With the conviction that we are nothing, we declare Him King
The end of Yom Kippur hits us like an orchestral crescendo. After 40 days of intense work, we’re as close as possible to resembling malachim. Our physical bodies have been impoverished with the five inuyim, reduced to sheaths for our soaring neshamos. The stench of our sins has been cleansed from our essence by receiving mechilah from those whom we have hurt and through the constant repetition of Vidui. The dramatic chazaras hashatz in Mussaf, where we recreate the avodah in the Beis Hamikdash, presses the reset button on Klal Yisrael, and we’re once again k’ish echad b’lev echad at Har Sinai. It has been a day of impassioned tefillos, of breaking down barriers between us and our Creator.
And yet and yet and yet.
There’s a feeling of existential emptiness. As if we’ve done nothing. As if there remains a massive impenetrable wall between us and Hashem.
In many shuls, the rav gives a rousing derashah before Ne’ilah. He warns us that the curtains are coming down on our once-in-a-year opportunity to cleanse the mistakes of our past and set ourselves up for success.
“P’sach lanu shaar, b’eis ne’ilas shaar, ki fana yom — Open for us the Heavenly Gate, at this time when the Gate is closing, for the day is fading away….”
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