- Mon. Sept 22 erev Rosh HaShanah 5786
Archive: <big>SOUNDS OF THE HIGH HOLIDAYS — posts by ramara</big> including amazing shofar service, Avinu Malkenu, Kol Nidre...
Two versions of Kol Nidre:
….vocal….
...orchestral….
Archive: <big>Or Even Higher, a tale of Rosh Hashana</big>
From the Yiddish “אויב נישט נאָך העכער“ (Oyb Nisht Nokh Hekher”[thank you, word is bond!]), “If not higher”/”Or even higher”, a traditional Hassidic classic from the pen of left-leaning author and social critic I.L. Peretz (1852–1915), a realist, romanticist, and optimist, believing in the inevitability of progress through enlightenment, and in every people as chosen people...”<small>Public Domain sources.</small>
The place is the western Ukraine city of Nemyriv [current spelling] where the Jewish community dated back centuries, becoming a world center of Breslov Hasidism and of Jewish studies, until the Holocaust… But that was later. Imagine for now the voice of a 19th century storyteller…
“Every year, early on the Friday morning of Selichot, before Rosh Hashana, our rabbi of Nemirov vanishes…”
![1929 Woodcut illustration of a town clustered against hills and trees, possibly depicting Jerusalem, by Todos Geller, in FROM LAND TO LAND, published 1937 in Yiddish, Fun Land tsu Land, L.M. Shteyn/Labor World Press. From the Yiddish Book Center Spielberg Digital Yiddish Library. Todros Geller (died Chicago 1949-02-23)[1]/The L. M. Shteyn Farlag -- Public domain,copyright not renewed.](https://cdn.prod.dailykos.com/images/1338911/large/Todros_Geller_-_From_Land_to_Land_-_1929_-_Jerusalem_-_0107.png?1724738640 "1929 Woodcut illustration of a town clustered against hills and trees, possibly depicting Jerusalem, by Todos Geller, in FROM LAND TO LAND, published 1937 in Yiddish, Fun Land tsu Land, L.M. Shteyn/Labor World Press. From the Yiddish Book Center Spielberg Digital Yiddish Library. Todros Geller (died Chicago 1949-02-23)[1]/The L. M. Shteyn Farlag -- Public domain,copyright not renewed.")
Archive:<big>At the Gates of Prayer, a Yom Kippur tale of the Ba’al Shem Tov</big><small>Public domain sources.</small>
It is said of the congregation of the Ba'al Shem Tov that one year during Ne'ila —the final of the Yom Kippur prayers, the closing of the fast, of the holiest day of the days of awe— that this occurred … when the gates of prayer would not open...
Respóndemos
From 2020: “This was introduced to me in the mid 1980s by a Greek-Cuban-American Masorti rabbi-cantor whose home congregation sang it in harmony on the high holidays. I have a tape of it but couldn’t find that exact version online, so:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wpeSlaODSEo
Cuatro Canciones Sefardíes /Four Sephardic Songs. Song Cycle by Joaquín Rodrigo Vidre (1901 - 1999), lyrics: trad./anon., Ladino — Respóndemos,
Respóndemos, Answer us
Dio de Abraham, God of Abraham
respóndemos!
Respóndemos, Answer us
Él que respónde en la hora God who answers in
de voluntad, time of good will
respóndemos!
Respóndemos, Answer us,
pavor de Yitshak, Isaac’s dread
respóndemos!
Respóndemos, Answer us,
Él que respónde, en hora God who answers in
de angustia, time of anguish
respóndemos!
Respóndemos, Answer us,
Fuerte de Yaakov, strength of Jacob,
respóndemos!
Respóndemos, Answer us,
Dio de la merkava, God of the chariot
respóndemos!
Respóndemos, Answer us,
O Padre piadoso O compassionate and
y gracioso, gracious [One],
respóndemos! ...answer us...
At this link is discussion about the era, place, cultural contexts where Respóndemos originated.
<big>The Drumming of the Heart</big> from JTA <small>condensed</small>
On this most physically demanding of Jewish days, by tradition we thump at the heart during the Vidui — the confessional portion of the service composed of the Ashamnu and Al Chait. Some imagine it as self-flagellation. In fact, it’s a sensory experience giving live connection between spirituality and physicality: between feeling, thought and act.
To Rabbi Goldie Milgram — master’s degrees in social work and Hebrew letters, founder of Reclaiming Judaism, an organization seeking Jewish innovation and “maximal involvement,” and author and publisher of a number of books on creating a meaningful Jewish life — it acknowledges “I am out of alignment” with mitzvot. No one is perfect, and life is full challenge. Now we make space for facing when we fall short. With a motion that is drumbeat and heartbeat, a dancing of prayer, the body an instrument, to speak, hear and listen, with head and with heart, to reach the personally applicable “we have sinned...”.
Why not at the head, to connect with thought that may have prompted actions misaligned from commitment? Reb Goldie reminds us the head as center is a Western concept, detached from heart. In Judaism, the heart is the seat of commitment, our awareness of ‘ahavat Hashem’ [love of God] starts there.
KOSMOS Ensemble, joined by dancer Natalia Garcia-Huidobro, and Ulises Diaz ~ Sephardic melody, Passion, Grace & Fire, thematically echoing a traditional Avinu Malkeinu —a Jewish prayer dating back centuries, recited/sung in services of the Ten Days of Repentance, from Rosh Hashanah through Yom Kippur in Sephardic and Western Ashkenazic custom— enhanced in Garcia-Huidobro’s drumming at the heart,…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iAQhYN6lnKg
With this action, the door of your heart flies open ...the beginning of teshuvah, the return, of asking and giving forgiveness, even of the self, determination to make amends resonating throughout the liturgy.
The Viddui, she notes, is written in the ” ‘we’ — “we” communally as well as individually, take responsibility to repair the world. Because the world needs repair — if not now, when? if not self, who? — For that, we need hearts and heads, bodies and minds, individuals and communities, connected. How to start? With each, ourselves. Heart first.
<big>Selichot -- a selicha (penitential prayer) leaf, in Hebrew, 8th/ 9th century, discovered 1908, Mogao Caves 16 miles S.E. of the center of Dunhuang, an oasis strategically located in Gansu Province, China, at a religious and cultural crossroads on the transcontinental Silk Road, More details at Dunhuang manuscripts</big>
From the Arba'ah Turim אַרְבַּעָה טוּרִים— “... far better a few words with kavannah, with commitment, than many words without.”
“Do not think that the words of the prayer as you say them go up to God. It is not words that ascend but what they convey: the fervent outpouring of the heart, rising as breath rises, as ru’ach, as n’shama, upward. If a prayer consists only of words empty of meaningful intention, what is there to rise up?”[1]
Mah Tov U'Mah Na'im Shevet Achim Gam Yachad
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"Humanity is but a single Brotherhood: so, make peace with your brethren." Qur’an 49:10 Chapter (49) Sūrat al-Ḥujurāt (“The Dwellings”)
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“Human beings, We created you all ... and made you into nations and tribes so that you may know one another….” Qur’an 49:13 Sūrat al-Ḥujurāt (The Dwellings)
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“Repel Evil by that which is better.” Qur’an 41:34, Chapter (41) Surat Fussilat (“Explaining in Detail”)
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<big>
שֶׁיִּמְלְאוּ מִשְׁאֲלוֹת לִבֵּנוּ לְטוֹבָה
Sheh’yimlu m’she’ehlot libenu l’tova.
May the outpouring of our hearts be answered for the good.</big>
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<big>Shabat Shalom</big>
![THE IMAGE STATES, Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world ' s grief. --- Do justly now. Love mercy now. Walk humbly now. --- You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are [you] free to abandon it. -- The Talmud. ------- These passages are Judaic paraphrases. The 3rd through 5th lines refer to Micah 6:8, in Tanakh (the Bible), the final sentence generally quotes the ancient sage, Rabbi Tarfon, in Pirkei Avot (2:16, ) the section of Mishnah (part of the Talmud) popularly called Ethics of the Fathers, (the word abandon is also accurately translated as desist from). The first sentence is widely attributed to the 1995 book, Wisdom of the Jewish Sages: A Modern Reading of Pirke Avot, by Rabbi Rami Shapiro, writing in the spirit of this portion of Mishnah, to assemble the combined adage.](https://cdn.prod.dailykos.com/images/1167979/story_image/Talmudquote.jpg?1678205064 "THE IMAGE STATES, Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world ' s grief. --- Do justly now. Love mercy now. Walk humbly now. --- You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are [you] free to abandon it. -- The Talmud. ------- These passages are Judaic paraphrases. The 3rd through 5th lines refer to Micah 6:8, in Tanakh (the Bible), the final sentence generally quotes the ancient sage, Rabbi Tarfon, in Pirkei Avot (2:16, ) the section of Mishnah (part of the Talmud) popularly called Ethics of the Fathers, (the word abandon is also accurately translated as desist from). The first sentence is widely attributed to the 1995 book, Wisdom of the Jewish Sages: A Modern Reading of Pirke Avot, by Rabbi Rami Shapiro, writing in the spirit of this portion of Mishnah, to assemble the combined adage.")
