On Yom Kippur: The Confessional Prayer, or Why Most American Jews are Liberals

Some of my friends here have asked me to write a little something about Yom Kippur; this is my humble attempt to acquiesce.

From Friday night from just before sundown until just after sundown on Saturday night, Jews around the world will be observing Yom Kippur, the "Day of Atonement," when we ask God to pardon us for any sins we may have committed against Him/Her/It over the previous year; by tradition, God judges our fate for the coming year on this day.

Accordingly, Yom Kippur is the holiest day of the year on our calendar; it marks the end of the aseret y'mai t'shuvah, the "ten days of repentance." During these ten days, we are obligated to ask our fellow human beings, both Jewish and not, for forgiveness for any wrongs we may have committed during the previous year. Moreover, merely asking for forgiveness is not good enough. We are obligated to do whatever we can to earn our neighbors' forgiveness, to deserve it. Only then can we face God on the Day of Atonement. Only once we have made every effort to earn forgiveness for the sins we have committed against our fellow human beings are we worthy to ask God to forgive us for sins we have committed against Him/Her/It.

As we pray for God to forgive us, we recite a particular prayer several times on Yom Kippur: the vidui -- the confessional prayer -- portions of which I have reproduced below:

We have trespassed. We have dealt treacherously. We have robbed. We have slandered. We have acted perversely. We have wrought wickedness. We have been presumptuous. We have done violence. We have framed lies. We have counselled evil. We have spoken falsely. We have scoffed. We have revolted. We have provoked. We have rebelled. We have committed iniquity. We have transgressed. We have oppressed. We have been stiff-necked. We have done wickedly. We have corrupted. We have committed abomination. We have gone astray. We have led others astray...

For the sin we have committed before You under compulsion or of our own will,
And for the sin we have committed before You by hardening our hearts;
For the sin we have committed before You unknowingly,
And for the sin we have committed before You with utterance of the lips;
For the sin we have committed before You by unchastity,
And for the sin we have committed before You openly or secretly;
For the sin we have committed before You knowingly and deceitfully,
And for the sin we have committed before You in speech;
For the sin we have committed before You by wronging our neighbor,
And for the sin we have committed before You by sinful meditation of the heart;
For the sin we have committed before You by association with impurity,
And for the sin we have committed before You by confession of the lips;
For the sin we have committed before You by spurning parents and teachers,
And for the sin we have committed before You in presumption or in error;
For the sin we have committed before You in violence,
And for the sin we have committed before You by profaning Your Name;
For the sin we have committed before You by unclean lips,
And for the sin we have committed before You by impure speech;
For the sin we have committed before You by the evil inclination,
And for the sin we have committed before You wittingly or unwittingly;

For all these, God of forgiveness, forgive us, pardon us, grant us atonement!

For the sin we have committed before You by denying and lying,
And the sin we have committed before You by bribery;
For the sin we have committed before You by scoffing,
And for the sin we have committed before You by slander;
For the sin we have committed before You in commerce,
And for the sin we have committed before You in eating and drinking;
For the sin we have committed before You by demanding usurous interest,
And for the sin we have committed before You by stretching forth the neck in pride;
For the sin we have committed before You by idle gossip,
And for the sin we have committed before You with wanton looks;
For the sin we have committed before You with haughty eyes,
And for the sin we have committed before You by effrontery;

For all these, God of forgiveness, forgive us, pardon us, grant us atonement!

For the sin we have committed before You by casting off the yoke of Your commandments,
And for the sin we have committed before You by contentiousness;
For the sin we have committed before You by ensnaring our neighbor,
And for the sin we have committed before You by envy;
For the sin we have committed before You by levity,
And for the sin we have committed before You by being stiff-necked;
For the sin we have committed before You by running to do evil,
And for the sin we have committed before You by talebearing;
For the sin we have committed before You by vain oaths,
And for the sin we have committed before You by baseless hatred;
For the sin we have committed before You by breach of trust,
And for the sin we have committed before You with confusion of the mind;

For all these, God of forgiveness, forgive us, pardon us, grant us atonement!

Note that all these sins are phrased in the plural form -- we committed them.

But did we? Surely we each committed some of them, but all of them? If we ignore BushCo for the moment, that seems rather unlikely.

But it doesn't matter.

Kol Yisrael arevim zeh ba'zeh.

All of Israel is responsible for one another.

We are obligated to each other. We must care for each other. When one of us is in trouble, we're all in trouble. When one of us needs help, we're all obligated to do what we can to help. And when one of us screws up, we all screw up. Insofar as it is our duty to ensure that every member of our community adheres to a certain code of ethical behavior, when one of us fails, it is partly because the rest of us failed to exercise the necessary and proper oversight.

That's not to say we don't believe in personal responsibility; quite the contrary, we believe that personal responsibility is fundamental to good citizenship. But it's not enough. None of us lives in a vacuum; every action each of us takes has an effect on the people around us, for good or for ill. Personal responsibility therefore demands that we worry about the welfare of our neighbors. It obligates us to help if they are in trouble, to help clean up the mess when they screw up, and to keep them from getting into trouble or screwing up in the first place.

This is why most Americans Jews are liberals. It's hardwired into our religion, our culture, our ethnic history. It's canonized in our liturgy. When we recite the confessional prayer, we do not ask people to stand individually to confess their sins publicly. We stand all together. We confess all together. And we take responsibility, both for ourselves and for each other, all together. This attitude does not lend itself to political conservatism, but it's a perfect match for liberalism.

There's a lesson here, I think, for all liberals, Jewish and not Jewish alike. (It also applies to non-liberals, but at this point, I just assume they're not listening and don't particularly care about all the damage they're doing.) We've had a lot of failures over the past year, and while some people are more responsible than others, none of us is above reproach. For my own part in that, I apologize sincerely. I can only promise that I will try my best to do better in the coming year.

To those of you who will be observing Yom Kippur with me, I wish you a safe, easy, and meaningful fast. And may you be sealed in the Book of Life.