Delivered by Rev. Alison Miller at First Unitarian Portland on October 1, 2025
The Jewish High Holidays have several themes – one of them is the birth of the world. There are a few Jewish creation stories, including two from the Book of Genesis; another story in midrash (a collection of rabbinical writings) which presents a scene of Adam on trial and ultimately going forth free; and a fourth story, a guiding story from Kabbalah (or Jewish mysticism) most famously shared by Rabbi Isaac Luria of Safed in the 16th century.
In the beginning there was only a wholeness we name God. Then, God breathed in and withdrew to make room for something else. The first thing that was created was light, a brilliant primordial light. In the story many of us are familiar with in Genesis, God says, “Let there be light,” and there was light on the first day. But, the sun, the moon, and the stars weren’t created until the fourth day! Where did that light come from – according to Kabbalah – it was God’s primordial light.
God filled ten vessels with the holy light and sent them to the world. However, the light was so powerful that the vessels shattered – a different big bang – sending shards and sparks across the universe and across our world. Some of the divine light became trapped in the shards. According to this story, humans were created with the purpose of finding the shards, collecting what is broken, and piecing back together the divine sparks within us, among us, and all around us, found in everything.
This concept is called tikkun olam in Hebrew, often translated as repairing the world. But, the Hebrew word tikkun also has the meaning of improve. The work is not simply to put things back the way they were – that was a context that led to brokenness. It is about the imagination and the courage to create something new, something more resilient, that better reflects and frees the divine light.
Many of us on the eve of Yom Kippur and in this time of gathering threats to our city and our democracy and with the rise of authoritarianism around the globe may be feeling shattered and exhausted. We may long to go back to the way it felt in our nation before January. However, we must remember that we were already living amidst brokenness.
The further breakdown of the shards of a society built on white supremacy, extreme nationalism, exploitation of the earth, and unfettered capitalism have revealed how fragile and flawed our healthcare, housing, education, immigration, and mass incarceration systems are and were as well as how many people have been harmed by them.
During the ten days of awe from Rosh Hashanah to Yom Kippur, we are companioned by the sounds of the shofar – the broken notes cry out to us like an alarm – calling us to wake up, to pay attention, and not simply lull ourselves back to sleep. The long, uninterrupted whole note that we also hear – the one that stretches in the direction of eternity also calls to us – inviting us to use our every breath to practice new possibilities rooted in love – the grounding and guiding force that allows that which is eternal and whole in life to emerge.
There are some who dread a day like Yom Kippur, a day when we reckon with the ways that we have fallen short, the times that we have committed unjust acts (both large and small), and the ways we have propped up unjust, broken systems.
However, in Judaism this annual practice is an acknowledgement that every new year is a chance to learn and become accountable for the ways we have harmed others AND a chance to grow… a chance to engage in the work of repair and apology and to do better… a chance to become someone who can heal what was broken. In Judaism, this annual practice also invites community spaces where others who have harmed us have the possibility of doing the same and coming back into right relationship.
Yom Kippur isn’t a day to dread. It is a day of hope and even the joy of knowing that to be human is to be capable of creativity and change… one step at a time. That’s why we need this annual practice.
The work of transformation isn’t a one-time thing. The work of love takes repeated and continuous effort, and none of us can do it all at once or on our own. As Rabbi Tarfon taught: “It is not our responsibility to finish the work [of perfecting the world], but we are not free to desist from it either” (2:16).
What we need is not perfection, but to join movements grounded in love. Here we are in a time of increasing militarization, economic disparity, erosion of our democracy, and an affordable housing crisis. We will not become whole in the year to come. What we do need is to learn how to move with our neighbors in this city and in our country to build communities of solidarity, peacebuilding, and mutual care.
According to rabbinical teachings, Yom Kippur is the day that Moses arrives with a second set of tablets with a covenant between God and the people, and this time one that lasts. Remember, this only happens after they broke their promises and after the possibility of that covenant seemed to be destroyed forever.
Moses came down the mountain with the first set of tablets and found the people worshipping the golden calf. Then, Moses in a fit of rage breaks the tablets and all seems lost. These were a people who were choosing death and idolatry rather than life and what is of worth. Yet, 40 days after Moses schlepped back up the mountain to be with God, he comes back with newly inscribed tablets. They have another chance!
This is the good news of Yom Kippur. Each year we can move closer to fulfilling our covenants with one another and with all that is holy. Each year there is the possibility of reconciliation even after fits of anger, the ultimate acts of betrayal, and all kinds of mistakes. There is joy in our individual and collective ability to start over.
So here we are in the middle of brokenness, but at least in this moment we can see it clearly – that is the precursor to be able to begin again and to recommit our lives to love. May it be so. Amen.