This week's Torah portion, called Shoftim (Judges), includes a large number of commandments (41!). Many of them we cannot fulfill in practice because the necessary conditions are not met, such as not all of us living in the Land of Israel, we do not have a Temple in Jerusalem, we do not have a king, and other reasons that prevent us from fulfilling these commandments.
However, as we have mentioned several times, the precepts have both a practical and a spiritual aspect, and these are independent of each other. Even if one cannot fulfill the mitzvah practically, one can still fulfill its spiritual aspect and generate the specific energy of that mitzvah. This is achieved through studying the laws of the mitzvah.
The Talmud (end of the tractate Makkot) tells us that there are 613 commandments, 248 positive and 365 prohibitive. In many cases, it is simple to identify a commandment in the Torah text, as, for example, in this parashah we are commanded to appoint a king. But there are cases in which our sages discuss whether a particular phrase is a commandment or not. Such is the case of Deuteronomy 18:13: "You shall be blameless before the Lord your God.".
All commentators agree on the meaning of the verse, which follows a series of prohibitions against consulting fortune tellers and sorcerers: you (the Jewish people) must not rely on those who tell you the future, but you must be wholehearted with God, and rely on Him alone, then you will surely be with God, your Lord.
Rabbi Moshe ben Nachman, the Ramban (1194-1270), explains that we should not rely on those who see the stars (or those who read palms, which is indeed a practice mentioned in Kabbalah, but nowadays no one truly knows how to apply that wisdom) and predict the future, since God is all-powerful and can change the decrees seen in the constellations. Up to this point, he essentially explains the same as the other commentators and adds that it is a positive precept (unlike, for example, Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon, the Ramban).
But Ramban adds a fantastic idea: "We must believe that everything that comes (i.e., everything that happens to a person) is in accordance with the person's approach to serving God." This statement will be easily understood with an example: When a person stands in front of a mirror, they see themselves at the same distance as they are standing. If they are standing one meter from the mirror, their reflection appears to be standing one meter away. When the person moves away from the mirror, the reflection also moves away, and when they move closer, the reflection moves closer.
The idea is this: God approaches and moves away from the person as if He were a reflected image in a mirror: if the person approaches Him, then he will feel a closeness of God towards him, but if he moves away... he will feel God far away... or not feel Him at all... to the point of being able to deny His existence, God forbid.
Being in the month of Elul, a month when Divine mercy is revealed to all people and everyone can access God and He receives everyone with a joyful face and a smile, we should take the opportunity to draw even closer, so that we may properly prepare for the coming year, so that it may be a good and sweet year.
May they be registered and sealed for a good and sweet year,