Category: Selichot

The Predator’s Tools

Building communities based on truly transformative justice requires that we strive to “put down the predator’s tools,” according to adrienne maree brown. (We Will Not Cancel Us; more here“). Considering the predator’s tools raises serious misgivings about this week’s Torah portion and many Jewish teachings centering the injunction to pursue “tzedek, tzedek [“justice, justice” or “equity, equity”]. Reflecting on inherited ideas of justice is but one aspect of exploring collapse and the possibility of (re-)building.

This is part of a series on Summer of Collapse.

Updated for more clarity of expression in the “Justice, In/Out of Context” section and addition of “Some History” section below Friday afternoon (8/29/25, around 5 ET)

Justice, In/Out of Context

The Torah portion “Shoftim [Judges]” (Deut 16:18-21:9) is composed of rules about appointing judges and other legal matters. It contains one of the most quoted verses in the Torah, which begins:

tzedek tzedek tirdof…, …צֶדֶק צֶדֶק תִּרְדֹּף
Justice, justice shall you pursue… (JPS 2006)
Equity, equity you are to pursue… (Fox/Schocken 1996)
— Deuteronomy 16:20

Teaching and preaching on this phrase is frequently separated from the context, in both narrow and wider senses.

In one narrow sense, focusing on the phrase alone and not the surrounding verses allows for generalizing the instruction beyond its most likely connection to the previous verse about accepting bribes. On another verse-specific level, many citations of “justice, justice” leave off the second half of the verse, which reads:

וְיָרַשְׁתָּ אֶת־הָאָרֶץ אֲשֶׁר־” אֱלֹהֶיךָ נֹתֵן לָךְ׃
…in order that you may live
and possess the land that YHWH your God is giving you! (Fox)
…that you may thrive and occupy the land that your God [YHVH] is giving you. (JPS)

Ignoring the bulk of the verse’s language allows for generalizing the instruction in ways the full verse doesn’t support. These specifics need not invalidate teachings centering “justice, justice.” And it’s essential to note that Torah text never stands on its own in Jewish tradition; it is interpreted and, in many cases, ameliorated by centuries of post-biblical teaching and legal rulings. Still, Shoftim reminds us that our inherited ideas of justice — in- and outside of Judaism — include ideas such as judicial death penalty (Deut 17:2-7), blood-avenging (Deut 19:11-13), “an eye for an eye” (Deut 19:21), and expectations of warfare (Deut 20).

Abolitionist efforts of any kind require serious examination of these and other punitive ideas we’re inherited and a careful look at how they frame our understanding of justice. Alicia Suskin Ostriker offers powerful teachings on the concept of justice and how it relates to Jewish theology — and ideas about the topic, more broadly.

Strange Invention

Decades ago, Ostriker remarked on the “strange invention of the Jews, God’s ‘justice'”:

It is a strange invention of the Jews, God’s “justice.” That God should be “just,” obliged to reward good men who obeyed his laws, care for widows and the poor and so forth, and punish evil ones who didn’t, was not a notion that occurred to the Egyptians, the Canaanites, the Babylonians, the Greeks. We appreciate, if we step back a bit from our theological assumptions, what a peculiar expectation it is that human justice should be intrinsic to a God, and still more odd, that human beings need to remind god about it….

…[God] was waiting for her [Job’s wife, or each of us] to issue her challenge. That is what really happens. God does not know how to be just until the children demand it….

She wants the unjustly slain to be alive and for singing and dance to come to the victims.

We already know what she wants. She wants justice to rain down like waters. She wants adjustment, portion to portion, so that the machinery of the world will look seemly and move powerfully and not scrape and scream. The children of God do not really say that God is just. But they invent the idea. They chew it over and over, holding it up to the light this way and that. And though blood drips from the concept, staining their hands, they are persistent. It is their idea. They want justice to rain down like waters. Justice to rain like waters. Justice to rain. Justice to rain.
–Alicia Suskin Ostriker, The Nakedness of the Fathers, p.232, 239, 240. Full citation below**

Ostriker was not writing from an abolitionist perspective or directly addressing the portion Shoftim. But her words point to important work we need to undertake around some basic concepts.

As we move through this period of collapse and consider which tools can still serve, it’s crucial to “take a step back” from many assumptions, in theology and beyond. As we move through Elul toward the new year, we are called to reflect on how our assumptions, and the structures built on them, contribute to harm and what steps we can take to remedy that.

Some History

For either Ostriker’s 1986 “Imagining of Justice” or the 1994 “Meditation on Justice,” a quick history reminder might be in order:

In the 1980s, gender was generally treated as a binary in- and outside of Judaism. Women’s leadership — or even full personhood — was not yet accepted in many parts of the Jewish world, although women were ordained as rabbis in some US movements beginning in the 1970s.

Keshet (For LGBTQ+ equality in Jewish life) was not founded until 1996 and, as their story reports: “Not too long ago, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer Jews were largely invisible in American Jewish life. Marriage equality wasn’t on anyone’s radar — certainly not on the radar of most synagogues and Jewish organizations — and there was not a single gay-straight alliance at a Jewish high school.”

Ostriker’s 1986 statement about being a Jewish woman — “I am and am not a Jew” — made sense across all Jewish movements, at that time, even in the equality-focused Havurah movement. By the time Nakedness of the Fathers was released in 1994, gender equity had advanced in some Jewish spaces; the Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance was still years away, however, and issues of gender and sexuality in Judaism still had (have) a long road ahead throughout Judaism.

Keeping this history in mind adds layers to the call to “take a step back” from assumptions. And Ostriker’s reminder that we have to imagine justice — and how it might relate to the divine — couldn’t be more timely…. it was in 1986 and in 1994 and the countless moments I’ve found myself turning to her words over the decades.




** Full citation: “Job, or a Meditation on Justice,” from Nakedness of the Fathers: Biblical Visions and Revisions. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers, 1994.

Here’s a PDF excerpt — “Job, or a Meditation on Justice”

An earlier version (1986), “Job, Or the Imagining of Justice” — originally in The Iowa Review — is available on Academia.edu.

Author bios at Jewish Women’s Archives and Poetry Foundation

Feature image is largely decorative: The words “Whose tools?” and a two-pan balance.

Repentance, Repair, and Cancellation

UPDATE 8/26/25: Congregation Membership and Removal resource page

UPDATE 8/29/25: Typos in copying from We Will Not Cancel Us corrected

Repentance and repair must be year-round efforts, but the Jewish calendar emphasizes these needs as a new year approaches. For help in this work, many Jews turn to a centuries-old, five-step process outlined by Maimonides, AKA “Rambam” (acronym for R‘ Moses ben Maimon):

  • Naming and Owning Harm
  • Starting to Change
  • Restitution and Accepting Consequences
  • Apology
  • Making Different Choices — as outlined by R’ Danya Ruttenberg

This is another in a series on Calendar Notes for a Summer of Collapse.

Beyond some quotations and a few questions, I haven’t got much to offer.

But the questions strike me as non-negotiable, given all we face in- and outside Jewish communities… living in DC and with many friends and family in Chicago, I am so conscious of the disasters coming our way if we cannot figure out how to resist in ways that don’t cause more damage….

Naming Harm and Starting to Change

This year, I am exploring these steps within the “unthinkable thoughts” of adrienne maree brown’s We Will Not Cancel Us:

I’ll start with the scariest unthinkable thought for me, which is that maybe we as a species are in a state of apocalyptic fatigue — exhausted in the face of all the changes and endings we are living through. Our current collective circumstances require us to think about death, to grieve, and to consider that everything we have known has to change or come to an end. [p.33]


I, we, have to be able to discern what is me/us and what is fear.

Which leads to my next unthinkable thought: do I really know the difference between my discernment and my fear? [p.37]


…We are full of justified rage. And we want to release that rage. And one really fast and easy way to do this is what I experience as knee jerk collective punishment in movements. [p.40]


We are afraid, and we think it will assuage our fears and make us safer if we can clarify an enemy, a someone outside of ourselves who is to blame, who is guilty, who is the origin of the harm. Can we acknowledge that trauma and conflict can distort our perspective of responsibility and blame in ways that make it difficult to see the roots of the harm? [p.42-43, emphasis added]


…
The tools of swift predatory justice feel good to use, familiar, groove in the hand easily from repeated use and training, briefly satisfying. But these tools are often blunt and senseless.

Unless we have an analysis of abolition and dismantling systems of oppression, we will not realize what’s in our hands, we will never put the predator’s tools down and figure out what our tools are and can be.

My third unthinkable thought — why does it feel like we are committed to punishment, and enjoying it? Why do our movements more and more often feel like we are moving with sharp teeth against ourselves? And what is at stake because of that pattern, that feeling? Why does it feel like someone pointing at someone else and saying: “that person is harmful!,” and with no questions or process or time or breath, we are collectively punishing them, tearing them, and anyone protecting them, to shreds?

Sometimes we even do it with the language of transformative justice: claiming that we are going to give them room to grow. They need to disappear completely to be accountable. We are publishing shaming them so that they will learn do do better.

Underneath this logic I hear: we are good and we are getting rid of the “bad” people in our community or movement. We are affirming our rightness and power. [p.44-45, emphasis added]


Knee-jerk call outs say: those who cause harm or mess up or disagree with us cannot change and cannot belong. They must be eradicated. The bad things in the world cannot change, we must disappear the bad until there is only good left.

But one layer under that, what I hear is:
We cannot change.
We do not believe we can create compelling pathways from being harm doers to being healed, to growing.
We do not believing we can hold the complexity of a gray situation.
We do not believe in our own complexity. [p.57-58]

— We Will Not Cancel Us: And Other Dreams of Transformative Justice by adrienne maree brown. AK Press, 2020.

Institutional and Movement Repair

The crucial perspectives of We Will Not Cancel Us return me to Rambam’s process, as R’ Ruttenberg describes it: Maimonides discussion of transformation “precedes his discussion of amends/reparations and apologies. He doesn’t spell out his thinking explicitly, but I think he was trying to tell us that apologies, and even amends and reparations, don’t truly have the needed effect if the work to become different isn’t already underway….The goal here isn’t amends. It’s transformation.” p.34, On Repentance and Repair.

One tricky aspect of work here involves our participation in a variety of institutions: “How can and should we think about the work of repentance when not a single person, but a rather a body, made of many actors with different roles is causing harm?…What are the obligations–and limits to the obligations–of the individuals in charge, and what does repentance look like when undertaken by an institution?” p. 101, On Repentance and Repair.

Again, beyond the questions, I haven’t got much to offer. But I believe we have to be asking them. And the questions lead me back to adrienne maree brown:

“I can’t help but wonder who benefits from movements that engage in public infighting, blame, shame, and knee-jerk call outs? I can’t help but see the state grinning, gathering all the data it needs, watching us weaken ourselves. Meanwhile, the conflicts are unresolved, and/or harm continues.” p. 54 We Will Not Cancel Us

congregation membership and removal resource page (added 8/26/25)

Rambam, Ruttenberg, Repentance

Laws of Repentance, a late 12th Century work, is part of the enormous Mishneh Torah and can be found in several translations at Sefaria. (Useful background on Mishneh Torah as a whole). R’ Danya Ruttenberg provides an overview of Rambam’s five steps and explores them in the context of personal, public, institutional, and national repair: On Repentance and Repair: Making Amends in An Unapologetic World (Beacon Press, 2022).

Rough Draft for a Rough Season

As Rosh Chodesh Elul approaches, rough draft of an al chet [litany of missing the mark] in hopes of awakening us to some areas of error we might try to fix as the Days of Awe draw near. Part of series: Calendar Notes for a Summer of Collapse

Selichot for Institutions, Elul 5785

New text for Elul 5785 (by V. Spatz, CC BY-SA-NC) with **quotations from Machzor Lev Shalem (Rabbinical Assembly, 2010)**

Two-page document is designed for praying, sharing, and printing through format that distinguishes machzor quotations and newer text for many readers. Full text also appears in post format below.

Skip to in-post format. Download/open as PDF —

selichot for institutionsDownload

Selichot (Forgiveness) Prayers for Institutions

The soul is Yours, the body is Your creation Have compassion on Your handiwork ** (p.225)

In function and in failure, our institutions are Yours as well
Re-orient us to divine sparks and powers within
Save us from ourselves with ourselves under Your guidance


Grant relief to this driven leaf (Lev 26:36)
Have compassion on that which is but dust and ashes

Cast away our sins, be kind to Your creations.

God saw it and appraised it, examined it and plumbed it,
and then God said to human beings:

“The fear of HASHEM — that is wisdom;
departing from sin — that is true knowledge” (Job 28:28) ** (p.224)

Our institutions are at once fragile and ponderous,
fleeting and stagnant, intractable and so easily toppled
conflict and confusion foster many modes of collapse

Keep us from contributing our own brittleness and turmoil
Remind us of connection’s strength and possibility
Help us pursue repair when all seems lost


If you see within me cause for sadness, guide me toward eternal truths

Hear my prayer, God, give ear to my cry; do not disregard my tears;
like all my forebears I am a wanderer, a guest in Your house

Make me an instrument of Your salvation ** (p.228)

My soul yearns for You, though I am afraid of Your judgment

My heart is caught in the web it has spun.
Form me anew, granting me a heart freshly born ** (p.230)


Our understanding is limited, obstacles abound
Our errors serve as brambles, adding pain along the way
We’ve lost ourselves and misled others

Clarify our missteps so we know when we must turn
Teach us to notice stumbling-blocks and dangers in the road
When despair threatens, nudge us back toward hope


We call out in words You taught Moses to use in times of trouble: “HaShem, HaShem, God compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, full of kindness and trust, extending kindness to the thousandth generation, forgiving iniquity, transgression and sin –” (Ex 34:6-7)

For the sin we have committed before You in destroying without thought to the future
For the sin we have committed before You by bowing down to the past

For the sin we have committed before You by focusing on policy in a world on fire
For the sin we have committed before You by thinking crisis overrides all planning and care

For the sin we have committed before You by thoughtlessly allowing ourselves to be led
For the sin we have committed before You by refusing to honor leadership

For the sin we have committed before You by failing to ask how we can help
For the sin we have committed before You by assuming it’s easier to do it all ourselves

For the sin we have committed before You by approving decisions that worry us
For the sin we have committed before You by second-guessing every step

For the sin we have committed before You by treating critique as attack
For the sin we have committed before You by attacking under the guise of help

For the sin we have committed before You by treating lock-step as unity
For the sin we have committed before You by mistaking variety of opinion for inclusion

For the sin we have committed before You by assuming we know too little to offer opinion
For the sin we have committed before You by thinking we know it all

For the sin we have committed before You by assuming our perspectives somehow universal
For the sin we have committed before You by assuming our own experiences unique

For the sin we have committed before You by mistaking outrage for justice
For the sin we have committed before You by succumbing to complacency

For the sin we have committed before You by fearing uncertainty and pause
For the sin we have committed before You by letting uncertainty paralyze us

For the sin we have committed before You by bringing punitive efforts into abolition work
For the sin we have committed before You by using abolition language to absolve real error

For the sin we have committed before You by putting Movement above people
For the sin we have committed before You by failing to keep our eyes on the prize

To all these sins, awaken us, help us recognize harm, and grant us ability to change
Bring us to the day when we can ask that you forgive us, pardon us, and grant us atonement.

Featured image is cropped from earthquake photo by Angelo Giordano via Pixabay

Luxury and Sin: A dictionary path

Is “living in luxury” the root of all “sin [chet]”?

The high holiday liturgy is filled with the word, “chet,” usually translated as “sin,” as in the prominent confession:

“For the sin we have sinned… […עַל חֵטְא שֶׁחָטָאנוּ, al chet sh’chatanu…].”

One root-meaning of chet is “[to miss], to fail, err, sin.” Archery metaphors abound this time of year. And considering how, where, and why we “missed the mark” is an important endeavor for the season. But rarely** are we asked to focus on another definition for the same root letters: “living in luxury” or “well-dressed, polished, cleansed.” Exploring the intersection of “luxury” and “sin” can be an important addition to our self-reflections.

There are plenty of resources out there for exploring the intersection of wealth, privilege, and “sin.” See this year’s Hill Havurah resources, for just one example. But here, as an offering for this season of return and repentance, is a basic exploration of the dictionary path less traveled.

**In fact, I don’t know of any such discussions and would appreciate any citations.

Please note: Geekier details appear further below, following an attempt at a more narrative approach.

Although this is my own exploration, this post was inspired by Elul studies at SVARA: The traditionally radical yeshiva, and by learning with Hill Havurah and sister organization, Mount Moriah Baptist Church.

Image is a pile of gold bricks. Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

Chet I, Chet II

The biblical lexicon, Brown-Driver-Briggs, has only one long entry for “chet,” based on the root “miss the mark,” with comparison to an Arabic word with a similar root-meaning. The Jastrow Dictionary, however, offers word has two separate entries for the same root-letters: The second (II) is the commonly cited “miss the mark,” and the first (I) is “to live in luxury, to be like a nobleman, to be well-dressed, clean &c.” based on a root-meaning “to stroll idly, saunter.”

The chet I entry is filled with references to midrashic texts that develop meaning through word-play and sound associations. (The full Jastrow entry can be found at Sefaria.)

The first example finds that “chet” means “purify” through a word-play around Leviticus 1:5 (sacrificial slaughter [veshacḥat] of a bull) with “cleansing” [chat] centered on a body part that bends [shach]. (See bend below.)

Examples of “chet” used to mean “to be gratified” and “to ask petulantly” are also explored. (See gratification below.)

An example linking “chet” with luxury centers on a midrash involving Abraham refusing gifts from the King of Sodom and Daniel refusing gifts from Balshezar. (See luxury below.)

The chet I entry does not offer straightforward grammar to explain the nature of sin in biblical or rabbinic thought. It does present a fascinating glimpse at rabbinic word-play over the centuries. And the mere existence of this entry offers food for thought on links between wealth and sin:

  • What can we learn from the examples of Abraham and Daniel rejecting wealth from rulers associated with excess and oppression?
  • Why did Jastrow include this speculative exploration here? And how can it help us this season of return, repentance, and repair?
  • With this entry as preamble to the one on “missing the mark,” what might we learn about how “living in luxury” and “being accustomed to comfort” affect our ability to hit the mark in all manner of thought and action?

Further exploration of the chet I examples follow, with some additional details also linked.

Luxury and Its Rejection

The chet I entry includes several citations to commentary on the Song of Songs, Shir HaShirim Rabbah. (Jastrow uses the Latin-based abbreviation “Cant.” to refer to the bible book [“Canticles”] and “Cant. R.” to refer to the midrash collection.)

Shir HaShirim Rabbah, dated roughly to 800-1000 CE, offers homelitical explanations for each phrase in the Song of Songs. To illustrate a reflexive form of “chet” as “to show one’s self a nobleman, to be generous, proud,” Jastrow references a midrash on Song of Songs 7:7, “How fair you are and how pleasant you are, love, in delights.”

The phrase, “love, in delights,” is explained with reference to biblical incidents involving riches:

  • Abraham refuses gifts (“excuses himself”) from the King of Sodom (Gen 14:22-23) after helping the king recover captured people and goods;
  • Daniel refuses gifts (“excuses himself”) from Belshazar (Dan 5:16-17), while providing him the service of reading “the writing on the wall.”

In each case, the biblical hero would have been expected to accept goods and recognition for services rendered. Refusing could seem insulting. In these instances, however, Abraham and Daniel are praised for doing so. The King of Sodom and Belshazar are associated, in their respective biblical stories, with a variety of excesses in their conduct and oppression in their rule. Abraham and Daniel stand in contrast. Their refusals to take “earthly delights” are understood as expressing love of God.

It seems clear that both the bible stories and the midrash hold Abraham and Daniel as righteous; it is less obvious (to me, anyway) how the midrash and grammar function: Who, in the midrash, exemplifies this sauntering show of luxury?

  1. Are Abraham and Daniel showing themselves as noble, generous and proud, that is, (avoiding sin by) rejecting luxury? OR
  2. Are the King of Sodom and Belshazzar showing themselves as noble, generous and proud, that is, (committing the sin of) flaunting luxury?

Abraham is clear and succinct that his rejection of the gifts is about NOT giving credit to the apparently generous King of Sodom:

I will not take so much as a thread or a sandal strap of what is yours; you shall not say, ‘It is I who made Abram rich.’ — Gen 14:23

Daniel’s response to Belshazzar is more complex:

You may keep your gifts for yourself, and give your presents to others. But I will read the writing for the king, and make its meaning known to him….
[to Belshazzar] You exalted yourself against the Lord of Heaven, and had the vessels of [God’s] temple brought to you. You and your nobles, your consorts, and your concubines drank wine from them and praised the gods of silver and gold, bronze and iron, wood and stone, which do not see, hear, or understand; but the God who controls your lifebreath and every move you make—[God] you did not glorify!
[Eventually, Daniel is given the gifts at Belshazzar’s command, and then Belshazzar is killed.]
— Dan 5:17, 23, [29-30]

While both Abraham and Daniel end up with riches at various points in their stories, cautionary elements remain in their tales and in Jewish commentary over the centuries. (See also “Belshazzar and the Wall.”)

The chet I entry offers opportunities to consider these tales in the approach to the high holidays or in other consideration of “sin” and what it means to “miss the mark.”

BACK to Chet I, Chet II

Gratification

The chet I examples for “being raised in luxury, being delicate” include more commentary from Shir HaShirim Rabbah as well as some from Kohelet Rabbah, commentary on Ecclesiastes dated to about 750 – 900 CE. In addition, this meaning is supported by citations to the Targum, Aramaic translation of the Torah, from the early centuries of the Common Era:

The man who is gentle [דְמֶחְטֵי, d’mechtei] and refined among you will look with evil eyes upon his brother, and the wife who reposes on his bosom, and upon the rest of his children who remain.
She who is delicate [דִמְחַטַיְיתָא, dimchatai’eta] and luxurious among you, who has not ventured to put the sole of her foot upon the ground from tenderness and delicacy, will look with evil eyes upon the husband of her bosom, upon her son and her daughter.
— Targum for Deut 28:54, 56

Worth noting, if only as evidence for complex interactions between the related words and their meanings, is the entry for the word, “chitui [חִיטּוּי, חִטּוּי].” It includes both the “cleansing, purification” and the “delicacy, luxury, enjoyment” meanings of chet, citing both chet I and chet II.

BACK to Chet I, Chet II

Bend

The chet I entry includes citation to a word-play around Leviticus 1:5 (sacrificial slaughter of a bull). Jastrow’s citation appears in a passage about kosher slaughter techniques for ordinary, non-sacrificial food (Babylonian Talmud, Chullin ([חולין], “ordinary”). The meaning “to make look well, polish, dress, cleanse, prepare” is derived from a play on the Hebrew for slaughter [veshacḥat]:

Slaughter is conducted “from the place where the animal bends [shach],” i.e., the neck; it is purified [chattehu] through letting the blood run out, “cleansing.” Additional citations are to Lev 14:52 (“v’chitei ha-bayit [you shall purity the house]…”) and Psalms 51:9 (“Purge me [techatte’eni] with hyssop and I will be pure.”)

Further discussion in Chullin asks if slaughter could be conducted from the tail, which is also bent. But this is countered with the idea that the tail is perpetually bent, and the requirement is for a body part which is usually erect but bent for slaughter.

It is not explicit in the cited discussion at Chullin 27a, but it is noteworthy that “bending” is key here. The bending aspect of slaughter is also discussed at Rereading4Liberation.


BACK to Chet I, Chet II

Chet I, Chet II: More Details

A Dictionary of the Targumim, Talmud Bavli and Yerushalmi, and the Midrashic Literature, edited by Professor Marcus Jastrow, was first published in 1903. It is available in many editions (although I do not believe newer versions differ from older ones). It can now be accessed through Wikipedia and Sefaria. More on Jastrow in the 1906 Jewish Encyclopedia.

Jastrow thanks earlier scholars:

In conclusion, the author begs to state his indebtedness to Jacob Levy’s Targumic and Neo-Hebrew Dictionaries, where an amount of material far exceeding the vocabularies of the Arukh and Buxtorf’s Lexicon Hebraicum et Chaldaicum is accumulated, which alone could have encouraged and enabled the author to undertake a task the mere preparation for which may well fill a lifetime.
— preface 1903, p.XIII

Jacob Levy (1819-1892) published the two-volume Wörterbuch über die Talmudim und Midrashim in Leipzig in 1867-68. The same publishers issued new editions in 1876 and 1881. These include an appendix by Heinrich Leberecht Fleischer (1801-1888), described by Wikipedia as “a German orientalist.” (I think these references are only available in German.)

In Jastrow, Fleischer’s appendix to Levy’s dictionary is referenced directly as “Fl. to Levy Targ. Dict.” These references, including the one in chet I, are infrequent.

BACK to Chet I, Chet II

Chet-tet-aleph/chet-tet-yud [חטי, חָטָא] has two separate entries in the Jastrow Dictionary. The second is the commonly cited “miss the mark” (II). The first entry (I) in Jastrow for chet-tet-aleph/chet-tet-yud [חטי, חָטָא] is quite different:

[to stroll idly, saunter (v. Fl. to Levy Targ. Dict. I 424,2)] to live in luxury, to be like a nobleman, to be well-dressed, clean &c. (cmp. פנק, פרנק).

The full Jastrow entry can be found at Sefaria. And here, for convenience, are the two verbs listed for comparison:

פָּנַק (b. h.; cmp. פּוּק) [to go out,] to be a freeman; to live in luxury (cmp. חָטָא I).

פִּרְנֵק (Parel of פָּנַק) to delight; to treat with dainties.
Hithpa. – הִתְפַּרְנֵק to enjoy dainties. Cant. R. to VII, 2 מִתְפַּרְנְקִין, v. חָטָא I.

The midrash contains a repeated expression, with a reflexive form of chet: “…שֶׁהָיָה מִתְחַטֵּא, she-hayah mit-chatei…” — translated as “excuses himself.”

for Abraham: שֶׁהָיָה מִתְחַטֵּא עַל מֶלֶךְ סְדוֹם

for Daniel שֶׁהָיָה מִתְחַטֵּא עַל בֵּלְשַׁצַּר.

BACK to luxury —– BACK to Chet I, Chet II

BOTH Chet I and Chet II

There is at least one spot where the Jastrow dictionary references BOTH meanings, chet I and chet II. Jastrow entry for the word, “chitui” includes both the “cleansing, purification” and the “delicacy, luxury, enjoyment” meanings.

חִיטּוּי, חִטּוּי m. (v. חטי I, II) [reference here to the verb chet-tet-yud entries I and II] 1) cleansing, purification. Sifré Num. 126 לכלל ח׳ under the law of purification (ref. to Num. XIX, 12, Naz. 61ᵇ טהרה). —2) delicacy, luxury, enjoyment.—Pl. חִיטּוּיִין. Cant. R. to VII, 2 חיטטין (corr. acc.), v. חָטָא I.

חִיטּוּיָא m. ch. (v. preced.2) , being raised in luxury, being delicate. Targ. Y. I Deut. XXVIII, 56. [Some ed. חִיטוֹיָא.]

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Psalm 27 for the season (4 of 4)

“If you’re not 20 minutes early, you’re late,” my ballet teacher, Marie Paquet, used to tell her adult students: Without time to leave behind the outside world and prepare to focus, warm up physically and mentally, class could be frustrating, even dangerous. Over the years, I’ve realized that her adage also applies to worship services. Still, life and public transportation don’t always support early arrival to services.

But necessity, as I’m sure “they” rarely say, is the mother of invention in kavanah [intention]….

This past Shabbat, Shabbat Sukkot, I entered the sanctuary un-early and a little frazzled. Moreover, this particular service skipped over some introductory prayers that ordinarily help me focus. This left me struggling to follow the service. But, then, in a moment provided for silent prayer, I stopped struggling and simultaneously “heard,” quite clearly:

“On Your behalf, my heart says: ‘Seek My face!'” (Psalms 27:8)

I wish I could say that this verse instantly helped me find my way into the service. But I can say that I my inability to keep up became suddenly irrelevant. Moreover, I stumbled into a three-part message encapsulating the fall holidays. I am hoping it will carry — for me and others, I hope — the essence of the season of teshuva into the mundane, post-holiday world.
Continue reading Psalm 27 for the season (4 of 4)

Teshuva in a Half an Inch of Water

Teshuva is a never-ending process because we are always changing and the context of our universe is always shifting….We need multiple opportunities for teshuva because our mistakes and errors change over time, and our circumstances are fluid.
— Erica Brown, Return: Daily Inspiration for the Days of Awe, 2012

I was sitting in the bathtub, counting my toes
When the radiator broke, water all froze
I got stuck in the ice without my clothes
Naked as the eyes of a clown

I was crying ice cubes, hoping I’d croak
When the sun come through the window,
the ice all broke
I stood up and laughed, thought it was a joke
That’s the way that the world goes ’round
— John Prine, “That’s the Way that the World Goes ‘Round” (details)

The “fluid” circumstances Erica Brown mentions undoubtedly bear no intentional relationship to John Prine’s bathwater. But Prine’s song and Return: Daily Inspiration for the Days of Awe have something related to say about teshuva, and together they offer a fruitful approach to “recovering” ourselves in this penitential season.
Continue reading Teshuva in a Half an Inch of Water

Past, Present and Future in Teshuvah: Amichai, Zelda and the Pit

…The past is not a piece of
jewelry sealed in a crystal box
nor is it a snake preserved
in a bottle of formaldehyde—
The past trembles within the present
when the present falls
into a pit the past goes
with it —
when the past looks
toward heaven all of life
is upraised, even the distant past.
–Zelda, from “That Strange Night” (full text, notes)

The Pit

In a famous midrash, Joseph and his brothers return to Canaan to bury their father, and Joseph notices, by the side of the road, the pit where his brothers threw him decades before. Watching Joseph look into the pit, the brothers worry. They do not believe Joseph has forgiven their past deeds and continue to fear recriminations.

While the brothers in the midrash are fretting, however, Joseph recognizes the pit, despite its painful associations, as the source of all that happened to him later: his incarceration in Egypt, eventual rise to power, marriage and children; and, most importantly to the Genesis story, his ability to help his family when famine strikes their homeland.

Avivah Zornberg writes:

[Joseph] has gone to the trouble of returning to that place of his terror in order to bring closure to the old narrative. He makes the blessing for a personal miracle, claiming the site of his trauma as the site of redemption. By this act, he rereads the pit as a space of rebirth, transforming pain into hope. The grave has become a womb.
—The Murmuring Deep: Reflections on the Biblical Unconscious, p.319; Continue reading Past, Present and Future in Teshuvah: Amichai, Zelda and the Pit