Pathos, pajamas, and perfection

This year, with no children home, my wife and I decided to go to Yerucham for Yom Kippur and pray at the Yeshivat Hesder (combined Torah study and army service) where our son learned and now lives with his wife and two young children. The prayer at night was a powerful yeshiva davening, over a thousand seats set up and many standing in the back. Powerful, but not unusual.

The walk home was the beginning of the new experience for me. The city was silent, not a car on the road. There were, however, groups of people, colored hair and tattooed, sitting shoulder to shoulder with what I always perceived as “regular” people. They were gathered in a large circle on plastic chairs and on the floor, all listening intently to a young man talking about Yom Kippur and our relationship with our Creator. Not about rules or traditions, but about love and connection. People walked the streets, some in all white robes, white suits, or dresses. Others in Mickey Mouse pajamas — but nice ones, a matching set. Seeing Klal Yisrael showing up ba’asher hem sham (just as they are) was humbling and inspiring.

I grew up in a world where you wore a tie to school in the sixth grade if a politician was coming to speak to your history class. Kids wore suits to shul on Shabbat. Yom Kippur, our holiest day, was met with proper preparation. Not everyone came, but those who did met the standard of how you appear before the King. We, the children of Jacob — the first of the forefathers to keep all of his children in the fold, not without some serious tza’ar gidul banim (the pain of raising children) — but all the tribes continued the legacy and became the Jewish people.

This Yom Kippur, I was blessed to see Jews of all kinds, not just the ones who measured up — and they shone. Shacharit (the morning service) started at 7 a.m. and the room was full shortly after. A day that saw more than 12 hours of prayer with less than a 15-minute break before Mincha (the afternoon service). At the entrance of the yeshiva, there was a table with memorial candles and photos of the 10 boys who had been killed in the war over the last two years. Many of their families and friends were among those praying together.

The tunes from the Yamim Nora’im are more than just a carrier for the lyrics. They have their own significance. Some haunting, some inspiring, some with a beat you have to dance to. Rabbi Hendler in Yeshivat Shaalvim would teach the new students the melodies in Elul before the holidays so that they would be prepared for the davening, so that the energy in the hall would roar. He explained that a particular tune was brought into the liturgy by a Hasidic rabbi who heard Napoleon’s armies marching on Moscow. He heard the march of 600,000 soldiers and sent his Hasidim to learn and record the melody. When asked why, he responded that, on Yom Kippur, we are fighting for our lives. We need a tune that inspires. Hearing the march of these soldiers, he knew this was a tune that brings down walls. That’s what we need.

At a certain portion of Musaf, there was a piyut with a refrain: V’itnu l’cha keter melucha — the nations will crown You. It was a joyful tune with a great beat. I watched hundreds of boys and their fathers and rabbis jumping and singing in unison to this thunderous refrain.

I was overcome. I sang along, but my voice kept failing, cracking over and over, barely managing to get two words in at a time. Such tragedy, so much pain this yeshiva had gone through — but the boys were not broken. They showed up and yelled to Hashem: We are here. You are our Father, You are our King, forever, and we can’t and won’t be pushed away. You, Hashem, are stuck with us. The imperfect children, whom You love, won’t go away.

If that doesn’t bring the walls crumbling down, I can’t imagine what will.

We come to this year, all of us, ready, as one big, loving, dysfunctional family, ready for redemption. That night in Yerucham — between pathos, pajamas, and perfection — I caught a glimpse of it.