Bringing the Truest You to the Yamim Noraim By Rabbi Benny Berlin

The Jewish Home | SEPTEMBER 22, 2022 Sparks of Light Bringing the Truest You to the Yamim Noraim

By Rabbi Benny Berlin

Why is it that emes is considered one of Hashem’s 13 famous characteristics of compassion? After all, it would seem that truth might often lead to precisely the opposite. Truth can often reveal individuals’ darkest motivations and actions, generating harsh judgment and criticism from those around them. And yet, we find truth front and center in Jewish law and liturgy, dotted throughout the Yamim Noraim davening, detailed and codified down to minutia in Jewish law. Bnei Yisrael’s identity is interwoven in the fabric of peace and truth.

It is being truthful to others – and even more importantly, to ourselves – that will unlock our ability to understand, empathize, and offer compassion for others. However, we all know that the lofty idea of emes is challenging to practice, especially once we have been negligent, spiteful, and committed wrongdoing.

Even one of the originators of the twelve Shevatim of Israel, the great Yehuda, found himself in a truth quandary. Bereishis 38:1 says, “And it was at that time, that Yehuda went down from his brothers…” Rashi comments there that the idea that Yehuda “went down” is that his prestige declined in his brother’s eyes after Yehuda told them to sell their brother Yosef. This decline occurred when they realized it would have been better to just come clean to their father Yaakov and tell him the truth about what had transpired between them and their brother.

When analyzing why Yehuda didn’t suggest lifting Yosef out of the pit and returning him to their father unharmed, it’s possible that Yehuda was afraid to face the truth. He was scared that if Yosef would return to his father, he would undoubtedly tell Yaakov the entire gruesome story of the pit and the maltreatment at the hand of his close kin, thus damning the brothers and especially Yehuda in the process. Better to cover up the story by silencing Yosef, by making him disappear before he could turn the other brothers in for their misdeeds.

In choosing this course of deceit, Yehuda failed the test of leadership causing himself to “go down” (Bereishis 38:1) in the eyes of his brothers and essentially become the first member of the family to be sent into “galus.”

And yet, this is not the end of Yehuda’s story, since we all know he later became the leader of the tribe, the progenitor of our nation’s kings, and the namesake of our religion, our identity! How does he accomplish this remarkable turnaround? The answer, the hidden gemstone of the story, is that he does teshuva precisely in the area in which he sinned.

In the uncomfortable episode with his widowed daughter-in-law Tamar, he doesn’t take the easy way out this time by lying. Instead, Yehuda emerges as the leader of the family, a person worthy of rule, because he admits the truth to others and to himself. “She is more righteous than I,” he famously declares (Bereishis 38:26).

With this willingness to acknowledge the truth, Yehuda, the first Jew to enter galus, was declared to become the father of the Moshiach, the final, ultimate heralder of geulah.

This revelation sheds new light on Yehuda’s name. The Torah tells us that Leah gave her fourth son the name “Yehuda” because “this time, I will thank (modeh) G-d.” But perhaps we now have a complementary insight to the name of Yehuda. The word “modeh” can mean “to thank,” but it can also mean “to admit” or “to acknowledge.” By acknowledging that he is the father of Tamar’s unborn child, he performs an act of “acknowledgment” or “admission.”

Jews are called “Yehudim,” Jews. We are named after Yehuda. Collectively, it is incumbent upon us to live up to our name. Surely, we should be thankful (“modeh”) to Hashem for the many blessings we have. That is easy. But let us not forget that sometimes, no matter how painful or difficult, no matter what the ramifications, we should be willing to face up to our own truths.

On the Yamim Noraim, we strive to identify what choices have fostered truth in our lives over the past year and what choices have not. We seek out behaviors that will bring us closer to our true purpose in the world and the barriers in our way, what caused us to hurt others and do wrong, and what has improved our relationships and aided us in doing good. Truth can act as a beacon of light and thereby bring compassion, but only if we choose to view it as a purifying element.

Emes has the power to heal if we let it transform us and elevate our lives, thus changing us and helping us emulate Hashem in His compassion.