Where is holiness? Where can you locate the essence of what it means to be holy, and if you actually saw/felt/heard/experienced/sensed
holiness - would you know it? We've just been celebrating a whole slew of holidays, and I can't help but wonder about what it's all for. We talk about preserving traditions to connect to our ancestors (ancient and recent) as well as to pass something on to future generations. And that makes a lot of sense. But we also talk about God, spirituality, and holiness, and I think THESE concepts are a bit more difficult to grasp. Oftentimes we'd rather just not address these tough questions at all... so let's delve right into them, shall we?
Holiness, in particular, is such an elusive thing, isn't it? We talk about pursuing it, trying to obtain it, but do we really know WHY holiness is special, or what it would feel like to be filled with holiness? I think
the High Holidays attempt to help us search for holiness through many different prompts and paths. But I purposely say they help us 'search for' holiness, because they don't hand us answers on a silver platter, and we may never find holiness on our own. And the holidays - as well as our prayer books, our traditions and rituals, our special foods, and our clergy members - cannot make holiness suddenly appear (or make us understand why it's special to begin with...). So where is the holiness of Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, Sukkot, Sh'mini Atzeret, and Simchat Torah - these special days that make up our High Holiday season?
We begin with Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, which is also supposed to be the day on which the world was created. Rosh Hashanah teaches us that spirituality and holiness come in ancient packages, and we can access them when we connect to our heritage. Then we move to Yom Kippur, which is all about self-examination, forgiveness, and repentance. This holiday teaches us about the self, both in terms of my relationship to ME and my relationship to God, but also about how holiness is in the spirit. It's a somewhat esoteric
holiday, related to the mind, the soul, and the intangible relationships between people and God. Sukkot then jumps into the mix with a giant cannonball-splash, reminding us of the joy of physicality. We build Sukkot, huts, with our own two hands, we grab branches of palm, myrtle, and willow, and shake them together with a lumpy, yellow, lemon-like fruit. It's a holiday of the body, in contrast to the spirituality of Yom Kippur and the history of Rosh Hashanah. So now we are thoroughly confused; which one of these helps us find holiness??
The answer is, all of them! Holiness doesn't come in one form, one package, or one recipe. We seek holiness to access God, to understand where we came from and what we are meant to do on this earth. And each holiday speaks to someone, or speaks to us at different times in our lives. So I return to my
original question, would you recognize holiness if it showed up at your proverbial doorstep? Not every moment of every holiday speaks to all of us, but when we know ourselves better, and understand that we are more historical, or spiritual, or physically-minded, then we know where to look for MY personal holiness. And lo and behold, when you know where to look, you may just find what you seek.
Chag Sameach - Happy Holidays!
Photos in this blog post:
3. CC image courtesy of ladybugbkt on Flickr.
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