Igeres Hateshuvah Chapters 2–3

00:00 Speaker 1 We started learning Igeres Hateshuvah last week. It was last week, right?

00:03 Speaker 2 No, almost a month ago.

00:05 Speaker 1 What, we haven’t had a class for that long? Ah, because of Purim and everything.

00:08 Speaker 2 Purim, and [unclear] too.

00:11 Speaker 1 Right. And today we’ll learn the next two chapters together, chapters 2 and 3. They’re both short, both easy, and both continue the same subject. The first three chapters of Igeres Hateshuvah are really only an introduction to the subject of teshuvah. The Alter Rebbe begins explaining teshuvah itself only in chapter 4. The first three chapters are essentially a clarification within the revealed dimension of Torah, and that whole clarification is one great innovation, with many smaller innovations in it. It’s the Alter Rebbe’s approach to what teshuvah means. Among the great Torah sages, there are all sorts of explanations and opinions about teshuvah: whether it means confession, atonement, fasting, or returning to Hashem. All sorts of things. Already in the first chapter, the Alter Rebbe took all these concepts, drew clear distinctions, and put them in order. He showed from our sources—demonstrated very, very clearly—how they fit together. The overall point of the first chapter is that teshuvah means returning to Hashem. Returning to Hashem, and that’s it. “Abandoning sin alone,” in the Alter Rebbe’s words. In other words, teshuvah is not about repairing what happened. That’s a separate matter. Teshuvah means returning—from the word “to return”—coming back to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Repairing what happened earlier is another matter. That is the completion of teshuvah, not the essence of teshuvah itself. And repairing what happened in the past, which completes teshuvah, is called kapparah, atonement. Kapparah comes from the word meaning “to cover”—to cover over, to smooth over what happened. So that’s essentially what the Alter Rebbe says. There are several more explanations and some profound points in the revealed dimension of Torah there, but the overall point of the first chapter is that teshuvah concerns what happens from now on, while kapparah repairs what happened before.

02:32 Speaker 1 That’s the broad picture. In the course of the explanation, the Alter Rebbe also ruled out, from every possible angle, the idea that teshuvah means fasting and self-affliction. He brought sources from the Gemara and elsewhere showing that fasting and self-affliction—causing oneself suffering—have nothing to do with teshuvah. Why not? Because when does suffering enter the picture in connection with teshuvah? There are three categories of atonement. If someone fails to fulfill a positive mitzvah, once he does teshuvah, he is forgiven on the spot. So where does suffering come in? If you’ve done teshuvah and resolved to return to Hakadosh Boruch Hu, then that’s it—you’ve returned. Finished. What does suffering have to do with it? Nothing. Ah, if he transgressed a prohibition punishable by kareis or a court-imposed death penalty—serious transgressions—then teshuvah suspends the punishment and Yom Kippur atones. So even though transgressions do require atonement, how is that atonement achieved? Through teshuvah and Yom Kippur. There’s no need for suffering here. Sorry, that’s for ordinary transgressions. Sorry, sorry—for ordinary transgressions. But if he committed the Torah’s most serious transgressions, punishable by kareis or a court-imposed death penalty, then teshuvah and Yom Kippur only suspend the punishment, and suffering that comes upon a person completes the atonement. And regarding that, he said—our Sages specified what is meant by suffering that comes upon a person: suffering that Hakadosh Boruch Hu brings upon him, not suffering he brings upon himself. So we see explicitly from the words of our Sages themselves, in the teaching quoted in the Gemara, that fasting and self-affliction have nothing to do with either teshuvah or atonement. That was the point on one side of the discussion. In the next two chapters, chapters 2 and 3, which we’re learning today, the Alter Rebbe explains at length that although fasting and self-affliction are part of neither teshuvah nor atonement, they nevertheless have an

05:04 Speaker 1 important—very important—role connected with teshuvah. That’s what we’ll see in these two chapters. What do fasting and self-affliction accomplish, and why are they needed, even though they are neither teshuvah nor atonement? Why are they needed? And how are they done—how much, when, and so on? Those are our two chapters. We’re starting chapter 2. “But all this”—that fasting and self-affliction have no place in teshuvah itself—“concerns atonement and forgiveness of sin.” To atone for a sin, to gain forgiveness and repair the past, fasting and self-affliction are unnecessary. “So that he is completely forgiven for having transgressed the King’s command.” When? When he has done complete teshuvah. If he has done teshuvah—and not just any teshuvah, but complete teshuvah—then his teshuvah doesn’t only bring him back to Hashem; it also repairs the past. So fasting and self-affliction are not needed in any case. And if he has done complete teshuvah, “not a single thing is brought up against him on the Day of Judgment, nor is he punished for it, G-d forbid, in the World to Come; he is completely exempt from judgment in the World to Come.” So fasting and self-affliction are unnecessary not only for returning to Hashem, but even for atonement. Why are they needed, then? “However, to be accepted by Hashem and pleasing and beloved before Him as he was before the sin, so that his service gives pleasure to his Creator”—that’s something else entirely. Before we go into the text and start reading, let’s explain it. It’s simply how things work between us. When a person wrongs his friend—gets angry with him, speaks badly about him, says things to him, treats him poorly—naturally that arouses anger in the friend, and sometimes a desire to do something back to him: “You did that to me, so I’ll pay you back.” A person is commanded to forgive his friend, all the more so if the friend comes over and asks, “Forgive me, please,”

07:24 Speaker 1 then it’s a mitzvah to forgive him. Now, even after he forgives him—“Listen, I didn’t mean it.” “All right, I forgive you. Let’s forget it. It happened, it happened; it’s over”—it hasn’t been erased from his heart. It remains there. What can you do? He’s forgiven him, but it’s still in his heart. Human nature being what it is, things aren’t the way they were before. If the person who wronged his friend wants to be as dear to him as he was before, he has to do something special. Bring him gifts, show him special respect, make an effort to appease him—he has to do something special. “I forgive you, I forgive you, it’s over” isn’t enough. To get it out of his heart takes something well beyond asking for forgiveness, right? That’s the role of fasting and self-affliction: the step beyond. Let’s see how this begins in the text. How do we arrive at fasting and self-affliction in the first place? What’s the connection? If I fast, does that count as doing something special for Hakadosh Boruch Hu? How is it connected? “However, to be accepted by Hashem and pleasing and beloved before Him as he was before the sin, so that his service gives pleasure to his Creator, he would have had to bring an olah offering, even for a minor positive mitzvah whose neglect carries neither kareis nor a court-imposed death penalty, as our Sages expounded in Toras Kohanim on the verse, ‘And it shall be accepted for him, to atone for him.’” What he’s saying is this: The Gemara says, and it’s the halachah in the Rambam, that when a person sins, there are prohibitions and there are positive mitzvos. If he transgresses a prohibition, he must bring a chatas offering; it’s an obligation. If he fails to fulfill a positive mitzvah, it doesn’t say that he has to bring an offering. There’s no such mitzvah. But if he wants to be as beloved before Hakadosh Boruch Hu as he was before the sin, then by all means, let him bring an olah offering, a shelamim offering, right? So that he’ll be beloved before Hakadosh Boruch Hu. But

09:40 Speaker 1 There’s no commandment here. That is how our Sages interpreted the verse “and it shall be accepted for him” in Toras Kohanim. When is it accepted for him? When he has neglected a positive mitzvah and brings an offering. As stated in the first chapter of Zevachim—there are several pages of Gemara there dealing with this—a burnt offering atones for a positive mitzvah. And the Gemara says that the burnt offering is called a gift, a present, brought after he has done teshuvah and been forgiven. There are three stages here. He did teshuvah; his punishment was forgiven. Now, after his pun—after his punishment has been forgiven, he brings an offering. Why bring an offering? His punishment has been forgiven. To be dear to Hakadosh Boruch Hu as he was before the sin. It is like a person who offended a king and appeased him through his advocates, and the king forgave him. Even so, he sends the king a gift and an offering so that the king will be willing to see him. Right? The king forgave him, but he doesn’t want to see him. There’s a certain difficulty here, because the Gemara says, “And it shall be accepted for him, to atone for him.” We said that atonement means erasing the sin, right? And erasing the sin, we said, has nothing to do with—why is this called “to atone”? Right? Seemingly, atonement isn’t about finding favor; atonement means cleansing. The cleansing is already finished. Right? So the Rebbe says, in parentheses, that the expression “atones,” and likewise the Torah’s words “and it shall be accepted for him, to atone for him,” do not refer to atonement for his soul. This is another meaning of the word “atonement”: rather, to atone before Hashem, to bring pleasure to his Creator. As it says there in the Gemara, or as it is written, “It shall be unblemished to be accepted.” The Gemara says explicitly that, in this context, the atonement being discussed is not atonement for his soul. It is not atonement for the sin, not the repair of the damage, but becoming dear to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. This is another meaning of atonement. Both are called atonement,

11:53 Speaker 1 the same word, but with a completely different meaning. It isn’t about repair; it’s about finding favor before Hakadosh Boruch Hu. That was when the Beis Hamikdash stood. A person would neglect a positive mitzvah and do teshuvah. Now, it’s true that the damage can’t be repaired, because the light can’t be drawn down, as he explains in the previous chapter. But to become dear to Hakadosh Boruch Hu, he would bring an offering. And now that we have no offering with which to elicit Hashem’s favor, what do we do? Fasting takes the place of an offering. So that’s exactly the point: fasting really isn’t part of either teshuvah or atonement. A person is forgiven for a transgression even without fasting. But to become dear to Hakadosh Boruch Hu as he was before the sin—that is what the fast is for. Why? Because fasting takes the place of an offering. How does fasting replace an offering? As it says in the Gemara: “May the diminution of my fat and blood be regarded as though I had offered it before You.” When a person offers an animal, the animal’s fat is burned and rises upon the altar. So too, when I fast, my own fat diminishes; may it be regarded before You as though I were an offering. Now that we’ve understood, at the beginning of chapter two, what fasting is good for—fine. How much must one fast, and when? So we come to this subject: “Therefore, we find among a number of Tannaim and Amoraim that they fasted many fasts over a minor matter.” For example, Rabbi Elazar ben Azaryah permitted a cow to go out on Shabbos with a strap between its horns, while the Sages forbade it. This is a Mishnah in tractate Shabbos. Once, his neighbor’s cow went out that way—not his cow. His neighbor’s cow went out with a strap between its horns. He forbade it, but the Sages permitted it. Sorry: he permitted it, but the Sages forbade it, and he did not protest. Why didn’t he protest? Because he permitted it. As far as he was concerned, it was allowed. And his teeth were blackened

14:03 Speaker 1 by fasting because he had not followed the ruling of his colleagues. That is, he did not change his opinion. In his view, it really was permitted. But since the halachah was decided according to his colleagues, his teeth were blackened by fasting because he had not followed their ruling. And it wasn’t even his cow. It was the neighbor’s cow, and what had he done, after all? He hadn’t protested. Another example is Rabbi Yehoshua, who said, “I am ashamed of your words, Beis Shammai.” He expressed himself disrespectfully toward Beis Shammai. His teeth were blackened by fasting. And once, the strap of Rav Huna’s head tefillin turned over, so that the white side faced outward, and he fasted forty fasts. Over what? It wasn’t a transgression. Nothing happened. And there are many such cases. The Gemara has many examples of this. Based on those examples in the Gemara, the Arizal taught his students, according to the wisdom of truth, the number of fasts for various wrongdoings and sins, even transgressions and sins that do not incur kares or death at the hands of Heaven. At the beginning of the previous chapter, we asked: To whom do afflictions apply? Whose transgressions, we said, are cleansed by afflictions? Only transgressions that incur kares or death imposed by a court—and even then, only afflictions that come from Above. So first of all, we see that Rav Huna and all these Tannaim fasted and took afflictions and mortifications upon themselves for transgressions that were not of that kind—for ordinary transgressions. And not only for ordinary prohibitions, but even for positive mitzvos, where afflictions don’t apply at all. For example, the Alter Rebbe gives examples of the number of fasts the Arizal prescribed for each kind of neglected mitzvah or transgression. For anger, it is 151 fasts. Each time a person gets angry, he should fast 151 fasts. That’ll do him in. Huh? That’ll

16:30 Speaker 1 do him in. And that’s for anger, which is a serious matter, because it says that anyone who gets angry is as though he worships idols. So let’s say that’s a serious transgression. But even for a rabbinic prohibition, such as wine handled by a non-Jew: suppose there was wine made by a non-Jew on his table by mistake. By Torah law it’s permitted; only the Sages forbade it so that we would not come to intermarriage, so that we would not become close to them. He didn’t know, and he drank the wine without realizing it. He should fast 73 fasts, and so on. And likewise for neglecting any positive mitzvah ordained by the Sages, such as prayer. Right? So the Arizal says that every time a person neglects a positive rabbinic mitzvah, he should fast 61 fasts, and so on. Yes, a great many fasts for all kinds of transgressions, even very minor ones. And the Rebbe adds a new point: as a general rule, the secret of fasting is that it is a wondrous means of bringing about a revelation of the Supreme Will of Hashem. In other words, what have we said up to now? At first, we asked: if fasting is not part of teshuvah or of repairing the sin at all, why is it needed? We answered: no, it is needed. Why? To be dear and pleasing before Him as one was before the sin. Okay. How much does one have to fast for that? Suddenly we received a list. The Rebbe adds something further, another point: in general, the secret of fasting is that it is a wondrous means of bringing about a revelation of the Supreme Will of Hashem, even apart from any sin. If a person wants to draw closer to Hakadosh Boruch Hu in general, fasting is beneficial. It’s just as a person may bring a burnt offering even if he has not neglected a positive mitzvah: he wants to draw closer to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Exactly the same thing. If he wants to draw closer to Hakadosh Boruch Hu,

18:46 Speaker 1 then fasting is a wondrous means of bringing about a revelation of the Supreme Will of Hashem, like an offering, of which it says, “a pleasing aroma to Hashem”—apart from any sin. But generally, in Chassidus, it’s as few fasts as possible. Wait, wait, we’ve only just started. It’s going to get much worse. Just wait. Yes. Yes. I said two chapters. And as it says in Yeshayahu, “Is this what you call a fast and a day of favor to Hashem?” Is that what you call a fast and a day of favor? That means a fast is a day of favor—what do you hear from that? That if it’s a genuine fast, it is indeed a day of favor. Right? That’s it. No, it has nothing to do with sin. No, no, no—not with kares, not with death imposed by a court, not even with prohibitions or positive mitzvos. It’s independent of all that. It follows that a fast that is accepted is a day of favor. Before we get to how much we actually need to fast—we don’t know exactly what is written in the Arizal’s writings about each matter, and so on, or what can be done by someone who cannot fast—the Rebbe, the Alter Rebbe, first enters, at the beginning of chapter three, into a discussion among the later scholars of mussar about how to carry out what the Arizal wrote. Because there are two opinions on this, and the Alter Rebbe presents them. Chapter three: “Now, the later scholars of mussar”—meaning those who came after the Arizal—“disagreed about a person who committed one particular sin many times.” The Arizal only wrote: for this sin, this number; for that sin, that number; for this sin... He did not write what happens if someone committed a sin several times. The Arizal did not write that. What does one do? So there is one opinion that a person who sinned several times must fast the prescribed number of fasts for that sin repeatedly, according to the number of times he sinned. For example, someone who emits semen in vain. And the Rebbe explained why the Alter Rebbe specifically chooses the—specifically

21:12 Speaker 1 That sin. I don’t remember the point. For example, one who emits seed in vain: the number of fasts specified in the Arizal’s Tikkunei Teshuvah is 84 fasts. So if he sinned in this way ten or twenty times, for example, he has to fast 84 times ten or twenty, and so on. Yes. Ten times already comes to 840 fasts, and twenty times comes to, uh, and so on. Why? Because it’s like a sin offering, which a person is obligated to bring for each and every time he sins. Each time he sins, he has to bring an offering. Give me 84 fasts in place of an offering, please. For each time, fast the required number. That’s the approach. That’s one opinion. And some compare this to a burnt offering. A burnt offering means, uh, it isn’t a sin offering, right? It’s an offering brought for neglecting a positive mitzvah, not for violating a prohibition. What’s the difference between a sin offering and a burnt offering for our purposes? There are several differences. For our purposes, what’s the difference? With a sin offering, every time he sins, he brings another one. But with a burnt offering, which is brought for neglecting a positive mitzvah, even if he neglected several positive mitzvos, one burnt offering atones for them, as it says in the Gemara, in the first chapter of Zevachim. And more than that: in chapter 25 of Tanya, which we learned a while ago, we didn’t emphasize this point or notice it, but there he writes that the offering brought every day, morning and afternoon—the daily offering—is a burnt offering, and it atones for the positive mitzvos neglected by all of Israel. One offering atones for all those positive mitzvos. One person neglected this one, another neglected that one, another neglected a third—all of the Jewish people. What’s the reasoning? Why can a sin offering atone for only one sin

23:24 Speaker 1 while a burnt offering is effective for different mitzvos, and for several mitzvos? The reasoning is very simple. A sin offering comes to repair the sin, the damage. Something was damaged here, and that is what needs to be repaired. Right? But when a person brings a burnt offering for neglecting a positive mitzvah, he isn’t coming to repair anything. He has already done teshuvah. What is there to repair? Nothing. The whole reason for the offering is to become pleasing to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. So what difference does it make how many transgressions he committed or how he committed them? He has already attained atonement for all of them; he just wants to become pleasing to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. So one offering serves for everything. That’s the reasoning behind it. So some of the mussar sages say that a person has to fast as many times as the number of offerings, while other sages say that the fast takes the place only of a burnt offering. So, you know, if it’s a burnt offering, he only has to fast once for everything together. Even if he neglected several mitzvos, one burnt offering atones for them, as it says in the Gemara, in the first chapter of Zevachim. Fine, so we have two opinions. What do we do in practice? The accepted ruling is to fast three times the prescribed number of fasts for that sin. For example, that means 252 fasts for emitting seed in vain. Yes, 84 times three is 252, and the same applies to other sins and transgressions. Why? Why specifically three times? The reason is based on what is written in the holy Zohar, at the end of Parshas Noach. The Zohar says: “When a person sins before Hakadosh Boruch Hu once,” it leaves a mark; it causes damage, and so on. He sins a second time, and the mark grows stronger, the damage grows. “The third time,” says the Zohar, “that

25:31 Speaker 1 stain spreads from one side to the other.” When a person commits the same sin a third time, the stain spreads through his soul from end to end. His whole soul becomes blackened in that respect. There’s nowhere left to—there’s nothing more to damage. It’s already damaged, that’s it. Even if he sins again, if he continues, it no longer makes a difference. It no longer adds to the damage. So three times is also enough to repair it. That’s why the number of fasts is also, uh... I’m missing a page.

26:07 Speaker 3 Three times.

26:12 Speaker 1 What? Ah, three times, yes. I lost the line at the end of that passage. Okay, so up to here, uh, we’ve discussed what one would have to do according to what’s written in Kabbalah and in the revealed teachings, and what one should do. Now, in practice. Indeed, everything we’ve discussed—sometimes a person, when he was young and not yet so strong, when he had desires and so on, may have committed various sins. He could arrive at a number of fasts so great that even the number of days in his life wouldn’t be enough to fast that many days. All this applies to a strong, healthy person whose health is not harmed at all by a large number of fasts—as in earlier generations. There’s a story in Sefer Hazichronos, which surely everyone here, or most of you, has read, about the Alter Rebbe’s father, uh...

27:21 Speaker 3 Boruch.

27:22 Speaker 1 Reb Boruch. There was a period when he decided that he would not support himself through gifts from other people. He reached a point where he had nothing to eat, and he simply fasted another day, and another day, and another day, because he would not ask people for gifts. No one gave him work, and he had no food. Well, he began to eat earth; he began to eat grass. Uh, I don’t know how long he would have lasted, but a miracle did happen. Why did he allow himself to do that? It’s explained there—there’s an astonishing description, a chapter or two, of how, at the very time he was suffering terrible hunger pangs—a person driven to eat grass, earth. You have to understand: a person who hasn’t eaten for a week. Can you—right? He goes down to the river to drink water to quiet his hunger. You can imagine what he suffered. The account describes how he fought every moment not to stop learning, not to stop contemplating his ideas. “He became absorbed for yet another hour and another hour in his lofty thoughts”—that’s the wording there. Expressions like that.

28:32 Speaker 4 Well, may they succeed too.

28:34 Speaker 1 A person like that is permitted to fast. The fasts don’t harm him, don’t interfere with his Torah study, and don’t harm his physical health. He really, apparently—I don’t know—but a person who is strong and healthy can do it. That was in earlier generations. But someone for whom many fasts are harmful, who might become ill or feel unwell, G-d forbid, as in our generations, is forbidden to undertake many fasts, even for sins punishable by kares or by a court-imposed death penalty. Uh, Rabbi David, a”h, whose yahrzeit is today, told me more than once that he knew elderly women in Ta’anach who would undertake a continuous fast. They wouldn’t eat for the whole week.

29:24 Speaker 4 The whole week?

29:25 Speaker 1 The whole week. It didn’t stop them from continuing to work in the cowshed and the chicken coop and... a continuous fast. No eating for the week. That was in the previous generation—there were still people like that here in Ta’anach. I heard firsthand testimony. I didn’t know anyone like that myself, but I heard it directly from Rabbi David, and I knew David well. A”h. Today is his yahrzeit. It’s twelve years today. 23 Adar. So the Alter Rebbe says that in his generation there were already no people strong enough to fast without it interfering with their normal functioning. That is, compared with what we know in our generation, the Alter Rebbe says that people in his generation were still much stronger than in ours, and yet he says that even then they could no longer fast so much. Therefore, in our generations, a person is forbidden to undertake many fasts—even for sins punishable by kares or by a court-imposed death penalty, not just for neglecting positive mitzvos. And all the more so, a person is forbidden to fast for neglecting a positive mitzvah or violating a prohibition that does not carry kares. How much may he fast? Only as much as he judges with certainty will not harm him at all. For even in earlier generations, in the days of the Tannaim and Amoraim, they would not fast in such circumstances except for those who were healthy and able to bear the hardship. Even then, only a few actually undertook the full set of fasts that would have been appropriate. And a person who cannot bear the hardship—that is, who cannot endure it, for whom it might be harmful—and fasts anyway is called a sinner in the Gemara, in the first chapter of Taanis. Because if you fast, the loss outweighs the gain. If fasting harms your physical health and you can’t learn, then why are you fasting? Even if he fasts for sins he has committed, as Rashi explains there in the Gemara, and as it says in the Gemara, in the chapter

31:32 Speaker 1 In the first chapter of Zevachim, it says that there is no Jew who is not obligated to fulfill a positive commandment, and yet not everyone is required to fast. All the more so someone devoted to Torah study: if he fasts, he sins and is punished doubly, because the weakness caused by the fast will keep him from studying Torah properly. So what is his remedy? What should a person do? He wants to be as dear to Hakadosh Boruch Hu as he was before the sin. He has done teshuvah, it genuinely pains him, he genuinely wants to make things right, but he cannot bring a sacrifice, and now he is being told not to fast either. What should he do? His remedy is as it is written: “Redeem your sins”—your sins, I don’t know how to read that—“with charity.” Give tzedakah. Instead of fasting, give tzedakah. How much? As the halachic authorities write: for each day of fasting for teshuvah, give the value of eighteen Polish grosh. So now there’s no problem. I’ll calculate how many fasts I owe, and after doing teshuvah I’ll give tzedakah according to the number of days required. A wealthy person should add according to his wealth, as the Magen Avraham writes in the laws of fasting. To be on the safe side, one can give even more tzedakah than this calculation requires. How much are eighteen Polish grosh? There is a letter from the Rebbe about this. We won’t go through the whole calculation now, but it comes out to—it also depends on the value of silver, how pure it is, its current market price, and details like that. It also depends on the context, because it depends on the value of a shekel. The value of a Torah sela varies. There is a sacred shekel; there is a particular weight of silver used when dealing with matters in which we rule stringently, while with rabbinic matters we rule leniently, and so on. So the value in silver of eighteen Polish grosh

33:33 Speaker 1 falls in the range of—as of yesterday, when I checked—between fifteen and twenty-five shekels. It depends on which method of calculation you use. So eighteen Polish grosh comes to about eighteen shekels. Or twenty shekels. So twenty shekels for each day of fasting. If he committed a sin that requires—say he got angry, right? He got angry. Then he has to fast 151 fasts times three, meaning 453 fasts times twenty shekels. That’s nine thousand shekels. Not too bad. Every time he gets angry, he’ll do teshuvah, give nine thousand shekels, and be as dear to Hakadosh Boruch Hu as before.

34:18 Speaker 5 Not every time. I mean, Rabbi, I think the times three is only once, isn’t it?

34:21 Speaker 1 Times three.

34:21 Speaker 5 No, so not every time he sins.

34:24 Speaker 1 Every time he sinned.

34:26 Speaker 5 For each sin. For each—

34:28 Speaker 1 Now he needs to do teshuvah, so for his anger he’ll give nine thousand shekels. For, I don’t know, neglecting prayer, he’ll give however much is required, and so on.

34:38 Speaker 5 Quite a few debts.

34:38 Speaker 1 Yes. And from now on he’ll be careful not to commit any more sins. Nevertheless, although we have a simple solution—a little expensive, but possible—any earnest person who desires closeness to Hashem, to repair his soul and return it to Hashem through teshuvah of the highest order, will not be satisfied with merely fulfilling his obligation by giving tzedakah instead of fasting. After all, I’m supposed to fast. What do you mean, “instead”? I don’t want a substitute. I want to be truly dear to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. The highest form of teshuvah. He will be stringent with himself and, at least once in his lifetime, actually complete the number of fasts for each of the severe sins punishable by kares or death—death. At least for those sins, at least once, I’ll complete all the... Even for sins punishable only by Heaven, such as slander and lashon hara: eighty-four fasts, once in his lifetime. He can put them off until the short winter days and fast, for example, about ten days in one winter, or fewer, completing the eighty-four fasts over nine years or more, according to his strength. He may also eat a little about three hours before sunrise, and it still counts as a fast if he stipulated this beforehand. But he needs to fast three times for each sin, and eighty-four is only a third. To complete the 252 fasts—three times eighty-four—he should fast another four sets of eighty-four, each time for only half a day, until midday. Right? But... That too counts as a fast in the Yerushalmi, and two half-days count as one day for this purpose. The same applies to other similar sins. Every heart knows its own bitterness and desires the restoration of its soul. So he’ll fast this way... Every Monday and Thursday, sometimes half a day, sometimes a full day, and over the course of his life he’ll gradually complete, at least once in his lifetime,

36:37 Speaker 1 all the fasts listed in the writings of the Arizal. And that’s in addition to the tzedakah he gives according to the calculation above, after he has, of course, done teshuvah to atone for his soul, and so on and so forth. Then everything will be all right. Okay. Now, the fasts in excess of 252—for example, if one needed to fast in deference to the opinion of those who require the prescribed number of fasts for each and every instance of a sin, as mentioned above. We forgot there was that opinion too, right? Well, he should redeem them all with tzedakah, at the value of eighteen Polish grosh for each day. Give a little more tzedakah. The same goes for all the other fasts one must undertake for sins that do not carry a death penalty, and even for neglecting a positive commandment, whether from the Torah or rabbinic law—and Torah study outweighs them all. We said he would actually fast only for the severe sins. What about all the lesser sins? He’ll redeem those with more tzedakah, according to the numbers specified in the Arizal’s prescriptions for teshuvah, most of which are mentioned in Mishnas Chassidim, Maseches Hateshuvah. All of them, without exception, he should redeem with tzedakah as above, if he cannot subject himself to the hardship of fasting, as explained above. He can’t fast; there’s no choice. Ah, but even if I take out a mortgage, I won’t have that kind of money! Even if it comes to a considerable sum, one need not be concerned about the rule not to spend more than a fifth, because all this tzedakah we’re talking about is not part of maaser. Maaser, the tithe a person gives from his money, is an obligation. He has to give it. All of this is tzedakah he gives to atone for his soul; it is not part of maaser. We’re talking about something extra. So it can amount to much more—much more than a fifth. Then what will I live on? And perhaps it’s... It’s not just a question of what I’ll live on. After all, it says in the Torah that one may not spend more than a fifth. It’s a Torah directive; it’s actually forbidden. This isn’t called spending extravagantly. It is not considered extravagance in this case, since he is doing it to redeem

38:51 Speaker 1 his soul from fasts and self-denial. It is no less important than medical care for the body and his other needs. If someone were, G-d forbid, ill—I see today, unfortunately, people who sell their homes for the sake of their physical health and go to live on the street. I mean, these things happen. So if he’s willing to do anything for his physical health, then for his spiritual health—for the sake of being dear to Hakadosh Boruch Hu—could there be any question at all? Of course he should give everything. And since the number of fasts prescribed in those instructions for teshuvah is exceedingly large, the practice now among all those who revere the word of Hashem is to give a great deal of tzedakah, because our generation is weak and people cannot bear so much hardship. As explained elsewhere regarding the verse, “Hashem’s kindnesses endure because we have not come to an end.” With Hashem’s help, we’ll get to Igeres Hateshuvah—Igeres Hakodesh—one day; I think it’s section 19, on “Hashem’s kindnesses endure because we have not come to an end.” There the Rebbe, the Alter Rebbe, asks: It should have said, “Hashem’s kindnesses have not come to an end.” We’re praising Hakadosh Boruch Hu for having so much kindness that it never runs out, right? Why does it say, “because we have not come to an end”? What does our not coming to an end have to do with it? Hakadosh Boruch Hu shows me kindness because I’m not complete? What’s the connection? Because I’m not complete—meaning not whole, not entirely sound—the Alter Rebbe explains there in the letter about tzedakah, I need the unlimited kindnesses of Hakadosh Boruch Hu. And to draw down Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s unlimited kindnesses, I need to give tzedakah without limit. “Hashem’s kindnesses endure because we have not come to an end.” To merit Hashem’s kindnesses because I am not complete, the way to do it is to give tzedakah without limit. That’s what

40:46 Speaker 1 That’s what he explains there. Okay, let’s see—there are two more things I want to add about the three chapters as a whole. First, the first three chapters of Igeres Hateshuvah—chapters 1, 2, and 3—are only an introduction to the subject of teshuvah. The Alter Rebbe puts things in order and explains what teshuvah is according to the revealed teachings of Torah. What does that mean? Teshuvah means returning to Hakadosh Boruch Hu, connecting with Him, yearning for Him, loving Him with love and awe, and leaving sin behind. That is teshuvah. There is another element that is not part of teshuvah itself but does complete it: teshuvah should not only apply from now on, with a person returning to Hakadosh Boruch Hu; it should also repair the past. That is atonement. This is a separate matter, involving Yom Kippur and depending on feelings of remorse, and so on. It is not part of teshuvah itself; it repairs the past. Besides these two things, teshuvah and atonement, there is also the completion of atonement. Just as atonement completes teshuvah, fasts and acts of self-denial complete atonement. For atonement to be complete, teshuvah and Yom Kippur alone are not enough. A person also has to give something of himself to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. “But I can’t offer a sacrifice, because there’s no Beis Hamikdash.” Then fast. “I can’t fast.” Then give tzedakah. How much tzedakah? Without limit. That is the point of the first three chapters. Starting with the next chapter, the Alter Rebbe will begin to explain teshuvah itself. All right, so we said that teshuvah means drawing close to Hakadosh Boruch Hu and leaving sin behind—but how do I draw close to Hakadosh Boruch Hu? What does it mean to draw close to Him? That begins in the next chapter and continues from there. That’s one point. Wait, one second. There is a letter from the Rebbe about these chapters,

43:01 Speaker 1 in which the Rebbe is very reassuring about all this. The Rebbe says: The fact that we cannot offer a sacrifice is not our doing. Hakadosh Boruch Hu made it impossible for us to offer a sacrifice. Could it be that Hakadosh Boruch Hu would prevent a Jew from doing teshuvah fully? That cannot be. So we must say that what could once be accomplished through a sacrifice can now be accomplished through fasting. Otherwise, Hakadosh Boruch Hu would not have put us in this position. Then the Rebbe goes a step further. Since it is clear that Hakadosh Boruch Hu would not put a person in a position where he cannot do teshuvah fully, and we cannot fast—because we are not commanded to afflict ourselves; in fact, that is prohibited by the Torah—what do we have instead? Only giving tzedakah. So we must say that tzedakah accomplishes exactly what fasting and a sacrifice do, completely. The Rebbe does not stop there. He goes one step further. We see that in our generation, people are weak spiritually as well as physically, and from time to time people stumble in sin. If we were to give all the amounts specified in the writings of the Arizal, even according to the most lenient opinion, then... it simply isn’t feasible. There’s no way to do it. It’s impossible. The Rebbe says it’s impossible. Could Hakadosh Boruch Hu put a person in a position where he cannot do teshuvah completely? He would not do that. After all, He wants us to do teshuvah. So we must say that what I am able to give accomplishes the whole thing completely. There is a printed letter from the Rebbe about this, I think even in Weinberg’s explanations at the end, if

45:08 Speaker 1 I’m not mistaken. I don’t know if I copied all of it here. In any case, that doesn’t change the point itself. To bring teshuvah to completion, teshuvah and atonement are not enough. We’ll see in the coming chapters how to do them, what to do, and what they involve. One also needs to give tzedakah, and tzedakah without limit.

45:37 Speaker 6 Can you put it out already?

45:41 Speaker 1 Yes, yes, I’ll put it out.