According to Pharrell Williams, the height of happiness is to feel like a “room without a roof.” Strange as it may sound, Yom Kippur is meant to be the happiest day of the year. The Mishnah teaches, “There were no better days for Israel than the 15th of Av and Yom Kippur.”1
So according to Pharrell, Yom Kippur is the day to feel like we are in a room without a roof. Why is this?
There is only one day a year that begins with a matter of simcha. Not Pesach, the time of our freedom, and not even Sukkos, our official זמן שמחתנו (time of our joy). Only Yom Kippur opens with a pasuk that stirs all hearts:
“אור זרוע לצדיק ולישרי לב שמחה”
“Light is sown for the righteous, and for the upright in heart, there is joy.”
The Mishnah continues:
וכן הוא אומר, (שיר השירים ג) ‘צאינה וראינה בנות ציון במלך שלמה בעטרה שעטרה לו אמו ביום חתנתו וביום שמחת לבו’.”ביום חתנתו” – זו מתן תורה.
And so it says, “Go forth and see, O daughters of Zion, King Solomon with the crown wherewith his mother crowned him on the day o…
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