Putting the Yetzer Horah In
Its Place: An Exposition on Vidui from the Torah of Rav Yitzchok Hutner,
zt”l (Pachad Yitzchok, Yom Kippur Maamar 17)
Adapted By Eliakim Willner
Eliakim Willner is author of “Nesivos Olam – Nesiv HaTorah: An
Appreciation of Torah Study”, a translation with commentary of a work by the
Maharal of Prague, published by Artscroll/Mesorah. He is currently working on a
continuation of the Nesivos Olam series, “Nesivos Olam – Nesiv HaAvodah: The
Philosophy and Practice of Prayer”.
Vidui
– A Return to Pre-Sin Odom
We know that vidui,
confession, is a necessary component of the teshuva process; we learn
this from the verse (Bamidbar 5:7), “they shall confess the sin they committed…”,
which appears in the Torah section dealing with theft from a convert. [Someone
who steals from a convert who has no descendants and who dies before the
contrite thief can make restitution must confess his sin and pay back what he
stole, plus a fine, to a kohen. This law serves as a paradigm for all baalei
teshuva; to do a proper teshuva they must confess the sin that they committed
as part of their teshuva process.]
There is, however, another
form of vidui, which is not a part of a teshuva process and which
also has a biblical source. The source for this form of vidui is the
verse dealing with the vidui of the high priest, the kohen gadol,
during the Yom Kippur service, which states (Vayikra 16:11), “and
he shall atone, v’chiper, for himself and for his household”. The Gemara
(Yoma 36b) explains that atonement in this context is accomplished not
through animal sacrifice, which was the usual way of achieving atonement in the
Bais HaMikdash, but through words – that is, through vidui,
through a verbal confession.
We see from this Gemara
that vidui has an innate power to trigger atonement even when it is not
accompanied by the other accoutrements of the general teshuva process,
and, moreover, this form of vidui has its own name, kaporas devarim
– “verbal atonement” – and does not fall under the general rubric of “vidui”.
There is another remarkable
aspect to verbal atonement, and that is, that although the function of
“standard vidui” is to articulate the other teshuva components, such
as a specification of the transgression for which forgiveness is sought, an
expression of regret for committing it, and an undertaking never to repeat it; so
as to draw them out of the heart, where they originate, into the open, verbal
atonement is different in that it consists of nothing more than a bald
statement of the transgression.
In truth, though, the
characteristics of this unique form of vidui teach us something that is
applicable to vidui in general as well. To understand what this is and
how it works, we have to first understand what it is about vidui that
enables it to achieve atonement at all, keeping in mind that its sometimes has
the power to achieve atonement even when it is standalone and none of the other
components of repentance are present. (Indeed, the Gemara referenced
earlier gives verbal atonement the same status as sacrificial atonement. Normally
when the Torah uses the word v’chiper, “and he shall atone”, it refers
to animal sacrifice, but the Gemara does not hesitate to define the v’chiper
in the context of the verse in Vayikra 16:11 as verbal atonement. By
allowing the substitution the Gemara is implicitly saying that the
effect of the two forms of v’chiper are the same.)
So, how does vidui, a
mere verbal articulation of an offense, achieve atonement?
Our Sages taught us that the
original sin of Odom and Chava caused the forces of evil to infiltrate man’s
psyche and insinuate themselves into the very root of his soul, fundamentally
changing man’s nature, and his relationship to the forces of evil, from their
creation-original state. Our Sages (Shabbos 146b) describe this change
of state with the phrase, “the primordial snake violated Chava and contaminated
her with foulness”.
Sages versed in the hidden
aspects of Torah (See Nefesh HaChaim, 1:6 in the first note) explain that
this contamination with foulness marked the beginning of a new stage in the
history of man, characterized by the muddling of good and evil. Evil existed
before this, but it was sharply defined and easily recognized, since it was
external to man; our Sages compared it to a dog, confined to the outdoors and
howling at the people indoors. No
one would confuse the dog with the people inside the house and similarly, no
one, pre-primordial sin, would have confused the advice of the evil inclination, the yetzer horah,
with the advice of the good inclination, the yetzer hatov.
After the sin, however, evil
lives in man like a cancerous growth whose cells are intermingled with, and
often hard to distinguish from, healthy cells. To the extent, then, that man
does manage to isolate evil, forcibly eject it from himself, and externalize
it, to that extent man moves himself closer to the state of Odom before he
tasted sin. In other words, he moves himself closer to Hashem’s original plan
for the optimum state of man, since the original sin was not “supposed” to
happen. Vidui is no more or less than an ejection of, and an
externalization, of sin! Vidui is a bald statement of the
transgression; that statement is an “outing” of evil; an exorcism that, in a
certain sense, extracts the evil of that sin from the person, exposing it to
the cold light of day, and moving the person that much closer to the state of
Odom pre-sin, when all evil was external.
This is the source of vidui’s
power to achieve atonement. Forcing sin from the depths of the soul, where it
had been hiding, to the openness of verbal expression, is akin to sifting out
evil from the mishmash with holiness where it had been hiding, and vomiting it
out to stand in isolation.
Exposure and Expulsion
We know that part of teshuva
is expunging evil and separating it from the oneself from the words of a Tanna
in the Gemara (Yoma 86b) who says that one should not re-confess sins
next year that have already been confessed this year. Rabbeinu Yonah declared
this to be the halacha, (Shaarei Teshuva 4:21) on the grounds
that re-confessing gives the appearance of a lack of faith in the power of teshuva
to eradicate sin – why would a person confess a second time if he truly
believed that the first confession was effective?
However, the aforementioned Gemara
characterizes re-confessing as being comparable to, “As a dog returns to his
vomit, so does a fool repeat his folly” (Mishlei 26:11). The idea is
that someone who returns to his confession is like a dog returning to his
vomit; like a fool returning to his folly. The comparison does not make sense
according to Rabbeinu Yonah’s understanding of the Gemara. According to
Rabbeinu Yonah the reason re-confessing is prohibited is because it shows a
lack of faith in the power of teshuva. However the comparison to the
verse in Mishlei implies that the problem has to do with the returning
itself, not with what the returning shows. Thus this Maamar presents an
alternative understanding of the problem with re-confessing that fits better
with the Mishlei verse.
In light of our
understanding that vidui is an expulsion of sin, though, it makes a lot
of sense. As we explained, the purpose of vidui is to transfer the sin
from inside the person to outside him; an uprooting of the evil of the sin from
its parasitic existence within a person’s soul. In that sense vidui is
similar to taking food that has already been enjoyed and digested, and
regurgitating it. The sinner
enjoyed the “forbidden fruit” of sin while he was “eating” it – that is, while
he was engaged in the act of sinning – and the evil of the sin was “digested”
into his being. Afterwards, though, he felt remorseful, so he “regurgitated”
the sin from himself through vidui, analogous to the vomiting out
referenced in the verse.
The Gemara’s
comparison of vidui to the regurgitation of food is a clear indication
that vidui itself is a process of expunging something hidden inside him
into the light of day.
A further indication that
points to our definition of vidui: The antithesis of vidui is
called mechaseh p’sha’av, “concealment of transgression” derived from
the verse in Mishlei 28:13. To conceal is the opposite of to expose.
Thus exposure is the factor in vidui that achieves atonement. And why is
this? It is because exposure disentangles the sin-induced mélange of good and
evil, and places the sin in isolation; in essence it is, to a degree, a
reversal of the contamination of Chava with foulness. Vidui expunges
that contamination from the body, and that brings a person closer to the ideal
state of man, before Odom ate from the Tree of Knowledge, when he was free of
the freeloading yetzer horah residing
in his person.
This, then, is how the power
of exposure achieves atonement. Exposing sin by confessing it aloud – vidui
– is deemed an expulsion of the evil of sin from its embedment within a
person’s psyche.
The Enemy Inside, and
the Enemy Outside
This provides us a starting
point for understanding the difference between the approach to sin avoidance of
the penitent, the baal
teshuva, and that of those who are righteous-from-the-start (for a
particular aveira). The baal
teshuva relates to his yetzer horah
as one would relate to a hostile opponent, intent on swallowing him up. He
calls on Hashem to be his witness that will not sin, much as a plaintiff would
call on a witness in a dispute with a second party. This is clear from the Rambam
(Hilchos Teshuva 2:2) who writes “What constitutes teshuva,
repentance? … And He who knows the
hidden, will testify concerning him that he will never return to this sin
again”, and the Kesef Mishna explains, “He must call upon Hashem to bear
witness that he will never repeat this sin…”.
However the
righteous-from-the-start relates to the yetzer
horah as a person engaged in a struggle with himself. To fortify himself
against sinning he takes an oath to his Creator, per the Gemara in Nedarim
8b, that he will not succumb to temptation. This is a mechanism that does not
involve a second party at all.
Again, the baal teshuva relates to his yetzer horah as one would relate to an
outside hostile opponent, intent on swallowing him up, whereas the
righteous-from-the-start relates to the yetzer
horah as a person engaged in a struggle with himself.
The reason for the
difference, we now understand, is that someone who is righteous-from-the-start
has never tasted vidui and therefore has never had the opportunity to
banish the yetzer horah embedded in
him to the outside. Since the transgression of Odom, everyone, even someone
righteous-from-the-start, has an yetzer
horah embedded in their psyche. Nonetheless, someone who is
righteous-from-the-start has never had an opportunity to recite vidui
since vidui can only be done after a person actually sins – since it is
a confession of sin – and this person has never actually sinned. Thus the yetzer horah remains bottled up inside
him and he must relate to it as a part of himself.
The yetzer horah started out within the recesses of his soul and
remained there. His battle with it is a battle between one part of his self –
the part that wants to resist sin – and another part of his self – the yetzer horah, that wants to draw him to
sin.
This is not the case with
the baal teshuva, who has experienced
vidui, and who has, as the Gemara said, spat out the evil from
within himself. His battle is now, in a manner of speaking with something
external to him. The enemy he must attack has an independent existence; it is
like the howling dog mentioned earlier.
Shma and the Baal Teshuva
“Listen, Yisroel, Hashem is
our G-d, Hashem is one” (Devarim 6:4). Our Sages teach us (Yerushalmi
Brachos 1:5) that this verse contains affirmations of the first two of the aseres
hadibros (Devarim 5:6). When we say, “Hashem is our G-d” we are
affirming the first commandment, which begins, “I am Hashem, your G-d”. When we
say, “Hashem is one” we are affirming the second commandment, which begins,
“You shall not have other gods…”.
It is worth looking into why
the affirmations of the Shma verse appear in Parshas V’eschanan,
after the contents of the second luchos are presented in the Torah. This
implies that an affirmation was only necessary after the second set of luchos
was presented. Why delay the affirmation until the second set?
Here too, though, the
concept that we have been developing in this Maamar comes into play.
The difference between the
first and second set of the aseres hadibros is that, while the first set
was imparted on the basis of the nation having the status of
righteous-from-the-start, the second set was imparted on the basis of the
nation being in a state of repentance; in fact, the second set was first and
foremost an instrument of solace for the nation, in recognition of their
repentance.
Prior to the giving of the
first set of luchos the nation was cleansed of sin and uplifted to the
status of Odom before primordial sin. They were given a fresh start, and
therefore had the status of righteous-from-the-start. They maintained that
rarefied state until the sin of the golden calf, the egel, after which
the first set of luchos were destroyed. The second set of luchos were
given only after the nation repented.
Now, the words, “Listen,
Yisroel” form an imperative statement expressed in second person – that is,
directed at an outside party. But immediately, the tense switches to first
person, as the verse continues with the words, “Hashem is our G-d”. In
other words, the Shma verse is couched in terms of someone who is
interacting with himself as one would interact with someone else – with an
outside party. This is the signature “baal
teshuva” mode of behavior. And that is why Shma is an affirmation of
the second set of luchos, in particular.
The
Perceptive Nazir
We can see how meticulous
our Sages were in their choice of words, in the incident of the Nazir
from the south (Nedarim 9b) of whose asham sacrifice Shimon HaTzadik partook, and whom he blessed
with the words, “May there be more Nezirim like you in Yisroel!” When
the Gemara relates this incident it takes pains to precisely quote the
response of this Nazir when he was asked why he accepted Nezirus
on himself, as follows:
“I was a shepherd for my
father in my city and I went to the spring to draw water. I gazed upon my
reflection and my yetzer horah rushed
over to me and sought to banish me from the world. I said to him, ‘Evil one!
Why are you giving yourself airs by tempting me to sin…?’ [A Nazir must
shave his head at the conclusion of his period of Nezirus and the shepherd
intended to thereby spoil his good looks and attenuate his temptation to sin.]
Upon hearing this, Shimon HaTzadik arose
and kissed him on his head and declared, ‘May there be more Nezirim like
you in Yisroel!’”
Anyone with an ear attuned
to the nuances of the words of our Sages will realize that the kiss and
blessing of Shimon HaTzadik were
directed not only at the actions of the Nazir, but also at the Nazir’s
turn of phrase, which teaches us something new about tactics to use against the
yetzer horah. The Nazir
emphasized that in the heat of the moment when the yetzer horah threatened to overcome him, at the beginning of his
“dialog” with the yetzer horah, he addressed him in the second person,
and he continued in this vein when he related the event to Shimon the
Righteous, using the words, “I told him…”
He was careful not to say,
“I told myself…”. And he continued in this manner when he related the
rest of his conversation with the yetzer horah. When he burst out in
anger at the yetzer horah, he said, “Evil one! Why are you giving
yourself airs in a world that is not yours”. In other words, he
continued to deal with the yetzer horah as one would deal with another
person, standing opposite him – not in an inward-facing manner, as someone
making a personal decision. This mode of interaction with the yetzer horah was part of what impressed Shimon HaTzadik and what impelled Shimon HaTzadik to kiss and bless the
shepherd.
We learned in this Maamar
how a baal teshuva and how a
righteous-from-the-start person relate to their yetzer horah, and we learned that relating to him as to an outside
party is reserved for the baal teshuva.
However, it seems that we may have to revise our thinking on this in light of
the words of the Nazir. Those words teach us an extraordinary thing.
Realize that the Nazir is not a baal
teshuva; his battle with the yetzer horah is that of someone who is righteous-from-the-start
and who has never indulged in this sin. [From his reaction to the yetzer
horah it is apparent that this Nazir never committed the particular sin that
the yetzer horah was tempting him with.] Yet his response to the yetzer
horah makes it abundantly clear that even someone who is sin-free can
relate to the yetzer horah in this way!
We see, then, that, in
planning a strategy to defeat the yetzer horah, there is an advantage,
even for someone who is righteous-from-the-start, to addressing it as if it
were an external party that one can turn to and address as “you”. Otherwise why
would the Nazir, who was righteous-from-the-start, address him in this
way, rather than in the introspective manner that is more natural for someone
in that category?
The key difference between
this strategy in the hands of a baal
teshuva and in the hands of a righteous-from-the-start person, is that for
the baal teshuva, this strategy is
reality, since the baal teshuva took
an action that actually ejected, expelled and spat the yetzer horah out
and away from himself. But the righteous-from-the-start has to visualize
the yetzer horah outside himself, since he never took an action to make
that expulsion a reality.
Nonetheless, there is value
to using the imagination in this way, just as there is value to “always
visualize oneself as hanging in the balance between conviction in the Heavenly
court and acquittal” (Kiddushin 40b). If a person continually views his
fate as hanging in the balance he will realize that a single good action could
tip the balance in his favor while a single bad action could tip the balance in
the other direction. Now, most people are not actually hanging in the balance,
but they are being advised to imagine themselves in this state as motivation to
seek out mitzvos and avoid transgressions.
In the same way, it is
legitimate to visualize the yetzer horah
as being outside oneself, even if he is not, since that makes it easier to
“talk your way out of” transgressing.
Moreover, while it is true
that this visualization is imaginary, for the righteous-from-the-start – unlike
the situation of the baal teshuva,
for whom relating to the yetzer horah as something external is very real
– it is not, strictly speaking, a lie, because when man was first created, the yetzer horah was, in fact, external to
him. This is the natural state of man, and it changed only because of the original
sin. Therefore, when man is at the pinnacle of his greatness – when he is in
the throes of subduing his yetzer horah,
and can visualize it as being external to himself – he is throwing himself back
to man’s originally intended state, where the yetzer horah really was external to him. There is imagination at
play here, but no falsehood.
In fact, we can go so far as
to say that just as, per our Sages (Yoma 29b), fantasizing about sin is
worse, in a sense, than actually sinning, so might we also say that at times,
dreams of holiness are better than acts of holiness.
Reality generally falls
short of the dream. When we dream, whether for good or for bad, the object of
our desire is perfect and without blemish and our ardor is never dampened, as
it might be when we are faced with the reality of an imperfect world. In this
sense, the righteous-from-the-start, who is visualizing his third-party
confrontation with the yetzer horah,
may actually has an advantage over the baal
teshuva, who has to deal with him in reality.
May we all merit dreaming of
holiness in these yimai hadin, and may we all merit achieving it!
An adaptation into English of
the full text of Pachad Yitzchok, Yom Kippur Maamar 17 can be obtained
from the author at eli@eliwillner.com.
