Pre-Selichos, 5786

לעולם יראה אדם עצמו כאילו הוא נוטה למות. A person should see himself, rachmana litzlan, at death's doorstep, shema yamus besha'asa, and he may, rachmana litzlan, imminently die, venimtza omeid becheito, and and he will be still mired in cheit. לפיכך ישוב מחטאו מיד. Consequently, a person should engage in teshuvah immediately. ולא יאמר כשאזקין אשוב שמא ימות טרם שיזקין. Hu she-Shlomo אמר בחכמתו בכל עת יהיו בגדיך לבנים. The Kesef Mishnah cites as the the Rambam's makor the Mishna in Avos, elaborated upon by the Gemara in in Shabbos: Tnan hasam, Reb Eliezer omer, שוב יום אחד לפני מיתתך. Sha'alu talmidav es Reb Eliezer, וכי אדם יודע איזהו יום ימות? It's hidden from everyone. When Dovid HaMelech requested, Hodi'eini, that HaKadosh Baruch Hu should tell him, Dovid HaMelech was was also hidden from him.
אמר להן וכל שכן ישוב היום שמא ימות למחר ונמצא כל ימיו בתשובה.
But the Rambam doesn't exactly replicate the lashon Chazal. Whereas Reb Eliezer speaks of שוב יום אחד לפני מיתתך, the Rambam makes it even more immediate of shema yamus besha'asa. Why that, why that difference? But then in the Rambam, even minei ubei, after that immediacy, the Rambam seems to weaken it a little bit: ולא יאמר כשאזקין אשוב. In terms of the unpredictability and frailty of human existence, so the Rambam is certainly correct. It's not only shema yamus lemachar, it's it's shema yamus besha'asa. So why does Reb Eliezer say יום אחד לפני מיתתו? Clearly, the constant preoccupation with teshuvah, which Reb Eliezer is exhorting us to be involved with, has to coexist with the full range of life activities. If a person would act on the possibility of shema yamus besha'asa, it would preclude anything and everything else. There's nothing that that can encroach upon upon teshuvah if if shema yamus besha'asa. And yet clearly, what Reb Eliezer is teaching us is that the involvement with teshuvah has to be a permanent fixture in our lives, in our day, but it it needs to coexist with everything else, and hence the lashon of שוב יום אחד לפני מיתתך. And that's why the Rambam also, as it were, seemingly backtracks somewhat. ולא יאמר שאזקן אשוב. But what does the Rambam have in mind with that initial formulation of כאילו הוא נוטה למות ושמא ימות בשעתו? The awareness of the frailty of human existence yields two perspectives. First of all, it lends a sense of urgency to doing teshuvah. As long as a person feels secure in actuarial tables, there isn't a sense of urgency in doing teshuvah. Kol eis, writes Rabbeinu Yonah, יכון לקראת אלוקיו כי לא ידע האדם עתו. A person should always be preparing to stand before Hakadosh Baruch Hu, because a person doesn't know when his time will come. In the next os, ויש על האדם לחדש לו בכל יום מצות. Every day a person should be looking to to to to increase, to add mitzvos.
אולי יגיע יום מותו ולא יחסרו המצות ההם ואמרו רבותינו ז״ל כל העושה מצוה אחת סמוך למיתתו דומה שקיים את כל התורה ולא היה חסר ולא היה חסר אלא אותה מצוה.
So that's one perspective, one mindset, which is fostered by consideration that yom hamisah may be present, may be imminent, is that the sense of urgency in doing teshuvah. But there is a second element to this mindset which is fostered by consideration of כאילו הוא נוטה למות ושמא ימות בשעתו. How will the world appear to us on yom hamisah? What truths about olam hazeh does yom hamisah reveal? Amongst other things, it will reveal that much of our important, time-consuming preoccupations were but distractions and diversions. That self-righteous fighting and friction bein adam lechavero were embarrassing, self-destructive, petty behaviors. How much time we wasted over the course of our lives, and how we're eternally diminished by that. That mitzvos are not onerous, but blessed obligations and extraordinary opportunities. The Rambam, in tweaking, as it were, Rabbi Eliezer's lashon, is calling attention to a second dimension of the mindset that Rabbi Eliezer is looking to foster. Rabbi Eliezer says, it's not only that one should have this sense of urgency about doing teshuvah, but that one's perspective on olam hazeh as one lives should be the perspective on olam hazeh which crystallizes on yom hamisah. One shouldn't wait till yom hamisa, rachmana litzlan, to benefit from the perspective that yom hamisa provides on life, on the opportunity of life, on the challenges of life, on what our priorities should be in life, how we should take advantage of the extraordinary blessing of life. She'ilu yomo besha'ato, a person puts himself in that mindset, the Rambam says, and and and see what the world looks like from that vantage point. Because if a person only benefits from that vantage point when it actually is samuch lemisa, so then it's almost entirely retrospective. If a person lives with the benefit of that vantage point and that perspective, so then it's prospective insight into how life should be lived. Rabbeinu Yonah continues, sha'ar beis, os yud zayin,
וכמה קשה המות למי שלא הפריד תאוות העולם מנפשו עד שיפרידם המות.
How excruciating is death for someone who never separated himself from the ta'avos of the world until death imposes that separation. Ve'omru raboseinu zal bemaseches Derech Eretz, רצונך שלא תמות, מות עד שלא תמות. Be'ur ha'inyan, הרוצה שיהיה לו יום המות לחיי עד, one who wants that the day of death should be a transition, a welcome transition to eternal life,
ידמה על לבו אחרי אשר סופו לעזוב כל מסחר האדמה, ולהניח חפצי הגוף,
ultimately a person cannot establish permanent residence in olam hazeh, uve'achariso yishtomeim veyeitzei, willy-nilly a person is going to have to leave, be extricated from all olam hazeh'dike connections, involvements, so
יעזבם בחיים, ולא ישתמש באדמה רק לעבודת הבורא יתעלה, ואז יהיה לו יום המות לחיים שאין להם הפסק.
A little bit more in Rabbeinu Yonah: ve'ikar Sefer Koheles chiber Shlomo Hamelech alav hashalom,
למען ישים האדם על לבו כי העולם הבל הבלים, ולא ישתמש בו זולתי לעבודת הבורא יתעלה, והודיע כוונתו בפתיחתו ובחתימתו, כי פתח ואמר הבל הבלים אמר
Koheles
הבל הבלים הכל הבל, וחתם ספרו ואמר סוף דבר הכל נשמע את האלקים ירא ואת מצותיו שמור כי זה כל האדם.
So here Rabbeinu Yonah is not talking about the sense of urgency which the awareness of yom hamisa generates. He's talking about the perspective and understanding and insight into life, and how life should be lived.
ומי שחננו השם יתברך דעה, ישם על לבו כי השם יתברך שלחו בעולם הזה לשמור משמרתו ותורתו וחוקותיו ומצותיו, ולא יפקח עיניו זולתי לעשות שליחותו.
His eyes should be set on that and exclusively on that goal, carrying out that that that shlichus, that mission.
ולקץ הימים אם עשה שליחותו באמונה ישוב ובא ברינה ושמחת עולם על ראשו, כעבד אשר שלחו המלך לעבר הים,
the the the the the servant whom the melech dispatches on a transatlantic mission, שאין עיניו ולבו זולתי על דבר שליחותו, he doesn't allow himself to be diverted, to be distracted. That teshuva... well, I don't know if... And he continues, you'll take a look. The Rambam adds, שמא יום כאילו הוא נוטה למות, שמא ימות בשעתו, because at that moment, even if a person has never engaged in this thought experiment of what will the world appear, at that moment, a person will see the truth of of the world. And the Rambam says, that's part of what Rabbi Eliezer wants us to know. Rabbi Eliezer, for practical reasons, says it, formulates it in terms of יום אחד לפני מיתתך. And it's interesting. In in Perek Zayin, Halacha Gimmel, the Rambam says that we need to do teshuva not only from for actions, but for midos. And to do teshuva for midos, the Rambam says, is more difficult.
אלו העונות, ודעות רעות שיש לו, כעס, איבה, קנאה, היתול, רדיפת הממון, אהבת הכבוד, רדיפת המאכלות, מן הכל צריך לחזור בתשובה, ואלו העונות קשים מאותן שיש בהן מעשה.
It's exponentially more difficult to do teshuva for dayos ra'os than for a single aberration, a single action. שבזמן שאדם נשקע באלו קשה לפרוש מהם. Habits are very, very difficult to change, to break. And yet, this notwithstanding, subsequently in the perek, if you take a look at Perek Zayin, Halacha Vav, when the Rambam depicts teshuva,
גדולה תשובה שמקרבת את האדם לשכינה שנאמר שובה ישראל עד ה' אלקיך ונאמר ולא שבתם עדי נאם ה' ונאמר אם תשוב ישראל נאם ה' אלי תשוב כלומר אם תחזור בתשובה בי תדבק, התשובה מקרבת את הרחוקים,
emesh! היה זה שנוא לפני המקום. Emesh, last night. Last night, he was he was mired in hate. Emesh, not just yesterday morning. Last night, as recently as last night, היה זה שנוא לפני המקום, משוקץ ומרוחק ותועבה, והיום, and already today, הוא אהוב ונחמד וקרוב וידיד. It means that the power of this perspective, if only a person would would cultivate that perspective of what the world, how the world is going to appear to him, בשעה, רחמנא ליצלן, שנוטה למות, that can have such a immediate, powerful, transformative effect, that even the teshuva for for for for the dayos ra'os in which he he was wallowing, he was nishka ba'elu, and it's so difficult to to extricate oneself from them, kasheh lifrosh mehem, and and as recently as emesh he was he was mired, but even that can change because of the the the power which inheres in this perspective. But Yom HaMisa teaches us not only about Olam HaZeh, teaches us about something additional. Note that the Ramban already comments that the Torah never explicitly reveals to us that Rosh Hashanah is a Yom HaDin. Interesting. In the Rambam... So the Torah Sheb'al Peh obviously does reveal that to us. So in the Rambam, I don't know, I think we would expect to find it, I don't know, most likely in Hilchos Shofar, maybe in Hilchos Yom Tov. But in the Rambam, where do you find that Rosh Hashanah is Yom Hadin? In Hilchos Teshuva.
כשם ששוקלין, פרק ג' הלכה ג', זכיות אדם ועונותיו בשעת מיתתו, כך בכל שנה ושנה שוקלין עונות כל אחד ואחד מבאיי עולם עם זכיותיו ביום טוב של ראש השנה.
Only in Hilchos Teshuva does the Rambam reveal that secret of what the day of Rosh Hashanah marks, that Rosh Hashanah is a Yom Hadin. In his Ta'amei HaMitzvah for Rosh Hashanah, כן ראש השנה, the Rambam writes,
יום אחד מפני שהוא יום תשובה והערת בני אדם משכחתם, ומפני זה יתקע בו בשופר כמו שבארנו במשנה תורה.
Doesn't even mention that it's Yom Hadin. Rambam explains to us mitzvas shofar on Rosh Hashanah without referencing the fact that Rosh Hashanah is a Yom Hadin. How is that possible? For purposes of contrast, if the question needs to be further highlighted, accentuated, the Rambam continues:
ושבועות הוא יום מתן תורה, ולהגדיל היום ההוא נמנו הימים מן המועד הראשון אליו.
You can't explain what Shavuos is without speaking of the fact that it's the day of Matan Torah. And yet, the Rambam fully explains mitzvas shofar and the Yom Tov of Rosh Hashanah without referencing that it's Yom Hadin. So the mashal is as follows, or a mashal. Let's say you go into a college library during exam week, and students are there around the clock, pulling all-nighters also. And if you ask them, what's all the studying? What's driving this frenzied, intense activity? So they'll tell you that finals, and our grades are riding on how well we do on the final. If simultaneously, you'll be able to, or you were able to go into the faculty lounge and see the professor working on drawing up the exam, and you would ask him, what's it all about? So he would tell you, my primary intent is to get the students to do a thorough review of the semester's work. And without an exam, it just doesn't happen. So they're studying because their grade rides on the exam, but the instructor is giving the exam so that they'll study. At least partially, maybe primarily, it's not in HaKadosh Baruch Hu's scheme, it's not that we need to do teshuva because it's a Yom Hadin. It's a Yom Hadin so that we'll do teshuva. It's a Yom Hadin so that we'll do teshuva because Yom Hadin, if only we relate to that seriously, if only we accept and are attuned to that reality, it makes us recognize the possibility of shemayamus, ספרי חיים, ספרי מתים פתוחים לפניו. It's something that we should be doing on our own every day. But the Ribono shel Olam, bechasdo, it's something that, that, as it were, He takes the initiative for us. And when one returns to the famous Rambam about shofar with this perspective in mind, so we'll understand what else yom hamisa reveals, what else besides the truth of olam hazeh.
אף על פי שתקיעת שופר בראש השנה גזירת הכתוב, רמז יש בו, כלומר עורו עורו ישנים משנתכם, ונרדמים הקיצו מתרדמתכם, וחפשו במעשיכם, וחזרו בתשובה, וזכרו בוראכם, אלו השוכחים את האמת בהבלי הזמן, ושוגים כל שנתם בהבל וריק אשר לא יועיל ולא יציל, הביטו לנפשותיכם.
Bish'as misa, the light of truth which misa shines, it shines not only on olam hazeh, it shines on a person, who, what the true person is. You know, there are all kinds of superficial elements to our self-perception as we go through life. And the Rambam says that when one stands on Yom Hadin, when Hakadosh Baruch Hu bechasdo imposes that perspective of shemayamus, so one discovers something not only about the world, but one is reminded about the reality of oneself, habitu lenafshoseichem. The nefesh ha'adam, מאת השם מן השמים, that's who you are, that's what you are. That's what the perspective of yom hamisa teaches us, that's who we are, that's what we are. It's the enduring element and hence the only true, real element of who the person is. And that should dictate how a person lives. Habitu lenafshoseichem. If only a person would have an accurate self-perception, his, his life would be transformed. The Yom Hadin of Rosh Hashanah is nora ve'ayom, but if we prepare, if we relate to it with the utmost seriousness, the potential brocha inherent in that experience of being omed ladin is something which will, be'ezras Hashem, be life-changing.