This week, Jews across the world will observe Yom Kippur.
As I noted last week, there are several Hebrew words for the English word holiday. In this case holiday is appropriate, at least in its original meaning. The English word holiday derives from the Anglo Saxon (also called Old English) word haligdæg or Holy Day.
Yom Kippur is often considered the “holiest” day in the Hebrew calendar.
As we received positive response to last week’s blog about Rosh Hashanah, this week’s blog includes information on Yom Kippur.
As always, please feel free to let us know what feedback you have. I enjoy getting your comments!
Yom Kippur
Yom Kippur literally means “Day of Atonement” and occurs ten days after Rosh Hashanah.
The ten days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur are known as the “ten days of repentance”. There’s a rabbinic idea that on Rosh Hashanah, God writes His decree about an individual, and on Yom Kippur, He seals the decree.
How is Yom Kippur observed?
Like Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur is commanded by the Torah. Numbers 29:7 says that Yom Kippur should be a “holy convocation”, that “you should afflict your souls” and that “you should not to any work”.
In Biblical times, Yom Kippur was observed in the Holy Temple in Jerusalem via the Scapegoat ceremony, detailed in Leviticus 16. This involved the high priest facilitating God’s expiation for the community by symbolically placing the sins of the community upon the goat, and then sending the goat into the desert.
Since the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE, sacrifices are no longer offered. The scapegoat ceremony does not occur in modern times. Instead, it’s replaced by a long section in the liturgy, which I’ll mention below.
Two practices central to Yom Kippur include fasting and praying. There’s also a tradition for people to dress in all white. This is meant to symbolize that on Yom Kippur, we’re like the angels, less attached to the physical, and more spiritually inclined.[1]
Why do Jews fast on Yom Kippur?
The Torah itself does not describe much detail about how to observe Yom Kippur.
Leviticus 16 directs that on Yom Kippur, “you should afflict your souls”.
But it’s not exactly clear from the Torah text what the definition of “affliction” is. The Talmud, a compilation of Jewish law and commentaries on the written Torah attempts to define affliction. By using a variety of verses from the Bible, the Talmud attempts to find a Biblical basis for the idea that “affliction” means “fasting”.
At the end of the lengthy Talmud discussion, there’s no logical conclusion about how exactly the commandment to fast is grounded in the Torah itself. (At least, nothing that’s logical in the Aristotelian sense.) It seems that the Rabbis of the Talmud received a tradition in which fasting was considered a central practice on Yom Kippur. The Rabbis tried to ground that tradition in the Torah itself.
Personally, I think that fasting on Yom Kippur makes a lot of sense. It just feels like the right thing to do. It feels meaningful. It doesn’t seem to contradict in any way the idea that we should “afflict our souls”. (Note: the Hebrew word “nefesh” can be translated as ‘soul’ or sometimes ‘life’ or sometimes ‘life-force’. It refers not only to the spiritual, as in English, but also to the physical.)
A note on fasting: pregnant and nursing women have exemptions from fasting. So does anyone who’s ill. They’re allowed (some might say, obligated) to eat in such a way that provides sustenance but not pleasure, by eating limited amounts at a time. An important principle in Judaism states that you’re not supposed to perform ritual actions if they endanger your life or someone else’s life.[2]
This principal applies both on the individual and the communal level. Famously, in 1848, the respected Rabbi Israel Salanter encouraged his entire congregation NOT to fast on Yom Kippur during a cholera epidemic, as fasting could weaken their immune systems. Rabbi Salanter stood in front of the entire congregation and publicly ate and drank, so that the whole congregation would do the same.[3]
Other prohibitions on Yom Kippur, which are documented in the same section of the Talmud, are: eating/drinking, washing, wearing (leather) shoes, marital relations, and anointing with oil. Presumably, these things are all either associated with pleasure, luxury, or physicality in a manner which detracts from the spiritual.
Liturgy
Yom Kippur, more than any other Jewish Holiday, is observed primarily with the community in synagogue.
There are four main synagogue services on Yom Kippur:
- Kol Nidre is a specific prayer which gives its name to the service which happens at sundown when Yom Kippur starts. All Jewish holidays begin at sundown of the day before the holiday is typically said to occur on an English calendar. This year, for example the “day” is on Thursday October 2, but the holiday runs from sundown on October 1st to (45 minutes after) sundown on October 2.
- Yom Kippur morning service (including the Avodah service which details the Scapegoat ceremony)
- Yom Kippur afternoon service (which includes reading the book of Jonah due to its themes of repentance)
- Ne’ilah (which occurs right before Yom Kippur ends)
Right before Kol Nidre, people eat a large pre-fast meal. (And guzzle as much water as they reasonably can before they have to abstain from drinking for 25 hours.)
The Kol Nidre service is technically supposed to start before sundown, because vows are to be legally annulled before sundown, rather than on the holiday itself. Often described as both beautiful and haunting, Kol Nidre prayer is sung three times. Each time it’s sung, the intensity of the prayer grows. (To hear part of it, as it is traditionally sung a capella, try this link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qj5rouyKZ9Y&list=RDQj5rouyKZ9Y&start_radio=1)
The morning services include some standard weekday prayers, many prayers that are special for Yom Kippur, Torah readings, and a reading from end of Isaiah 57 and all of Isaiah 58. In this portion, God declares that Israel’s fasts and affliction of their souls is undesirable to Him unless Israel also practices justice and ministers to the poor.
Prayers regarding atonement are included, with lines such as, “We have sinned, we have transgressed, we have spoken perversely, we have slandered, we have lied,” and a whole host of other sins.
However, says the Talmud, Yom Kippur does not mean that someone can sin on purpose with the self-justification, “Yom Kippur will atone for this sin.” (The Talmud explicitly states: “For the one who says, “I will sin and Yom Kippur will atone, Yom Kippur does not atone.”)[4]
Later in the morning or during the early afternoon (depending how long all the prayers take, whether there’s a long sermon, etc.) the Avodah Service occurs. The Avodah Service reenacts the Scapegoat ceremony of Leviticus 16.
During the Avodah service, the prayer-leader chants liturgy which recalls how the High Priest would perform the scapegoat ceremony.
The last service of the day, Ne’ilah, is conducted almost entirely with the congregation and leaders standing. The rabbi – or whoever is leading the congregation – often tells the crowd that they can (and should) sit if they feel physically unable to stand. The ark, which houses the Torah, is usually open for most of the service.
The liturgy of Ne’ilah is quite beautiful. The liturgy pictures the Gates of Heaven closing, closing slowly, and inspires us to “submit” our last prayers to Heaven and God’s heavenly court. I once told a Christian neighbor about this liturgy, and she burst out laughing. “But God always hears our prayers!” she said.
I agree – God always hears our prayers. But anyone who has tried to abstain from eating and drinking for 25 hours knows their physical bodies can’t sustain that for very long. I personally think the liturgy is meant to impress upon us, mortal humans, a sense of the urgency that we need to have with our prayers. Of course, God can hear our prayers after the Neilah service ends. But that doesn’t mean that humans are always ready to offer such prayers with the same level of intensity.
With that, I hope that everyone celebrating Yom Kippur has a meaningful day, and that this article was helpful even to those not celebrating!
[1] One Biblical grounding for the idea that white corresponds with being sin-free can be found in Isaiah 1:18 “Come, let us reason – declares the Lord – if your sins are red as scarlet, they will become white as snow”
[2] The Talmud explicitly states (Yoma 8:1) that a pregnant woman or someone who is very ill should eat to prevent or heal illness.
[3] Rabbi Salanter has another important connection to the High Holy Days. He was a proponent of the Mussar movement, which focused explicitly character improvement. People tend to think about Mussar (character improvement) more during the period before the High Holidays, for the entire month preceding Rosh Hashanah. There’s an idea that you’re supposed to perform a Cheshbon Ha-Nefesh, or Accounting of the Soul, in which you do a personal assessment of where you’ve fallen short.
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