Who To Ask For Forgiveness And For What? Part 3

Question: Why is there a tradition of redemption before the new year (Rosh HaShana), and sages warn that the Creator records all our actions and presents us with an account? It sounds as if He prescribes us penalties for our misconducts?

Answer: This is very simple. We all are linked into one closed system that connects us to each other with billions of strands: all of the people, stones, plants, and animals. Everything is connected together; therefore the “penalty book” is this network itself.

Every time I make some movement, not an external one with the arms or legs, but an internal one, regarding the connection between us, becoming closer to people or farther from them, it is immediately realized and felt in our connection. It means that I am already recorded in the record book of nature for the benefit or harm I have caused. There is a general account of how much I affected the system, since it is integral and closed.

It is like the cells of one body, where each is linked to all others. So it turns out that all my actions and influence on the system are recorded in it and change it in some way.

Moreover, I am not in some single point of the system, but spread over all of it, among all the billions of people, animals, plants, and inanimate matter, and affect them all. I am in absolutely everyone and bring them either to unity or separation with my actions. It means that I am recorded in the book.

Our egoistic desire is growing every moment because evolution moves forward steadily, and we develop from generation to generation and during our entire life. Therefore, every day I must care about correcting all missed opportunities to connect all the people into one system.

If I neglect my duties, then I contribute to the general separation. Even my ignorance doesn’t relieve me from the punishment. Since I don’t contribute to the connection, I lead to the discord.

If when getting up in the morning I don’t act in order to unite the entire world, or at least the entirety of Israel into one family, it is called behavior that is detrimental to the system. After all, egoism is constantly growing and we don’t correct it, we don’t fix our connection.

If I did something bad or good to one person, it affects the entire system. And even if I simply did nothing good, it also counts as a wrecking, because in the meantime the egoism that separates us has grown. All this is recorded on my account into two columns: debit and credit.

Question: If I ask for forgiveness on the eve of the new year, will all my debts be written off?

Answer: Nothing will be written off. The idea is that the person makes an internal calculation with himself and decides that from now on he must cause only the connection of the system. He truly repents for his past and makes a decision for the future. These aren’t empty words with nothing behind them, but are the result of a serious preparation.

He swears that from this day he will constantly check and correct each of his desires. Eventually we all should come to the state where the whole system is corrected. Nobody will make this correction instead of us. What I can correct or damage inside my soul, like in the cell of a body, nobody can correct apart from me.

Therefore, my redemption doesn’t cancel past sins, but gives me an opportunity to start as if from scratch and correct them. Due to the fact that from now on I start to do good deeds, I add my past wrongdoings to them and correct them.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 9/27/16