It’s the Thought That Counts

By Rabbi Joshua (thoughtfully known as The Hoffer) Hoffman

God tells Moshe that after he dies, the people will rise up and stray after gods that are foreign to the land, and forsake God and annul the covenant that He sealed with them. In His anger over this, He continues, He will forsake them and conceal His face from them. As a result many evils and distresses will encounter them. The people will then say, “Is it not because my God is not in my midst that these evils have encountered me? God then says, “I will surely conceal My face on that day because of all the evil that it did for it had turned to the gods of others” (Devarim 31:16-18). Rabbeinu Bachya notes that God says twice that He will conceal His face from the people. He explains that the first time refers to the exile in Bavel, and the second time refers to our present exile. He points out that the second concealment is expressed with a double expression “hasteןr astir,” to allude to the fact, that unlike the first concealment, which lasted a relatively short amount of time, our present exile is much longer. He then cites a verse in parshas Bechukosai (Vayikra, 21:24) which teaches, that, ultimately the nation will be redeemed from that exile.

The Ramban, however, offers a different explanation of the verse which speaks of a second concealment of God’s presence. He points out that this concealment comes after the people have recognized their sin and said that they are suffering because God is not in their midst, so that they now rejected the idols they had serveג. The second concealment, says the Ramban, comes from God’s mercy, and is really a form of redemption, albeit in a hidden, limited way. The recognition of sin, however, is only the beginning of the process of repentance, a “hirhur teshuvah,” an awakening of teshuvah. Ultimately, this feeling of regret for their sin, and God’s show of mercy, will lead them to complete repentance, expressed in vidui – confession – and a full redemption.

We noted in last week’s message that, while Rosh HaShanah is the beginning of the ten days of repentance, there is scarcely any mention of repentance in that day’s liturgy. Rav Yosef Dov Soloveitchik zt”l explained (see Machzor Mesoras HaRav to Rosh HaShanah, introductory essays, pps. xvi-xvii) that Rosh HaShanah is devoted to hirhurei teshuva, by which once is aroused from his spiritual slumber, as the Rambam describes the purpose of the shofar, and sets him on the path of repentance. This seems to be the stage that the Ramban describes in our verse.

Following the Ramban’s explanation, we can better understand the verse that follows. God says, “Now write this song for yourselves and teach it to the bnei Yisroel, place it in their mouth” (Devarim 31:19). The commentators explain, that the song referred to here is the Torah, and the verse is a command to write a sefer Torah. This Torah should then be taught to the people, as the verse reads, “and teach it to the bnei Yisroel, place is in their mouths.” In fact, the Rosh and others say that one can fulfill this mitzvah by writing other books of the Torah, not only in the form of a sefer Torah, since the purpose of the mitzvah is to teach Torah. The study of Torah, in fact, is an important element in repentance. In the daily shemonah esreih, we say “return us to Your Torah.... and return us with complete repentance,” indicating that complete repentance requires immersion in Torah On a practical level, this is simply because we must study Torah in order to recognize the extent of our misdeeds, so that we can fully repent of them. On another level, Torah is our primary means of attuning ourselves to God, and in this, it is essential to the teshuvah process. The Torah, then, is here telling us that through Torah study, we can expand on our awakening of teshuvah, and complete the process, and ultimately merit full redemption.

Shana tova to the Netvort family.