a better person.

Any accomplishment in the physical world can only cause temporary joy. If you win a bowling trophy it only gives you joy to take it out and impress someone who hasn’t seen it yet. The experience of winning a game is momentary. The St. Louis Cardinals won the World Series last year. This year nobody really cares. It’s a new season; a new team. Now is the time to focus on spirituality. Ask yourself if by next year you want to be on a higher level of spirituality. Do you want to be less petty? Do you want to have more respect for yourself? Do you want to know how to love more?

In the time leading up to the holidays the joy is not only in the accomplishment of achieving growth in an area you want to grow in, the joy is in knowing that you have a spiritual benefit in just trying. Make a small effort, and be happy to be connected to spirituality and your Jewish roots.

Originally Published on Sept 7, 2007

Like everyone, I have my faults. I spoke a bit of lashon hara last week. I squabbled with my husband because our overdraft is plumbing the depths of our bank account; and I skipped bentching on shabbos because it was just us for lunch and I couldn’t be bothered.

But ultimately, I believe that I am accountable for all of these ‘little’ things, and that on Yom Kippur, if I don’t properly hold myself to account, then G-d will do it for me in a myriad of wonderfully aggravating ways.

Yom Kippur Teshuva and Baal Teshuva Teshuva are similar inasmuch as they are both ultimately a search for truth, and an attempt to get past all the little lies and flattery we feed ourselves to see who we really are, and whether we are really living up to the covenant agreed by our forefathers.

But I find Yom Kippur Teshuva is harder. It’s harder because when you are a BT you get very used to swimming against the stream. Becoming a BT is a constant battle against the people who think you’ve turned into a religious fanatic, and the people who you think are giving religion a bad name by acting like a religious fanatics. You get used to it; perhaps a part of you even relishes the fight – because you are fighting for a just cause.

And when you know that pursuing the truth in the secular world is often a lonely calling, it doesn’t bother you so much to be doing it alone.

But come Yom Kippur, I’m aching to go to shul and to feel like part of a wider community, asking Hashem to have mercy on us as individuals, as a kehilla and here in Israel, as a country, too.

But it’s just so hard. It’s hard because in many shuls, even where everyone is outwardly observant, there is a palpably complacent sense that ‘G-d will understand’. And, ‘I’m really a good person’. G-d is educated, you see. He knows that we all have busy lives, and that we both need to work long hours in order to pay for the house and the two cars and the expensive High Holiday tableware.

He appreciates that after a long day at the office, we are too tired to visit a sick friend, take a meal to a newborn’s mother or watch our neighbour’s kid for a couple of hours.

But I often wonder if the value system that we judge ourselves by is the one that Hashem himself uses. Sure, we say vidui and we bash our chests, but how many of us actually take a moment to really internalize what we are saying? We do lie, steal and cheat. We do embarrass other people and act insensitively. We are selfish and lazy – and these things apply to pretty much anyone you’ll meet in any shul in the world. And let’s not even get started on the fraudsters and adulterers.

Yet most of us act as if the millions of things we do wrong a year are petty infractions that G-d will wink at come Yom Kippur.

I was recently at a shiur where we were discussing the power of prayer. One of the participants told us that she doesn’t believe it makes any difference, but she still does it as a form of therapy.

In our secret souls, I’m sure that many of us would agree with her. Yom Kippur is not so much about making amends to G-d, as much as about making ourselves feel better.

And that’s why I find Yom Kippur Teshuva harder than becoming a Baal Teshuva. Every year, I wish that my neighbours in shul and I were on the same page, and that we all honestly believed that we had done some serious sinning that we needed to atone for, and that our prayers really matter.

And every year, I realize that most of us are just going through the motions. I’ve realized that even in a shul full of observant people, the path towards truth is still one you often tread alone.

Originally published on Sep 27, 2006.

By Rucheli Manville who posts great photos and writings at Rucheli’s Ramblings.

There was once a young man. He was raised in a good home filled with positive influences. He had the best education in a great community. His parents set him on a straight path towards success, but he had his own ideas of what he wanted from life. And so the downward spiral began. He started indulging in the “pleasures” of life… He demanded meat; he started drinking more wine than normal. His parents tried to curb his newly-formed habits and give him life advice, but to no avail. He declined to listen to them, and worse, he demanded that they fund his selfish habits! No matter what his parents did, he refused to turn his life back around. Left with no other choice, his parents are instructed by the Torah to bring him before the Beis Din (Jewish court) to have him sentenced to death. A tragic ending to what could have been such a promising life…

This is the story of the “wayward and rebellious son” in the parshah, Ki Seitzei. The Talmud (in Sanhedrin 71b) tells us that this story never actually happened… that in all the years of history, not a single “rebellious son” was ever actually found among the Jewish people. Supposedly, it was included in the Torah so that we can reap the reward for learning something simply l’shem shamayim, for the sake of Heaven. Well, I’m not normally one to disagree with the Sages of the Talmud… but they’re wrong. The story of the rebellious child has actually happened. Don’t believe me? Just ask my parents.

My parents, thank G-d, did a fantastic job raising my sister and I. We lived in a modest home in a great neighborhood in one of the top areas of South Florida. I went to the best elementary, middle, and high schools in the state. My parents taught me self-confidence, self-motivation, and self-worth. I excelled at whatever I chose to do, and graduated high school with a full-ride offer to not one, but dozens of different colleges. I knew that within 10 years of graduating high school, I would be making 6 figures and be well on my way to becoming a CEO of a Fortune 500 Tech company.

I went away to university and things were right on track. My grades were great, I had incredible internships with some of the top engineering companies in the world, and life was good. Little did I know that a crazy Rabbi dressed in a penguin suit, along with his wife, was about to turn my life completely upside down…

A little bit of background first. When I started college, I was a “devout” atheist. I preached atheism. I was 100% convinced that science had a perfectly reasonable and logical explanation for everything. It came with the territory: I was an industrial engineer by trade with the small side hobby of quantum physics. Yet my Jewish soul was still alive and kicking after all those years of being suppressed once I had given up my Judaism after laining (chanting) this very parshah on my 13th birthday. Yes, my bat mitzvah was on my 13th birthday instead of my twelfth. Yes, I lained. Anyway, once I got to college I began looking for Jewish groups on campus. Not for the “religious” aspect of it, of course. I just missed the synagogue’s social scene. (At least that’s what my subconscious tricked my evil inclination into thinking.) And so I tried out Hillel at UCF. They had a nice building and plenty of money, but like David Brooks of the New York Times said last week, they had gone too far and “crossed the Haimish line.” It felt too cliquey and impersonal for me. At the time there were no other options, and so I decided that it just wasn’t meant to be and dove headfirst into the engineering and honors clubs instead. For the next year, Judaism was pushed to the back of my mind again.

This was my mental state when the Lipskiers moved to Orlando during my second year of college. Now, I’m not sure how he did it, but Rabbi Lipskier, being totally in tune with the times, somehow found a way to get the email address of every Jew on campus and proceeded to spam us constantly. From the second they moved into town, I had at least three event invitations in my inbox every week. Shabbat, a class, a barbecue, you name it. He even went on to campus a few days a week to hunt us down. Now for a while, I managed to successfully ignore their blatant attempts at attracting students to their events, but eventually they wore me down. And so one day, I called my mom.

“Sooo there’s this new Jewish group on campus and they’ve been spamming me with invites to stuff nonstop for a few weeks so I’m thinking about just going to check it out…”

She was SO excited that I actually wanted to do something reminiscent of my childhood days in Temple Sunday School. “Really? That’s great! What’s the group called?”

And so I told her: “I dunno, Cha-bad or something.”

And her response? “Oh my G-d, Kabad?! DON’T GO!”­­­

She then proceeded to spend the next seven and half minutes lecturing to me about how ‘Kabad’ is that group of crazy people that walk on Saturdays and they brainwash people and they oppress women because they’re so old-fashioned and that under no circumstances whatsoever should I set foot anywhere near this so-called Jewish group.

But, like the rebellious son, I could only listen to my parents for so long and so started the “downward spiral.” About three weeks after that conversation (and to be totally honest, I’m surprised it actually took three weeks), I decided to go check out ‘Cha-bad’ anyways. And so I called up Rabbi Lipskier at about 4:30pm on a Friday afternoon (which we all know is just about the worst time ever to call a Rabbi) and proceeded to explain at length how I kind-of wanted to come check out this event thing he was doing that night… but I didn’t know what it was, and I hadn’t been to Temple in about six years, and I didn’t know how to pray, and I didn’t know what to wear, and, and, and… And so Rabbi cut me off mid-sentence and told me to stop worrying, wear whatever I was wearing, and just show up at such-and-such address in three hours. And so, three hours later, I showed up to the Lipskiers’ house wearing jeans, a tank-top, and a pair of flip-flops. For Shabbat, my very first one.

Of course, like any Chabad family would do, Rabbi and Rivkie took me in with open arms despite my completely-underdressed-for-the-occasion attire. It was the exact opposite of the experience I had at Hillel. It was warm, the food was delicious, the people were friendly, and the conversation was relaxed. And somewhere deep inside, my little spark of G-dliness –my Jewish soul– was having a ball. And so I went back the next week. And the week after that. Rapidly it became my weekly pre-game before Friday frat-parties and clubbing. I mean, who wouldn’t want a four-course meal and several glasses of wine before meeting up for a night on the town??

After about a month, I think I finally told my oh-so-pleased mother. And after a few more weeks, I started going to the Tuesday night “Kabbalah and Kabobs” barbeques also. And then I started going over on Thursdays to help Rivkie cook for Shabbat. And eventually I started going on Sunday for the infamous “BLT” (Bagels, Lox, and Tefillin) event, even though I wasn’t exactly putting on tefillin. Before long, I added in Wednesday women’s programs, Monday night classes, and even gave up my hung-over Saturday mornings for some quality “family” time at the Chabad house. It was an addiction, I was out of control. I was losing myself… thank G-d.

That summer, my Rabbi convinced me to go on Birthright to Israel with the Mayanot program. I went. It was the most incredible experience of my life, and I loved it so much that I extended my trip and backpacked around Israel with six total strangers. One of them was the guide from my trip, a modern-Orthodox-ish college student from FIU. So even though the rest of us weren’t at all observant, we were respectful. The result was that when I got back to the states, I was keeping Shabbos(ish), Kosher(ish), and was even dressing more Tznius(ish). I wasn’t observant by any means, but turning off my phone on Friday nights and lighting Shabbos candles, paired with giving up pork, and on top of that, always covering my knees and shoulders (even if it was a t-shirt and jeans) was a HUGE deal for someone who was raised as Reform as it gets. And so when I got home, my mom broke down and cried. Literally, on the floor pleading with me not to be crazy because she would never see her grandchildren because she wasn’t Jewish enough for me. It was ridiculous, and it was all my fault… all a result of my rebellion.

Just as things were starting to get better and my family was getting used to my unruly behavior, I went with the Lipskiers to Crown Heights for my first Chabad Shabbaton. It was like a different planet… a whole city of penguin-looking rabbis and women wearing way too much clothing. I was overwhelmed, but something about it was entrancing. The modesty, the confidence, the respect people had for each other… it was enticing to someone who grew up in a culture of “bare all or be nothing.” I was hooked.

Before I even realized what was happening to me, it started getting more serious… All of the sudden I was demanding to have special (Kosher) red meat on Fridays and Saturdays… And I was drinking more wine than normal (making my own Kiddush when I was at home with the parents)… I started talking more about G-d than about my plans for taking over the tech world. I spent more time reading Chabad.org than the latest articles about the Big Bang. I stopped wearing all the nice clothes that my mom had bought me and started buying a whole new wardrobe full of “frumpy” skirts. And worst of all, I expected my parents to fund all of my crazy new habits. I had to have been the epitome of the rebellious child in the eyes of my family. Why couldn’t I just be normal?! But no matter what they did, no matter what they said, I refused to turn my life back around.

I’m sure there were times that my parents would have dragged me off to Beis Din if they had remembered the parshah I had read all those years ago. Fortunately, they didn’t. Not that it would have mattered, since keeping Torah and Mitzvos wouldn’t have seemed so rebellious in the Beis Din’s eyes anyway. But still, it was a cause of much strife in my family.

My grandfather was really the only one who was okay with everything that was going on at the beginning. One of the acronyms of Elul is “Es levavcha v’es levav”, speaking about how “G-d will circumcise your heart and the heart of your children,” an act that will arouse teshuvah (return). Well, it must have skipped my parents’ generation, but in Hashem’s quirky idea of humor, I was the one bringing it around full-circle. Grandpa’s acceptance was a start, and before I knew it, things were getting better. It wasn’t long before my family was making Glatt-Kosher Christmas dinners so that I could come home for the holidays (oh, the irony) and adjusting to my incessant need to dress like it’s mid-winter outside. I wouldn’t say that they were quite happy, but they were no longer ready to disown me.

I kept finding new ways to push my limits, to stoke the fire of rebellion just a little more. Eight days in the Florida Keys with 100 Jewish girls for Bais Chana’s Snorkel and Study program. A few more college Shabbatons in Crown Heights. The Sinai Scholars class on campus. Random plane trips to New York to visit the grave of a man I never met but felt like I had known my whole life. Lavish five-star JLI retreats every summer to listen to Jewish topics that no one else in my family cared about. But no matter how many curve balls I threw, my family adapted with ease.

Left with no other choice, I did something totally insane. You’re adjusting to my rebelliousness? Well then, that’s no longer rebelling! I’ll push you even further!! And so, almost exactly a year ago, I turned down a full-time engineering position making $65K a year to go be dirt-broke in a yeshiva somewhere in the middle of Israel. Surely, that would push any parent completely over the edge… and they lost it. Again.

My sense of social responsibility was completely out the door, I had no regard for the economic welfare of myself or those closest to me, and I had clearly given up on the idea of ever using my brain. I had effectively reduced myself to a life of “sitting in the kitchen and popping out babies,” as my sister so eloquently put it.

Hardly discouraged, I spent the year living life to the fullest. I was soaking up information like a sponge, trying desperately to catch my pathetic childhood Jewish education up to par with my college degree in engineering in the span of 10 months in a Beis Medrash. I was taking trips to places that could be found nowhere else on earth. I was walking on the same stones that my ancestors walked on thousands of years ago, when the Temple still stood. I was tired, I was poor, and I was loving every single minute of my time at Mayanot.

A few weeks after I got to Israel, my dad got a camera and Skype. We talked face-to-face for the first time in a little over a month. He had a beaming smile on his face the whole time, a novelty for my emotionally-grey father. When I asked why he was in such a good mood, he answered, “I wish you could see your face. I’ve never seen you so happy in my life.”

That was it. That was the turning point. I was happy, truly happy, and my family could finally see it. I guess distance really does make the heart grow fonder. Within a few months, my dad was more supportive than he had been since he was my softball coach when I was 12 years old. My mom and I were racking up triple digit phone bills again. My little sister was over the fact that she had a freak for a sibling. My grandpa started reading articles and watching videos on Chabad.org and TorahCafe.com and my grandma started lighting Shabbos candles again for the first time in decades. The tables had turned… The rebellion had spread. We’re all rebelling now, rebelling against the status quo, rebelling against this materialistic world with its fake morals and pathetic values system. We’re rebelling against the idea that money buys happiness. We’re looking for more out of this life, and I’m no longer the only one finding what I’m looking for in the letters of Torah.

The last four and a half years have been a constant battle, always uphill and never easy. But that’s what this parshah, my parshah, is all about… ki seitzei, going out to war. In this case, against myself. And although I’ve won many battles, the war continues on. But this month is Elul, and that makes the struggle completely different. Ki seitzei is always read in Elul, a time for teshuvah, a time for return. It’s time to win the battle and go back to what’s important.

And so, I’ll close with a blessing… may we all continue to live “ki seitzei.” May we constantly go out from our comfort zones; l’milchama – to go to war; al oyvecha – over our enemies, the yetzer hora and material desires; un’sano Hashem Elokecha B’Yadecha – we should always be able to realize that Hashem is on our side and that He will help us win these battles. And let us right now shavisa shivyoi – capture the captives of the yetzer hora, and let us recapture our souls and our very lives. May the beautiful spark that has been trapped inside each of us take this month of Elul to weep in Teshuvah, for a full month, as the parshah says. And through this battle and rebellion, let us be truly victorious over our enemies, and may this victory bring us to the beginning of next week’s parshah, where it says “v’haya ki savo el haaretz asher Hashem Elokecha noisen lecha” “And it will be that you will enter the land which G-d, your Lord, has given to you.” May we enter the Land of Israel together for the final time in the ultimate rebellion against the status quo, with the coming of Moshiach speedily in our days. Amen.

It was every author’s worst nightmare. Summer, 2005. Just another routine morning, or so I thought. The screen went dark on my computer, with no fanfare or warning, as sudden as a solid oak door slamming shut in the wind. And nothing I did brought it back to life. I tried restarting it, davening, begging, and yelling at it, but the computer before me seemed to have left this planet. Inside of this mysterious metal box was untold hours of work, my kosher cookbook and all of the recipes I had developed in the previous two years, thousands of files that represented the heart and soul of my work life for over ten years.

Thank G-d I have regular back up, I thought, as I made an appointment with the nearest Macintosh repair shop in another town. I had been regularly backing up my most important computer files to an external hard drive, well aware of the dangers of depending on a computer that could break down with no forewarning. All I needed to do was retrieve those files, buy myself a new computer, (ouch, not in the budget), and I’d be back in business.

One major problem. The computer technician gave over the horrifying news the way a surgeon informs the anxious family that he’s so sorry he lost the patient on the operating table. “Did you ever test this back up to be sure it was working?” the computer genius asked me. “No, never did,” I replied, the panic rising up my chest. “I’m sorry to tell you,” he responded, “there’s nothing on this back up. I don’t know what you have been doing all these months, but this back up is empty.”

I just about fainted. My computer was dead as a doornail, he confirmed, all the files gone forever. And my so-called back up was useless. I was distraught. In our town of Highland Park/Edison, NJ, we Jews rely upon a “Yahoo board” where we post electronic messages for one another – SOS’s like “I need a ride, I need a doctor, has anyone got this in their attic not being used?” It was there that I posted my call for help. “Any mac geniuses in town who can resurrect a dead computer and save the life of an author in a panic?”

Marnin Goldberg, Mac Genius, responded. He took my computer home with him and promised he’d see what was possible. He’d be in touch when he knew. I doubt I slept, ate, or functioned until I heard from him. When I heard from him the next day, his words were pure gold. “I was able to bring your computer back to life just long enough to grab your documents off of it, and now it’s completely dead, you can bury it. You’ll need a new computer, but I have your documents for you.”

I’m a religious married woman. I couldn’t hug him, but I would have if I could. With new computer, and retrieved documents, I was back to the land of the living, breathing author.

I don’t know what Marnin did to bring my computer to life for those precious few hours, some kind of techno mumbo jumbo with a magic wand only he and other geniuses like him would understand. But this High Holiday, twenty years after Rabbi Alan Ullman of Massachusetts brought my neshama back to life, I honor the Rabbi who revived a secular Jew whoseJudiasm was for all intents and purposes dead.

In 1991, I woke up just long enough to be revitalized. Rabbi Ullman spoke words of Torah to me, and from the slumbers of secularism, something in me started stirring. What looked dark, and dead, was only dormant, waiting for the right person to know how to bring me back to life. All those Yom Kippurs when I ate and drank because I didn’t know better, those Rosh Hashana’s when I didn’t go to shul because I didn’t have a clue how to daven, those sukkots that passed me by because I had never even heard of the holiday….I wasn’t lifeless. I wasn’t forgotten. I was just lost.

Twenty years later, my frum husband and our three frum-from-birth children will be davening in shul, pleading for a good year from Hashem.

Rabbi Ullman, you didn’t only change the course of one Jew’s life. You altered the course of history for my family for generations. When you met me, you didn’t see a dead Jew. You saw a Jew who had not yet been awakened. And I met you in the nick of time.

Thank you. My Hakoras Hatov knows no bounds.

Azriela Jaffe is a holocaust memoir writer privately commissioned by families who wish to document the surviving matriarch or patriarch’s life story for future generations. She is the author of 24 books, and also founded the worldwide movement for bringing more kavod into Shabbos by preparing by chatzos on Friday. She can be reached at chatzoslady@gmail.com, or visit www.azrielajaffe.com

Advantages of Doing Teshuva out of Love
In the Aryeh Kaplan Reader article titled Yom Kippur Thoughts – A Good Day for Repentance, Rabbi Kaplan points out the tremendous advantages of doing teshuva out of love versus out of fear:
1) Your sins become merits
2) You require no further atonement even though we can’t bring a Korban these days
3) You are immediately forgiven for all your sins, even those involving Koreis or Chillul Hashem

Teshuva out of Love is Very Possible in Our Generation
Rabbi Kaplan refutes the claim that many make that it is hard to reach this level with all the distraction we face these days. He believes that people today are more equipped to have a love of G-d than previous generations especially in our close-to-Moshiach times.

He points out that most Baalei Teshuva didn’t return because they had visions of Gehinnom before their eyes, but rather because they have a special love for Judaism and G-d.

Ideas on How to Do Teshuva out of Love
1) Set aside 15 minutes at the beginning of Yom Kippur and think about all G-d has done for us and the greatness of G-d’s deeds and works.
2) Recite the Shomoneh Esrai with strong kavanah on Yom Kippur, especially the first brocha which serves as a method of defining G-d to ourselves

The brocha use terms like “the great, might, awesome G-d”, If we say this brocha and all its words with concentration, carefully, slowly and thinking about the meaning of every word, will at the moment come to tremendous love for G-d.

He will think that “I love G-d so much. I want to be so close to Him. How could I have possibly sinned?” This will inevitable bring a person to Teshuva with love.

Go for It
The little skeptic inside us might be saying, “you can’t do Teshuva out of love”, but let’s use the power of the day of Yom Kippur to focus in the first brocha and to recognize G-d’s greatness which will lead to teshuva from love. We can do it and it really is what Hashem wants.

Today I did something I’d like to delete from my supernal report card. I googled the name of someone I dislike just to take him down. Yes, I’m jealous. X is an uneducated boor, crass, ostentatious, but blessed, it seems with a talent for earning easy money.

What my search turned up wasn’t the stuff of the Yom Kippur afternoon Torah reading, just some potential securities fraud, tax swindles and other practices that could fall under the general heading “sketchy.”

“Ha Ha”, I thought, “Unless X’s lawyers are really sharp he’ll soon be wearing orange. I bet he’s even got that color in his wardrobe already. Won’t that save the Feds a bundle.”

Later on though , my higher self kicked in. X’s affairs were not my business. I had no justification for my inquiry, no Toeles. Plus I was guilty of a full fledged violation of the laws of Loshon Hara, seventeen negative commandments and 14 positive ones according to the Hafetz Haim.

Why did I even go there?. Was it worth upsetting Hashem for the momentary thrill of taking X down? I could almost feel the slime droplets dripping off my soul. How would I shower myself clean? One day, I’d bring an animal to the temple but for now there was teshuva, repentence, especially now when Hashem is in our corner rooting for us.

So I’m klopping al cheit over googling sins conducted resolving not to do it again..

But that isn’t enough. For my teshuva to be good, I need to think well of X, disbelieve all that I read, and see him in a good light and that isn’t just to be nice.. Since Hashem judges me as I judge others if I come down on X , Hashem will come down on me.

Switching mental gears isn’t easy. I’m scrawling X’s name on a post it note stuck into my siddur at shema koleinu, the place for personal request so that I can ask Hashem to let me see him with “good” generous eyes.

The best way to develop those generous eyes is by counting my own blessings, realizing that Hashem isn’t just kind of X, He’s more than kind to me.

Here’s a short list of things I can thank Hashem for-not in any particular order. My eyes, my ears, my mouth, my teeth, my fillings (imagine life without dentistry) my ability to use a computer, my kids, my husband, my car, my air conditioner, regular trash collection, the food I have in my fridge (even the left over meatballs no one wants to eat) my home, even when it’s messy. And that is only a start. Since I’ve got plenty, can’t X have plenty too?

In one of her final conversations, the victims of the tragic Israeli train track van collision said that people need to rise up above their own pettiness. She said that our own small mindedness actually prevents the final redemption. With terrorism returning the New York Times reporting that the Palestinian State is on it’s way, we Jews need Moshiach badly. If cleaning up my own personal relationships will help Moshiach to come, then consider me a member of the clean team.

Rabbi Welcher on Tekios on Rosh Hoshana 2010 – mp3 can be download here.

Rabbi Oelbaum on Teshuva 2010 – mp3 can be download here.

Rabbi Yonason Sacks on Teshuva – mp3 can be download here.

Rabbi Welcher on Selichos night from 2007 can be downloaded here.

Rabbi Welcher on Halachos of Blowing Shofar from 2007 can be downloaded here.

R’ Dovid Schwartz on Rabbi Yonah of Gerona – Guilt is Good can be download here.

R’ Moshe Schwerd on Rosh Hoshana – Why Change is Possible can be downloaded here.

R’ Moshe Schwerd on Din V’Cheshbon can be downloaded- here.

R’ Daniel Stein on Hilchos Teshuva – Chapter 2 can be downloaded here.

R’ Yechezkel Rosenberg on How Loud Can You Daven on Yomim Noraim and Other Times can be downloaded here.

R’ Yakov Haber on Rosh Hoshana davening can be downloaded here.

R’ Yakov Haber on Rosh Hoshana and Hirhur Teshuva according to Rav Soloveitchik can be downloaded here.

Its now been nearly two weeks since I stepped on the large metal scale at my produce market and discovered that I was overweight Until then, I rarely weighed myself.. I didn’t even own a scale because, hey, I wasn’t fat. I wore a small dress size and nothing I owned (except for two skirts that weren’t all that nice anyway) seemed to be too tight. What weight problem? But then came that fateful afternoon when the market was empty and my eight year old son pounced on the scale . Just for fun, I followed him along (not at the same time) discovering, to my horror that I was the fattest I’ve been since puberty.

Yikes. How could that have happened? One of my friends said that the scale was wrong the produce man was a crook. I tried to convince myself of that , but, the produce man . seemed too nice to be doing a Bernie Madoff on his customers, but then again how could I have accumulated so much bulk? Just to be on the safe side, I went to the dietician.and of course she asked me what I had been eating. “Oh nothing too bad,” I mumbled describing the salads, whole wheat toast and fruit and yogurt I had consumed. “Just that” she wondered. I thought for a moment and then I came clean, confessing to her about . those frothy iced coffees at the mall –only on days when I was really wiped out, and the freshly fried chicken cutlets— to get me through Erev Shabbos and those late night cake licking sessions, only the frosting, never the cake. How bad could that be? . None of this could really be called overeating, right?

After that the dietician put me on her scale, an old fashioned doctors office models with the sliding beam and the little metal weights that you adjust by hand. To my horror the beam waved up and down like a lulav when little weight blocks indicated my new high weight. Well, at least I knew that the produce man was honest, but I wasn’t.

Its now almost a week since I’ve stopped fooling myself about food and started in earnest on the new eating plan prescribed by the dietician and it’s tough, not much fun, but all this has got me thinking. Since the body is just the soul’s down wintercoat what about the person who lives inside?. If I’ve been playing games about my eating, what kind of games have I been playing about the rest of my behavior. Quite a few, it seems. Here’s just some of the little lies I’ve been telling myself:

1) the I’m generally just fine. I do such great stuff, visiting the sick, giving people rides, that I’m a shoo in for the Righteous book even if I daydream or sleep my way through the davening.

2) The Loshon Horo Lie . Since I read “Guard Your Tongue” (sometimes) and even own a copy) that exempts me from the sin of evil speech. Yes, I know the rules, but does that mean I don’t break ‘em. Fat chance.

3) The anger lie. Losing it with my kids ( or my spouse) doesn’t really count because everybody does it and beside the bible says its okay. Here’s proof: King Solomon Proverbs Spare the rod and spoil the child and Genesis’s descriptions of the wife: “Helpmate against him”— isn’t that permission to chew out your man every once in a while? Well maybe not, especially if you are out of control..

4) The ingratitude lie- telling myself that teachers and babysitters and cleaning ladies and plumbers and wig stylists don’t need to be thanked for a job well done because they are getting paid for it anyway. Yeah? Is that how you would feel if it were you? And as for volunteers, like family members, they certainly don’t deserve a thank you because they owe it to me considering all the stuff I’d done for them already. Really?

5) Then there is my favorite one– the time wasting lie, — telling myself that tooling around in cyberspace revs up my creative motors. Again…Yeah, really?

And that is only scratching the surface. According to Mrs. Tzipora Heller in Temple times, the Cohanim, the high priests were teshuva therapists– short term only. No long hours on the couch. Just one look and they told where you had messed up and how to fix it. And don’t forget about the leprosy they had back then.. One misstep and KAZAM! a blotch on your wall or flesh. But what are we moderns supposed to do?

I’ve got a solution, not an original idea, and not perfect, but it’s a start. A short cut which I’d like to call the Teshuva Diet. Three short questions to ask myself every day . What did I do right today. When did I do wrong and how am I planning to fix it.

Of course there will be days when I’ll forget but the Teshuva Diet is one small step to a better me the way that each lo cal meal and each iced coffee skipped are small steps to a thinner me.

Since new year is a good time to take on new spiritual practices let this be mine, so that I can fix things as they happen instead of having them blow up on me the way my body just did.

Ketiva VeHatima Tova.

We are taught that although there were Seven Days of Genesis, still all of Creation is constantly being re-created. If at any moment, chas v’sholom [Heaven forfend], Hashem should so much as cease affirmatively desiring His ongoing Divine regeneration of the whole universe, all of it would immediately revert to tohu u’vohu — the primordial state of total entropy. All of it, all of us, and any thought, memory or mark of us, would simply vanish; the best metaphor is that the plug would be pulled on an entirely electric Universe. And yet in His ongoing kindness Hashem does will our ongoing existence and that of the world around it, because it matters to Him; because this world has purpose; because He loves it and he loves us. So for these reasons, which amount to no tangible benefit to Him (“benefit” as typically understood being, to the Omnipresent, axiomatically impossible), Hashem goes through the “trouble” of powering all existence, from the Leviathan to the tiniest mote, from the hidden saints to the most wretched vermin, from the crashing waves to the smallest, stillest voice, continually into being.

And we can barely sustain kavonah [concentration] for the first three brochos [benedictions] of Shemona Esrei [our daily prayers]!

But it is only human nature to forget gratitude and enthusiasm, isn’t it? Most of us are not able to imitate Hashem and constantly burn with spiritual energy. In the Tefillah Zakah [the prayer of forgiveness] we will all be saying in about a month, we confess: “My strength was insufficient to stand up [to the Evil Inclination]; the burden of earning a livelihood to support my household, and the weight of Time and its vicissitudes have befouled me…” Who thought when he began the journey toward religious observance that factors as mundane as punching the clock would blow a fuse on our zeal to go and to grow as new Jews? Yet who among us, who has felt the press of that weight extended over time for years and decades now since first turning that corner, doubts that these seeming trivialities can ground a potentially soaring spirit down low, and hard? As we get older and this pressure only increases, we begin to appreciate the magnitude of achievement of the spiritual giants of our people who lit of up the world of the spirit even as their own material existences flickered?

Still, shouldn’t “balei teshuva” be different? Shouldn’t we have something, somewhere, that we can draw upon to uncover that burning Jewish spark that fired our motors and got us on this road in the first place? Where can I go, then, to plug in, for a fresh infusion of energizing electrons from the spiritual grid?

The answer came for me this week. I followed my nose.

The time had come to freshen up my supply of tzitzis, and I bought three new pairs of round-neck cotton ones — two “regular,” and one with the heavy strings to wear “out” on Shabbos. I dutifully, which is to say rather thoughtlessly, removed the labels, and placed two of them in my drawer. Then I opened up one of the new ones and prepared to say the brocho which those of who wear a tallis godol usually do not say; but here I was putting on a new pair of tzitzis in the middle of the day. And then it hit me.

The smell of a new set of tzitzis, which for some reason I had not remembered though I had bought and buried scores of sets of them over the last 22 years, hit me right in the face. It was the smell of that moment when I crossed the line to becoming a Torah observant Jew. For a yarmulke is almost meaningless, or was for me — I used to wear them when I went to shul, and wearing one all day, though qualitatively different, was not a shock. But putting on tzitzis — now that was different. That was something that, simply, only orthodox Jewish men did. And once I put these on, I would be one. Forever — this I knew. It was frightening. Electric.

And the smell now, 22 years later, was the same. And I put them on again, not with a thumping heart and a cold, sweaty brow, no; but at least with a vivid and visceral recollection — a personal besomim whiff — of that moment, when I crossed that line, made the commitment, acknowledged the truth, and began creating my world and participating consciously in the spiritual sustenance of the Universe as a whole. It was the electrons that jumped off that cotton cloth, via the simple expedient of static charges, that plugged me in then to the direct current of Creation. And if in light of the burdens of worldly obligation and the taut pull of Time I have not spent the last two days in a spiritually electrified state, I think now at least I remember where the outlet is.

With God’s ongoing help, and with the reminder of the fringes I carry around like a battery pack, I hope I can increase the voltage over the coming weeks of introspection, and that I can do my part to break free of it all and that I can ask for God’s continuing generation of all Creation, and of blessing for us and all of Israel, as we approach the Birthday of Creation. I know I need a jump start, and I know I’m not alone.

Originally Published Aug 22, 2007

When it comes to the Yom Kippur fast, I have experienced three basic emotions throughout my 48 years). The first was apathy. In our home growing up, we went to synagogue two days a year, Yom Kippur being one of them. And then we came home and had lunch. I didn’t fast for the first time until my mid-thirties. For all of my upbringing and my twenties, I felt no guilt, no ambivalence, really, nothing about it. Fasting on Yom Kippur was for other people, and had no relevance for me. I can’t even say that I felt regret about not fasting. That would have been like asking me if I regretted not ever going para sailing. Nope. It just wasn’t part of my reality, and I didn’t think it should have been, and I felt just fine about missing it.

The next phase of my Yom Kippur fasting we can label “ defiance.” In my thirties, as I began this long process of discovering Judaism, I started looking at the fast differently. Now, I could no longer ignore it. It seemed to have great meaning for so many Jews, and I had begun practicing many other rituals. I now believed that there was a G-d who cared about me, and for whom these practices mattered. I label this phase of the fast – which took about seven years – defiance, because I convinced myself ( with the help of other equally defiant peers), that a G-d who really loved me and wanted my teshuva cared much more about my drawing close to Him, than He cared about me fasting.

I really thought: “If fasting makes me ill, so that I can not pray, certainly G-d doesn’t want that, and if I have to choose between fasting and so-so praying, or fervent praying with a full belly, it is so clear to me that G-d would chose the latter.”

I was so sure of that belief, I was defiant about it ( read – feeling guilty, rationalizing, not ready to face the possibility that the Torah was written by G-d, and that fasting on Yom Kippur was part of the program, lightheadedness or not). In fact, when I attempted fasting for a few years, and gave it up part of the way through the fast because I felt so sick, I was furious about it. I was angry at a religion that would do something as ridiculous (I thought) as expect someone to simultaneously reach emotional depth and soul healing while trying not to faint. I was angry with the Jewish community for making the fast such a big deal. (I had a rebbetzin once tell me that I should be fasting, no matter what, as long as I didn’t need an ambulance to cart me off to the hospital, and that didn’t go over well with me at the time). I was angry with myself for not being able to fast when so much of the Jewish community seemed to do it, young, old, or pregnant. Instead of apathy, I felt shame, and to cover up the shame, I got angry.

And then my children entered day school, and we started growing spiritually as a family, and they came home from school with the knowledge that Mommies and Daddies fast on Yom Kippur. For a few years I snuck food when they weren’t looking, but like so many of the rituals I now keep, I finally “got with the program” so that I could be a good role model for my children, and not create mixed messages about Yom Kippur fasting in the house.

This is when I eventually moved into the emotion I still hold on to today which I’d call “surrender”. I still don’t “get it, why Hashem designed the system the way He did, but I’ve come to accept that this is what it is, and as a Jew, I am commanded to do it. I still feel lousy on fast days, and yes, I’ve tried all the tricks for making it easier and some have worked somewhat, but bottom line, it’s just a day I try to survive, and I count the minutes till the fast is done.

Which brings me to a confession. My davening stinks on Yom Kippur. I am not yet spiritually elevated enough to get past all of my physical symptoms, and to, as they suggest, “ feel like an angel.” I understand the importance of davening on this day, and what is at stake. Each year I try to do better. But I am being honest with you – at best, I might reach a C minus when it comes to davening on Yom Kippur, and more realistically, I probably hover closer to a D.

Call this a rationalization, or perhaps this is a good example of Hashem accepting a BT where we are, as long as we keep striving for better. For me, the Yom Kippur fast is my prayer. I offer it up to Hashem as my sacrifice. I ask Hashem to accept my fast, and the miracle that in my life, surrounded by family who think fasting is stupid, it’s an accomplishment in and of itself. As the afternoon and early evening tests my physical and spiritual and emotional strength, I speak to Hashem, not from a prayer book, but from my heart. And I ask Him to forgive me for my sins of the year, and for not davening properly. I ask Him to take my fast as a symbol of my obedience to him and His Torah, because surely, if He didn’t say do it, I never would.

I learned once that it isn’t proper to wish you an easy fast. I should instead wish for you a meaningful fast.

From one faster to another, I hope that your day is meaningful, and your fast is easy!

First Published on October 8, 2007

In the Fall of 1995, I was employed at a small civil defense law firm on Wall Street. It was Aseres Yemei Teshuvah and OJ Simpson was on trial for the murder of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend, Ronald Goldman. On October 3rd, the news broke that the jury had reached its verdict. Most of us at the firm were huddled into a small corner office where we kept the television that we would use to view surveillance videotapes.

There were myriad reasons why everyone in the office was interested in watching the verdict. Some of us were sports fans who had grown up watching OJ’s Hall of Fame career as a running back for the Buffalo Bills. Others were interested in the racial perspective of the case which seemed to be polarizing the nation. Still others, as lawyers, were interested in watching the judicial system in action with some of the nation’s top lawyers at work. I think that for others (and perhaps for all of us) it was reality tv writ large. Some of these reasons engendered my interest as well. But there was something else. Something more. It was erev Yom Kippur and I couldn’t help associating myself with OJ, as loathsome as I found him. He, like me, was awaiting his verdict. I watched with earnestness as OJ waited for the jury to enter. I wondered, what must be going through his mind? What does a person think about when his life hangs in the balance? How did it feel to know that the decision was imminent? How could he stand to just sit there and wait for his verdict?! And how could I? I, too, was awaiting my verdict as that evening began the Yom HaDin, the Day of Judgment.

OJ was eventually acquitted and his acquittal became the symbol of a system gone awry. I didn’t have much interest in the aftermath of the acquittal and the subsequent civil trial. Life moved on.
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