Elul 5784 – Hilchos Teshuva 7: Acknowledging Sin at Its Root

כיצד מתוודים אומר אנא השם חטאתי עויתי פשעתי לפניך ועשיתי כך וכך והריני נחמתי ובושתי במעשי ולעולם איני חוזר לדבר זה.

So the Rambam is giving us the quintessential nusach of the viduy to when a person is doing teshuva for a particular aveira, right?

כל מצוה שבתורה בין עשה בין לא תעשה אם עבר אדם על אחת מהן בין בזדון בין בשגגה.

So the Rambam's giving us the nusach of viduy for a single infraction, be it beshogeg, be it bemezid. So why does the nusach then include all three leshonos of chata'si, avisi, pashati? Chata'si shogeg, avisi mezid, pashati rebelliously, whichever in this instance, in this context, which one is correct? The עבר אדם על אחת מהן, was it zadon, was it shgaga? If it was zadon, was it a regular zadon, was it a rebellious zadon? So he should be saying either chata'si or avisi or pashati. So the Minchas Chinuch takeh says that's what it means. It's sort of like when you have in the siddur in Ya'aleh Veyavo, you know there's a column Rosh Chodesh, there's a column Chag Hamatzos, so you know and you plug in the appropriate one. So Minchas Chinuch says that's what it means here also. Plug in the appropriate one. If it was shogeg, plug in chata'si, if it was a regular zadon, plug in avisi. V'chora it's not the simple pshat in the Rambam. So then what does it mean? So at first glance either of two things. One is that maybe even though obviously in halacha we do classify actions as zadon or shgaga and it obviously has many nafka minas in terms of what the onesh is, what the din is, whether it's zadon or shgaga. But on another level you can't really surgically separate them. Let's say a person ate cheilev thinking it was shuman. So we classify that as shogeg and he'll bring a chatas. Let's say he ate because he didn't know that this, that this fat is classified as cheilev, he thought it was classified as shuman. So he brings a chatas. Lema'aseh lema'aseh, if he was machshiv the mitzvas hatorah, the mitzvas haborei the way one should, so would many instances of shgaga happen? So a lot of them probably wouldn't have happened, right? So there is an element of mezid in shogeg, you know what the Gemara has in a different context of hayah lo lilmod. So on another level they're always intertwined. They're always intertwined. So maybe that's what it means. You mean ein hachi nami Ribbono Shel Olam I did one thing and again in other contexts we would classify it exclusively as, you know, is he a mumar lete'avon or is he a mumar lehachis, is he shogeg or mezid, in another context we would classify it, but for purposes of doing teshuva on that level so we recognize that you have strands of each are mixed into a particular action. That's one possible mahalach. The other possible mahalach is that what the Rambam means is like this. No, the עבר אדם על אחת מהן, right now what he's dealing with is again it's either shogeg or mezid or whatever the case may be. But when a person does teshuva for one cheit, there has to be an acknowledgment that there are other chata'im as well. For a person to be misvadeh Ribbono Shel Olam I'm doing teshuva for this cheit without any reference that there are many other chata'im, there's an element of chutspah, משל למה הדבר דומה. So imagine that Reuven accosts Shimon, first he insults him verbally, then he spits at him and then he physically attacks him and in the course of physically attacking him he rips his suit. Then he comes and knocks on the door the next day and says you know I really want to make amends, I'm really sorry about what happened to your suit, it was all my fault and you know here's a check for $150 to go buy a new suit. So that's very nice, but how can you do teshuva for that? Okay, so let's say he doesn't really I don't know for whatever. For whatever reason he’s not ready to do teshuvah. For whatever reason he’s not doing teshuvah yet on the other elements, but not to acknowledge it, it it can’t be. The Chovot HaLevavot says something says something ayom v'nora. The other Rishonim don’t understand the Gemara this way, but the Chovot HaLevavot says something ayom v'nora. When the Gemara says, the Gemara that the Rambam quotes in Perek Bet, when the Gemara has the mashal of that a person is מתודה ולא גמר בלבו לעזוב, that he’s דומה לטובל ושרץ בידו, so the Chovot HaLevavot says that it means a person’s doing teshuvah for one aveirah and he’s not doing teshuvah for another aveirah. Ayom v'nora. Ayom v'nora, the Chovot HaLevavot. Fortunately, the other Rishonim don’t understand it quite like that. But the Chovot HaLevavot is ayom v'nora, but what what it illustrates, what it underscores, is that I mean ultimately, right? I mean every aveirah is on one level the same, is a person is mo'el b'Hashem, a person violates ratzon Hashem. So how can I be doing teshuvah for this if there’s... so at the very least there needs to be an acknowledgment. So that’s where the person says חטאתי עויתי פשעתי רבונו של עולם, I have many, many aveiros and right now I’m ready to, I think, to honestly, sincerely do teshuvah at least, at least for one of them. But there has to be that acknowledgment. And yitachen according to that, that the way to vocalize when when he says hareini nichamti uvoshti, again the Rambam didn’t write with nekudos, but hareini nichamti uvoshti, so the next word ב מ ע ש י, so presumably should then be vocalized b'ma'asai in the plural even though it’s לעולם איני חוזר לדבר הזה along the same lines. So of those two mahalchim in the Rambam, both are true in the abstract, in terms of which the Rambam means as to why one says chatasi avisi pashati for a single for a single cheit, so the pashut is again, the Rambam’s lashon is, omer אנא השם חטאתי עויתי פשעתי לפניך, and then he says v'asisi kach v'kach. So what’s the difference between if the Rambam would have said asisi kach v'kach or he or as he actually does say v'asisi kach v'kach? What’s the difference in meaning? So if he would have said asisi kach v'kach, it would have meant chatasi avisi pashati in that asisi kach v'kach, that would have been our first pshat. But the Rambam says חטאתי עויתי פשעתי ועשיתי כך וכך, so the v'asisi kach v'kach is something additional to the chatasi avisi pashati, which means that lekhora the again, both ideas are true but in terms of which one the Rambam is expressing the second is the is the pshat here, the person’s doing teshuvah for one shogeg, for one mazed, and it’s identified and defined as such, but a person has to acknowledge that that his his his deficiencies go well beyond the particular aveirah for which he’s doing teshuvah now.