I have mixed feelings about attending services on High Holy Days.  Friends of mine would never be caught in a schul, synagogue or temple on one of these days.  They eschew religion.  I do not go because of religion but because a lot of friends of mine, some people I know and mostly, the people I study Torah with attend.  If caught out of town I would, perhaps, attend services at the nearest place of worship.  I have problems with this because I would not be comfortable in an Orthodox synagogue, a little more comfortable in a Conservative Temple and most comfortable with a Reform congregation.  However, I have noticed that even if the name is the same, there are differences in each as if they were established in different places and different times by different actors in the Diaspora.

The music and ritual are virtually the same world wide and in all of the different streams of Judaism.  However, in Yiddish derived services there is a difference between those and Ladino derived services.  In fact, no two places of worship, worship exactly the same. My part in this is a total disconnect with what the Rabbi, Cantor and notables on the pulpit are doing. Traditionally, at least in my memory, there were impassioned pleas from the pulpit about giving money to keep the house of worship going.  The big donors were already in the first pews and some of these were asked to hold the Torahs taken from the ark and march around the congregation.  This, for me, is not what High Holy Days were or are all about.

My personal belief about doing good works, having good thoughts and treating everyone else as I would want to be treated gets lost in the ritual which admittedly is thousands of years old.  Just on that score, the “praying” together, repeating the same words from the same siddurs (books) should have great meaning.  Unfortunately, since I do not pray (for me, prayer is a bi-directional street – you pray and someone answers), I do not feel comfortable sitting, standing and repeating well worn words in Hebrew and English. The High Holy Days have been selected to commemorate the Akeda or the Sacrifice of Isaac to test Abraham’s commitment.  And, here too, this is just Rosh Hashanah, the replacement of the old year with the new one, 5767.  This is a significant event that gives us pause to think about the Day of Atonement, ten days hence, or Yom Kippur. Purging of sin independent of another year being born is part of the two Holy Days of the Jews.

How can a people, with no malice in their hearts and wishing to forgive and start over, not make a big deal about something called the Jewish New Year?  Based on a lunar calendar it comes and goes around the beginning of the school year calendar so you can keep track of it.  It is sufficiently important that you might compare how calendars in Latin, Greek, Arabic and now Kwanza fare in recounting the days of our lives. High Holy Days in each year provide much to think about.