When the Rebel Says Amen

Can the Yetzer Hara Become the Yetzer Tov?

Every morning, we wrap the tefillin shel-yad around our arm and then place the tefillin shel-rosh upon our head. We have done it thousands of times. But what if hidden inside that simple order is an entire philosophy of how we are supposed to fight—and ultimately transform—the yetzer hara?

In this morning’s Breakfast & Class, based on a beautiful teaching of Rabbi Pinḥas Friedman, we discover the Ḥatam Sofer’s remarkable image: before we can crown the King, we first have to bind the rebel. But Judaism asks us to go even further. The ultimate goal is not simply to defeat the yetzer hara, but to harness its fire and teach it to serve HaShem—until, like the “bad angel” who accompanies us home on Friday night, even the rebel learns to say Amen.