Between Man and G-d; Between Man and his Fellow Man

Repentance

The Ten Commandments are divided into two components: Commandments dealing with the obligations of the human being, as a created being and as a servant, towards his or her Creator, and those dealing with the obligations of the human being towards his or her fellow human beings. This dichotomy is well-known.

However, the Fifth Commandment, "Honor your father and your mother..." (Shemot 20:12) partakes of the essence of both categories. It belongs to the category of "Between Man and G-d," because as Creator of the Universe in a global sense, He is also the Creator of the Universe in a particular sense. And thus, He is the Creator of each and every member of the human race, as well as of all other races and species. It belongs also to the second category, "Between Man and His Fellow Man," because one’s parents are living, breathing, thinking and feeling human beings.

It is also true that the Sixth Commandment, "You shall not Murder" (Shemot 20:13), combines aspects of the relationship between Man and G-d and between Man and his fellow Man. For when a human being murders another human being, and the first murder, that of Hevel by Kayin, occurs in Parshat Bereshit, the most heinous aspect of the crime is that one is diminishing the "Tzelem Elokim," the Image of G-d, in the World. For this crime, the Torah will later say, there can be no monetary ransom; the murderer can only find atonement by "paying," so to speak (at least theoretically) with his own life.

After the sin of Adam and Chava, the Torah describes their encounter with Hashem. "And they heard the sound of Hashem ‘walking’ in the Garden, towards evening; and the Man and his wife hid themselves from Hashem among the trees of the Garden. And Hashem called out to the Man and said to him, ‘Where are you?’ " (Bereshit 3:8-9)

The verb "hid" is rendered in the "hitpael," reflexive form, "hitchabe," to hide oneself, this "binyan, or form, denoting in general an action upon oneself, similar to "hitlabesh," to dress oneself.

The impossibility of hiding from G-d is communicated later in the Torah by the verb, also in the "binyan hitpael," "Vehitkadishtem," "And you shall make yourselves holy; this is the only operation, says G-d, that I want you to perform upon yourselves. One cannot act upon him or herself without G-d’s knowledge; He is the "Yodea Machashavot," the One Who knows all our thoughts.

He has also planted within each of us a "Neshama," a soul, as it says, "And He blew into him a living soul," (Bereshit 2:7) which is a "Chelek Eloka Mimaal," a "part of G-d, from above." It is the "lantern of G-d; searching out all our inward parts."

It was simply silly for Adam and Chava to think that they could hide from G-d, and it would be equally, if not more foolish, for us to think so.
After the first murder, Hashem enters into conversation with Kayin, "Ei Hevel Achicha?" "Where is Hevel your brother?"

As an aside, let us note an interesting linguistic point. "Ayecha," "Where are you?" "Ei?" "Where is an other?" the later "Eichah esa levadi?" "How can I carry (this burden) alone?" uttered by Moshe in response to a continuous barrage of massively trivial requests by the People of Israel, and the "Eichah," "How could it have happened?" spoken in horror by Yirmiyahu, regarding the destruction of Yerushalayim, all begin with the same letters.

When Kayin answered "Lo Yadati; HaShomer Achi Anochi?" (Bereshit 4:9) "I do not know; am I my brother’s keeper?" the Torah had already precluded Kayin’s response. Before the birth of Kayin, the Torah said, "And Adam knew Chava, his wife, and she conceived and gave birth to Kayin..." (Bereshit 4:1). "Knowing" means "intimate knowledge" in the Tanach. The "intimate knowledge" which had allowed him entry into the world disallowed him from saying "I do not know" regarding his brother’s life.

The Torah already obligated Kayin, simply by virtue of his humanity, to view Hevel at least in the context of "And you shall love your neighbor as yourself," and to have the perspective of "...If I am only for myself, what am I?" (Pirkei Avot 1:14)

Very homiletically, Megilat Kohelet, which we read on Shmini Atzeret, also teaches Kayin the point. "Havel Havalim, Hakol Havel!’ "The proper way to look at the world is that everything is for ‘Hevel,’ (your brother, the ‘other person,’) not for yourself." "There are four character types among people: One who says, …Mine is yours, and yours is yours, is righteous…" (Pirkei Avot 5:13).

In Parshat Bereshit, the Torah alludes to a unique capacity of the human being; namely "Teshuvah," Repentance, "returning" to G-d:

In the context of G-d’s pronouncing the verdict upon Adam for his sin in the Garden, the verse reads, "By the sweat of your brow shall you eat bread until you return to the ground from which you were taken; For you are dust, and to dust you shall return." (Bereshit 3:19)

Repentance, as mentioned above, is the return of Man to G-d. This "return" defies logic; it should be impossible. Doesn’t Shlomo HaMelech say in Kohelet, "Meuvat, lo yuchal litkon," "That which has been made crooked cannot be made straight?" (Kohelet 1:15) A person should not be able to erase, or even modify, the past!

But Hashem is not bound by human logic. He is the One Who created the Universe "Yesh Me’Ayin," "ex nihilo," as "something out of nothing," which is outside the bounds of Natural Law (which He also created). He is likewise the Creator and Definer of Time, and if He says it should be modifiable or even erasable, it must obey.