The Ten Days of Repentance

As the sun sets on Yom Kippur, the judgment handed down on Rosh Hashanah is sealed. Known as the Ten Days of Repentance (Aseret Y'mei Teshuva), the first ten days of the Hebrew month of Tishrei (from the beginning of Rosh Hashanah until the end of Yom Kippur) are highlighted by an intensified desire for teshuva (repentance).

How to Change the Sentence in Ten Days: Teshuva, Tefila U’Tzedukah (Repentance, Prayer and Charity)

Teshuva, repentance, is the major focus both before and after Rosh Hashanah. During the Ten Days of Repentance, it is customary to scrutinize one’s actions and to review the process of teshuva that was begun during Elul, the month before Rosh Hashanah. Many people make extra efforts at self-improvement during the Ten Days. For instance:

* Someone just starting to get more involved with Judaism may determine that the perfect time to begin eating kosher food is during the Ten Days.
* Someone who is farther along in his/her involvement may decide to use the Ten Days to begin davening (praying) regularly.
* Some people choose to strengthen themselves during the Ten Days by designating one hour a day during which they are particularly careful not to speak Lashon Harah (evil or gossip)

Tefila
* The concluding words of the first blessing are changed to: Remember us for life, O King Who desires life, and inscribe us in the Book of Life — for Your sake, O Living G-d
* The conclusion of the second blessing is changed to: Who is like You, merciful Father, Who recalls His creatures mercifully for life.
* The third blessing is amended to end with the holy King instead of the holy G-d.
* The ending of the blessing for the restoration of justice is changed to: the King of Judgment.
* During the second to last blessing, we insert the line: And inscribe all the children of Your covenant for a good life.
* The ending of the final blessing is changed to: In the Book of Life, Blessing, and Peace, good livelihood, may we be remembered and inscribed before You – we and Your entire people, the Family of Israel, for a good life and for peace. Blessed are You, G-d, Who makes peace.

Avinu Malkenu, “Our Father, Our King,” a petitional prayer asking G-d to intervene for our benefit, is recited during the morning and afternoon services.

Tzedakah, charity, is an additional method one may seek to revise or avoid a negative verdict.

*Isn’t that bribing G-d? No. The life-long goal of the human being is to move closer to G-d. While Judaism has mandated laws about giving charity, these laws are meant to develop a person’s sensitivity to those in need. During the Ten Days, when we seek to show G-d that we have grown and are striving to be better, giving charity fortifies our fundamental giving instinct. Rather than bribing G-d, we are actively reminding ourselves of the direction in which we should be moving.

Copyright © 2010 National Jewish Outreach Program. All rights reserved.

Yom Kippur

Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, begins at sunset.

There is something mystical about Yom Kippur in that almost all Jews recognize the holiness of the day: On Yom Kippur, G-d graces the world with amnesty--all one needs to do is to come and ask for it. When we spend the day talking with G-d, we are discussing, privately, all the things for which we need such amnesty, thereby cleansing ourselves and helping us recognize how we can improve our lives. In fact, the holiday is structured for us to build towards this connection with our inner-selves and with G-d.

To make that connection, the Torah instructs that:
"...on the tenth of the month, you shall afflict your souls and do no work at all...for on that day God will forgive you and cleanse you, that you may be clean from all your sins before God" (Leviticus 16:29-30).

How does one “afflict one's soul”? The oral law enumerates the following five restrictions:

Fasting (No Eating or Drinking) - From sunset on the eve of Yom Kippur until nightfall the next day, it is forbidden to eat or drink. However, those who are ill, as well as pregnant and nursing women, should and, in some cases, must, eat on Yom Kippur, as decided by their rabbi in consultation with their doctor,. In such cases the rabbi should also be consulted about specific details of eating on Yom Kippur. Additionally, girls below the age of 12 and boys below the age of 13 are not required to fast.

Washing - During the fast, one may not wash for pleasure, but one may wash to get rid of dirt or when preparing food (e.g. for children). One may also bathe a baby.

Anointing - It is forbidden to anoint oneself with oil. Thus, the use of perfumes, liquid or cream make-up, suntan lotion, and other such items is prohibited.

Wearing Leather Shoes - During the fast it is forbidden to wear leather shoes. Some people wear only socks, but others wear shoes of canvas or other non-leather materials (i.e. crocs).

Marital Relations - It is forbidden to have marital relations.

It may seem that refraining from the above actions would make one focus on the body, due to hunger or thirst, or the discomfort of not washing. However such discomforts are temporary and, in fact, turn one’s attention back to the importance of the day and the fact that we can transcend physical discomfort in order to connect with the spirit of the day.

Copyright © 2010 National Jewish Outreach Program. All rights reserved.

How We Prepare For Yom Kippur I

Kapparot – This is a ritual of symbolic atonement

1) Before Yom Kippur, we make every effort to rid ourselves of sin. The custom of Kapparot is recorded in the Shulchan Aruch, The Code of Jewish Law, written 500 years ago and is described there as an ancient custom.

2) Kapparot is generally performed during the night before Yom Kippur, although it may be performed earlier.

3) Traditionally, kapparot is performed by taking a live hen or rooster, depending on one’s gender, and swinging it over one’s head while reciting a passage transferring one’s sins onto the bird. The bird is then slaughtered according to Jewish Law and given to a family in need. -- An alternative custom (which is widely practiced in modern times) is that, instead of a chicken, one takes the appropriate amount of money to feed a family and donates it to a charity that provides food to the needy.

Copyright © 2010 National Jewish Outreach Program. All rights reserved.

How We Prepare For Yom Kippur II

Mincha – During Mincha, the afternoon service, the Vidui, confession, is added to the Silent Amida.

Eating a Festive Meal – It is a mitzvah to partake of a festive meal the day before Yom Kippur. This meal should be eaten early so that one may have the special seudah hamafseket, meal before a fast, after the afternoon service.

a) Whoever eats on erev (the eve of) Yom Kippur and fasts on Yom Kippur, it is as if (s)he
fasted both days.

b) The fasts in Judaism are not about deprivation, but about reaching a more focused spiritual
level. It is, however, important that one has the strength to focus on the activities of Yom
Kippur day.

Seudah HaMafseket, The Meal Before the Fast.

1) This meal can actually be eaten any time during the day, although most people partake of it after mincha, the afternoon service. The meal must be concluded during the daytime.

2) One should only eat light foods which are not too salty in order not to make fasting difficult. (It is therefore the custom not to eat fish at this meal.)

3) No intoxicating beverages should be served.

4) It is customary to eat kreplach dumplings, (usually served in soup) before Yom Kippur. The kreplach are hidden bits of meat in dough, symbolic of our desire that G-d will hide our sins.

Copyright © 2010 National Jewish Outreach Program. All rights reserved.

How We Prepare For Yom Kippur III

Yahrtzeit Candles: It is customary to light memorial [yahrtzeit] candles which burn for 24 hours just prior to lighting the festival candles.

Festival Candle Lighting: All Jewish holidays begin at sunset the evening before. On the Sabbath and Yom Tov [festival], candles are lit 18 minutes before sunset to welcome the holy day. The procedure for lighting candles for a holiday varies slightly from Sabbath candle-lighting:

The end of the blessing is changed to represent Yom Kippur:

Baruch atah Ado-nai, Ehlo-haynu melech Ha-olam, asher kideshanu b’mitzvotav
v’tzeevanu l’hadlik ner shel Yom ha-Kippurim.

Blessed are you L-rd, our G-d ruler of the world, who sanctified us through His
commandments and commanded us to kindle the lights of Yom Kippur.

An additional blessing is made to acknowledge the good fortune of being able to experience the holiday:

Baruch atah Ado-nai, Ehlo-haynu melech Ha-olam, she’he’che’yanu v’kee’manu
v’hee’gee’anu la’zman ha’zeh.

Blessed are you L-rd, our G-d ruler of the world, Who has kept us alive, sustained us,
and brought us to this season.

Copyright © 2010 National Jewish Outreach Program. All rights reserved.

Kreplach Recipe

(reprinted with permission from “Jewish Art Calendar” published by A cable to Jewish Life www.cablejew.com)

Dough Ingredients:

2 cups flour
½ tsp. salt
3 Tbsps. oil
2 egg yolks
½ cup water
1 ½ tsps. baking powder or baking soda

Combine flour, salt, and oil. In a separate bowl, beat egg yolks, water and baking powder (or soda). Add to flour mixture. Knead and rollout, thinly, on floured surface. Cut into 3 inch squares or circles.

Filling Ingredients:

1 onion, diced
2 Tbsps. oil
1 cup ground cooked meat or chicken
1 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. pepper
1 egg
1 Tbsp. matzoh meal

Saute onion in oil. Add chopped meat and brown for 5 minutes. Remove from heat and cool.

Add salt, pepper, egg and matzoh meal, and mix well.

Fill center of each square or circle of dough with meat mixture. Fold into triangles, or bring both sides and bottom together towards center, pinching together, and thus forming a triangle.

Place folded triangles in lightly salted boiling water for approximately 20 minutes until kreplach float to top.

When ready, remove from pot and serve in soup or as a side dish.

For firmer kreplach, fry in heated oil in skillet over medium flame until golden brown on both sides.

Wearing White on Yom Kippur

Many people have the custom of wearing white on Yom Kippur. Some men, wear a kittel, a simple white robe, over their clothing. On Yom Kippur evening, men wear their tallit, prayer shawl, which is usually worn only during the day. Wearing white serves several purposes:

i) One’s burial shroud is white and one is therefore reminded of one’s mortality and the need to do teshuvah, repentance.


ii) On Yom Kippur one wishes to resemble an angel, and therefore one symbolically dresses in white.

Copyright © 2010 National Jewish Outreach Program. All rights reserved.

The Yom Kippur Prayers

Yom Kippur night

Kol Nidre: This most famous of prayers is the opening of the Yom Kippur service. It begins before sunset, when the ark is opened and two Torah scrolls are removed to the bimah where the cantor is standing. The Kol Nidre service is an annulment of vows that one took in the past year or that one may take in the forthcoming year. This annulment refers only to voluntary vows between man and G-d and does not remove one’s obligation to repay debts or fulfill personal agreements.


Vidui/Confession: One aspect of the teshuvah/repentance process is to verbalize one’s sins. This takes place during the confession. The confession must be with a true heart – one must truly repent the action (s)he is confessing.

Vidui is recited during every Yom Kippur service, including the afternoon service (mincha) preceding Yom Kippur.

The Vidui service is made up of a list of 22 sins (one for each letter of the aleph-bet). Examples of the confessional lines are:

i) For the sin that we have sinned before You under duress and willingly…

ii) For the sin that we have sinned before You with harsh speech…


The confession is recited standing up, head bowed in humility. As each confession is stated, one strikes the left side of his/her chest with his right fist.


Focusing on Vidui
* On first reading through the Vidui, one may think “I didn’t do that!” Each time one reviews the Vidui lines, however, one can gain a deeper insight into what is being said. For instance, one confession reads:For the sin that we have sinned before you by causing subservience through bribery.

“Subservience through bribery” does not necessarily mean giving a judge money to change a verdict. Every day people bribe each other with promises or flattery. When reading the Vidui, perhaps one may realize that they have coerced someone into doing something not quite right by promising them something or by encouraging the continuation of a negative character trait.

Reviewing the confession lines and reading them with a slightly different outlook will make the Yom Kippur experience all the more meaningful. Through this service, we realize how important our every action is.

The Torah Reading on Yom Kippur: During the Morning Service two Torah scrolls are removed from the ark. An account of the Yom Kippur Service of the High Priest in the Holy Temple is read from the Book of Leviticus, followed by a listing of the special sacrifices of the holiday in the Book of Numbers. The Haftorah is from the Book of Isaiah.

Copyright © 2010 National Jewish Outreach Program. All rights reserved.

The Afternoon Service/The Story of Jonah

Yom Kippur is the only holiday on which there is a weekday afternoon Torah reading. The section is taken from the portion of Acharei Mot in Leviticus and deals with the laws of forbidden sexual relations.

The Haftorah is the story of Yonah (Jonah), one of the prophets of the Bible:

G-d chooses Yonah go to the Assyrian city of Nineveh and warn them that they will be
destroyed unless they change their ways. Instead of following G-d’s command, Yonah flees
onto a ship, hoping to avoid this mission.

G-d sends a great storm. The people on the ship, fearing for their lives, discern that Yonah is
the cause and, at Yonah’s instruction, throw him overboard. Yonah is swallowed by a large fish
(commonly interpreted as a whale). He lives inside the fish for three days, praying to G-d and
accepting G-d’s will. When he is returned to dry land, he goes to Nineveh and gives them G-d’s
message. The people repent and are saved.

Yonah, however, leaves the city depressed that this city of idol-worshipers heeded G-d’s
warning when his fellow Jews do not. He sits outside the city waiting to see what will happen.

While he sleeps, G-d makes a vine grow over him to shade him from the heat. Yonah awakes
and rejoices over the vine; but that night, G-d sends a worm to destroy the vine, causing Yonah
to weep. G-d then rebukes him for having pity on a plant that appeared and disappeared in one
night, but not having pity on the hundreds of thousands of souls of Nineveh.

We read from the Book of Yonah on Yom Kippur because it highlights the idea of teshuvah, repentance.

Yonah realized that he had done wrong in trying to run away from G-d’s command. Yonah
actually follows the pattern for teshuvah: He recognizes his mistake while on the ship during
the storm; He verbally confesses that he was wrong by telling the men on the ship that he is
the cause and instructing them to throw him overboard; He regrets his actions as expressed
by the prayers he says while in the belly of the fish; and, when once again commanded by
G-d to go to Nineveh, he does so.

The men on the ship, seeing the power of the G-d of Israel, repent their worship of idols and
convert to Judaism.

The city of Nineveh heeds Yonah’s warning. The king of Nineveh decrees that his subjects
must don sackcloth and repent. G-d sees that the people actually change their actions. The
city is saved, highlighting the fact that G-d desires and accepts repentance from all people.

Copyright © 2010 National Jewish Outreach Program. All rights reserved.

Yizkor – The Memorial Service

The Yizkor Memorial Service is recited on the last day of each festival – Passover, Shavuot and Sukkot, and on Yom Kippur (as Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur are considered like one holiday). The Yom Kippur Yizkor Service, however, is considered more significant than the other holidays.

While those who have passed away are unable to grow spiritually, the deeds of their children earn merit for their souls.

During the Yizkor Service, it is customary for people to offer a pledge to charity in memory of their loved one(s).

In Ashkenazic custom, those whose parents are both living leave the sanctuary during Yizkor. In Sephardic custom, everyone remains in the sanctuary while the cantor recites Yizkor.

Copyright © 2010 National Jewish Outreach Program. All rights reserved.

Ne’ilah – The closing prayers

As the sun begins its descent on Yom Kippur, the Gates of Mercy, opened during the period of Teshuvah, are closing, and it is the last hour before the sentence is sealed.

Only on Yom Kippur is a fifth Silent Amida added to the day, and this is during the Ne'ilah Service.

As the day closes, the Ne'ilah Service concludes with the blowing of the Shofar, heralding the closing of the Heavenly gates and announcing our optimism that our prayers were accepted and that the day will have a positive outcome.

Copyright © 2010 National Jewish Outreach Program. All rights reserved.

After the Fast

After the Havdallah (separation of holy and weekday) ceremony, everyone returns home and partakes in a festive meal. Because one wishes to extend the holiness of the day, many begin preparing for the next holiday, Sukkot, by starting to build their sukkah right after Yom Kippur.

Copyright © 2010 National Jewish Outreach Program. All rights reserved.

The Fast Of Gedaliah (Tzum Gedaliah)

The Fast of Gedaliah is observed to commemorate of the murder of Gedaliah the son of Achikam, which is described in the last chapter of the Second Book of Kings. This murder resulted in the final Babylonian exile and destruction:

After the first Holy Temple was destroyed and the Babylonians had driven the majority of the Jewish people into exile, a small minority of Jews were permitted to remain in the Land of Israel. Also, Jews who had fled during the war returned and began to work the land.

Nebuchadnetzar, the King of Babylon, appointed Gedaliah to be the governor over the remaining population.

The King of Ammon, a neighboring country, was vying for control over the Land of Israel against the Babylonians. He commissioned Yishmael the son of Netanyah to remove Gedaliah.

Murder! Yishmael, who was a descendant of King David, came to the town of Mitzpeh and murdered Gedaliah and all those that were with him.

In fear of retribution for the murder of the appointed governor, the remaining Jews fled the Land of Israel, thus completing the exile.

When

The Fast of Gedaliah is observed on the third day of Tishrei, the day after Rosh Hashanah. The fast begins at the break of dawn and ends at nightfall .

* Some people will get up before dawn and have an early morning breakfast (but this is only permitted if a decision to do so is verbally expressed the night before).

Do’s and Don’ts

1) During the duration of the fast, eating and drinking are prohibited.

2) Unlike Yom Kippur and Tisha B’Av (The Day of Atonement and the Ninth of Av), bathing, anointing, marital relations and wearing leather are permitted.

3) Pregnant and nursing women, and others with health considerations may be exempt from fasting (please consult your rabbi). Children under the age of bar/bat mitzvah (13 for boys, 12 for girls) are not required to fast.

4) Special prayers are added to the synagogue services:

a) Selichot (Penitential Prayers) and Avinu Malkeinu (Our Father, Our King) are recited.

b) At the morning service, Exodus 32:11-14 and 34: 1-10 are read from the Torah.


**5) If the third of Tishrei falls out on Shabbat, the fast is postponed until Sunday, as it is forbidden to fast on Shabbat (with the exception of Yom Kippur).

Copyright © 2010 National Jewish Outreach Program. All rights reserved.

Rosh Hashana

Rosh Hashana, which literally means the Head of the Year, is the Jewish New Year. Rosh Hashana is Yom Harat Olam, The Birthday of the World.

According to the Biblical narrative, it took six days to create the world, and on the sixth day God created Adam. During the first six days, animate and inanimate objects were formed, but the world was inactive until after the creation of the first human, who could appreciate and use God’s creations. Rosh Hashana is actually the day that Adam was created, but, even though there was prior creativity, it is nevertheless considered the birthday of the world because on this day the world came to life. With the creation of Adam, time was sectioned into hours, days, years, etc., and, therefore, we begin counting the years from this day.

Rosh Hashana is celebrated on the first and second days of Tishrei.

In the Torah, Rosh Hashana is given several names, each of which characterizes the day:

Yom Hazikaron – The Day of Rememberance – It is the day on which God recalls all of humankind’s deeds of the past year.

Yom Hadin – The Day of Judgement – It is the day on which God judges the actions of humankind.

Symbolic Foods

The symbolic foods: Since Rosh Hashana is the day of judgement, it is customary to eat foods with symbolic meanings to invoke God’s blessing. We therefore utter a prayer and then eat these items. (Except for apples and honey, which is universally practiced, the exact items eaten depend on family custom.)

Apples and Honey:
A slice of apple is dipped in honey, and the blessing for the fruit of the tree is recited:

Baruch atah Ado-nai, Ehlo-haynu melech Ha-olam, Borai p’ree ha’aitz.
Blessed are you Lord, our God ruler of the world, Creator of the fruit of the tree.

Take a bite and then recite the following brief prayer:

“May it be Your will, Hashem, our God and the God of our forefathers, that You renew for us a good and sweet year.”

Dates
(t’marim – from the word for “to consume”)

“May it be Your will, Hashem, our God and the God of our forefathers, that our enemies be consumed.”

Some people eat the date first because it is one of the fruits for which the Land of Israel is known.

Squash
(kara – from the word for “to tear”)

“May it be Your will, Hashem, our God and the God of our forefathers, that the decree of our sentence be torn asunder; and may our merits be proclaimed before You.”

Black-Eyed Peas
(rubia – from the word for “increase”) or
Carrots
(merrin, in Yiddish – from the word “more”)

“May it be Your will, Hashem, our God and the God of our forefathers, that our merits increase.”

Raisins and Celery
(this is a recent, somewhat humorous, English addition)

“May it be Your will to grant us a “raise in salary.”

Pomegranates

It is said that each pomegranate has 613 seeds, representing the 613 commandments of the Torah:

“May it be Your will, Hashem, our God and the God of our forefathers, that our merits be as plentiful as the seeds of a pomegranates.”

Fish
A fish is considered to be a symbol of fertility and blessing:

“May it be Your will, Hashem, our God and the God of our forefathers, that we be fruitful and multiply like fish.”

Head of a Sheep/Fish:
Some have a custom to have the head of a sheep or a fish on the table and to say:

“May it be Your will, Hashem, our God and the God of our forefathers, that we be as the head and not as the tail.”

Nuts
On Rosh Hashana, nuts are not eaten since the numeric value of the word for nut, egoz, is equivalent to the numeric value for the word for sin, chet.

Shofar Service

“…It shall be declared a holiday for you, a day of sounding a teruah for you”
(Numbers 29:1).

Teruah is the word for one of the sounds of the shofar.

* The shofar is made from the horn of a ram. A special person to serve as the Shofar blower is designated for the holiday. This person has studied the various laws of the shofar service and is trained to properly maintain strong consistent sounds.
* The shofar is not sounded on Shabbat.
* It is a Torah obligation to hear the shofar during the Rosh Hashana Mussaf service (the additional service). If one is unable to attend services, during the daytime one may:

Find out what time the shofar will be blown and go specifically to hear the shofar blown and then return home.

Check with the local synagogue if there will be a special shofar sounding for people who miss it in the morning.

Have someone blow the shofar for him/her privately.

There are three types of shofar blasts:

Tekiah – The Long, Solid Blast.

* The tekiah sound is like the blast of the trumpet at a king’s coronation, reminding us that God is the King of Kings.
* The tekiah is a strong note of joyous happiness, to remind us that we are standing before God, our Maker, who loves us and judges us with mercy.

Shevarim – The Three Medium-Length Blasts

* The shevarim is reminiscent of deep sighs or soft crying, (where one is gasping for breath).
* The shevarim is the beginning of the recognition of all that God does for us, and all that we could be doing, thus the sighing sound.

Teruah – The Nine Quick Blasts

* The teruah evokes the feeling of short piercing cries of wailing.
* The teruah is the recognition that the year is closing and that the time for teshuva will soon pass.

Tekiah Gedolah

The elongated, solid note that is blown as the last blast of the shofar service. The regular tekiah is a note of joy – the tekiah gedolah is a triumphant shout that reaches out to the hearts of all to assure them that their prayers have been heard.

Tashlich – The Casting Away of Sins

It is customary after the afternoon service on the first day of Rosh Hashana, to go to a body of water in which there are live fish (or to a place where one can see the water) and to symbolically cast away one’s sins. While standing by the water, several verses from the books of Micha and Psalms are recited expressing the desire for the sins to be carried away.

When the first day of Rosh Hashana is Shabbat, tashlich is postponed until the second day.

If one does not perform tashlich during Rosh Hashana, for instance if one is unable to get to a body of water, it may be performed until Hoshana Raba (the seventh day of Sukkot).

Rosh Hashana Recipes

Tammy Reid’s Sweet Challah:

6 cups flour
3 eggs
3 Tbsp honey
1/3 cup sugar
2 envelopes dry yeast
4 Tbsp oil
drop vanilla
½ cup raisins

Mix dry ingredients. Add wet ingredients. Knead in raisins. If it seems too wet, add flour. If seems too dry add juice or water.

Allow to rise for 1 hour.

Knead down.

Mold dough into thick strands and curl into circular loaves. Allow to rise for another hour. Bake at 350 for 20 minutes, or until golden brown.


Carrot and Sweet Potato Tzimmes

1 bunch carrots peeled and cut into 1″ pieces
6 sweet potatoes (large) peeled and quartered
½ cup pitted prunes
1 cup orange juice
½ cup honey
½ tsp salt
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/4 cup margarine

Cook carrots and sweet potatoes in boiling, salted water. Cover until firm yet tender. Line a 2-quart, shallow casserole dish with heavy foil. Drain carrots and potatoes and place in dish with prunes. Stir gently.

In a separate bowl, mix orange juice, honey, salt and cinnamon. Pour mixture evenly over potatoes- carrots-prunes. Dot with margarine. Bake covered (with foil) in preheated 350 oven for 30 minutes. Stir gently and bake for another 10 minutes uncovered.


Applesauce Kugel

1 lb noodles (wide is better)
4 eggs (beaten)
2 Tbsp sugar
½ tsp vanilla extract
½ cup melted margarine
½ cup raisins
2 cups applesauce
½ can pineapple pieces (Drained)
cinnamon and sugar mixture

Cook noodles until nearly tender and drain.

Mix all ingredients except cinnamon and sugar mixture.
Mix well.

Pour into a large greased baking dish.

Sprinkle cinnamon and sugar on top.

Bake at 350 for 1 hour or until brown on top.

Although Rosh Hashanah is a time for eating sweet foods (in the hope of having a sweet new year), this Carrot Cake is a delightful treat:


Dietetic Carrot Cake from Beryl Levenson

1 cup grated carrots
½ cup chopped walnuts
½ cup raisins
2/3 cup Sugar Twin
½ cup vegetable oil
2 eggs
1 cup flour
1 tsp baking soda
½ tsp cinnamon
½ tsp salt

Combine Sugar Twin, oil, and eggs in a bowl and beat until blended.

Add flour, baking soda, cinnamon, salt, carrots, nuts and raisins. Stir well.

Pour mixture into pan and bake at 350 for 35-40 minutes.

Allow cake to cool completely before frosting.

A Season of Repentance

Imagine that you receive a notice from the IRS that you are going to be audited in one month. You are frantic. After all, receipts and credit slips are scattered in drawers and piles throughout the house; and, now you have only one month to find them. The beginning of the month of Elul marks the one month notice until the “Divine audit” on Rosh Hashana. Throughout the month of Elul, Jews search for every receipt and credit slip left by their behavior. “Did I belittle the secretary who couldn’t remember my name?” “Did I borrow $20 and forget to return it?” “Did I…?”

Elul is the time to look back over the past year, sort out our strengths and weaknesses, and see what impact our deeds have had. Like sorting the receipts, we can put our actions into little piles: wrong to God, our fellow humans or even ourselves, and good to God, our fellow humans or ourselves. Sometimes an action may fall into several categories. Reviewing our behavior is, according to the Medieval scholar Rabbi Moses ben Maimon (Maimonides), the beginning of the first step in teshuva, repentance. The Jewish view of repentance goes much farther than mere regret. Teshuva is a pro-active process that recognizes our fallibility and our ability to change.

People err. The Bible is full of people “messing up.” What is important, however, is that one learns from his/her mistakes; and, the first step in setting it straight is recognizing the problem and stopping the behavior. For many, recognizing a negative behavior is painfully difficult. After all, it’s so easy to justify our actions -- “Well, he shouldn’t have cut me off, I had every right to yell at him!”"The government already gets enough money, I don’t have to declare this on my taxes!” “Hey, so what if I told them that I saw her out last night, everybody knows she’s a real partier!” But rationalizations don’t make the action right, they only make the rationalizer feel better about their behavior. Admitting that an action was wrong or that it may have hurt someone, takes courage and honesty. Stopping the behavior is an even greater challenge.

Humankind, however, was created to meet this challenge. As the only one of God’s creations with a soul, humans alone are capable of spiritual growth. Unlike physical development, spiritual growth must be a conscious effort, with both short and long term goals. For instance: long term, one may wish to be able to read from the Torah, but the short term goal may be to learn the Aleph-Bet. When setting the long term goal of becoming the best possible person, Rosh Hashana is the date by which one sets a short term goal of evaluating the direction in which one is heading.

On Rosh Hashana the world came to life. It was the sixth day of creation. The trees had been planted, the seeds for the grasses were sown, fish, birds, mammals and all other creatures were formed…and then God created the human being. How can Rosh Hashana be considered the birthday of the world if the world was already six days old? A baby is conceived and exists for nine months before the child is born, yet only the day of its first breath is considered its actual birthday. So too, only on the sixth day, when God “formed Adam of the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life,” did the world become actualized.

That first breath set the world in motion. It was also from that day forth that humankind has had to face the battle of free-will. While it may appear to be a burden, free-will, the ability to choose one’s actions, is actually the necessary ingredient for spiritual growth. After all, if one works solely upon natural instinct, one will always have the same reaction in similar situations. Without free-will there are no choices about behavior and there can be no reflection about right or wrong. With free-will, however, what we did yesterday is not necessarily what we do today or tomorrow. However, with free-will comes responsibility and accountability; and, on Rosh Hashana God holds each man and woman accountable for his or her actions over the last year

While people should strive to improve themselves throughout the year, as the month of Elul begins and the Shofar is sounded, we are reminded that there is just one month left. Thirty days remain to check one’s balance and settle old accounts. By using Elul to prepare, one is able to face the Divine audit on Rosh Hashana with clarity and confidence, knowing that one has moved towards his/her spiritual goal and has made a better connection with the power of the day, and with God.