From Whom Do We Take ?

בס"ד

Tucked in between the details of the specific responsibilities held by the Leviim and the laws of the sotah and the nazir, is the cornerstone of any atonement or forgiveness, the mitzvah of viduy. The pesukim briefly describe an action of wrongdoing and state that, as part of the restitution process, the sinner confess his sins. The Sefas Emes posits the following question. Why is the universal mitzvah of viduy (confession) listed here? The answer (that he credits to the Chiddushei HaRim, his grandfather) is the nature of the sin with which viduy is linked.

The Torah (Bamidbar 5:6)refers to the sinner as one who "misappropriates" or "embezzles" something from Hashem. Only by reading the commentaries, do we understand that the underlying sin here is theft. Why should theft be the paradigm misdeed that the Torah uses to teach us how to do teshuva? Because there is something of theft in every sin we do.

The Chiddushei HaRim explained that all of our abilities, every sling and arrow in our arsenal of achievements, were given to us for one purpose – to serve Hashem. By misusing our G-d given abilities and straying from the proper path, we are, de facto, embezzling these powers from Hashem, since we aren't using them towards their intended consequence.

Additionally, we can consider another reason why the misdeed of theft is used as the paradigm to instruct us in the specifics of teshuva. Without proper cognition of our sin, we can never hope to attain forgiveness and repentance. We might erroneously consider simple restitution a fitting teshuva for the crime of theft. By performing viduy, we are acknowledging that the action, in and of itself, was wrong – not just its consequence. Since the action itself was a crime against G-d ( as well as a crime against the man from whom we stole ) we must ask His forgiveness as well. We begin this process by confession.

May we use all our many talents and strengths for the service of He who bestowed them upon us and may we constantly recognize that all our actions have a direct import to our Grand Maker up above.

Hatzlacha !!