Elul-Fixing Midot

Parshat שופטים always comes with the beginning of the month of Elul. The first Pasuk of שופטים ושוטרים תתן לך בכל שעריך, “Judges and policemen shall you place upon your gates,” has a classic Chassidic interpretation. The “gates” actually refers to the openings in our bodies, that we need to monitor. These gates refer to our senses, seeing, hearing, smelling, speaking, and touching. These “gates” can be used for Mitzvot or Aveirot. What we look at, listen to, how we speak, what we touch, and even smelling, can have positive or negative implications. The Netivot Shalom uses a play on words when the Torah says, לא תנאף, “Thou shall not commit adultery.” The wording should actually be, לא תהנה אף, that your nose should not derive benefit. (There is a Halacha that men should not even smell the perfume of women forbidden to them.) The Netivot Shalom continues by emphasizing that the month of Elul is meant to be the time when we work at improving our Midot, character development. The Prophet Isaiah says, יעזוב רשע דרכו, that the wicked should forsake “his ways.” This refers to negative character traits, and it can be learned from this Pasuk that someone with bad Midot, is called a רשע, evil person. So we are to begin to take advantage of the next forty days from Rosh Chodesh Elul to Yom Kippur, to work on ourselves with the intent of achieving real דבקות בה׳, clinging to G-d. חודש טוב