rav chessed v'emes -- hoshana rabbah

A few weeks ago when the Y"T season started we started saying slichos with the 13 midos ha'rachamim, "Hashem Hashem K-l rachum v'chanun... v'rav chessed v'emes."  I think most of us would say that we hope the court upstairs does not judge us based on the "whole truth and nothing but the truth," because then we would be in big trouble.  We want Hashem's thumb on the scale tilting it in our favor -- that's what chessed, rachum, chanun, is all about.  So how is it that "emes" is one of the 13 midos ha'rachamim?  How can truth possibly work in our favor?

The Maharal often distinguishes between properties of a thing that are b'etzem and those that are b'mikreh.  All the books on child rearing say never criticize the child -- only criticize the behavior.  Johnny is b'etzem a good boy, just right now b'mikreh because he hasn't had his nap and instead had 6 pounds of sugar candy he is acting like a monster. 

The Kohzhiglover says that's the pshat in our 13 midos.  Yes, we did aveiros.  But that's not the truth of who we are.  We're in galus, we're surrounded by all kinds of bad influences, we have all kinds of distractions -- b'mikreh, we end of sinning.  But b'etzem, if you look at who we really are, and it's only Hashem that can really see who we really are underneath all the bad behavior on the surface, then the "emes" is that we are innocent.

Hoshana Rabbah is 26 days after the creation of mankind.  25 Elul was the day man was created; we are now 26, gematriya shem Havaya, days later.  The shem Havaya means this day represents the real essence, the etzem, of who a person really us.  We know the 4 minim represent the 4 types of Jews, some with ta'am and reiach, taste and smell, Torah and mitzvos, and then you have the aravah that has nothing -- no taste, no smell, no Torah, no mitzvos.  Yet it's the aravah that we take in our hand and put in parade this day.  Even if you've got nothing, it doesn't matter -- that's b'mikreh. Today we focus on the etzem, and the etzem of a Jew is always good.

Ramban writes that positive things need to be translated into concrete action.  When a navi got a message, he often would do something concrete -- when the message is translated into something concrete, it becomes more real.  Sukkos has a multitude of concrete mitzvos for us to do -- lulav, esrog, sukkah.  Shmini Atzeres comes along and we have nothing.  At least on Shavuos we have cheesecake, but Shmini Atzeres doesn't even have that. 

Maharal writes that the number 8 represents going beyond teva.  7 days is the natural cycle of the world as it was created; 8 is outside the boundaries, outside the lines.  During Sukkos we want to bring the ruchniyus into our world so we need concrete mitzvos, kelim, to contain the ohr.  Shmini Atzeres is 8 -- we are outside the boundaries.  It's not about bringing ohr into the concrete world, but rather about bringing ourselves to a place outside the normal confines of teva, outside the concrete and finite that is the day to day of our lives.  Shmini Atzeres if the extra mile, the extra 10% of the 110% we need to give.