Yom Kippur: The Song of Teshuvah

Topics

• Ashreichem Yisrael — The Heart of Yom Kippur
• The First Song of Teshuvah
• Why Sing Vidui? Because Vidui Is a Mitzvah
• Cleaning the King's Palace
• “Al Chet Shechatanu Lifanecha”
• Korban, Kirvah, and the Song of Teshuvah
• The Berdichever's “Trade”
• Avichem ShebaShamayim
• Lifnai V'Lifnim — The Closeness of Yom Kippur
• When It Is Your Own Child
• A Father Sees the Same Act Differently
• “Shuvu Banim Shovavim”
• The Aveirah Becomes the Beginning of Growth

Transcript

## Ashreichem Yisrael — The Heart of Yom Kippur

As we approach Yom Kippur, I want to share with you what Yom Kippur feels like to me—what I believe lies at the heart of the day.

The Mishnah ends Maseches Yoma with the words of Rabbi Akiva:

**“Ashreichem Yisrael! Lifnei mi atem metaharin, u'mi metaher eschem? Avichem shebaShamayim.”**
“Fortunate are you, Yisrael! Before Whom do you purify yourselves, and Who purifies you? Your Father in Heaven” (Yoma 85b).

Rabbi Akiva compares HaKadosh Baruch Hu to a mikveh: just as a mikveh purifies the impure, so Hashem purifies Klal Yisrael.

If we understand those words—*Ashreichem Yisrael*—I believe we will understand Yom Kippur.

Vidui is one of the central avodos of the day. Again and again, in every tefillah, we confess. The sefarim emphasize that Vidui must be said seriously, with kavanas halev and a **lev nishbar**, a broken heart. That is only reasonable. We are standing before Hashem and listing our aveiros. We should feel humbled and broken by what we have done.

And yet we have a striking minhag.

We **sing** the Vidui.

There are communities where the words are said with a sweet, almost joyous niggun.

Why?

What exactly are we singing about?

If Vidui means facing the things of which we are most ashamed, why does the Jewish heart turn it into song?

That is the question I want to understand: **What is the song of teshuvah?**

## The First Song of Teshuvah

The connection between **Shabbos** and **teshuvah** is very deep. It is no accident that the Shabbos between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur is called *Shabbos Shuvah*. Shabbos itself contains a power of return.

Chazal say that one who keeps Shabbos properly can be forgiven even for the severe sin of avodah zarah (Shabbos 118b). The question is obvious: if he did teshuvah, then teshuvah should help; and if he did not do teshuvah, why should Shabbos help?

The answer is that not every aveirah is erased by teshuvah alone. Chazal describe different **chilukei kapparah**—some sins require teshuvah together with Yom Kippur, some require yisurim, and some reach completion only through death (Yoma 86a; Rambam, *Hilchos Teshuvah* 1:4). Shabbos, however, carries an extraordinary power of kapparah.

And there is something even more striking.

The Midrash describes Adam HaRishon meeting Kayin after Kayin had killed Hevel. Adam asked him what had happened with his judgment. Kayin answered: **“Asisi teshuvah v'nispasharti”**—I did teshuvah, and I was reconciled with Hashem.

Adam was astonished.

There is such a thing as teshuvah?

There is a way back after sin?

And Chazal say that Adam immediately opened his mouth in song: **“Mizmor shir l'yom haShabbos.”**

The first response to discovering teshuvah was **shir**.

That is what I want you to hear.

Adam did not merely say, “Baruch Hashem, punishment can be reduced.” He sang.

Teshuvah itself created a song.

So our minhag to sing Vidui on Yom Kippur is not as strange as it first appears. From the beginning of history, teshuvah and shir were already bound together.

The question remains: **Why?**

## Why Sing Vidui? Because Vidui Is a Mitzvah

The Chasam Sofer asks this very question: why do we say Vidui with melody? Would it not be more appropriate to confess with crying, brokenness, and tears?

He gives several answers.

The first is simple and profound: **Vidui is a mitzvah.**

And a mitzvah is performed with simchah.

That sounds almost impossible. I am confessing embarrassing things. I am speaking about failure, weakness, aveirah. How can I be happy?

Because if I understand Yom Kippur properly, I understand that the very ability to stand before Hashem and confess is itself an extraordinary gift.

Rabbi Akiva does not end Yoma by saying, “How frightened you should be, Yisrael.” He says:

**Ashreichem Yisrael.**

How fortunate you are.

Yom Kippur is here.

You are being given the possibility of taharah.

You are being given teshuvah.

Rabbi Akiva understood the gift of teshuvah in his own life. At forty years old he changed the entire direction of his existence. He knew what it means for a human being not to be imprisoned by his past.

So yes, there must be a broken heart. There must be seriousness. There must be shame for what we did.

But alongside all of that is *Ashreichem*.

How lucky am I that Hashem allows me to come back?

How lucky am I that my past does not have to be my future?

That itself is reason for song.

## Cleaning the King's Palace

There is a story told in the Chassidishe sefarim about the Baal Shem Tov.

He once came to a town for the Yamim Noraim and asked about the rav who would be the baal tefillah. He was told that the rav had a beautiful voice and that he sang the Vidui with sweet niggunim.

The Baal Shem Tov challenged him: **You sing while confessing sins?**

The rav answered with a mashal.

Imagine a servant in the king's palace whose job is to clean the floors and remove the garbage. It is not glamorous work. He is dealing with dirt.

But the king assigned him that task.

So while he sweeps the palace, he sings.

Why? Not because garbage is beautiful. Because he is serving the king.

That is how I understand Vidui.

I am cleaning.

I am speaking about the dirt.

But Who asked me to clean? Before Whom am I standing?

**Lifanecha.**

Hashem asked me to come before Him, open my heart, admit what I did, and clean it out.

That itself is closeness.

I grew up with a story about the holy Kapishnitzer Rebbe. During the war, the Nazis forced him to perform degrading labor, cleaning the streets. They intended to humiliate a great Rebbe.

But he sang while he worked.

The chassidim could not understand it. Rebbe, at such a moment you can sing?

He explained: they think they are degrading me. But I am cleaning Hashem's world. If I place the act inside my relationship with the Ribbono Shel Olam, they cannot define what I am doing.

That is the first song of Vidui.

The aveirah itself is not a song.

But the fact that **Hashem allows me to stand before Him and clean**—that is a song.

## “Al Chet Shechatanu Lifanecha”

I think of another story, this one about Rav Aryeh Levine.

He once noticed a man whose job was to clean the courtyard. The man looked broken and ashamed of himself. Rav Aryeh asked him why.

He answered: Look what I am. I am only a cleaner. I wash floors. I remove dirt.

Rav Aryeh told him: **You are looking at yourself incorrectly. You are cleaning the beautiful world of the Ribbono Shel Olam.**

From then on, the man saw his work differently.

That is exactly what happens on Yom Kippur.

We say again and again:

**“Al chet shechatanu lifanecha.”**

Not merely: I sinned.

**Lifanecha.**

I sinned before You.

I am standing before You now.

I am speaking to You.

That changes everything.

Vidui is humbling. It should be humbling. I am taking out the dirty laundry and saying openly: this is what I did.

But the humiliation is taking place inside a relationship.

I am not sitting alone saying, “I am terrible. I am worthless. Look what I became.”

I am saying: Ribbono Shel Olam, **I am here in front of You.** You asked me to tell You the truth, so I am telling You the truth.

That is a mitzvah.

That is connection.

That is why even a broken-hearted Vidui can contain simchah.

The song is not denial of the chet.

The song is the *lifanecha*.

## Korban, Kirvah, and the Song of Teshuvah

The Chasam Sofer gives another explanation for singing Vidui.

A korban brings kapparah, and the avodah of korban in the Beis HaMikdash is accompanied by **shir**.

There is a deeper point here.

The word *korban* comes from **kirvah**—closeness.

A korban means that a person who had become distant is drawing near again.

And when there is real closeness to Hashem, there is song.

This brings us back to Adam HaRishon. The moment he discovered teshuvah—the possibility of *shuv*, of returning—he broke into **“Mizmor shir.”**

Teshuvah is return.

Return is kirvah.

Kirvah creates shir.

But now I want to come to the deepest answer.

The Gemara teaches that there are two kinds of teshuvah. Teshuvah from fear can reduce deliberate sins to the level of mistakes. But **teshuvah me'ahavah** does something astonishing:

**Zedonos naasin lo kizechuyos**—deliberate sins become merits (Yoma 86b).

This is the teshuvah toward which Yom Kippur reaches: teshuvah of love.

And now we have a much bigger question than why we sing Vidui.

How can an aveirah become a zechus?

I understand forgiveness.

I understand wiping away the punishment.

I can even understand Hashem treating the aveirah as less severe.

But a mitzvah?

A merit?

How can the thing I did wrong become something good?

If we understand that, we will understand the real song of Yom Kippur.

## The Berdichever's “Trade”

I want to bring you into this through a famous Yom Kippur image from the holy Kedushas Levi, Rav Levi Yitzchak of Berditchev.

He would make what the Chassidim called a **bayit**—a trade—with the Ribbono Shel Olam.

He would say, in effect:

Ribbono Shel Olam, we have three things to give You: **chata'im, avonos, and pesha'im**.

And we ask You for three things in return: **selichah, mechilah, and kapparah**.

A fair trade?

Then he would continue: actually, Ribbono Shel Olam, we are giving You much more. Our aveiros fill warehouses. For You, forgiveness is easy. So perhaps You should add a little more to Your side of the bargain.

What is this?

Was the Berdichever making a joke on Yom Kippur?

Chas v'shalom.

He was touching the deepest point of the day.

The Gemara says that through teshuvah me'ahavah the aveirah itself can become a zechus. The Berdichever is saying: Ribbono Shel Olam, we bring You the very things that separated us from You—and You transform them into the material of our return.

That is the great wonder.

We are not denying the sin.

We are not calling evil good.

We are asking: **How can the chet itself become part of the zechus?**

That question will bring us directly into the meaning of *Ashreichem Yisrael*.

## Avichem ShebaShamayim

Why are we singing the Vidui?

Because, says the explanation brought in the Tiferes Yisrael and developed by the Chasam Sofer, through teshuvah me'ahavah the sins are becoming **zechuyos**.

So of course there is a song.

But we still have to understand how that can possibly happen.

Go back to Rabbi Akiva's words:

**“Ashreichem Yisrael, lifnei mi atem metaharin, u'mi metaher eschem? Avichem shebaShamayim.”**

The key word is **Avichem**.

Your Father.

Rosh Hashanah emphasizes Malchus. Hashem is the King. There is awe, judgment, yirah.

Yom Kippur reveals another dimension: **the Father**.

A father looks at a child differently than a king looks at a subject.

This does not mean that the aveirah disappears or that nothing matters. It means that the relationship changes the entire way the failure is understood.

I once had to appear in court over a traffic ticket. While I was waiting, another Jew was sitting there terribly nervous. He had accumulated a number of tickets and was afraid his license would be taken away.

Then the judges switched for lunch.

The new judge was Jewish, and my new friend suddenly became hopeful. “I know this judge,” he said.

In the end, the judge dismissed his tickets—and, almost before I knew what happened, dismissed mine as well.

That experience stayed with me because it gave me a picture.

Imagine coming into court and discovering that the person sitting in the judge's chair is **your father**.

That is Yom Kippur.

The Dayan is real.

The judgment is real.

But the One before Whom I stand is **Avichem shebaShamayim**.

Now *Ashreichem Yisrael* begins to make sense.

## Lifnai V'Lifnim — The Closeness of Yom Kippur

What is the central avodah of Yom Kippur?

The Kohen Gadol enters **lifnai v'lifnim**, into the Kodesh HaKodashim.

Why is this permitted only on Yom Kippur?

Because the closeness of the day is unlike any other time.

The Kohen Gadol represents Klal Yisrael, and on this day he enters the innermost place. The *lifanecha* becomes literal: Klal Yisrael is brought into extraordinary kirvah with HaKadosh Baruch Hu.

Rav Yerucham describes the closeness of Yom Kippur in language so strong that the Jew and HaKadosh Baruch Hu are bound together in an unparalleled way. I would want the exact formulation checked before publication, but the idea is clear.

There is an extraordinary Gemara in Berachos.

Rabbi Yishmael ben Elisha, the Kohen Gadol, describes entering the Kodesh HaKodashim and seeing **Akatriel Yah Hashem Tzevakos** seated upon a high and exalted throne. Hashem says to him:

**“Yishmael beni, barecheini”**—“Yishmael, My son, bless Me” (Berachos 7a).

Listen to those words.

**My son.**

On Yom Kippur, in the innermost chamber, the language is father and son.

And what brachah does Rabbi Yishmael give? He asks that Hashem's rachamim overcome His anger and that He conduct Himself with His children through the middah of rachamim.

What kind of brachah is that for Hashem?

It is the perfect brachah.

Hashem has addressed him as a father addresses a son. Rabbi Yishmael answers by asking that the relationship of Father and children be fully revealed.

That is Yom Kippur.

That is *Avichem shebaShamayim*.

## When It Is Your Own Child

I want to tell you a story that my grandfather told me in the name of Rav Hutner.

A parent once came to Rav Hutner deeply upset about a boy in his son's class. This child, he said, was a terrible influence. He was bringing improper material into the yeshiva and affecting the other boys.

“You have to throw him out,” the father insisted. “A child like this cannot remain in the class.”

Rav Hutner tried to soften him.

“He is a child,” he said. “Children make mistakes.”

The father would not accept it.

“No. This is serious. He is harming everyone else.”

Rav Hutner continued: “But if I throw him out, imagine what it will do to the boy's family. Imagine the pain.”

The father remained firm.

“The yeshiva has a responsibility. Find out who the boy is and remove him.”

Rav Hutner asked him who the boy was.

The father answered that he did not know. The boys in the class were protecting their friend and would not reveal his identity.

A few days later, Rav Hutner called him back.

“I found out who the boy is.”

Who?

**Your son.**

And suddenly the entire conversation changed.

## A Father Sees the Same Act Differently

The moment the father heard, “It is your son,” he began saying all the things Rav Hutner had been saying.

“He is only a child.”

“Why throw a little boy out of yeshiva?”

“What did he do already?”

Nothing about the facts had changed.

Only one thing had changed:

**It was his son.**

That is what I want you to understand about Yom Kippur.

We say about Hashem, **“Nosei avon v'over al pesha”**—He bears iniquity and passes over transgression (Michah 7:18).

*Nosei* means He carries it. He lifts it. He does not look only at the cold act standing by itself.

We ask Hashem to see the circumstance.

Ribbono Shel Olam, You know how weak I was. You know what pressure I was under. You know what confused me. You know what brought me to that point.

Try saying that to an ordinary judge.

“I went through the red light, but I was under pressure.”

The law answers: you still went through the red light.

But a father listens differently.

A father wants to know why his child fell.

A father can look at something broken in the house and, because it was his child, find himself saying: look how cute he is.

The principal will not say that when a desk is broken.

A father might.

That is *Ashreichem Yisrael*.

Who is judging us on Yom Kippur?

**Avichem shebaShamayim.**

And once that becomes real, the entire day looks different.

## “Shuvu Banim Shovavim”

There is a Rashi that, to me, opens the entire sugya.

The Gemara says that teshuvah brings healing to the world and compares two pesukim: **“Shuvu banim shovavim”** and **“Erpa meshuvosam”** (Yoma 86a).

The Gemara distinguishes between different forms of teshuvah, and Rashi explains the language of **“Shuvu banim shovavim”** in a breathtaking way.

When a person does teshuvah me'ahavah, Hashem calls him **banim**—children.

And then Hashem looks back at the original chet as though it came from **na'arus, shtus, and shovavus**—the foolishness and waywardness of a child.

Do you hear what Rashi is saying?

The chet was real.

But after the child returns with love, the Father says:

He was a child.

He was foolish.

He acted immaturely.

He will grow out of it.

He will become better.

That is the language of **shovav**. We call a child mischievous. He did something wrong—but the word itself assumes that this is not necessarily the final definition of who he is.

I once showed this Rashi to Rav Chaim Pinchas Scheinberg. He began to cry.

Hashem is telling us: come back to Me as My child, and I will look at your past as something you can outgrow.

That is not merely erasing punishment.

That is a Father rewriting the meaning of the failure.

## The Aveirah Becomes the Beginning of Growth

Now we can understand how an aveirah can become a zechus.

In the yeshiva world, the idea is explained that the aveirah itself became the **catalyst** for teshuvah. Because I fell, I confronted myself. Because I confronted myself, I changed. Because I changed, I grew closer to Hashem.

So the very thing that was once my downfall becomes part of the story of my growth.

I heard this explained in the name of Rav Chaim Brisker, and I would want the exact source checked before publication.

At first glance it is difficult. Are we really going to say that an aveirah is now a mitzvah? **“Haratzachta v'gam yarashta?”**—you sinned and now you profit from it? (I Melachim 21:19).

Who could speak that way?

A father.

A father can say: **You learned from your mistake.**

That sentence contains the entire song of teshuvah.

Yom Kippur gives me the opportunity to look at the aveiros of the past year and say: I will not merely carry them as shame. I will learn from them. I will grow from them. I will become a better person because I finally understood where I went wrong.

That is how the failure can become part of a zechus.

And that is why I can sing Vidui.

Not because sin is sweet.

Because teshuvah is beautiful.

Because Hashem gives me another chance.

Because I can stand before **Avichem shebaShamayim** and say: You understand me. You know my weakness. You know why I fell. And You are giving me life so that I can grow, serve You better, and become a better son.

**Zochreinu l'chayim l'maancha.**

Give me life for Your sake—so that I can become what You want me to become.

That is *Ashreichem Yisrael*.

That is the song of Vidui.

That is the song of teshuvah.