Tomorrow night (Sunday night) begins Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. It is a Biblically commanded fast day (no food or water), on which all work and creative productive activity of any kind is strictly forbidden.

Children below the age of majority (13 years for boys, 12 for girls), as well as pregnant or nursing women and people with serious medical conditions whose health might be endangered by fasting, are exempt from the fast, but are still commanded to abstain from work or creative activity.

Additionally, on Yom Kippur we refrain from wearing leather shoes, from bathing or washing (except for washing hands for hygiene), from anointing or perfuming ourselves, and from marital relations. All this is part of the ‘humbling of our souls’ or the subjection of our appetites.

————

It is a mitzvah to convoke (gather together for the public reading of the Torah) on this day. We will not be having an online meeting on Yom Kippur, but we will be holding services at our home, and those who wish to do so may join us. If you wish to follow along, or just listen to the prayers, you may find that it gives your mind something to focus on, and makes the fast a little easier.

Here’s the schedule for Yom Kippur services this year (U.S. Eastern Standard Time):

Sunday evening (begin after sunset):
7:30 PM - Ma'ariv prayers, beginning with Kol Nidrei (a special prayer for the evening of Yom Kippur, which will not occur again during the remainder of the holiday.)

Monday morning:
10:00 AM - Shacharis prayers, including the Torah reading
3:00 PM - Minchah prayers, including a second (different) Torah reading and the Book of Jonah
6:45 PM - Ne'ilah (closing) prayers
Note: the Ne'ilah prayers are supposed to begin when the sun has reached the treetops, and they should extend past sunset. If sundown occurs earlier (or later) than 7:00 PM in your area, you should begin the Ne'ilah prayers earlier (or later) accordingly.
7:30 PM (approximately) - After the Ne'ilah prayers are concluded, we will be breaking our fast together with those who have joined us.

—————

For those of you who do not have a machzor book (a special siddur for Yom Kippur), we have included a PDF version for you below.

Although this machzor is not complete (it omits the Mussaf prayers at the end of the Shacharis service, as well as all the chazzan’s extra prayers which are recited in a public assembly), it is still 55 pages long, so be warned before you print it.

L’shana tova techateimu!
(May you be sealed for a good year!)

The holiday of Yom Kippur (the name means "Day of Atonement") is observed between the eve of the ninth and the eve of the tenth of Tishrei, which is the seventh month in the Jewish calendar. It is the only holiday in the Jewish calendar which does not have a day added to it for those Jews living outside the land of Israel.

Tishrei is both the first month and the seventh month in our calendar. It was the month in which man was created, so in that sense is the first month of man’s physical existence (our first birthday, so to speak). However, from the point when our people were transformed into a nation as described in the book of Exodus, we have a new way of looking at the calendar – reckoning from when we left slavery to become free people, unified by our G-d to serve Him only.

It could be said that Israel was 'born again' spiritually as a new creation in the springtime month of Nisan, and that is why Hashem told us in the Torah to begin to consider the month of Nisan as the first month – “for you”. He wished us to recognize a new 'first' month, the first month of our new lives, as our true spiritual rebirth, the time in which we began anew. This is why it is possible to recognize a New Year for creation, and also a New Year later for Hashem’s 'new' creation, His people Israel.

On the first day of Tishrei, Rosh Hashanah, we recognize G-d's kingship over us, and (according to tradition) He passes judgment and issues decrees on what will happen to each individual and each nation in the coming year. On Yom Kippur, we as a corporate national body receive His forgiveness, not because of anything we have done or promise to do, but because of His mercy and atoning power, as He wipes away the past and uproots the seeds of destruction which we have sown by our past sins. The people of Israel are thus emboldened by Him to face the coming year with a clean slate.

Fasting

Yom Kippur represents a culmination of the Ten Days of National Repentance which began on Rosh Hashanah. It is simultaneously the most solemn and the most joyous holiday in the Jewish year, and it is characterized by individually and collectively “humbling our souls” (our appetites) before G-d. The actual laws concerning this “humbling” are given in halacha, a biblical authority structure dating back to the time of Moses. Specifically, five things are forbidden to individuals, which when practiced with other Jews reflect Israel's national mood on Yom Kippur: Eating and drinking, washing oneself for personal grooming, the wearing of leather shoes, anointing the body (for non-medical purposes), and conjugal relations. The punishment for indulging in these pleasures during this day of humbling is in the hands of Heaven, and is said to be death. Children, pregnant or nursing women and those who are seriously ill are generally exempted from observing the fast of Yom Kippur. (Ask your local rabbi if you have specific health concerns.)

Although we collectively fast and abstain, we are not mourning or sorrowful during this day. The proper mood of the day is a somber but joyous expectation. According to the medieval sage Rambam, we fast because on this day we have transcended our need for food and bodily necessities, and as individuals, we represent the people of Israel collectively by standing before G-d clothed in white, praising him in a manner similar to the myriads of angels in heaven who need no food or drink.

Prayer on Yom Kippur

A holiday prayer book is called a Machzor, meaning 'returning'. Our rabbis teach that every year is a repeating cycle, in which the same separation between holiness and the mundane occurs both annually and weekly. Every Sabbath in the year, for example, has the same sanctity and blessing which existed on the very first Sabbath of Creation. In the same way, every Yom Kippur has the very same sanctity as the very first Yom Kippur observed by the Children of Israel at Mount Sinai, approximately 3500 years ago, when Israel received full forgiveness after the sin of the golden calf and Moses descended the mountain bearing the second set of tablets (Exodus 34). This means that every Yom Kippur is just as effective for our repentance and forgiveness as that which Moses was granted on our behalf.

Each day of the year we gather for collective prayer three times a day. On almost all biblical holidays, we pray four times a day. On Yom Kippur, we pray five times:

• The first time of collective prayer is prayed just after nightfall after Yom Kippur begins and we start Ma’ariv (the evening prayer service) with the recitation of “Kol Nidrei” (lit. “All Vows”). This prayer asks G-d to consider the coming year’s 'statements of intent' that we might make – which cannot be fulfilled because of circumstances beyond our control – as not being vows or oaths in His eyes. The evening service then continues with a slightly adapted version of that which we pray every night of the year.

• The second time of collective prayer is Shacharis (morning) prayer, upon arising and assembling. This also has some slight variations, due to the holiday.

• The third time of collective prayer is known as the Mussaf prayer, the "additional" service which is only recited on holidays. Every biblical holiday has its own thematic elements in the Mussaf prayer for that day. Yom Kippur's deals mostly with our repentance and our being forgiven.

• The fourth time of collective prayer is the Minchah (afternoon) service. We pray Minchah every day, but again there will be some holiday specific adaptations.

• The fifth and final prayer for Yom Kippur is unique to Yom Kippur, and is never prayed at any other time. It is called Ne'ilah, which means "closing". It is prayed just as the sun begins to reach the tops of the trees, as the day is drawing to a close. (However, Yom Kippur is not over until the sky is dark and at least three stars are visible.)

After Yom Kippur ends, we recite or hear Havdalah (the short ceremony of 'Separation') before we eat anything. The Havdalah service declares the separation between a holy day and ordinary days, and Yom Kippur is the holiest day of the year.

As we leave the synagogue at the end of Yom Kippur, we bless each other with wishes for "a good and blessed year."

Atonement

While human beings can forgive or pardon, atonement is possible only with G-d. Atonement does not merely let the perpetrator off the hook. It erases the record of the debt. Atonement does not merely try to patch up a damaged relationship. It removes all obstacles to the relationship and effects full reconciliation. Left to ourselves, our sins would drag us down by their weight and force us unto a downwards spiral of evil from which there would be no escape. Evil brings more evil in its wake, and even our efforts at repentance would be unable to reverse all the effects of our sin on ourselves and the world around us. But G-d offers not only pardon and forgiveness but also atonement.

"[Atonement] is the highest act of the absolute, free-willed Almighty power of G-d, Who alone can do away with the natural law of cause and effect… so that the consequences of the errors and sins of the past have no disturbing effect on the… life of the future; so that after a morally bad past, the blossoming of a pure and happy future is still possible. … The Day of Atonement is the appointed-time for the revelation of that miracle of miracles, G-d's almighty power in eradicating all consequences of the past, the re-creation of all existence which had already lapsed toward extermination… the spiritual, moral, social rebirth through the almighty grace of G-d, the resurrection out of spiritual, moral and social death." (Rabbi S.R. Hirsch)

Every Yom Kippur, we acknowledge that we are recipients of His atoning power, as He wipes away the past and uproots the seeds of destruction which we have sown by our past sins. We are thus emboldened by Him to face the coming year with a clean slate.

Rabbi Akiva taught: “Happy are you, O Israel! Before Whom are you cleansed? Who cleanses you? Your Father in heaven! As it is written, ‘I will sprinkle upon you clean water, and you will be cleansed of all your impurities...’ (Ezekiel 36:25) Furthermore, it is written, ‘G-d is the Hope (mikveh) of Israel.’ (Jeremiah 17:13) [The word mikveh ("hope") is also the name for the ritual purification pool.] Just as the mikveh cleanses the impure, so does the Holy One, blessed is He, cleanse the Children of Israel.” (Gemara, Yoma 85b)

And every Yom Kippur, we are reminded of the supreme act of atonement which was performed on our behalf:

"And if any man sins, we have an advocate with the Father, Y'shua Moshiach HaTzaddik (the Righteous Messiah). And he is the atonement for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the whole world." (1st Letter of Yochanan [John] 2:1-2)

"For all having sinned, and falling short of the glory of G-d, are made righteous gratuitously by his favor, through the redemption that is in the Messiah Y'shua; whom G-d has determined as a means of atonement through faith, by his blood, to demonstrate his righteousness through the remitting of previously existing sins…" (Letter to the Romans 3:23-25)