What Happens When You Regret Becoming Religious?
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Transcript
1:33One or two, how big of a sin from one to ten? Like one, one, ten? Why ten? There's a big, big difference between you guys. This is a bet? No, actually, you bet on the head? No, ten. You basically regret all your mitzvot. Why? Why is it ten, though? Is it like eating pig or committing a moral crime like killing somebody? That's a 10. That's a 10. Do you rate regretting the mitzvot the same way as murder? Yes, why? Because you lose everything you ever did. The Rambam... In Hilchot Teshuvah, chapter 3, halacha number 3, it says the following: Anyone who changes his mind about the mitzvot that he has performed and regrets the merits that he has earned, saying in his heart, not even saying out loud, in his heart.
2:40He says, what value was there in doing this? What value do I gain from keeping Shabbat? What value do I gain from keeping my brit? What do I get out of this? Come on, my life isn't really that great anyway. I wish I hadn't performed them. Why? Because I'd still be with Christine. I'd still be with Jose. I'd still be, you know, going to the movies every weekend with my friends. I'd still be playing poker, Texas Hold'em, with Daniel Negreanu and the rest of the degenerates. I'd still be doing all this fun stuff. So the Rambam says, if he says these things in his heart, he loses all of his mitzvot and no merit. preserved for him at all, meaning not only has he now made his sin by saying something that implies the mitzvot are not worth very much, but all the work that he's done already for the last year, two years, three years, five years, 50, 60 years—he's 70 years old; he's been religious for 50 years. Imagine how many mitzvot a person has in 50 years—all of it gone.
3:56All of the merit is gone; everything goes into the basket. He wants to get an enemy and start all over again, meaning he if dies the next day, he goes up to Shamayim. They say, "Well, sorry sir, you have nothing. Your spiritual bank account is in bankruptcy." "Wow, what do you mean? I put on tefillin, I did this..." "You did, yeah, but you said it's not worth anything, so we said it's not worth anything, it's not worth anything." Where does the Rambam get this from? The prophet Yehezkel says in chapter 33 verse 12, "The righteousness of the upright will not save him on the day of his transgression." So this specifically applies to somebody who regrets their previous deeds, meaning not just what they're doing now, but what they did in the past. It's not like when someone simply feels it's really hard to keep Shabbat and doesn't feel like doing it anymore. That's one thing; you don't lose the merits from the past for that. Only if you say, you know what, I wish I didn't. I wish I didn't keep Shabbat. I wish I didn't go into a kosher business. I wish I was still in the cash advance, murdering people's bank accounts business. I wish I was still going out with Christine and Jose. I wish I was still there. The Rambam says, okay, that person wishes, he gets his wish. He loses everything. And just as a person's merits and sins are weighed...
5:21at the time of his death, so too the sins of every inhabitant in the world, together with his merits, are weighed on the festival of Rosh Hashanah. If one is found righteous, his verdict is sealed for life. But if one is found wicked, his verdict is sealed for death. So, here we see, Rabotai, it is a very, very big deal. But if he repents, if he does teshuva, get life again. If not, he gets death. The point is that a Jew is supposed to train himself before the yetzer hara arrives. Before the yetzer hara arrives, to not allow any of this nonsense into his mind or her mind because if you do, you could literally lose all the work that you've done. Now, even if somebody has made this mistake and has said it, that doesn't mean that you should continue making sins. Start all over. You'll do teshuva, and if your teshuva is really, really serious, you could even turn all of your aveirot, all of your sins, into mitzvot. But the point is that we learn from the halacha, we learn from the laws, the laws of HaKadosh Baruch Hu, that a Jew is supposed to not only be careful with his actions, but even with his thoughts.
6:42even with his thoughts. Now, this is Halacha; this is not an opinion.
