Congregation Netivot Shalom

Atonement and Repentance
Jonathan Heinstein, Yom Kippur morning 5763

What is atonement and why is it necessary? The answer to this question is obscured from our view by the repentance theology central to monotheistic religions, and elaborately developed in Judaism. Repentance is, however, starkly absent from the core of the Torah's historical narrative and its legislation. The Hebrew root, shin-vav-vet, to return, is familiar to us from the word Teshuva. This root is ubiquitous in the first four Biblical books, primarily indicating a reunion with a person, place or object. Its most ambitious meaning is found in Gen. 3.19, 'and to dust you shall return', with a transformation of our biological state. The word gains its ethical connotation of revival only much later under pressure from the prophetic tradition in the land of Israel. The return from exile portrayed in Chapter 30 of Deuteronomy is accompanied by a moral reformation. Yom Kippur, and the atonement it offers, is the original expression of Judaism's aspiration to define and limit the domain of evil. To seek atonement is to seek the resolution of a conflict, to cover or bury it, so that it will no longer contaminate the domain of life.

It is tempting to define the relation between repentance and atonement as one of means and end. In this equation all of the significant work is done in the repentance stage. A successful process of introspection and intervention leads to the repair or control of damage, and ultimately atonement is achieved. Yet the prophets, who spoke so eloquently on behalf of national repentance, did not envision its linkage with atonement. The Palestinian rabbis of the second commonwealth, who personalized repentance and linked it to atonement, nonetheless restricted its efficacy in combating severe transgressions. And the two classic formulations of repentance that I would like to examine, Isaiah's prophecy of consolation contained in the Yom Kippur Haftara and Chapter 4 of Maimoniades' Hilchot Teshuva, present obstacles that may render our efforts at repentance futile.

'Lama tsamnu ve'lo ra'ita, eenenu nafshenu ve'lo tedah': Why did we fast and you did not see? Why did we afflict our being and you did not know? These are the doubts attributed by Isaiah to the leadership of the Judean exiles in Babylon during the sixth century B.C.E. The prophet depicts an outwardly sincere observance of the fast, and their desperate petition for repatriation. Hanoch Albeck supports the conjecture that Isaiah's prophecy was delivered on Yom Kippur of the Jubilee year. The Jubilee, in theory, caused ancestral lands sold by impoverished families to be restored to their original owners. The Jubilee shofar that sounded the completion of a fifty-year cycle also emancipated Jewish slaves as in any other seventh year. This general amnesty was meant to rehabilitate the Israelite social contract. Isaiah demands a repentance on Yom Kippur informed by the spirit of the Jubilee. The mass of Jews, suffering from poverty and degradation after the destruction of the first Temple, prevent the penitence of the aristocracy from being rewarded. Isaiah establishes the imperative: 'u'mibsarcha lo titalam'. You shall not ignore the plight of your own flesh and blood.

Maimonaides outlines twenty-four examples of transgression that prevent Teshuva from taking effect. Foremost among these is conduct by leaders and parents that contributes, directly or indirectly, to the detriment of those in their charge, including friends and even oneself. Another category is alienation, either by adopting an insular approach hostile to the mainstream of Jewish society or by dismissal of criticism or rebuke from the community. Fraud and bribery lead to a chain of events that involve unknown victims, obscuring the criminal's view of the damage, and compromising the ability to repent. Lashon ha'ra is a sin that people take lightly, and even if they recall their own mean-spirited language they may not feel it warrants repentance. Finally there are transgressions of an addictive nature such as anger or the friendship of corrupt individuals. Rambam emphasizes that these flaws ingratiate themselves in us as a second nature, expanding into areas we do not anticipate. Why does the Torah deliver rebuke to the Israelite nation from the mouth of our advocate Moshe Rabenu and praise from the mouth of the Jew-hater Bilaam? The stakes are a great deal higher for rebuke.

If the process of Teshuva was not marred by the same self-deception it attempts to correct, if it more effectively combated the vacillation of our mixed motives, we would see the results in a healthier Jewish society. We would actually become better people. Each year Yom Kippur arrives without regard for the condition our condition is in. The day sets up a siege on our being. Time has suddenly run out, although a day of fasting and affliction stretches ahead of us. The Hebrew root caf-pey-resh, in its core meaning indicates the act of covering, concealing or atoning. Its derivations are used for a variety of tasks, including the 'kofer', a pitch that sealed Noah's ark, and the 'kaporet', the gold slab covering the ark of testimony. A more distant relative is the 'kofer nefesh' the half-shekel poll tax for the sanctuary that acted as both a census marker and a ransom payment against plague. In Gen 32.21 the flocks and gifts presented by Jacob to Esau upon his return to Cannaan are a kind of ransom. He is afraid of his brother's oath of revenge, and attempts to appease him: 'achapra panav bamincha' - I will hide his (angry) face with the gift. Esau's tears and kisses at their reunion, so mistrusted by Jewish tradition, nonetheless mark a cessation of hostilities that began in the womb. In Num 35.33 the issue of pacification of the drive for revenge is again expressed with the root caf-pey-resh. A network of cities of refuge is proposed to end the cycle of revenge killings by protecting the murderers until justice is delivered. 'Ve'la'aretz lo yechupar la'dam asher shupach ba ki im be'dam shofcho', and the land will not be covered, or atoned from the blood shed except by the blood of the one who shed it. When 'goel ha'dam', the clan member assigned to redeem the blood of the murder victim, avenged his death, ancient Israel understood this as an act of 'kapara'. Though the initial victim's family then had both closure and atonement, the land of Israel remained defiled by blood, lacking either.

The Sa'ir La'azazel, the scapegoat led to its death in the wilderness, had a twin brother. The High Priest sacrificed a goat of identical dimensions, appearance and price. This goat was designated as 'korban hata'at la'shem', a sin offering from the Israelite populace to God. The lottery of Yom Kippur sets up two parallel dimensions of potential 'kapara', one for each goat. One animal is sacrificed in the traditional manner and brings atonement for the sins of Israel. A second animal is led by the designated man over the Mount of Olives past ten way stations to a cliff in the Judean desert. There he tumbled the Sa'ir into the ravine, 'ad sh'na'asa evarim evarim', until it was torn limb from limb. This ritual as described in the Yom Kippur reading fails to clarify the precise role played by the Sa'ir La'azazel. In Hilchot Teshuva 1.2 Rambam states categorically: The goat sent to Azazel provides 'kapara' for all transgressions in the Torah, and even without repentance for those not punishable by death or excision. Ramban, in his commentary to Leviticus 16.21-22, supports the opposite claim. When Aaron, or the High Priest in his stead, laid both hands upon the head of the goat and declaimed the 'vidui', the list of the evil committed by the people over the past year, he was simply attaching that evil to the animal's being. Azazel was powerless to grant atonement. The wilderness goat functioned as a beast of burden, symbolically conveying the evil to its final resting place.

Tosefta Yoma 4.9 provides a Rabbinic formulation of the relation between repentance and atonement. Rabbi Ishmael posited four discrete levels to post-Temple atonement. First, transgressions of a minor positive commandment could be atoned for on the spot simply by doing Teshuva at any time. Second, those involving minor Torah prohibitions could be atoned for by the arrival of Yom Kippur as long as Teshuva suspended the penalty until that day. Third, for those deeds involving an excision or death penalty, both Teshuva and Yom Kippur suspend it until sufferings over the course of the following year purged the individual enough for atonement to take effect. Fourth, for those transgressions compounded by a public desecration of Torah principles, the window for atonement shrinks to the day of our death. Teshuva and Yom Kippur begin the atonement, subsequent affliction contributes a piece, and the remainder abides the day of death. The 18th century Rabbi of Sarajevo and Tosefta commentator David Pardo interprets this passage as indicating that the suffering and trauma on the actual day of death, and not death itself, complete the process of atonement.

Isaac Babel's 'How Things Were Done in Odessa' presents a model of atonement we are both drawn to and recoil from. The tale of how Benya Krik, an affable but ruthless Jewish mobster, obtained his moniker 'the king' begins with a protection shakedown at the factory of an affluent Jew. Savka, one of Benya's lieutenants, arrives drunk and late to the factory office. Disoriented by the sight of guns drawn, he shoots and kills the factory clerk. Within 24 hours Benya negotiates a pension for the poor clerk's mother, executes Savka, and arranges an elaborate procession and Jewish funeral for the clerk. Just as the funeral is about to commence, Benya arrives in a flourish, interrupting the Rabbi to deliver this speech:

'Ladies and gentlemen', Benya Krik said. 'Ladies and gentlemen', he said, and the sun stood above his head, like a guard with a rifle. 'You have come to pay your last respects to an honest toiler, who died for a copper half-kopeck. In my own name, and in the name of all those who are not present, I thank you. Ladies and gentlemen! What did our dear Josif see in his life? One big nothing! What did he do for a living? He counted someone else's money. What did he die for? He died for the whole working class. There are men who are already doomed to die, and there are men who have still not begun to live. And suddenly a bullet, flying toward the doomed heart, tears into Josif, when all he has seen is one big nothing. There are men who can drink vodka, and there are men who can't drink vodka but still drink it. The former get pleasure from the agony and joy, and the latter suffer for all those who drink vodka without being able to drink it. Therefore, ladies and gentlemen, after we have prayed for our poor Josif, I ask you to accompany Saveli Butsis, a man unknown to you but already deceased, to his grave.

Babel reveals to us an atonement that completely bypasses repentance. The king of the Odessa mobsters has a conscience but he cannot repent. He is both the cause and the incarnation of evil. Yet his treatment of the murder in this tale has all the marks of atonement. Benya is an unworthy emissary by any standard, but his message is one of reconciliation.

Repentance and atonement overlap because both attempt to repair what is broken, to correct what is mistaken. But there is no atonement without a full redress of wrongs, and in this process we must sacrifice something we value. Atonement cannot be accomplished until compensation has been made, until the loss has been made whole. Our 'cheshbon nefesh', our reckoning on this day is influenced by a host of subjective factors. We can never quite get beyond ourselves and our infatuation with the process of introspection. Teshuva is often about an intermediate stage of changing attitudes and intentions. Yom Kippur sets atonement as its centerpiece. We look upon this world without the cosmetic of our personal hopes and dreams. We encounter the existence of crimes for which atonement is arduous, and those for which there will be no atonement. Our petition for 'mechila' - for clemency, takes on a raw urgency.

We are commanded to afflict our being by fasting and abstaining. But we are also afflicted by what we know about this world and the place of the Jews in it. Our world seems to have an insatiable appetite for conflict and inexhaustible resources to pursue it. We take it personally that Jews are once again the object of demonizing caricature. The murder of innocent Jews is once again a religious act, an act in the service of ideology. Yom Kippur extends its reach to the Jewish collective without nullifying the individual. We can, as a community, create a part of the atonement that we all need. Personally, I have joined a group that will extend moral and financial support to a family in Israel that has been victimized by terror.

A friend of mine, Moti Buhadana, was hospitalized after a heart attack on Shabbat. You may know him as he's part owner of the Oakland Kosher Market on Lakeshore, and a chef and caterer. When we visited him yesterday morning he was playing the host, amusing us despite the gravity of the situation. It was a case of dueling mitzvoth - bikur cholim verses hachnasat orchim. Moti asked me if I had finished my drash, and then later asked me again, as if he didn't believe me. He was correct though, I haven't found a way to finish, so I will simply say something concerning my thoughts. I'll also take a cue from Peggy, who asked what is a stake for us in Yom Kippur. What are the consequences of this day? We have a chance on this day to expand our being, to gain an extra self that is connected with Jews everywhere. Atonement a collective goal…I'm not certain…well…I will just have to end here. (JH sits down. The kahal manages to keep a straight face. WR tells JH: I was with you until you got to the gangster.)