Kol Nidre 5771
Fri, September 17, 2010
Just stop! Stop what you are doing. Forget about the fact that you just ate your last meal for the next 25 hours. I moved my sermon to this spot, because I know you aren’t ready for what’s to come, because if I waited until after the Kol Nidre prayer, you would have missed what you are here to do.
Even if you did everything to prepare for this most sacred moment of the Jewish year: listening to the shofar daily during the month of Elul, the classes on Friday nights to prepare spiritually, Selichot a week ago Saturday, Rosh Hashanah Erev, and morning, and afternoon and tashlich, ten days of repentance, you still may not be ready – to hear and to feel, to commit and to change – to let go and to open up to fully appreciate the magnitude and power of the Kol Nidre experience.
I’m begging you to unplug from that world out there. It’s Yom Kippur. Turn off everything – your mind, your to-do-lists, the cell phones, the Blackberrys, the iPhones and Droids, the computers and Kindles and iPads, your TV’s, and radios, iPods or MP3’s of any kind—all of the distractions and the noise – turn it all off.
Quiet your life, your mind, your heart, so that you can hear your best self when it is ready to come forward. Put aside the addiction to the technologies that have seduced you into believing you always need to be connected to everyone all of the time.
Life was fine before all of those connections, you know. People lived in the moment, and cared about the person they were with, instead of glancing down all the time at a screen, or taking that call that is more important than you are.
I remember a time when people looked into each other’s eyes and shared meals and conversations without interruptions and technological distractions. We went to movie theatres without a series of mini-screens aglow distracting us in the rows in front of us.
Promise yourself 25 hours—one Yom Kippur day— to detach from the world out there so you can focus on the world in here. This is your ONE chance to be accountable for what you said and did all year long and with the Kol Nidre prayer, for what you are about to say and do in the year to come. Prepare to meet your God, your history, yourself in just a few minutes.
Kol Nidre, every vow, every word, every promise, you have spoken or will speak, every word tweeted or put on Facebook pages, e-mailed or written has consequences greater than you could ever imagine — words have so much power. They touch and teach, trouble and reach hearts and minds. It is time to account for all of those words, O Israel.
Kol Nidre is one of the most ancient melodies of Jewish existence. Its music testifies to Jewish continuity and its power to the survival of the Jewish people in the face of persecution, forced conversions, and the denial of our very right to be, to pray, to live freely as Jews. When you rise to hear that ancient melody this Yom Kippur night, let it be with full focus and attention. Your life depends on it.
If Hava Nagila is the Jewish national anthem of happiness, moving us to rejoice and dance, commanding us to have happy hearts, then Kol Nidre is the Jewish national anthem of accountability, calling us to be faithful to our history, our heritage, our God, and our best selves.
This Jewish liturgical moment grabs hold of our souls, as its words collectively purge us of our thoughtless, selfish, and hurtful vows and deeds. Kol Nidre is the yearly Jewish accounting for our souls. Its words and music demand that we stand, face the Torah, our God, and one another, to take responsibility for our lives and our actions.
The original version of Kol Nidre asked God to absolve us of last year’s vows we were unable to fulfill, so that we could begin the new year with a clean slate. I wish we still said that version, which makes more sense to me. But, it was argued, by the rabbis, that a blanket nullification, retroactively releasing us from promises made, would lead others to mistrust all Jews, and not want to do business with us. So, instead, we recite the compromise prayer, which is anticipatory rather than retroactive in formulation. In advance, we atone for all the promises we will utter that we will not be able to keep in the year to come. I am not sure the current formulation is any better than the older version, but it is what we shall sing tonight.
You will soon be witness to high Jewish drama: rabbis and Torahs dressed in white, symbolic of the shroud of death, with our respected communal leaders holding the sacred scrolls before our eyes, in a sanctuary so quiet you can hear a pin drop. We are supposed to recite the thousand-year-old Kol Nidre prayer three times. With our fellow congregants acting as our witnesses, we ask to pray with avaryanim – sinners, for we are all sinners.
Some people believe that Avaryanim means Iberians hearkening back to a time during the Spanish Inquisition when secret Jews came to atone for their forced conversions. Haven’t we all been seduced away from our faith and its practice in some way? We are all Avaryanim, sinners who have strayed from what our God and Torah asks of us.
Reform Jews historically tried to eliminate Kol Nidre, but the power of the prayer made that impossible. Even Johnny Mathis recorded Kol Nidre on his 1958 album, “Good Night, Dear Lord.” When Donna Breskin sent me that link on the internet, my husband Gary immediately went to his record collection to get the album. Remember albums?
The holiness of Kol Nidre transcends the Jewish world. So, Reform Jews kept the prayer, but we usually say it once, thinking that is enough. But, tonight we will sing it three times, to get the full traditional experience— with my apologies, in advance, to our Torah holders. First, we sing quietly asking to be forgiven and released from the foolish vows and oaths. You know, like the one (by Rabbi Bruce Ginsberg in Yom Kippur Readings, ed. Rabbi Dov Peretz Elkins, Jewish Lights, 2005, p.20-21): “God, get me thru this crisis and I swear I will donate half of my possessions to charity, give up chocolate, and never sleep past 6 a.m.” I promised to buy my son Jonah a Porsche if he’d only live through NICU when he was a baby. I didn’t keep that promise; and sorry Jonah, I don’t intend to. I am still atoning for that ridiculous bargain with God, even as I thank God every day for the man that baby has become.
The second time we intensify the melody and articulation of the words, tonight singing them in English so we can understand what we are saying. And by the third time, the cantor is supposed to give it everything — to allow the words and music to crescendo into a powerful penitential prayer. Done right, this Kol Nidre prayer has brought Jews back to Judaism – apostates who were forced to convert, or like the great musician Arnold Schonberg, who was baptized for love of a woman he wanted to marry. Many years later, divorced and alone, Schonberg went to services with friends. He was so moved by Kol Nidre that he returned to Jewish life in a ceremony at the Rue de Copernic Synagogue in Paris, witnessed by his dear friend Marc Chagall. There has been no greater sin than leaving the faith of our forefathers and foremothers in our history, failing to continue our heritage l’dor vador, for yourself and the generation to come. Kol Nidre begs the apostate to return to the promise of our people. It begs each one of us to return and be faithful to the legacy of our history and to every Jew who gave his or her life so that we could stand here tonight.
Even in Auschwitz, the power of Kol Nidre was not abandoned. In the words of Yosef Vaynberg who describes his experience there: (in Miriam Weinstein’s Yiddish: A Nation of Words, 2001— found on The Best of A Little Joy A Little Oy Calendar, Sept. 18-19)
“We have been promising to observe the Kol Nidre service. The rabbi prays. I look at the crematorium. And I hear the voice of the rabbi, as though it no longer came from his heart, but as if his heart itself had opened and wept. “And a portion of our fat and our blood.” The congregation repeats, “our fat and our blood.” Louder and louder… “The blood and fat of our parents, children, relatives.” Tears pour…The weeping flows together, like a river.”
By the third and last time, I feel the wetness of those tears and the pain and suffering of our people. I stand tonight for those who died never to hear the Kol Nidre prayer again.
At our darkest hour, at the moment of death, where do we turn if not to our Judaism and our heritage? It is the most important investment of time, money, and loyalty we can make. All of us are so busy. We stray and neglect our faith, our Torah, and our obligations to the Jewish community, which depends on us to continue the richness and beauty of 5771 years of courage and commitment.
Kol Nidre begs us to stop filling our lives with things that really don’t matter in the grand scheme of life and death. It implores us to get over our petty issues and squabbles, grievances and ugliness. Kol Nidre calls us to get over ourselves.
Kol Nidre, all the promises of our lives travel with us wherever we go and arrive here tonight in our emotional luggage. Kol Nidre reminds us that the vow not to let go of the hurt and disappointment, the betrayal or anger invades our souls. Even if the world is not as fair or forgiving as you would like, stop holding on to that hurt for dear life. Vowing revenge, or pledging never to forgive is destructive for you so much more than the person you want punished.
Kol Nidre reminds us that so often the issues you are upset about aren’t about you at all. Get over yourself. People don’t wake up in the morning determined to slight or hurt you.
Kol Nidre teaches us that the most dangerous and destructive people of all are those who do not use words to tell you what is bothering them. They walk away without explanation, or a chance to see if what they think is wrong is just a miscommunication, or a misunderstanding.
So often the truth is obscured or buried beneath destructive rumors and innuendo, assumptions and falsehoods spread like chum for sharks who feed on the blood of a good rumor. My desk quotation calendar teaches, “Don’t make use of another’s person’s mouth unless it has been lent to you.” There is Jewish merit in quoting the source be it your teacher or your mother. But, too many quote words that were never said. It is time to stop listening to people who share criticism, or complaints, or rumors, especially about someone you know and trust, often from an anonymous source. An anonymous source is trouble, or someone who is looking for trouble.
A wise man asked, “What can you do better?” Kol Nidre demands that we take responsibility for what we say and what we do, and take stock of our actions and their consequences within the greater community. Kol Nidre implores us, collectively, to come face to face with our faults and frailties, and those of others. We must embrace and forgive our past, before we can confront and dream for our future.
Kol Nidre demands that we be better. I promised to speak out and failed miserably God. As a loyal Virginian and community leader I haven’t done enough to decry the perversion of justice, and religious and personal freedom, in the Commonwealth by those manipulating the law to promote an extremist religious agenda filled with xenophobia, homophobia, and narrowmindedness, which represents the antithesis of Jewish values. I should have spoken out, in the name of all that I hold sacred in Judaism and as an American, to protect the separation of Church and State, the integrity of our public universities and public buildings, desperately needed clinics and private homes. I have not cried out loudly enough that every loving couple deserves to be married in this state and have rights and benefits and security for themselves and their families.
Kol Nidre and our Yom Kippur fast remind us that the hungry need to be fed every day, not just the days when we remember to bring food for the shelter or we are handed bags. Irving Cramer tells the story of a teacher in Minnesota who asked his class, “How many of you had breakfast this morning?” Only a few of them raised their hands. So, he continued, “How many skipped breakfast, because you don’t like breakfast?” Lots of hands went up. “How many of you skipped breakfast because you didn’t have time?” More hands. He then asked, “How many of you skipped breakfast because your family doesn’t eat breakfast?” knowing that many families couldn’t afford breakfast. A few more hands went up. There was one boy who hadn’t raised his hand. Thinking he didn’t understand the question, the teacher asked, “Why didn’t you eat breakfast this morning?” The boy responded, “It wasn’t my turn.” (Elkins, p. 4-5)
We don’t have to go to Africa to find hungry children. They live down the road and in our county, and our commonwealth, and country. Our fast needs to move us to make sure those children are fed. Sign up to feed the hungry children at our shelter at least once this year.
Kol Nidre reminds us of the words of the Israeli activist Alice Shalvi: [in her Techine, her meditation in preparation for Yom Kippur (Elkins p. 3 &4)]
“Grant me the power to feel as others feel… May I better understand the suffering of strangers; and may that understanding lead me to do everything in my power to alleviate and to prevent such suffering. When I see streams of refugees… may I recall the wanderings of the people of Israel and may I vow never to be the cause of loss and homelessness… Grant me the wisdom to discern what is right and what is wrong and inspire me with the courage to speak out whenever I see injustice, without shame or fear of personal retribution. Enable me to feel pity even for my enemies. Grant me the will and the ability to be a peacemaker…forgive my obliviousness to all that is going on in the world save what is directly related to my own experience and that of the Jewish people.”
Kol Nidre reminds us that we prayed for peace and promised to work for peace, but did not do enough to uphold the sacred promise to bring every soldier home to a loving family and grateful nation. Every picture and name I hang on the wall outside is a personal failure. I vow to remember the sacrifice of those brave men and women who have given their lives for our nation, and the sacrifice of their families. I promise to work harder for peace and national security with all of my being for this beloved country. And I promise to speak out for a peace that insures the security of the people and borders of State of Israel, even as I labor tirelessly to make sure that she does a better job of protecting the religious freedoms and rights of all of her citizens.
Kol Nidre demands that we use our mouths for the good of others so that no human being will become the victim of persecution or derision because of religion, national origin, the color of their skin, economic fortune or misfortune, or lack of opportunity.
Kol Nidre reminds us that we have been “the other” in society and the hatred toward Israel is testimony that we still are. We must defend “the other” in our courts of justice and the legislatures of nations and states, lest we become so complacent in our assimilation and acceptance that we are deaf to the plight of those who are persecuted for being an immigrant or a Muslim by a world that demonizes all for the sins of a few.
Tomorrow afternoon we read from Leviticus 19, verses 33 and 34: “When strangers live with you in your land, you must not oppress them. The strangers who live with you shall be to you like citizens, and you shall love them as yourself for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.
We are not strangers this Shabbat Yom Kippur. We recite Kol Nidre together as one community of avaryanim, sinners. We can no longer pay lip service to our faith or our God. Our hearts need to open with promises we will keep and vows we will honor, and words that speak truth, and demand justice and peace.
Whether this is your first Kol Nidre, or your fifty-first, on this holiest night of our year, we bring “all our vows” – “Kol Nidre” into this sanctuary and place them before our God together in community. As we stand, as we listen, we want our prayers to matter, because want our lives to matter.
Hear, O Israel, the words and the melody of our Kol Nidre prayer that have been calling us for centuries.
Now, I think we are ready.