I would love to spend Yom Kippur in the woods, every year I have the same debate and every year my yetzer tov or yiras shamayim takes the form of “dude are you f–cking nuts” and I shoot down the idea of backpacking to a beautiful glacial cirque in the central Sierra, setting up camp and conversing with the lord for a full day in silence with no distractions but his wonderful creations.
I just don’t like doing teshuvah in shul with people around, I myself feel like a voyeur on Yom Kippur watching everyone crying and wondering what on earth they did so wrong that they would be willing to look like idiots in shul. Then I wonder if they are really crying, or show off crying to convince the rabbi that they are frummer than they are. Either way, my teshuvah is private, I love to talk and yell at God and at myself – but it’s really not a shul thing, especially because I have a terrible potty mouth when I talk with and do teshuvah to the Lord.
For instance this past Rosh Hashanah kind of sucked, sure the food was real nice, shared some super good wine with peeps and wondered about my departure from this lovely community due to work, but the overall repenting and shul experience sucked. The first day for me was just one long cynical commentary about how this is all so dumb, the second day I went to the San Jose sephardic minyan and the personal musaf was so long that I skipped half the thing because there was only so much abstract God praising I could do.
Then I decided to skip shul on Friday night, I was all shuled out and you know what happened? I cried my freaking brains out and wondered about life and all of my wrongdoings and all of the good shit that’s been happening that I don’t want to stop and of course every time I have one of these sessions I have to throw in a little skeptics rant about how crazy all this stuff is and how it’s nuts and how we’re going to die and see we were all wrong and what a waste that is. Anyway, the point is that I basically pissed away the whole Rosh Hashanah only to do my little intense prayer session on my front lawn during kabalas shabbos – yechidus always works better for me and here was the proof – so, nu why don’t you go to the woods for yom kippur?
Why shouldn’t I go to the woods for Yom Kippur? My davening will sure as hell be better, I wouldn’t have to sit through any more dull downed mussar shiurim or aliyah appeals, I won;t sit around and disturb people’s davening with my frivolous talk, I won;t sit around trying to see if there are any hotties on the other side of the mechitza and I won’t have anyone but God to hear my teshuvah. Of course I won’t go through it, I’ll think about what a good idea it would be to be poiking my head out of my tent watching sunrise while sayuing tehillim from 12,000 feet atop some ridge looking out onto the granite peaks of the Sierra, but is this what God wants. I always figured he wanted me to be in a minyan regardless, to suffer through it and to try and find meaning where I don’t. I stopped trying to actually say the words long ago, I clop my chest and do that whole thing, but rarely do I follow along in other parts. Instead, I read mussar seforim or gadol biographies and try to drift out of the shul to some beautiful place in my mind where I feel I have to give thanks and apologize for the shit I’ve done in the past year.
Ironically, the more skeptical of Judaism and religion I get, the more I can give in to teshuvah, because I start to look inward and the things I am trying to change are universal things which every person should try and change. I used to sit around and do teshuvajh for wasting seed, not washing negel vaaser and forgetting to bench, instead my teshuvah is much grander in my mind – I’m trying to change the way I feel and think. I’m trying to judge others favorably and use my powers for good (as hard as that may be) I am trying to never have a temper, never get angry and appreciate the abundance in my life of all that is good. The teshuvah has transformed me to focus on the good, I’m at the point where teshuvah is more about a device to remind me that it all can be taken away, rather than a clutch to use when shit doesn’t go your way. I’ve always felt that turning to God when it was going bad was pretty lowly when you retreated from him the second things went good – I’ve taken the opposite route, sure when it’s going bad it sucks. But for me, the good is scary, because when the good suddenly turns to bad it changes everything – so in my mind I like to give thanks for both and repent for both.
Jeez, Hesh, another one of your post holiday crazy rants about the inspiration, but really this is just my plead for inspiration when shul, organized religion and community cannot provide those tools – it’s all in the head man and I didn;t even smoke this past Rosh Hashanah.
Find more Yom Kippur rants on 4torah.com
Thanks Hesh,
Your description of Tshuva is an opportunity to look inward and concentrate on what’s really important may be the best Mussar Shmoze I’ve heard in ages.
Hope that you do get the guts to spend YK on a hilltop alone somewhere, sounds like a great idea, but why not compromize, get a few friends together and make a minyan out in nature somewhere. That way you can still do the Jewish stuff (minus the stuffy shul and long drasha) and still spend time alone with the Big Guy Upstairs.
We’re actually doing something similar and having YK on a hilltop with a very intimate few this year. People really liked the Rosh Hashanah version. I missed seeing my friends from shul but it definitely felt different. Quieter for sure and more focused. I’m sure you have two handfuls of friends who would love to join you and it honestly wasn’t too hard apparently to put this hilltop, outdoorsy minyan together.
I heard shofar in a shul and duvened in the woods both days.
Heshy, the point is to make teshuvah. If you can do that better in the middle of nowhere without distractions to get between your soul and your Maker is that such a bad thing?
No, the on Yom Kippur the point is to do teshuva WITH your community. As a community we recite viduy listing all the possible sins and asking for forgiveness. If you can’t be in shul because you are sick, you are supposed to be at home in bed. I will go to Kol Nidre for annulment of vows and then go to shul in the morning if I can. I will definitely be there for Neliah when the gates close.
If someone wants to “do their own thing” in the woods, that’s there business, however, it’s not normative Jewish practice.
If your a slow-moe davening BT, like me, your likely to be 20 or so pages behind everyone else. So that kind of does it for the “as a community” stuff for me.
I am a slow davener, and if necessary, I pray in English.
I have had to spend YK in bed for many years off and on. It’s really difficult. Because despite being like Heshy and feeling that I can really only talk to G-d in private–and hey, when there aren’t a bunch of people around me chattering or asking me questions while I’ davening–it feels REALLY, REALLY lonely to be cut off so often from the community because of illness. Though, hearing the shofar or having the megillah read to me alone has been very moving.
This year, I found out that a local family who is experiencing illness is having a minyan brought to them because they couldn’t otherwise attend shul. I think because I’m a woman and because my illness is chronic, I couldn’t get that kinda love in my new community but it gave me something to think about.
I always figured he wanted me to be in a minyan regardless, to suffer through it and to try and find meaning where I don’t.
Did God ever say anything about a minyan? Did God ever say anything about suffering through it?
From: http://www.cogasoc.org/holidays/yom_kippur.html
Yom Kippur is mentioned several times in the Torah. Initially it occurs in Leviticus 16:29-34. In this reference, the Children of Israel afflict their souls while the priest makes an atonement for them for the sins they have committed. In Leviticus 23:27-32, Yom Kippur, along with several other feasts, is commanded by God to be kept by Moses and the Children of Israel. Yom Kippur in this reference is designated as a holy convocation and a day of atonement before the Lord. It is a time when Israelites afflict their souls and make an offering unto the Lord. The final time that Yom Kippur explicitly is mentioned in the Torah is in Numbers 29:7-11. In this reference, Yom Kippur once again is designated as a holy convocation and time of afflicting souls. Outside of these references, there are no other explicit references to Yom Kippur in the Bible.
Note: Of course, that’s assuming you believe the Torah was given by G-d, which I do.
You linked to a “Hebrew Israelite” site: FAIL
I didn’t know that I posted from a Hebrew Israelite site. However, are you saying the citations are wrong?
I remember reading the same from my Orthodox Stone Chumash.
apologizing for the typos.
If someone wants to “do their own thing” in the woods, that’s there business, however, it’s not normative Jewish practice.
So, big deal. Do what you’ve got to do. Go to the woods. Go. To. The. Woods. Do it for all of us who want to but don’t want to be the first.
I hereby officially make you a Breslover. You now have permission to go to the woods and cry out to God through intense hitbodedut.
Consider that some of the people beating their breasts are feeling responsibility for all of klal yisroel – vidui is for everyone. So Yom Kippur is a good day to feel responsible for not improving the world around me, to consider how best to take active responsibility for all those other Jews.
It sounds like a great idea. You should definitely do it.
I want to know if you’re moving. You mentioned something taking you from that community.
If you are being called to the woods, go to the woods! Maybe G-d’s got something important to tell you. Where would we be if Moshe stayed home?
Get thee to a mountain top, brother!
We promise not to build a golden cyber calf on your blog while you’re gone…
Maybe you promise.
Ok. Fine. I promise.
@OTDwannab – Remember that calf thing didn’t end well. Fourty years in the desert, not to mention the invention of Goldschläger…
Does that Outdoor Woodsy rabbi and his program do a YK minyan? Yeah, I know that gives you little to go on but someone was just telling me that he was a rabbi who does wilderness programs for all sorts of Jews.
Thats still one of the most hilarious cards I’ve ever seen.
Going to the woods feels to me like nature worship. It borders on pantheism.
You could just as easily say that praying in a shul or perhaps even the Bet HaMikdash is architecture worship.
No, you couldn’t. Hesh’s description of davenning was *all about* nature. People don’t find profound inspiration from the wood panelling and florescent lights of shul. Instead, they are forced to look inward for spiritual satisfaction.
And at least a building is something *people* make for the glory of G-d. Communing with nature is far more ambivalent.
Sorry – the right word is ambiguous.
So why wouldn’t being in Nature which was created by G-d trump anything created by humans? Plus I think the argument could be made for avodah zarah in regards to how the sefer Torah is treated: the tzibur prays toward the place where its kept, you rise when it is taken out, people kiss it, you don’t turn your back on it, etc. Looking from the outside, I can totally see how someone would think the sefer Torah was a physical stand-in for G-d.
If you want to daven w/ others in Nature, perhaps one year you could go out to Colorado and try this:
http://www.adventurerabbi.org/congregation/Yom_Kippur_jewish_high_holidays_2011.htm
But nobody who goes to shul thinks so. We respect the Torah because it is G-d’s Word, accessible to us.
Seeing beauty in nature often confuses the mind. Nature is beautiful because it reflects the choices made by its Creator. But when people appreciate natural beauty, they often assume that this means that nature is also good, which it most assuredly is not. Nature cares not one whit whether you live or die.
Goodness is reserved for those who consciously make the right choices. And that means choosing to follow G-d’s word as given to us in the Torah.
A fair point that it feels that way to you, but I think this whole post rests on the argument of: is it more important to do what you can to really feel that connection, or is it more important follow the troops. Of course, it’s not necessarily a binary question; Heshy could spend time in schul and be social, and also spend time in the woods where he feels like he can really reach out.
I remember when I was in college, and I had a single. Many nights, before I went to sleep, I spent just a few minutes talking to G-D. Maybe I was really just talking to myself, but it made that connection for me, that sense of the numinous. And I think that just because people HAVE gone to schul in the past, doesn’t mean that it’s right for everyone all the time.
Go for a hike, Heshy… just don’t be like that guy in 127 Hours, and go shlepping up rocks and cutting off limbs. It would be harder to be funny when you’re typing with only your left pinkie.
I dunno. I laughed.
Hey-
I hear what you are saying….for those of you who still want to go to shul this Yom Kippur and looking for afordable, free, dynamic choices, visit http://www.nomembershiprequired.com and find a shul in your city.
Have you ever considered that people might be crying because they’re STARVING on yom kippur?
No joke, feeling that miserable helps prayer. On Rosh Hashanah , you start pleading with Gd that if he plans on killing you that year, it should be before Yom Kippur, so you don’t have to suffer through more shul on Yom Kippur. Then you start wondering if the other people around you are as depressed and fidgety, so you pray that, if they can afford it, they should have a baby by next year so at least the wife can escape. This leads you to daven for those in the shidduch crises- they have no socially acceptable excuse to miss shul. While you’re on the subject, you hope that there’s going to be a simcha on some school day so you can take off a day. This leads to prayers about school, and how you hope that the teacher whose class you’re failing’s daughter has quadruplets in Israel, or at least another part of the country. Your stomach amps up it’s begging, so you start raving about what amazing mitzvos everyone who makes food you like has, so give them a good year….
You get the picture
This may be one of the funniest posts on this site I have ever read. Yasher Koach!
(blushing) thanks
There is a communal performative aspect to being in shul. Other people need you there to be their community. The people who know you feel more connected to the kahal (and therefore, arguably, closer to Jewish tradition and HaShem). They need your hugs and hangshaking and well-wishing for a good year (or on other days a gut yontif or gut shobbas) so they feel like a part of the community, and they want to feel that you need their presence too.
And, some of those people are crying because it’s the first (or maybe the 2nd or even the 30th) YK following the death of a parent, sibling, spouse, or child, and the holiday, especially yizkor, brings up those feelings of loss.
You’re part of Am Yisrael, so do your “civic” duty and daven with your tribe. YK is not just about individual forgiveness; it’s about forgiveness at the level of peoplehood as well.
Hope that helps your kavanah for Yom Kippur. G’mar hatimah tovah.
That…was beautifully said.