Rosh Hashana - Haazinu

Our Rabbis teach us that on the days of Rosh Hashana the ספרי חיים & ספרי מתים , the books of the living & the books of the dead, are opened.

The אוצרות התורה asks, it's understandable that the books of the living are opened in order to review the actions of people during the past year & judge accordingly, but why do we open the books of the dead? They were already judged at their time of death & can't do anything else. Why does Hashem judge them, too, every year?

The Maharsha interprets ספרי חיים & ספרי מתים the way most of us were taught, that it’s to judge the living & in which book they will be inscribed for life or death.

However, הגאון רבי יהושע הלר explains a little differently. There are two types of mitzvos, one where the mitzva itself is paramount, like shabbos or lulav where the observance of the mitzva itself is what counts. Then you have mitzvos that bear future fruit, things that you do now that have a lasting effect. For example, you inspire someone & because of you that person changed his ways & became a better person & his children became better. For that, you get credit every year even after you're gone.

The first Rosh Hashana after a person is gone, the heavenly court summons him & puts him in a better place than he was initially assigned. The person wonders how is this possible? I can't do any more good deeds. How did I get elevated? The answer is that while you were up here, someone down there was inspired by you; one of your teachings enlightened someone; a story about you triggered someone else to change; you get rewarded for all that because it came about because of you.   

How can we accomplish not only getting inscribed in the book of life but making sure what we do counts for eternity?
In the song of Haazinu which is the song of the history of our nation, the Torah states הלה' תגמלו זאת עם נבל ולא חכם, is it to Hashem that you repay this, O people who are vile & unwise?

The Chafetz Chaim explains this rebuke with a parable. A father married off his son & gave him a large sum of money as a wedding present. The son still lived off his father for many years. All his needs were taken care of. After a while, the father told the son that it was time for him to fend for himself. The son took all the money that he was given & went to the marketplace. When he got there, he saw some gold utensils that he really liked which the people told him were a great deal. Without checking them out too much, he spent half his money on them. With the rest of the money he bought bonds that he was told were worth a lot more then he paid for them. Pleased with his purchases, he set home happily anticipating the profits he would make.  

When he got home, he showed his father what he bought. After a little examination, he saw that, even though it looked like real gold, it was just gold plated & worthless. You wasted half the money I gave you. Let me see what else you bought. The son brought out the bonds & showed his father. Look, the amounts that are written on here are a fraction of what I paid! Again the father looks & sees that the documents are forged. He loses patience & says, not only won't you make any money but it's a crime to even own these documents. You will probably end up in jail for having these!

Look what you did to me, continued the father, I raised you until today; I took care of you; I even gave you the opportunity to succeed. You act like a blundering fool. First, you just look at the glitter & buy gold plated worthless utensils. Then, to add insult to injury, you buy forged documents to land us in jail!

This, says the Chafetz Chaim, is us. First, Hashen brings us into the world  and gives us everything we need to succeed. Instead of using our intellect to serve him, we're fooled by the glitter & use it for nothingness. Even worse, we sin with it & can get punished.

The posuk is saying Hashem has given us the tools we need, each person on his own level. Just as a father gives his son what he needs to succeed, we need to examine our lives to see where we're lacking & study the Torah & do mitzvos instead of looking at the glitter.

If we could take this lesson to heart & focus on what Hashem wants us to do, then not only will we make our lives & the lives of our children more meaningful, we will also no doubt inspire many others, leading to the ultimate goal: inscription for eternity!