Parashat Vaetchanan - A Deeper Understanding of the Yetzer Hara

In this week’s Parasha, we find the source of our most famous prayer, Shema. The famous pasuk of ואהבת את ה׳ אלקך בכל לבבך has so many important lessons and messages. There is one that caught my attention this week.

What does it mean to love Hashem בכל לבבך with all your heart?

Rashi quotes the Gemara in Brachot (54) that it means בשני יצרך, ביצר הטוב וביצר הרע, with both your good and evil inclinations. 

It is straightforward to say that we should use our good inclination to love Hashem, But what could it mean to love Hashem with our evil inclination? Isn’t the role of our evil inclination to distance us from Hashem? It almost seems like an inherent contradiction? 

The sefer Otzrot HaTorah suggests a few answers to this question. Let’s see which one sounds best to you:

1. The Rabbeinu Yonah suggests that the way you fulfill loving Hashem is in fact by doing His mitzvot. So when you do a positive mitzvah, that is an act of loving Hashem. Similarly, by refraining from sin, it is also a fulfillment of loving Hashem. So using your Yetzer Hara means beating and overcoming it - that expresses love for Hashem.
2. The yetzer hatov refers to our positive midot like having mercy on others. But even positive midot have limits and shouldn’t be applied to everyone. Perhaps evil people don’t deserve mercy in some instances. So by not showing mercy in those instances, that use of your “yetzer hara” is an act of loving Hashem.
3. The Rambam says that when a person has a moment of anger or misfortune, the root stems from the yetzer hara and a person has to internalize in that moment and infuse his heart with love of Hashem so he can overcome the challenge of negative feelings or tzarot.
4. One reason Hashem created the yetezr hara in the first place is to give us an opportunity to overcome it and gain reward for maintaining the Torah standards. The Vilna Gaon explains that another reason is that without a yetzer hara, mankind would cease to exist, as we would not have physical desires. We would never desire food to sustain ourselves and we would have no physical desires to procreate and build a family. While the physical desires are needed to maintain us, by controlling our lusts and desires and doing everything לשם שמים, we are expressing our love for Hashem.
5. Perhaps my favorite answer comes from the Ktav Sofer who explains that the yetzer hara is smart. He does not try to get us to jump to extremes. He knows he cannot just convince us to violate Shabbat in public or eat a cheeseburger. He first tries to get us to violate “aveirot kalot - lighter sins,” with the knowledge that once we start sinning our guard will be down. Once we start rationalizing “small” sins, he will move us up the ladder to become less and less sensitive to the mitzvot and eventually perhaps to  violate major sins. The Ktav Sofer explains the message is we need to learn from the yetzer hara and follow this strategy for growing in our avodat Hashem on the positive side. We will never sustain positive growth if we go from zero to 100 in a day. Religious growth that is sustainable has to take place in small, manageable steps. So when Chazal say that we should love Hashem with our yetzer hara, this means we should learn from his strategies to turn it around and use those strategies for religious growth.