The Road to Teshuva | Part 5, by Rav Moshe Taragin
Teshuva Paradoxes- "We Will be in the Same Place Next Year"- 3 Ways to Solve the Hypocrisy of Religious Recidivism
KMTT - the Torah Podcast
The Road to Teshuva | Part 5
In the next couple days, we're going to explore the dark alleyways of Chiva. What do I mean about the dark alleyways of Chiva? Well, there are a lot of conundrums and paradoxes that you hit in Chiva, and I hope that you're going to struggle with them your whole life because they're built into Chiva. And there's really no way to resolve them, but I want you to be aware of them so that when you dive in and you come to these bumps in the road or these walls in Chiva, you know how to manage them. But before we talk about the paradoxes of Chiva, let's talk about the paradoxes of life. When it comes to our relationship with each other, we're on an even basis. We're both human beings. We both have noses, two eyes. We put our pants on one foot at a time. So we can interact with one another through one variable. If let's say I like you, then we're friends. If I hate you, we're enemies. If we learn together, we're chavruses. There could be one dimension that defines our relationship. But in our relationship with Akarish barghu, we're so different that the interface, our relationship, is always going to be a paradox because there's not one variable, one factor that can carry the relationship. So for example, the most famous one is should we build an interface with Hashem based on Ahaba? An Ahaba means intimacy and knowledge and familiarity and understanding and comprehension. Ahaba doesn't just mean love. Ahaba means comprehension. Or should we build an interface with Akarish barghu based on absolutely not knowing him. He's a complete mystery. He's so distant from us. I just submit to him that's called Yershemine. Of course, the answer is both. Now, when it comes to human beings, I make a choice. Either I know someone and I like them and I'm close with them and I'm familiar with them. Or I don't know them. And they're mysterious to me and I'm distant from them. They can't have both. But Hashemine must have both. And that's just the classic paradox that defines our relationship with Hashem. There are many, many, many, many other paradoxes. This is to me one of the unspoken cornerstones of our bicellivagics writings. Though paradox in human realm is meant to be resolved, paradox in our relationship with Hashem is meant to be sustained because that lends depth and profundity and resonance to the relationship. And they're a villain because sometimes I'm close to Hashem, sometimes he feels distant from me and I have to draw upon different reservoirs of emotions at different moments in life. So when we talk about paradox in chuvah, this is not a bad thing. This is not the chuvah. The chuvah system is broken because there's a paradox. It means that you're talking to Hashem, trying to rebuild your relationship. He's a malchmachmachmachm. Your busser verdam, there's always going to be some static there. And that static is healthy and learn to use that static, not fear that static or ignore that static. So today we're going to talk about one paradox, and over the course of the week we'll highlight some other paradoxes. Because I'll say in the mission in Yoma that if a person says, (speaks in foreign language) And then I'll do chuvah, (speaks in foreign language) Now don't ever default to simple toots, or to simplistic readings. The mission is not discussing someone who's a flagrant criminal, and you know, it's just a chuvah tomorrow. Today I'm going out and letting it rip. I'm going to Las Vegas, I'm going to gamble, I'm going to murder, I'm going to, whatever. And tomorrow I'll show up in the basement, (speaks in foreign language) Do not have to call out that type of counterfeit. That's embarrassing, it's humiliating, it's worthless, person's a hypocrite. (speaks in foreign language) Don't waste their times with moral emptiness. (speaks in foreign language) I call it the five Rs, and the adults here will affirm this. You sincerely go through chuvah, but life has a rhythm of its own, and you find yourself each year more or less back in the same place you were the year before. And that's why Chazau repeated twice. (speaks in foreign language) You start to get old enough, think about your chuvah last year. Have you really made change? Or are you basically back where you were? You say the same things each year. What if I remember the five fives I call them regret, remorse, recidivism, regression, repeat? Rin swatch repeat. You just go through the same cycle. I feel so terrible, Cham. I'm gonna change my habits, I feel remorse, and then all of a sudden it starts very grass, and you slide back recidivism into your habits because they're deeply ingrained habits. So it's not that your chuvah was a sham, but it's like neutral. You move forward one step, and you move back one step, and it's a cycle. That's why Chazau say twice. (speaks in foreign language) If we're just the counterfeit person to try to deceive us, then they'd say it once. But it's the cycle of life, it's very hard to shatter. And as you grow older, that specter hovers above you like an albatross, 'cause you know, I'm already 58 years old, and I know that I've been trying for many, many, many, many years to overcome the flaws that I possess, and I'm very sincere about it, but every year, they're still with me. And as you grow more mature and more honest, you'll start to hit that bump in the road, or you'll hit that wall. So I want to give you three ways to solve that. Not to eliminate it, but to finesse it, to understand it. First of all, there are moments of breakthrough. There are times in life you break through, and you revolutionize your character, and you do a 180. They're rare. If you work hard enough, they happen. You can ever candle them, nor should you be angry at yourself if they don't happen. But ultimately, the goal of chuvah is not to improve by inches, but to transform radically. There is an apocalyptic nature to chuvah. The highest chuvah is death and rebirth. And that's Yona. Yona dies in his reborn. And if you don't appreciate it, look carefully, because he's swallowed by a male whale, and he's spewed out by a female male. Namely, the first whale is his tomb. The second whale is his womb. He buried. He sent me Beth and Joel Chuvati. I'm in the grave, and then he's born again. So, yes, there is an expression in the chuvos in Europe. Chuvah is nish zuzain abesirimanch, nard zuzain and underimanch. Chuvah is not to be a better person to be a different person. So, there are times in life where you could radically transform character traits. I can't tell you when will happen. I can't promise you it will happen. But you're not stuck in neutral. You're unlimited free will with the Ramban rights. Hollow is just a sinnerly Adam. Number two, it's an aggregate. What I mean, it's an aggregate is that you may not sense it year by year, because year by year the movement is barely, barely discernible. But the long view over the course of your life, as is a sham, each centimeter you move forward, each year. I mean, net. You move forward by several feet, but then you slide back. But you're still in a different place, and you have prepared the ground for next year's Chuvah. I'm going to talk about this imagery a lot this year. Yishaya Parakalal talks about Chuvah through color. And from, of course, the color of sin is red, and the color of Chuvah is white. And what does Yishaya say? Im yukat echam kashanim kashal y albino. If your sins are red, like a red string, then I'll make them white as no. Im yadimu katala, and if they are red like a, let's say a worm, red worm, katsemer yuhu. I'll turn them into white wool. What's the difference between white snow and white wool? They're both white, but what does Yishaya hope to convey? By on the one end, comparing Chuvah to the whiteness of snow, and the other, giving Chuvah to the whiteness of wool. That's a very, very extensive question. I don't want to talk about one issue. Snow falls, and then it disappears. When you wash wool, you know it's going to get dirty again. But you know that Mondays washing will make it a little cleaner next week when you have to clean it again. So washing clothing is a process, right? How many times have the shirt that you're wearing been washed? Please don't answer that question. Hopefully your shirt you're wearing has been washed multiple times. And it's called hygiene, and you keep up your hygiene. And today's washing means that it's less stain, right? If you weren't to wash your shirt for months, it would be much harder to get the stains. Or to get the stains of the odor out. So there's an aggregate sequence to it. There's a process. So you're right. There may be slip and recidivism. But each year, you know yourself better. You know where to start better. You're more aware of your failures. Where it comes from, why it comes from. So even though it's frustrating, because you're shooting for the moon, and by the time you'm keepers over, you think you're going to be the Vilma Gone, and by the time Conica time comes, it's a big, you know, a little bit of who you are. It's not that binary here. It's still a little closer. And then next year, so the first answer to that conundrum is, there are breakthrough transformative moments. The second answer is, it's an aggregate process. And you're laying the bricks for your future wool approval. It's a process. And you're starting a long construction process of character and identity. Don't expect it all to happen in one year, but you're cutting ground. You're starting. The third solution is as follows. I call it the pill test. Very often, when boys want to come to Yeshiva, say, "I don't want to -- I don't know if I want to learn Gomara." I'm in high school. I'd say close to 90 percent of the boys. Either feel that or say that. Should I come to Gush, where they're learning so much Gomara? Let's say, here's your answer. If I put a pill on the table, and you took the pill test, you took the pill, and that pill could magically make you want to learn Gomara, would you take the pill? Now, don't tell your parents that the rabbi who interviewed you is offering you pills. It's not a good thing. But this is just the theoretical, hypothetical. If you'd be happy to take the pill, then you may not want to learn now, but you want to want to learn. That's why you're taking the pill. You want to take a pill that'll help you want to learn. And the truth is sometimes I've met boys who say, "I wouldn't take the pill." So I say, "Okay, then, you're not at the point where you want to want to learn." But it plays like, "Gush, it's not just for people that want to learn already, but people that want to want to learn because the environment and the amazing rabbi will help you want to learn." It's the same thing with you, but the pill test shows inner sincerity. Ask yourself as follows. When you're pledging all these commitments, and you know that as sincere as you are, life will beat you down. Life will take all your dreams and grind them to dust. Life will take all your hopes and bolarize them. But let's say you could take a pill at the end of Yom Kippur, and lock in all those dreams and all those goals and all those accomplishments and avoid the recidivism, the anti-recidivism pill. And if you took that pill, you would be exactly who you pledged to be on Rosh Hashanah Yom Kippur. If you're willing to take that pill, then basically your heart's in the right place, but the world is just an unforgiving reality. And then you can turn to Rosh Hashanah and say, "You know what? Judge me by my heart, not by my actions." "I'm gonna leave my body." In a perfect world, I would be the person that I pledged to be. Life's heart. Other mainstatic words is "Shea Yassa Tovalloyefta." Sin is inevitable. We read a little bit about this in Philazaka, which is the introductory vidoy to Yom Kippur. Then all the pressures of this world, all the confusion of this world, and all the inner weakness we exhibit, it tears us down. It breaks us down. But you know what? If I could take the anti-world pill, and that pill would immunize me to weakness and immunize me to pressure and immunize me to the cultural forces that affect me, I really want to be that person. That's called inner Rosh Hashanah. She says, "You know what, that's enough." These are three voices inside your head to help you solve that not just this year, but for the rest of your life, because you can encounter this. Number one, there are breakthrough moments. Don't give up. But you have to work really hard for them. I can't promise you to look up. You have to be super existentially honest with yourself. I'll say it in harsh terms. There are times, you know, Kippur's in my life where I was convinced that I would not make it to the next year, that I didn't deserve another year, because I worked so hard to break away all the layers of conceit and false narratives and complacency, and I tried to look at myself in its most barest form without any excuses, and I felt horrible about myself, and I basically felt dead spiritually. I felt so terribly, and then I felt I had to rebuild myself, and those were transformative moments. I said, "You know, I really became a different person. Something changed." It hasn't happened that often. It's not so easy. But if it happens, know it, hear it, know how to detect it. The second solution to that is, it's an aggregate process. You're washing the laundry now. It's going to get dirty again. But if you wash it this year, it's easy to wash it next year. If you don't wash it this year, it's going to be much harder to wash it next year. Snow doesn't make a difference. Each snow is unrelated to the previous snow. We'll talk about other differences between snow and wool. The third issue is, even if you can promise action, promise sincerity, promise commitment, and the way to concretize it is, Hashem, send me the pill. You give me the pill, I'm taking the pill. This is the pill that I want to be. Life's tough. Life barriers me, and barricades me. But this is the person that I want to be, and if I'm completely sincere and I know that, it's really who I want to be. I took that pill. I would become that person. I'm not afraid to take it, because it's afraid to become a person you're not now. Too firm, too religious. Once you reach the stage where you cross that barrier, I'm not afraid to be as pious and committed as I'm saying I want to be. I just know that I may not be able to be. That's already a way to overcome that wall of trooper when you hit it. when you hit it, okay?