The Blogs: Rosh Hashana: Challenges of Repentance

«Il est bien plus difficile de se juger soi-même que de juger autrui. Si tu réussis à bien te juger, c’est que tu es un véritable sage. »

— Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Le Petit prince, Ch. 10.[1]

Rosh Hashana, the Jewish New Year, has an ambiguous nature. The Pentateuch calls it Yom Hazikaron, a day of remembrance. Yet we are called upon not only to remember our own misdeeds and seek forgiveness from those we have harmed but also to forgive and erase from memory the wrongs others have done to us. Moreover, this requirement seems to contradict a commandment that has been very much in the news for the last two years: “Remember what Amalek did to you on your journey, after you left Egypt. […] you shall blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven. Do not forget!” [2]

Talmudic sages and their heirs through the centuries, from the Zohar to Rabbi Levi Yitzhak of Berdichev (1740-1809), defused the genocidal potential of this commandment by reinterpreting Amalek. They suggested that Amalek embodies the evil inclination to prey on the weak that each of us hides in the dark corners of the soul. [3] Therefore, we must carefully examine our actions and motivations. Rosh Hashana and the days leading to Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, are considered particularly propitious for this kind of soul-searching and spiritual cleansing.

Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch, (1808 – 1888) saw the battle between Israel and Amalek as a war between different sets of values:

[He] interprets the phrase “the memory of Amalek,” as referring to a specific type of remembrance; when a society honors infamous strongmen who build their reputation through acts of violence, they are perpetuating the “memory of Amalek.” The world must stop glorifying savagery as heroic, and when that happens Amalek will disappear.[4]

Nowadays, many people in Israel and beyond are inspired by the teachings of Rabbi Meir Kahane (1932-1990). His ideas, initially shunned by the Israeli mainstream as racist and extremist—he was even expelled from the Knesset—have since become normalized. [5] Israeli officials have invoked Amalek when calling for the total physical destruction of Palestinians following the attack on southern Israel in October 2023. No wonder that soldiers chant “Amalek” as they lay waste to the Gaza Strip and its inhabitants. [6]

This is another example of the radical incompatibility between Zionism and the rabbinic Judaism developed over almost two millennia. Zionist founding fathers were quite honest about their intent to abandon Judaism, which they abhorred and disdained. They overtly rejected it by creating a martial culture inspired by European exclusionary nationalism and a literal, anti-rabbinic reading of biblical scenes of war and conquest. Therefore, as I have recently argued, they cannot be blamed for departing from Jewish moral values. [7]

Nor should one reproach the State of Israel for betraying its self-proclaimed status as a “Jewish state.” After all, it is not a protected designation like that of famous French wines (appellation d’origine contrôlée). The Zionist understanding of “Jewish” is diametrically opposed to the rabbinic Judaism of the last two millennia. However, Judaism has no higher authority, similar to the Vatican, that can decide which form of Judaism is legitimate. Only time will tell who inherits the title.

However, on the eve of Rosh Hashana, individual Israeli Jews tormented by crimes they committed may repent for what has been done to the Palestinians. To do so, they need to shake off certain values and beliefs inculcated in them from kindergarten. The prominent Israeli author Amos Oz identified them with sharp sarcasm long ago:

Our sufferings have granted us immunity papers, as it were, a moral carte blanche. After what all those dirty goyim [non-Jews] have done to us, none of them is entitled to preach morality to us. We, on the other hand, have carte blanche, because we were victims and have suffered so much. Once a victim, always a victim, and victimhood entitles its owners to a moral exemption.[8]

Within the traditional values of Judaism, one must focus on what we, both as individuals and as a collective, have done wrong. This is not easy because, rather than repent for our collective transgressions, we often tend to condemn those whom we deem transgressors. This is how we commit the serious sin of self-righteousness.

Do we consider ourselves part of a collective that includes soldiers reveling in genocidal bacchanalia in Gaza? Are they “abandoned babies” (tinok she nishba) whom we must re-educate and welcome into our midst, or should we stop considering them part of the Jewish collective? Tribal loyalty pushes us to include them, but it is the same tribalism that underpins unconditional support for Israel—“my country, right or wrong.” Some may conclude that moral values, not biological kinship, demand our loyalty.

Moreover, how can we repent for the crimes committed in our name in Gaza if we cannot stop the destruction, repair the damage, or even ask the survivors of this violence to forgive us? These are difficult questions to ponder as we recite the Vidui, the traditional litany of sins. Some have included clarifications in the traditional text. This is what Independent Jewish Voices in Canada suggests:

Bagadnu (we betrayed). We have betrayed the Jewish value that every life contains an entire universe by dehumanising and demonising Palestinians. (Everyone: ashamnu) Our politicians, media, and mainstream institutions are complicit in laying the groundwork to allow for this genocide by spreading false accusations that are based in racism that is Anti-Palestinian, Orientalist, Islamaphobic, and anti-Arab.[9]

But how exactly did we betray this Jewish value? By voting for politicians complicit in the violence? By supporting institutions that stifle dissent? By using and therefore supporting mainstream media that routinely whitewash Israel’s crimes? These are some of the difficult questions that emerge as we prepare for Rosh Hashana. Answers may not come easily—or at all—but pondering them is part of the serious soul-searching particularly required this year.

May you be inscribed for a good year!

לשנה טובה תכתבו!

[1] “It is much more difficult to judge oneself than to judge others. If you succeed in judging yourself rightly, then you are indeed a man of true wisdom.”

[2] Deuteronomy 25:17-19.

[3] For example, Zohar, 3:160a; http://berdichev.org/amalek.htm

[4] https://jewishjournal.com/commentary/opinion/344089/amalek-and-the-problem-of-human-cruelty/

[5] https://mondoweiss.net/2020/01/kahane-the-prophet/

[6] https://www.youtube.com/shorts/qb_oBSAZjDs

[7] https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/dont-blame-israel-for-violating-jewish-ethics/

[8] Oz, Amos, The Slopes of Lebanon, San Diego, Harcourt, Brace and Jovanovich, 1989, p. 40.

[9] https://www.ijvcanada.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/Days-of-Awe-5785.docx-compressed.pdf; a more complete list of resources can be found here:

Independent Jewish Voices

Jewish Voice for Peace

Tzedek Chicago

Other Groups