The Meaning Of The Selichot Prayer Service - Rabbi Yitzchak Breitowitz

meaning uh the the same words that say something is user must also be believed if something is what an example would be um if a woman says a wife of a Coen says she was captured by a go kidnapped by a guy so normally Hally she would not be allowed to marry stay married to the koi because if she had we assume she had intercourse with the go the raped her and the beer of a GU prohibits a woman to be married to a CO so even though she didn't say she was raped but if she said I was a shuya thatuna but what if she says I was a shuya but I wasn't raped so if the only reason you know she was captured because she said it so if you believe her that she was captured you also have to believe her that uh she was not raped now if there were Adam that she was captured but she says she was not raped she's going to be user because I'm not believing her on the issue of being captured but if she is the only source of the of the Messias that she was captured this is called Pasha assar P okay this was a totally uh total digression to my introductory comment really had nothing to do with it but you learned a new and that is uh I was the reason why we're doing tanak is because RAB asked me to do and therefore we doing but he asked me to suspend During the period yipper to do to learn with you a little bit so I think I have to go there because since he's the one that did the so if he says to suspend it I'm going to listen to him on that as well forgive the loose Association but okay anyway so he did he did ask me for a few days to go over some um one he was thinking he was thinking maybe would we would actually explain theas during but that would I think would be too difficult and would take too long and ding is longer anyway so so instead we're going to go some sessions on now some of some of this did say um shabas I don't want to repeat all the stuff that I said butos the idea of before is a or a of the it is not in the gar itself It came it came later and when you start as you know there are different the r brings a which I don't think is followed today that they start the 25th devel what is the magic significance of the 25th El it is the first day of creation because rosashana which is the 30th of is the creation of that's day six so if you go backward it's the first day of creation the beginning of the creation of the world began on the 25th of Elo but ashim have a thing that we have to have at least four days of this year for example we do have four days ofos we had MO we had Monday Tuesday Wednesday now if rashash is earlier in the week if rashash would be let's say Tuesday so you have to go a whole week before you always start Mo shabas so if by starting Mo shabas you'll get four days or more ofos so then you start the mo shabas before if you're going to get less than four days if you start M shabas you actually have to start a whole week early earlier so this year we have the really the shortest PR R because we only have four four days what is the significance of four days so the post can give two different reasons for the four days uh reason number one is the minog used to be that people would fast during a Chua literally now that doesn't mean they wouldn't eat at night but they would fast during the day and break their fast at night so for 10 days of repentance they want to be Yos beus as a way of getting forgiveness from Hashem but the problem is in the ASA there's only six days that you can fast there are four days you weren't allowed to fast and those four days are the two days of rosashana and the chabas in the middle chabas Shuba and arer there a m the E so you're missing four days of ESS so conect the four days of fasting that you're missing that you should say four days before rash and fast on those days so really it was the fasting that generated the four days that generated the rather than vice vice versa now that's not so NOA to us today because most of us do not fast during SOS the only fast we would have during the SOS per period is many that's the meaning of Thea many do fast on until some people don't but but that's the only fast you're going to have other than Yumer and so Galia and and the like now the second reason is that on rashishana we are like a Corbin we are giving our lives as a sacrifice to Hashem we're like a Corbin to Hashem we're dedicating our lives a Corbin cannot have a blemish and uh in the time of the B mikash A Corbin has to be insed four days to be free of every blemish and uh obviously we're not concerned in our prayers with our physical blemishes but we want to purify ourselves for four days before the rash that we should come to Hashem as a coron without blemish that's the idea of the four of the four days the Lush the was a great great Po in the time of the I mean they were was the tment of the Rama but uh he wrote um it's interesting he wrote a beautiful beautiful code of that was actually a competitor to the it's very interesting there was a time in which it was thought the would become the because the is much more explanatory than the uh it's interesting how practice works like obviously was that became the definitive code but what in terms of in terms of History what made the the definitive code was the fact that g began writing per on it meaning if the G would have written per on the the would have become the so the is still a very very and all the including the commentaries on bring the constantly but it never became the dominant safer of even though as I say there are many mil to the that the is very even with the just gives you the rules gives background and reasons and the actually says that corresponds to a separate service it is just like has the of a whole service even though there's no I mean normally what defines something as a complete service is an amid there is no but says nevertheless it is a service and he he said it kind of combines and you have Andes just like the the many are Praises of Hashem that corresponds [Music] to the and they are like they are prayer and after we say which actually say every day right so and then the final kades after is the thees with we say accept our prayers T is only said after is not said any other time so makes the point that the are of they are actually considered to be a prayer uh service and the like now the most important part ofos are and in fact in the time of the they didn't have the poems the poems that we call weren't even written yet they come from a late later time so if you would have been in Ra's you know show when they were saying uh what you would have is you would have some that are recited and other that are recited you would recite three or four times uh which is why you know again it's a little little inous I I had said something the name of Rebel Yash during M then the gab was not at mha came in and just said not to do exactly what I said to do he asked not to do okay uh but here we're going to do it it really doesn't add it doesn't add that much uh time to things rash argued that in many many places they skip those suim and they just say that P re said if you're you're going to skip something skip the p and say the are more important now again in a typical you don't even you you may not even know what I'm referring to but if you look at the art scr you'll see very very much that when they introduce the they say preliminary verses do again in in uh these books it doesn't really tell you that uh the preliminary verses are very very important they were the original M that the gim chose and generally the PE the poem is written based on those Pim meaning if you look at the Pim before the poem you'll see that the poem incorporates the meaning of those of those Pim okay now the Yim MOS we actually spent a real long time on uh that was the basis of the saer DOR that that we had looked at for for a long time but just to go over a few of the the were taught by after the when Hashem wanted to destroy the Jewish people and he told Moshe I'll have a private arrangement with you and mosha said no and mosha prayed and he DAV he went up to harini for 40 extra days to DAV then he went down then he went up a second time really his third time to get the second l and at some point during that time some say it was oner itself when did he show him the some actually say it was yum Kipper some say it was before yum Kipper uh some say Hashem taught him one maid at a time from which is 13 13 days Hashem taught him theid of and the way the gar describes it put on a Talis like a he passed before mosha and he said anytime your children do these midis I will answer them I will give them ra so the AL the great Daran in the time of the AR and of yo inra M says a beautiful de most people translate when your children do the Midas as when your children recite the Midas other words most understand the gamor theion of reciting theas but the AL points out the gor's L is not but the L of the gar is meaning the thing that gives you the ra is when you do those mid when you carry out theid in your relationship to other people that brings the mercy into the world and the whole safer tomor from the Al's contemporary ra mosha Cordo the ramak uh we spent a very long time on that tries to show you how you could emulate theid in your that's a very important thing so yes saying theas is very important but you also have to figure out how can I emulate those in the that is what truly brings R it's kind of what we called a double imitation idea I imitate Hashem so then Hashem imitates me in other words I imitate hashem's mid but my imitation of hashem's Mida causes that maida to be activated in the world and bring ra not only on me but ra on on on the world right that's the yo mid uh and we say them uh in a before well typically in the before R we say the Y will meet us four times and I'll explain what the significance of the four times are okay now uh a few comments about the the uh first of all let's count them because interestingly enough in theim there are 13 different ways of counting the 13 me so I'm first going I'm first going to mention I'm only going to mention two of the 13 I'm going to mention uh R which is the this is the standard counting then I'll mention the Aral which is a somewhat of a different counting R counts them this way Hashem Hashem YKK number one second y k number two kale is three ra is four is five ra merciful and gracious longsuffering and patient is six ra abundant in kindness is seven EMS truth is eight I'll come back to that not he keeps his loving kindness unto the 2,000th generation is I'm losing count is that nine say nine um that counts for three he carries he Bears a I'll come back and explain it so that's 10 11 12 V and he will cleanse you so according to those are the 13 mid of RA the first Mida is Hashem and the last mid is V the AR as a different has he does not count the first two Hashem as a Mida because they are General R it's as if to say I am the Lord of Mercy I am the Lord of Mercy colon and these are the 13 ways that I manifest my mercy so the Hashem Hashem the Aral says is not one of the or not one or two of the 13 mid of rather they are generic statement hasem is and these are the 13 ways so according to the AR the first of theid is K so obviously like the AR you are missing two because from kale you only have 11 so the Aral splits it this way he splits and which means longsuffering in patience he says there are two different levels of patience so that gives you one extra and he keeps kindness unto the 2,000th generation he splits and as as two So based on those two splittings the ARA will get 13 even without counting the Hashem Hashem now the reason why this is important is important that although generally speaking we follow Rab's minion but you'll see in Tash Tash the main verse we recite in t we actually don't recite the we recite a M the prophet mik Etc who was like you but but above those words in mik you will see in small print that you don't say how the words in mik correspond to the and if you look at any you will see that it corresponds based on the that and are counted as two and not is counted as two so in the of the wanted to link the mik the prophet mik with the they follow the of the Arisa now what's very unfortunate is that the gamorra does not give us a complete p and the the gamar just picks a few and explains them but it doesn't explain the rest so the and other go over go over them and the like but we don't have uh definitive explanations but I just want to go over just a few points about the Yas first of all um it says ra VMS God is abundant in kindness VMS and Truth now I understand why an abundance of kindness would be Aid that means god is kind God is merciful but why would Ms be a of RA Ms truth to give me what I deserve that's not so merciful so one would think is a contradiction to EMS so why would EMS Aid of RA this is true like and both count ands as as to so the maral says a beautiful idea again it's not in K but he says the following idea he says well I I'll give you a a modern mush he doesn't use this mushel but this will illustrate his point let's imagine that you had a professor who is a very tough grader and he gave very very very difficult exams but you are a conscientious student and you study and you study and you study and you work and you work and you work and you do well and most of the people who don't study that well they do bad and you know you realize you're got I work and I get so let's say one day he comes in and he's a changed man he's decided you know he gave you he gave one of his hard exams that you studied for and the people next to you didn't study for and he says you know I've decided I'm too rough on people I'm giving everybody an A and I'm not going to even read the exams I'm just he just rips them all up and says everybody gets an A+ so ultim now here's the thing how are you going to feel where all of your work is not acknowledged it's not going to be noticed it's not going to be appreciated the professor doesn't even care if you worked hard or not because everybody gets an A+ you're going to feel very bad because again I I'm not even saying this in jealousy not because hey why are they getting an a if they didn't work I I mean something deeper than that let them get their a but let there at least be an acknowledgement that I worked for my a it shouldn't be the bread of embarrassment now here's the thing let's say Hashem decides to show raim on the world or rim on a community so you might think why should why should Hashem determine whether I deserve it or not because even if I don't deserve it I'm going to get the Rah so the ma of EMS says that even if God is going to give you Mercy anyway he is first going to look into your Deeds to see if you deserve it so if you deserve it you will not get it because of Mercy you will get it because you deserve it now if you don't deserve it so then he'll give you Mercy if that's his decision you see the the is in other words that if somebody does deserve it Hashem will give him a chance Hashem will read the test paper Hashem will read the test paper even though it doesn't make a difference so that when you get that reward it'll be a reward that you deserved and not just so that actually is an act of RA because you might say yeah we're using metaphors here but why should God go to the trouble of reading the test if he's going to give you an a anyway the answer is the extra is that if you do deserve the a you'll get it because you deserve it and not because it's a and this goes back to the idea of embarrassing the famous idea of the bread of embarrassment to get to get something that you don't deserve even though it's a but there's a certain humiliation uh that's involved so that's the maral's understanding of RA the MS why Ms is uh considered to be a Mida now let's go back to the beginning Hashem Hashem now we now we're going to go through time understands Hashem hasem are the first two mid of R question why do we need two mentions of hashem's name why do we say hashem's name twice so here the gamor gives us AA the gamor gives us AEM I am the Hashem of Mercy before a person sins and I am the Hashem of Mercy after a person sins and does chuva that's the gar in question why do you need Mercy before a person sins so the rush answers even though Hashem knows that you're going to sin he's not going to punish you ahead of time so that's the first MAA Hashem will not factor in your future misbehaviors uh as we find of course by Isel uh on the first day of rashash we read this that yesma is dying of thirst and Hashem brings a well there and the M are saying why are you letting him live his descendants are going to persecute uh B Israel and Hashem says the famous phrase I share ham I look at him the way he is now not what he will become again the sh does ask a well-known Kasha that the Ben the rebellious son is exactly the opposite he's getting punished for what he will do because right now all he did was steal he stole meat and and andw wine uh you don't get the death penalty for that but he gets killed because there's a certain trajectory a certain path that he's going on which will eventually culminate in murder and the mishna says in Sanhedrin better that he die innocent rather than thy guilty so that's a a famous question is Al he is judged for what he will eventually do as opposed to yesel who is not judged based on what he will eventually do he's judged on what he is right now uh okay we'll maybe we deal with that question later uh but certainly B is an anomaly B is not the usual Hana the usual Hana is aam and the rush says that is the meaning of the first hasem which is okay we then come to the second Hashem and the second Hashem is I am the Hashem of Mercy when he does sin and he does Chua so the second Hashem picks up the idea that shows Mercy to a sinner if he does chuva that's what the second Hashem says like that is the second maida so F Mar let's skip all the way to the 13th maida the last maid is V now in reality we're cutting the PK short a little bit the PK really reads so the gamar itself asked theha V he will cleanse you and he will not cleanse you so the gamorra says which which is it it's a contradiction will he cleanse me will he not cleanse me the answer is he will cleanse you if you do chuva he will not cleanse you from your sin if you don't do Chua which is why we don't read in other words we end with we don't read Because is not that's referring to a person who is remains guilty because he didn't do Chua how we interrupt the Ping in the middle is a is a question but as a is not a it's just referring to the idea you won't get the ra of if you don't do Chua okay right everyone understands that basic idea but so but here's the problem what is the difference between Mida number two and MAA number 13 MAA number two says already all the way number two I am the Hashem of Mercy the Lord the god of Mercy who if you sin and do Chua I will show you Mercy that's number two number 13 I am the god that will cleanse you when you do chuva now the meas are supposed to be ascending now I understand that you know we didn't really explain each one but just just looking in terms of two and 13 they both are saying the same idea God will forgive you if you do chuva so what is ma 13 adding to number two so there are two answers you can give to that the first answer is the n is much higher meter number two says I will have mercy on you and forgive you n is I will cleanse your n so you will have the intimacy of a relationship with God now one could understand that forgiveness could simply mean God says I'm not going to punish you get out of here meaning you deserve to die or whatever it is you do cha okay you're not going to jail go home but don't bother me again so one might say the first hash the second Hashem meaning the second maid is God erases the sin but even if God erases the sin that does not establish closeness V is your soul gets purified from the sin that's a higher level and that's not inevitable forgiveness might just have meant you know no punishment no negative consequences but it doesn't restore the relationship n is restoring the relationship this is uh one answer marau gives another answer to this and he says the following he says MAA number two and MAA number 13 are referring to two different different types of chuva mea number two is what you might call Total chuva that would be an example of a person who had rejected the Torah he had gone off the Der and he decides to totally change his life and keep the Torah and keep the Mitzvah Total Transformation total change Hashem says if you're willing to totally change you are like a briad you are like a new creation you're a different person if you're a different person so of course I forgive you because you have no connection to that old person you're a BRI but what if you're not totally transforming what if for example and this is really how most of us are I may have many different AAS and I successfully do chuva on some AOS but the other AOS I'm really not working on it all so I don't come to God as a total transformation I fixed a little bit here but there's a lot that I didn't even bother to fix maybe Chua doesn't work at all there maybe Chua requires Total Transformation if you're not transforming yourself you didn't do Chua so thees of the is that God will give you forgiveness on what you did cha for even if there are other aspects of your life for which you did not do Chu based on this he has a in the the gar says right says so how did the gar explain it n he'll purify you for those who do chuva and he will not purify you for those who don't do chuva right that's the gor I quoted so everybody understands that refers to two different people the guy that does Chua is V and the guy who doesn't do Chua is the Loya says the maral no no no no no it's actually saying he will purify you on what you did chuva for for even though he will not purify you for what you didn't do chuva for it's actually incorporating partial chuva and therefore the says that the 13th mid is not just the word v the 13th mid is because that's the whole point of the 13th maida he will purify you even if there's other parts of your life for which you're not going to get purified therefore the says which we don't like that when you say you don't end with the word v but you add two more words V that also answers the question of not cutting a pusk in the middle it happens to be moral will will help you with that question as well again I'm not saying that anyone should change anything you know I don't change things either I I I say like everyone else but the is AAL very very interesting in the meaning of okay by the way they point out that we have a similar thought to the moral is expressed in another aspect of chuva we find that Chua is compared to purifying water actually not but hashem's forgiveness for chuva is compared to purifying water but there are two different images of purifying water that are used one is Hashem is described as a mikah mik is hasem which literally means mik there means TI Hashem is the hope of Israel but the gor has a r has a mahik just like a Mikvah purifies those who are purifies so one aspect of the Forgiveness of CHA is it is like a Mikvah but then we have a Ines I will sprinkle upon you pure water like paruma the Waters of mixed with the ashes of the paruma sprinkling so the Forgiveness of Chua is described as Mikvah and the Forgiveness of Chua is described as H the sprinkling of par aduma spring water now both of them are purification rituals if you're t m you need to be sprinkled with the uh Waters mixed with the paduma ashes as well as go to the Mikvah but what is the halik Naina between sprinkling and M mikah requires total immersion if there's even one hair of your head that's above the Mikvah water the whole immersion is no good Mikvah 99.9% is not enough got to be 100% by contrast H is exactly the opposite how much water has to hit me to be a valid hazzah one little drop May cover a thous sou a thousandth of my my skin area so the reason why Chua is referred to in these two ways is there are two different madas of Chua there is the Chua of Total Transformation which is like mikah and then there's the peace meal partial Chua which is like the sprinkling of the paruma and each one brings Purity certainly Total Transformation brings a higher level of Purity for sure but one has to know that sha is not All or Nothing every little step that you take is worthwhile and the morale says that that is thees of the 13th of the and that is that even if there are parts of my life for which I did not do chuva that does not negate the Chua that I did now I I'll save this for tomorrow uh when we say theid we preface it with a paragraph now you will notice let's say this morning we said the yis four times the introductory paragraph Was the Same for three of those times but the first time we say theid the in introductory paragraph is a different introductory paragraph and this is going to be consistent throughout that the first time you say the you preface it with a paragraph that begins every other time okay so tomorrow we we'll talk about these this is called the P this is the uh introduction by the way just a little theas can only be recited if you have a minion uh if there's no minion you can say them asuk of the tah but then you have to read it with the Trap you cannot recite it as a prayer unless there's a minion now that means the following if you're in the middle of the introductory paragraph and the seor is beginning the yimas you should just stop wherever you are or even in slos even if you're not even let's say you're not even up to the introductory paragraph you're in the middle of SOS or you're in the middle of the introductory paragraph at whatever point that SAR says the you should stop and say it with them and then you can go back and finish what you were doing you can go back you know you don't have to even be up to Theos of the congregation you can you can say SOS at your own pace but since the can only be said minion it's like Kad at whatever point the CRA says the you stop and you say it with them by the way this is also show even during the year is part of Tak they say the every day that they say right you may have SE seen that so if I'm an ashkanazi daving in a show and I'm doing my ashkanazi daving so I don't have to dve in like them I should dve in the way I D in but when they say the it's asking for it's very special I should say the along with them that's even during the during the year okay so tomorrow we'll look at the two introductions thank you for listening to this awesome production to find out more and to partner in our mission please visit o.edu