Yom Kippur – The Day the Yechidah of the Soul Is Revealed | The Holy Day in Light of Chassidus

00:00 The holy Rabbi Levi Yitzchak of Berditchev said that there are two fasts on which you don’t feel the fast at all: Tisha B’Av and Yom Kippur. On Tisha B’Av, who can eat? And on Yom Kippur, who needs to eat? What did he mean? When we speak about these two fast days, on Tisha B’Av the grief over the destruction is so great that food simply won’t go down. Who can eat? And on Yom Kippur, because of the delight a Jew feels that day in connecting with Hakadosh Boruch Hu, there’s no need to eat at all. So today we’re going to talk about this: understanding the depth of Yom Kippur as a day of delight. We’re all used to seeing Yom Kippur as a day of sorrow, a day of affliction. After all, the Torah says, “You shall afflict yourselves.” Yom Kippur has five forms of affliction, as the Mishnah in the last chapter of Tractate Yoma sets out when it details the laws of Yom Kippur and what is forbidden on Yom Kippur—eating, drinking, and so on. These are all things meant to afflict the body, to cause it discomfort. And yet, according to Kabbalah, the teachings of the hidden dimension of Torah, and according to Chassidus, Yom Kippur is specifically a day of delight, a day of joy. There’s a source for this in the Gemara as well. At the end of Tractate Taanis, the Mishnah says, “There were no days as festive for Israel as the fifteenth of Av and Yom Kippur.” So Yom Kippur is counted among the most joyous days, as the Mishnah there goes on to describe. Later in that same Mishnah it says, “On the day of his wedding and on the day of the joy of his heart.” That refers to Yom Kippur, as Rashi says and the Gemara explains: Yom Kippur is called “the day of his wedding” because that was when the giving of the Torah was completed. We know that Hakadosh Boruch Hu gave the Torah on Shavuos.

02:29 Afterward, Moshe Rabbeinu was on the mountain for forty days. When he came down with the first tablets, there had been the sin of the Golden Calf. He broke the tablets and went back to pray that Hakadosh Boruch Hu would forgive the Jewish people. Then he went back again on Rosh Chodesh Elul for the second tablets to be written. From Rosh Chodesh Elul until Yom Kippur are those forty days—the forty days of teshuvah and the forty days of Divine favor. Then, on Yom Kippur, Moshe Rabbeinu came down with the second tablets, and Hakadosh Boruch Hu said, “I have forgiven, as you have spoken.” Hakadosh Boruch Hu forgave us for the sin of the Golden Calf, and we received the second tablets. Of this it says, “On the day of his wedding and on the day of the joy of his heart,” referring to Yom Kippur. So if Yom Kippur is a wedding day and a day of joy, when Hakadosh Boruch Hu wholeheartedly forgave the Jewish people and gave us the Torah—when our receiving of the Torah was completed—then surely Yom Kippur is a day of delight and joy. The obvious question is: How do these things fit together? What is Yom Kippur? It’s a day when we go to shul, fast all day, daven, do teshuvah, and ask Hakadosh Boruch Hu to forgive our sins and transgressions. How exactly does that become a day of delight? A day of joy? How do we explain the nature of Yom Kippur’s delight? In one of his diaries, the Frierdiker Rebbe recounts at length things he heard from his father about the days of teshuvah. He describes in detail how his father taught him about them when he was a young man. The Rebbe Rashab told him what he had heard from his own father about the days of teshuvah, which begin in the month of Elul. Among other things, he gives a remarkable explanation of the five periods we have during these days, each a period of teshuvah: the month of

04:44 Elul, followed by the days of Selichos, then Rosh Hashanah, the Aseres Yemei Teshuvah—the seven days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur—and finally Yom Kippur. In other words, we have five periods during these days that are times for teshuvah, five times for teshuvah: Elul, Selichos, Rosh Hashanah, the Aseres Yemei Teshuvah, and Yom Kippur. The Rebbe Rashab explains to the Frierdiker Rebbe that in each of these five periods, we need to work on another aspect—to do teshuvah in relation to a particular faculty of the soul. He explains it this way: a person has five components, five general faculties. There are what the Alter Rebbe calls in Tanya the “garments of the soul”: thought, speech, and action. These are what a person needs to work on during Elul. Elul is the time for taking stock of oneself, the time for teshuvah when a person must correct his thought, speech, and action. He needs to examine what happened over the year and how to correct it, so that in the coming year his thought, speech, and action will be clean, pure, and holy, as they should be. That is the main work of Elul. During the days of Selichos, a person needs to work on his character traits, to refine his character—to work on himself, to break his bad traits so that his traits will be good. On Rosh Hashanah, a person mainly needs to correct his intellect—his chochmah, binah, and daas. We work on this by accepting upon ourselves the yoke of Heaven on Rosh Hashanah and giving ourselves over to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. We correct the intellect so that it will be as it should, so that it will be subject to the Divine will. That is the main work of Rosh Hashanah. During the Aseres Yemei Teshuvah—the seven days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur—the main work is to correct the power of will. The power of will is very strong. Nothing

07:14 stands in the way of the will. Will is the force, the engine, that drives all the other faculties of the soul. During these days of the Aseres Yemei Teshuvah, a Jew needs to give his will over to Hakadosh Boruch Hu and work on the power of will—to do teshuvah in relation to our will, so that our will is devoted to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Then comes Yom Kippur, when the work is to correct the faculty of delight, of pleasure. The faculty that is even higher than will is the faculty of delight. Delight is what drives the will; in other words, it is the inner dimension of will. A person wants things because he takes delight in them. Delight is the deepest faculty of the soul. As the sefarim say, “There is nothing higher than delight.” Delight is something loftier, something higher. It is the soul itself. When we speak about the faculty of delight, we tend to think of pleasure from simple things. When someone says “the faculty of delight,” a person thinks: I eat something tasty, and I enjoy the food. But delight is actually a very deep faculty of the soul, something bound up with the soul’s very essence. When you say, “I take delight in something,” delight is an expansive state of the soul. The soul has two states: it can be in a state of sorrow, or it can be in a state of delight. When the soul is in a state of sorrow, it contracts; it becomes withdrawn. You can see how a person going through sorrow becomes withdrawn. He’s depressed. His soul is in a state of contraction. He doesn’t open up; he’s closed in on himself. Delight is the opposite state. With delight, the soul is expansive, spreading outward. Things are good for me; I feel good; I lack nothing. It’s a very deep, inward feeling of delight. We

09:24 We know that Shabbos is a day of delight: “You shall call Shabbos a delight.” On Shabbos, a Jew’s soul has room to breathe; there is an expansiveness of spirit. How is it put? On Shabbos, nothing is lacking. “All your work is done.” A Jew’s state of mind on Shabbos is one of delight. He takes pleasure in having a soul, an additional soul. The true delight of Shabbos is the soul’s delight, Divine delight. And there is a mitzvah to make Shabbos delightful: that delight must also find expression in physical things. That is why we have the mitzvos of oneg Shabbos—eating and drinking, and all the laws concerning the delight of Shabbos. But the essence of that delight is the Divine pleasure that the G-dly soul feels from Hakadosh Boruch Hu on Shabbos. As the Alter Rebbe explains in Tanya, on Shabbos a Jew should devote more time to Torah study and to the avodah of prayer, with delight. That, in essence, is what Shabbos is. Now Yom Kippur is a “Shabbos of complete rest.” If Shabbos is a day of delight, and the Torah calls Yom Kippur the Shabbos of Shabbos—the innermost depth of Shabbos—then the delight of Yom Kippur is even greater than the delight of Shabbos. It is delight beyond delight. The innermost depth of a Jew is revealed, the deepest dimension of a Jew’s connection with Hakadosh Boruch Hu. A Jew feels such tremendous pleasure in that connection—pleasure so deep and so wonderful—that he simply does not need food. Food is too small, too limited, to express the connection and delight a person feels. So the reason we fast and do not eat on Yom Kippur is that on Yom Kippur the G-dly soul receives its delight from prayer, from its connection with Hakadosh Boruch Hu.

11:39 And that is what Reb Levi Yitzchak of Berditchev said: On Yom Kippur, who needs to eat? A person takes such pleasure, such delight, in his very connection with Hakadosh Boruch Hu that he is in a state where he does not need food. He does not need physical things to bring him pleasure. The pleasure comes from the connection with Hakadosh Boruch Hu itself. In other words, on Yom Kippur we must serve Hakadosh Boruch Hu from a very deep place, with the inner depth and inner joy the soul feels in its closeness to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. We know that Yom Kippur is a day on which we are obligated to pray five prayers. The number five is very central to Yom Kippur. As we said, it is the fifth stage of teshuvah if we begin with the month of Elul. But on Yom Kippur itself, the number five stands out very strongly: it is the day on which we are obligated to pray five prayers. There are five prayers. Every other day of the year we pray only three; on Shabbos there are four, and on Yom Kippur there are five: Shacharis, Mincha, Maariv, Musaf, and also Ne’ilah. When we say it is the day on which we are obligated to pray five prayers, we mean that Yom Kippur as a whole is connected with the number five. We see the number five in other aspects of Yom Kippur as well. One of the interesting and central places we find it is in confession, vidui. One of the main things we do on Yom Kippur is confess. We say “We have sinned, we have betrayed,” and “For the sin,” repeating them many times. The mitzvah of confession is central to Yom Kippur, because it is, in fact, the mitzvah of teshuvah. Yom Kippur is a day of teshuvah. It is the day Hakadosh Boruch Hu gave us as an appointed time for forgiveness and pardon for everything. It is the time when Hakadosh Boruch Hu

13:49 gave us the day on which He removes our guilt, year after year. And we know that the mitzvah of teshuvah goes together with confession. Indeed, according to the Torah, the main mitzvah of teshuvah is confession. A person who wants to do teshuvah must confess. According to the Rambam, that is actually the sole mitzvah of teshuvah. The Rambam rules that there is one mitzvah: when a person wants to do teshuvah, he must confess. And that is what we do on Yom Kippur. Now, when we look in the Torah for the mitzvah of confession, we find it in Parshas Naso. Where exactly? In Parshas Naso, where the Torah says, “They shall confess their sin.” This appears in connection with the mitzvah of giving an additional fifth. The Torah is speaking there about certain sins, such as theft and the like, for which a person must make restitution to gain atonement. The Torah says it is not enough to return what was stolen; he must add a fifth as well. So there we have this matter of the additional fifth, and there in Parshas Naso, where the Torah speaks about the mitzvah of giving it, it says, “They shall confess their sin.” It is interesting that the mitzvah of confession appears in the Torah in the same verse as the mitzvah of adding a fifth. The question is, what is the connection between them? Why does confession appear specifically there? Here we see the connection to what we have been discussing. Adding a fifth is connected with the fifth dimension. A person wants to repair what he has done, so he is told that returning what he took is not enough; he must add a fifth on top of it. And it is precisely there, when the Torah speaks about that additional fifth, that it also speaks about confession, which is

15:57 the main mitzvah of Yom Kippur—because Yom Kippur, too, is connected with the fifth dimension, as we said. When we speak about the number five and its connection to Yom Kippur, it is because, as we know, the Midrash says that the soul has five names: five names were given to it. The soul’s five names are nefesh, ruach, neshamah, chayah, and yechidah. Chassidus explains that these are not just names. Every name expresses something particular. The soul has five names because each one expresses a level, a particular faculty of the soul. These are the five levels we spoke about earlier. First is nefesh. What is this level called nefesh? Nefesh is the faculty of the soul invested in thought, speech, and action. In other words, nefesh refers to the more concrete part, the part of the soul that gives life to the limbs and enables a person to think, speak, and act. That is called nefesh. Then the second level, the second name, is ruach. Ruach refers to emotion, to the feelings of the heart. That is the level of ruach. Neshamah is the level of intellect: “The breath of the Almighty gives them understanding.” The verse says that from the neshamah we receive the power of intellect, the ability to understand. So those are the three levels: nefesh, ruach, and neshamah. Nefesh is connected with actions; ruach is connected with emotions, with our character traits; and neshamah is connected with the mind, with intellect. After that comes the level of chayah, which refers to the power of will. Chayah within the soul is that power. As we discussed, will is the general driving force behind all of a person’s actions. It is called chayah because life, the dimension of vitality, is connected with will. All of a person’s vitality stems from will. The will to live, the power of will, is the driving force that gives the

18:31 A person’s life force. That is why it is called chayah, “life.” Yechidah. The fifth level is the yechidah of the soul, called yechidah—“yechidah, to unite with You.” It is the part that is united with and connected to Hakadosh Boruch Hu at the deepest, most inward level. Among the soul’s faculties, this is the power of delight. The yechidah of the soul is the G-dly delight the soul feels in Hakadosh Boruch Hu. The connection of a Jew with Hakadosh Boruch Hu, and of Hakadosh Boruch Hu with a Jew, is found in this place of delight. A Jew delights in Hakadosh Boruch Hu, and Hakadosh Boruch Hu delights in the Jew. Then Yom Kippur arrives. As the Alter Rebbe explains, on Yom Kippur the yechidah of the soul is revealed in every Jew—the fifth level we spoke about. On Yom Kippur, the yechidah of the soul awakens and is revealed: the innermost part of the soul, the G-dly delight the soul feels in Hakadosh Boruch Hu. The Jew’s connection with Hakadosh Boruch Hu, and Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s connection with the Jew, comes from a place of delight. That is why a Jew’s avodah on Yom Kippur must be done with delight. A Jew davens and spends the whole day in shul. We are engaged in davening, and we need to awaken that feeling. The davening should come from a connection filled with joy and delight, as the Rebbe spoke about. I was privileged to hear the Rebbe speak several times on Erev Yom Kippur. The Rebbe would give a blessing after Minchah; there would be a sicha after Minchah on Erev Yom Kippur, in which the Rebbe would bless the entire Jewish people. Later, before Kol Nidrei, when the Rebbe was already dressed in white garments and his tallis, the Rebbe would come in again and give a special blessing to the yeshivah students. Those were very, very special moments—lofty, holy moments. We would see the Rebbe’s holy face. They were extraordinarily special moments,

21:04 deeply moving. In those sichos, forty years ago, I remember the Rebbe speaking about this subject. He explained that, as Chassidus teaches, Yom Kippur is about teshuvah. The avodah of teshuvah on Yom Kippur is the loftiest form of teshuvah, what Chassidus calls teshuvah ila’ah. Teshuvah ila’ah is teshuvah a person does with joy and delight. It is the deepest, most inward connection, the greatest closeness of a Jew with Hakadosh Boruch Hu. As the Alter Rebbe explains in Tanya, teshuvah ila’ah is not repentance for sins and transgressions. Teshuvah ila’ah is the soul’s cleaving to Hashem, when a Jew feels that bond—the deepest connection: “And the spirit returns to G-d, Who gave it.” It is the deepest, most inward connection of “an actual part of G-d above.” The most tangible and profound bond of a Jew with Hakadosh Boruch Hu is what is revealed on Yom Kippur. That is really the inner secret of Yom Kippur. A Jew knows that all the avodah of the forty days, from Rosh Chodesh Elul until Yom Kippur, is like a mikveh: forty days corresponding to the forty se’ah of a mikveh. After those forty days, a person reaches the fullness of purity. And each period, as we said, is another stage. There is teshuvah at the level of nefesh, in the month of Elul; teshuvah at the level of ruach, during the days of Selichos; teshuvah at the level of neshamah, in the first days, the days of Rosh Hashanah; and teshuvah at the level of chayah, during the Ten Days of Teshuvah. When Yom Kippur arrives, teshuvah is at the level of delight, the level of yechidah—the deepest connection between a Jew and Hakadosh Boruch Hu. That is why the avodah of Yom Kippur is davening, but davening with closeness and connection, davening with delight. Then the Rebbe spoke about the yeshivah students and added: Yom Kippur is the completion of the Giving of the Torah, as

23:24 we said. So Yom Kippur is the time when we must receive the Torah anew. The Torah we received with the second Tablets, when Hakadosh Boruch Hu forgave the Jewish people and gave us the second Tablets—from there comes all our strength to toil in Torah. So on Yom Kippur, a Jew must resolve to devote himself to learning Torah with joy and delight. In fact, when we look more deeply into teshuvah ila’ah, the Alter Rebbe tells us in Tanya that its deeper meaning is learning Torah with joy and delight. When Yom Kippur arrives, this is the time for each of us to awaken and reach the depth of our bond with Hakadosh Boruch Hu, and to know that a Jew’s deepest, most inward bond with Hakadosh Boruch Hu is a bond of delight. Receiving the Torah on Yom Kippur means receiving it anew with delight and joy. And the avodah of davening on Yom Kippur is davening that must emerge, that must burst forth, from the deepest, most inward place in the soul—davening with much delight and much joy. So although we fast on Yom Kippur, because that is what the Torah commands us, the fast of Yom Kippur is not a fast that causes a person distress. Rather, as Rabbi Levi Yitzchak of Berditchev said, it is a fast that comes from such a place of delight that, out of sheer delight, a person feels no need to eat. And so, from Yom Kippur, from this deeply inward bond between a Jew and Hakadosh Boruch Hu, we reach the end of the day. It is the custom of chassidim to break into a dance, as is also explained in Chassidus. The Tzemach Tzedek explains that Yom Kippur is called a day of mechilah, forgiveness. The word mechilah is also connected to the word machol, a dance. The machol is the dance, the dance of forgiveness. After we

25:34 know that Hakadosh Boruch Hu has pardoned and forgiven us, the king’s son returns to his father, the King. The deeper, more inward connection formed on Yom Kippur is between the Jew’s yechidah and the One of the world. The Jew and Hakadosh Boruch Hu become one single being. That is the dance of joy, the dance stirred within a Jew with the greatest joy at the end of the Yom Kippur fast. And that dance of “Next year in Jerusalem” comes with hope and with confidence that immediately after Yom Kippur we will arrive in the holy city of Jerusalem, and experience the great bond between a Jew and Hakadosh Boruch Hu. From there we move into the days of great joy, “the season of our rejoicing.” “Our rejoicing” is plural: the joy of Hakadosh Boruch Hu with Knesses Yisroel, and the joy of Knesses Yisroel with Hakadosh Boruch Hu. May Hakadosh Boruch Hu give us the strength to truly connect on this Yom Kippur, so that our connection will be deep, a connection of joy and delight. Especially as the Rebbe spoke about a year like this one, which began on Shabbos: the first day of Rosh Hashanah, the first day of the year, began on Shabbos, and “you shall call Shabbos a delight.” Since this year began on Shabbos, the delight of Shabbos permeates every day of the year. Certainly, then, Yom Kippur, which follows Rosh Hashanah, brings delight upon delight, delight within delight—the avodah of teshuvah with delight and joy. Teshuvah is to connect with Hakadosh Boruch Hu through learning Torah and through davening, specifically with joy and delight. May each of us have a year of delight, a year of joy, a year of Geulah, when there will truly be the greatest joy and the greatest delight of the World to Come—Shabbos and rest for everlasting life. May everyone be inscribed and sealed for good, for a good and sweet year, a year full of delight

27:41 and joy.