Rosh Hashanah, literally the “head of the year,” recognizes the “Jewish New Year.” My spouse said, “I like Rosh Hashanah better than the other New Year because I don’t have to stay up until midnight for this one.”

The Days of Awe

Rosh Hashanah also initiates the “days of repentance,” also called “the days of awe,” that culminate with Yom Kippur, considered the holiest day of the Jewish year. We are now in a time of reflection, making amends for wrongdoing, and adjusting our attitude, focus, and practice. Yom Kippur is a day for fasting and internal work to consider what we plan to improve about ourselves in the year ahead.

The literature of the Torah and rabbinic writings that developed to interpret, negotiate, and apply the law are concerned with social reform: caring for the stranger in your community (Leviticus 19), prohibiting the charging of interest when lending money to people who are living in poverty (Exodus 22), canceling debts every seven years (Leviticus 25), leaving a portion of your field unharvested so those in need of food may take from your land (Leviticus 23), and other guidelines and duties that speak from the perspective of the oppressed.

While we caution against imposing our modern views onto the text, none of what I’ve said should surprise us. Ancient Israel through modernity has been a small country that has served as a vassal state to other empires. Israel has faced occupation and diaspora. The population is historically agrarian-based, often at the whims of the climate and neighboring nations. In the modern era, the Jewish people have faced hate and genocide.1

To counter those who would suggest my selection of verses above violates the very polemic against univocality that I’ve written about here, I appeal to this accessible article:

One of the enduring strengths of Judaism is its ability to speak urgently and passionately about important questions without enforcing univocalism or devolving into rhetorical chaos. This talent for productively embracing a variety of perspectives — a talent that, throughout human history, has been in rather short supply — links biblical authors, with ancient rabbis, with medieval Scholastics, with Spanish Kabbalists, with Halachic [Jewish legal] authorities, with contemporary Jewish philosophers in one magnificent discursive chain. Indeed, the Jewish conversation about how and when to mete out justice has spanned millennia.

For the Christian tradition, consider that Jesus was welcomed into Jerusalem with cries of “Save us!” Jesus was executed by Rome as an insurrectionist, and the gospel writers were composing their texts in diaspora following the destruction of the Temple by militarized Rome—of course, I’d still call those gospel writers Jewish, but they are actively pursuing outreach to non-Jews, and this escape from empire is part of the origin of Christianity before Rome adopted Christianity as the state religion.

Why introduce this now, I mean, in this post? Because bringing together the themes from the literature and the themes of the days of awe, we find also an intersection with the tradition of the Jesus movement: repentance, or more appropriately, t’shuvah, or return. Jesus spoke actively against amassing wealth (Luke 19.8), and he instructed the rich to sell all that they owned (Luke 18.22). Jesus advocated for nonviolence (Matthew 5.39), and his healing and speaking were often set in the backwaters of Galilee, not the cosmopolitan Jerusalem. It would seem that Jesus, speaking from the tradition of impoverished rural life,2 embodied certain commitments to social reform that punctuated the prophetic tradition.

We’ve spoken at length here about the notion of t’shuvah, a turning towards, a turn toward Torah; toward the law. The repentance that Jesus called for would be just such a t’shuvah:

T’shuvah is never easy. It’s for those who are strong of mind, heart, and soul, who are willing to suffer failure, but also to get up, own what we’ve done, acknowledge our wrong-doing, apologize unconditionally to those we’ve hurt, and recommit to our struggle for greater enlightenment, step-by-step, patiently, one day at a time, one hour at a time, and even one moment at a time (Union for Reform Judaism).

I imagine that I could submit this excerpt as a prayer of confession in a Christian setting and it wouldn’t feel out of place. This isn’t to conflate the traditions, it’s only to say that this time of reflection and atonement for Jews is very similar to the time of Lent for Christians. This claim is made by Amy Jill Levine in her book, Entering the Passion of Jesus, her study guide for Lent, directed toward Christians.3

An obvious correlate to a conversation about t’shuvah, correcting wrongdoing, brings us to a consideration of forgiveness.

Forgiveness: Justice and Restoration

The assigned gospel reading for today deals specifically with forgiveness:

²¹ Then Peter came and said to him, “Lord, if my brother or sister sins against me, how often should I forgive? As many as seven times?” ²² Jesus said to him, “Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy-seven times.

Here, the Matthean author is recalling Genesis 4.24. We could do a great deal of work with the significance of the “mathematical forgiveness” with the divine number, seven, multiplied for rhetorical force, seven times seven, or even seventy-seven. We could zoom out and consider that here in Matthew’s text—that we’ve been reading together—is especially concerned with the disciples duty to others in the community. In the opening to chapter 18, the disciples ask who among them is the greatest, then at verse 15, they wonder how to rebuke a member of the community who does wrong, and now at verse 21, Peter asks about the rules for forgiveness. The disciples are asking their teacher to define the disciples’ duties and responsibilities to others. This is very Jewish discourse!

Understanding the responsibility to others and resolving conflict is drawn directly from the tradition of the Jewish people. From the same article cited above, “Conflict between people is not only avoidable but is also, strikingly, non-normative.” The article concludes:

“Thus all Jews must pursue peace, in order to be one with peace and to completely and flawlessly resemble their creator, for the name of God is peace.”

Another intersection presents itself: In the tradition of the mainline Protestant United Church of Christ is an interfaith movement that has been a proclamation of the UCC since 1985. That is the Just Peace proclamation. Just Peace, originally conceived as an alternative to Just War theory, the movement has grown to incorporate interfaith perspectives and mobilize local congregations to declare themselves as Just Peace assemblies in the effort to embody themes of justice, peace, care, dignity, and restoration.

Annually, falling on the Sunday before the United Nations Day of Peace, is Just Peace Sunday. This year’s theme is “A Just Forgiveness.” From the Just Peace resource page, “Too often, forgiveness is sought before truth and harm are fully acknowledged.”

This year in gatherings where Just Peace is proclaimed, members of these assemblies are asked to:

Acknowledge responsibility for conflict and injustice and seek repentance and forgiveness.” Forgiveness and justice are key principles in the work of peace building, reconciliation, and restorative justice.

Between the call for t’shuvah and forgiveness lay the duty to truth telling. I challenge us to discern our responsibility to processes of truth and reconciliation in our settings—including nationally. I cannot see how to align myself with the traditions of the Hebrew Bible and Greek Scriptures without advocating for restorative justice.

The Way of Just Peace

T’shuvah, repentance, forgiveness, social reform, speaking from the perspective of the powerless, pursuing peace… these are principles that present themselves to us through the history of the Scriptures of Israel and the the Greek Scriptures read by Christian communities. This is the common call for people related to either tradition—or both, like me! When I write and speak on matters of Judaism and Christianity, I often wonder whether at some point I declare an identity. Likewise, I challenge myself to consider whether my writing is purely informative or if it may motivate a deepening of the commitments that you all have, as readers, as theists, atheists, Jews, Christians, humanistis, and so on.

I recognize that embracing both traditions may press on the institutional framework by which us people love to circumscribe boundaries, we can see this, or at least I see this, as little more than boundary maintenance. Maybe helpful in abstract, but if the law givers and covenant makers from the Hebrew Bible and Greek Scriptures find alignment, even if that alignment is imposed post hoc, in the end I hope it is improving the condition of the world that may bind us across traditions, and considering deeply our responsibility to others is of utmost importance.

For more on Just Peace, I invite you to watch this 20-minute discussion I had with National Leaders from the UCC Just Peace Steering Committee. Oh, and shana tova u’metukah! May you have a healthy and sweet new year!