Yom Kippur 2015

R. Eleazar also said : From the day the Temple was destroyed, the gates of prayer were locked ; as it is said, "Yea, when I cry and call for help, He shutteth out my prayer" (Lam. iii. 8). But although the gates of prayer are locked, the gates of tears remain unlocked ; as it is said, "Hear my prayer, O Lord, and give ear unto my cry ; keep not silence at my tears" (Ps. xxxix. 13).

"God passed over his face and called": Rabbi Yohanan said: If the text itself did not say this, no one would be able to! It teaches that the Holy Blessed One wrapped himself like a congregational leader and showed Moshe the sequence of prayer. God said to him: Every time that Israel sins, they should do this sequence before me and I will forgive them. "YHVH, YHVH": I am the One before a person sins and I am the One after a person sins and repents. "Merciful and compassionate God": Rav Yehudah said It is covenant that the thirteen attributes always work (lit.: do not return empty), as it says (Exodus 34:10) "Behold, I make a covenant."

And Rabbi Hama the sone of Rabbi Hanina said: (Deuteronomy 13:5) "After God you shall walk." And is it possible for a man to walk after the Presence of God? And doesn't it already say (Deuteronomy 4:24) "Because God is a consuming flame"? Rather, [it means] to walk after the characteristics of God. Just as He clothed the naked [in the case of Adam and Chava]… so, too, should you clothe the naked. Just as the Holy One Blessed be He visited the sick [in the case of Avraham after his brit milah]…so, too, should you visit the sick. Just as the Holy One Blessed be He comforted the mourners [in the case of Yitzhak after Avraham’s passing]…so, too, should you comfort the mourners. Just as the Holy One Blessed be He buried the dead [in the case of Moshe]…so, too, should you bury the dead.

(1) The first commandment of positive commandments is to know that there is a God, as it is said, "I am the LORD thy God" (Deuteronomy 5:6).

(2) To unify Him, as it is stated, "The LORD is our God, the LORD is one" (Deuteronomy 6:4).

(3) To love him, as it is stated, "And thou shalt love the LORD thy God" (Deuteronomy 6:5, Deuteronomy 11:1)....

(8) To mimic His good and straight ways, as it is stated, "and walk in His ways" (Deuteronomy 28:9).

5. ...We are commanded to walk in these intermediate paths - and they are good and straight paths - as [Sefer Devarim 28:9] states: “And you shall walk in His ways.”

6. [Our Sages] taught [the following] explanation of this mitzvah: Just as He is called “Gracious,” you shall be gracious; Just as He is called “Merciful,” you shall be merciful; Just as He is called “Holy,” you shall be holy; In a similar manner, the prophets called G-d by other titles: “Slow to anger,” “Abundant in kindness,” “Righteous,” “Just,” “Perfect,” “Almighty,” “Powerful,” and the like. [They did so] to inform us that these are good and just paths. A person is obligated to accustom himself to these paths and [to try to] resemble Him to the extent of his ability.

(2) In our Commentary on the Sayings of the Fathers (chap. 5:7) we have explained the expression ḥesed as denoting an excess [in some moral quality]. It is especially used of extraordinary kindness. Loving-kindness is practised in two ways: first, we show kindness to those who have no claim whatever upon us; secondly, we are kind to those to whom it is due, in a greater measure than is due to them. In the inspired writings the term ḥesed occurs mostly in the sense of showing kindness to those who have no claim to it whatever. For this reason the term ḥesed is employed to express the good bestowed upon us by God: "I will mention the loving-kindness of the Lord" (Isa. 63:7). On this account, the very act of the creation is an act of God's loving-kindness. "I have said, The Universe is built up in loving-kindness" (Ps. 89:3); i.e., the building up of the Universe is an act of loving-kindness. Also, in the enumeration of God's attributes, Scripture says: "And abundant in loving-kindness" (Exod. 34:6). The term ẓedakah is derived from ẓedek, "righteousness"; it denotes the act of giving every one his due, and of showing kindness to every being according as it deserves. In Scripture, however, the expression ẓedakah is not used in the first sense, and does not apply to the payment of what we owe to others. When we therefore give the hired labourer his wages, or pay a debt, we do not perform an act of ẓedakah. But we do perform an act of ẓedakah when we fulfil those duties towards our fellow-men which our moral conscience imposes upon us; e.g., when we heal the wound of the sufferer. Thus Scripture says, in reference to the returning of the pledge [to the poor debtor]: "And it shall be ẓedakah (righteousness) unto thee" (Deut. 24:11). When we walk in the way of virtue we act righteously towards our intellectual faculty, and pay what is due unto it; and because every virtue is thus ẓedakah, Scripture applies the term to the virtue of faith in God. Comp. "And he believed in the Lord, and he accounted it to him as righteousness" (Gen. 15:6); "And it shall be our righteousness" (Deut. 6:25).

(4) וחנון, and “Who is gracious,” even to the wealthy; anyone dispensing gifts is considered as practicing the attribute of being gracious.

(5) For your praise is just as your name. You are slow to anger and quick to be appeased. For you do not desire the death of the condemned, rather, that they turn from their path and live and you wait for them until the day of their death, and if they repent, you receive them immediately. (It is true -) [For] you are their Creator and You understand their inclination, for they are but flesh and blood.

(6) We come from dust, and return to dust. We labour by our lives for bread, we are like broken shards, like dry grass, and like a withered flower; like a passing shadow and a vanishing cloud, like a breeze that passes, like dust that scatters, like a fleeting dream. But You are the king who lives eternal.

There were never days as good for Israel as Tu B'av and Yom Kippur.

(18) Thou shalt not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD.

(2) The term includes also the idea of following a thing and of conforming with the moral principles of some other being. Comp. "Ye shall walk after (aḥare) the Lord, your God" (Deut. 13:5); "They shall walk after (aḥare) the Lord" (Hos. 11:10), i.e., follow His will, walk in the way of His actions, and imitate His virtues: "He walked after (aḥare) the commandment" (ib. v.11). In this sense the word occurs in Exodus 33:20, "And thou shalt see my back" (aḥorai); thou shalt perceive that which follows me, is similar to me, and is the result of my will, i.e., all things created by me, as will be explained in the course of this treatise.

(4) Man is like unto a breath; His days are as a shadow that passeth away.

Any man who is endowed with grace is known to be a God-fearing man, for it is said, ‘But the loving kindness of the Lord is from everlasting time to everlasting time to them that fear Him.”