Chevre, this week’s parsha is הַאֲזִינוּ **(Hazinu) and is Shabbat Teshuvah. Shabbat Teshuvah is the Shabbat between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur and often overshadows Hazinu, which is a relatively short parsha. I actually asked Amazon Bedrock (https://aws.amazon.com/bedrock/) to come up with a Drash for Hazinu and the results were “entertaining”. +Bedrock Hazinu

However, I was struck this morning by something Rebbe Natan of Breslov mentioned in Lekutei Halachot. When someone does teshuva between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, their averot (sins, but let’s call them oopsies) become merits. How does that work?

At this time, I’m also preparing for my re:Invent talk, so let’s look at it from a Cost Optimization perspective (or a Way to Avoid Cost Surprises COP212, no pressure). If someone has a cost anomaly and doesn’t catch it, they will be surprised and have to pay (literaly) for that mistake. My wife’s entrepreneurial self will call this a “Stupid Tax”. However, if someone learns from this mistake and enacts the proper mechanisms and alarms (and actually investigates on the alarms), the next time there is a cost anomaly, they should find the oopsy much faster and avoid a much larger “Stupid Tax”. So the first oopsy is turned into a kind of merit.

Now I don’t have any specific insights into the spiritual realm (there is no SQL interface for that yet). My understanding is that in the case of teshuvah, even the original oopsy is counted for merit, where in our scenario, there is still the payment of the “Stupid Tax”. I think yall get the idea and it’s interesting to think about. Shabbat Shalom. Shanah Tovah. Gemar Chatimah Tovah to all of you and your families.