parsha of the week

Joining heart and mouth on teshuva road

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At least three words in our parsha, Nitzavim, could be defined as a “milah manchah” — a repeated word which Nechama Leibowitz Z”L would utilize to draw out a theme in a particular segment of text in the Torah. The words are LVVKh (“l’va’vekha,” your heart), which appears seven times, mostly to encourage “your return to G-d with all your heart.” Perhaps Nechama Leibowitz would suggest that all the references to the heart demonstrate the role the heart plays in teshuva.

She noted the word “shav” (to return, or do teshuva) seven times, as well as a motif in a different repeating of the word “chaim,” life.

In her essay addressing themes of teshuva and choosing life, Nechama Leibowitz quoted Rav Kook, who said of teshuvah, “When people sincerely desire to come back to G-d, they are held back by numerous hindrances, such as confused thinking, weakness or inability to remedy those matters pertaining to relations between man and his fellow neighbor.”

He explains that we each face a hurdle in achieving teshuvah. Sometimes the only real way to overcome that hurdle is to bring G-d in. Or as Rav Kook might say, bring in the Light. The definition of living life is in the last verse of the parsha, “[You must thus make the choice] to love G-d your Lord, to obey Him, and to attach yourself to Him. This is your sole means of survival and long life when you dwell in the land that G-d swore to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, [promising] that He would give it to them.”

The idea of Torah’s teachings being “close to you” (30:14) is explained differently by the commentaries. Yosef Bchor Shor notes how anything done with the mouth alone is merely lip service. If it’s just done with the heart, it is meaningless. A thought process doesn’t translate to action. Giving one’s word, however, becomes binding, motivating a person to finish a task. Perhaps the heart chooses, the mouth commits, and then the body follows through.

Ramban says what’s close to you is your mouth and heart. When our heart brings us to make a decision, we will come to say Viduy, Confession, with our mouths.

Seforno adds a twist: First you have to use your heart to recognize both your sin and your G-d to Whom you sinned. Then regret. Then say viduy with the mouth.

Even those who take the Day of Judgment most seriously might have a significant reservation — a reticence to let go and to surrender to G-d. The last verse of the parsha tells us “to love Hashem our G-d, to obey Him, and to attach ourselves to Him. This is your sole means of survival and long life.”

Rav Kook’s suggests that the ability to tap into our hearts, see our realities, face our inconsistencies, and use our abilities to return to G-d is something that every Jewish soul, at its heart (pardon the pun), wants.

So we need to be able to take the next step.

Rabbi Yaakov Mecklenberg, author of Haktav V’hakabbalah, gives a little more encouragement. He says, “I have put into your mouths a clear structure. A written law and an oral law, through which the intent and understanding of the Torah is made clear.” If you use your mouths to repeat and repeat and review and review, you’ll know it! “And what’s in your heart is the ability to understand, to make sense of it all. Such that there’s no reason for you to doubt the authenticity, to question whether this is real.”

Malbim relates this verse to the phrase, “Who is the one who desires life? Guard your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking falsehoods.” One must speak truthfully. Honestly. And avoid gossip and slander. These bring down not only the subject of the conversation, but the speaker and listeners. That’s “in your mouth.”

And what about “your heart?”

“Turn from evil, for the heart rules over a person.” It can choose to turn from evil to goodness. “To do it” is paralleled in the phrase “And do good.”

The mitzvah of teshuva is unique because it doesn’t have instructions. Malbim describes it in genera terms. “It is a command to have a true yearning in heart and soul that when you’ll be in the land you’ll fulfill the mitzvos. But you don’t need to go to the heavens, to find Moshe, you don’t need to go across the sea, to Eretz Yisrael. You just need to look in your mouths and hearts.”

Choose how you speak. Choose how you view others. Choose how you relate to others. Steer away from bad actions and turn towards doing chesed. This is all available to you! It’s right here. It’s up to you!

We can all use improvement in how we utilize our mouths and hearts in the service of G-d.

With our mouths we can be better about davening. More careful about how we speak. More cautious of what we choose to speak about with others. We can aim to have G-d’s name on our lips in an appropriate manner.

With our hearts we can choose to love G-d with all our hearts. We can open it to fulfill the mitzvah of ahavas Yisrael, loving a fellow Jew. We can open it to be more tolerant of other people. We can open it and remind ourselves that when we see a person getting upset over something which seems trivial to us, there may be other things going on in their lives that we know nothing about.

When we can surrender to G-d in our heart, we’ll feel that what is “close to you” is G-d Himself.

“G-d is close to those who call to Him, to those who call out to Him with truth.” (Tehillim 145,  Ashrei)

When we use our mouths properly and our hearts deeply, we are carried through by G-d Himself. We should merit to see how a small opening of the heart can be the opening that brings us the greatest clarity to our lives, and of course, by extension, a blessing from G-d for a shana tova for us all.