Don’t Change/Surely Change (Ha-Azinu & Yom Kippur)

I got some important messages yesterday from Yom Kippur.


I spent the day at home, with services coming through livestream.


As much as I wanted so badly to be in community with friends, my head was very sharply telling me, “No!” (migraine)


On the flip side, despite the migraine, I got up in the morning, showered, and dressed all in white, like I was going to synagogue.


I sank down onto the living room floor, and into the cocoon of my tallis/prayer shawl, which I sometimes think of as “God’s wings” holding me, to pray/daven and try to be cleansed.


The first part of the message I got was about Azazel.


This reading from Leviticus is where we get the idea of the “scapegoat.” This was a special ritual during Temple times to send a goat out into the desert to repent for our sins on Yom Kippur—to take on the responsibility for us--and thus cleanse us of our sins without us having to do much of anything.


During Yom Kippur services, the prayer leader does some of the pleading for us. But we’re supposed to join in as well, in a serious way, taking responsibility for ourselves.


We ask forgiveness for the ways we have wronged, and ways we have hurt each other.


Because when we hurt another, it has long, and wide-reaching repercussions.


I ask, who do we each blame when we don’t want to take responsibility for our own actions—or even our feelings and thoughts?


To take this further; when we are the people hurt by others, do we allow ourselves to feel whatever we feel for as long as we feel it—because hurts have long, wide-reaching repercussions?


And do we take responsibility for working through these feelings, so we can be cleansed of them?


Or do we tell ourselves it’s time to get over it because, "That was a long time ago”?


How harsh is our voice to ourselves?

Another message I got was from two poems by the famous Israeli poet, Yehuda Amichai, about his parents.


His mother “was a prophet” without knowing it.


She brought the voice of love and support through harsh judgement, and her many “little predictions came together in one big prophecy that will last until the Vision of the End of Days,” says Yehuda Amichai.

His father was the softer voice of love.

According to Amichai, His father was “God,” who gave him the eleventh and twelfth commandments:


“Don’t change.”


And, “You must surely change.”

On Yom Kippur, we face our own death, thinking of how we would like to be remembered, and we remember those who have died—the harsh and the kind voices that gave us love, withdrew it—or never gave it at all.


On Yom Kippur, we also repeatedly recite the thirteen attributes of God as stated in Exodus: compassionate, gracious, slow to anger…


Yet, as we come to the end of the year’s Torah cycle, these attributes couldn’t seem farther from the truth as represented by Moses.


The parsha Ha-Azinu begins with Moses calling out:

הַאֲזִ֥ינוּ הַשָּׁמַ֖יִם וַאֲדַבֵּ֑רָה וְתִשְׁמַ֥ע הָאָ֖רֶץ אִמְרֵי־פִֽ’׃

Ha-Azinu Ha-shamayim va’adabeira v’timshma ha’aretz imrei’fi:

Give ear, O heavens, and I will speak; let the Earth hear the words I utter!”

Moses communicates his own and God’s love for the Israelites—but unfortunately, with his harsh voice.


And what follows is a poem that comes out more like damnation (remember last week, when God told Moses to write down a poem?) than love and blessing.


It’s a poem that repeats all the mistakes we’ve made as a people—yet God caught us under God’s wings each time.


On Yom Kippur, we stated our shortcomings repeatedly throughout the day.


We called out, and begged forgiveness—for what we have done to each other—and the Earth (prayers do get updated!)


According to our tradition, we have been cleansed. And I actually did feel cleansed after all that calling out and begging.


But that’s only for today.


Going forward, we must keep up the work—of awareness, so we don’t continue to hurt other.


Going forward, we need to keep up the work of fighting for justice—for people, animals, and the Earth, which only has so much forgiveness in her; the harm we have caused has had far-reaching repercussions.


As a species, we need to preserve the beauty and the health of the world we live in. (Don’t change.)


As individuals, we need to stay grounded in who we are, appreciating our own particular gifts and speaking to ourselves in a kind voice. (Don’t change.)


And we also must evolve in the ways we move in the world, becoming kinder to all beings, even those we disagree with. (Surely change.)


Each one of us. And all of us together.


Don’t change. Surely Change.


Because we don’t want the prophecy of the End of Days to be one of death and destruction on Earth.


The End of Days should be a time when we bring Mashiach/the Messiah into the world through our own actions--taking responsibility.


And as we continue to stumble as a species and as a world, let us make the intention to be the wings of God that catch each other.


May the Heavens and the Earth hear us.

And say Amen.