Parashat Re’eh customarily falls near Rosh Chodesh Elul, about one month before Rosh HaShanah. This entire period is dedicated to spiritual preparation for the Days of Awe. In accordance with Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi’s dictum that we should “live with the times” (i.e., connect with, learn from, and apply the weekly Torah reading to our lives), we would expect the weekly Torah portions read immediately preceding and throughout the month of Elul, beginning with Re’eh, to contain explicit or implicit allusions to the approaching Days of Awe and the process of spiritual introspection undertaken at this time. It is no surprise to learn that this is indeed the case, as the first verse in parshat Re’eh makes clear: “See, I put before you this day a blessing and a curse. A blessing, if you listen to the commandments of Havayah your God, which I command you this day; and a curse, if you do not listen to the commandments of Havayah your God.”[1] In this passage, the Torah instructs us to keep our eyes wide open, to clearly examine the choices life presents and to accept responsibility for the consequences of our chosen paths. As we begin the month of Elul and start preparing for the Days of Awe, we must be fully aware of what is at stake, especially how our own actions and behaviors play a major role in the Divine judgement that occurs Between Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur.
Chodesh HaRachamim—the Month of Compassion
The month of Elul is referred to as Chodesh HaRachamim, the month of compassion.[2] It was on the first day of Elul, Rosh Chodesh Elul, that Moses ascended Mt. Sinai for the third time and spent the entire month of Elul there with God, pleading with God to forgive the Israelites for their grievous and idolatrous Sin of the Golden Calf. God revealed His compassion and forgiveness and at the end of these third set of forty days, Moses received the second pair of tablets.
That very energy of Divine forgiveness is encapsulated in the Thirteen Attributes of Compassion that God taught Moses at that time.[3] These Thirteen Attributes (or Principles) of Compassion are one of the most important prayers in Judaism, recited in many congregations most days of the year (as part of the repentant, Tachanun segment of prayer), and during the months of Elul and Tishrei—the season of repentance when Jews beseech God for forgiveness and atonement, on both the individual and communal level. In fact, the Thirteen Attributes of Compassion form the very basis of the special prayers recited during Elul called Selichot.
Chodesh HaTeshuvah
The month of Elul is also referred to as Chodesh HaTeshuvah, the Month of Repentance.[4] There is a tradition that teshuvah—repentance, return, or realignment—was created in the spiritual worlds even before the creation of the physical world.[5] This statement parallels another teaching that God initially wanted to create the world with the attribute of din, strict judgment, alone, but then realized that the world would not be able to exist without an equal measure of compassion. So He crafted Creation out of a mixture of both energies.[6] According to this, God’s original thought for Creation was that all would work according to a strict paradigm of “measure for measure,” the basis upon which the laws of nature operate. This unwavering cause and effect principle is reflected in the Name of God, Elokim, which is associated with strict judgment, and is used exclusively in the initial Torah account of Creation.[7] It is only in the second account of Creation[8] that the four-letter Name of God, Havayah, which is associated with mercy and compassion is introduced.[9] From this, the Sages deduced the above teaching regarding God’s creative process, resulting in the addition of mercy into the cauldron of creation, in order to temper and balance strict judgment.
Ultimately, teshuvah reflects God’s compassion for mankind, as it gives a person the opportunity to make amends and change their ways through the compassionate gift of a second chance. We are therefore each able to break through the strict laws of cause and effect and “measure for measure” through sincere acts of repentance, forgiveness, and introspection. In this way, teshuvah is the ultimate expression of our freewill, as our past does not necessarily lead to a fixed and inescapable future. It is through teshuvah that we can transform ourselves in the present, inevitably impacting our future and even, mysteriously, reconstructing our past. In fact, when discussing the power of repentance, the Sages state that one who repents out of fear has his or her intentional sins transformed into inadvertent mistakes, while one who repents out of love, has his or her (even) intentional sins transformed into merits.[10] By performing a rectification in the present, the future is drawn into the past, and, in effect, changes its valence; a transformative leap takes place, transcending time altogether.
Since Rosh HaShanah corresponds to the sixth day of creation, the day that humanity was created, the first day of Creation corresponds to the 25th day of Elul, five days earlier.[11] Thus, Elul is not merely a preparation for the New Year, but rather the renewal of Creation is already manifest in this very month. Therefore, the essential soul work of renewal, improvement, healing, and rectification should not be put off to Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur. Instead, we should focus on it from the first day of Elul, when the gates of compassion and teshuvah are open.
Searching for the “I”
An essential part of the process of teshuvah is making an accounting of “Who am I? Where am I coming from and where am I going?” It could be thought of as searching for the “I,” the real, essential me, which I have lost track of during the preceding year.[12] In order to accomplish that goal, a paradoxical dynamic is called for. The same Hebrew letters that form the word “I” (אֲנִי), when permuted, spell the word for “nothingness,” (אָיִן), in this context meaning existential humbleness, selflessness, and minimization of the ego. These two seemingly opposite states of consciousness are not only, in truth, complementary, but in fact, they are essential ingredients in any balanced and holistic attitude toward life. Paradoxically, the more one experiences his or her own existential state of nothingness in relationship to the overwhelmingly awesome reality of an infinite Creator, the more their unique soul powers will be enlivened and activated. Additionally, entering into a state of self-nullification is similar to experiencing an ego death, which, by its very nature, instantaneously revives and resurrects one’s essential self.[13]
In fact, in Aramaic the root of the word Elul means “to seek.”[14] The entire month is dedicated to seeking self-realization, improvement, and ways to come closer to God.
“I am To My Beloved”
The word “I” plays a very important part of an important acronym of the word Elul from the Song of Songs. The Hebrew name for the month of Elul (אֱלוּל) has four letters found in order in the initials of the phrase, “I am my beloved's, and my beloved is mine"[15] (אֲנִי לְדוֹדִי וְדוֹדִי לִי). Yet, not only are the roshei teivot, the initial letters, significant in this phrase, the final letter of all four words is the letter yud, whose value is 10 (אֲנִי לְדוֹדִי וְדוֹדִי לִי). The sum of the four yuds is thus 40, the exact number of days between the first day of Elul and Yom Kippur.[16]
These were the 40 days that Moses spent on Mount Sinai praying for forgiveness for the Israelites for the Sin of the Golden Calf at the conclusion of which, he received the second set of Tablets of the Law as a sign of God’s forgiveness. He ascended the Mt. Sinai on the first day of Elul and descended with the second tablets on Yom Kippur.
The last word in this phrase, “I am my beloved's, and my beloved is mine,"[17] “mine” (לִי) itself equals 40 and is divided into 30, the equivalent of the letter lamed and 10, the value of the letter yud. Likewise, on the calendar, these forty days are divided naturally into the 30 days of Elul and the ten days between Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur, known as the Ten Days of Teshuvah.[18]
Word Soul Mates
There are many verses that have a deep connection due to the wording of the verses being very similar. These verses are in a sense “soul mates,” as they complement and complete each other. The first verse is the one we discussed above from the Song of Songs, “I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine, he shepherds among the lilies” (אֲנִי לְדוֹדִי וְדוֹדִי לִי הָרֹעֶה בַּשּׁוֹשַׁנִּים). The second verse is also from the Song of Songs, “My beloved is mine and I am his, he shepherds among the lilies”[19] (דּוֹדִי לִי וַאֲנִי לוֹ הָרֹעֶה בַּשּׁוֹשַׁנִּים).
These almost identical verses express the archetypal love between God and Israel. In both these verses it is Israel speaking yet there is a mirror image in the order of how this love is manifest and experienced. The first verse expresses an “arousal from below,” from Israel first reaching out to God—“I am my beloved’s”—whereas the second verse expresses first the experience of feeling an “arousal from above”—“My beloved is mine”—when first God’s love is felt and then responded to. When both of these experiences are nurtured and deeply felt, the human “I” becomes one with the Divine “I,” creating a unity that allows a proper orientation towards oneself, others and God.[20]
As with all unification with the Divine, this is not a static state, rather it is achieved through the dynamic of “run and return,” by experiencing a faster and faster transition from feeling that “I am my beloved’s” to feeling that “My beloved is mine.” The unification can last only as long as the “run and return,” the pulse of these two complementary experiences continues to beat.
The Letter Yud and Action
According to Sefer Yetzirah each month is created by means of a Hebrew letter. The letter creating the month of Elul is a yud.[21] Each month also has a chush, a “sense.” The sense of this month is assiyah, action.[22] The letter yud is cognate to yad, “hand,” a symbol of taking action.[23] Thus, both the letter and sense of Elul allude to the importance, as stated above, of not waiting to do teshuvah until Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur, but taking advantage of the month of Elul to do the essential work preparing one for the Days of Awe.
The Torah concludes the story of Creation with the following verse: “God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, for on it He rested from His work which God created to make.”[24] The Rabbis have noted that the infinitive “to make” appears to be redundant and somewhat contradictory: if the verse has just signified the end of creation with the words “God created,” what can it possibly mean by adding “to make”?
In this context, the word “to make” means “to do” or “to rectify.” God has therefore made humanity and especially the Jewish people His partner in the ongoing rectification of the world. The words “to make” thus imply an ongoing creative process, not one definitively finished at a single, isolated point in time. God in fact purposefully left the work of finishing the process of creation in the hands of humanity, who is meant, through free choice, to become partners with God in the rectification of the world.
[1]. Deuteronomy 11:26.
[2]. Mivchar Shiurei Hitbonenut, vol. 9, p.191.
[3]. Exodus 34:6-7.
[4]. Mivchar Shiurei Hitbonenut, vol. 9, p.192.
[5]. Pesachim 54a.
[6]. See Rashi on Genesis 1:1, s.v. “bara Elokim.”
[7]. Genesis 1:1 through 2:3.
[8]. Genesis 2:4 through 2:25.
[9]. Ibid. 2:4.
[10]. Yoma 86b.
[11]. Vayikra Rabbah 29:1. Also, Pirkei deRabbi Eliezer 8:1.
[12]. Hazman Hapnimi, Chodesh Elul.
[13]. Ibid.
[14]. Ibid.
[15]. Song of Songs 6:3.
[16]. Mivchar Shiurei Hitbonenut, vol. 9, p.193.
[17]. Song of Songs 6:3.
[18]. Ibid.
[19]. Song of Songs 2:16.
[20]. Hazman Hapnimi, Chodesh Elul.
[21]. Sefer Yetzirah 5:8.
[22]. Ibid.
[23]. The Hebrew Letters, pp. 159-161.
[24]. Genesis 2:3.
