Yom Kippur thoughts
Rabbi Raymond Apple shares his thoughts.
SAINTS WHO SIN
Rabbi Raymond Apple
The word “sin” comes into basically every page of the Yom Kippur service. Its sparring partner, “saint”, hardly figures at all.
Nobody is expected to be perfect. Nobody is such a tzaddik that they do only good and never sin: “Ki adam ayn tzaddik ba’aretz asher ya’aseh tov v’lo yecheta” (Koh. 7:20). The only complete tzaddik is God.
When my teacher, Rabbi Koppel Kahana, asked us to expound a Tosafot he gave members of the class 50%, 60 %, 70%… but no more, and he said, “Only God gets 100%”.
The Lubavitcher Rebbe says that anyone who sins is being stupid. He quotes a verse, “If anyone goes astray…” (Num. 5:12). That, he said, is what sin is – stupidly going astray. It is not only that the sages say that a person does not sin unless they have been overtaken by a spirit of stupidity. Rarely does a sinner act in defiance and rebellion against God; on the contrary, they let themselves go astray from the right path.
Sin does occur, but usually it is not deliberate. It happens by mistake when we lose control and go astray.
WRONGS & SONGS
A couple of weeks ago when we read Parashat Ki Tetzei, a sidra which contains such a large number of commandments, someone told me that Rav Kook advised people not just to say the words of each commandment but to sing them.
Rabbi Nachman of Breslov gives the same advice when he says, “I sing to God ‘b’odi’ – whilst I am still alive” (Psalm 146:2). Rabbi Nachman says, “When you see a particular mitzvah before you, rejoice that God has given you the opportunity of making this a nicer, more harmonious world.”
The idea is to celebrate the mitzvah and enjoy living the commandment life.
But how can one possibly sing when there is no one without their faults? The answer is: don’t obsess about your failings and your faults. Concentrate on your virtues and capacities; use them to sing to God (Likkutei Moharan 282:2).
The Torah reading for Yom Kippur is probably the origin of the habit of casting blame on others.
Sins committed in the Israelite community were transferred to a goat which was sent out into the wilderness (Lev.16; Mishnah Yoma 6:4). The high priest drew lots “LaShem”, “for God” and “La’Azazel”, “for despatch into the wilderness”.
What did “Azazel” mean? Maybe it indicated the goat, maybe the destination in the wilderness. If it is a place, the terrain was hard and rocky; in folklore it is a place to which two fallen angels, Uzza and Aza(e)l, were banished because they had besmirched the Creation.
If the name indicates the goat, it possibly denotes “the one that goes” (in the Septuagint, “the sent-away one”).
Various Midrashim think it symbolises a power opposed to God. These sources, plus the Dead Sea Scrolls, say that in the end all the negative forces in the world will be overcome and destroyed.
Maimonides (Moreh Nevuchim 3:46) regards the “scapegoat” procedure as symbolic: in order to eradicate all trace of sin it suggests despatching it to a distance (an example of “put it on a fast train to nowhere”).
Unfortunately, transferring blame somewhere else is a prevalent habit, “passing the buck”, accusing the other of doing things for which we ourselves are responsible.
The best approach is the Talmudic story of Elazar ben Durdaya (Avodah Zarah 17a) who after trying the scapegoating approach and blaming heaven and earth, night and day, came to the honest conclusion, “My fate depends on me myself”.
OUT OF THE WOODWORK
Yom Kippur always brought great crowds to the synagogue. The numbers swelled even more when the time came for Yizkor and people came out of the woodwork, so to speak.
Even people who claimed to be atheists who are angry with God or question His existence found their way to their people and its memories.
The origin of the Yizkor ceremony derives from the Torah reading which depicts events “after the death of the sons of Aaron” (Lev. 16:1). The reference to the death of our ancestors gave rise to the idea that memorial prayers should be said by people who are bereaved, regardless of how long ago the death took place.
I know that some people whose parents are still (Baruch HaShem) alive tend to go out of the synagogue when the memorial prayers are said. It is a practice that really has nothing to commend it. It would be much better for people to stay in the synagogue and give thanks for the blessing of having parents alive.
Likewise it would be better to stay in the synagogue and say a prayer for the martyrs whose lives were lost in the destruction of European Jewry or in defence of the State of Israel.
If you say, “My father wasn’t such a tzaddik: why bother with his memory?” Maybe in God’s eyes your father was one of the 36 hidden saints, even though you yourself might be unaware of his value to Heaven…
thank you, rabbi, I needed this. The holy spirit directed me to this, about sin in our lives. This is what I really needed. And I will be saving this message.