Happy Yom Kippur?
A reporter writes that his wife received an email yesterday that said Happy Yom Kippur – really? – to know a Jew is to know that most major holidays are about suffering – and fasting from sundown to sundown is not a joyous occasion – particularly when you are doing it because you believe that on this day God opens the Book of Life and decides who will live and who will die, who will be happy and who will be sad, who will suffer and who will rejoice, and on and on. The purpose of the fast is to atone for your sins from the previous year and win yourself into the good graces of that Book of Life. Happy Yom Kippur, not!
I’ve reinvented the day to be a day of renewal and introspection. I fast, and think about the year that went before and the year ahead, and I kind of decide if I have been good or bad, and what I want the new year to bring. Like other Jews, I ask the cosmos for forgiveness from those I have wronged and I forgive myself for my bad. Jews believe you cannot start the new year without forgiveness – so you make sure if you owe apologies, you offer them.
The reporter said he himself received a better missive that said – “may God accept your pleas for forgiveness and wipe your slate clean. L’Shana Tovah [Hebrew for happy new year].”
I find myself fortunate enough to have been given one of the richest heritages on earth, but still I prefer to usher in the new year in a different manner than praying all day in a synagogue full of people with bad breath because they haven’t eaten in 24 hours. Not to mention that I still flinch when the men read: “thank you god for not making me a woman.” I do miss – the shofar being blown – there is nothing like the sound of a ram’s horn to wake you up inside.