Ten days after Rosh Hashanah we celebrate Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish year. For 25 hours, we fast and refrain from physical pleasures and mundane activities to focus on a vital mission: making a personal accounting of our behavior and resolving to be a better person in the coming year. It’s a time for self-reflection and spiritual honesty as we ask ourselves difficult questions we usually avoid. Do I consistently treat others with kindness and respect? Do I honor my Creator? Am I humble or arrogant? Selfish or giving? Truthful or deceptive? Sensitive to the pain of others or focused only on my own problems?
Jewish tradition teaches that on Rosh Hashanah God decrees who will live and who will die in the coming year… but the decree isn’t sealed until Yom Kippur. That means that even if our merits weren’t enough to inscribe us in the Book of Life on Rosh Hashanah, we still have another chance to turn things around and get a better decree. The beautiful lesson of Yom Kippur is that we can change our character and our destiny if we acknowledge what we’ve done wrong, make amends to those we’ve hurt, and sincerely resolve to improve our behavior. The Torah promises, “For on this day atonement shall be made for you, to cleanse you; from all your sins before God you shall be clean.” (Lev. 16:30)
🙏 PLEASE FORGIVE ME
Yom Kippur atones for sins between us and God, but it does not erase the harm we’ve done to other people. Difficult as it may be, we must contact every person we’ve wronged in the past year and ask forgiveness. If they refuse to forgive, we ask again and again. If our sincere apology is rejected even after three attempts, we have fulfilled our personal obligation and the spiritual burden shifts to the other person for committing the sin of holding a grudge.
🍽️ EAT, DRINK & GET READY
One of the ways we prepare for the biggest fast of the year is by eating heartily on the day before Yom Kippur. Before sunset, we eat our final meal called the seudah hamafseket, or “separating meal.” After the meal, we light holiday candles, parents traditionally bless their children, and then the 25-hour fast begins.
🚫 NO FOOD, NO DRINK, NO DISTRACTIONS
On Yom Kippur, healthy adults abstain completely from food and drink. We also refrain from washing for pleasure, applying lotions or oils, wearing leather shoes, and marital relations. The point isn’t to suffer for the sake of suffering but to deemphasize our bodily needs so we can focus on the state of our souls. Traditionally Jews dress in white on this holy day to emulate the angels.
🕍 LIVING ON A PRAYER
Much of Yom Kippur is spent in synagogue, beginning with the haunting Kol Nidrei service on Yom Kippur eve. Throughout the holiday, we repeatedly confess our sins and ask God for forgiveness. Our ritual public confession is in the plural, not singular. We have sinned. We have betrayed. We have spoken wrongly. Why confess to sins we may not personally have committed? Because Judaism doesn’t view us as isolated individuals. We are part of a people and a community. As it says in the Talmud, “All Israel is responsible for one another” (Bavli, Shevuot 39a).
🐋 JONAH AND THE WHALE
During the afternoon service on Yom Kippur we read the Book of Jonah. God gave the prophet Jonah a difficult mission: “Go at once to Nineveh, that great city, and proclaim against it; for their wickedness has come up before me.” (Jonah 1:2). Jonah initially rejects the mission and instead of going to Ninevah he boards a ship going in the opposite direction. God does not accept Jonah’s refusal and sends a powerful storm. The sailors on the ship sense that Jonah is responsible for their bad luck, and they throw him overboard where he is swallowed by a giant fish. After three days Jonah finally gets the message. He goes to Nineveh (a non-Jewish city) and warns its people to repent. Incredibly, they do—and God forgives them. Jonah learns lessons we all need to hear on Yom Kippur: you can’t run away from God, true repentance is possible, and God’s mercy is universal.
📣 THE GATES ARE CLOSING
After a long day praying in synagogue, Yom Kippur reaches its emotional peak with Neilah, the final prayer service. We make a last earnest appeal to God as the gates of repentance are closing. Then comes one long powerful blast of the shofar indicating that the fast is over and we return to ordinary life. But the goal is not to return as the same sinful people we were at the beginning of the holiday but rather as renewed and cleansed souls ready to serve our Creator with renewed dedication and vigor.
✨ A NEW BEGINNING
Yom Kippur is solemn, but it isn’t sad. It is a day of profound spiritual joy and considered one of the happiest days of the year. It might seem difficult to be in a good mood when we’re denied basic physical pleasures of life, but elevating ourselves spiritually brings a deeper level of joy than mere physical comfort. Yom Kippur asks us to make sacrifices, but it offers extraordinary rewards: a clean slate, a second chance and a new beginning.
May we all be inscribed and sealed for a happy, healthy and meaningful new year!
Image: Jewish men praying on Yom Kippur, Lower East Side 1900, from Brittanica
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