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The Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe Podcast Collection is the one-stop shop for the Torah inspiration shared by Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe in one simple feed. The Jewish Inspiration Podcast, Parsha Review Podcast, Thinking Talmudist Podcast, Living Jewishly Podcast and Unboxing Judaism Podcast all in one convenient place. Enjoy!
You're listening to Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe, Director of TORCH, Torah Outreach Resource Center of Houston.
This is the Jewish Inspiration Podcast.
All right, we're now in Tractate Yoma,
which is about Yoma, the day, what's the day?
The day of Yom Kippur.
And in Tractate Yoma, you can imagine
that there's more than one conversation
that talks about repentance.
And the Talmud here on 86a, all the way on the bottom,
says the following.
The Gemara records a series of aggadic teachings
that each begin, great is repentance.
Great is repentance.
Repentance is so powerful.
Om Rav Chama, Barchanina Rav Chama,
the son of Rav Chanina says,
Gedol atshuva shemevi urifu osla olam.
Great is repentance, for it brings healing to the world.
Yes, Bruce.
Great is repentance, for it brings healing to the world.
I will heal their waywardness.
I will love them freely.
A related teaching, Rav Chama Barchanina Rami.
Rav Chama Barchanina pointed out a contradiction.
The verse states in Jeremiah,
return, O wayward children,
the meikora shovim atem,
which implies that you will be regarded
as though you were wayward from the beginning.
This is after repentance,
the sin is viewed as having resulted
from the wayward immaturity of youth,
for which the sinner is not responsible
because they were a child.
Thus, the sin is eradicated completely.
V'ksiv arpa meshuvosechem, but it also says,
I will heal your waywardness,
which implies that the penitence is regarded
as an invalid who has been healed.
This indicates that even after repentance,
the taint of sin still remains.
So the contradiction resolved.
The Gemara says, lo kasha.
It's not difficult.
Kan mi ava, kan mi yira.
Here's where someone repented, motivated by love,
and here's where one repented being motivated by fear.
The Gemara now says another teaching
based on the last verse.
Rabbi Yehuda Rami, Rabbi Yehuda pointed out
the following contradiction.
It says, banim shovavim arpa meshuvosechem.
Return, O wayward children.
I will heal your waywardness.
Stating children, this verse teaches
that God relates to penitence
like a father to his children.
Why?
V'ksiv, it says in the verse,
which is the contradiction here,
ki anochi ba'alti bachem,
v'alakachti eschem echad meir v'shnaim mi mishbacha.
For I shall be your master.
I shall take you, even one from a city
and two from a family.
Here, scripture likens the relationship
between God and penitence
to that of a relationship between a master and his slaves.
So is it a father to a son or is it master to a slave?
The Gemara says, lo kasha.
It's not difficult.
Kan mi ava, kan mi yira.
Over here, the repentance came as a motivation of love.
And over here, it came as a motivation of fear.
Kan ali de yisurim.
And whereas here in the verse
that describes penitence as slaves
is referenced to those who repent
as a result of suffering.
Okay, so there's one type of repentance,
which is a repentance of love or repentance of fear.
And then there's another one
where he repents because he's suffering.
He has no choice.
He's pushed into a corner.
What are you going to do?
Another teaching about the greatness of teshuva.
Okay, so first let's talk about
what is repentance out of love
and what is repentance out of fear.
So you know, we discussed this previously.
What's the difference between love and fear?
Love is when you love someone,
you feel like anything you did
is a rebellion to the relationship.
Even if it's something small,
it's a rebellion to the relationship
because I have such love for you.
Therefore, anything that I may have done
is an objection to the relationship,
to where my feelings are.
So that's, I just have this incredible love
and I feel unwhole with this deed that I did.
So imagine that with our creator
and God gives us everything
and we love God so much
and God loves us so much.
And here we kind of blew that relationship.
So what do we do now?
So what we need to do is
we need to be very, very sincere
in this being a rebellion in our relationship.
Okay, but what is fear?
Fear is not that I have a love for God per se,
but it's I have a fear,
I'm terrified that I'm going to get beaten up.
God's going to punish me.
I don't want to get punished,
I'm sorry, I'm sorry, God,
but it's not that,
which one is a better,
it's like think of a child.
A child does something wrong.
So why does the child apologize to his parent?
Because he loves his parent
and he realized that this is,
it's in contradiction to my relationship
with my dad or my mom.
Or if he's just afraid,
he's apologizing because he's afraid of punishment.
I don't want my dad to take away my bicycle.
I don't want the retribution.
So which one is a more sincere,
more genuine repentance?
One that comes out of love.
That's the highest.
Second is fear.
But then there's another level,
which is a third level.
And that third level is repentance from pain,
which is I'm suffering, I have no choice.
I'm going to have to look at my ways
and realize why God did this to me.
Now, I will tell you,
my great-grandfather has in his masterpiece book
called Torah of Rome,
Rabbi Vrom Grudzinski, my great-grandfather,
my grandmother's father.
And he was the spiritual leader
in the great city of Slobodka.
And he said something,
he taught something so amazing.
He said that God,
when prophecy was removed from this world,
today we don't have prophets.
We have torch, like a nun for prophets,
but we don't have prophets.
So what do we do without prophets?
Who's going to tell us?
Who's going to guide us on the path we should take?
So a great-grandfather brings that today,
the prophet is pain.
The prophet is pain.
Pain is where God already communicates,
gives you the patch.
And now you're like, ow, it hurts.
Why did I get that patch?
Oh my, I went down the wrong path.
I made a mistake.
I didn't do something the way I was supposed to.
I made a, I erred here.
I erred there.
I did something wrong.
Oh, now you're coming after you got the punishment.
So it's a good thing you learned the lesson.
That's great.
But what's more important
is if we're able to elevate that,
that it be one rung higher,
which is the level of fear,
and one rung higher than that,
the highest level, the rung of love.
The highest form of repentance,
the repentance out of love.
I rebelled in my relationship with God.
Number two is where I repent out of fear.
And then level three, the worst,
the lowest of the levels,
is where I repent out of pain.
I'm afflicted with pain,
and that's why I'm repenting.
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