We have entered the Hebrew month of Elul, a month whose Hebrew name א-ל-ו-ל is an acronym for אני לדודי ודודי לי – “I am my Beloved’s and my Beloved is mine.” This phrase comes from Shir Hashirim (6:3), the bible’s great love poem about the relationship between God and the Jewish people. That phrase, “I am my Beloved’s and my Beloved is mine,” describes a relationship with God characterized by intimacy, tenderness, and reciprocity. Each day during Elul, we read Psalm 27, a poem full of longing for that kind of intimacy with God:

“One thing I ask of the Lord, only that do I seek: to live in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord. He will shelter me in his pavilion…In Your behalf, my heart says: ‘Seek My face’ O Lord, I seek Your face. Do not hide Your face from me…”

In contrast to these familiar, tender descriptions of God, the liturgy of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur are full of descriptions of God as king and judge of the universe, designed to inspire awe and dread, rather than tenderness. Yet, Elul is the warm-up to Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, a time to begin the process of soul-searching and teshuvah that will reach its peak during the Ten Days of Repentance in Tishrei.

On Tuesday night, during our class on Preparing for the High Holidays, the question was asked, if Elul is about doing teshuvah, working on repentance, why do we read Psalm 27 every day instead of a quote from one of the prophets exhorting us to repent? Wouldn’t something like Jeremiah 26:13, “Therefore mend your ways and your acts, and heed the Lord your God, that He may renounce the punishment He has decreed for you,” or Isaiah 1:16-17, “Wash yourselves clean; put your evil doings away from my sight. Cease to do evil; learn to do good. Devote yourselves to justice; aid the wronged. Uphold the rights of the orphan; defend the cause of the widow,” be a more appropriate selection for the season of teshuvah?

The truth is, we are often much more receptive to constructive criticism or even rebuke when it comes from someone we feel close to and love, someone we trust to have our best interests at heart, whose good opinion we crave. When the same criticism, however valid, comes from a stranger or a casual acquaintance, we are more likely to get offended or simply dismiss it.

Perhaps that is the reason that Elul and Psalm 27, with their atmosphere of love, have to precede Tishrei, the month of judgment. Even God can’t make us change unless we care about Him and His good opinion of us enough to listen to what He has to say. During Elul, we work on building a relationship of love, trust, and intimacy with God, so that during the Days of Awe, Rosh Hashanah to Yom Kippur, we will be more receptive to the idea that we need to change.

This month of Elul, of “Ani Ledodi vedodi li,” let us open ourselves up to the desire for intimacy with God; let us cultivate a love for God and the desire for His approval. If we do that, then maybe we will be better able to hear God’s voice in the Shofar on Rosh Hashanah calling upon us to do teshuvah and change.