“Walking humbly” has nothing to do with a low self-image. Just the opposite
MY Yom Kippur topic this year will not be teshuvah itself, but rather the conditions that make teshuvah possible. What kind of person must one become to do teshuvah, and how does one develop into that person?
First, to be capable of doing teshuvah, one must be able to think deeply about oneself. And that, in turn, requires that one has a self that is not just determined by the opinions of others. And it requires an awareness of Hashem as a constant presence. Before one can begin to repent of the distance that one has placed between himself and Hashem — the Mabit’s definition of teshuvah in his Beis Elokim — one must first develop a consciousness of Hashem and of living one’s life before Him.
Surprisingly, the stimulus for these thoughts comes from a new sefer titled Reclaiming Dignity: A Guide to Tzniut for Men and Women, which has been flying off the shelves since its publication. (That enthusiastic response is itself a reflection of how deeply felt is the need for guidance in this area.) The sefer is divided into two parts. The first is a collection of essays on tzniyus by a broad cross-section of Torah educators compiled by Mrs. Bracha Poliakoff; the second, an extensive halachic and meta-halachic treatment of the topic by Rabbi Anthony Manning, is rooted in a series of shiurim given by Rav Yitzchak Berkovits in his Jerusalem Kollel 20 years ago.
As the subtitle suggests, one of the authors’ principal objectives is to broaden the scope of what we mean when we speak about tzniyus to include far more than dress codes, and to apply that broader context to both men and women. That effort is crucial, Rabbi Manning and a number of the essayists suggest, if we want our wives and daughters to relate to the halachic requirements not as a set of arbitrary, imposed rules, but as means to a deeper relationship with Hashem and a far more spiritually uplifting life.
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