Elul 5785 – Hilchos Teshuva 2: To Heal a Fractured Soul (5:2)

Let's return to what we spoke about yesterday and try a little bit better to present it a little bit better and to expand a little bit. There is a Midrash which says that שבעה דברים קדמו לעולם, that seven things preceded Bri'as Ha'olam. So obviously Midrashim speak in metaphorical language. The Seforno and others explain time didn't exist before Bri'as Ha'olam. We can't really talk about before Bri'as Ha'olam. So what does it mean when we speak of שבעה דברים קדמו לעולם, one of which is Teshuva? So itachen that what it means is that there are certain things which certain concepts which are axiomatic to the Bri'ah that HaKadosh Baruch Hu created. And one of those Shiv'a Devarim is Teshuva. And that's what we saw that the Rambam explains that he includes in Sefer HaMada only those things which are עיקר דת תורת משה רבינו, עיקר דת משה רבינו, things which are so fundamental that you can't have Torah without them. And the Rambam says that Teshuva is bichlal that, that without knowing of the possibility of Teshuva it's inconceivable to live a life of Torah. And the Rambam explains that not in terms of what would otherwise be the inevitability of onesh. And that's what we were speaking about. The Rambam speaks and the reason this is so fundamental is because the Rambam gives us here such a basic understanding of both cheit and Teshuva, those two understandings are going to be correlated, they're going to be coordinated. That the essential to the understanding of cheit is not cheit is not simply a liability, you park in a no parking zone and you get a ticket so you have to pay the ticket. So cheit is you go against what HaKadosh Baruch Hu said so there's liability and the onesh that's forthcoming. So all of that is true but that's not essential, it's all true, it's all very true, but that's not essential to what cheit is. The cheit means that the person damages his nefesh, that he's pogea his nefesh. And Teshuva means that the person can repair and restore. And absent the ability to do Teshuva it would mean that the person would have a sense that with my damaged nefesh so future cheit is now inevitable, is now unavoidable. And that's what the Rambam is talking about. Now lema'aseh this same conception of cheit and Teshuva, so the Rambam expresses again later in Hilchos Teshuva. If you take a look in Perek Hey of Hilchos Teshuva, this is the perek of Bechira Chofshis where the Rambam teitches the pesukim in Megillas Eichah. The Rambam says that אין לו מי שיכפהו ולא אונסו, Velo Gozer Alav, in the middle of Halacha Beis, no one is decreeing, Velo Mi Shemoshcho, no one is pulling him

בגזרה לאחד משני הדרכים אלא הוא מעצמו מדעתו נוטה לאיזה דרך שירצה.

A person autonomously decides what to do, how to behave, what path he travels in life. Hu SheYir'm'yahu Omer מפי עליון לא תצא הרעות והטוב, it's a declarative statement the way the Rambam understands the pasuk.

כלומר אין הבורא גוזר על האדם להיות טוב ולהיות רע.

If a person acted in a way that it's tov, that wasn't from HaKadosh Baruch Hu, the person chose to do it. And conversely Rachmana Litzlan if a person engaged in ra, it wasn't HaKadosh Baruch Hu who decided that or determined that, it wasn't MiPi Elyon, the person did it. Vekivan Sheken Hu and here's the phrase which is our... focus at the moment, vekevan sheken hu, נמצא זה החוטא הוא הפסיד עצמו. The choteh engaged in something self-destructive. Hu hifsid atzmo. So again, chet is not merely a liability, but chet inflicts damage on the person. The Rambam's about to reinforce that. ולפיכך ראוי לו לבכות ולקונן and therefore a person should cry and should lament על מה שעשה לנפשו וגמל רע for what he did to his nefesh. So the definition of chet again is chet is something which spiritually is pogeim a person's nefesh, which is why if that were irreparable, a person would feel that he's now been set on a path where he's not going to be able to resist chet in the future with this nefesh pegumah. And that's what the promise of the prospect of teshuvah tells the person that's not the case, that that damage can be repaired and the person can restore and rebuild.