Unraveling the True Essence of Elul: A New Perspective on Sin, Repentance, and Personal Growth

0:01 It is my sincere hope that tonight we hear this story from these great Kedolin and we have a total rebrand, a reboot, an upheaval of the old ways and in with the new perspective on how a modern generation us living in 2023, can fully maximize this potent, powerful and auspicious month of Elul that is very much right around the corner. The great Rapslomo Hoffman, who you should definitely have his book and read it a hundred times. He is one of the great Kedolin, a master of Taira Shab-i-Xaab, taira Shab-al-Pah, along with the keen knowledge of the brain, the psychologist par excellence, the mental health counselor that the great Rav Shakh used to consult with, amongst other Kedolin.

0:54 He knew how the brain works and how we can best maximize our need for balance, for peace, for tranquility and yet to progress in our life. And in Elul he says that he learned what it's all about. He said he was walking through the hallway and his Yeshiva when he was just a young chap and he had a certain intensity about him. He was walking through during the Yeshiva, during Elul and the great Rabbi Yecheskol Sarno, the rest of Yeshiva. He looked at him and he said Shlima the Hoffman, why do you look so intense? Perhaps, why so serious and he said well, it's Elul, rabbi, and I'm doing Chua, and the Rambo, he tells us that Chua Shalema, real Chua is when even the Almighty can testify about you that you'll never return to that sin.

1:50 That's Chua. But that's very hard. I'm trying to gather up the strength and the fear of what it is to be punished from the sin. So therefore I can change, and it would be Cheskol Sarno. It happened 1938, that long ago. He said what You're on, mahmere, we don't paskin like the Rambo. You hear that we don't paskin like the Rambo, we paskin like Rebenu Yonah. And why are you taking the stringent approach? You know what Chua is. You know what we're doing during Elul, rabbi Yisro Sarno to explain Rebenu Yonah's approach, it means that Yom Kippur is Mahaper in atones, for the shoven, for the returners, and during Elul we just become returners, as if we get off the bad, wrong path and we just get on the good path.

2:40 But to actually get there, like the Rambo says, to actually finish Chua, what type of foolishness do you think it is that right now you should just give up whatever sin that you're entrenched in, that you should all of a sudden flip your path and then become a total saddic overnight. What type of crazy Yatsuhara filled foolishness is that? No, what the Avalda is like, rebenu Yonah says, is if you're driving up trying to get to Maine on Highway 95 and an hour into your journey you see a sign that you're only a couple hours from Miami, florida, you realize that you've been going south this entire time. No, during Elul, you get off the highway, you just turn around and get on the highway going back up to Maine.

3:25 The goal is to get to Maine. The goal is to return to all the way, be there at the full spot when total completion. But Elul's a time to become a shover about Chua. So the truth, the directness, saladra says just figure out which highways are on that are the wrong ones, leading to the wrong places. You get on the highways that are going to the right places. That's done with thought, introspection and some charting. That is our Avalda during Elul, that willing will continue to talk about it. I encourage you to think about which highways you are on that are leading towards Miami, as opposed to going to Maine to become a shover about Chua, so that Yom Kippur will atone for us.