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Teshuva – Chessed From Hashem
November 9th, 2024 / 8th of Tishrei 5785
Teshuva based on intellect – only through servitude and mesirus nefesh
At the end of Sefer Bereishis [the Book of Genesis] (50:17), Yosef’s [Joseph’s] brothers come before him with an important message after the passing of their father, Yaakov [Jacob]. The brothers thought that without Yaakov, Yosef might now turn against them because of what they had done to him, selling him into slavery. They decided to send the sons of Bilhah, who were close to Yosef, with a message in the name of all the brothers, that their father had commanded them before his death to tell Yosef to forgive them for all they had done to him. All the brothers later came to Yosef and fell to his feet, declaring: “We are your slaves” (v. 18).
What was this declaration, that they were Yosef’s slaves? And what did this have to do with trying to atone for having sold him?
Let’s first understand what teshuva [repentance] means. A person commits a sin. Let’s say he killed someone, or desecrated the Shabbos [Sabbath; also pronounced Shabbat]. If we would try, based on our intellect alone, to devise a way for him to atone for his sin, what could we say? Only what the prophet says: “With what shall I approach Hashem? … Shall I approach Him with burn offerings? … Will Hashem be appeased by thousands of rams or with tens of thousands of streams of oil? Shall I give over my firstborn…?” (Micha 6:6-7)
In other words, we’d have no answer. Nothing can undo what was done, no matter how many sacrifices a man burns on the altar, even if he sacrifices his firstborn. Ultimately, he can’t undo his deed or erase its repercussions. Sacrificing his own child will not revive the man he killed or undo his desecration of the Shabbos. “In truth, how can a man fix what he ruined?” asks the Ramchal (Mesilas Yesharim 4). “The sin was done! A man kills another, or commits adultery — how can such a deed simply be ‘fixed?’ Can he remove this deed from reality?”
Not only does teshuva have no place in the intellect, in the realm of prophecy as well it is untenable, as the Sages state (Yerushalmi, Makkos 2:6): “Wisdom was asked: what is the punishment for a sinner? It replied: ‘Evil pursues sinners’ (Mishlei 13:21). Prophecy was asked what is the punishment of a sinner, and it replied: ‘The soul that sins shall die’ (Yechezkel 18:4). Therefore, if a person committed a sin, chalila [may it never be], and wants to atone for this, intellectually, we would tell him: there’s nothing you can do. You can’t erase the past. The only thing you can do is give yourself up entirely to Hashem and become his slave. This will address the fact that you rebelled against Him; maybe He will deal with you mercifully.
It follows that a sinner should beg Hashem, “Please! I sinned, I beg Your forgiveness, erase my sin! I nullify myself before You; I am Your slave, I’ll do whatever You say, just please, forgive me!”
This is what the intellect would require of a sinner, and in fact this is exactly what the brothers said to Yosef, that they knew the greatness of their sin and had no way to atone for it. They could not undo what they had done, and all they could do now was to offer their very selves as compensation for their sin.
The chiddush of Teshuva – regret and acceptance for the future
The Yerushalmi continues: “Hashem was asked, what should be the punishment for the sinner, and He replied: Let him do teshuva and he will be atoned for.” In His great mercy, Hashem tells us in the simplest of terms, I don’t need any of this, not thousands of offerings of rams, and surely not your own children. All I need from you is regret for the past and to make an acceptance for the future.
The Ran (דרוש השישי ד”ה והיתה התשובה, וכן בד”ה והוא שאמר הכתוב) explains that even though it would have been appropriate for the sinner to bring thousands of fattened cows, Hashem nevertheless tells him that He does not want this, and about this specifically Yirmiyahu Hanavi: “And they built the high places of the Baal, to burn their sons as burnt offerings to the Baal, which I never commanded, nor spoke of, nor even considered in My heart (Yirmiyahu 19:5). In Taanis (4a), the sages say that this refers to Yiftach [Jephthah], Misha and Avraham [Abraham], whom Hashem never in fact commanded to offer their children to Him, as He does not want this, but rather that the sinner regret the past, as Hoshea Hanavi [the prophet Hosea] states: Take words with you and return to Hashem. Say to Him: May You forgive all iniquity and accept good, and may our lips (i.e., our prayers and confessions) substitute for bulls (Hoshea 14:2).
And accept upon yourself to fix your actions in the future, which the Navi [Prophet] goes on to say: “What does Hashem require of you? But to do justice, to love kindness and to walk humbly with Your G-d” (Micha 6:8).
The feeling required of the sinner
The Ran is mechadeish [innovative] (ibid., ד’יה וכל זה ביאר הנביא) that when the navi states, “With what shall I approach Hashem,” he does not mean to tell us the way to do teshuva. Meaning, thousands of rams and tens of thousands of streams of oil won’t help the sinner erase his sin. Rather, the navi is addressing the sinner himself, telling him how he should feel, because one who feels that he did something terrible by defying the word of Hashem, so much so that he wants with all of his heart and soul to undo what he did this sinner should feel ready to sacrifice all of his animals, meaning to give away all of his money, and even all of his children, in order to be granted atonement. He should understand that in principal, he has no way out; there’s no way to undo his wrongdoings.
Sefer Ha’Ikarim states similarly (Maamar 4:25, ד”ה וזה כאילו אמר), noting that the Ramban (Nitzavim 30:11) writes that when Moshe Rabbeinu [Our Rabbi] stated this mitvzah [commandment] is not in the heavens nor is it beyond the sea, the mitzvah he refers to is teshuva. Moshe said of teshuva that it is not in heaven and not beyond the sea to teach us that one should in fact be willing to cross the sea or ascend to heaven in order to be granted atonement.
What comes out is that in addition to the concrete steps of teshuva laid out above, there is another thing a Jew must do, and it is a necessary part of teshuva: he must feel, all the time, the awesome chessed [kindness] Hashem did for him in designing a system for doing teshuva, because really, he would be ready to give up all of his wealth and family. Only, Hashem mercifully saves him from this, and gives him this way to come back to Him, as we will explain at length.
The chessed of teshuva: ridding oneself of the desire is as if one rid himself of the deed!
Mesillas Yesharim (end of chapter 4) explains the system of teshuva in a rational way, that through regretting one’s actions now, he undoes the desire for what he did in the past. Mesillas Yesharim compares this form of regret to the regret that plays a halachic role in annulling vows: “He who is repenting recognizes his sins and admits it, and reflects upon his evil and repents, and wishes that the sin had never been committed, as he would wish that a certain vow had never been made, in which case there is complete regret, and he desires and yearns that the deed had never been done, and suffers great anguish in his heart because it has already been done, and departs from it for the future, and flees from it — then the uprooting of the act from his will is accredited to him as the uprooting of a vow, and he gains atonement, as it states (Yishaya 6:7): “Your wrong will depart, and your sin will be forgiven.” The wrong actually departs from existence and is uprooted because of his suffering from and regretting now what took place in the past.”
The Ramchal is being mechadeish a source for the concept of teshuva within the laws of the Torah — namely, that of hataras nedarim [annulment of vows]. However, the Ramchal goes on to say that even though the chessed of teshuva does not go against Hashem’s trait of judgment and is not an out-and-out contradiction to Torah logic, teshuva is nevertheless not “the letter of the law.” In other words, it is obvious that on our own, we could never arrive at such a concept of teshuva, as the Medrash states (similar to what was quoted above from Makkos Yerushalmi, that “the Torah was asked, what should be the punishment of the sinner? Torah replied: ‘Let him bring a korban asham [guilt offering] and gain atonement.” Meaning, even the Torah could not reply, let the sinner regret his misdeeds and be atoned for, as in hataras nedarim, since the entire procedure of teshuva is one of mercy, beyond the boundaries of strict justice.
Why is teshuva considered such a chiddush [revelation], one that only Hashem Himself could have devised? The answer is as we said above, that when a man has already done a misdeed, even if he reaches a state of utter remorse for what he did, his misdeed nevertheless remains part of reality. What good will his remorse achieve? It won’t bring a murder victim back to life! Therefore, the Ramchal adds that teshuva is a “complete chessed.” (In fact, regret is enough to undo the act of rebelling against Hashem, but as for undoing the actual deed and reach a state in which it is as if the sin was never committed this requires Hashem’s chessed.)
It is for this reason that the nations feel that it is impossible to do teshuva. If you hurt someone, how can you undo that hurt? If you run a red light and get a ticket, will it help you to go to the judge and say: “I’m so sorry; I sincerely regret running that red light.” Will the judge forgive you? Is he allowed to? The court is based on the rule of law. What room is there for teshuva? All you can do is promise that you’ll be better in the future, but for the past, there’s no choice but to receive the punishment.
Hashem, however, gives us both parts of teshuva: there’s the teshuva that focuses on resolving to change in the future, to return to Hashem after having distanced ourselves from Him, and there is the teshuva that focuses on erasing the sin from the past. This is the avodah [work] of regretting our sins.
Once we better comprehend the awesome chessed Hashem has done for us with this gift of teshuva, we should realize automatically that as we do teshuva, we should have in mind always that the very concept of teshuva has no foothold in the world of justice, but is only a chessed of Hashem.
The tefilla required of the sinner
The Ran adds (ibid., ד”ה והוא שאמר הכתוב) that in addition to the acts required of the penitent — regret and a resolution for the future, and the constant feeling that teshuva is Hashem’s chessed to him — he must also daven [pray] for Hashem’s mercy, that he be successful in changing himself and doing complete teshuva, and that his teshuva be accepted. The source of this prayer, says the Ran, is Hoshea 14:3. After the Navi says, “Return unto Hashem, your G-d, because you have stumbled in iniquity,” he adds, “Take words with you and return to Hashem.” Meaning, in addition to the teshuva we do, we have to pay for a thousand cows with our lips. We have to pray to Hashem that He help us receive this chessed of His and with love. The Ran concludes: “And He promised us that if we do this, His anger will subside.”
Changing oneself and teshuva depend on siyata deShemaya
Although the idea of changing oneself entirely is accepted in the world at large, they want to take Hashem out of the picture, as if to say: a man can always change himself. How? By being positive, creating positive energy forces, etc. This is in fact what we do, but we look at it entirely differently. The whole length of the way, we base our changing of ourselves on Hashem. First, because the whole concept of teshuva is His great chiddush, and second, because teshuva must depend on tefilla [prayer]. It’s not enough to know that teshuva is a chessed of Hashem. We have to beg Him to help us do it, and that He accept what we’ve done. Teshuva is no different from all the other forms of Hashem’s chessed, as it states in Bava Basra [Talmud] (25b) and is brought in halacha (Orach Chaim 94:2): One who wants to gain wisdom should turn southward, and one who wants to gain wealth should turn northward — meaning, all the gifts Hashem gives us come only after praying for them. Therefore, in the Shemoneh Esrei [Eighteen (Benedictions), i.e., the Prayers] we pray for wisdom, health and sustenance, and for that same reason we ask also, hashiveinu [return us] and s’lach lanu [forgive us], because without prayer for teshuva, Hashem’s chessed will not go from its potential to its actual state. (As Rashi states in Bereishis [2:5], why hadn’t the grass of the field begun to sprout? Because Hashem had not brought rain to the ground, and why not? Because “there was no man.” Meaning since man had not yet been created, there was no one to pray for rain.)
People think that it’s enough for them to change their ways by going to classes. This is not enough. In short, we must bear in mind always that 1) teshuva has no foothold in reality; it’s purely a chessed from Hashem, and 2) we have to ask Hashem to help us do it. Without these two elements, we won’t succeed.
Excerpted with permission from Imrei Mordechai, Vol. 2, A Collection of Inspirational Insights from the “Mussar Shmoozes” of HaGaon Rabbi Mordechai Goldstein Ztzvk”l, The Imrei Mordechai Institute, Diaspora Yeshiva Toras Yisrael, Mount Zion, Jerusalem, Kislev 5779.
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