Kol Nidrei - 5785/2024 Rabbi Elkin

  • 5785/2024
  • Rabbi Elkin
  • Yom Kippur
Kol Nidrei - 5785/2024 Rabbi Elkin

Kol Nidrei 5785/2024
Rabbi Hannah Elkin
Resnick Family Campus
Wilshire Boulevard Temple, Los Angeles

 

 

Striving Towards What?: Moral Striving in a World That Has Given Up on Morality

Yom Kippur is a long 25 hours. As we made our way into this sanctuary tonight, we have done our best to fill up and hydrate for the day ahead. We wish each other an easy fast, but we know there is nothing easy about this holy night. Even if we wanted to physically conserve our strength, the very beginning of the first service of Yom Kippur requires us to stand for about fifteen minutes straight as the Kol Nidre prayer is traditionally sung or played three times in a row. Similarly at the end of holiday, after the day of fasting and praying, we stand for a majority for the 45 minute long service. We pour all of our remaining energy into every last second of the holiest day of the year. We watch the shadows grow longer and the clock tick down, yet we should not waste a moment of our time during this one fleeting day.

Yom Kippur asks us to give everything that we spiritually have within us to give. If we are appropriately engaging in the Yom Kippur experience, we push ourselves mentally, emotionally, physically, and spiritually all day long. The ritualized long minutes of standing at the opening and closing of the holiday makes certain that we get the message. Removed from our daily routines and patterns, we go without eating and drinking, we stay focused on the grueling work of taking stock of our conscience and commit to do better in the coming year. We strive through this soulful and challenging process because of the importance of the task.

Striving is not a novel or unknown concept to anyone in this room tonight. I know how hard you all work, how much energy and determination you put into careers, education, accomplishments, charitable work; the list goes on and on. You cannot find a more accomplished collective than the community at Wilshire Boulevard Temple. We spend all year striving in so many areas of our lives, and Judaism encourages that kind of effort and success. But Judaism and Jewish practice also encourages us to take a break from that work. As Shabbat arrives each week, it reminds us that rest, restoration, and reflection are just as important, and  that we need a break from creative, material striving. In his spiritual masterpiece, The Sabbath, Abraham Joshua Heschel wrote: 

“All week we may ponder and worry whether we are rich or poor, whether we succeed or fail in our occupations; whether we accomplish or fall short of reaching our goals…The Sabbath is no time for personal anxiety or care, for any activity that might dampen the spirit of joy… It is because the Sabbath was given to us by God for you, for delight, for rest.”

As worthwhile as it is to tend to and flourish in our responsibilities of the work week, the practice of Shabbat insists that we pause and fill our day with joy for a short window in time.

Similarly, the High Holy Days force us to take a break from our daily grind as well. But on Yom Kippur, we do not desist from striving. Rather, we strive in a different way. The Day of Atonement requires us to engage in moral, spiritual, soulful striving. As we look back on our missteps, attempt to make genuine amends, and move forward in a better direction, we push ourselves to do the work of the season, the work of teshuvah, repentance, and kaparah, atonement for our mistakes. Each of you came here tonight to dig into repenting and repairing, bringing our broken hearts and broken spirits to heal and improve. Yes, it is a holiday to gather in community and celebrate the start of a new year, but it is not a time of relaxation. This is challenging work. It can be hard and painful to acknowledge where we messed up or caused harm. It is not easy to humbly seek forgiveness from those we have wronged. We do not always want to admit how much we have missed the mark, or even take the time and energy to examine whether we did right or wrong. Even the ancient Jews struggled with the spiritual challenge of Yom Kippur. In the haftarah portion for Yom Kippur morning, we read from the book of Isaiah, who wrote about Jews participating half-heartedly in the Day of Atonement over 2,500 years ago. Through Isaiah, God declares to the people:

“To be sure, they seek Me daily, Eager to learn My ways…They ask Me for the right way, they are eager for the nearness of God: ‘Why, when we fasted, did You not see?’...Because on your fast day, you see to your business and oppress all your laborers! Because you fast in strife and contention, and you strike with a wicked fist!...Is this the fast I desire, a day for people to starve their bodies?...No, this is the fast I desire: To unlock fetters of wickedness…, to let the oppressed go free. It is to share your bread with the hungry, and to take the wretched poor into your home; when you see the naked, to clothe them, and not to ignore your own kin.” 

This passage offers a criticism to those ancient Jews who showed up on Yom Kippur to fast and pray for one day, yet all the while still violated the ethical and moral laws of Judaism by conducting business unfairly, mistreating workers, and ignoring the needs of the most vulnerable in society. Rather than spending Yom Kippur play-acting our contrition, we are meant to actually be contrite, be hard on ourselves, and determine to be better people in the new year. We may get a break from the material striving of the rest of the year, but we give that up to make space to strive in the spiritual and ethical arenas. 

So what then should we be striving for from tonight until the sun sets tomorrow? While I believe in individuals’ ability to be responsible and caring and transform themselves into better, more ethical people, I feel less hopeful when I look at the collective these days. Whether it stems from the impact of the dislocation of the Covid pandemic, or the warpspeed technological advances that change how we relate to and communicate with one another, or simply the breakdown of the social fabric and the social contract, the world does not seem to care anymore. Caught up in our frenetic and distracted routines, we do not see each other, we do not pay attention to or care about our impact on others. On a cultural and political level, we view each other through a divisive lens. We speak about people from opposing perspectives with disdain, losing the capacity to engage civilly and productively with our neighbors on the issues that matter most to us. Myself included, we slip too easily into discourse and language that is disrespectful and dehumanizing. Wherever you sit on the political spectrum, this is no way that a responsible and morally-grounded society functions, and it is exhausting.

When we look around these days, it seems like the world has given up on being ethical, on treating others with respect, on acting like the adult in the room. Some people feign concern in a way that will earn Instagram likes and Tiktok views, play-acting interest and understanding without doing the ethical work to address a real problem.  And of course, the “they started it first,” or “they are worse than us” excuses do not help either. Even if it feels good in the moment to unleash diatribes, insults, and blame, I do not think we feel good about how society relates to each other right now, and we don’t want to be stuck in this cycle again and again. I think it breaks our hearts to see a world devoid of empathy, respect, and accountability for how we impact each other. And that is where our work as Jews begins.

In a world that seems to have given up on morality, it is all the more important that we strive to be moral. In Pirkei Avot, a chapter of the 2nd century rabbinic source called the Mishnah that passes down wise teachings from generation to generation, we are taught, “B’makon sh’ain anashim, hishtadel l’hiyot ish,” in places and circumstances where no one is acting like a human being, strive to be a human being. If we substitute the word “ish,” meaning man or human being, for its Yiddish equivalent, mensch, this message becomes clear: when everyone around you has stopped acting like mensches, you be a mensch. But not just be a mensch, strive to be a mensch. Even if it requires us to push upstream against the current of apathy and callousness, act like an ethical, upright, responsible person. We do not get to turn away when the going gets morally tough.

But why does it matter to do this, why does it matter to do right and to do good? In a world that seems to have lost sight of decency, of care for each other, of care about the Jewish people, we do not need to be complacent, or even complicit, in those trends. When we treat each other with humanity, with an open mind, we feel more humane. When we live up to, or even exceed our usual moral standard, we feel like more complete human beings. We do harm to our souls when we cut ourselves off from compassion and accountability. As we recite the Vidui, the confessional prayers on Yom Kippur, we beat our chest with our fist to crack open our hearts to repentance and atonement. We beat our chests to break through that veneer of detached toughness that we carry around in order to reach the human soul underneath. Just as we take pride in striving towards achievements and success, the Jewish people take pride in striving to live ethically and humanely. 

And beyond what moral pursuit does for ourselves, the people in our life and our world benefit from our actions. When we live in a more decent way, our actions affect our partners, children, family and friends, community, and even the person behind us in line at the grocery store. We impact our world for better or worse, so why not make it for better? Why not put positive, morally grounded efforts into the world?

In order to strive to be a mensch, we begin with ourselves, by chipping away at our sins, our errors. We cannot point the finger at society and those around us if we cannot take an honest look at our actions and behaviors and hold ourselves accountable. Each year, we stand together in synagogue on Yom Kippur and we confess to the sins of the past year, “Ashamnu, bagadnu, gazalnu, al cheit sh’chatanu l’finachah, we betray, we steal, we lie, for the sins that we have committed before you knowingly or unknowingly.” But often we keep coming back to the same mistakes, we repent each year for the sins that are entrenched in us. Perhaps you tried stealing for the first time this year and now want to repent, but more likely they are the same bad habits that we just can’t kick. I know for myself where I struggle, and I return each Yom Kippur to atone for those failures. So if we truly will strive to be mensches when they seem hard to find, we begin by improving our moral character. What if we spend this Yom Kippur imagining how we will cross off one of those al cheit confessions for the new year? Not just apologize for it and hope to do better, but strive to do better tonight and tomorrow.

I won’t be so naive as to say that all people genuinely want to be mensches- there are plenty of people in the world who feel great about treating decent people terribly. But we have a higher standard as Jews. And as exhausting and challenging as it is to care and take responsibility for our impact on the world, strive to care. Be the adult in the room. Even when we feel that we do not have the energy to try, or it is too burdensome, choose to crack open our hearts and souls. Yom Kippur demands that we take a break from the work of daily life and material goals, but only to make space for the work of the soul. May we strive to repair and transform ourselves, and then repair and transform our world in the coming year.

G’mar chatimah tovah, may we all be sealed for blessing in the Book of Life.