Somber silence

             At ten minutes to eight this evening, we heard a voice calling for silence. We were walking through the parking lot, just arriving at the tekes being held by the local Israeli scouts, near Gan Sacher. We walked into the open square to see burlap wrapped wire supported by giant wooden frames, tied together with rope and protected by aluminum foil.

            The square was filled with people of all ages, chatting quietly among themselves. As the disembodied voice announced that it was ready to begin, people started to quiet down and turn their attention to the front.

            Five minutes to 8, all was quiet. There was a little whispering, but for the most part we just waited. As 8 o’clock struck, we heard the siren wind up and begin to wail. Immediately, everyone took a solid stance and turned their gaze slightly downward, as if in prayer. Almost nobody moved.

            For a minute, everyone stood just so. Everyone remembered.

            The poignancy of that moment cannot be described. Just imagining everyone feeling the one degree of separation from death in this country is beyond my capacities. Each and every person feels some pain on this day. Even the outsiders can feel the mourning and grief experienced. But everyone is silent – even the little boy next to me, full of questions for his tired mother, stands in silence and listens, waiting.

            I stood there and bowed my head as well, feeling something stirring within me. It was pain and the need to mourn, but something else, a sense of pride. Pride in this country, in this incredibly, resilient people. Pride in being a part of a group that cares so much about collective memory and identity, actually takes the time to ensure that this memory is formed and revitalized every year. Pride in the unity that I experienced.

            The individual stories of people who died, the specific Kaddish recited on this Yom HaZikron, Kaddish Yatom as a blanket memorial prayer. The songs and poems written about loved ones, friends, neighbors, countrymen. The entire country feels the power of these words. And knows that memory is one of the most powerful ways of continuing on.

            I will always remember the sound of that siren, of the silence in the square. I will remember the flag at half-mast and the collective mourning this country experiences. I will remember, and I will live out the blessings that show tribute to the lives of those who died so I could live in this country.

Judgement day

 

Reading Vidui, or the confession part of the service, I was struck by the words in the Machzor, the prayer book. The following is the poem that emerged from that:

Each year we repent

Ask forgiveness, apologizing, lamenting, beseeching—

The potential we are bestowed with, that inwardly we possess, we did not fulfill.

The אחריות, responsibility, to our fellow man is still incombent upon us

And yet, we’ve reached this day

The most holy day, שבת שבתון, the day of judgement.

Here we stand,

Before you—

            Incomplete

            Unwhole

            Unsure.

But here.

We are indeed present,

accepting you,

            struggling with the past

looking with open heart to the new year.

Hear our prayer;

Accept our prayer

Listen.

We are ready.

This year, we will try to do better.

This year, we will not stand idly by our neighbor.

This year we will deal honestly.

This year, we will act in love justly.

I have done wrong, an entire alphabet of woes,

But so too have I done right.

Help me, guide me, encourage me, O God.

Today I stand before you in judgement

Prepared for repentence

Prepared for understanding,

Knowing I have failed.

But in that, I know I can do better.

I WILL do better

On this Yom Kippur day

I pledge to do better—

            on myself

            to my friend

            my neighbor

            my community

            to my world

סלח לנו, מחל לנו, כפר לנו.

Forgive us, pardon us, grant us atonement.

Amen.

Chicken...I think I'll pass

I love being Jewish. The traditions, the food, the prayer, the conversations, the opinions - you name it, we've got it. We even have those traditions that as a Reform Jew, I sometimes get a little squeamish over.

Enter Shlocking Kaporot (symbolic atonement using a chicken). My first encounter with this pre-Yom Kippur tradition was last year during Yom Kippur. My father stood on the Bimah and handed out rubber chicken finger puppets to all the children after Havdallah (he preached about it at some point during the day). The purpose confused me, but I had a rubber chicken to swing around my head nonetheless.

Coming to Jerusalem for the year, I was encouraged to take advantage of the many opportunities around me offering glimpses into worlds very separate from those of a Reform Jew. Once such opportunity was heading to the shuk for Kaporot. As I needed to go to the shuk anyway, I figured why not. Although I am incredibly susceptible to emotional reactions (especially when I have already had an emotional day), I should have known it wasn’t the best idea, but alas, hindsight is 20/20…

I found the big sign announcing that people could come in and pay to have their sins transferred to the chicken and therefore allowing them to start Yom Kippur on a clean slate. I walked up the stairs, unsure what I would find under the black mesh canopy. In a C-shape were stacked dozens of crates of live chickens. The smell was unbearable while the sound was a gentle squacking (until a chicken was taken out of its plastic crate and transferred to a cardboard box for the shocket (butcher) to have easier access.

Although five or six people asked me if I wanted to do it, I gave a wide-eyed answer of no, wildly gesticulating my disapproval and fear of this custom. Instead, I just wanted to watch (which I managed to communicate in bumbled Hebrew).  So, I stood there, a fearful 22-year-old, feeling out of place as the smell permeated my brain cells, waiting for someone to come in and actually have the chicken swung over their head.

At first, I watched as an Asian woman read off a list of names for a couple, asking that each person on the list have the ritual performed for them. To this, the shocket slit the throat of each chicken and threw it in a funnel like contraption so the blood could drain from their necks as they thrashed within. The next step would be the shave off the feathers with a brutal sounding standing machine, which would allow the chickens to be given to those in need of meat for the chag (holiday).

Finally, a woman showed up and I watched the shocket swing the chicken over her head, over and over, 4 repetitions of three times each. The entire experience was fascinating. No matter the request, the chicken ended up kaput, dead. And these people worked at this job all day, smoking, eating, joking as they did it. I was thoroughly disgusted.

However, this is not my practice. Although I don’t think it is humane or particularly nice (some may say chickens don’t have feelings, but they have never heard the ethereal squack of a chicken when its being held by its wings nor have they witnessed what a thrashing chicken looks like), I understand the intention behind it. One wants to be as cleansed as possible before he or she comes before God tomorrow, on THE day, Yom Kippur. I just feel there may be better ways to do it.

I will apologize to those around me. I recognize that I may not have atoned for EVERYTHING I have done wrong in the past year, but I know that I am not perfect, and that I have sinned. Yom Kippur is not just a day for atoning. It is also a day for petitions and for living, for celebrating being written into the book of life. I will remember the importance of gratitude, of appreciating the fact that I am alive each and every day.

            Most importantly, I will say thank you. So, thank you!

Celebration, continuity, and catastrophe

Shabbat yesterday consisted of a number of new experiences, ones I was not initially prepared for. I wanted to do T’fillot in a new place, so I decided to try out Shira Hadasha with Lori. I arrived around 9am (I was up till three the night before watching the opening ceremony of the Olympics-the first time I’ve seen the whole thing), and missed my favorite part of Shachrit, the beginning. However, the rest of the T’fillah was mostly familiar. The repetition of the Amida was different than what I am used to, meaning instead of being a different repetition it repeated the actual words of the Amidah. It makes no sense to me to repeat words that we have already done silently. I understand the concept of acknowledging the past use of sacrifices, but this was exactly the same thing as before.

            Also, every time someone spoke to the entire congregation (i.e. not doing prayers), they opened up the Mechitzah. Having it open was incredibly distracting, keeping me from listening to the person talking and therefore understanding what exactly was occurring. I did however understand when they invited people without a place to eat to join a woman and her family for lunch. As I am always up and open to new opportunities to meet people, I jumped at the opportunity, therefore forcing Lori to join me!

            The family was a transplant family, having made aliyah over 20 years previously. There were ten of us, as well as the 6 family members who were there. We ate on the ping pong table, because it was simply an overlay on their regular dining room table.

            Lori and I had started a discussion on the way over about Reform Judaism and what we thought about the service, the mechitzah, the way it was run, and paused the discussion when we walked into the house. However, one of the woman there, who made Aliyah 6 months ago, questioned me about what I had been saying and of what exactly is Reform Judaism is comprised (someone else asked me why I was a reformED Jew. That was an interesting question…to which I don’t have an answer). We got into a lengthy discussion of what Reform Judaism is all about and why I practice it, and the fact that so many Reform Jews practice simply because that is what their parents do, or that is what they think they are supposed to do, or out of convenience. Part of the reason I want to be a Rabbi is to change that, to help people understand why certain practices exist and why we do and don’t participate in certain rituals. Saying that one does a practice just because, STAAM, doesn’t seem like the purpose of Judaism or practice. I want to help inform practice and help people find more reason for why.

            Anyway, we left lunch and went back to Lori’s, where we both worked, sang musicals, and did laundry (on her part). As the evening started a fast day, for Tisha B’Av (commemorating the destruction of the 1^st and 2^nd temples, as well as a number of other sad occurrences in the Jewish timeline), Lori and I ate dinner early, before heading over to HUC for an introduction to Tisha B’Av and then t’fillot. The introduction would have been interesting, but it was way too hot in the chapel and I couldn’t concentrate. I basically learned that there are a number of different events that transpired during the same day in history**.

            Split into groups, we ventured off to places throughout the city. I was off to a Sephardic synagogue near Ben Yehudah Street. The service itself wasn’t that odd, minus the fact that we were all sitting on the ground and we read the entirety of Eicha (Lamentations) aloud, wailing away. However, as today is Tisha B’Av, that makes sense. We are lamenting the destruction of the Temples and therefore miserable. I left the raised Mechitza to join the other Sephardic woman on the ground level, in order to better hear what was going on. They were wonderful, laughing together (although we were supposed to be somber) at the children or our complete inability to follow along. We helped each other find the spot in Eicha, as the men’s voices were often either too quiet or too cacophonous. It was such a great moment, connecting. Plus, we were talking in Hebrew and I understood them. The hardest part was that I didn’t understand what was being read, meaning I feel I now need to read Eicha again.

The Kotel today, post-destruction of the 2nd Temple in 70 CE

            We left and discussed what we had experienced. I decided to head down to the Kotel with about 5 other people, to see what was happening down there. We booked it into the Old City, ending up at the Wall by around 10:30. People were sitting everywhere, in groups and isolated, wailing quietly. The term the Wailing Wall finally made sense to me. No one was seated on the normal chairs. Rather, they were on low set stools or sitting on the ground. Everyone seemed to have a prayer book in their hand. Although the Wall area was not packed, there were a good number of people there (the woman’s section WAS packed).

            Within 15 minutes, I was done and we left soon after. Eric and I went off to find Anas, a guy he met the last time he lived in Israel, but he was not at his family’s shwarma stand in the Arab quarter.  (Cool fact, the Muslim quarter is ornately decorated with lights for Ramadan). Therefore, we booked it out, all the time discussing the importance of the Temple and whether or not we want to see a third temple built (I am not in favor, but I understand some people’s strong desire to see it happen).

            My night didn’t end with our leaving the Old City. Eric and I walked up Agron, happening upon the beginning of a protest in Freedom Park. There were speeches going on and so many people standing there with flags. Many police vans were parked on the edge of the park, cordoning off the area. We asked people what was going on, to which they responded that they were preparing to walk into the old city, protesting Arab occupation. As Eric and I had just been discussing the Dome of the Rock and the fact that we wanted to see it, we were curious, but we decided it wasn’t necessary to join them. However, we were very curious.

**The Hebrew calendar does not follow the Gregorian calendar, meaning that Tisha B’Av happens between the middle of July and the end of August, depending on the year. Therefore, although the events were on the same Hebrew day, the Gregorian day differed.