Parashat Nitzavim – 5785
Rabbi Shmuel Rabinowitz – Rabbi of the Western Wall and Holy Sites
In Pirkei Avot the Mishnah teaches:
“Every single day a heavenly voice goes out from Mount Horeb and proclaims: ‘Woe to the people for the insult to the Torah!’”
(Chapter 2, Mishnah 2)
For whom does this heavenly voice go forth, and to whom is it “addressed”? If this voice goes out from Mount Sinai every day, it is meant to reach our ears, to wake us from slumber, to arouse us to serve G-d. If so, why do we not hear this voice?
The Baal Shem Tov (founder of the Hasidic movement) explains that this voice exists in reality, present within each of us, every day. It refers to that familiar feeling of dissatisfaction, sudden unexplained heaviness, and perhaps even helplessness or despair. That feeling, which most of us try to ignore or suppress, is what the Baal Shem Tov calls an “awakening.”
This experience can take many forms. Sometimes we feel a kind of “inner contraction” – our spirit shrinks and grows heavy. Sometimes a sense of emptiness rises up, as if everything we have achieved or experienced in life has lost its meaning. Suddenly we wander in a world devoid of interest, with nothing bringing us joy. At times, we begin to feel trapped, like a prisoner in a maze, overcome by a sudden sense of lack of control over life.
According to the Baal Shem Tov, these sudden, illogical feelings are none other than the calls of awakening that go out from Mount Sinai every day. G-d is calling us. He wants to rouse us, to return us to living together with Him, as in good times in the past.
The prophet Jeremiah describes it this way:
“A voice is heard upon the high places, the weeping and supplications of the children of Israel, for they have perverted their way, they have forgotten the Lord… Return, O backsliding children, I will heal your backslidings…”
(Jeremiah 3:21–22)
The people of Israel weep over forgetting G-d, over the emptiness and sorrow surrounding them as a result. And G-d answers: Return to Me, My wayward children, return to Me and I will heal you.
In our parasha, Nitzavim, also called “the parasha of repentance,” read each year during the Days of Mercy and Selichot, it is written:
“And it shall be, when all these things come upon you, the blessing and the curse which I have set before you, and you shall take them to heart… and you shall return to the Lord your G-d and listen to His voice, according to all that I command you this day.”
(Deuteronomy 30:1 – 2)
What is the Divine voice we hear “today,” when we return to the Lord our G-d?
Rabbi Tzadok of Lublin explains that it is that hidden inner voice that awakens within us so often – that familiar feeling. And when this inner distress surges within us and threatens to paralyze us, that is precisely the time to remember: What is this voice, and who is speaking to us? Instead of sinking into sadness and withdrawing into the suffocating heaviness of inner contraction, we must respond to the Divine call.
What does He want from us at this moment? A good deed, even the smallest one. A kind word to another, an act of restraint, a gesture of encouragement, or perhaps a short heartfelt prayer – any true connection to goodness.
If we respond correctly to this call, we will quickly free ourselves from the sense of heaviness. “The clouds will scatter, the sun will shine,” and the world will once again smile upon us.
