Kol Nidre – Seeking Forgiveness
5773
by Rabbi Arnold Saltzman
Around the world tonight people gather in prayer. Why?
What is the Kol Nidre Service that it continues to bring people together for a serious day away from business and work, away from sports, away from our favorite indulgences – food, Starbucks, Paneras, and shopping?
Speaking about ‘Asking for Forgiveness,’ – rabbi, are you kidding?
No one does that!
I want to hold on to my grudges, hatreds and prejudices!
How does one begin the New Year with a clean slate?
How will we be able to forgive ourselves?
Were we too weak in a moment or were we at a loss to act?
Were we too self indulgent, satisfying our passions or were we afraid to live?
Is the world spinning out of control or spinning out of our control?
The noble human spirit God has implanted within us needs to be renewed.
Judaism teaches us that if we dwell on the past too much, we will loose the chance to see what is just ahead of us.
In the opera, Touro, which I composed in the early 1990s, I used the Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice as a story within the story. When each of us reads a story or sees a work of art, we project something of ourself onto the meaning of the work (which can effect a catharsis). One character sees that Love can rescue us from death, while another character observes that Orpheus was impatient, he could not stand hearing the cries of his beloved without turning to face her, and in that moment he loses her. The main character in the opera, observing the drama, sees the cruelness of life in the story, a rabbinic commentary, that even when we do everything right and should be overcoming obstacles, in a moment we may loose everything.
The Jewish citizens of Newport had a marvelous community, yet war, the American Revolution, the British occupation of Newport destroyed everything, and for Isaac Touro, not being able to see past his loyalism to the future held out by patriotism, caused him to have his head turned in the wrong direction, backward, when he should have been looking to the future.
How does one emerge from the tunnels and caverns we are placed in by life? How can our gathering here help us to emerge to life with good expectations for this coming year? Life can sometimes be so bitter that food looses its taste and we can no longer endure the music we once loved to listen to.
“How will I sing the songs of the Lord in a foreign land?” Eych Nashir Et Shir Adonai Al Admat Neichor –
“If I forget thee Oh Jerusalem, May my right hand forget its cunning!”
Im Eshkachech Yerushalayim, Tishkach Yemini —
The bitterness can make us numb failing to see what once was beautiful and now is distorted by pain, suffering, loss of work or a loved one, illness, and life changes that have altered our landscape.
A man shoots a member of congress and kills people around her. Someone stops him from killing even more people.
A deranged student kills in a classroom in Virginia Tech, and a holocaust survivor who is the professor, holds the killer off at the door preventing even more deaths and injuries. The Holocaust survivor is killed.
Aurora, the Siek Temple, Columbine…
We gather on Kol Nidre and ask” What kind of world we live in?
We have loss of life intentionally and are devastated.
We have loss of life intentionally through acts of violence and terror.
Four Americans are killed for no reason in Libya. Every American is hurt by these actions.
Were we unable to foresee these things? Were we too weak? Are we to accept what some would call fate?
If for any reason we carry some sense of guilt as individuals or as a country – God proclaims on this solemn day – that we are forgiven.
After the Holocaust there are those who might be tempted to ask – Has God asked for forgiveness? As shocking as this might sound, there is some biblical evidence that God asks for forgiveness, according to
Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel. How so?
Rabbi Heschel wrote:
When shown in a vision the immanent destruction of Israel…Amos [the Prophet] has no arguments to offer in his attempt to save his people. He does not question God’s justice;
He appeals to God’s mercy:
O Lord, God, forgive I beseech thee!
How can Jacob stand?
He is so small!
The Lord repented concerning this!
It shall not be said of the Lord.
(Amos 7: 12=13, 7:5-6)
“The Lord repented because they are small. Judgement is never final. Affection and compassion prevail over Justice. Mercy is possible.”
Amos wrote (5:15):”It may be that the Lord will be gracious to us…”
If we seek God, or at least seek what God wants of us – will God become closer to us?
Is God closer to us today in order to listen to our supplication, to our atonement?
Is God with us today, in our midst, to seek atonement, just as we seek atonement?
Is there a need to forgive God or is that ‘blasphemy?’
At very least we may need to let go of our anger toward God, for the things gone wrong, for loss of life, the loss of the reasons for existence, for being weak, for allowing ourselves to dwell on our pain and suffering while a magnificent world awaits us.
I present you with two very different stories of atonement to ponder, one about a German artist, and one by the leader of France.
A German artist has created an art form called stumbling blocks. Very simply, he places these blocks with markers in areas where Jewish people lived, or where there was a Jewish business, and he places a stone block there making it difficult for people to walk by without noticing these blocks of stone.
The artist, Gunther Deming has been doing this since 1992 and is still gong strong. Since that time he has placed 30,000 stumbling stones in Germany and the surrounding boarder countries. An article about this was brought to my attention by Alvin and Ellen Cohen, members of Sha’are Shalom in Waldorf, who are survivors of the Holocaust. They witnessed him do this in their hometown of Ludwigsburg.
Gunther Deming considers his work to be the largest artwork in the world. His work provokes inquiry as to why these stones are there and who they are for, causing many to stop and think about the fate of the victims of their town, how they were taken, removed, sent away, and in most cases never returned.
Some of these stones are cause for reunion of survivors and remembrances with people traveling from all parts of the globe, New Zealand, Israel, South America, South Africa, Canada, and the United states.
Something about the placing of the stone makes it emotional when relatives are present. Since there is nothing else left of the past someone will go and bring a photo which explains a great deal to those standing around. Not surprisingly in Stuttgart and Cologne there were complaints about the stones (recently a Judge in Cologne ruled that circumcisions could no longer be performed on anyone under 18 years of age).
People do not know whether to walk on the stumbling stones or to walk around them. The stones are for those killed and those who survived. These stones and their placement bring many surviving family members together for the first time in decades. FYI the artist, Gunter Deming was born in 1947 in Berlin.
One may look at this as an art project, however it clearly is an artist creating atonement for the crimes committed by his country. Three quarters of the earth is covered with water. Even these waters cannot wash away the deeds of the second world war, yet this artist is educating a new generation while making a powerful statement for all time.
A second example of atonement, was the statement made by Francois Hollande, the President of France on July 22, 2012.
He said:
“We’ve gathered this morning to remember the horror of a crime, express the sorrow of those who experienced the tragedy, and speak of the dark hours of collaboration, our history, and therefore France’s responsibility.”
This was one of the few times that I have heard a French official mention responsibility in relation to the Shoah.
He continues by saying he wanted to pass on the memory of the Holocaust, so that barbarity will not surface in new generations.
Over thirteen thousand Jewish men, women, and children were arrested seventy years ago in July 1942 and placed under guard in the Velodrome d’Hiver, known as Vel D’Hiv for five days in inhuman conditions. Not a single German accomplished this. This was done by the French Police under a directive from the Vichy government. All the children were separated from their parents, and no one left together under this directive.
They were taken eventually to Aushwitz-Birkenau and murdered solely for being Jews. The crime took place in Paris, the center of the French Republic, a democracy with Freedom of Religion. This was part of the attempt to annihilate the Jewish population from Europe. Of the 76,000 deported only 2500 returned.
These men, women and children had no idea what awaited them, nor could they imagine it. “They trusted in France” since the days of the French Revolution and since 1791 when Jews became full citizens…”seventy years ago, this promise, and trust was trampled under foot.”
Jews trusted in France, and the president of France admits, they were betrayed.
“Across time, beyond grief, my presence this morning bears witness to France’s determination to protect the memory of her lost children and honor these souls who died but have no graves, whose only tomb is our memory.”
The crime was committed by the French Police and their helpers without any assist from the Germans. He goes on to say that France’s honor was saved by those who were rescuers, the righteous who enabled most French Jews to survive. The schools of France now have the responsibility to tell this story, to teach the truth.
Four months ago children were killed in France for being Jews. This week a Kosher market was bombed in the suburbs of Paris. France has a problem which is finally being recognized, and the leaders of France are beginning to understand that unless all French citizens stand up and say ‘we’ are all Jews, we are all French, there will never be an end to this hatred.
Even after all these years, we welcome this statement accepting responsibility and renewed commitment to end religious bigotry and hatred which has been specifically aimed at Jews in France.
Yet, in spite of this welcome statement of Cha’tahnu – we have sinned! by France seeking atonement, I would hope that it is coupled with a renewed commitment to support Israel even as there are those who seek to undermine it. Israel clearly has a mission, and no matter how imperfect Israel is, history has taught us that forgiving those who committed these acts against us historically should not be traded for giving up the right to be free people capable of defending ourselves. What’s the question?
Can we forgive France? Let those who were the victims decide that. Other than that let us leave forgiveness to God this Yom Kippur. When Yom Kippur arrives through Teshuvah, Tefillah, and Tzedakah we are granted atonement.
The noble human spirit God has implanted within us needs to be renewed.
Judaism teaches us that if we dwell on the past too much, we will loose the chance to see what is just ahead of us.
On this day of atonement we recognize the atonement offered for the terrible deeds done to our people, and accept the intent with which these gestures of atonement are offered. At the same time let us look to the future with clarity that we must not be lulled into complacency.
While we must let go of some of the anger, we must not let go of our collective memory. We need to hear the atonement being offered in order emerge from the tunnels, yet, we must hear the cries of the past, while facing the light just ahead of us with the hope for a better future.
G’mar Tov – May you and your loved ones be inscribed in the book of life in the New Year!