Yom Kippur 5773 — September 26, 2012
By Rabbi Anna Boswell-Levy
For years I’ve struggled with a particular part of the Yom Kippur liturgy, a piece that
really should be the most emotionally intense, dramatic part of the day, and that is the
Avodah service. Avodah means “holy service” and is the time during Yom Kippur where
we recall the duties of the High Priest in the Temple in Jerusalem.
Once a year, on the Day of Atonement, the High Priest would enter into the most holy
place within the Temple, a place called the Holy of Holies, and utter the ineffable name
of God and plea on behalf of his people for forgiveness for all the ways they had sinned
against God in the past year. Since the Temple was and is considered the holiest place
for Jews, the place where God’s presence is most concentrated, and Yom Kippur is the
holiest day of the year, this act of the High Priest is the most awesome and holy — and
dangerous. If the actions of the High Priest were off by even a little bit, or were in some
way displeasing to God, he could die. And since no one except the High Priest was
allowed into the Holy of Holies, a cord was attached to his leg so that he could be
dragged out if need be.
So as you may imagine, many special arrangements needed to be made to prepare.
Seven days prior to the Day of Atonement, the high priest was moved to a special
apartment in the Temple court where he studied with the elders every detail of the
sacrificial cult for the Day of Atonement. A deputy priest was appointed to take the place
of the high priest should he be prevented due to defilement or death from performing his
duties. The day before the Day of Atonement, the high priest was escorted to his
chamber in the Temple compound where he joined the other priests. The elders
earnestly entreated him to perform all the minutiae of the sacrificial cult carefully, and
then took leave of him.
On the Day of Atonement, the high priest himself performed the offering of the daily
sacrifice, the incense offering, and the other sacred duties. After a series of immersions
and ablutions he offered a bull as his personal sin-offering. He confessed his own and
his family's sins, the sins of the tribe of Aaron (the priests), and those of all Israel (Lev.
16:6). Every time he uttered the holy name of God, the Tetragrammaton which was
uttered only on the Day of Atonement, the people prostrated themselves and
responded: "Blessed be His Name whose glorious kingdom is forever and ever" (see
Tosef., Sot. 13:8; Yoma 39b). During the service of the high priest, this procedure was
repeated ten times (Tosef., Yoma 2:2), or, according to another source (TJ, Yoma 3:7),
13 times.
Yom Kippur 5773 — September 26, 2012
By Rabbi Anna Boswell-Levy
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The high priest then drew two lots from a wooden box, one inscribed "For Azazel" and
the other "A sin-offering for the Lord." The role of each of two he-goats participating in
the ritual was determined by the lots. The high priest sent the goat "For Azazel" into the
desert and he offered the other as a sin-offering. After a special incense-offering in the
Holy of the Holies, the high priest recited special prayers (Yoma 5:1, Yoma 53b; Ta'an.
24b) for good weather and for the kingdoms of Israel and Judea.
If you are curious, you can find the text of the Avodah service, which is comprised of
texts from chapter 16 of the book of Leviticus, Mishnah Yoma, and the Talmud of Yoma,
scattered through the Musaf service in our mahzor. It’s a lot of words, much of it
echoing what we just heard chanted from the Torah today. I struggle how to make this
long and elaborate description of the High Priest’s service feel relevant and spiritually
resonant for all of us, particularly as I believe it to be so critical to what we are doing
here today. Judaism does not operate around one central Temple anymore, nor do we
make animal sacrifices, thankfully. So we don’t necessarily have an intuitively grasp of
why the actions of this High Priest are important for us today.
Additionally, the concept of sacrifice is foreign to us today, not only because we don’t do
it anymore, but also because we don’t have a priestly caste system. The very idea of
one person acting on behalf of an entire people, beseeching forgiveness, is so foreign
to the Judaism we know. Nobody intercedes to pray on another person’s behalf —
nobody has special access to God’s attentions in the way that the priesthood is
described. (And lest you think otherwise, no, rabbis are just like everyone else — we
have no special access to God.) Each person must take responsibility for him or hers
own relationship with God and his or her community.
But in spite of all the differences, there are so many ways the actions of the High Priest
impact our current experience of Yom Kippur and shape Jewish theology. I could spend
my whole sermon discussing it, but instead I’d like to focus on the person of the High
Priest himself.
It occurs to me that all the effort in Jewish liturgy and text to detail his movements are
so that we here today, some 2000 plus years later, can see him as vividly as if we were
watching him on our high definition televisions. So I want you to put yourself in the
shoes of this High Priest, who is after all, just a person. He spends much time preparing
himself spiritually and mentally. He bears such a heavy responsibility for his people. Not
Yom Kippur 5773 — September 26, 2012
By Rabbi Anna Boswell-Levy
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only does he have to get it 100% right to avoid possible death, but the lives and
wellbeing of his people also were at stake. Imagine his night before Yom Kippur —do
you think he could sleep?
Here is one person who wields immense power to make a difference on behalf of his
people. The High Priest is a model for us of the power one single person can have to
make a difference, to make an impact on our world today.
We live in a world that feels so small because of amazing advances in technology. We
are connected, almost immediately, to events taking place on the other side of the
world. Yet paradoxically as this perceived connectedness increases, we feel our
individual selves to be inversely much less powerful.
We are plagued by an overwhelming sense of powerlessness. It seems the more
connected we are beyond a particular time and a particular space, to events on a global
scale, the less rooted we are on a micro level, to local communities and neighborhoods.
For example, we may feel ourselves more connected to the national election, but aren’t
as informed about local issues and who is running for office in our own communities.
Perhaps, as people have become more mobile in this day and age, and that we have
family and friends across the country and the globe, we are less rooted to and invested
in life on a local level.
Rabbi Brant Rosen, a Reconstructionist rabbi in Evanston, Illinois, comments about how
vulnerable, how powerless we 21st century westerners often claim to feel, this in spite
of the comfort and wealth that we have and often take for granted.
He writes, “It’s fascinating to me that we Americans live in the most powerful country in
the world, and yet we feel so disempowered in so many ways. There are obviously
many complex reasons for this — for my part I believe it has largely to do with a
pervasive culture of fear — but without over analyzing this phenomenon, I do believe a
palpable sense of helplessness has taken hold of our lives. The problems of the outside
world blare at us full strength from every available media outlet, and it often feels as
though there is little we can really to make things better. Even more troubling to me is
the way our sense of disempowerment too often leads to cynicism — and eventually to
the dismissal of those who are endeavoring to make a difference.”
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The High Holidays, and especially Yom Kippur, come as an antidote to this rootless
malaise. The teshuvah process beckons us to focus on the importance of even our
smallest actions, it urges us to take responsibility for our lives, to redirect ourselves
toward a higher purpose. Teshuvah says, “You are large. What you do has
consequences — for yourself, for those around you, for future generations. Root
yourself in this time, in this place. Don’t run away! People are depending on you!”
This is the experience of the High Priest. He is rooted so precisely at the intersection of
holy time and holy space, transformation for himself and all his people is possible, and
he is acutely aware that so much is at stake. Imagine his fear and quaking as he makes
his preparations and then walks into the Holy of Holies with the rope around his ankle.
When we beseech forgiveness from our Creator as we do today, we call out “We have
cheated, we have lied, we have betrayed!” For all the mistakes, all the sins, all the
hataim of every person, they rest on us, even if we ourselves have not committed them
ourselves. We shoulder responsibility for all of our people, just as the High Priest does.
For today, we are each one of us a High Priest.
Each of the movements of the High Priest is critical. Likewise each of our actions is as
well. It is critical whether you arrive on time, or if you are 5 minutes late. It is critical to
pay attention when your spouse or your friend is speaking to you. It is critical to notice
that you child has a poopy diaper. It is critical to use your turn signal when you are
driving. It is critical to vote. It is critical to apologize when you misspeak, and it is critical
to speak up when you see that something isn’t right. Your actions matter.
In Jewish teaching, a person is often seen as a world, a universe in microcosm. The
Mishnah in Sanhedrin says, “If you save a life, you save the world entire.” And I think it
is a helpful and good comparison — while there are certainly people who may need to
hear that they aren’t quite as important as they might think, I believe that the vast
majority of people need to hear (perhaps repeatedly) that we count. We are important,
we can make a difference, and our actions really do impact others, mostly in ways we
can’t know. In Talmud Kiddushin it is written, “The world is judged by its majority, and an
individual [too] is judged by his majority [of deeds]…happy is he for turning the scale
both for himself and the whole world on its merit…” Whatever we do on a micro level is
and has the potential to be reflected in the entire world.
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By Rabbi Anna Boswell-Levy
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The great medieval philosopher, physician, and rabbi Maimonides, in his work, Hilchot
Teshuva/The Laws of Repentance, picks up on this theme. He writes, “Throughout the
entire year, a person should always look at himself as equally balanced between merit
and sin and the world as equally balanced between merit and sin. If he performs one
sin, he tips the balance and that of the entire world to the side of guilt and brings
destruction upon himself. [On the other hand,] if he performs one mitzvah, he tips his
balance and that of the entire world to the side of merit and brings deliverance and
salvation to himself and others.” Maimonides’s proof for his assertion is found in
Proverbs 10:25: “A righteous person is the foundation of the world.” That is, one who
acted righteously, tipped the balance of the entire world to merit and saved it.
You might, for example, believe that in this election year your vote doesn’t really matter,
especially when it’s so clear how a few major donors and SuperPACs wield such
disproportionate power. You may be disheartened by the new voter ID laws in
Pennsylvania and many other states that in many ways discourage and even prevent
the poor and the elderly from voting.
Whatever the issue, big or small, external or internal, on Yom Kippur more than any
other day we are called to take personal responsibility for creating hope in our lives and
our world. And the most direct way to hope is through the resolve to act. To stare down
that which feels intractable and identify the actions we can take that will make a
difference.
Yes, it’s overwhelming to consider the systemic roots of these enormous and pervasive
problems. However, we cannot surrender the conviction that individual actions do
indeed make a difference in our world, in ways we often cannot quantify or understand.
We have it in our power ourselves to vote, and to do what we can ensure that others are
able to vote as well. Perhaps someone will see our example and speak to their greatuncle, who is in a nursing home, about whether he has the right ID and the ability to get
out to a polling booth.
As part of Rosh Hashanah services this year, for the Shofarot piece of the liturgy we as
a congregation were encouraged to give examples of notable events that happened this
past year. Howard Blumenthal contributed the following comments:
Perhaps last fall, a result of gang violence in the USA this year, a young Arab
woman's father was killed. She will become a member of the clergy, following in
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the footsteps of Martin Luther King, Jr. She will accomplish three things in her
life: eliminate gang violence as a significant urban problem; eradicate poverty as
a modern American plague; and outlaw nuclear weapons on the global stage.
In India, probably last spring, several students learned about open source
software, and quickly connected with like-minded people around the world. In
time, they will connect those people and encourage the sharing of ideas, and
collaboration on projects that will assure freedom of speech and an equitable
economy for an astonishing number of people in every nation.
Of course, these amazing occurrences haven’t happened yet — but, according to
Howard’s creative mind, the path that makes these things possible has already begun.
Would that we knew, or even sensed, the power or the effect of our actions. What if we
behaved as if our actions we no less critical than those of the High Priest. Like the High
Priest, we cannot let our fear or sense of helplessness stop us from taking action. It
doesn’t have to be grand, but we must begin, we must take small steps and start with
what we think just might be possible for us.
Rabbi Brant Rosen again: “Every opening of a door, every act of peacemaking, every
move we make to heal the world around us has the potential to create a sacred
transformation. They can make a difference in ways we can see readily and in ways we
will never truly know. And lest I forget one more crucial point: such actions have the
potential to transform our own lives as well. Isn’t that what this time of year all about in
the end?”
Let me be clear, what we are to do today on Yom Kippur, is not simply to pray, not just
to repent our litany of sins. No matter what may happen in the world around us, we are
not simply bystanders bearing witness to eternal cycles occurrence and recurrence. We
can break these cycles, we can re-chart our courses, in a myriad of small and not so
small ways. We are here to acknowledge a single truth, that each of us carries the same
potential power of the High Priest.
This Yom Kippur, may we release what no longer serves us, and be strengthened and
inspired to transform the world, starting with our actions, one important step at a time.
Gmar Chatima Tovah.