Image: A waning moon. Photo by Thomas Bresson.
Selichot is a service with which we prepare for the High Holy Days season.
1. WHAT IS SELICHOT? Loosely translated, it means “Please forgive.” The word has two meanings at this time of year: (1) prayers asking God’s forgiveness for misdeeds and (2) a service of such prayers, usually on the evening of the last Saturday before Rosh HaShanah.
2. WHAT HAPPENS AT THE SERVICE? The Selichot service marks the beginning of the High Holy Day season. While individuals may have been observing Elul, this is the point at which we see big changes in the synagogue. Torah covers are changed from the regular covers to white ones. The clergy may begin wearing white robes. The music and the tunes of the prayers change from the familiar tunes to the High Holy Day tunes. We read lists of sins (vidui) that individuals or the whole community may have committed.
3. WHAT ARE HIGH HOLY DAY TUNES? For a taste of the High Holy Day nusach [tune], listen to this playlist of melodies assembled by Rabbi Ahuva Zaches. It’s particularly nice because it shows you the words while you learn the tunes, and because it is so simply done that you can really hear the melodies.
4. WHY READ LISTS OF SINS, ESPECIALLY IF THEY AREN’T MY SINS? First, we are fallible human beings, and it is easy to forget things, especially things we do not want to remember. Going over a list can disturb the memory and the heart. Secondly, we approach the High Holy Days both as individuals and as a community, responsible for one another. My neighbors and I are responsible for each other’s well-being, and so their sins affect me. Finally, some sins are communal: for instance, we may talk about “the poor” and the need to “love the stranger” but what action have we as a community actually taken? Are we a community who fosters sinful behavior such as gossip? The lists bring up those questions as well.
5. WHY ALL THIS FOCUS ON SIN? When we sin — do things that damage relationships, do harm to the world or ourselves — our actions have consequences. When we pray for mercy, we are praying that those consequences will be light. However, wishing alone won’t do the job — we have to take responsibility for our deeds, and take action to minimize the damage we have done. That’s teshuvah, or repentance. All the sins listed in the vidui [list of sins] are behaviors that will have bad consequences if left unchecked. If we have done any of those things, we need to take responsibility and take action to change our behavior in the future. Ideally, this is more than “resolving to do better” – it involves an action plan.
6. WHY IS THE SERVICE HELD AT NIGHT? In some communities, Selichot may be a midnight or late night service. Traditionally, the hours between nightfall and midnight are hours of din, of stern justice, but the hours after midnight are a time when the presence of God is gentler. We are asking for mercy in these prayers, so we say them late at night. (This has to do with the darkness, which will begin to lift towards morning.) In more modern terms, it gives a very solemn feel to the service, and breaks us out of our usual routine, which is a way of saying, “Look out! The High Holy Days are almost here!”
6. WHAT IF I DON’T BELIEVE IN GOD? Even if we don’t believe in God, we need to deal with things we have done. Whatever is your highest ideal, focus on that and substitute it for the God-language.
7. WHAT IF I USUALLY FIND SERVICES BORING? Selichot is a different kind of service, wherever it is held. It is usually not a long service. You will get an introduction to High Holy Days music. But more than anything else, it is a service to get us ready to change our ways for the better. Also — added bonus! — if you are not going to be able to go to the High Holy Day services for some reason, this is a small taste of them that does not require tickets.
L’Shana Tova Umetuka! I wish you a good and a sweet New Year!
I wondered today whether or not it is appropriate to tell the party you have forgiven them? Is it really necessary if G-d knows you forgive them? What if a person thinks they did no wrong? And, telling them you forgive them has the possibility to inflame the disagreement again?
If the person hasn’t made their own teshuvah, then you are under no obligation to tell them that you forgive them. In a case like that, the benefit of the forgiveness is that you are no longer carrying the anger. On the other hand, if someone apologizes and makes teshuvah, we must forgive and express that forgiveness. (Forgiveness does not mean that we are required to make ourselves vulnerable to future injury, by the way. If the person is sorry but not trustworthy, it is sufficient to accept the apology and stay far away from them in future.)
If the person thinks they did no wrong, we are not obligated to forgive. However, carrying anger or grudges is a miserable business.
Who forgives God for all the genocide, death, torture and suffering he committed and commanded? Your God’s a douche bag.
Joe, I get it: you are angry. I don’t know what you personally have suffered. There is a long tradition in Judaism for holding God responsible for “acts of God” and for failure to intervene in human disasters – a group of Jews in a concentration camp in the 1940’s once actually put God on trial and convicted him of crimes. So there is precedent.
So there’s that: when I lose someone I love, I can be and sometimes am angry at God. There’s a whole book of the Bible, titled Lamentations, that is basically a rant, pointing out to God the terrible carnage in the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 BCE.
People who believe themselves commanded to do terrible things to other human beings are misreading scripture, in my opinion. The whole body of Torah argues for compassion towards other human beings. The arc of development of Torah (I am a Reform rabbi, I believe that we live in history and that we are still in the process of understanding Torah) points towards justice, to borrow an eloquent phrase from Martin Luther King. The rabbis who advocated the murder of Yitzhak Rabin were way out of line and NOT teaching Torah, for example.
I believe that we – all human beings, not just Jews – can be God’s hands in the world. If we are mean, then we express meanness. But I believe there is more to us than meanness. Torah points us (and maybe points God) to a ideal of justice and peace.
Enough about what I think – what’s going on with you? Can you say more about your belief that God is a douche?