In Brief   Repentance   Prayer   Charity

About Teshuva The motifs of Repentance (Teshuva), Prayer (Tefila) and Charity (Tzedakah) are among the several recurring themes that weave through the customs and liturgy of the "Days of Awe." What is Teshuva About Teshuva How to do Teshuva Self Improvement Chart Your New Years Resolutions Three contemporary Jewish thinkers discussed their own perspectives on the Teshuvah. There's a message for everybody somewhere... | We All Need Teshuvah by Samson Raphael Hirsch | Condensed from the original We all stand in need of teshuvah; for who can say that he has never departed from the path of the law, that his life has been a flawless realization in practice of the model presented in the Torah? We all need teshuvah. The one means for rehabilitating our communal life in the future is teshuvah, nothing but teshuvah. Teshuvah is the goal of our thousand years of suffering and trial among the nations. ... At last Israel should return to God and to itself, and should not, through aiming at something other than the real goal, make it a matter of chance how far this path leading elsewhere coincides with walking with God... The least great and small in Israel should learn to look upon this as the highest and supreme goal for everyone, to which everything else should be subordinated. We all need teshuvah. Therefore we cling to one another in order that the path to return which is trodden by one may stimulate another by its example. This is also one of the reasons why our confession of sin is pronounced in the plural, collectively. Let us never, even in jest, mock at that which should be holy to us in actual life, in order that its holiness may not become cheap to us. Let us respect our teachers in order that they may show us the way of goodness and lead us along it. | Lights of Repentance by Abraham Issac Kook | Condensed from the original Repentance encompasses the major part of Torah and life; upon it are based all the hopes of individual man as well as the community... On the one hand, [this command] is the simplest to perform, for the slightest thought of repentance is in itself repentance. Yet in another sense, repentance is the most difficult of all commandments to fulfil, for indeed it has not been fully actualized in the world and in human life. Without the thought of repentance, its tranquility and assurance, man would be unable to find rest, and spiritual life would be unable to develop in the world. The ethical sense demands of man righteousness and virtue- perfection. How remote from man is the realization of ethical perfection in terms of actuality..! How then shall he strive for that which is not at all within to impugn righteousness and morality, since the primary basis of perfection is the yearning and firm desire toward perfection ... Every perfect repentance must inevitably achieve two contradictory effects upon the soul: On the one hand, trembling and sorrow for the sin and evil within him; and on the other hand, trust and joy for the virtue, since it is impossible that man should not discover within himself some share of virtue. Even if [an individual] can find no vestige of virtue, the very fact that trembling and sorrow encompass him ... itself possesses great virtue. And immediately the person must rejoice, trustful and filled with strength and might, even for this virtue, till he shall find himself constantly, even amidst the great oppression, involved in the emotions of repentance, abounding with spirit of life, fortified with the very basis of achievement and action with joy of life and preparation for their blessings. |A Uniquely Jewish Concept by Eliezer Berkovits | Condensed from the original Teshuvah, a uniquely Jewish concept, means literally "response" or "return." Repentance and "renewal" of faith are only one phase of teshuvah... The return to God is not merely "a change of heart," but a change in one's way of life... Teshuvah is a turning away and a turning toward a matter of believing and of altering one's daily living. The Talmud draws a sharp distinction between those motivated by teshuvah me-yirah, "return out of fear" (of punishment), and teshuvah me-ahavah, "return out of love" (of God). Of the former it is said that their intentional sins are accounted as if they were unintentional; of those who return out of love, their intentional transgressions become like merits. At the source is a concept of the human personality as dynamic, spontaneous, and capable of regeneration and renewal. Teshuvah is thus an experience of personality transformation. When performed out of fear, it lessens the burden of sin but does not remove it; intentional transgressions become unintentional ones. Teshuvah undertaken out of love accomplishes a fundamental transformation, in which healing and purification are complete. Intentional sins of the past function almost as meritorious deeds in their impact and significance for the new personality. Past failures may serve as new sources of spiritual strength and security for the baal teshuvah, "the man who returned."