Rosh Hashanah - 5783

Rosh Hashanah - 5783

Rabbi Hal Miller

Forgive us, our Father, for in our abundant folly we have erred,

Pardon us, our King, for our iniquities are many.

Rosh Hashanah is the beginning of the new year, but more importantly, it is the Day

of Judgment, when we are judged for what will happen to us, for good or ill. During

the selichot that we say for either a week or month before (Ashkenaz or Sephard),

during the viduy confessional on Yom Kippur, and during our weekday Shemoneh

Esrei prayers, we repeatedly say this quote or words to this effect. What exactly does

it mean, in particular why the two different words forgive and pardon? Any time two

words are used, they must have some difference in connotation.

The Hebrew is selach lanu avinu ki b'rov ivalteinu shaginu, m'chal lanu malkeinu

ki rabu avoneinu. The two words we are looking at are selach and m'chal. The

Alcalay dictionary lists virtually identical English translations for both -- pardon,

forgiveness, remission -- and they appear there to be interchangeable. Translations

of the various commentators seem to treat them equally and interchangeable. But

there must be something for us to learn.

Rambam explains that the teshuvah process begins with ceasing to do the sin. Next

is viduy, a positive commandment to speak out loud a confession. It means to admit

to wrongdoing, thus the first sentence in the viduy is "Forgive us our Father for we

have sinned". Rav Schwab says that selach is related to tzalo'ach, to jump over

something and continue. It refers to inadvertent sins, asking God to overlook them.

The next phrase is "Pardon us our King for we have rebelled". m'chol here is the

asking for a Royal Pardon for having done an intentional transgression. There is a

difference between unintentional and intentional violations of law, thus a difference

in what we ask of God in our attempt to clear ourselves from His anger. This is affirmed

in the next sentence, "for a Pardoner and Forgiver are You", listed in the order of

severity, mocheil v'solei'ach.

Our verse asks "our Father" to forgive and "our King" to pardon. What does this

difference mean? Rav Moshe Feinstein explains that forgiving is letting it go, but

pardoning is erasing the sin as though it never happened. A father who forgives his

son for a transgression is able to let it go and move forward, but cannot forget the

fact that it happened. Only the King can pardon in order to eliminate it.

In concluding the viduy, which we all recognize from the Yom Kippur service, we say

many times, "And for all these, God of forgiveness, forgive us, pardon us, atone for

us." The first thing we notice here is that in addition to selach and m'chal, it adds kapeir,

atone. There must be something different between that and the previous two. The

second thing we notice is that with this verse, we ask the God of forgiveness to do

these things, but do not ask the God of pardon, nor the God of atonement. Using this

and the commentary of Abudraham, we can adjust and refine our explanations above.

Abudraham write, "selicha, forgiveness, means not even harboring resentment or ill will,

but mechila, pardon, means giving up the right to punish for a wrong." From this we see

that there is still that last step, separated out from mechila. Once God has forgiven, once

He has given up His right to punish, there remains in His mind the fact that we did the

wrong. Atonement then is the actual erasing of the sin from His book.

Why does it say only "God of forgiveness" and not the other two? This is the foundation.

Without forgiveness, there will be no pardon nor erasing. A true forgiveness will lead to

pardon and erasing, but neither pardon nor erasing lead to any of the remaining aspects.