A Thought For Aseret Yemei Teshuvah

Traditionally speaking, a major focus of the week between Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur is the process of requesting mechilah, forgiveness. We identify others whom we have wronged, and approach them, ideally face-to-face, to ask their forgiveness for our actions — actions that we are committing to not repeat in the future. This process of seeking mechilah is an aspect of teshuvah, and another way in which we seek to “return” to being the people we want to be.

But what if what we carry into the new year isn’t a realization of who we have wronged, but the pain and emotional baggage of having ourselves been wronged by someone else? To be certain, if we have wronged others, we need to own that, apologize, and make amends. But what if we are the one who was wronged, and what if no one is seeking us out to apologize?

A story is told in the Talmud (Masechet Ketubot 67B) of Mar Ukva, a scholar and leader of the Jewish community in Babylonia during the time of the Talmud. Every year, on the eve of Yom Kippur, he would send a significant monetary gift of 400 zuz to a poor person who lived in his neighborhood. One year, Mar Ukva was too busy, so he sent his son on Erev Yom Kippur to deliver the 400 zuz. Mar Ukva’s son returned and told his father there was actually no need — the poor person was actually financially comfortable and even had enough money to use aged wine to perfume his house! Mar Ukva disagreed with his son and decided that not only did the recipient of his gift still need it, he actually needed more, so Mar Ukva doubled the amount.

There are two ways to read this story. For one thing, it emphasizes the dignity of any person who has become impoverished, and showcases the Talmud’s expectation that we support those who have fallen on hard times not according to what they need in order to subsist, but according to what they need to live as they had been living before without suffering a loss of kavod or respect. But if that’s what this story wanted to teach, or all it wanted to teach, then what is the significance of the detail that this happened on the eve of Yom Kippur?

I prefer a different reading. Mar Ukva knew from his son’s report that he had been taken advantage of. He knew that he had been swindled, that this allegedly poor person didn’t need his money, and that the “poor” person had in effect been stealing from him. Mar Ukva had every right to be angry, to harbor resentment against this person, and to feel like the victim he actually was. But it was Erev Yom Kippur, and the only thing worse for Mar Ukva than being the victim of this theft would be allowing the thief to also dictate the emotional baggage Mar Ukva would carry into the new year.

I believe that Mar Ukva made an active choice to say: I have every right to be angry, but I simply don’t want to be angry. The person who wronged me didn’t have the right to take my money, true, but that person also doesn’t have the right to dictate negative emotions for me, especially at this moment of the dawning of a new year. 

I believe that Mar Ukva decided to let it go. Not to forget what happened, but to forgive, and not to forgive for the thief’s sake, but for his own sake. And I believe we can do this too.

One aspect of teshuvah is undeniably owning our mistakes and apologizing for them, but another important aspect of teshuvah is recognizing the situations and experiences for which we still carry hurt and anger and letting them go. If we have hurt another person, then we owe it to ourselves and to them to apologize, but if someone has hurt us, and for whatever reason beyond our control that person isn’t going to apologize . . . we still owe it to ourselves to let it go. That too is a form of “return,” allowing us to return to being who we were before we were made to feel hurt and angry, allowing us to return to being our best selves.

Gmar Chatimah Tovah — a good sealing in the book of life for our entire community.