(רו) וּתְשׁוּבָה וּתְפִלָּה וּצְדָקָה
(רז) מַעֲבִירִין אֶת רֽוֹעַ הַגְּזֵרָה:
Before Hashem You Shall Be Purified: Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik on the Days of Awe, pp. 8-9
On Rosh Hashanah, the shofar demands of the Jew hirhur teshuvah (the “awakening” of repentance)... Precisely what is involved in the emotional experience of hirhur teshuvah? While abstract concepts are often easily described, it is far more difficult to convey such a subjective emotional experience. He therefore felt reluctantly compelled to relate the following personal occurrence as an analogy to clarify this concept.”
On the seventh day of Pesach, 5727 (1967), I awoke from a fitful sleep. A thunderstorm was raging outside, and the wind and rain blew angrily through the window of my room. Half awake, I quickly jumped to my feet and closed the window. I then thought to myself that my wife was sleeping downstairs in the sunroom next to the parlor, and I remembered that the window was left open there as well. She could catch pneumonia, which in her weakened condition would be devastating. I ran downstairs, rushed into her room, and slammed the window shut. I then turned around to see whether she had awoken from the storm or if she was still sleeping. I found the room empty, the couch where she slept neatly covered. In reality she had passed away the previous month.
The most tragic and frightening experience was the shock I encountered in that half second when I turned from the window to find the room empty. I was certain that a few hours earlier I had been speaking with her, and that at about 10 o’clock she had said goodnight and retired to her room. I could not understand why the room was empty. I thought to myself, “I just spoke to her. I just said goodnight to her. Where is she?”
Ms. C.B. Neugroschl, Head of School, Yeshiva University High School for Girls
This, according to the Rav, is the condition that the shofar provokes. A jarring recognition of our realities that are buried deep within us. This experience must be evoked by an experience that the words of the machzor don’t approximate. In the voice of the shofar we are returned to our inner beings and we are thus prepared for teshuva. This state of being, hirhur teshuva, may come about suddenly, as the blasts of the shofar, but it is a prerequisite stage for teshuva. While teshuva must be, according to the Rambam, a thorough process with multiple difficult stages, hirhurei teshuva can be so powerful as to catapult a person through teshuva with great force and speed.
This can be illustrated in the story of the death of R. Chaninah ben Tradyon. As he was being burned to death, a Roman officer tried to ease his pain:
אמר לו קלצטונירי רבי אם אני מרבה בשלהבת ונוטל ספוגין של צמר מעל לבך אתה מביאני לחיי העולם הבא אמר לו הן השבע לי נשבע לו מיד הרבה בשלהבת ונטל ספוגין של צמר מעל לבו יצאה נשמתו במהרה אף הוא קפץ ונפל לתוך האור יצאה בת קול ואמרה רבי חנינא בן תרדיון וקלצטונירי מזומנין הן לחיי העולם הבא בכה רבי ואמר יש קונה עולמו בשעה אחת ויש קונה עולמו בכמה שנים.
The officer said, my master, if I fan the flames and remove the wool sponges from your heart, will you bring me to the World to Come. [R. Chanina] responded, yes … He immediately fanned the flames and removed the wool sponges from his heart and R. Chanina died quickly. [The officer] too jumped and fell into the fire. A heavenly voice called out: R. Chanina ben Tradyon and the officer are invited to the World to Come. Rebbe cried and said, there are those who can acquire their portion in the World to Come in one moment and there are those who acquire it over years (Avodah Zarah 18a)
רמ״א - וגם נוהגים שלא לישן ביום ראש השנה (ירושלמי) ומנהג נכון הוא: