A Thought on Parshas Nitzavim

"...v'lo Ya'az'vecha..." (31:6) "...and HaShem will never forsake you..." As we move from Nitzavim to VaYelech, two parshios which are often read together but on years such as 5777 are separated, ibn Shu'aib continues on last week's theme of teshuva. He actually has a long essay on Rosh HaShanna, but I will focus here on his parsha commentary alone. The Torah reminds us that HaShem gave us His Torah and mitzvos and that they are within our reach. They are "in your mouth and in your heart to do." He cites a Midrash Tanchuma that we are expected to serve HaShem with our entire physical being, which includes our utilizing our physical selves to correct and remedy our errors. This can become a means of kapparah, atonement. ibn Shu'aib offers a recipe for such physically-sourced atonement procedures. Some of us fantasize about improper acts, hirhurei aveira. The mind's straying can be corrected, he writes, by our having fantasy or ideational preoccupation about personal prayers which we long to say, and we can have remedial fantasies in developing self-guided images of HaShem's creations and manifest actions. Imagine what you would pray for if you had the patience, the time and the incentive. Imagine what Matan Torah would have been like had you been there. Those tasks represent sacred use of fantasy. When one has strayed with his eyes, his eyes should be directed to increased efforts at personal Torah study. Read Torah with your eyes. When one has misused his ears, he should make more efforts to listen to others who share words of Torah. Listen and be inspired.The improper use of one's hands should be remedied through putting on Tefillin, or other constructive forms of serving HaShem, such as writing down words of Torah, and performance of "manual" mitzvos. Put those hands to work in serving HaShem. When one has used his legs incorrectly (we have an al chait for "ritzas raglayim l'hara"), let him walk to shul. Let him walk to study Torah. He can also walk to help bury the dead, to comfort the bereaved, to visit the infirm, to attend a bris. Let the mind's repentant stirrings and the soul's longings for closeness to Heaven translate into activities which use the entire self. Kol atzmosai. He offers a metaphor: when a person is not well, the doctor tries to determine whether it is because he has too much, or too little, of something in his body. If he has too much, the body needs emptying out and he has to void or reject that troublesome ingredient or substance. If his Illness is because his body has too little of a substance or nutrient, the doctor must instruct him to replenish the deficiency. With our efforts to do teshuva, he says, we also need to determine where our soul suffers from excess, and where from insufficiency. The failure to perform positive commandments when we have the opportunity is like an internal deficiency and requires that we feed this emptiness by increasing our performance and engagement in proper, sacred conduct. If our spiritual malady stems from excessive involvement with the forbidden, then we need to "void" ourselves. How is that done? ibn Shu'aib says that fasting, sitting out opportunities to pursue unnecessary stimulation of one's mortal comforts, and expelling our wealth to help others are ways in which we get rid of the excesses through which we often over-stimulate ourselves. May our efforts during these Ten Days of Repentance be acceptable and may this first Shabbos of 5777 be a good one. D Fox