Speech or Babbling

The holy Klausenberger Rebbe zt”l told the following story: Rebbe Levi Yitzchak of Berditchev once saw a man who davened so fast that his words were an incomprehensible stream of babbling. Reb Levi Yitzchak approached the Jew after the end of davening and began to speak with him in an equally nonsensical flow of gibberish. When the Jew expressed his lack of understanding, Reb Levi Yitzchak replied, “but this is how you just davened to HaShem! How do you expect Him to answer your prayers when it is impossible to understand a single word?” The Jew, who didn’t recognize the Rebbe, responded calmly and surely that it wasn’t so. Just as a mother can understand the incoherent babbling of her baby, so too our heavenly Father understands our words even if no one else can! Reb Levi Yitzchak accepted the answer as true and saw it as a defense of Am Yisrael.

The Klausenberger explains that at this time of year, in addition to our lengthy and hopefully coherent prayers, we also speak to HaShem in “sign language,” beginning with the special foods that we eat on the night of Rosh Hashana and concluding with the crying of the shofar in the morning. HaShem, our heavenly Parent, understands our baby talk.

Perhaps we need to ask ourselves if we understand our own baby talk! What am I asking for when the shofar sounds? As those sharp cries pierce my soul, where am I? Where do I want to be? Or as the Piaseczner encourages us to ask, “Who do I want to be one year from now?” This is the time to review our lives, both spiritual and material. Have they perhaps gone stale? Am I satisfied to complacently live a life of the superficial slogans that my community sanctifies? This is the moment of truth and the time to ask myself the really hard questions that I usually manage to evade. As the shofar calls us to wake up from our year-long slumber (Rambam, Hilchot Teshuva 3:4) we may feel as though we are waking up from a nightmare! But that is fine, it is good to wake up from nightmares. Now I can feel the wind of the shofar as HaShem’s breath blowing into my nostrils (Rav Yitzchak Hutner, Pachad Yitzchak: Rosh Hashana 25:4) and be reborn as Adam and Eve. Now my baby talk can become meaningful and I can start my journey anew. Shana Tova.

Rav Zvi Leshem

Guest Lecturer Rav Zvi Leshem made aliyah in 1979 and lives in Efrat with his family, where he serves as the rabbi of Congregation Shirat Shlomo. He is the Director of Overseas Programs at Nishmat, the Jerusalem Center for Higher Torah Study for Women. He studied in the Kollel of Yeshivat Hamivtar for many years and was ordained by the Chief Rabbinate of Israel. Rav Zvi is now completing his doctorate on the Piaseczner Rebbe's Definition of Chassidut at Bar Ilan University. He was a Jerusalem Fellow and is the author of Redemptions: Contemporary Chassidic Essays on the Parsha and the Festivals, available at Amazon.com.