A happy day or a serious day?

20th of Elul, 5770

In less than ten days, the night of Wednesday September 8thwe will be celebrating Rosh Hashana, (New Year) 5771.
To understand the dual aspectof this Holiday let me share with you a question that was asked to Rabbi Obadia Yosef. A Chazan (cantor) asked Rabbi Yosef if the melodies of Rosh haShana’s prayers should be joyful or grim and solemn?

If we understand the nature of this question we will understand the nature of Rosh haShana.
From one side, Rosh haShana is a Yom Tob, a very happy festive day in which we bless each other wishing to have a good and sweet year. For this we do a Seder that B’H we will explain tomorrow.
We also convey to each other a second wish: ‘life’. We wish each other literally to be alive, ‘one more year’. We realize our fragility and absolute dependence on God’s mercy, thus, recovering our dormant sense of mortality.Upon realizing that ‘life’ is not a given but a delicate gift from God, Rosh haShana becomes a serious day. It becomes ‘Yom haDin’, the day of judgment. We are judged –and we must judge ourselves-if we do deserve another year of life.
Rabbi Yosef answered that the melodies of Rosh haShana should be joyful melodies.

Why?
Because although we are judged, our Judge is our own loving Father, who is ready to forgive, forget and grant us another chance!

Israel is one of the happiest countries of the world: http://www.aish.com/jw/id/101741303.html

VIDUY: Why should I confess my sins in plural?

17th of Elul, 5770

As I’ve mentioned before, there are different texts of the Viduy (confession). In all versions, however, the transgressions are mentioned in alphabetical order. There is an additional element all texts of Viduy share: we confess our sins in plural. We do not say: ashamti (I am guilty) bagadti (I’ve betrayed You) but ashamnu, bagadnu (we are guilty, we have betrayed You).

Why?

One of my teachers, rabbi Baruch Garzon from Madrid, Spain, sent me recently the following conversation he had with his son Abraham when he was 12 years old:

“Daddy, I cannot lie in the Tefila... I assure to you that I have not committed all the sins that we mention in the Vidduy. Some things I did, but the majority, I did not!.

- You are right, Abraham. Our Rabbis are not forcing to you to lie. No one is saying that you committed all those sins. The Vidduy is in plural because we also are responsible for the mistakes committed by other people, sometimes because we have given our collaboration knowingly, and other times because we have seen them and we did not say anything. In both cases, we are accomplices; we share a responsibility and we must confess our fault. Not to complain, at times when we must do it for the sake of HaShem, is also a serious offense”.

Shabbat Shalom!

SELICHOT ON LINE: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CayIX_PTBpo&feature=related

VIDUY: Specific and personalized.

16th day of Elul, 5770

There is a discussion among the rabbis regarding the performance of the Mitzva of Viduy, confession of our sins. Should we be specific and detail our transgressions when we confess or is it enough just to mention generally: ”I've sinned, I made mistakes, I've rebelled against You”?.

Maimonides asserts that we should specify our own sins. His evidence is that when Moshe Rabbenu addressed God to ask forgiveness for the sin of the 'golden calf' he said: “This people committed a great sin, they made for themselves a god of gold' (Shemot 32, 31). Moshe specified the nature of their 'great sin'.

Following Maimonides' opinion, our Rabbis elaborated different versions of the Viduy, enumerating the possible transgression we might have committed. As we whisper each category of transgressions, we should focus and introspect in each specific area, and reflect if indeed we might have committed a sin in that area, admitting it and determining not to repeat it again.

Moreover, many rabbis advice that, before Yom Kippur we should retire to ourselves for a while to honestly review our misdeeds and bad habits in our hearts. Then we should write our own personalized list of transgressions in a piece of paper or a post-it-note or and attach it t our personal Machazor (=prayer’s book) and when we say the Viduy go over our own personal list, admit, regret and determine to abandon our bad deeds.

Read: http://www.aish.com/h/hh/rh/48942456.html