Page 17 - HaMizrachi Australia Rosh HaShana Yom Kippur 5781
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otherwise law-governed universe,      the work of creation, but we repeat-  you brought healing to a place of
       we are  able to  break the  law –  a   edly disappointed Him. Yet He never   human pain or hope where you
       power that we too often exercise      gives  up.  He  forgives  us  time  and   found despair? You may have been
       with relish.                          again. The real religious mystery of   a success, but have you also been a
                                             Judaism is not our faith in G-d but   blessing?  Have  you  written  other
       This raises an acute theological      G-d’s faith in us.                   people in the Book of Life?
       dilemma. How are we to recon-
       cile G-d’s high hopes for humanity    This is not, as atheists and skeptics   To ask these questions once a year
       with our shabby and threadbare        sometimes claim, a comforting fic-   in the company of others publicly
       moral record? The short answer is     tion but quite the opposite. Juda-   willing to confess their faults, lifted
       forgiveness.                          ism  is  G-d’s  call  to  human  respon-  by the words and music of ancient
                                             sibility, to create  a world that  is  a   prayers, knowing that G-d forgives
       G-d wrote forgiveness into the        worthy home for His presence. That   every failure we acknowledge as a
       script. He always gives us a second   is why Jews are so often to be found   failure and that He has faith in us
       chance, and more. All we have to do   as doctors fighting disease, econ-   even when we lose faith in ourselves,
       is to acknowledge our wrongs, apol-   omists fighting poverty, lawyers     can be a life-changing experience.
       ogize, make amends and resolve to     fighting injustice, teachers fighting   That is when we discover that, even
       behave  better.  And  G-d  forgives.  It   ignorance and therapists fighting   in a  secular  age, G-d is still  there,
       allows us to hold simultaneously to   depression and despair.              open to us whenever we are willing
       the highest moral aspirations while                                        to open ourselves to Him.
       admitting honestly our deepest        Judaism is a supremely activist faith
       moral failings. That is the drama of    for which the greatest religious   Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks is Emeritus
       the Jewish High Holy Days.                     challenge is to heal some   Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Con-
                                                        of  the  wounds  of our   gregations of the Commonwealth.
       At  the  heart  of  this  vision  is              deeply fractured world.
       what the post-Holocaust writer                     As Frankl put it: the
       Viktor Frankl called our “search                    real question is not
       for meaning.” The great institu-                      what do we want
       tions of modernity were not con-                         from life but
       structed  to  provide  meaning.  Sci-                        what does
       ence tells us how the world came                               life want
       to be but not why. Technology gives                            from us.
       us power but cannot tell us how to
       use it. The market gives us choices
       but no guidance as to which choices
       to make. Modern democracies give
       us a maximum of personal freedom
       but a minimum of shared morality.     That is
       You can acknowledge the beauty of     the  ques-
       all these institutions, yet most of us   tion  we  are
       seek something more.                  asked on Rosh Hasha-
                                             nah and Yom Kippur. As we ask
       Meaning comes not from systems        G-d to write us in the Book of Life,
       of thought but from stories, and      He  asks  us,  what  have  you  done
       the Jewish  story is among  the most   with your life thus far? Have
       unusual of all. It tells us that G-d   you thought about others or
       sought to make us His partners in     only about yourself? Have







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