The Voice That Needs No Words

The Mishnah in Avos (6:2) speaks of a bas kol, a heavenly voice, that calls out every day for people to repent and return to Hashem. Rav Yaakov Yosef writes that his master, the Baal Shem Tov, asked, “What good is a daily heavenly voice that no one hears?” The Baal Shem Tov answered that in the place where the voice comes from there are no words and no speech, only the realm of pure thought, Olam HaMachshavah. So every thought of repentance a person has, every urge to return to Hashem and His path, is not his own. It is the sound of the bas kol. Through our thoughts of teshuvah, we truly do hear it.