Dear friends,
Yom Kippur is the best.

There isn’t any way that a human being could give this kind of a gift. I am sure that there were many times in your life that you realized that it’s your choice whether to forgive someone who is genuinely wrong, or to hold on to negative feelings. I am also sure that you made the right choice a significant amount of times when you had to choose who to be. You made yourself closer to being the kind of person that you are comfortable living with. On the outside nothing changes. If someone reneged on a loan, you don’t magically have money in your account just because you forgave them. If someone humiliated you by sharing parts of your past that you wanted to keep private, you can’t erase the information that has now been registered forever in the minds of anyone who heard the “news”. 

You, like me and all the rest of us, live in time, and time moves only in one direction, forward. The past is untouchable.

Living in time keeps you stuck in Now. Not only is the past untouchable, it is also imminently forgettable. You unlearn lessons almost as fast as you learn them. The future seems more real than the present at times. I don’t know how many of you are worriers, but those of you who are know what I mean. If you can spend an uneasy night weighing out possible responses to situations that may or may not arise, you have been there. 
Sin flourishes when you forget everything you ever picked up along the way. When you were in pre-school you knew that each person you encounter is a mirror. If you are friendly, he will be too. How come you forgot it when your body language and facial expression told someone you care about that they lost the game? You learned ages ago that you can count on Hashem to make the sun rise in the east and set in the west. How come you found yourself saying things like, “This isn’t going to work. It’s time to daven”, as though putting your trust in Him is a necessary but clearly desperate last resort? 

Shabbos and the holidays let you step back enough to get out of jail. Shabbos tells you that there is an ultimate beginning, and that the first thing that G-d created was the spiritual light that will be revealed in the future. The Torah says that Hashem made it possible for us to measure time by creating the potential for days, months and years, so that we can hold on to the signs and times of meeting that we experienced in the past.

Yom Kippur is an entirely different story. It isn’t about the past. Its message is not “Okay, we can forget that this ever happened.” 

In fact when Hashem forgave us on the very first Yom Kippur, He didn’t say that at all. He still recalls what we did so many years ago, because in so many ways we are scarred by our choices. He said something far more meaningful. “I love you no less. I love you so much, that even this terrible betrayal didn’t change anything”. Only Hashem can erase the past enough to say this with integrity. You will soon be standing before Him and experiencing this great love. He told you how to open yourself to returning to Him. He also told you how to make the most of this sacred time.

One way is by doing something only humans can do. Chazal say that eating the day before Yom Kippur with the intent of glorifying Hashem, is as holy as fast the next day. The Arizal explains that when you eat, make a brachah on the food, what you are doing is making Hashem’s creative presence more concrete in a world that full of concealment. You are undoing the damage that living in the world as it is creates.
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The next day you fast. 
No more dealing with the world and its kaleidoscopic Balagan (an untranslatable Israeli word for something between chaos and mess). You let go of the five types of bonds that hold you down. You go back to being simple. Just the real you, not the body that you wear full time as your best friend and best disguise. You are like the Kohen Gadol who would enter the holiest place on earth with the simplest of all clothing. 
No statement. Just you and your deepest will, which for all of us (believe it or not) is to echo Hashem’s unending love for us. 
No more barriers of yesterday. That’s what tshuvah is all about. 
No more forgetting who you are, or what you want , because you have get to work, or put up supper, or answer the phone. 
No more thinking that the keys to your future are in your hands. 
Just simplicity and purity.

Dear friends,

The Old City is the most beautiful place in the world, at least in my opinion. The dazzling array of people range from the hidden tzadikim who go to the 4:30 Kabbalah minyanim and then disappear into anonymity to the clueless Nigerian tourists, the scene is spectacular. They are all seekers, trying to find their yetzer tov (higher selves).  There is subtle layer of joy that covers everything in the midst of unspeakable destruction that you see wherever you see the ancient stones that once were far more alive than anything you can imagine. 

Bnos Avigail was there for Shabbos.  We stayed in a hotel on Har Tzion.  It felt timeless. Friday night we davened at the Churva. The literal meaning of the name of the largest and most beautiful synagogue in the Old City is ‘the wreck”. It got its name from the many years that it remained half built after the Jordanians left it looking like an amputee whose existence proves human resilience and survival, but nonetheless isn’t whole. Its restoration took years, and the way it looks now is exactly as it did once. You can almost see the image of Yerushalaim’s famous sages of a centuries back.  When we got there, we settled into the women’s section, but the flow of the tefillah as we said Kabbalas Shabbos was interrupted by a horde of little boys on the stairway interacting with each other in archetypical little boy fashion. Suddenly the yelling, laughing and running back and forth stopped.  They walked up the stairs to the indoor parapet (fancy word for balcony). They went through an absolutely amazing transformation. They began reciting Shir HaShirim (the Song of Songs, a poem narrating the love between Hashem and His people using two lovers who long for each other as a metaphor). They suddenly morphed into something otherworldly and almost angelic. They recited it perfectly using the traditional Trop (cantillation). The moment they finished they reverted to their little boy-ness;pushing each other down the stairs with the older ones heading towards the interior of the synagogue for maariv, and the younger ones headed outside to play, some in the tourist filled Old City Square and some between the Roman pillars in the Cardo just below ground level. What an enchanted childhood!

Instead of heading back to Har Tzion for Shabbos dinner, we went down the hill past the Kararite synagogue. The Kararites were members of a heretical sect that based their system on adhering only to the literal meaning of the Written Torah. They once were a credible presence. The Rambam and Rav Saadia Gaon, the greatest luminaries of their eras spent endless hours writing learned treaties and pushing them to the wall with their logic. Today the Kararites have disappeared from the scene. Their synagogue no longer attracts even a minyan; and for all intents and purposes is just another artifact in a city full of artifacts. We were on the way to Rav Neventzal’s home. You probably have never heard of him- he is about as far from the limelight as you can get. One of the closest disciples of Rav Shlomo Zalman Auerbach, he is renowned halachic decisor in his own right, as well as being the Rav of the Old City and has over a thousand students in his chain of kollel. He is also approachable, humble, and what you have in mind when you think of the word sage. I had arranged for us to go down to his house, and expected at most a few moments of his time, and best wishes to me and the girls for the coming year. It turned out different.

When we got there, his daughter-in-law took us in to his large living room. The tables were set for about thirty guests. She took out enough stackable chairs to give each of the 60 plus people a seat. She told us that the Rav was not expected just yet, closed the doors and suggested that we can spend the time singing. This as many of you know is not my strong point (and you may consider yourself blessed that I also know it……). The girls spontaneously found themselves singing soulful songs of Shabbos. It felt like just a few minutes, but when I looked at my watch, I saw that it was fifteen minutes. He smiled a greeting, and began to speak to us (In English!). I want to share some of the main points that he made.

Rosh Hashanah is the anniversary of the creation of the first human being. When Hashem created the world, the first thing that Adam did was to name the animals. When you give something or someone a name, you are actually describing the way you see it, and the way that you choose to relate to it. After Adam finished, G-d asked him, “And who are you?” and he answered, “I am Adam, because I was taken from the adama (earth in Hebrew, a reference to the way Adam was created, his body was taken from the dust of the earth, and his spiritual soul was breathed into him by G-d). G-d then asked, “And who am I?” and Adam answered, “You are the master”. This answers a question that you may have had about Rosh Hashanah. If you observe Jewish law, you use the phrase “King of the universe” many times a day. Every time you eat, use the bathroom, and of course as part of the formal prayers. What is new on Rosh Hashanah? What makes the relationship to Hashem new is your renewed ability to take yourself back to your ancestor Adam, and to say you have no other master.

You may think, erroneously that your decision to do this is both private and somewhat irrelevant to anything real. Who knows or cares what’s going on deep in your heart? The prayer book focuses on Noah’s story. He was only one person, but everyone you will ever see is his descendent. One person. One set of choices. An entire world was saved. Hashem remembers not only what you did, when He determines your fate for the coming year, but He also sees into your heart, knows your deepest thoughts and secret longing for letting go of all of the other “Kings” who you may have allowed to replace Him. The first and last sound that you hear the shofar make is a long sound, called “tekia” in Hebrew. This is the sound of Hashem’s coronation, His commitment to His world, to the final redemption,. The first sound is loud, clear and unbroken. So is the last sound. In between there are various other sounds, that are called, “terua” and “shvarim”. They are shorter, and broken up. This is to tell you that the beginning is good, and the end will be good. In the middle we have times of challenge, but they are taking us to where we want to be.
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This version of what he said is much shorter, and less complete than what he actually said. When he conclude, smiled and blessed us, I think we all felt not only the magic of Yerushalaim, but the magic of some of its people. I wanted to give you all a present for the new year, so this is my gift, a bit of Shabbos in the Old City.

Love, and ketiva vechatima tovah – be written and sealed for a good year!
Tziporah

​Dear friends,
Irma and Harvey. Two names I never considered giving any of my children. These names won’t be easily forgotten.
I have been watching unending images of the hurricanes. They aren’t meant to be ignored. The Talmud tells us that thunder is meant to straighten out the crookedness that lives in the human heart. Instinctively you think of yourself as eternal. None of us is. My daughter in law sent me a clip of two teenage boys who were (apparently) taking a selfie. You can see the tornado in back of them.  The tornado was so beautiful! It was pure white against a backdrop of blue. It moved forward zigzagging continually it reached them.  They didn’t see it coming, they were facing the other way, enjoying being outside in the midst of the drama of the storm. The cars on the road flew into the air falling to the ground and crumbling. The houses were reduced to blacken particles the size of two by fours. I don’t know the fate of the two boys with absolute certainty I don’t know who found their camera or phone. I do know that the laughter and fun that they wore on their faces with the bravado of being a teen is gone.
Imagine an eight month old baby crawling across the floor. He is busy experimenting with the planet. He is on still another search and gather mission. The entire world is food. Everything has to be tasted. He sets his eye on the electrical socket. It has two holes just the size of his fingers. Who know what treasures are hidden inside its interior? His fingers are damp from continual tasting. He is about to put them inside. You see him and grab him off the floor at the last moment. “No! No! NO!” The baby trembles and finally cries. You are not being abusive. You are being human, caring and loving. There is one problem. The baby doesn’t have the emotional or intellectual ability to connect the two experiences that he has just had. To him eight months, exploration is part of life. Hearing the one person you trust with absolute faith shout at you is more than frightening. It’s inexplicable. You can’t explain natural disaster. You don’t have the emotional or intellectual ability to fathom its purpose or the specific message it has for each individual. 
You have both good and evil within you. G-d makes you encounter events, people, situations, that can challenge the balance between good and evil you may have built over decades. Every step along the way is calculated by the only One who can see the entire picture simultaneously. He can see you, your potentials, your limitations, and your backdrop and determine what you need next. Your set of character traits is unique to you. Your basic character is a mixture of some traits that take you towards spiritual self-actualization when you tap into their power (such as generosity or humility), but can be surprised by ego or desire. That doesn’t change the fact that these traits are inherently good by default. You have other traits, such as self-absorption, and impulsivity that also have almost unstoppable power. They can be redirected and used for the good, but their default is that unless you do something to reroute them they take you further and further away from being the person you wish you were. On Rosh Hashanah, Hashem looks at you, and sees what you built. He is unwilling to give up on you. He will pull you away from the socket.
One of the most sobering lines in the Rosh Hashanah liturgy (what a fancy word for prayer!), is “Who shall live, and who shall die”. The truth is that physically we all will eventually die. It is also observable that many people who are complete moral failures were here last year= they didn’t die. The kind of death referred to is spiritual death.
 You get to a point where you put up so many defenses that no matter what you encounter, you don’t force yourself awake. SPirtually you are dead, but there is somehow hidden possibilities that things can change.  
One of my Neve students told me about her mother. Her father died when she was young. Her mom was left with three kids, no family support, and no real desire to live. She chose life anyway. She decided to bring joy to her family, and to work as hard as she had to keep them together at the same time. Every step along the way, from her husband’s diagnosis to her final (and most unusual conscious discussion to choose being really alive) change the quality of her life and that of her kids. Every step was orchestrated by G-d. He wanted to offer her life. There were always two choices. She chose life.
Now is a good time to examine your choices. You have all chosen life many times. Look at the moments in which you made that kind of choice, and make a resolution.” I want to continue choosing life”
 This choice doesn’t  just affect you. The world itself is compared to a gigantic person. You are part of the whole. The entire “body” needs the life-force that you generate by being yourself in the highest sense. Don’t compromise your integrity as a part of the body.
Love,
Tziporah 

​Dear Girls,
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Did you ever want to be a lawyer?

As Rosh Hashanah approaches, it can feel like a judgment day in which you didn’t do much for your defense. In a court of law, the lawyer has to defend his client. If he is the accused, he will want to play every card in the deck. You haven’t ignored the fact that the Day of Judgment is coming. There is one problem. Although you may have thought through the direction your life has taken until now, and contrasted it with what you want it to look like in future, when the Great Day comes, this isn’t going to be what you find yourself saying when you open yourself up to Hashem.

The long list of sins, the viduy, should be reviewed. You need to explore where you have been if you want to continue differently in the future. You need to say, “No more” and shake off the burden of habits that may be almost as old as you are. It takes time, but more than that it takes emotional effort to not slide back into the old patterns that feel organic, and to make the necessary repairs the broken places in your heart and our personality. This isn’t what you will be taking to the “court room”. The entire two days of judgment doesn’t feature reciting viduy even once. On Yom Kippur you say it five times. Why don’t you defend yourself when you are being judged? Tshuvah is the best (and only genuine) defense.

You also might reasonably question why when you come home from shul at night on Rosh Hashanah you sit by a set table with all sorts of traditional foods. They all have one theme. Now it’s going to be good. A sweet year. A year in which you will be” the head”, in charge of your personality which will lead you to have profound influence on others. Not “the tail”, the eternal follower, unable to break away from the influence of people whose opinions and lifestyle aren’t in sync with yours, never in touch with your own capacity or longings. You look at the plate in front of you, and declare that you will have a year in which you are as full of mitzvot as a pomegranate is full of seeds. You? What makes the puzzle even more cryptic is that you will soon be in shul again, on Yom Kippur. This is the day of forgiveness. You would think that this is the best time for joyous fete in which you can sincerely celebrate the new you emerging cleansed of all of the debris that clutters your inner life. Instead, you fast for 26 hours, and keep the basic laws of mourning.

In one of Rebbe Nachman’s mystic stories, he talks about people choosing a king. The king in the story mirrors what his subjects genuinely are. Don’t think too deeply about the implications of the fact that so many world leaders today have been accused of corruption….    When the hero of the story, who has been searching for the king in order to be able to make a portrait of his royal image, comes to realize that the king is mirroring who he is, he is torn between two responses. One is anger. When you see yourself reflected back to you with no holds barred, you may be infuriated by what you see. You may retreat into defense, blame, self-hatred or escapism. The other response is praise. He sees that the king is far more than the mirror. The mirror is what he is using to show his subjects what they are, so that they can make choices.  Behind the mirror is the King Himself. His presence is felt rather than seen. The awe that you feel when you recognize His creativity, His endless power to give, His willingness to forgive changes the way you feel not only about Him, but about yourself. You recognize that when all you see is your face reflected back to you in the mirror, and you blind yourself to the King, the One who gave you life; the One who believes in your potentials. Many of us only see ourselves. In fact, this inability to see beyond yourself is the root of all of the items on your viduy list. Rosh Hashanah takes you beyond yourself. See the King.
Most of the prayers on Rosh Hashanah are geared to opening your eyes to His splendor, His eternity, His ability to know you far better than you know yourself. Everyone wants to find the King and to follow Him. He is leading us to sweetness, greatness, and the kind of goodness that you never believed you could have or experience. There may be a long road, but it’s where it takes you in the end that counts.

In Israel, if you get up early, you may pass the many Sephardic synagogues and hear the selichot that they began to say daily from the beginning of Elul. One of the famous melodies is Adon HaSlichot- Master of Forgiveness. The tune is rhythmic, joyous, and not at all what you would expect if you associate tshuvah with angst and fear. It isn’t about “me” (in the collective sense). “Me” may be very imperfect. It’s about Him, perfect, in love with us, and always there. The One you always wanted to follow. The King whose portrait is engraved on your heart. The One who will also give you Yom Kippur as a gift to make it possible to head where you want to be heading without the confusion of roads once travelled.

Getting all of this back down to earth…can sound like mission impossible. It isn’t. Every day you make countless choices. They range from what Special Ed teachers call, “Activities of Daily Living”, to far reaching and subtle decisions. All of the choices have one common feature. You are either putting the crown on your own head (or at least trying to), or putting it on Hashem’s Head (so to speak) by letting Him rule.
Rosh Hashanah is where this choice is made in the deepest and most joyous sense. Get ready. Neve girls who are now home: Make your holiday plans now, for meals, synagogue attendance and all of the rest.

Love,
Tziporah