Page 38 - HaMizrachi02-04( #12)2019RoshHaShanaYomKippurUSA

Rabbi Stewart Weiss

YOM KIPPUR

The Ultimate Near-Death Experience

ne of the most powerful Then there is the beautiful custom to light a yahrzeit candle – for our-
portions of the Yom Kippur of asking mechila (forgiveness) from selves! – on Yom Kippur, as well as
Otefillah is the Avoda, the everyone we know, akin to a person for our loved ones.
intricate ceremony performed by who fears his life is slipping away
the Kohen Gadol in order to effect and wants to make amends, to clear But there is more. Each of our fore-
kapara (forgiveness) for the entire his conscience before he dies, so he fathers had his own near-death
nation. doesn’t leave this world with any experience. Avraham was thrown
bad karma. into a fiery furnace by the evil
A dramatic adjunct to the Avoda is Nimrod; Yitzchak, at the akeida, felt
the Eleh Ezkerah or ‘martyrology;’ Men immerse in a mikvah on erev the knife pressed upon his throat;
it is read just twice each year, on Yom Kippur. Part of this is con- Ya’akov wrestled with the angel sent
Tisha B’Av and on Yom Kippur. The nected to the concept of purity, as to kill him. All these perilous events
account of the murder of 10 of the we express our desire to be spiritu- played a crucial part in shaping the
greatest Sages in Jewish history at ally clean. But the act of dunking in lives of our patriarchs and implant-
the hands of the Romans is a grip- the mikvah is deeper; it is literally ing in our Jewish DNA the traits of
ping account of the terror that has a tahara for us – a ritual washing courage, mesirat nefesh and faith.
all too often struck our nation. But of the body, like that which takes
what is it doing in the middle of the place before our funeral! Similarly, Yom Kippur is a near-death expe-
Avoda, a ceremony so uplifting and visiting the graves of tzadikim rience for each and every one of us,
charged with G-dliness and opti- before Yom Kippur is meant to be a granting us the moment of decision
mism? Why cast us into despair, sobering experience, prompting us when we glimpse what is real and
particularly after the exuberant, to think: If a tzadik could die, then what is important, what is illusory
joyous song of “Mareh Kohen?!” certainly we can too! and what is trivial.
Would Yizkor not have been a more
appropriate place for it? And the white kittel worn through- This is the idea behind Eleh
out Yom Kippur? It approximates Ezkerah. As we relive the demise
The classic answer is that the death the tachrichim (burial shrouds) we of the Sages, we ask ourselves: if
of the righteous is in itself a form of will someday wear on our final jour- indeed I am to imminently die,
atonement, as potent as the Kohen ney to the Olam HaEmet (World of what will my legacy be? How will I
Gadol’s prayers. But I want to sug- Truth) and serves to remind us that be remembered by my family, my
gest that the Eleh Ezkara is just one life is finite and fleeting. community, my G-d? Will my name
more component of a pervasive Yom long be spoken of with pride, or will
Kippur theme: the near-death expe- I suggest this is also the rationale it soon be forgotten? Will I simply
rience. Consider all the things we do behind the suspension of our phys- fade away, or will I ultimately enter
for Yom Kippur that focus on our ical and sensual component during the holy place, bathed in white light,
mortality: Yom Kippur. All those things which
make us ‘alive’ – food, drink, sexual like the Kohen Gadol in the Avoda?
Before Yom Kippur, we perform relations – are temporarily put on
kaparot, originally done with a hold. For this one day, we are in The choice, as always, is ours.
chicken. Whatever else you may say a ‘twilight’ zone between life and
about it, the clear message being death; still alive, technically, yet
sent is that one minute you are purposely placing ourselves in a
holding a live, squawking, jumping semi, death-like state so that we can
bird, and the next second it lies life- truly discover the meaning of life.
less. And you ponder how short life Rabbi Stewart Weiss is Director of the
can be, and how quick the end can And we might add the stunning Jewish Outreach Center of Ra’anana
come; for a chicken – and for you. minhag cited in the Shulchan Aruch jocmtv@netvision.net.il

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