Rosh Hashanah, of course, is Yom Hadin. Rosh Hashanah, of course, is the first of Aseret Yemei Teshuva. And yet, on Rosh Hashanah, clearly in both capacities, as a Yom Hadin, as Aseret Yemei Teshuva, so it's one's response to din has to be teshuva. One's response to the opportunity of dirshu Hashem behimatzo of Aseret Yemei Teshuva has to be teshuva. And yet, seemingly, we're not allowed to do a proper teshuva. We don't say Viduy on Rosh Hashanah. We don't say Viduy on Rosh Hashanah, and you're not supposed to say Viduy on Rosh Hashanah. Ad kedei kach, as noted in many Machzorim, the Arizal is of the opinion that even אבינו מלכנו חטאנו לפניך you're not supposed to say. That on Rosh Hashanah, you're supposed to skip אבינו מלכנו חטאנו לפניך. So how can it be? How can it be? It's a Yom Hadin, so to be zocheh b'din, we want to do teshuva. It's Aseret Yemei Teshuva. That's the mitzvas hayom. Viduy is certainly me'akeiv, the Rambam says, in the kaparah of teshuva. Right? The Rav, following the Minchas Chinuch, explains it's not me'akeiv in teshuva per se, but it is me'akeiv in the kaparah of teshuva. So how can it be that our hands are tied in terms of attaining kaparah on Rosh Hashanah? Now, without answering the question, we can understand why we don't say Viduy and why the Arizal is makpid not even to say the אבינו מלכנו חטאנו לפניך. That we can understand. Why? Because Rosh Hashanah is the day of Malchiyos. A day of Malchiyos. On a day of Malchiyos, it encroaches, it contradicts the Malchiyos, even the mere mention of cheit. Even if said b'derech charata, even if said בדרך בקשת סליחה ומחילה, the very mention of cheit, just raising the prospect and על אחת כמה וכמה the fact of defying the devar hamelech, so that contradicts the Malchiyos. And that's why there can't be Viduy, and that's why the Arizal, he says you can't even have the regular seder hatefillah of Avinu Malkeinu, you can't even say chatanu lefanecha because that contradicts, that clashes the Malchiyos. Imagine a coronation of a melech basar vadam and a מלך שבידו להמית ולהחיות, where everyone pledges absolute loyalty to the melech, all his subjects. And then, in that context, in their presence, someone comes and says, oh, you know, I really feel terrible about having been mevazeh you all this time. So that, again, even if said sincerely with חרטה בדרך בקשת מחילה וסליחה, so that's antithetical to the Malchiyos. That's antithetical to the Malchiyos. So we understand why there's no Viduy on Rosh Hashanah, why we can't mention cheit on Rosh Hashanah. But we're still left with a quandary, we're still left with a quandary, of how is it possible that there's no possibility of kapparah on Rosh Hashanah, on the first of Aseres Yemei Teshuvah, on the Yom Hadin. So what this points to is a tremendous, tremendous chiddush, tremendous chiddush. When we say that viduy is me'akev, without viduy there's no kapparah, so we mean on the track, the regular track of teshuvah. If the path to kapparah is the regular path of teshuvah, so then viduy is me'akev. On Rosh Hashanah there's another path. There's another path and that path is malchuyos. By being ממליך הקדוש ברוך הוא, by being ממליך הקדוש ברוך הוא and being ממליך הקדוש ברוך הוא means pledging all one's time, energies, abilities to avodas Hashem. Being ממליך הקדוש ברוך הוא, that's also a path to kapparah. So it's not that in the absence of viduy that we're limited. It's just that the path is a different one on Rosh Hashanah. Smuchin l'kach that the regular path of teshuvah is not the only, and again with all its dinim and pirtei pratim of the viduy that you have to say as the Rambam describes in פרק א הלכה א with a charata, with a kabbala l'haba, with a pirut hacheit. Smuchin l'kach that that's not the exclusive path, but that there are other paths as well. Let's say the Gemara says in Berachos that כל העושה דבר עבירה ומתבייש בו מוחלים לו על כל עוונותיו.
What do you mean מוחלים לו על כל עוונותיו? He wasn't misvadeh. He didn't say ניחמתי ובושתי עשיתי כך וכך ולעולם איני חוזר לדבר זה.
He didn't say that. And nevertheless the Gemara says מוחלים לו על כל עוונותיו. The Gemara says in Shabbos that כל העונה יהא שמיה רבא בכל כוחו קורעים לו גזר דינו.
What do you mean קורעים לו גזר דינו? Again, he didn't satisfy the requirements of פרק א הלכה א. Ela mai what you see, later I think the Netivos Shalom talks about this Gemara in Shabbos also, the same, the same inference. You see that all those dinim define and regulate how kapparah is attained through the track of teshuvah. But the same way there's a track of אמן יהא שמיה רבא, there's a track of misbayesh bo, so on Rosh Hashanah there's a track of malchuyos. And when one thinks about it, it's intuitive. Because after all through teshuvah, right, by expressing nechama, busha, and the kabbala l'haba that לעולם איני חוזר לדבר זה. So what does all that equal? What does that add up to? Again, you need all of those, all of those components. You need the nechama, you need the busha, you need the לעולם איני חוזר לדבר זה. But what's the sum of the parts? What does it add up to? What it adds up to as the Rambam says in Perek Bais is איני אותו האיש שעשה אותם המעשים. That I'm a different person. I'm a different person in the sense that that person committed these aveiros. I'm humiliated at the thought of such aveiros. That person again was lived such a life that he could do such things. I'm a different person. I'm a different person. That's what the teshuva adds up to. Malchios, real Malchios, real Malchios has that effect, that same transformation. Malchios also is certainly again when a person becomes an eved, an eved to a melech, so that means what is avdus, what's the definition of avdus? So one component of the definition, the most obvious and most conspicuous one is that the eved basically has no personal identity. He belongs to the odom, that his identity is defined in terms of the odom. So a person comes, if we were chotei during the course of the year, so that meant that there wasn't a real Malchios, right? Because Malchios and cheit are a tarti d'sasrei. That's why we can't even mention cheit on Rosh Hashana. That's why we can't have the viduy. So a person comes and says real Malchios on Rosh Hashana, so that's also a transformation. And that's another track. And that's another track. Hence, hence the inability to be misvadeh doesn't impair our ability to achieve a teshuva gemura to qualify for a kappara gemura. Because that's not the only track. So the avodas hayom, the avodas hayom of Rosh Hashana is a teshuva mituch Malchios. That the teshuva is based, that the teshuva is anchored in a Malchios. That's how we do teshuva on Rosh Hashana and that's the avodas hayom. It's not the teshuva again where you begin from the cheit, with pirut hacheit and describe your reaction to it. No, but it's rather a teshuva mituch Malchios. And that's the challenge of Rosh Hashana, that's the opportunity of Rosh Hashana, that's the avoda of Rosh Hashana. So I hope we should all be zoche to be mikayeim it. A gut yohr, s'iz a yomtov.