THE JEWISH ENCYCLOPEDIA
Atonement day
of Succotli
is
called the first
day [Lev.
xxiii. 35]
because on it a new record begins, the sins of Hie year having been wiped off on Atonement Day " (Tan., Emor., 22). The sins of the preceding year therefore, unless they have been repeated, should not be confessed anew (Tosef., Yoma, v. 15; Yoma 866; Ex.
Ii. lii.).
" He who says, make atonement
' I will sin, and the Day of Atonement shall 1 for me, for the Day of Atonement is of no avail. Only such sins as concern man's relation to God will he pardoned. Sins committed hy man against his fellow man are pardoned only after his fellow man's pardon has been obtained ; for it is said ' From all your sins before the Lord ye shall be cleansed' (Lev. xvi. 30), thus excluding sins before
Mm
man " (Yoma
viii. 9)
282
seducer to lewdness (Meg. 31a Tos. ad loe. Yoma 674), and as Haftarah, the Book of Jonah, containing the great lesson of. God's forgiving love extended to This is followed by the Gentiles as well as to Jews. Ne'ilah service, in which the main ideas of the day are especially emphasized repentance conditioning forgiveness, and God's sealing the decree of man for The service ends with a solemn the ensuing year. invocation of God 's name, the Shema ', and the sevenfold exclamation, "The Lord, He is God " (compare Kings xviii. 39), forming the climax of the continuous devotions of the day. As a signal of the close of the sacred day, so that the people may know that they can work or eat (Tos. to Shab. 1146), or for other reasons(see Kol Bo, lxx. Shulhan 'Aruk, Orah Hayyim, 623, 6 Tur Orah Hayyim, 624), the trumpet is blown once, or, as in Palestine, four times "Teki'ah, Shebarim, Teru'ah, Teki'ah" (see Mahzor Vitry, pp. 345, 356 Abudrahim, " Seder Tef. Yom Kippurim "). Either in the Kol-Nidre service, as in Jerusalem, before the main prayers (Schwartz, " Das Heilige Land," p. 336), or after the morning service (Mahzor Vitry, ». 353; Shulhan 'Aruk, Orah Hayyim, 621, 6), the dead are commemorated, and gifts are offered for their salvation (see Tan., Haazinu, i. ed. Vienna, 1853, p. 28; Pesik. xxvii. 1746, and Rokeah, quoted in Beth Joseph to Tur Orah Hayyim, I.e.) a custom which in the Reform liturgy has been made a more prominent part of the service. In preparation for the Day of Atonement it is usual to offer gifts of charity, according to Prov. x. 2, "Righteousness [charity] delivereth from death," and to go to the cemetery to visit the graves of the dead, a practise taken over from the fast-days (Ta'anit 16f< Yer. Ta'anit ii. 65a). The custom of bringing candles to burn in the synagogue the whole day, in memory of the dead, may have originated in the desire to light up the otherwise dark synagogue for the recital of prayers and psalms by the pious during the entire night. This is the one view expressed in Kol Bo lxviii. but other reasons of a mystic nature are given for it there as well as in Mahzor Vitry, p. 340 Abudrahim, I.e. and Shulhan 'Aruk, Orah Hayyim, 610. Very significant, as showing a deep-rooted desire for some form of atoning sacrifice, is the custom known already in the time of the Geonim, and found in Asia and Africa (see Benjamin II., " Acht Yahre in Asien und Africa," 1858, p. 273), as well as in Europe ( Asheri Yoma viii. 23 Mahzor Vitry, p. 339 Kol Bo lxviii. Shulhan 'Aruk, Orah Hayyim, 605), though disapproved by Nahmanides, Solomon ben Adret, and Joseph Caro (Tur Orah Hayyim, I.e.) of swinging over one's head, on or before the eve of Atonement Day, a fowl, usually a rooster or hen; solemnly pronouncing the same to be a vicarious sacrifice to be killed in place of the Jew or Jewess who might be guilty of death by his or her sin. Fishes and plants, also (see Rashi, Shab. 816), perhaps originally only these, were used in the gaonic time. The slaughtered animal or its equivalent was then given to the poor (see Kapparot). Another custom of similar character is the receiving on the eve of Atone;
—
The Day ter;
it is
Atonement has thus a double characboth a fast-day and a festal day. It comof
prises the elements of the great fast-day of the year,
on which
are prohibited all those things from which the people abstained on any other public fast-day, such as eating and drinking, bathing and anointing, the wearing of sandals or shoes, etc. Both Fast- (Yoma 766 and 77«). Any other mode Day and of affliction or penitence, however, Festal Day. is prohibited (Yoma 746 Sifra, Ahare, There were likewise embodied vii.). in the liturgy of the Day of Atonement all those forms of supplications and portions of the liturgy used on public fast-days (Ta'anit iv. 1), including the most characteristic portion recited at sunset, Ne'ilah ("the closing of the gates of the sun"). Of these the confession of sins forms the oldest and most prominent part of each portion of the day's liturgy, the alphabetical order in the catalogue of sins having originated in Hasidic circles (Rom. i. 29 et seq. Didache v. Shab. 54<0 rather than in the Temple liturgy (Sifra i. Yoma iii. 8). This is to be followed by the "Selihot," the appeals to God's forgiveness as expressed in the thirteen Attributes of God as He appeared to Moses on Sinai, promising "Salahti," "I have forgiven" (Num. xiv. 18-20). The reading from the Law of the chapter on the Atonement sacrifice in Lev. xvi., in the morning portion, is followed by the reading from the prophet Isaiah (lvii. 15-lviii. 14) as Haftarah, which has been significantly chosen to impress the worshipers with the lesson that the external rite of fasting is valueless without the works of righteousness and beneficence. Differing in this respect from any other fast-day, and resembling all Sabbath and festival days, the celebration of the Day of Atonement begins in the synagogue on the preceding evening, in conformity with Lev. xxiii. 32 (Yoma 816). It probably did so during the time of the Temple (Yoma 196), but not This evening servin the Temple itself (Yoma i. 2). called Kol-Nidre from its opening formula, ice which canceled rash vows with its strongly marked melodies and songs, assumed in the course of time a very impressive character. On the Day of Atonement itself, the noon or"musaf " (additional) service presenting as its chief feature the 'Abodah, a graphic description of the whole Atonement service of the Temple— is followed by the afternoon or " Minhah " service, which begins with the reading from the Law of the chapter on incestuous marriages, with a side-reference, as it were, to Azazel, the
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—
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ment Day,
cither in the
synagogue or at home
I.e.)
—
— the
Jerusalem (see Schwartz, of thirty-nine stripes at the hand of a neighbor
latter is usually the place in
