Tefillah - 086 The Purity Within

The Sound of The ‘Great’ Shofar

תקע בשופר גדול לחרותינו – Blow the great shofar, to our redemption.”We ask Hashem to blow a “great shofar”, which will signal the redemption of our exile.

What kind of redemption do we await? We await a redemption of “ושא נס לקבץ גלויתינו” – that all of the exiles be gathered together.

We are not simply asking for a simple blowing of the shofar; we ask for a ‘great’ shofar. What does this mean – why do we ask specifically for a ‘great’ shofar?

Hearing The Sound of the ‘Great’ Shofar: Inner Teshuvah

Let us reflect on this concept. At Har Sinai, we all heard the sound of a “great shofar”. We are no longer on the level in which we hear that shofar sound, but it was still engraved deeply into our souls ever since we heard it. There is still a way for us to somewhat access that “great shofar” sound that we heard; we will explain.

The word ‘shofar’ comes from the word shaapru maaseichem, “Beautify your ways.” We blow shofar in Elul to remind ourselves to “beautify” our ways, by doing teshuvah. Simply, it means to do teshuvah for our sins. 

But there is a higher, deeper kind of teshuvah. It is to realize that we are all a pure soul from Above (cheilek eloka mimaal); in the depths of all our souls, we are all intrinsically pure. Chazal say that “A Jew, even when sins, is still a Jew.” The intent of this is that there is an inner point in every Jew’s soul which always remains unaffected by sin, even when a person sins.

As long as a person remains unaware of this, he will sink further and further into sin. His sins – both intentional and unintentional - will continue to send him further away from his Source. 

This is the reason why many people continue to sin their whole life. They have gotten used to viewing themselves as being an entity of evil [i.e. “I’m such a bad person”; I’ve done so many aveiros (sins) in my life”] and that is why they justify their sins their entire life. They are unaware of this fact that a Jew, at his root, is really completely pure.

The Pure Point of the Soul: “Temimus”

A person needs to reveal the inner point (nekuda hapenimis) of his soul. It is otherwise known as temimus (simple earnestness). It is the point in one’s self which is always pure, no matter what a person has done in his life.

If a person wishes to seek a true kind of life in this world, he must awaken this innermost point of temimus in his soul.

If you want to have some idea of temimus, you can see it in a child. A child is innocent and pure. A child’s very nature is temimus.

But all of us as well have in us a point which is like a pure child! We need to use that pure part of ourselves to turn to Hashem and speak to Him from there; from that pure place in ourselves, which is as pure as an innocent child.

Talking To Hashem From Your ‘Temimus’

When you speak with Hashem, speak to Him like how a child speaks to his parents. Begin to talk with Hashem, earnestly, from your temimus.

Talk to Hashem, with temimus - get used to talking to Hashem like how a child talks to his parents, who talks to them innocently and sincerely.

Your ‘Temimus’ Always Remains

To illustrate the concept of temimus, a person can feel a sense of inner purity when he immerses in the mikveh (if he is in the midst of doing teshuvah, earnestly). In the same way, a person can feel a pure place in his soul and use it to connect to Hashem from there.

This remains true in spite of all one’s sins he has committed and all of the timtum halev (‘blockage of the heart’[1]) that a person has piled up on himself throughout his lifetime. The pure point of temimus in a Jew’s soul is always there.

‘Daas’ In Learning Torah, ‘Temimus’ In Our Relationship With Hashem

Temimus doesn’t mean that we have to forego our daas (thinking mind). Our daas is used when we learn Torah, and we need to analyze the Torah very in-depth in order to learn Torah. But when it comes to our relationship with Hashem, we must learn how to be utterly earnest with Him, and to relate to Him with temimus.

So our avodah ends up being two-fold, making use of opposite powers in the soul: on one hand, we are commanded to learn Torah in-depth, which makes use of our daas; at the same time, we also need to be “earnest” at the same time in our relationship with Hashem – our power of temimus.

Remaining Connected To Our Inner Purity

We are surrounded with impurity, especially in today’s generation. But we still have an inner point in us which remains pure: our temimus.

Thus, we can now understand with greater depth of our tefillah to Hashem to blow the “great shofar.” Even though we cannot hear the great “shofar sound” nowadays, still, we aspire for it, because we still have an inner point in our soul that is pure. We are asking Hashem in this tefillah for a true and complete freedom from impurity of the exile, when our point of inner purity will become fully exposed to us.

Even though we haven’t yet merited the redemption, we can still penetrate into the inner point of our soul. Each person can reach it on his own level, even if we are not in touch with it completely.

‘Moshiach Will Return Everyone To Teshuvah’

It is brought in our sefarim hakedoshim that Moshiach will return everyone to teshuvah - even the tzaddikim. How will the tzaddikim be returned to teshuvah? Why do the tzaddikim need to be returned to teshuvah?

The depth of this matter is because even tzaddikim don’t realize the full extent of the purity of their soul. Moshiach will succeed in returning every tzaddik to fully realize the inner point of the Jewish soul.

Remaining Pure In A World That Is Not Pure

All of us need to realize that we all possess an inner point in our soul that is totally pure.

The more impure that this world is becoming, the more we need to uncover our inner purity. In this way, we can have a place in ourselves to run away to from all the impurity, and be protected.

So we must reflect about this, every day: that we have in ourselves a pure soul that comes from Above![2]

Every day, the yetzer hora gets stronger, as Chazal say; and if not for Hashem’s help, we cannot overcome it[3]. It is therefore all the more apparent that we need to get in touch with our inner point of purity, with the more and more that time goes on.

May we merit, speedily in our days, to hear the inner sound of the “great shofar”.