Dear Friends,
Our Jewish brothers and sisters have just completed one of the most important periods in the Jewish calendar. Rosh Hashana, the Jewish New Year began on September 25th, followed ten days later by Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement (October 5). Many Jews who may not participate much throughout the year in other holy days make a real effort to be present for the evening prayer service that marks the start of Yom Kippur when worshippers recite Kol Nidrei, one of the most famous passages in Jewish liturgy.
The Day of Atonement liturgy has always struck me as fascinating, curious and profound. Here is one translation of the Kol Nidrei, “ All vows, prohibitions, bans, oaths, restrictions, penalties and oaths of dedication, that we will utter and swear, and take upon ourselves, from this Day of Atonement until the next Day of Atonement, to come in goodness; all these I regret; let all of them be discarded and forgiven, abolished and undone; they are not valid, and they are not binding.”
Rabbis teach that this legal formula offers an important message about the temptation to take vows that we will later regret and about the power of regret to foster lasting change in our lives. This tradition did not exist in the time of Jesus but came about in the 8th or 9th century and came not from rabbis but from the laity. Rabbis often worried that people would see the statement as too broad and worried that the public nature of the ritual might be twisted in such a way that Jews were not to be trusted. However, the Jewish tradition makes clear that repentance before God does not undo a misdeed against another human being. Only attempts at forgiveness and reparation from those wronged can make up for those sins.
Rabbi Soloveichik of Congregation Shearith Israel in New York recently wrote in the Wall Street Journal about the Kol Nidrei prayer. “No other piece of Jewish liturgy combines in so elemental a fashion the notions of human fallibility and freedom, which together comprise the foundation of repentance and the Day of Atonement itself. ‘All of these I regret.’ This is the essence of Kol Nidrei, and if regret, sincerely expressed, can help heal the past by undoing the effect of the words irresponsibly uttered, then there is reason to hope that past misdeeds can be healed as well. For this reason, Kol Nidrei speaks profoundly to our time. In the age of the internet, every impetuous posting, every misguided tweet, every regretted utterance survives forever, and often no amount of regret is sufficient to undo the stain on someone’s reputation. Kol Nidrei reminds us to cancel mistakes, rather than people, accepting genuine regret and embracing the possibility of change and growth. After centuries of debate, the future of Kol Nidrei in Jewish liturgy is secure, but its lessons need to be learned once again.”
In the same article he also quotes the great Jewish medieval philosopher, Maimonides, “Free will is given to every person. Freedom is what allows human beings to sin, but it is also what allows us to change. In repentance, the penitent proclaims ‘I am now another individual and am no longer the same person who committed these misdeeds.’”
Our Catholic tradition of Lent is similar to the Jewish observance of Atonement. It reminds us that we can change and be better. None of us is bound by our past sin. With God’s help, we can always be made new.
Peace,
Fr. Damian