4 December 2011 · A sentence from the teachings of Rav Kook

„For some time now I have been waging an inner war, and a strong spiri…”

„For some time now I have been waging an inner war, and a strong spirit pushes me to speak about repentance. And all my thoughts are concentrated only upon it. Repentance occupies the greatest part of Torah and of life; upon it are built all the personal and communal hopes. It is a commandment of God that is, on the one hand, the easiest of the easy - for a stirring of repentance is already repentance - and on the other hand, it is the hardest of the hard, for it has not yet come forth into full actuality in the world and in life.”From Introduction to Orot HaTeshuvah

In his introduction to the book Orot HaTeshuvah, the Rav writes of his great yearning and desire to write about repentance.

Repentance is the central pillar of life, which for some reason has become, in common speech, a very specific definition ("there is one who was a heretic and returned in repentance and became religious"). According to the Rav, a person who returns in repentance is not necessarily a person who turns from secular to religious, but a person who realizes his personal hopes, who advances the community, who advances the world.

A good evening to all!

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From the community archive of Mishpetei HaRav Kook — studying Rav Kook's teachings since 2011.