Community Magazine September 2016

16 COMMUNITY MAGAZINE Dedicated in memory of the pure neshamot of the Sassoon children Words of Rabbi Eli J. Mansour ELUL AND THE DOCTRINE OF PERPETUAL MOTION For observant Jews, the Hebrew month of Elul is an especially exciting time. This period is known as “ yemeh harahamim vehaselihot – the days of compassion and forgiveness.” It is when we are given a special opportunity to earn forgiveness for our mistakes, and the timing could not be more perfect, as we prepare for the judgment of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. The only condition, however, is that we take advantage of this opportunity by taking a close look at ourselves and seeing where we need to improve. The arrangement of the weekly Torah readings is intended, in part, to assist us in this most crucial endeavor. Every week’s Torah portion is closely associated with the time of year, and this is true during Elul, as well. Thus, for example, the Talmud teaches that Ezra arranged that Parashat Ki-Tavo, which contains the frightening description of the curses that Gd threatens to send upon us if we violate His word, would be read at the very end of the year, so that “ tichleh shanah vekileloteha – the year shall end along with its curses.” Reading about these curses at the end of the year expresses our hope that the end of the year should mark the end of all our hardships, struggles and anguish. There are many lessons presented by the Torah readings during this season that are especially relevant to the process of introspection and repentance. We will focus our attention here on one lawwhich is read each year during Elul, and which, while at first seems to have no practical relevance to us at all, actually conveys one of the most critical messages that we need to internalize as part of the Elul experience. An “Abomination”? In Parashat Ki-Tetze (24:1-4), the Torah presents the basic laws of divorce. It addresses in this context the unusual case of a woman who marries, gets divorced, marries somebody else, is divorced again, and then wishes to remarry her first husband. The Torah strictly forbids the woman from remarrying her first husband in this case. Although a divorced couple is permitted to remarry one another if they so choose, this is prohibited if the woman had been married to somebody else in the interim. The Torah surprisingly accords special severity to this violation, stating, “ toevah hi lifneh Hashem – this is an abomination before Gd.” The term “ toevah ” is not used too often in the Torah, and when it is used, it describes especially grievous sins such as idol-worship, intimate unions between two males, and commercial fraud. We might wonder why the aforementioned law, prohibiting the remarriage of a divorced couple if the "And this is true of spirituality, as well. If we’re not moving forward, then we’re falling backwards. If we’re not moving up, then we’re on the way down."