On the journey to Yom Kippur

ST PETERSBURG, FL — Judaism’s annual 10 days of reflection, repentance and forgiveness, known collectively as the High Holy Days, conclude Saturday with Yom Kippur.

Observed with a 25-hour fast that will begin Friday at sundown, Yom Kippur is a day of communal confessional prayers drawing crowds of worshipers to synagogues and temples. Many will wear white garments and white canvas shoes, a tradition inspired by the words of the prophet Isaiah, “Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow.”

Like Yom Kippur, the days leading up to what is the holiest day on the Jewish calendar are steeped in symbolism. The High Holy Days are when God judges his people and writes their fate for the new year in the Book of Life. Since that fate is sealed at the close of Yom Kippur, the days until then are spent in repentance.

One way of doing so is with the Tashlich ceremony, during which participants pray and symbolically cast their sins onto a moving body of water. The ritual usually takes place on the first day of Rosh Hashana, which is the Jewish new year and the first of the High Holy Days. Allowances, however, have been made for the ceremony to be performed at any time during the High Holy Days, said Rabbi Jacob Luski of Congregation B’nai Israel in St. Petersburg.

That’s what happened at the Pinellas County Jewish Day School this week. Students participated in Tashlich ceremonies organized on their Clearwater campus. Jewish studies director Liz Sembler said the program was a chance for students who hadn’t been able to attend a Tashlich ceremony with their families to participate in the High Holy Days ritual.

The term Tashlich comes from the prophet Micah, Luski said. “It’s where we’re casting our sins into the seas, so there’s the symbolism of taking the negative qualities and disposing of them into a body of living water, so they truly go away.

”We use every possible opportunity for symbolism, to challenge us to accomplish the task of the Days of Awe, which is evaluating, recognizing wrong and choosing a path to correct it“ Luski said.

Orthodox Rabbi Alter Korf approaches Tashlich on mystical and kabbalistic levels.

”The significance of Tashlich has many different facets and dimensions,“ said Korf of Chabad of St. Petersburg.

The ritual can be considered in terms of remembering ”the ultimate test“ God gave to Abraham, when he asked him to sacrifice his son Isaac, Korf said. Tradition holds, Korf said, that while Abraham was on his way to obey God, he came across a river that could have provided an easy excuse for him to be disobedient. Instead, he forded the river until the water reached his nose. He prayed and the water miraculously disappeared.

The Tasclich ceremony, Korf said, is ”a reminder to God of the dedication of our ancestors.“

”It’s also a time when we reaffirm our dedication. We come back to the river. We recite prayers. We cast away our sins,“ Korf said.

Yom Kippur, he added, is about ”a triangle of forgiveness.“

”We ask God to look beyond our deeds and see us on the soul level. But if we expect God to do that, we have to be willing to forgive our friends and acquaintances that may have hurt us,“ he said. ”The third point of the triangle is we have to be able to forgive ourselves.”