An expanded Elevate in honor of Yom Kippur
IT will be exactly three months from when, after a long day of mourning, you sat down and drank that first cup of rejuvenating orange juice to the night when you walk into shul, dressed in white for Kol Nidrei.
In his sefer, Darash Moshe, Rav Moshe Feinstein ztz”l connects the parallel calendar dates of Motzaei Tishah B’Av and the night of Kol Nidrei. It’s to show us that the tears of the ninth of Av aren’t meant to leave us in despair. We’re meant to draw motivation from the pain we felt when mourning the absence of the Beis Hamikdash to fix, l’saken, by reaching toward HaKadosh Baruch Hu. And it’s by doing this that we’ll merit to rejoice.
Yom Kippur opens with the words, “Or zarua latzaddik ul’yishrei lev simchah — light is sewn for the righteous one, and joy for those with an upright heart.” After something is planted, it may not look like any growth is happening for quite a while. But a tzaddik is always growing. And that is what brings true happiness — accomplishment. Thus those with an upright heart experience simchah!
Rav Moshe Feinstein explains that if halev lo yashar, if the heart isn’t upright, and your goal is just to party and enjoy, then your life will become miserable because it has no purpose. I often think of the reality that there isn’t one physical pleasure that lasts, while all of our mitzvos and ma’asim tovim give us merits that last forever.
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