Elul: Returning to One’s Sources

Good evening, everyone, and how good it is to be with you again. We are indeed going to take up the subject of the day, that of the month of Elul — the preparation for this renewal of one’s being, this rediscovery of the self, this re-creation of the self. And the preparation is far more important than the operation itself, than the success of the operation, which extends over a period of ten days — the Aseret Yemei Teshuvah, the Ten Days of Repentance, isn’t that so? But here we need a whole month. We undertake this preparation throughout the month of Elul, and we make this search, this quest for the self, coincide with the day on which Moshe begins his ascent to the heavens to bring down the new Tablets of the Law.

Precisely: on the first of Elul, Moshe is invited to a prolonged stay of meditation in order to forge the new Tablets of the Law. They are identical to the first in spirit, though not quite in the letter. Something comes to fruition through the second Tablets, which are much closer, much more accessible to the level of the people — for let us not forget that the Torah is the minimum required for the spiritual elevation of the human being. Of course, there are different degrees of elevation, even in the interpretation of the Torah, and depending on the interpretation one does indeed discover other flavors, other essences. For we must remind ourselves that, just as there is a variety of plants, flowers, trees and minerals, so too there is a variety of flavors in the practice, or in the perception, of spiritual values.

And it is not uniform. Nothing is uniform, because space is not uniform, time is not uniform, and man still less so; the days that follow one another differ from one another. The Hebrew calendar is distinguished by the mark it has given to each Rosh Chodesh — each new month, each bridgehead of a new cycle. Now each month has its letter, which presided over its creation, which gave it its stature and its attributes; and each month belongs to the personality of a tribe, to the attributes of a tribe, doesn’t it? Nissan is Yehudah; Iyar is Issachar; then Zevulun, and so on through Tishri and Elul — Elul, the month we inaugurated a few days ago already.

Its letter is the yud. Now the yud is the smallest letter of the alphabet, yet it is the one at the base of all the other letters; it is the essence of all the other letters. Whenever one begins a letter, one always begins it with a yud. The yud is the point, and to this point you will give different forms by drawing it out. It is elastic, isn’t it? And indeed, the month of Elul is the month of the creation of the universe — the month that prepares the appearance of man, the birth of man, on the first of Tishri. This universe began on the 25th of Elul, and something existed before the universe, our Sages tell us: the Torah, of course, because there is always a guiding thought behind the realization of any project. And this came about from 974 drafts, for there were 974 worlds that were created and, in a sense, destroyed, because they could not answer to the original design, which was meant to serve all of humanity. For what reason remains to be seen; but the fact is that the notion of error in a creation — the imperfection of the project itself — is written into the creation of the world. And that is why our Sages teach that teshuvah [preceded the world].

That is to say, the possibility of restoring, of re-creating, of correcting creation. It was not acceptable that any error whatsoever should demolish the project of creation irreparably; it had to be possible to re-create the world, to re-create man, to allow a new orientation, a new destination. And that is Elul — that is Elul: this examination of the state of our universe and of ourselves within the project of creation, within its history and its orientation. Might there be an original design to which we ought to remain faithful? It is up to us to recover that first virginity, for the sign of the month of Elul is virginity: Betulah belongs to the month of Elul. And as its name indicates, Elul is an exploration — ve’alilu, vayaturu, “and they scouted”: to search, to explore, to examine.

Understanding: the numerical value of Binah is 67, I believe, identical to that of Elul, which also has a numerical value of 67. For the month of Elul indeed invites us to a deep examination, not a superficial one — because man, naturally, tends to approach life with a certain lightness. That lightness does not serve man in the demands of his own fulfillment, that is, in the yud that dwells within him, the yud of creation. We are the bearers of this yud. It is no passing coincidence that we define ourselves by this yud of Yehudi, by this yud of Yisrael. It is the yud of that primordial light, of that luminous point which stood at the origin of creation and which, as it unfolded, gave rise to the creation of the world. But the creation of the world, in and of itself, obscured that light; the light was overlaid, and the universe became a screen for it.

Yes — matter is now kneaded through with these lights, and one would like to try to release the light from matter. Now the Holy One, blessed be He, saw that in the end we would lose it or fail to value it: ganzo le’atid lavo, He hid it away for the time to come. He buried it, He buried it in the hearts of the tzaddikim. He wanted this light to dwell within man, and it is this light that projects man toward the future. Indeed, when one wants to move from the present, or from the past, into the future, one simply adds this yud: shamar, yishmor — “he will guard.” The yud is a projection toward the future. It does not allow one to stop for good; rather, it marks a boundary for a new sentence, as for a new page of history.

That is it, that is it: the yud. And the yud is indeed inseparable from the yad, the hand — from action. It is not simply an abstract thought. It is true that this yud belongs to the third person, doesn’t it? For it is always the alef: ani, “I,” atah, “you” — it is always the alef. In the relationship of ani and atah we remain very limited. To transcend this dialogue, which remains very subjective and very limited, one must pass to the third person; and the third person is the possibility of transcending the matter that limits us in our project, and of bringing in a light from outside, a new energy. And that is the month of Elul, which indeed begins with a new teaching — that is Elul. Elul is linked to the tribe of Gad. And what was the distinctive trait of Gad, we are told? They were valiant, highly skilled soldiers, but they had the particular ability, with one stroke of the sword, to cut off the head together with the arm, at the same time as the arm — because they were people who would not accept any separation whatsoever between thought and action, between thought and its fulfillment.

And that is why the knot we wear on the tefillin of the hand is that of the yud. So it is the yud that is the month of Elul; it is the yud that forges the identity of the month of Elul. Now, I was speaking of this possibility, after a deep search — because there are two kinds of repair for a fault. When you make a mistake and ask someone’s forgiveness, you know, it is not the same when it is someone we see often, or an employee, or simply a friend: then we count somewhat on his indulgence. But beware of committing a fault toward a superior — that has consequences, and it embarrasses us enormously. Because, say what you will, he may well forgive us, but he will not allow us to continue on our path of social advancement, of professional promotion, of moving up. So there is what is called teshuvah tata’ah and teshuvah ila’ah, lower teshuvah and higher teshuvah. In the first, the repentance or the forgiveness is of an inferior quality: he has been forgiven, he has been forgiven — fine, all right, but I no longer entrust you with anything, I no longer count on you, you have lost my trust. But no — the other kind is something else: you committed a grave fault, I forgive you, but I do not disqualify you; I give you the chance to prove yourself further still. That is indeed the principle of the true attachment to which we aspire: yashuv yerachamenu, “He will again have mercy on us.” Yashuv yerachamenu — that He may once more give us the possibility of an additional measure of mercy that will allow us to go forward.

Yes — and how? There is a leitmotif that recurs in the prayers characteristic of the Yamim Nora’im, these days that we call, in French, the “dreadful” days. I translate the word that way because a notion of fear is involved; but it is not really “dread” — the word “dreadful” is not the right one. For when we say of the Holy One, blessed be He, hagadol vehanora, “the great and awesome,” that does not mean that we dread Him. So: uteshuvah utefillah utzedakah ma’avirin et ro’a hagezerah — “repentance, prayer and charity avert the severity of the decree.” That is the leitmotif. Teshuvah: repentance, the return to oneself, the return to that state of first virginity; prayer; and tzedakah, the practice of charity.

Ma’avirin et ro’a hagezerah: they remove the evil decree, they abolish the evil decree; however evil the decree may be, it is erased at once by these three things. What is special about these three things? When our Sages sought some small allusion to the month of Elul in the texts, they cited three verses. You will say it is far-fetched, but one must see the idea behind it. The first, for teshuvah, repentance: umal Hashem Elokecha et levavecha ve’et levav zar’echa — “Hashem your G-d will circumcise your heart and the heart of your offspring.” Et levavecha ve’et levav: alef, lamed, vav, lamed — that is the first. But they were not content with a first allusion; they felt it necessary to find a second one, and this one is much better known: Ani ledodi vedodi li. Ani begins with an alef; “I am for my beloved” — ledodi, the lamed; vedodi, “and my beloved,” the vav; li, “is mine,” the lamed. Together they spell Elul. And this one is attached to tefillah, prayer. A parenthesis on this Ani ledodi vedodi li — “I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine”: it means that spirituality, the Creator, sends back to me the image that I myself give Him. Everything depends on my own investment — in the same proportion, in an equal proportion: Ani ledodi vedodi li. I close the parenthesis.

The third allusion they sought in Megillat Esther: ish lere’ehu umatanot la’evyonim — “each man to his fellow, and gifts to the poor.” Ish lere’ehu: at Purim we are obliged to send, each to his fellow — ish, the alef; lere’ehu, “to his fellow,” the lamed; umatanot, “and gifts,” the vav; la’evyonim, “to the poor,” the lamed — and there you have Elul. And this is attached to the third element of teshuvah, tefillah, tzedakah: this is tzedakah, charity. In other words, this return to oneself is tested on three levels. First, in relation to myself. We are all conditioned: the culture of the age, the ideas of the age, the fashions in dress, the daily routine; and however much we might wish to break free of them, it is impossible. The social pressure is such that one does not wish to condemn oneself to the life of a nazirite — to total abstinence, to isolation, to solitude.

Yet if I am to seek myself in the depths of my being — I share with my Creator a breath, a part of Him, of His essence; it is there, in the depths of me. To free it — but how shall I do that if I do not learn, from time to time, to strip it of all its garments, of all its wrappings, of this whole cloak of hypocrisy? So teshuvah, the return to oneself, is first of all this return to what characterizes me, myself. I am different from the other; I am not the other. Every creation is singular, and I am charged with a mission that is not the same as another’s; so it is different. It is a matter of my own identity: because I was created as I am, I do not have the same faculties, I do not have the same aptitudes, but I am asked to answer for what I have been endowed with, and I must acquit myself of my task, which is made to my measure. That is the first: the return to oneself. The second is to know that there is a Borei Olam, a Creator of the world; that there is something beyond me; that not everything can be reduced to pure reason; that there is an outside force governing the universe in another way, in another perspective, and that I must inscribe myself within that perspective.

To free my emunah, my faith. Yes, because this relationship belongs to the realm of pure faith. You know, all the errors we commit represent a weakness of trust — a lack of self-confidence, a lack of assurance, a lack of faith; and it is by the degree or the nature of this absence of faith that one can gauge its unfortunate consequences. So this must be restored through prayer. And prayer means establishing the word with the very Word of creation, with the first Light of creation, the first Love of creation — because we said that the world has indeed become the envelope of this Word. Yes, but this Word is present in this world.

One must know how to restore the contact, the communication, and this can be done only through prayer — not even through study, because study and rationality are yedi’ah, knowledge. And if emunah becomes yedi’ah, becomes knowledge, it is no longer emunah. Finally, the third register, as we said: ish lere’ehu umatanot la’evyonim, “each man to his fellow, and gifts to the poor.” What is my relationship with my fellow? For I am never a complete being. Just as the Holy One, blessed be He, hid a particle of His light in every being, so too He hid my counterpart in my fellow. For example — listen — there is a particle of me in my wife. She is different, entirely different; she is my shadow; but she carries the share of light that I share with her. We share it; we have this particle of light in common, because it comes from the same origin, the same substance, the same nature. And that remains the only means of communication.

So if I do not act toward my fellow — in my relations with my fellow — in the same way that I ask the Holy One, blessed be He, to act toward me, then what are my requests before the Creator worth? It is the same network, the same connection. So Elul is also ish lere’ehu umatanot la’evyonim; that is the reason. And with that I think I will close my reflection on the month of Elul. I don’t know — I have spoken in previous years, but I don’t remember what I spoke about; I apologize in advance if I sometimes repeat myself, but that too belongs to the phenomenon of attachment; it is of the same texture. There remains the last of the prophets, Malachi.

Did you know that among the Prophets we have a collection of twelve prophets? There are those who hold that the words of these prophets — of these twelve prophets in particular — resonate, each one separately, in each month. And the last month of the year, which is Elul, is the prophecy of Malachi. Now Malachi inaugurated another form of prophecy, one that establishes a dialogue between him and the people — a people that had reached a certain maturity and was able to understand. And so there is a heart-to-heart conversation, and he begins by saying: “Listen, I have always regarded you as My own children — banim atem laShem, ‘you are children to Hashem’ — and you, you ought to grant Me the status of an av, of a father.”

Here I open a parenthesis. We always speak of the Avot, the fathers; we do not say the Imahot, the mothers. Zechut avot — why not zechut imahot? Zechut avot, the merit of the fathers — and the merit of the mothers? No, there is no such expression, no. For one can be a father only through the mother; without the mother, the attribute of father does not exist, there is no father. So when we say zechut avot, it is a whole. I return from my parenthesis. Ve’im av ani ayeh kevodi — “and if I am a Father, where is My honor?” Ve’im adonim ani ayeh mora’i — “and if I am a Master,” if you regard Me as Master, “what fear do I enjoy?” And at the end, when he speaks of the times to come, it is he who is the author of that famous verse: “I will send you Eliyahu the prophet,” veheshiv lev avot al banim velev banim al avotam — who will restore communication between the fathers and the children, and between the children and the fathers.

Why this relationship in particular, the relationship par excellence? It is the platform — indeed, Kabed et avicha ve’et imecha, “Honor your father and your mother.” You know that there are two tablets in the Ten Commandments. The first tablet brings out the relationship between man and his Creator. That is why in the first tablet, in each law, in each commandment, there appears the Name of Hashem, the Name of G-d. In the second tablet this Name is absent. It is not there: lo tirtzach, lo tinaf, lo tignov, lo ta’aneh [vere’acha ed shaker], lo tachmod. All of these — five laws that belong, if you like, to the moral order; that is not quite it, but the Divine Name does not appear among them.

And so the question was asked: Kabed et avicha ve’et imecha, “Honor your father and your mother” — ah yes, what is it doing there? Should it not have appeared among the commandments of the second tablet? There are three partners in every human being: the father, the mother and the Shechinah. That is what leads us to say that, in a couple, one plus one always equals three, not two. There is an additional presence in this union. One may well ask how to regard it: is it a mitzvah between the Holy One, blessed be He, and man? That is: just as one must honor one’s parents, one must honor G-d; or just as one must honor G-d, one must honor one’s parents — because the notion of parent means that the parent lies at the origin of the other, of an existence proper to each human being […]. Another parenthesis.

And the father has his father, who has his father, who has his father, and so it goes back as far as Avraham, who is av hamon goyim, “the father of a multitude of nations.” And of course Avraham recognizes the Master of the world as Father. Al ken ya’azov ish et aviv ve’et imo — “therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother” and cleave to his wife. Which father is meant here? It is the Holy One, blessed be He; his father — and his mother is Knesset Yisrael, the Community of Israel. And how is he to detach himself? Ya’azov here does not mean to abandon; rather, to collaborate, to support, to show oneself worthy of one’s father and mother. But if this notion of Father and Mother is found in a state of mourning, it is written: uvachtah et aviha ve’et imah yerach yamim, “and she shall weep for her father and her mother a full month.” So the neshamah, the soul, must weep for its Father and Mother for thirty days. Thirty days — that is the month of Elul. Uvachtah et aviha ve’et imah: we are weeping over our disconnection from Av and Em, from Father and Mother.

This connection with Av and Em has a divine dimension. For on the purely social level — of course, who does not practice honoring parents? Honoring parents is practiced by everyone, by the whole world. There is this intense love borne toward their parents even by the most perverse, the most immoral people, each in his own way. Esav himself was distinguished by his honoring of his parents — that is something no one can reproach him for. How can that be? Ah yes: there is an honoring of parents that imposes itself by nature. We are a part of our parents, we are a part of our parents; by nature, we belong to them.

They placed something in us, then they took care of us, and in spite of everything they invested something, each in his own measure, in his own way. But hakarat hatov, gratitude, requires at least a modicum of recognition. Otherwise — loveh rasha velo yeshalem: only the wicked man borrows and never repays. That is what it would amount to. And so the honoring of parents is indeed practiced by all of humanity; and we see that among the nations it is sometimes emphasized, even to an extreme. So what is the difference? The difference is enormous, for […] on this subject. There is the honoring of parents that stems from rationality, from my methods, from my qualities, from my perception of morality, from my emotional sensitivity. And there is the honoring of parents that has a divine dimension: I honor my parents; I honor this Shechinah, this presence that gave birth. That is immovable; it lies beyond all rationality.

And that is why everything rests upon it. The laws bein adam laMakom, between man and G-d, and bein adam lachavero, between man and his fellow — the axis on which all the other commandments turn is the honoring of parents. Now what is the month of Elul in the phenomenon of teshuvah, in the preparation for teshuvah? It is to return to one’s sources, to rediscover one’s origins, to rediscover one’s parents, one’s great-grandparents, to go back all the way to the Avot. That is why we invoke “our G-d, the G-d of Avraham, the G-d of Israel” — the G-d of the Avot — recognizing ourselves as their children. And if we have restored this lineage as we should… Are there any questions? — Yes, Kevod HaRav. I have two small questions. The first is about Esav. How is it that Esav honored his parents so much, when we see the Western world going quite the other way — whereas, on the contrary, the Muslims tend to honor their parents? Today it is rather Yishmael who honors his parents, and rather Esav who utterly neglects his parents.

It’s a little strange. And then the second thing: you said that honoring parents is something that is not natural at all. I think it is the most natural thing in the world — honoring parents is the most natural thing in the world, the most automatic thing in the world. — Well, yes, that is what I said: it is inscribed in the teva, in nature; it is in the nature of man. You say that I called it something supernatural — but it is not supernatural, it is not supernatural. In what way does it become so? Because I do not simply give it the status of the mitzvot bein adam lachavero, the status of gratitude; it has become a mitzvah bein adam laMakom, because I link the honoring of parents to the honoring of the Heavenly Father.

Avinu Malkeinu — “our Father, our King”: we always say Avinu before Malkeinu. — Yes, but that is very natural. It is precisely very rational; the reasoning is very rational: in the same way that our parents gave us life, and so on. — No, no, it is not rational. It would not occur to you to go back through your parents to your great-grandparents, whom you never knew, and further still… It is truly a matter of reviewing the whole line until you reach the origin — that is, you inscribe yourself in the logical line of these fathers, descended from Avraham Avinu, Yitzchak and Yaakov, down to this day. — But it is still very rational. Can one not stop there?

— Oh, how rational! Do you think of it all the time? — Well, every time we study Torah, every time we… We do nothing but make connections; we make connections every day. — But this connection, all the same, is not obvious, I believe; it is far from being so. Because when you say zechut avot, what do you mean? What is zechut avot? Why? Zechut avot […]. You never knew them. And yet they are the ones reflected in every generation, in every generation. This zechut avot, this particle of the Avot, did not stop; it went on generating, generation after generation…

…right down to you, with your light. — How is it that Esav today shows so little interest in his parents? — I’ll tell you: one cannot generalize the problem. I believe he does it in his own way. He puts his parents in homes, he pays for a service; all the same, he pays for it with his own money. But he is incapable — he has lost that sensitivity — and yet he remains attentive to his parents. No, we cannot cast stones at him. — All right. Thank you very much, Kevod HaRav. — May I add something? — Yes, yes, with pleasure. — This question of Esav in today’s society is a very important one all the same, because — I don’t know whether this is what Yves had in mind — we are in the continuation of what was initiated during the Second World War by Nazism, that is, the setting aside of biological origin.

That is what it had set out to do: to create human beings entirely freed from any parental origin. And this idea has unfortunately made its way into our society today, and we are in a society that is coming completely apart because of it. In fact, the central issue today in the secular world is to set aside the notion of the family. What the system — at least in Europe, the Western system — is working at today is to take apart, to dismantle completely, the notion of the family, to set it entirely aside, and to break free of any biological origin. And so we find ourselves in a society that has come apart at every level, because no moral value is respected anymore, not even the most basic principles.

That is to say, it is decreed that there is no longer any gender, no longer any sex, that one can do absolutely whatever one wants. So indeed… — Do anything at all. — Yes, indeed… One can do anything at all. To do anything at all — that is, to live in a world that is a virtual world, a world of illusion. But this notion of the disappearance of the family and of breaking free of biological origin — in fact, I think that the society we live in applies not only that particular ideology of Nazism; it applies absolutely all the principles of the ideology of Nazism. But that is another question; we can talk about it another time. It is not only that one.

But regarding Esav and this honoring of parents — how can we first understand it, and how can we deal with it? — Well, the notion that all the writers who have looked into the question… For in Bava Batra there is a story that perhaps you have not followed. A man who had several children left his entire estate to one child without naming him; so he disinherited all his children except one — but which? The matter was brought before several rabbis, who could not settle it. Rabbi Bana’ah had the following idea. He said to the sons: “Listen, you are claiming your money. You know, if I were in your place, I would go and strike your father’s grave until he rises and says which is the true son for whom he intended this estate.”

Well, the sons, at their wits’ end, said: “Fine, let’s do it.” And they all rushed to their father’s grave, with hammers, with blows of pickaxes, striking and striking and striking, hoping he would do it. Only one did not dare to do it. He was the heir. — Yes. Thank you. — Well then, go ahead. — May I ask a question? — Yes, please. — It is directly connected with parenthood. You mentioned, or alluded, once or twice to light. — Yes. — It is obviously an undefined subject, but what do you mean by light? — Light is the first revelation of G-d. On the first day, what He reveals is His light through the darkness. The darkness is the world He creates.

This darkness, since it is matter, conceals. Light is what manifests — indeed He said vayehi or, “and there was light”: it is a light that manifests itself. He did not create light; He formed it. What He created, on the other hand, is darkness. To or, to light, He gave a form, a structure; but the darkness He created out of nothing. It is a creation ex nihilo. — Yes, but then what is this light? — This light is the divine light; it is the light that dwells in each one of us. And one could say that it is represented by the yud present in each person.

— It is in the divine breath, in the Word. — Yes, the divine breath — it is, after all, this breath that brought about creation, this creative Word. — Yes, and the human being is the bearer of this divine breath. — Yes. That is why it is said ro’im et hakolot: at the foot of Mount Sinai they saw the voices. It does not say they heard them. — And what can man do with this light that he has within him? Must he reveal it to himself? — He can precisely take part in perfecting this world, can he not? — a world created in a raw state, to which one must give a human form. — Does this notion of light connect with the scientific notion of light, which is a wave?

— Excuse me? — Could we find some kinship between divine light and light in the scientific sense? It is a wave. — It is a wave and a particle; both wave and particle. — Yes, yes, yes, absolutely. But it would remain a derivative of that light. — Yes, absolutely, yes. — But everything is a derivative of that light, to different degrees. — Would it be this light that lies at the origin of our search for our self? It is the light of which we are the bearers that leads us to… — Yes, and that is why we inaugurate the month of Elul with the sound of the shofar, that is, the divine breath. — So light would be both the source of our quest and its object.

What is it made of? What is its… what is its essence? What is it? — That is impossible to say. Madam, if I knew, I would have told you. — Yes, but you do have an approach, through your work, through all your inquiries. — You have the numerical value of light, or: 207. Raz — mystery. — Thank you, thank you. — Well then, go ahead. — Thank you very much, Rav Benizri. I would just like to say that if you are asking what light is, what represents light, and what we can do with it, you really should […] Rav Benizri to see what he does with light. — Yes, of course. When is the next session, the next lecture? — Next Sunday at 7 p.m. in Brussels, 8 p.m. in Israel. — Yes, I know.

Thank you very much. And so we receive the invitation each time. […]