Thus we conclude this sacred day. With the commitment to try to be better people and hopeful of receiving divine favor and of having been inscribed in the book of life and blessings.
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There are several reasons that can explain why Yom Kippur – the day of forgiveness – is the most momentous day in the Jewish calendar. Fasting (25 hours without eating or drinking anything), the liturgy of atonement for faults, the solemnity of the day, the memory of our deceased loved ones, the synagogue full of people, etc.
Possibly it is a conjunction of all of them that gives the day such a special character, along with the memories treasured over the years.
Yom Kippur concludes the period of “ten days of repentance” that begins on Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year. It is a very special time of year.
Our sages teach that on Rosh Hashanah each human being is judged by God, but the final verdict comes at the end of Yom Kippur. Hence the intensity of the day.
The prohibition of eating and drinking throughout the day (this year from sunset on Sunday, September 24 to the rise of the first stars on Monday the 25th) aims to focus on our spiritual side. We try to control our instincts. Our teachers teach that on Yom Kippur we resemble angels.
Just before beginning Yom Kippur, Kol Nidré is recited, a declaration that nullifies the promises made to God in the previous year that were not fulfilled.
We want to begin the prayers of the holy day without outstanding debts. The text, written in a mixture of Hebrew and Aramaic, is a legal formula. However, despite its technical and unspiritual language, the recitation evokes a diversity of memories and sensations. The Torah scrolls are carried in front of the entire congregation who, in an atmosphere of deep devotion, listen to the well-known words sung with their traditional music. A feeling of transcendence runs through everyone present.
During the morning, the liturgy invites us on a journey through time. We read in the Torah the description of the atonement ritual of Yom Kippur by means of the scapegoat (Leviticus chapter 16), we continue with the prophet Isaiah speaking precisely on a Yom Kippur about 2,500 years ago, criticizing his contemporaries for the hypocrisy of their fasts and their rituals that did not translate into ethical behavior; and then we are described what the Yom Kippur ritual was like at the time of the Jerusalem temple, when for the only time in the year the High Priest entered the Holy of Holies and pronounced the ineffable name of God to atone for the faults of the entire world. town.
Yom Kippur also includes a prayer in memory of deceased loved ones and the martyrs of our people. On the holiest day of the year, we look to those who came before us for guidance and inspiration. You try to make the past illuminate the present for us so we can be builders of a better future.
The day’s liturgy includes prayers of repentance and confession of faults. The book of Jonah is also read. At the end of the day, exhausted by the intensity of the prayer and with our strength diminished by fasting, we pray the Neilá, the concluding prayer, at the moment in which – as our wise men say – the doors of heaven begin to close.
Thus we conclude this sacred day. With the commitment to try to be better people and hopeful of receiving divine favor and of having been inscribed in the book of life and blessings.
2023-09-24 18:11:14
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