Guest rambler, Yitty Koval
Will You Make the Days or Lose Them?
Here it is. The year 5780. A clean slate, a fresh calendar, an open horizon. The months of Elul and Tishrei hold a dichotomy of sorts: joyous yet weighty, solemn yet not quite sad.
For most of my teenage years, a quiet, persistent feeling of overwhelm accompanied the arrival of the month of Tishrei. The concepts of yir’as Hashem (awe of God) and ahavas Hashem (love of God) can be hard to hold at the same time. I know that God will always love me, His daughter, just the way I am. And at the same time, I feel a calling to push myself, to accept new and improved spiritual habits into my daily life.
Then I traveled to Israel for seminary, and stayed for a second year too. Experiencing the High Holidays in Jerusalem, Israel was pretty high up there on the list of the most spiritual, surreal moments among the two years which I was blessed to study in Jerusalem.
A vivid memory from Yom Kippur 5777 is strongly embedded in my mind. It was a month after I’d arrived in Israel, and I was experiencing a bit of a culture shock. In the space of three weeks, I’d gone from summer in suburban America to High Holidays at my aunt and uncle’s synagogue in Jerusalem.
I’ll never forget the moment that Yom Kippur eve when I stepped onto the women’s balcony at the largest, fullest synagogue I’d ever been at for High Holidays. The synagogue was filled with religious Jews, immersed in prayer and reaching for tissues every few minutes.
It wasn’t an experience that spoke to my soul in the deepest way; I couldn’t hear or see much and by the end of the Mussaf service, I felt distraught. It was as though I was an outsider looking in, unable to break through the wall to reach connection on the other side. To quote from the Broadway musical Dear Evan Hansen: “I'm tap, tap, tapping on the glass/Waving through a window.”
What was wrong with me? Why couldn’t I feel and understand the yoke of the most important, serious day of the year?
Fast-forward a few hours later. I was trudging up the steep hill of Bar Ilan Street heading back to my dorm, weak from fasting. It was late afternoon and the sun was shining brightly on the quiet street. A couple of Chasidim, decked in pure-white kittels (the traditional long white jackets worn on Yom Kippur), were walking down a nearby street not far from me.
I reached the top of the hill, just a few minutes away from my dorm where I hoped to rest for a couple hours before the Neilah service. There was a small staircase with an awning nearby, and I sat, closed my eyes, and paused to catch my breath.
And it was in that moment, in the holiest city in the world, on the holiest day of the year, in the waning hours of Yom Kippur - I was overcome with the spirit of the day. It wasn’t a realization borne of guilt or self-reproach, either. It was as though God was giving me a glimpse into the instinctive love and awe that I’d sensed back in synagogue that morning. I no longer felt like an outsider. Rather, I felt included in the essence of Yom Kippur: the deep, intense love that God has for each and every one of us.
There was a comedian a few decades ago who recalled a disagreement he had with a friend. He told his friend, “I forgive you, forget about it, don’t worry about it. But don’t you forget about it, because I won’t forget about it either.”
As much as we all try to make amends and repair broken relationships in our lives, as mere humans, we’ll never truly forget. But God forgets. He’ll consider our very first inevitable mistake of this new year to be our first mistake ever.
In fact, the Talmud states that if a Jew were to spend Yom Kippur going about his daily routine without acknowledging the holiest day of the year at all - no prayer, fasting, or anything at all - it doesn’t matter. Even if you don’t go through Yom Kippur and all it entails, Yom Kippur will still go through you. Simply living though the day cleanses a Jewish soul and leaves it fresh and new.
The theme of Yom Kippur isn’t to bang on our chests and acknowledge our sins. That stuff is definitely important - but it isn’t the most important. What God wants us to know is that even a kernel of a desire to connect is powerful enough to soar to the heavens and be accepted lovingly by God. As the Talmud states, “Teshuvah miga’as ad kisei hakavod.” Sincere teshuvah, a real desire to return to our relationship with God, leads to automatic erasure of any and all sins from the past year.
It was on that incredible Yom Kippur afternoon in Jerusalem three years ago that a part of my soul shifted in my core, subtle yet permanent. An awe-evoking flash of connection to the High Holidays, unlike any understanding I’d had before, passed over me, giving me newfound closeness to Yom Kippur and God himself.
I felt as though God was whispering a personalized Yom Kippur message in my ear: “My daughter, I love you and I only want blessings for you this upcoming year. You are My dear child, and My love for you knows no bounds.”
(Special thanks to Rabbi Sruly Koval, Mrs. Ruchi Koval, Rabbi Yossi Devor, and Mrs. Rochie Berkowitz; as well as my grandparents Jake and Rochel Koval, for being the inspiration behind this article)
Shabbat Shalom,
Yitty Koval
