Adath Jeshurun

Yom Kip­pur 101

Reprinted with per­mis­sion. For more about Jew­ish hol­i­days and Jew­ish life, visit MyJewishLearning.com.

The cul­mi­na­tion of the Yamim Noraim (Days of Awe) is the fast day of Yom Kip­pur (The Day of Atone­ment). This is the day at the con­clu­sion of which, accord­ing to tra­di­tion, God seals the Books of Life and Death for the com­ing year. The day is devoted to com­mu­nal repen­tance for sins com­mit­ted over the course of the pre­vi­ous year. Because of the nature of Yom Kip­pur and its asso­ci­ated rit­u­als, it is the most solemn day in the Jew­ish calendar.

His­tory

A rit­ual for the expi­a­tion of sins was in exis­tence already dur­ing bib­li­cal times. How­ever, it was only dur­ing the Sec­ond Tem­ple Period that Yom Kip­pur assumed cen­tral impor­tance as a day of mourn­ing and absten­tion. By the Rab­binic Period, it had become the most impor­tant day in the Jew­ish litur­gi­cal cal­en­dar, an impor­tance that the day has retained until the mod­ern period.

At Home

Yom Kip­pur is the day on which we are instructed to divorce our­selves as com­pletely as humanly pos­si­ble from the mun­dane world in which we live, in order to devote our­selves with all our hearts and minds to our rela­tion­ship with the Divine. Fast­ing is the most wide­spread man­i­fes­ta­tion of this devo­tion. Other exam­ples include: refrain­ing from wash­ing, sex­ual rela­tions, and the wear­ing of leather (a sign of lux­ury in ear­lier times). It is tra­di­tional to dress in white on this day, sym­bol­iz­ing per­sonal purity. Because of this and the desire to avoid leather, many Jews wear white ath­letic shoes on Yom Kippur.

In the Community

The liturgy of Yom Kip­pur is com­pletely cen­tered in the syn­a­gogue. It is tra­di­tional to wear a tal­lit, or prayer-shawl, at all times in the syn­a­gogue on Yom Kip­pur; this is the only time dur­ing the year when the tal­lit is worn in the evening. There are more and longer ser­vices on this day than any other in the Jew­ish cal­en­dar. Yom Kip­pur is ush­ered in while it is still light out with a pow­er­ful and ancient prayer called Kol Nidrei (All Vows), in which the con­gre­ga­tion asks that all vows made under duress dur­ing the com­ing year may be con­sid­ered null and void before God. In addi­tion to the three daily ser­vices of Maariv (evening ser­vice), Sha­harit (morn­ing ser­vices), and Min­hah (after­noon ser­vice), the Yom Kip­pur liturgy adds a spe­cial Musaf (addi­tional) ser­vice. On Yom Kip­pur, Yizkor, the memo­r­ial ser­vice, is recited, as is the Avo­dah, a sym­bolic reen­act­ment of the ancient priestly rit­ual for Yom Kip­pur. Dur­ing the course of the hol­i­day, a major com­po­nent of the liturgy is the repeated com­mu­nal con­fes­sion of sins, the Vid­dui. The day closes with a unique and emo­tion­ally pow­er­ful ser­vice called Neilah, dur­ing which the liturgy imag­ines the gates of heaven clos­ing at the end of the High Hol­i­day period. Neilah, dur­ing which it is tra­di­tional to stand since the ark is opened, ends with a long blast of the sho­far or ram’s horn, under­stood by many as sig­ni­fy­ing God’s redemp­tive act in answer to true repentance.

The­ol­ogy and Themes

The over­ar­ch­ing theme of Yom Kip­pur is repen­tance. Dur­ing the hol­i­day all thoughts are sup­posed to be cen­tered on this theme. From Kol Nidrei to the repeated Vid­dui to Neilah, the day revolves around the theme of com­mu­nal repen­tance for sins com­mit­ted dur­ing the past year, in order that both the com­mu­nity and the indi­vid­ual be inscribed in the Book of Life for the com­ing year.