Welcome to the Good Place!

(16) Rabbi Jacob said: this world is like a foyer before the world to come; prepare yourself in the foyer, so that you may enter the banqueting-hall.

Rav used to say:

The World-to-Come is not like this world.
In the World-to-Come there is no eating, no drinking, no procreation, no business negotiations, no jealousy, no hatred, and no competition.

Rather, the righteous sit with their crowns upon their heads, enjoying the splendor of the Divine Presence, as it is stated:
“And they beheld God, and they ate and drank” (Exodus 24:11) [meaning that beholding God’s countenance is tantamount to eating and drinking]

(1) Each and every human has merits and sins. The one whose merits exceed his sins is just, and the one whose sins exceed his merits is an evildoer; if both are evenly balanced, he is mediocre. So too with a state. If the merits of all of its inhabitants exceeded their sins, it is, indeed, a just state; but if their sins exceeded, it is, indeed, a wicked state. So too for the whole world.

(2) A person whose sins exceed his merits presently dies in his wickedness, even as it is said: "For the multitude of thine iniquity" (Hos. 9. 7). And so too a state whose sins exceed is presently destroyed, even as it is said: "Because the cry of Sodom and Gomorroh is great (Genesis 18:20). So, too, is the whole world, if their sins exceeded their merits they are presently destroyed, even as it is said: "And God saw that the wickedness of man was great" (Genesis 6:5). But the weighing of this is not according to the number of merits and sins, but according to their size. There is a merit that overbalances many sins, even as it is said: "Because in him there is found some good thing" (I Kings, 14. 13); and there is a kind of sin which overbalances many merits, even as it is said: "But one sinner destroys much good" (Ecclesiastes 9. 18). And these are weighed only by the knowledge of the Knowing God, for only God knows how to value the merits versus sins.

(3)One who renounces his observance of the commandments, and recants his merits, saying in his heart: "In what have I advanced by observing these? If only I had not observed them!" He, indeed, lost the merits of all of them, and by no merit in the world should he be remembered, even as it is said". The righteousness of the righteous shall not deliver him in the day of his transgression" (Ezek. 33:12); on no other can this be said than on him who recants his first virtues. And, even as man's merits and sins are weighed at the time of his death, so are the sins and merits of each and every one who comes on this earth weighed on the holy time of Rosh Hashannah. He who is found righteous is sealed for life; he who is found wicked is sealed for death, and the midiocre is suspended until Yom Kippur, if he did repent he is sealed for life, if not he is sealed for death.

(2) Ben Azzai said: Be quick in performing a minor commandment as in the case of a major one, and flee from transgression; For one commandment leads to another commandment, and transgression leads to another transgression; For the reward for performing a commandment is another commandment and the reward for committing a transgression is a transgression.

(1) What is complete repentance? He who once more had in it in his power to repeat a violation, but separated himself therefrom, and did not do it because of repentance, not out of fear or lack of strength. For example? One who knew a woman sinfully, and after a process of time he met her again privately, and he still loving her as theretofore, and he being in a state of potency, and the meeting is in the same land where the sin was first committed, if he parted without sinning, he has attained complete repentance.

(9) One who says: I shall sin and repent, sin and repent, they do not afford him the opportunity to repent. [If one says]: I shall sin and Yom HaKippurim will atone for me, Yom HaKippurim does not effect atonement.