This Could Be It

Friday September 19, 2025/ 26 Elul 5785/Parshat Nitzavim

Hevre/Friends,

What motivates someone to make change? Is it a sense of urgency, or a sense of possibility? Is it feeling like it’s now or never, or that there are steps to take one at a time? The Jewish answer to those questions? Yes.

The Torah portion of Nitzavim is always read right before Rosh Hashanah when we are primed to hear its repeated calls for teshuvah, literally a return to our core essence which makes devotion, compassion, humility and honesty - with ourselves, with others, with the Divine - possible. The root of the word teshuvah appears no less than seven times in the first ten verses of chapter 30 alone.

On the one hand the calls summon us to a lifetime of spiritual and moral discipline - day by day, decision by decision:

וְאַתָּ֣ה תָשׁ֔וּב וְשָׁמַעְתָּ֖ בְּק֣וֹל יְהֹוָ֑ה וְעָשִׂ֙יתָ֙ אֶת־כּל־מִצְותָ֔יו אֲשֶׁ֛ר אָנֹכִ֥י מְצַוְּךָ֖ הַיּֽוֹם׃

You, however, will again heed יהוה and obey all the divine commandments that I enjoin upon you this day.

 On the other, there’s an urgency to the order:

הַעִדֹ֨תִי בָכֶ֣ם הַיּוֹם֮ אֶת־הַשָּׁמַ֣יִם וְאֶת־הָאָ֒רֶץ֒ הַחַיִּ֤ים וְהַמָּ֙וֶת֙ נָתַ֣תִּי לְפָנֶ֔יךָ הַבְּרָכָ֖ה וְהַקְּלָלָ֑ה וּבָֽחַרְתָּ֙ בַּחַיִּ֔ים לְמַ֥עַן תִּֽחְיֶ֖ה אַתָּ֥ה וְזַרְעֶֽךָ׃

I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day: I have put before you life and death, blessing and curse. Choose life—if you and your offspring would live—

Our tradition tries to balance taking the long view - a lifetime of trying to do the right thing, making mistakes, learning from them, renewing our efforts - and recognizing that every single moment counts. In another notable feature of the text, the word “hayom/today” features five times in the first six verses of the portion. Rashi explains this repetition by suggesting that Moshe knew this was the last day of his life; that this was his final chance to teach the people standing before him whose days would continue to unfold to embrace a way of life filled with righteousness and holiness.  How could he have known that day was his last? How could any of us know that? He couldn’t, and we can’t. But we can live as if we do. 

Picking up this thread, the Mishnah records Rabbi Eliezer teaching that we should repent one day before our death. Not being able to predict that day, his teaching is that we should approach each day we’re gifted to be alive with the commitment to doing good and to righting our wrongs. Teshuvah/repentance/coming home to ourselves isn’t a seasonal cleaning; it’s a way of life.

Later, the Baal Shem Tov would warn us that each human being is given a limited number of words to say over the course of their lifetime. When we’ve used them all up, our life comes to an end. Each word we say brings us one step closer to our death. To truly sanctify our speech, how and what we say to one another, we should ask ourselves: is this word worth dying for?

It’s hard - and uncomfortable - to always be mindful that any day might be our last. It’s impossible to imbue every act and every conversation with such magnitutde. And yet, in this season of change, we’re asked to bring renewed awareness to both the fragility and the possibility each moment brings. 

Here's how I’ve tried to incorporate this consciousness into my own spiritual practice. Each morning when I awake and open my eyes to the blessing of another day, I say the prayer, Modah ani l’fanecha melech chai v’kayam shehechezarta bi nishmati b’chemla rabbah emunatecha/Thank you for graciously and faithfully returning my soul within me. And then, echoing Francis Weller from his stirring book, The Wild Edge of Sorrow, I say to myself some version of the following: “I am one day closer to my death. So how will I live this day? How will I greet those I meet? How will I bring soul to each moment? I do not want to waste this day.”

With just days to Rosh Hashanah, try to embrace these dual messages: life is fleeting, but there’s always time to make it meaningful. 

With continued prayers for our ability to bring home all the hostages, protect the soldiers, heal the injured, comfort the bereaved, and build a lasting peace in Israel and around the world, and with blessings for a Shabbat Shalom,

Dini

(Photo by Ronen Avisror)