Page 146 - Chayei Adam LAYOUT sivan 5782

Chayei Adam - K’lal 143 - Laws of Aseres Yemei Teshuva & Erev Yom Kippur

yemei teshuva for a few days at a time and stand the entire Yom Kippur without
lifting their hands, and other such self-deprivations, afflictions, and fasts. R’ Leib
Taller z”l compares them to a person who once stayed in someone’s home and
his host apologized for not giving him enough honor, because although he has
some ducks which he could slaughter, they are too scrawny and need fattening.
After several months, he came again to the same place and the host greeted him
graciously and slaughtered some of the ducks in his honor. When they sat down
to eat, his host told him that these are from the scrawny ducks that he had told
him about previously. The guest asked him how this could be, because everyone
knows that one can only fatten a duck for a few weeks and it has been several
months. He answered that he feeds the ducks until they can no longer eat, then
he lets them starve for several days. After fasting, the ducks can eat again. This is
what he does, until he is ready to eat them. This, [explained R’ Leib Taller] is the
way of the yetzer hara, as the posuk (Mishlei 7:22) says “it follows after it suddenly,
like an ox to the butcher he comes, meaning, that before slaughtering it, the
butcher fattens the ox. The ox believes it is for its own good but it is really bad for
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it. The entire life support of klipos is that when a person does a mitzva but he is
wicked and the sparks of kedusha which he gains as reward for the mitzva are
taken by the klipos and sustains it. When a person sins to the point when no
sparks of kedusha remain, [the yetzer hara] convinces him to fast and oppress
himself and repent so that he will be like a newborn baby. Then, when he returns
to sin, he gives him the strength and energy for it. See how mistaken people are
for even those who hold that Yom Kippur can atone without teshuva, that is only
when he happened to fall and sin, but a person who sins and says that Yom
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Kippur will atone for him, it doesn’t atone. This is according to all opinions,
because the prosecution cannot come to his defense. Therefore, one shouldn’t
rely on this and view the entire year like the yomim noraim, only that during [the

םדו רשב
14. This is a kabbalistic concept. The he receives for these mitzvos are hijacked by
‘klipos’ are a certain manifestation of the klipos and are by the yetzer hara against
impurities which survive and thrive on kedusha him, recommending certain holy measures
and mitzvos which they hijack. In short, when which are really a trap to make him fall.
a Jew who is a sinner does mitzvos, the reward

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