The way a person prepares to go to sleep at night, which in many ways is similar to preparing for death, is a good indication of how a person leads his life. If after a whole day of running around after vanities he lays down weary and sums them up one by one, cherishing each vanity for the little satisfaction it gave him, he has in essence signed his own death sentence, for essentially he is already dead. If, on the other hand, he lays down and takes a serious toll of his deeds that day, weighing each one for its true value on a scale of eternity, not only does his sleep change, but so does his life and eternal existence. For he has saved himself most fundamentally from all the misery that useless existence brings in its wake: All the animalistic tendencies naturally rampant in the Human Race, those character traits that breed war and murder, all become like tame farm-animals when those truths are pondered upon. As darkness falls, one can either fall with it into the dark ages of crude will controlling justice, or soar up to where there is no darkness and no grief.
This is the test, the daily drill of the day of death.
As a nation too we go experience the same test in a more general way. As we go through our exile, we are being watched to see how we will react to our tribulations. If we see them as independent occurences, as coincidental happenings, we will turn forever on a turnwheel going nowhere. Only if we do as we should when going to sleep, to declare the united Oneness of creation and to beseech the Master of all Happenings that no mishaps should come our way, can we survive this confinement and merit our promised redemption. The only way of breaking our shackles so as to see the fruits to our labor, is by breaking the inner shackles, the ones that tie us firmly to that nothingness that breeds nothingness.
As you go over the punishments outlined in this weeks Parsha, notice how the ultimate penalty is the stripping away of all signs of humanity, till parents eat the flesh of their children. There is no reason why parents should not do so after having defined themselves and all mankind around them as refined pieces of meat. Where humanity is not practiced in its fullest sense, there are no limits to the baseness to which we can stoop.
Think of this as you go to sleep tonight.
Adapted from Rabbi Vali's book on Vayikra. Questions and subscriptions can be mailed to: the Yeshiva