Friday the 13th had a full moon. What a great reminder that we are not in control; two eerie signs, especially for the superstitious, that the natural world itself has a dark side. This particular full moon marks the middle of the Hebrew month of Elul, the month of preparation for the Jewish High Holy Days. In two more weeks, as the moon wanes to nothing, Rosh HaShanah, the Jewish New Year, will begin. This year, more than ever, I am struck by the focus of the language of the machzor, the High Holy Day prayer book.
The focus of our prayers as we face God’s judgment appears to be on the soul’s divine purity. As we seek forgiveness, acknowledging the sins of our physical misdeeds, the prayers refer time and again to our soul being God’s. We say, “haneshama lakh[the soul is Yours].” We spend the holy days trying to cleanse ourselves by getting in touch with our souls and their divine purity. We literally beat our hearts (softly with our fists) for alphabetical lists of sins. The theme that emerges throughout is that our connection to God depends on reconnecting with our souls.
The contemporary world encourages us to let go of our bodies and to improve our souls. We live with a mind-body duality where our bodies are problematic. Some see our material bodies as the cause or origin of our sins with the soul, by contrast, as an ephemeral spirit trapped inside the body. In this dualism, we are supposed to help our soul rise above its bodily container. While we can attribute the problem of this mindset to Cartesian philosophy, it is we who must decide how true it is for each of us.
The High Holy Day liturgy, especially the confessional passages, has a subtle focus also on the body. Haneshama lakh[the soul is Yours], while serving as a title and familiar call out about the soul, actually continues with the words v’ha’goof poh’ah’lakh [and the body is Your act]. Our body is as much God’s as the soul. It has divine intent in its formation. We do well to beat our hearts with our fists because our bodies can be forces for good.
We are, body and soul, called to improve ourselves. Neither meditation nor a gym workout alone will honor all that we are designed to be. Additional learning and additional dieting are likewise insufficient. Even together these approaches to better living do not respond adequately to the charge of the High Holy Days. We need a holistic approach in which we recognize that it all matters.
Shortly after Haneshama lakhis a poem calledKi Hiney Ka’chomer[Like this clay] which guides this approach. In the imagery of the poem, we are like clay in the hands of The Potter; stone, in the hands of The Mason; iron, in the hands of The Smith; and more. In each case, we matter. We are fully existing materially and spiritually; we just need shaping and refining. Our body and our soul are God’s.
By recognizing body and soul as jointly who we are, we can better achieve self-improvement in all the ways the liturgy encourages us. By recognizing body and soul as God’s rather than ours, we can let go of that which drives us to misdeeds and we can open ourselves up to what we can be. We can accept who we are so that we can become even better representations of ourselves. Our lives and deeds shape us as God designs. We do not need to be in control of either body or soul to be better; we simply need to be, to be in connection and to be God’s body and soul.
About Rabbi Jeremy Winaker
Rabbi Jeremy Winaker is the executive director of the Greater Philadelphia Hillel Network, responsible for West Chester University, Haverford, Bryn Mawr, and other area colleges. He is the former head of school at the Albert Einstein Academy in Wilmington and was the senior Jewish educator at the Kristol Hillel Center at the University of Delaware for four years. Rabbi Winaker lives in Delaware with his wife and three children.
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