{"id":63596,"date":"2019-09-27T15:25:29","date_gmt":"2019-09-27T12:25:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=63596"},"modified":"2019-09-27T15:25:29","modified_gmt":"2019-09-27T12:25:29","slug":"reflections-on-memory-forgiveness-and-videotape-for-rosh-hashanah","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/reflections-on-memory-forgiveness-and-videotape-for-rosh-hashanah\/","title":{"rendered":"Reflections on Memory, Forgiveness and Videotape for Rosh Hashanah"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[],"acf":{"old_id":"63596","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":63587,"related_cahpter":"317","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"Special High Holiday feature","content":"

The \u201cbook of memories\u201d [mentioned in the liturgy] is not just what we post on social media for others\u2019 consumption, but also everything we would never dream of posting: the stingy tip we left for the waiter after we took that beautiful picture of our meal. The nasty remark we made to our spouse right after we stopped recording that smiley video of our vacation. All the times we trash-talked our friends behind their backs, or lied to our bosses to cover up our mistakes.<\/p>\n

\u2026In some cosmic sense, all of that has been recorded, along with every other moment of our lives over the past year. And the prayers insist that we sit down, watch these tapes, and ask ourselves: What parts do I wish I could edit out? When would I have acted differently if I had known I was being watched? What moments do I never, ever want to repeat?<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is how God is different from Big Brother, who also knows everything we do and say, but who uses it against us,\u201d explains Rabbi Alan Lew. \u201cGod watches the whole video with a boundless, heartbreaking compassion.\u201d<\/p>\n

What would it feel like to stand before such a God and say, \u201cYes, I did these things, and yes, I feel awful about that, and I don\u2019t ever want to act this way again.\u201d What would this God say to me? I imagine it might go something like \u201cDearest, I know. Those things you did are not you. And I feel quite confident of that because I created you, and I am intimately familiar with your pure soul. So really, sweetheart, stop tormenting yourself and just focus on doing whatever reflecting\/apologizing\/resolving-to-be-better that you need to do to come back to me and return to your pure soul\/truest self.\u201d<\/p>\n

I imagine that coming before such a God would make it a lot easier for me to confront what\u2019s on those tapes.<\/p>\n

Like many other prayers, Unetaneh Tokef<\/em> includes a number of quotes from the Hebrew Bible\u2014and guess which book it draws most heavily from? Believe it or not, it\u2019s the Book of Job, in which God unfairly punishes a righteous man named Job\u2014an extreme example of bad things happening to good people. When Job confronts God, God basically replies, \u201cYou have no idea what it\u2019s like to create and rule the universe, so back off.\u201d Not exactly the biblical book I would advise quoting from if you\u2019re trying to promote a clear-cut reward-and-punishment theology.<\/p>\n

\u2026We can\u2019t always control what happens to us, but we do have some control over how we react. When bad things happen, we can cultivate a spiritual practice so that we feel less isolated. We can engage in self-reflection, and do teshuvah if necessary, to help us grow. And we can get some perspective by helping others who are worse off. These actions may not change our circumstances, but they may change us, giving us what we need to cope and even thrive.<\/p>\n

Excerpt from Sarah Hurwitz, Here All Along: Finding Meaning, Spirituality, and a Deeper Connection to Life\u2014in Judaism (after finally<\/u> choosing to look there),<\/em> Random House, 2019, pp. 191-193<\/p>\n","image":{"ID":63589,"id":63589,"title":"Sarah Hurwitz cover","filename":"Sarah-Hurwitz-cover.png","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Sarah-Hurwitz-cover.png","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/discovering-millions-of-pages-and-new-old-ideas\/sarah-hurwitz-cover\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"sarah-hurwitz-cover","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":63586,"date":"2019-09-26 15:33:44","modified":"2019-10-22 16:15:58","menu_order":0,"mime_type":"image\/png","type":"image","subtype":"png","icon":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-includes\/images\/media\/default.png","width":1000,"height":1000,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Sarah-Hurwitz-cover-150x150.png","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Sarah-Hurwitz-cover-300x300.png","medium-width":300,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Sarah-Hurwitz-cover-768x768.png","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":768,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Sarah-Hurwitz-cover.png","large-width":1000,"large-height":1000,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Sarah-Hurwitz-cover.png","1536x1536-width":1000,"1536x1536-height":1000,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Sarah-Hurwitz-cover.png","2048x2048-width":1000,"2048x2048-height":1000,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Sarah-Hurwitz-cover.png","post_full_size-width":1000,"post_full_size-height":1000,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Sarah-Hurwitz-cover-420x420.png","home_baner-width":420,"home_baner-height":420}},"embedded_video":"","video_duration":"","show_fb_comments":true,"credit_media":""},"tile":{"top_caption":"Excerpt from \"Here All Along\"","main_caption":"Reflections on Memory, Forgiveness and Videotape for Rosh Hashanah","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"Special High Holiday feature","preview_embedded":"","preview_image":{"ID":63589,"id":63589,"title":"Sarah Hurwitz cover","filename":"Sarah-Hurwitz-cover.png","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Sarah-Hurwitz-cover.png","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/discovering-millions-of-pages-and-new-old-ideas\/sarah-hurwitz-cover\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"sarah-hurwitz-cover","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":63586,"date":"2019-09-26 15:33:44","modified":"2019-10-22 16:15:58","menu_order":0,"mime_type":"image\/png","type":"image","subtype":"png","icon":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-includes\/images\/media\/default.png","width":1000,"height":1000,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Sarah-Hurwitz-cover-150x150.png","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Sarah-Hurwitz-cover-300x300.png","medium-width":300,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Sarah-Hurwitz-cover-768x768.png","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":768,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Sarah-Hurwitz-cover.png","large-width":1000,"large-height":1000,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Sarah-Hurwitz-cover.png","1536x1536-width":1000,"1536x1536-height":1000,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Sarah-Hurwitz-cover.png","2048x2048-width":1000,"2048x2048-height":1000,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Sarah-Hurwitz-cover.png","post_full_size-width":1000,"post_full_size-height":1000,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Sarah-Hurwitz-cover-420x420.png","home_baner-width":420,"home_baner-height":420}},"preview_video":"","external_link":"","link_for_pay":false,"tile_gallery_items":false,"credits":""},"alternate_tile":{"top_caption":"","main_caption":"","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"","hide_media":false},"tile_group":{"preview_image_url":false,"main_caption":"","sub_caption":"","":null,"popup_package_extra_content":"","read_time":""},"home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo":{"seo_title":"","seo_description":"","seo_default_title":"","seo_default_description":""},"links":false},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63596"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63596"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63596\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":63597,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63596\/revisions\/63597"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63596"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63596"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63596"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}