Nitzavim / Rosh Hashana

The previous sedra tells us all the blessings which will be given to us when we listen to Hashem as well as the curses that would befall us when we don't listen.  Ramban says this is talking about the future; at some point in time, the blessings will happen & at another point in time the curses will happen. 

Now, Moshe tells the people about these blessings and curses.  When they are in exile amongst the nations of the land, and will return to Hashem to listen to His voice & all that Moshe commanded them today, then “ושב ה אלקיך את שבותך ורחמך, Hashem will return your captivity & have mercy on you.” Then, Hashem will gather us all from the four corners of the world & bring us back home to the holy land. 

All the curses will then be placed on our enemies, those that ‎persecuted us throughout the exile. All the blessings will come to us when we listen to Hashem & keep His commandments. We just need to do teshuva & choose the path of good & be granted life. The posuk goes on to list numerous ways that we choose good, of which one is ללכת בדרכיו, to walk in His ways . 
What are the ways of Hashem? What characteristics of Hashem are we supposed to emulate?

‎In his sefer, Reb Chaim Shmulevits mentions various ways to ensure that one has a good judgment on the Days of Judgment. One of them is דן את כל האדם לכף זכות, judge every person favorably, for the gemara says that if one judges other people favorably, then Hashem will judge him favorably too. 

Reb Chaim asks what does that mean that Hashem will judge favorably? As humans, we're not sure what someone is doing so we can judge him either for good or bad. However, Hashem knows the person’s intentions. He knows exactly what's going on, so how can we hope that He judges us favorably?

He explains, the posuk says, "there is no one righteous in the land that does only good & does not sin" meaning that even though the tzaddik doesn't actually sin & do bad things, in the good that he does there might be something that's lacking, or he didn't do it happily or to its fullest extent etc.  Included in the Mitzva to judge people favorably is the occasion when one sees someone doing something good with some bad possibly mixed in. Rather than thinking that he's doing it for ulterior reasons, one has to think that he's doing it only because that's the will of Hashem. So, מידה כנגד מידה, Hashem will judge his actions by the good that's in them not the bad. Even if his mitzvos are not done one hundred percent, he will be judged by his good intentions. 

Similarly, says the Chafetz Chaim, one has to be very careful to judge people favorably, for by this very judgment, one seals his own fate. We know that the merit of a person is based on how many mitzvos or avairos he has. We also know that if Hashem would judge us strictly, not many of us would have too many mitzvos. After all, many are done without the proper intent & enthusiasm, or they are lacking in some other way. If, however, Hashem judges us with mercy, then the good parts of our mitzvos will be what He looks at & our mitzvos will count. More than that, He will see our sins as lacking intent or that they were accidental. No matter what we do, Hashem can really make it go either way depending on what He focuses on. 

What He focuses on depends on how we judge other people. If we always looked to see what the bad was in what people were doing, then Hashem will look to see the bad in what we're doing. If we look to always see the good in what people are doing, then Hashem will look to see only the good in our actions. 

Sometimes we don't even see someone doing anything wrong but just think that it must have been this person that hurt us because who else could it be? We have to learn to not jump to conclusions as can be exemplified by the following story.  There was an egg merchant in Jerusalem who, during a bad economic year, started noticing that every morning he was short thirty eggs. He realized that there must be a thief & started checking to see how he might have entered. Not seeing any forced entry, he came to the logical conclusion that it had to be his neighbor in the store next to him. However, he couldn't catch him. Day after day, the same scene repeated. At his wits end, he went to Rav Shmuel Salant & told him of his problem & asked what he could do to confront his neighbor. 

Rav Shmuel told him to boil up thirty eggs & put them on the top of the egg pile.  The man was wondering how that could help but did what he was told, listening to his Rav even though he didn't understand. In the morning when he opened the store, imagine his surprise when he saw a huge snake dead on top of the eggs! It became clear that this snake was the thief & would eat the eggs.  Now, when he ate them hardboiled, he choked & died.  
Had he confronted his neighbor, imagine the embarrassment.  

This is how we should be careful to emulate Hashem, מידה כנגד מידה , knowing that Hashem will treat us as we treat other people. For, if we would take it ‎to heart & really believe that we will be treated as we treat other people, then who among us would ever treat someone else badly? No one would, for then he’s just doing bad to himself! Before judging others or jumping to conclutions  we must think if I was doing that, what would I want people to say?