Machshava:

Tanya 

Collections: Rabbi Weinberger: Yom Kippur

Description

The obligation of teshuvah on Yom Kippur is different from the rest of the year. The Navi (prophet) Yonah attempted to escape from his responsibility. Sleep is the modern day American version of suicide. A Jew should not come to Ne'ilah with a death wish like Yonah. The desire to die comes when we fear that we cannot go on living the same way. There are two definitions of Ne'ilah: 1) Feeling completely powerless to deal with external circumstances. 2) Our misery is completely self-imposed and we see the tza'ar (pain) we have brought upon our lives. We need to ask Hashem for a new way of life when we do not know how to move on to the next stage in our lives.