Community Magazine April 2014

18 COMMUNITY MAGAZINE Community magazine speCial disCount! use promo COMMUNITY5 $ 4 perday! בס”ד Hey, we all go to Israel ... stay connected! get Unlimited service for as low as unlimited talk inCluding Calls to the usa unlimited text unlimited* data web, email, etC. (phonecanbeusedasahotspot) UNLIMITED ISRAEL I P H O N E R E N TA L S F O R I S R A E L Visit www.unlimitedisrael.net to reserve yours today or check our reviews sales@unlimitedisrael.net / 845-371-9800 / 855-972-CELL (2355) 25 Robert Pitt Drive, Suite 103A, Monsey, NY 10952 *Web filter available We ship nationwide! ameriCan number · group rates · seminary speCials dynagrafik 845-352-1266 On Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, we come before Gd in dread and fear. We stand in judgment before the King of kings, and, recognizing our failings and shortcomings, we are frightened. And so we pray, we cry, we ask for forgiveness, and we commit ourselves to try to improve. This type of repentance is called by the Talmud “ teshuvah miyirah – repentance out of fear.” Repentance borne out of fear is very valuable, but there is an even higher level of repentance, called by our sages “ teshuvah me’ahavah – repentance out of love.” And this is what we do during the month of Nissan. Hametz represents the yetzer hara – our evil inclination, the various negative instincts, impulses and pressures to which we are all subject, to one extent or another. Just as a small morsel of yeast has a transformative effect upon the entire batter, similarly, a slight negative tendency can transform us to sinners. The arduous task of ridding our homes from hametz has the power to rid ourselves of our negative tendencies. The process of Pesach cleaning is laden with spiritual powers which we cannot see or perceive with our senses, but are undoubtedly present. We eliminate the hametz from our homes in order to eliminate the yetzer hara from our hearts. And this is no small matter, to put it mildly. We all struggle with ourselves. We all have bad habits and negative tendencies that we’ve tried very hard to overcome. The month of Nissan is an especially propitious time to win these battles. As we work to rid the hametz from our homes, we become better able to rid the “ hametz ” from within us, and become better people and better Jews. When we repent from fear, we experience sincere remorse, but we do not go to the root of the problem, the underlying cause of our mistakes. During themonth of Nissan, we undergo “spiritual root canal,” tackling the origin and source of our wrongdoing. We don’t just beg for forgiveness; we work to eradicate the “ hametz ” which causes us to err just as yeast causes the dough to rise. This is why the Zohar calls matzah “ lahma de’asvata – bread of healing.” By eliminating hametz and eating only matzah, we “heal” our souls. Just as an antibiotic kills the bacteria which cause our illness, the elimination of hametz kills the spiritual “bacteria” which contaminates our souls and causes us to sin. The Gemara teaches that when a sinner repents out of fear, his teshuvah has the effect of transforming his sins into shegagot – inadvertent mistakes. But repentance from love, as we do during Nissan, is far more powerful, transforming our sins into mitzvot . On Rosh Hashanah, when we repent out of fear of judgment, we go to a river and symbolically cast our sins into the water. In Nissan, however, as we bake the matzot, we draw water from the well as though we are trying to bring those sins back. Now that we repent out of love, eradicating the root cause of our wrongdoing, we want our sins back – because now they are transformed into mitzvot . And for this reason, our sages referred to the water used for matzah as “ mayim shelanu .” Literally, this refers to the fact that the water