 |
| with Rabbi Steve on Yom Kippur |
My friend Rabbi Steve Blane's Sim Shalom synagogue lives most of it's life online. (http://www.rabbi.net/sim-shalom-online-synagogue ) But come the High Holy Days, it comes to life at the Bitter End, perhaps Greenwich Village's most iconic nightclub. (Video of service here...https://www.facebook.com/search/top/?q=sim%20shalom%20online%20synagogue). Once again, he asked me to share a sermon...and afterward, a song....here's what I had to say....
It is good to be back here with you again this year. Since last year I have actually performed on this stage twice...with Rabbi Steve and Liz...so I feel at home.
It's Yom Kippur which means that most of you are fasting. I'm thinking that's a strange word. Because I did this for many years... in an interfaith family...and you know what, when you are fasting, time goes really slooooowly....
Yom Kippur....the holiest day of the year. It means literally Day of Atonement. I've been thinking about that word. I mean we all know that to atone is something you do to make up for something you did.
But I want to go a little deeper. In English, it is what looks like, at ... one.....the word emerged in the 16th century from the Latin word adunamentum or ‘unity.' ....and carried with it the sense of reconciliation.
It reminds me that in my tradition, after our corporate prayer of confession, I would say...It is good as we seek forgiveness from God that we seek forgiveness from one another, as we seek oneness with God we seek oneness with one another and as we seek peace with God, we seek peace with one another...the peace of the Lord be always with you...and they respond and with your spirit...and then we all exchange greetings of peace. As I think about it, it's a reminder of something I learned from my Jewish friends...that repentance is never just personal, it has a social aspect. As a rabbi friend of mine once said, Judaism is a team sport.
You can't ask God to forgive what you did to another person without going to that person first. It also says, as Simon Wiesthenthal made clear in his beautiful book the Sunflower, neither can you forgive what wasn't done to you. Your being here as a community says that you can't be one with God without being one with one another. It begins with relationship.
I need to say a word here about forgiveness and reconciliation. They are not the same thing....forgiveness is something one does for oneself. To stop being controlled by another. To break the power of victimhood. To let go. As one friend once said, to give up for all time the hope for a different past. It frees oneself. Last year in Berlin, I met a man from Rwanda who after years of searching found the man who had murdered his father. He had intended for years to take revenge. Take his life. Get even. But confronting the man, he thought about what had been controlling his heart all these years and forgave the man. He said he had learned that we become what we do not forgive.
Forgiveness however, does nothing for the relationship. As a friend of mine once said, there is no reconciliation without reconstruction. It is a process. Sometimes a long process to reconstruct a relationship step by careful step. But what else can atonement be about?
Well, I know these are the final hours of the days of awe....what was written down last week in pencil is now going down in ink, close to being sealed. Book closed and locked. As we used to sing when I was a kid, making a list, checking it twice,gonna make sure who's naughty and nice..
But think about this afternoon in the waning hours. Find a quiet place. To sit for a few moments. Let the faces of people who are important to you pass in front of you. Those who have made you happy, who have been there for you. Those who have hurt you. And perhaps those you have hurt. Even inadvertently. Where a relationship is broken. And ask yourself if there is just one step, just one that you might make to break the ice, the iciness of brokenness.
There is a lot of brokenness around us these days. When we think about how hard it is between two people, sometimes even family members, how can we even imagine that there might be reconciliation between those who believe Donald Trump is the answer and those who don't? Between blacks and whites? And yes Palestinians and Israelis?
But in that first scary step, that is where life is. The closing words of the Torah portion for this morning say:
I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Choose life so that you and your descendants may live, 20 loving the Lord your God, obeying him, and holding fast to him; for that means life to you and length of days,
May your fast go well. And your breakfast joyous, L'chaim.
No comments:
Post a Comment