Rav
Ovadya Yosef shlit’a, the Gdol HaDor, has a website/e-mail service that
everyone can receive (halachayomit.co.il). This past week the organization sent out an e-mail about
the Customs for Rosh HaShanah that many people follow. But before they sent out
the Halachot (law) regarding certain customs, they first began the e-mail with
a piece of Torah from the Midrash on Sefer Devarim.
The
Midrash explains that Rabi Chaninah and Rabi Yehoshua say: the only Nation in
the world that knows the ‘personality’ (really the behavior and characteristics
of judgment) of its G-d is Am Yisrael. What does that mean?
To
the average person in the world, before going to a life-or-death, poor-or-rich
decision factor court case, he/she dresses all in black (a sign of mourning),
is depressed, and worried to the point where they reach distress and lack of
sleep. There’s no chance this type of person goes out of his/her way to get a haircut,
take care of their looks and hygiene, or even attempts to be happy before the
date of the court case.
However,
Am Yisrael is not like this. We dress in white, shave our beards/mustaches,
clip our nails, and we drink/eat and have a feast filled with happiness, song
and dance. Why? Because we know when we enter our court case with Hashem, He
wants to find us innocent because of His all merciful quality, and then from
some type of miracles He does find us innocent!
Therefore,
we have the custom to dress and clean ourselves especially for the days or Rosh
HaShanah.
However,
we also need to understand that at the same type that all this is true, there
is no such thing that Hashem finds us innocent for ‘free.’ Meaning at the same
time that we believe Hashem loves us and wants to find us innocent (and write
us in the year’s book of life), we need to believe that Hashem is not a sucker
or pushover. There is no such thing as Hashem forgiving us of our sins without
us doing Tshuva or wanting to come back to Him.
So
what does this mean? We are actually 100% SURE that Hashem will forgive us after
we do Tshuva, greaten our passion and kavana (intention) in Tefillah,
and give Tzedaka. Only after these actions will Hashem for sure (and we
have to believe it) forgive us and listen to our Tefillot, with the end result
that we will be written in the book of the Tzaddikim (the book of life).
SHAVUA TOV!
Rosh HaShanah is in 4 days.
Have you prepared?
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