08 Oct YOM KIPPUR: RETURNING TO THE THRONE

The Gemara teaches,
“Teshuvah [repentance] is
great, because it reaches
the Throne of Glory.”
What exactly does this
mean? How does our
teshuvah reach G-d’s throne in the
heavens? And what is this supposed to
teach us?
The answer is that our souls all originate
from the Throne of Glory. We each
possess a soul which began pure and
pristine. It left its place in the heavens,
right by Hashem’s throne, and was sent
down to the earth, into a physical body.
But with time, the soul loses its purity.
We become distracted by the lures of the
physical world, and so instead of focusing
on nurturing the soul, we end up focusing
on the body, on things like money,
clothes, cars and fancy homes.
Teshuvah means returning to the throne.
We restore our soul’s purity, so it becomes
sacred like it was originally, before it
came into this world. We focus again on
Torah and mitzvot so our soul becomes

cleansed and pure like it was by the
throne.
This is why we spend so much time on
Rosh Hashanah talking about מלכות ,
about Hashem being King over the world.
if we look at the Rosh Hashanah prayers,
this theme מלכות – – is the predominant
theme.
This is what we repeatedly talk about –
that Hashem is King over the universe. In
fact, during the ten days from Rosh
Hashanah through Yom Kippur, we make
a number of changes to our daily tefilot,
but the only changes which are absolutely
required, such that our prayer is not valid
if we forget to make them, involve the
word מלך) king). If we forget to say this
word, then our prayer is not valid and it
must be repeated.
We spend so much time focusing on
Hashem’s kingship because this is where
our souls come from – His Throne in the
heavens. We focus our attention on
Hashem’s Throne to motivate ourselves
to return to the throne – to remind
ourselves that we have a sacred, pure

neshamah, and we are here
on this world to care for that
neshamah and keep it pure.
There is a famous story told
of a man who was traveling,
and he came to visit the
Hafetz Haim in his home. He
entered the home, looked
around, and noticed that the
house was very scarce. There
was very little furniture and
the like that fills most other
houses.
“Why do you barely have
any furniture?” the man
asked the great sage.
“Why don’t you have furniture with you
here?” the Hafetz Haim replied.
“What do you mean? I’m traveling.
Nobody takes furniture with them when
they travel.”
“I’m also traveling,” the Hafetz Haim
said. “I’m on a temporary journey in this
world. I don’t really need furniture.”

During our time on earth, we get
distracted by the “furniture,” by all the
physical joys. This time of year reminds
us to focus on our neshamah, the main
part of our being, which is here on earth
temporarily. It reminds that we have a
pure soul from Hashem’s Throne, and we
need to make our neshamah our highest
priority in life so we can keep it pure and
pristine just like it was back in the
heavens.