Shabbat Nitzavim

Wednesday, 28 September 2005

Shabbat Nitzavim

We are here today davening together as a community for the last time before we move forward into the year 5766. So perhaps this might seem a little counter intuitive, but I would like us all to cast our minds back, over the last month, of Ellul. I won’t ask for personal confessions, but just for a moment, I’d like you all to have a think back over the last month, of the last year, and what it has contained for you, what stands out, in particular, about Ellul 5765.

Perhaps it was the aftermath of hurricane Katrina
Or perhaps it was an important family event
Perhaps it was the Ashes test

Perhaps it was an illness
Or a recovery
A new beginning
Or an ending

Whatever the last month has brought us, from the extraordinary to the mundane, we take all of these with us into the New Year, and yet we should also be embarking on a process of change and repentance, taking time to consider who we are, and who we would like to be, as we move forward.

So how does Ellul help us to prepare for the experience of the New Year? Last week I was at a wedding class, preparing with Gary and a group of young couples to understand what happens under the chuppah and the Rabbi offered something that fascinated me. Have a look at the phrase Ani ledodi veledodi li. I am my beloved’s and my beloved’s is mine. If we take the first letter of each of the words of the Hebrew phrase we have aleph, lamed, vav, lamed, which spells - ? Ellul!

The connection between the month of Ellul, leading us up to the New Year and Teshuvah, or repentance and return, and the phrase ‘I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine’ has begun to fascinate me over the last week. Why should we be reminded in the month leading up to Rosh Hashanah of our relationships?

Shir ha Shirim, has often been regarded as a metaphor for the love affair between God and Israel; and all of us who have taken Jeremy’s liturgy course will know that there is much in Jewish tradition that explores our relationship to God and the damage we do to that bond. Although we may think of the God of Love as being a Christian notion, we do speak of our special relationship with God, and certainly through the ages have hoped and prayed for God’s love, even if we haven’t always seen it manifesting itself as we might have liked! While Yom Kippur is a day closely linked to death, all the high holy days are also filled with images of love. God will care for us, gather us up, listen to us, love us. Through our teshuvah, our return, our relationship with God is repaired after the mistakes and transgressions of the year. Yom Kippur is, indeed, our day of intimacy with God. Appearing unadorned and un-perfumed, indeed traditionally unwashed, we will come before our maker vulnerable, and without the trappings of modern life to hide behind. By the end of Neilah, as the Gates of Judgment close, we should have had the opportunity to do some real soul searching, and in peeling away our layers of materialism we may allow ourselves to feel God’s closeness to us.

But what does Ellul have to do with all this? Why do we need to have a month to prepare for this time of self examination and intimacy with God? Could a year ever be enough for such a mammoth task which most of us will leave until the period between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, if that! Perhaps Ellul’s anagram doesn’t only refer to our relationship with God, but to our relationships with each other. While we are repenting to God, it is crucial that our relations with one another on earth are repaired. It is not enough to say sorry to God, without dealing, head on, with those we have hurt on earth.

We English often find it very easy to say sorry – we even apologize when it’s not our fault – on the tube, for example, I have been known to apologize to someone who has stepped on MY foot; maybe I’m sorry for being in their way? But when it is so automatic to apologize, does it really fulfill the requirements of Teshuva. The most challenging part of teshuvah isn’t for most of us, I suspect, the fasting, or repenting to God, but simply saying sorry to each other, and meaning it. It is one thing for me to turn to those who love me and apologize for the times they and I both know I was hurtful, spiteful, lazy or nasty. But what about those who I don’t have a close relationship with? Or who I have a damaged relationship with? I can feel remorse, and repent to God for the wrong I may have done them, but without a direct apology to the person, our teshuvah is, traditionally, meaningless. I will openly put my hand up and confess that this is not something I have ever done. Approaching those who we have a difficult relationship with does not come naturally. So no matter how easy we find it to say the word sorry, saying it to those who we need to, and with real remorse, is a tall order.

So why is it required of us? We are all included in today’s Torah portion, along with those who stood at Sinai, and so must all take responsibility for making our journeys through Ellul. We are not expected to be perfect; the Torah does not present for us infallible role models who never make mistakes, but glimpses of real people who don’t always get it right. But perhaps we are expected to learn from our mistakes. If we are to make teshuvah, we must acknowledge that we didn’t necessarily always get it right, and want to change, and perhaps going through the process of apologizing, or maybe even of realizing how hard it is to apologize, we begin to make a change within ourselves. It isn’t easy to apologize, and neither is it easy to change, but as we move into a new year, we must strive for something other than more of the same, unless of course we are all tzaddikim, righteous ones. In Taoist philosophy change is constant, and in today’s world things certainly move at a pace. Technology, medicine, fashion, all change at such a rate that time for reflecting upon our own change is rare. With an ideal to apologize in place, we are encouraged to take the time to really reflect on our own actions, and the effects they have on others.

There are two distinct relationships in Judaism: person to person and person to God. To atone for deeds committed against another person, Jewish tradition teaches, you must confront that person directly and apologize. The High Holy Days will address the impact that deed has had on your relationship with God, but without the personal apology, the deed remains uncorrected. Perhaps in taking the month of Ellul to remind ourselves that we wish to be in a loving relationship with both God, and those around us, we take an important piece of rare time to really reflect and in so doing bring change in ourselves, and in our community, closer to our grasp.