Tag: repentance

Relationship with the earth

At the dinner table, I asked my family what I should write. One of my kids, age 10, immediately said, “Climate change. People think the problem’s all hot air, but the problem’s really hot water.” There was a smirk at his joke, but his twin nodded in agreement.

Hurricane Ida’s just made landfall and is churning its way up through swaths of the United States as I write this. Haiti is in shambles from its most recent earthquake, only compounded by the storm that followed. In Manitoba, we’ve lived through a hot, smoky summer, surrounded by wildfires and besieged by drought. When it finally rained, there was so much of it that some places flooded.

The weather has, at times, felt apocalyptic. While I’m not superstitious, the recent uptick in truly awful weather and world events made me think back to Yom Kippur, 20 years ago.

In 2001, my husband and I sat in Yom Kippur services in Durham, N.C., where we lived at the time. Just a little over two weeks after Sept. 11, the terrorist acts in New York, Pennsylvania and at the Pentagon were on most people’s minds in that congregation.

Like many, I have images burned in my brain from that time, as both my family near D.C. and my husband’s in New York City, were alive, thank goodness, but personally affected. At synagogue, when we reached the prayer Unetaneh Tokef, the room fell silent, electrified. This ancient prayer, perhaps written by Yannai in the sixth century, is familiar to most who’ve attended services on the High Holidays or listened to Leonard Cohen:

“On Rosh Hashanah will be inscribed and on Yom Kippur will be sealed – how many will pass from the earth and how many will be created; who will live and who will die; who will die after a long life and who before his time; who by water and who by fire, who by sword and who by beast, who by famine and who by thirst, who by upheaval and who by plague, who by strangling and who by stoning. Who will rest and who will wander, who will live in harmony and who will be harried, who will enjoy tranquility and who will suffer, who will be impoverished and who will be enriched, who will be degraded and who will be exalted. But Repentance, Prayer and Charity mitigate the severity of the Decree.”

In Temple Beth El in Durham, there was loud sobbing and then, the most elemental keening and grief that I’ve ever heard. Twenty years later, I can’t forget my brother-in-law running down Broadway as the second tower fell behind him, covered in its dust as he escaped Manhattan on the Staten Island ferry, or my father-in-law, who walked five miles through Manhattan in the middle of the street, only to stand in Central Park, afraid to go indoors. My father and brother, away from D.C. on business trips, waited days, unable to get home. My sister-in-law, stuck in D.C. overnight, was finally able to leave the city and walked home to her apartment in Virginia, only to suffer through continual sonic booms, as fighter pilots raced overhead, shaking her high-rise building.

I will never hear this prayer, which is primarily part of the Ashkenazi liturgy, without being shaken by that keening sound.

However, just as I remember it, it’s also helpful to keep reading. It says that, by doing repentance, prayer and charity, we can change the severity of the outcome. We’re taught clearly that repentance is not simply feeling badly about past behaviour, it’s about making amends. We must apologize to those we’ve wronged and try to fix our mistakes. Our prayers are not simply rote, but must come from our hearts, with the right kind of kavannah, or intention.

Finally, it mentions we must do tzedakah, which some translate as charity, but really also means righteousness. It is the obligation to do the upstanding, just thing, and to act with integrity.

Although I can’t help but think of this prayer in context of those who died, both on Sept. 11 and those who, each year, aren’t written in the Book of Life for the next year, it’s not just about that. This prayer says we must act now to make change and to stop bad things from happening to us.

Even for those who don’t believe in its literal power, the message is clear. If we want to be able to live with ourselves later, we’re taught that we must repair our relationships promptly, practise introspection through prayer, and make a big effort to step up and do the right thing.

Those who’ve lived through floods, wildfires, earthquakes and hurricanes this summer would argue that bad things are happening. The rest of us, living through the pandemic, would be hard-pressed to disagree. Yet, Jewish tradition teaches us that we aren’t passive observers. We aren’t meant to simply submit and accept this.

More than one rabbi has told the joke about the man on top of his roof in the middle of a flood. He ignores the orders to leave, turns down a neighbour’s offer of a ride, says no to the rescue boat and refuses to be saved by helicopter.

The floodwaters rise higher. He drowns. Then he gets to speak with G-d. He says, “Lord, I believed in you. Why didn’t you save me?” And G-d responds, “Well, I sent you an evacuation order, a carpool, a boat and a helicopter!  What else do you want?”

While we battle a pandemic, forest fires, rising temperatures in ocean waters and on land, it’s helpful to remember that our tradition teaches us that “G-d helps those who help themselves.”

This is a strange year, where some of us, used to sitting in synagogue, will instead be streaming services at home again, or perhaps spending time praying outdoors. It could also be the year where we decide that, upon reflection, it’s important to repair our relationship with the earth and to start doing the right thing personally. Climate change is upon us. It’s going to take everyone’s efforts to make a difference.

Wishing you an easy fast. May you be written for good in the Book of Life.

Joanne Seiff has written regularly for CBC Manitoba and various Jewish publications. She is the author of three books, including From the Outside In: Jewish Post Columns 2015-2016, a collection of essays available for digital download or as a paperback from Amazon. Check her out on Instagram @yrnspinner or at joanneseiff.blogspot.com.

We need less awe, more action

“Day of Atonement” by Isidor Kaufmann, circa 1900. “We cannot afford the luxury that accompanies the perception of atonement as an end unto itself. We must look at every facet of our lives, internal and external, collective and individual, and challenge ourselves to think anew,” argues Donniel Hartman. (photo from commons.wikimedia.org)

There are those who believe that the goal of Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement), as its name attests, is to merely attain atonement for our sins, to recalibrate our standing before God. These are called the Days of Awe, for our destiny stands in the balance: who will live and who will die. To achieve this atonement, we fast and pray for forgiveness.

The problem with this approach, however, is that, beyond fidelity to the laws and practices of the holy days, it does not make any other demands upon us. Instead of striving to change our behavior, we are satisfied with the yearning for atonement. The old year fades out and a new one approaches, and everything stays as it was.

There is much experience of awe in the Days of Awe, but there is little action. Instead of serving as a catalyst for change, the High Holidays often remain a line of defence for the status quo, a defence achieved by the idea of atonement itself. Isaiah’s critique against his generation, who complained before God, “Why, when we fasted, did You not see? When we starved our bodies, did You pay no heed?” (Isaiah 58:3), continues to reverberate and have new significance.

What is the cause for this continuing failure? I believe that it may be found in the fact that the idea of atonement has two distinct meanings and we, unfortunately, give preference to the more convenient and easy one. Atonement can be viewed as an end unto itself or as a means that enables a new beginning. As an end unto itself, its goal is to change the consequences of past behavior and not to change the behavior itself. God is the one who atones for past mistakes and erases them from the equation. Yom Kippur has a goal to recalibrate the world, a form of restart button. However, as an end unto itself, it enables the human being to start over from the same place and to wait again for the next Yom Kippur with its promised “new beginning.”

On the other hand, atonement can be viewed as a means. Its importance is derived precisely from the fact that it has the capacity to enable and serve as a catalyst for change and renewal.

One of the major stumbling blocks that prevents us from changing our behavior is the difficulty in believing that we are capable of it. We are shackled to mediocrity and the status quo, for we often believe that we are ruled by the past and that it defines us in the present and will continue to do so in the future. The idea of atonement can serve as the ally of the status quo or as the vehicle of liberation from it. A human being who achieves atonement can squander this moment of grace by repeating the mistakes of the past, or he or she can use atonement to establish the belief that the past does not necessarily define who we will be in the future. One who receives the gift of atonement is given a chance to reshape one’s life; the critical question is whether we use this gift or waste it by believing that atonement as an end unto itself is sufficient.

The rabbinic tradition understood both the challenge and danger embedded in the idea of atonement. It consequently ruled that Yom Kippur atones only when it is accompanied by tshuva (Mishnah Yoma 8:8). The days are truly Days of Awe, for they are days of reckoning, not merely with God, but primarily with ourselves and regarding our lives. This notion of a day of reckoning requires us to go beyond the experience of the awe that accompanies these days and to act and challenge ourselves to embark on new directions for our lives. To do so, however, we must not merely pray, but must internalize the central category that fulfils a key role throughout the rituals of the Days of Awe – hattanu – we have sinned.

The purpose of the ritual of confession, the Al Het, is not to remove our sins from the eyes of God, but to establish them in front of our eyes. It is only a human being who recognizes his or her limitations and who strips away the aura of self-righteousness who can recognize both the need and responsibility to change.

It is not simple to be a Jew, for we are obligated to strive for excellence and to see in a life of mediocrity a contradiction to our identity. We cannot afford the luxury that accompanies the perception of atonement as an end unto itself. We must look at every facet of our lives, internal and external, collective and individual, and challenge ourselves to think anew. We must reconnect to our values and ideals, and find new ways to allow them to guide our individual and national lives.

May these Days of Awe serve as a spiritual foundation and moral anchor for the renewal of our people. May we truly believe in our potential for renewal and may this belief give birth to new levels of aspirations, dreaming and action. May this year be a year of health, happiness and peace. Shana tova.

Donniel Hartman is president of Shalom Hartman Institute and director of the Engaging Israel Project. He contributes a regular column to Times of Israel and writes for many other publications on a regular basis. This article can be found on the Shalom Hartman Institute website, hartman.org.il, and is reprinted with permission.