One August, the son and daughter of non-observant parents leave for college. They return home a month later for the High Holy Days. On Friday morning, the father happens to see his son secretly putting on tefillin. Late that afternoon, he sees his daughter secretly lighting Shabbos candles. Outraged by this religious fervor, he storms off to the home of his local rabbi. “What is happening to my children,” the father demands. “I raised them to follow the American dream. I taught them that being a good Jew means being kind to others, that’s it. Now they’ve gone crazy—Oy, and this is what they call teshuvah!” The rabbi replies, “Quickly, go home. Check your mezuzahs. Maybe they’re kosher!”

* * *

Shoftim: Crowning a King

When you come into the Land, and you take possession of it, and you settle in it, you will say: “I will set a king over myself like all the nations around me.” You should always set a king over yourself…[1]

The word v’yashavtah, ‘and you settle’ has an extra letter Hei.[2] What might this letter tell us about “setting a king” over oneself? Furthermore, this portion is read in the beginning of the month of Elul. What do the extra Hei and the mitzvah of crowning a king have to do with Elul?

THE LETTER HEI AND ‘KINGSHIP’
The gematria of Hei is five. The Baal HaTurim explains that the additional Hei means that with the passing of five generations after entering the Land, the time was right to crown a Jewish king. Indeed, in the year 2882, during the era of Samuel the Prophet, the Jews crowned their first king, Saul. The sound of the letter Hei is the sound of breath. Breath is the essence of speech, the back-drop behind each articulation, each letter and word. The Torah says that G-d creates the world through speech. Kabbalah explains: G-d created the world with the letter Hei.[3] Furthermore, this creation process happened through the sefirah of Malchus-kingship.

The Book of Proverbs says, “the King rules through speech.” As Chassidus explains, the process of creating the world through speech can only take place when G-d desires to be King over the world and every living being. Therefore, it is through Kingship–the letter Hei–that the world receives its vitality, its life-breath. As it states in the Baruch Sheamar Prayer, “Chei HaOlamim, Melech…“–’the life of the universe is King(ship)’.

SERVING A KING
The portion of Shoftim is read during the month of Elul, also known as the Month of Reckoning,[4] when we begin to take an account of our good deeds and misdeeds of the past year. We work to rectify the past and make new resolutions for the year to come. We once again resolve to accept G-d as our King and pledge our allegiance to His Torah. After a month of teshuvah, repentance, on Rosh Hashana, we crown G-d as King of the world. The portion of Shoftim, therefore, must be coming to give us strength to accept the yoke of the Divine King.

What does it mean to accept G-d as King? There’s a basic difference between pledging one’s allegiance to a king of the nations, and to pledging allegiance to Al-mighty G-d, the King of all kings.[5] A human king is primarily concerned with his army and his taxes. He’s not very concerned with the details of the personal lives of his subjects–who they marry, what they eat, and how they dress. As long as you pay your taxes–and in many countries, register with the army–you have served your king and country well.

To serve the King of all kings, however, means to be subservient to His will in every detail of life. Soldiers of the Divine King must not only register or obey, but completely nullify themselves before the King. The result of this self-nullification, however, is not that the soldiers become non-entities. On the contrary, they become one with the King, as it is written, “A servant of the King is the King.”[6] This is the meaning of the Shema, “G-d is One”: a soldier is conscious that the King’s presence permeates the essence and fiber of his or her being.

THE KING IS IN THE FIELD
The Alter Rebbe says that during the month of Elul, “the King is in the field.” That is, before the Divine King enters His palace, he passes through the fields. All the city people go out to escort the King through the fields. He greets everyone with a happy face, joyfully accepting upon Himself to fulfill the wishes of each of his subjects.

Throughout the rest of the year one must request a ‘meeting’ to approach the King, and not everyone is automatically granted permission. In this month, however, the King comes down to the level of each person, whether great or small. To remind us of this tremendous opportunity, the Torah portion tells us, “you should set a King over yourself.”

Now we can appreciate that the essence of Elul is an opportunity to come close to G-d–as close as He is to us.[7] This is also the meaning of the teaching that Elul is the time for teshuvah, repentance. Teshuvah literally means ‘returning’–spiritually returning to closeness with G-d our King, as it is written, “The spirit (or breath) returns to G-d, who bestowed it.”

It is interesting to note that when the word v’yashavtah, “when you settle,” is spelled with an extra Hei, the letters can also spell teshuvah. The one leftover letter is Yud. The gematria of Yud is ten. Teshuvah-Yud therefore means, ‘Return with Yud, all ten faculties of your soul’.[8] When we return our seven emotional and three intellectual attributes to G-d, He can reign over and through us.

CHECKING TEFILLIN & MEZUZAHS
In resonance with the theme of teshuvah–stock-taking and repairing–is customary in the Month of Elul to bring our tefillin and mezuzahs to an expert sofer, or scribe, to check that they are still kosher. Over the year, because of the natural changes of the weather, the sacred letters inside can crack and become invalid. Many times, the sofer can repair them. Using only kosher tefillin and mezuzahs brings us powerful spiritual benefits, and contributes to our material success as well.

ACTIVATING THE HEI
The three lines in the graphic design of the letter Hei () allude to thought, speech and action. Proactive teshuvah is thus to return our thoughts, our words and our actions to the service of our Divine King. Therefore, during Elul, we add in speaking words of Torah and prayer, and in performing acts of kindness. Once we have thus activated the Hei, G-d can begin to settle into this world. We can then be ready, on Rosh Hashanah, to crown G-d with an absolute sovereignty. “And G-d will be King over the whole world, and on that day He will be One and His name will be One”–with the coming of our righteous Mashiach.

A STORY
A prince committed a sin in the eyes of his father, the king. The king banished him to one of his distant colonies for an unspecified time.

Occasionally, the king would visit his colonies. On these expeditions, as the citizens of the land escorted him, they would write notes of request, crumple them and throw them into the king’s carriage. The king would pick up the notes, read them, and resolve to fulfill many of his subjects’ requests.

One day, the king visited the colony where he had exiled his son. The exiled prince, hearing the news that his father’s arrival was imminent, prepared a note and waited. A marching band and ticket-parade heralded the arrival of the king. Finally, as the royal carriage passed by, the prince threw his note into the carriage.

When the king picked up the note, he recognized his son’s writing. As he read the note, he began to weep. It said, “My father, my king: just recently, my hut was burned to the ground. Will you please build me a new hut?”

In the month of Elul, G-d awaits our requests. Let’s ask G-d to take us home–with the in- gathering of our exiles, right now!

ACTION: Meditate on the letter Hei and then ask G-d to bring Mashiach now.

FOOTNOTES
[1] Deuteronomy, 17:14
[2] See, for example, Deuteronomy, 26:1—the word v’yashavta has no Hei.
[3] The Zohar says that “B’heibaram” (Genesis 2:4) means, ‘With a letter Hei did He create them…’ Note that in the Torah, the Hei in B’heibaram is unusually small. This alludes to the lower, second Hei in G-d’s name, corresponding to Malchus, Kingship. The articulation of Creation occurred, through G-d’s five anatomical organs of speech, as it were. When the breath is focused through these five parts of the mouth, the other letters are formed.
[4] HaYom Yom, 27th of Menachem Av
[5] Sefer HaSichos 5748, Parshas Re’eh
[6] See Talmud Shavuos 47b. See also Rashi on Genesis, 15:18, and Numbers, 1:7. Rashi comments: “The servant of a king is a king. Attach yourself to the captain and they will bow down before you. Go near an anointed person and you become anointed yourself.”
[7] ‘Elul’ is an acronym for “I am to my Beloved, and my Beloved is to me”–Ani l’dodi v’dodi li. See Lekutei Sichos, 29, p. 272, etc., regarding teshuvah.
[8] When G-d created Paradise, He used the letter Yud.