"Listen, O heavens, for I will speak! Let the earth hear the words of my mouth!"
The Midrash explains that Moshe was "close to the heaven," so he told them to "listen" - a term which suggests a closeness between speaker and listener. But since he was "distant from the earth," he told it to "hear", from afar.
Since every Jew has a spark of Moshe within his soul, it enables us to attain, to some small extent, the spiritual greatness of Moshe.
Thus, to some degree, we too can appreciate that - spiritual matters are more important than physical things - to be "close to the heavens and distant from the earth."
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In the midst of the Yom Kippur services, the Rebbe, Rabbi Shneur Zalman, the Alter Rebbe, interrupted his prayers and made his way to the nearby forest. There, he collected dry wood and branches. He carried them to a small house. He knocked on the door and then entered. Once inside, the Rebbe kindled a fire from the wood he had brought. He prepared a soup and he fed it, spoon by spoon, to the woman in the house who had just given birth.
We must take into account the magnitude and intensity of the Rebbe's Yom Kippur prayers which were on behalf of all the Jewish people. Yet, he saw that caring for a new mother was more precious before G-d than his exalted prayers.
A Jew's compassion and caring is driven by the fact that this Mitzva is an integral part of his/her relationship with G-d.
As the Alter Rebbe says, "Love of G-d and love of the Jewish people are equally engraved in every Jew's soul. However, loving of the Jewish people is superior, for you love whom your beloved loves."
Candle lighting time for LA is 6:28
Candle lighting time for Sunday, ushering in Yom Kippur is 6:25pm.
The fast ending Monday evening at 7:28pm
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