The Book of Life (Days of Awe)
Who writes
Who reads
The sentences
In careful paragraphs and chapters
That follow ancient codes?
Or the disjointed scrawl,
Random and indecipherable,
No system at all?
The contest is closing in days.
Who judges the book,
By what rules?
How will we know
If we win or lose?
Another new year growing old,
Another life on the shelf.
I brought them out of the land of Egypt and I led them into the wilderness. I gave them My laws and taught them My rules, by the pursuit of which a man shall live. Moreover, I gave them My sabbaths to serve as a sign between Me and them, that they might know that it is I the Lord who sanctify them.
Ezekiel 20:10-12 (New Jewish Publication Society translation)
Note from The Jewish Study Bible:
The Sabbath is the foundational sign of the covenant (Exod. 20.8–11; 31.12–17). Scholars have suggested that the Sabbath became particularly significant in the exile, as holy time replaced the vacuum of holy space (the Temple); this might explain why the Sabbath plays such a significant role here. As in Exod. 31.13, 17 (from the Priestly tradition), it is viewed as a sign, namely a symbol acknowledging God as Creator.
Here we are confronted with the phenomenon at the heart of this holiday. At the heart of every holiday. At the heart of religion and reality itself. We are concerned with space. We are concerned with being. We are concerned with time too. But we may not be properly concerned, in a balanced way that accounts for time, space and being.
We can rule space, or at least pretend to. If you visit New York or other great cities, you see how people have shaped space to their liking and purposes. But where in New York or elsewhere have even the richest and most powerful ultimately shaped time? We can mark time, but do we understand? To help us understand, time is set aside. It may be by God, it may be by our society or community, it may be by and for those close to us.
The Sabbath each week, and the Days of Awe each year, are set aside to be different than the other days of the week or of the year. Different in fact than any other days of eternity. In part to remind us of present eternity.
For more, see The Sabbath by Abraham Joshua Heschel and The Time-Being by Zen Master Dogen, which can be found in Enlightenment Unfolds.
This is the first post in a very small project/experiment in random wisdom I call The Days of Awesome. In addition to the standard and traditional forms of worship and contemplation associated with the Jewish High Holy Days (also known as Days of Awe), each day of the holiday I will be studying a randomly selected chapter of the Tanakh (also known as the Jewish Bible or the Old Testament), which has 39 books containing a total of 929 chapters.
Among other things, this is inspired by the I Ching and by social theorist and philosopher Gregory Bateson, who is quoted as saying “I am going to build a church someday. It will have a holy of holies and a holy of holy of holies, and in that ultimate box will be a random number table.”
Central Synagogue in New York is one of the great synagogues and congregations in America.
If you are not attending High Holy Days services in-person anywhere, for whatever reason (don’t usually attend, not convenient, not Jewish, etc.), here is your opportunity to join in the services at Central Synagogue. Without leaving the comfort of wherever you have your PC, tablet or phone. For as little or as long a visit as you like.
Central Synagogue live streams its services. Here is just a partial schedule. (You can see the complete schedule here.) All times Eastern Time.
Erev Rosh Hashanah
Sunday, October 2, 8:00pm
Rosh Hashanah
Monday, October 3
Morning Service 9:30am
Kol Nidrei
Tuesday, October 11
6:00pm or 8:00pm
Yom Kippur
Wednesday, October 12
Morning Service 10:45am
Afternoon Service 3:30pm
No prayer books? No problem. You can download those from Central Synagogue too.
Kol Nidrei and Yom Kippur Morning Prayer Book
Yom Kippur Afternoon Prayer Book
These are the highest of all Jewish services with the highest of all Jewish music and prayer on the highest of all Jewish holidays at one of the most extraordinary Jewish congregations with one of the most extraordinary rabbis. And all you need is a browser.
Do Jews pray to angels? Do all of us need all the help we can get?
The Jewish Days of Awe begin soon, starting with Rosh Hashanah on the evening of October 2, ending with Yom Kippur on the evening of October 11.
It is a time of teshuvah, often translated as “repentance”, but more precisely “turning”—that is, turning away from ourselves and our ways and to God and godly ways. To start the process of reflection, on a Saturday night before Rosh Hashanah a special set of preparatory prayers begin to be recited, known as Selichot. This year, Selichot begins tonight, on the night of Saturday, September 24.
The conventional cast of characters in the soulful dialogue of teshuvah and the Days of Awe are yourself, the people and world around you, and God. But Rabbi Geoffrey W. Dennis, in the fascinating Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic and Mysticism, adds an unexpected player:
Machnisei Rachamim (Conveyors of Compassion)
This is a prayer petitioning the angels to intervene with God:
Conveyers of compassions, obtain our mercy before the Master of compassion,
Makers of prayer, make our prayer heard before the Hearer of prayer.
Makers of wailing, make our wail heard, before the Hearer of wailing.
Conveyers of tears, convey our tears before the King who yields to tears.
Strive to raise up supplication, raise up supplication and plea,
Before the King, high and exalted. The King, high and exalted.
This prayer is only recited at Selichot, a penitential service recited prior to the coming of Rosh Hashanah.
This prayer is anomalous in that the rule that Jews should pray only to God, and not to intermediaries, extends back to Talmudic times: “If troubles come upon a person, do not entreat the angel Michael or the angel Gabriel. Rather, entreat Me alone and I will help you immediately” (J. Ber. 9:1). Maimonides makes this normative, “It is only fitting to pray to God and it is not fitting to pray to any other.”
The Maharal of Prague was sufficiently troubled by the appearance of this prayer that he amended the wording (Netivot Olam, Netiv Ha’Avodah no.12), an innovation that did not catch on. In modern times, no less an ultra-Orthodox authority than the Hatam Sofer wrote that at Selichot he personally skips over this prayer (Orach Chaim no. 166), a shocking confession from the leader of a community that insists ALL of the tradition is sanctified and obligatory. The prayer has been entirely edited out of Selichot liturgy in the modernist Reform movement.
And yet at least one Midrash exists that endorses the idea of angels as intermediaries of our prayers (S of S R. 2:7). And many Jews worldwide recite the words barchuni l’shalom … (“bless me with peace”), when they sing the popular Shabbat hymn, Shalom Aleichem. This prayer is found only in the Ashkenazi (northern European) tradition, suggesting it was written when Jews were surrounded by a Christian culture that emphasized the use of divine intermediaries (saints) and even had services in honor of specific angels (Michaelmas).
This week begins the Jewish Days of Awe, starting with Rosh Hashanah, the New Year. Shana Tova – a good year.
A tale about Hasidic master Reb Levi Yitzchak of Berditchev (1740-1809):
It was Yom Kippur. The faithful, weak from fasting, were waiting for the Rebbe to begin the Mussaf prayer, but he too was waiting. An hour went by, and another. Impatience turned into anguish. This time the Rebbe was really going too far. It was late. Why was he waiting?
When he finally emerged from his meditation, he explained: “There is in our midst someone who cannot read. It is not his fault; he has been too busy providing for his family to go to school or study with a teacher. But he wishes to sing. And so he allows his heart to speak: ‘You are God; I am but a man. You are Almighty and know everything; I am weak and ignorant. All I can do is decipher the twenty-two letters of the sacred tongue; let me give them to You to make into prayers for me and they will be more beautiful than mine.’ ” The Rebbe raised his voice: “And that, brethren, is why we had to wait. God was busy writing.”
From Souls on Fire: Portraits and Legends of Hasidic Masters by Elie Wiesel
“Like Jonas himself I find myself traveling toward my destiny in the belly of a paradox.”
Thomas Merton
The Sign of Jonas
The Jewish High Holy Days begins this evening, starting with Rosh Hashanah (New Year 5775) and ending on the tenth day with Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement). So it is a good time to talk about Jonah.
On Yom Kippur, the Book of Jonah is read at services. It is supposedly so simple a story that we tell it to the youngest children. It isn’t that simple.
Prof. Barry Bandstra writes:
The book of Jonah has been interpreted in many different ways: as a satire on prophetic calling and the refusal of prophets to follow God’s call; as a criticism of Israelite prophets who were insincere in preaching repentance (because they really wanted to see destruction); as a criticism of the Jewish community’s unwillingness to respond to prophetic calls to repentance (in contrast with Nineveh); as a criticism of an exclusive view of divine election (God only cares about “chosen people”); as an assertion of God’s freedom to change God’s mind over and against prophets who would limit that freedom; as emphasizing the problem with true and false prophecy (even true prophets have words that do not come true); or as an allegory of Israel in exile (both Jonah and Judah look to God for destruction of an evil empire). De La Torre argues for an interpretation of the book that views Jonah as a marginalized person frustrated with God for not punishing those who have brutally oppressed people. Person reads the book of Jonah as a conversation between author and reader, focusing on the implied verbal rejection of God’s command by Jonah in 1:3.
The entire very brief Book of Jonah is at the end of this post. It goes something like this:
God tells Jonah to preach to the wicked city of Nineveh.
Jonah runs away from this assignment and gets on a ship.
A storm batters the ship and the sailors figure out Jonah is the cause.
The sailors say they don’t want to throw him overboard to appease God, but then they do anyway.
Jonah is swallowed by a big fish.
After three days, the fish disgorges Jonah on land.
Jonah finally preaches repentance to Nineveh.
Nineveh does repent.
God has mercy and doesn’t destroy Nineveh.
Jonah complains that he went through a lot of trouble, so God should have destroyed Nineveh.
God gives Jonah a special plant and then destroys it, as an example of how a prophet has nothing to do with what happens and shouldn’t care how God ultimately deals with things. God explains:
“You are concerned for the castor-oil plant which has not cost you any effort and which you did not grow, which came up in a night and has perished in a night. So why should I not be concerned for Nineveh, the great city, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left, to say nothing of all the animals?”
So for the New Year, among the many things you may ask yourself:
Was God too lenient? Was Jonah not compassionate enough, taking joy in the misfortune of others? Am I or should I be more like God? Like Jonah? Like the sailors on the ship? Like the people of Nineveh? Like the fish? Can I tell my right hand from my left?
Whatever your faith or no-faith, you can never have enough New Years and new starts. Please have a happy one.
Book of Jonah from the Jerusalem Bible (J.R.R. Tolkien)
Selecting a Catholic translation of the Book of Jonah on Rosh Hashanah may seem odd. There are two reasons. The Jerusalem Bible is the best English-language combination of literary style and scholarship. And this particular book has a very special translator/editor: J.R.R. Tolkien.
The original Jerusalem Bible, published in English in 1966, was conceived as a very modern Catholic Bible—modern in terms of both language and scholarship. A French edition had already been published, and for the English version, a number of English-language scholars and writers were enlisted. Some texts were translated from original languages (Hebrew, Greek) while other texts were re-translations of the French. Tolkien was brought on as an editor, but he did create one book in English, taken from the French: The Book of Jonah.
Jonah 1
1. The word of Yahweh was addressed to Jonah son of Amittai:
2. ‘Up!’ he said, ‘Go to Nineveh, the great city, and proclaim to them that their wickedness has forced itself upon me.’
3. Jonah set about running away from Yahweh, and going to Tarshish. He went down to Jaffa and found a ship bound for Tarshish; he paid his fare and boarded it, to go with them to Tarshish, to get away from Yahweh.
4. But Yahweh threw a hurricane at the sea, and there was such a great storm at sea that the ship threatened to break up.
5. The sailors took fright, and each of them called on his own god, and to lighten the ship they threw the cargo overboard. Jonah, however, had gone below, had lain down in the hold and was fast asleep,
6. when the boatswain went up to him and said, ‘What do you mean by sleeping? Get up! Call on your god! Perhaps he will spare us a thought and not leave us to die.’
7. Then they said to each other, ‘Come on, let us draw lots to find out who is to blame for bringing us this bad luck.’ So they cast lots, and the lot pointed to Jonah.
8. Then they said to him, ‘Tell us, what is your business? Where do you come from? What is your country? What is your nationality?’
9. He replied, ‘I am a Hebrew, and I worship Yahweh, God of Heaven, who made both sea and dry land.’
10. The sailors were seized with terror at this and said, ‘Why ever did you do this?’ since they knew that he was trying to escape from Yahweh, because he had told them so.
11. They then said, ‘What are we to do with you, to make the sea calm down for us?’ For the sea was growing rougher and rougher.
12. He replied, ‘Take me and throw me into the sea, and then it will calm down for you. I know it is my fault that this great storm has struck you.’
13. The sailors rowed hard in an effort to reach the shore, but in vain, since the sea was growing rougher and rougher.
14. So at last they called on Yahweh and said, ‘O, Yahweh, do not let us perish for the sake of this man’s life, and do not hold us responsible for causing an innocent man’s death; for you, Yahweh, have acted as you saw fit.’
15. And taking hold of Jonah they threw him into the sea; and the sea stopped raging.
16. At this, the men were seized with dread of Yahweh; they offered a sacrifice to Yahweh and made vows to him.
Jonah 2
1. Now Yahweh ordained that a great fish should swallow Jonah; and Jonah remained in the belly of the fish for three days and three nights.
2. From the belly of the fish, Jonah prayed to Yahweh, his God; he said:
3. Out of my distress I cried to Yahweh and he answered me, from the belly of Sheol I cried out; you heard my voice!
4. For you threw me into the deep, into the heart of the seas, and the floods closed round me. All your waves and billows passed over me;
5. then I thought, ‘I am banished from your sight; how shall I ever see your holy Temple again?’
6. The waters round me rose to my neck, the deep was closing round me, seaweed twining round my head.
7. To the roots of the mountains, I sank into the underworld, and its bars closed round me for ever. But you raised my life from the Pit, Yahweh my God!
8. When my soul was growing ever weaker, Yahweh, I remembered you, and my prayer reached you in your holy Temple.
9. Some abandon their faithful love by worshipping false gods,
10. but I shall sacrifice to you with songs of praise. The vow I have made I shall fulfil! Salvation comes from Yahweh!
11. Yahweh spoke to the fish, which then vomited Jonah onto the dry land.
Jonah 3
1. The word of Yahweh was addressed to Jonah a second time.
2. ‘Up!’ he said, ‘Go to Nineveh, the great city, and preach to it as I shall tell you.’
3. Jonah set out and went to Nineveh in obedience to the word of Yahweh. Now Nineveh was a city great beyond compare; to cross it took three days.
4. Jonah began by going a day’s journey into the city and then proclaimed, ‘Only forty days more and Nineveh will be overthrown.’
5. And the people of Nineveh believed in God; they proclaimed a fast and put on sackcloth, from the greatest to the least.
6. When the news reached the king of Nineveh, he rose from his throne, took off his robe, put on sackcloth and sat down in ashes.
7. He then had it proclaimed throughout Nineveh, by decree of the king and his nobles, as follows: ‘No person or animal, herd or flock, may eat anything; they may not graze, they may not drink any water.
8. All must put on sackcloth and call on God with all their might; and let everyone renounce his evil ways and violent behaviour.
9. Who knows? Perhaps God will change his mind and relent and renounce his burning wrath, so that we shall not perish.’
10. God saw their efforts to renounce their evil ways. And God relented about the disaster which he had threatened to bring on them, and did not bring it.
Jonah 4
1. This made Jonah very indignant; he fell into a rage.
2. He prayed to Yahweh and said, ‘Please, Yahweh, isn’t this what I said would happen when I was still in my own country? That was why I first tried to flee to Tarshish, since I knew you were a tender, compassionate God, slow to anger, rich in faithful love, who relents about inflicting disaster.
3. So now, Yahweh, please take my life, for I might as well be dead as go on living.’
4. Yahweh replied, ‘Are you right to be angry?’
5. Jonah then left the city and sat down to the east of the city. There he made himself a shelter and sat under it in the shade, to see what would happen to the city.
6. Yahweh God then ordained that a castor-oil plant should grow up over Jonah to give shade for his head and soothe his ill-humour; Jonah was delighted with the castor-oil plant.
7. But at dawn the next day, God ordained that a worm should attack the castor-oil plant — and it withered.
8. Next, when the sun rose, God ordained that there should be a scorching east wind; the sun beat down so hard on Jonah’s head that he was overcome and begged for death, saying, ‘I might as well be dead as go on living.’
9. God said to Jonah, ‘Are you right to be angry about the castor-oil plant?’ He replied, ‘I have every right to be angry, mortally angry!’
10. Yahweh replied, ‘You are concerned for the castor-oil plant which has not cost you any effort and which you did not grow, which came up in a night and has perished in a night.
11. So why should I not be concerned for Nineveh, the great city, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left, to say nothing of all the animals?’
Politics and prayer. There will be plenty of both during these Jewish High Holy Days.
Rosh Hashanah, the New Year, begins this evening. Please consider a donation to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) to help the more than two million refugees who have so far fled Syria.
Ktivah v’chatima tova. May you be inscribed and sealed for a good year.
The days from Rosh Hashanah (“Head of the Year”, the New Year) and Yom Kippur (“Day of Atonement”) are the ten holiest on the Jewish calendar. Known as the Days of Awe or Days of Repentance, they are a time for reflection on the year past and the year to come, and a time to make amends—not by asking God for forgiveness, but by asking it from those who have been wronged, and through the practice of repentance (literally, “turning”), prayer and charity.
During these days, the Book of Life is metaphorically open, and on its pages your life is weighed: “On Rosh Hashanah it is written, on Yom Kippur it is sealed.”
The liturgy for these holidays, and particularly for Yom Kippur, is some of the most moving and soul-searching in all of the religious canon. There are Old Testament readings included, but not too often from the Book of Job.
There are two solid consensuses about the Book of Job.
Literary types agree that it is probably the greatest work of literature in the Bible.
Religious types agree that it is the most puzzling book in the Old Testament, and that even when you look at it in the most common and superficial way (“Why do bad things happen to good people?”), you end up scratching your head.
Job is the book to read for Yom Kippur. It is the book to ponder at the start of the year, at the end of the year, and at points between. (It was, by the way, Abraham Lincoln’s most studied book of the Bible.)
We begin with the book itself.
It is unusual for it to have been included in the canon of the Hebrew Bible because it is not about a Jew. When non-Jews appear in other books, it is usually a story of helping Jews or hurting Jews or marrying Jews or eventually becoming Jewish. None of that applies to the Book of Job.
The story is relatively simple, at least until the end. Job is a rich and pious man who has everything: health, wealth, family and friends (or so they seem). Satan wants to prove that Job’s piety is dependent on his having everything, and challenges God to take it all away. God does.
Job’s friends are convinced that he must have done something wrong, and urge him to figure it out and repent. The scenes with his friends are talky, like a play, or maybe like the film My Dinner With Andre—except this is My Dinner with Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite.
Job’s wife has a different suggestion: “Curse God and die.”
Job remains steadfast in his faith.
And then, in Chapter 37, God appears to Job, to explain it all.
The chapters that follow are a poetic and breathtaking description of the world’s wonders, by the one who made them. God tells Job that his friends don’t know what they’re talking about (God takes care of them later). And God implicitly tells Job the only two things to do: Be awed. Be humble.
Job’s reply in Chapter 42 is one of the most important passages in the Bible. It is not only the watchword for Yom Kippur; it is the watchword for everyone, religious or otherwise, who is convinced they are smarter than anyone in the room or in the universe:
Then Job answered the Lord:
“I know that you can do all things,
and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted.
‘Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge?’
Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand,
things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.
‘Hear, and I will speak;
I will question you, and you declare to me.’
I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear,
but now my eye sees you;
therefore I despise myself,
and repent in dust and ashes.”
“I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.”
Whether this is a day of reflection and fasting, reciting centuries-old prayers, or an ordinary day of work or study, managing others or being managed; whether you are Job beset by unexplained misfortune, or Job’s wife, ready to kill him if he doesn’t kill himself, or Job’s friends so quick with advice; whether you are being punished by God, Satan, or whatever other forces you believe are working against you; whether you are the smartest person in the room or not; this is what we can do, even if there is seemingly no comfort in it:
Be awed. Be humble.
Bob Schwartz 