Yom Kippur: The Practice of Meditation and Atonement

While Yom Kippur is a holy day set aside for atonement, each and every day can be a day of atonement. When we sit in meditation, we practice atonement. We practice returning to who we really are.

When I first started practicing meditation, I was blessed to spend time with and learn from Rabbi Don Ani Shalom Singer Sensei. To the best of my knowledge, Rabbi Singer is the only ordained Rabbi and empowered Zen teacher. He often taught that meditation itself is a practice of at-one-ment.

This is not what we typically think of as atonement. Atonement becomes living our life fully, in each moment, as things are, as we are.

Then, waking up each morning is atonement. Going to and being at work is atonement. Spending time with friends and loved ones is atonement. Yet we cannot take this practice mindlessly or for granted.

Life, Death, and In-Between

The Jewish tradition teaches that on Rosh Hashana, God inscribes everyone’s name into one of three books – The Book of Life, The Book of Death, and The Book of the In-Between.

According to the tradition, the righteous are inscribed into the Book of Life, the evil are inscribed into the Book of Death, and those in-between have judgment suspended until Yom Kippur.

The language of our liturgy on Yom Kippur speaks about Our Father, Our King. How we approach our introspective examination and relate to ourselves this High Holidays and Yom Kippur is a two-way mirror for how we relate to others, most especially the Divine.

We may think that we sit in judgment before the Exalted on High this Yom Kippur, but it is really we who are our strongest judges. So often, it is the man or woman in the mirror that is your strongest and harshest critic, competitor, and judge.

While I personally don’t literally believe that there is a man in the sky with a pen in his hand, this tradition has something deeper to teach. Life and death are not only absolute facts of life, but are also ways in which we can choose to orient and live our life.

Choose Life!

“I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day. I have put before you life and death, blessing and curse. Choose life— if you and your offspring would live” (Deuteronomy 30:19; JPS).

Now that the Jewish New Year has passed, we have heard the shofar’s call as our own and are near completing this time of contemplation and self-examination. What do we do next?

The choice of life and the choice of death are before us. Moment by moment, breath by breath, we choose. Life or death? Life or death?

We choose life! We choose to live in a way accepting all that is alive and to walk the path of service and kindness to ourselves and others.

This way of living is beyond life and death and also eating and drinking and sleeping.

When we face the great judge this Yom Kippur, we struggle as Jacob did at the Jabbuk river with the face of the other. We wrestle with the face of our brother and the struggle with our most significant relationships. Each face is but one face of the Divine. Every face is the face of the Divine.

This is the practice of meditation. When we struggle against our adversary, we really struggle against ourselves and bear witness to the darkness of our dimmest shadows. Only after facing our fiercest adversary do we capably choose life. Only then can we truly choose life.

Atonement

We will never know to which book our name is inscribed. The future is uncertain. We can only act in ways congruent with our greatest self and aspiration. On the Day of Atonement, we stand before the Divine, fully perfect, fully imperfect, fully ourselves.

During this intensive practice period between Tisha B’Av and Yom Kippur, we transverse the horrors of pain and destruction and wake up to the truth of our life and all that it contains.

Be kind to one another. Do justice. Befriend the stranger and adversary. See everyone in yourself and yourself in others. This is atonement.

Do Not Squander Your Life!

In the Zen tradition, there is a prayer that is chanted each morning called the Gatha of Atonement:

All evil karma ever committed by me since of old,
Because of my beginningless greed, anger, and ignorance,
Born of my body, speech, and mind,
Now I atone for it all.

Similarly, in the Jewish tradition, we also offer a similar prayer of atonement each night before we lay to sleep in the bedtime Shema prayer:

I hereby forgive anyone who angered or antagonized me or who sinner against me – whether against my body, my property, my honor, or against anything of mine; whether he did so accidentally, willfully, carelessly, or purposely; whether through speech, deed, thought, or notion; whether in this transmigration or another transmigration – I forgive. (Artscroll translation)

There is a very special and necessary place for introspection, taking stock of our lives, and making repentance and amends when, and as, necessary.

Each Yom Kippur, we honor and celebrate the gift and fullness of each entire moment. All of it!

Some days in our life feel good. Some days in our life feel bad. Sometimes we do good, and sometimes we do bad. We live lives in accord with our deepest values and aspirations, and sometimes we just miss the mark. This all is our life! Every moment and all parts of it.

At the end of each day of a traditional Zen retreat, a prayer is read aloud:

Let me respectfully remind you,
Life and death are of supreme importance.
Time swiftly passes by and opportunity is lost.
Each of us should strive to awaken.
Awaken! Take heed!
Do not squander your lives!

This Yom Kippur, treat yourself kindly. Treat yourself as God would treat you. Do not squander your life!

May you be inscribed into the Book of Life! Gmar chatimah tovah!

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Adam Fogel
www.mindfuljudaism.com