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For many Jews, the Yom Kippur fast is one of the hardest and most meaningful Jewish acts they will perform during the year.

Yom Kippur has concluded. The break-the-fast has been consumed, and the prayers about becoming the person we could be are now a memory.

The hard work is behind us.

We prayed, chanted, cried, healed, remembered, re-aimed our arrows of good intentions toward the target of new priorities, and reflected on trying not to deflect.

We focused.

On Sukkot, we celebrate the harvest.

I cherish the holiday of Sukkot. It beautifully encapsulates the quintessential magic of this bountiful time of year.

When the words of liturgy are taken too literally, the sacred power of prayer is often lost. In his latest book, Rabbi Lawrence A. Hoffman offers a way worshipers can transcend the limitations imposed by language.

Jewish law says we are to fast on Yom Kippur. This is based on the biblical law that on the Day of Atonement, “You shall afflict yourselves” (Lev.

Return.
Again.
I have returned again
to this place of
Fullness,
this place of everythingness;
and I feel empty.
Hollow.
Again.
I fling my sins,
all bright copper
and colored feathers,
out into the heavens -

We pray to you
Creator of the Universe,
who causes the winds to blow
and the seas to rage…

For the weary and the heart shattered
refugees
escaping violence and bloodshed and war