Yom Kipur

 This must be the first Yom Kipur I have experienced that is NOT intolerably hot.  In fact it is downright chilly, and this morning at home for zoom services I turned up the heat.   As I have written before, wherever I am in the world, Yom Kipur is always a scorching day.  I almost wonder whether there is any special meaning behind today.

Yom Kipur for me is the day I made a strange uneven pact with God. I entered into the pact on October 6, 1973.  The war began in Israel at 2.00 p.m.  on Yom Kipur.That was for all of us alive at that time, the day that forever changed our lives.

 In South Africa I fasted on Yom Kipur,  somehow it was sort of exciting, it felt a bit like a challenge, who could fast the longest! Then one year, when I was about 17 years old.  I remember going to synagogue and seeing a vicious, nasty, teacher of mine go up to the bimah and bow before the Ark.   His utter hypocrisy made me think about the meaning of religion and rituals.  I seriously questioned the sincerity behind these rituals when the person who carries them out with such pomp and ceremony is an evil being.  That day I decided from then on I would try to be a good person without religious trappings. I discussed this with my father. I informed him that I would no longer fast. He understood what I was saying. However I continued attending synagogue on the high holidays because it gave me a sense of belonging in South Africa. And, despite my protests, I fasted anyway.

My first Yom Kipur on kibbutz was, to my astonishment, a non event.  No one fasted, everyone worked, as if it were like any other day.  No one even seemed to know that it was a holy day.  Outside of kibbutz Yom Kipur was the only completely quiet day in Israel.  No buses, no cars, nothing. My second Yom Kipur on Ein Dor began in the same non manner, except that this year it began on a Friday night. I attended the disco after dinner , excitedly planned a party for when my husband was to finishe his army service the next week. I had thought he might be back this weekend, but he didn't get leave, so for sure he would be back the following weekend.

Saturday a group of friends sat at the pool,  an entanglement of bodies, slick with water and suntan lotion (NOT SPF),. We made plans for the upcoming event,  spoke of ordinary things, and then came the war.  As I walked back to my room my mind a jumble, my thoughts  turned to God. I asked him (of course he was a him) that if he spared my husband I would begin to fast again   Well, he wasn't saved, but ever since, I have fasted. That is why I call it my uneven pact.  Uneven, but unbroken. And over the many years, I have come to deeply honour and cherish this day.  It is a special day set aside to go deep within, and to be present with something that is greater than us.  And now, the second year of the pandemic, it feels even more important to me. As a congregant leader said this morning, on Zoom, (attended by 390 people ) "we feel you, we see you, we know you are with us.

And so I fast, alone, together with millions of people, and I am comforted.