JOURNEYS NEAR AND FAR
PART THREE

THE JOURNEY INWARDS

A Sermon for Kol Nidre Eve 5764
October 5, 2003

Rabbi Edward Paul Cohn
Temple Sinai
New Orleans, Louisiana

Helen Keller was once asked if there was anything worse than losing one's sight. After a moment's thought, she replied, "Yes, losing your vision."

This is no night for lack of vision. This is the night when we Jews acknowledge that our lives are rescued and enobled because of our insistence upon personal accountability. Says Hammarskjold,

We take many journeys in our lifetimes, but perhaps none is more decisive all year long than the one we begin this evening: The Journey Inwards, "choosing our destiny."

Some time back I read the obituary of Keith Clark. You won't recognize the name, but most of you will remember how this musician literally blew his most notable performance. You see, Keith Clark was the bugler who botched the playing of "Taps" at President John Kennedy's funeral forty years ago next month. Remember how severely cold it was in Washington that day, a bad day for a brass player. And to make matters worse, he was standing right beside the firing squad whose three volleys made Clark temporarily deaf just when he was to play those best known 24 notes in the entire musical repertoire. And on the sixth note, Sergeant Clark fluttered off key for the entire civilized word to hear. There was no place to hide.

It was a moment of naked and poignant human imperfection which somehow came to express the depth of grief and emotion of that day. This recognition of our imperfection goes to the very heart of our Yom Kippur journey inwards, as you and I come before God "as we are." We, too, have "sounded" some incorrect notes, and we know it.

The melody of Kol Nidre reaches the deepest recesses of our hearts and souls. Hearing just those first few notes, is often enough to send shivers down our spines. It's a drama you know. An ancient synagogue drama.

The rabbi, cantor and honored lay leaders stand infront of the ark. And for just a few minutes, as we stand before them, those very Torah scrolls serve as a bet din, a court of judgement, eyeing us all and skeptically examining the sincerity of our Journey Inwards in search of reconciliation and forgiveness.

Tradition prescribes the cantor chant the words of Kol Nidre three times. The ninth century prayer book, Machzor Vitrey, explains it in this fashion. First, the cantor chants in a soft voice, like a person who is awestruck at being admitted to the palace of the king in order to ask for a favor, and who is afraid of coming too close to the king.

The second time, the cantor sings, he raises his voice a little higher than the first time. And in the third and final rendition of these 13-century old words, the cantor intensifies his voice, singing with added urgency as would one who is at home and accustomed to being a member of the king's household. Yes, more than any other time, tonight's Journey Inwards presupposes our confrontation, our meeting with our God-however we have come thus far to conceive of God's nature.

I remember that old story of the angel who was accidentally impaled on the nose cone of a space probe and, amazingly, was discovered when the rocket returned to earth.

Well, as you can imagine, it set off a media circus-scientifically as well as theologically-for the entire world. As physicians attempted to heal the celestial patient's wounds sustained from the probe, a team of theologians gathered around to ask questions about heavenly imponderables. The theologians finally dared to ask the ultimate question: "Is there a God?"

"Yes," replied the shy angel. "There is a God."

Great relief all around. Then the next question:

"And what is God like?"

Pens at the ready, they waited for the answer. What would this angel answer in such an unprecedented eyewitness interview?

A long, long pause. The suspense was unbearable, until finally, the angel answered, quietly: "She's black."

Well, I'm not getting into the theologically "hairy" question of the attributes and nature of God here tonight. There are as many theologies here tonight as there are people in this santuary. But there's a much more compelling question to be addressed on this night of the soul's inward journey. Can you guess it?

In his autobiography, The Ragman's Son, actor Kirk Douglas tells us how, once while driving to Palm Springs, he offered a lift to a young sailor who was hitchhiking. When the fellow got into the car and recognized the famous driver, the sailor exclaimed in shock, pointing at the driver:

Hey! Do you know who you are?

That's the number one question. Do you? Do we know who we are?

Behind the pretenses and the posturing, the multitude of deceptions, small and large, the lies we tell to others and the ones we tell ourselves, there is that secret person we really are. "Death of a Salesman" concludes with Arthur Miller's thoughtful lines: "He had all the wrong dreams. . . . He never knew who he was." This is the night when the masks come off, and we admit that our consciences are not clear.

Arturo Toscanini was a world-renowned conductor, holding himself and his fellow musicians to demanding standards. Once, after a grueling and highly unsatisfactory rehearsal with the cellist, the great Gregor Piatagorsky Toscanini managed to reduce his colleague to quivering tears, repeating to the cellist:

You are no good. I am no good.

This nonstop derogation continued to the last minute when the conductor led the trembling soloist to the stage, at which point Toscanini observed:

We are no good, but others are worse.
Come on, let's do our best.

And here is the profound paradox which lies at the heart of our Judaism: Even when we admit "we are no good," we claim our dignity and we demonstrate our strength, not our weakness.

Not so long ago, I spotted this title in the window of a bookstore: Self-Esteem in Ten Days. Now, really, do you imagine self-esteem to be something akin to the technique of serving a tennis ball? Isn't self-esteem a product of what we're made of, not how we pose or position ourselves? I hate to hear people say, "He hasn't found himself or she hasn't found herself." Selves are not discovered. Selves are constructed.

There's nothing healthier for us all than this evening when we take an honest look at ourselves. Someone once admitted, "You know Rabbi, deep down I'm really shallow." Well, we all are at times.

Everyone makes mistakes. Good, well meaning people can and do spend years of selfless, loving attention to our personal needs and benefit. Some of them maybe friends and acquaintances. Some of them may be in our employ. Others, are the very people we purport to love and with whom we live under the same roof.

And yet, we can all be so harsh, so critical and judgmental. Our minds become forgetful of all the love and devotion we've received, often when we didn't even deserve it. And we jump with both feet when a mistake is made, or at least, we so perceive.

At age 55, I've concluded that everyone ought to have a right to mess up on occasion. I'm not talking ax murderers, mind you. But sometimes, we're going to be let down by those from whom we're accustomed to better. Get over it! At times, along the way, you're certainly no prize either!

Kol Nidre calls us tonight to take a journey inside the soul. And it beckons and urges us to repair those disconnects, person to person, which in our arrogance and haste to judge, have become a blight on our relationships and dealings with others.

Writer and columnist Mark Jacobson and his wife Nancy invested three months to take their three children, 16, 12, and 9, around the world. They wrote a book called; 12,000 Miles in the Nick of Time: A Semi-Dysfunctional Family Circumnavigates The Globe. It all began because these parents despaired that this was the only way they could rescue their children from, as they put it, becoming:

prisoners of the idiot culture, which seemed a terrible waste of perfectly fine DNA.

It's an ok book, but here's what I want to share from it: The Journey Inwards. Apparently Mark Jacobson had had a poor relationship with his Dad. He tells how his father once built a sailboat called "L'Chayim" and he would take Mark sailing. But the boat was far too heavy to maneuver and they just sat on the Long Island Sound with nothing to say between the two of them. Mark recalls:

We could go out a hundred times, and we would never get any closer. There would always be that space between.

Years later, when alone with his father's casket, the son, looking down at his father, tearfully admits:

Even now, with him in that cramped little box, the space between us seemed impossibly huge...
Were we lazy or were we afraid? Was it chemical, something between the two of us that
didn't mix? Or were we simply too busy. . . ?

And Jacobson concludes with the realization that relationships are brittle, and we husbands and wives, brothers and sisters, parents and children, can grow to foolishly, stupidly make peace with that space between us, as did Jacobson and his father.

So, you and I are booked; we are engaged in a Journey Inward tonight and throughout tomorrow. Sitting here won't really be the hard part, you know. If you choose to fast, that won't be the hardest part either. Opening ourselves to become both vulnerable and reachable, that's the hardest part!

You know, I've checked with the experts on the latest theories as to history of Kol Nidre. By no means are they certain whether or not the Kol Nidre's words were written by Spanish marranos who would secretly gather on this night to repent for their forced conversions. It's a fascinating, if endless, subject for the historians and the liturgists, but it really doesn't make any difference to us tonight.

Here's what does!

Kol Nidre's power exceeds any literal translation of its words. And on the wings of its beloved melody, it brings us tonight, right now, to the very courtyard of our Creator.

Bolder, and utterly assured of God's love and mercy, we know with a timeless assurance that we have only to enter and call out:

I'm home! Dear God, I'm home! Bathe me in Your love,
for I would be clean.

Amen.