Yom Kippur

I’m not sure where to begin to describe my Yom Kippur experience. I was going to wait until later this week and write about the Tiyul (hike) we’re going on tomorrow in the same post, but Yom Kippur deserves it’s own. Plus, I’d write way too much later if I waited. I guess I’ll give you the highlights first (I think “highlights” is my favorite word in these posts), and then I’ll tell you how each of the parts inspired me, and probably add some details along the way. I do have to warn you that it’s probably hard to understand without being there. I barely understand. So I may seem a little insane – but that’s the price of publicizing your thoughts where anyone can read them, I guess.

Here’s a sketch: the fast felt supernaturally easy, I prayed for eleven hours straight and barely noticed, we sang all day long, and my eyes may have watered at the end (but don’t tell anyone who doesn’t have the web link)!

Sunday night went by really quickly, possibly because there was only one prayer. I did choose to stay for a class afterward, on the Book of Jonah. It was actually enlightening, which is surprising considering that every single year I’ve learned about why we read that book on Yom Kippur. If anyone’s interested in what I learned, it’s not so hard to explain, but it puts the events of the story in a new light. So let me know. I went to sleep around 10:30, and woke up at 7:15. By 7:30 I was in the synagogue. I should explain what that was like. We rented an auditorium of a nearby Yeshiva because Yom Kippur with HaRova is so inspiring that alumni come back years later with their families to experience it again and again. So on top of the 115 girls in the program this year, we had 70 alumni and 10 teachers, plus about 15 men (Rabbis and husbands of the alumni). It was so interesting to have a mostly all-girls prayer service. There’s something about 200 women’s voices singing out that feels so holy and serene.

There are four different prayers on Yom Kippur, morning prayer, “additional” prayer, afternoon prayer, and closing prayer. Each prayer has similarities, so throughout the day we all became familiar with different tunes that repeated. Some of them felt so meaningful – the words took on new truth when people were singing their hearts out. (Favorites were “G-d, hear our voice”, “in the time of the temple, the high priest was glorious…”, and “return us, G-d, and we will return to you; I still have the melodies ringing in my head.) Anyway, I prayed all day, sitting next to one of my roommates, Karen, from 7:30 am until 6:30 pm, but really it just felt like a single day devoted to self reflection. I was surrounded by other inspired people, and yet it was also just me, myself, and G-d. Of course I felt hungry at times, but there was this supernatural feeling of overcoming physical needs for a day, in almost every way, that being able to spend a day praying and not eating or sleeping or drinking or even using chapstick (that may have been the hardest), that added to my inspiration. Don’t get me wrong, I wouldn’t do it more often than I have to, but it was really special just for that one day.

The Rabbi who lead the final service – during which one pictures the gates of heaven wide open for prayer – wasn’t as big into the tunes as the other cantors had been, but every word he said in Hebrew was spoken with such meaning it might as well have been in English. He got so worked up as we repeated the Attributes of G-d over and over that he actually started sobbing. I’m sure it sounds over the top, but it was so inspiring. When the stars came out and the fast was over, we barely even noticed – in fact we continued singing for a good fifteen minutes past when we could eat, unwilling to return to the real world. But eventually we did, and I went almost immediately to sleep. As for lasting effects of the day, I can’t really tell. I definitely feel more appreciative of the mundane and the spiritual, but it’s an innermost development that I don’t completely understand (and if I did, it probably would be unexplainable). I’d be happy to go into more detail about any part of my experience – just let me know if you’re curious.

As I am still in the real world, I desperately need to pack for the two day hike/trip/tour we’re embarking on early tomorrow morning, so I’ll sign off with this: Yom Kippur affirmed to me that this is the right place for me to be for this year, and I hope I’m successful in conveying my excitement and inspiration to you. Until next time (post scuba-diving and hiking)!

Gabriella