The ten days between Rosh HaShana (the New Year’s Day) and Yom Kippur (the day of atonement) are called ″Aseret y’me t’shuva″ according to the Jewish tradition. It means the 10 days of reparation or repentance.
These days are coming after T’shuva (conversion) which final aim for all men is to prostrate before God and be judged.
It is a conversion where we are answerable and have to deny all the evil that we made in the past. It is also the opportunity for us to restart in life in complete submission and obedience to God. We start again in blessings after having been judged before Him…
According to the Jewish faith, three books do open for all men at Rosh HaShana.
- The first one is the book of good and long life in which the name of all people who have been considered as being righteous is written at the beginning of the year.
- In the second are written the names of those who have been judged for having done the opposite of these ones below.
- In the third one, we find the names of those who do not belong to none of the categories below. Here we can find the names of the people who are still waiting for the judgment of God…for a certain time…
In the Jewish faith, these people still have 10 days to convert and to change.
The ″Heavenly Court″ gives an extension for life and for death. God is waiting during this period of time before declaring the final verdict at Yom Kippur.
So Rosh HaShana is essentially Yom Hadin, the Day of Judgment…
For this reason we are greeting each other with the following words full of hope and good wishes:
″Gemar hatima tova″…. Should the final seal be good...!
It is not a coincidence if this event is preceded by the reparation of sins, in a word, by self examination. This is an individual and internal introspection through the magnifying glass of the Torah: the Laws of God, in order to be purified from all sin.
These are the unavoidable conditions to Grace and to all new start in life just as for seeing our names being written in the ″book of the righteous″.
When we see that Adam was the first man who repented according to Midrash – the Jewish tradition - , (Baal Teshuva), I think that it would be necessary for all of us to do the same.
The harm committed between us has to be repaired since our relation with others is not a matter of a personal affair but a responsibility before God.
The same way, conversion has to be followed by a complete turn back to the point where we have turned aside in order to be able to get back to the narrow way.
The Narrow Way means the departure towards a life submitted to the Messiah and having a very precise goal and calling.
The 10 days of reparation, the time of conversion and of the return to submission finally ends at the moment when the members of the Chosen People are gathering and stop in unity before God. This is the moment when they repair their relationship with Him and implore His forgiveness.
Although the People still has one obligation before the beginning of Yom Kippur, before the Day of Expiation.
KOL NIDRE- All vows (engagements)…
″All vows, prohibitions, oaths, consecrations, konam-vows, konas-vows, or equivalent terms that we may vow, swear, consecrate, or prohibit upon ourselves - [from the last Yom Kippur until this Yom Kippur, and] from this Yom Kippur until the next Yom Kippur, may it come upon us for good - regarding them all, we regret them henceforth. They all will be permitted, abandoned, cancelled, null and void, without power and without standing. Our vows shall not be valid vows; our prohibitions shall not be valid prohibitions; and our oaths shall not be valid oaths.
It shall be forgiven for the whole assembly of the sons of Izrael as for the foreigner which is sojourning among them, because the people sinned through ignorance.
Forgive oh Lord all this people’s sins as you already did it several times since the Exodus till today as it is written:
And the Lord said:
And I forgived as you asked for"
The Day of Expiation also called particular Shabbat does really have a particular atmosphere.
The ″peace of the Shabbat″ (Leviticus 16, 31) is preceded by a tense expectation.
This is the moment when the prayer of Kol Nidre is recited.
We are gathering to give accounts for the last time while examining again our last year…
It is the moment when the People goes before God in unity but everyone still having his own responsibilities.
Everyone is responsible for himself, for his acts while still remaining responsible for the whole People…!
Yom Kippur is the Shabbat which leads to God. The first step of this path is Kol Nidre…the complete release…
Here, men are wearing their future funeral clothe and all is recovered with white in the temple. This reminds us that things are so ephemeral and that we all will have to stand one day before God in order to be judged…
The honor given to God together with the character of feast of this Day is also shown by the fact that all the participants are wearing their most beautiful clothes to assist the worship.
Most of Jews are doing the following things the day before Yom Kippur:
- They apologize to all those who they have hurt
- They forgive their fellow men to appease their hearth and to be ready to go before God.
- There is a festive dinner before the fast to prepare for the Great Day.
We rejoice and make feast since we are going before God. We are invited there in order to start a new departure…
At the beginning of Kol Nidre’s worship, the chorister and his two attendants announce the beginning of the Day of Expiation. They announce the opening of the Gates of the Skies.
All sinners are allowed to approach. It is still permitted to pray towards the Sky.
Kol Nidre is then repeated three times. First at a low voice and finally very loudly.
This is an exultant introduction, the dissolution of the preceding tension, a joyful singing going higher and higher towards God and coming from the hearths of those who are really willing to repent and receive Release and Salvation.
Because afterwards the entire expiation, the complete joy is to come:
God’s promise recited in joy…:
It shall be forgiven for the whole assembly of the sons of Israel as for the foreigner which is sojourning among them, because the people sinned through ignorance. (Leviticus 15:26)
Many where scandalized by Kol Nidre’s prayer and even gave wrong explanations to this event in order to discredit Jews and accuse them of being liars, incredulous and filled with hate.
Then what happens here? And how can someone discharge himself from having to give accounts of his promises and lies in advance?
″All vows, prohibitions, oaths, consecrations, konam-vows, konas-vows, or equivalent terms that we may vow, swear, consecrate, or prohibit upon ourselves ... may it come upon us for good - regarding them all, we regret them henceforth…″
Although the will animating these words is quite the opposite of the antisemitic accusations!
At New Year, all Jews repent and forgive to each other.
If we read carefully the text of the prayer which begins by ″All vows″ (engagements), we can here find the root of all our sins!
The origin of our sins and rebelliousness to God are always human yokes that are ruling over us instead of God.
We even often rule over ourselves or others in order to get the forgiveness or any other reward from God or from men because of our ″good actions″…
It would be futile and superficial to repair sins and to order our relations with our neighbors without first having lived all the releases explained before. Anyone submitting himself to any human power and who is waiting remuneration from it does simply deny the power of Christ.
The denial of this Power is the source of all sins!
We must suppress all relations in our life that are submitted to human powers and exigencies in order to prevent and avoid the functioning of all sins.
This way, the prayer of Kol Nidre that close all that is human in our lives is the most sincere in the world.
This prayer does not leave any force to our carnal or soulish desires. Although we are still aware of the fact that we can fall and stumble again in sin during the following year when instead of God, we are trying to rule our lives or the lives of others people.
Despite of all, Kol Nidre remains a prayer full of joy and hope recited in community with the people with whom we have a task to do and a calling to fulfill as Jews.
The three times repetition of Kol Nidre reflects timelessness which is lived by Jews in God’s Spirit. Jews do not divide time in past-present and future. They always look to the future while considering the existence as an indivisible unity.
The Jew knows and does never forget his past. This past that he puts in order today so that his existence should grow and fill its calling tomorrow.
The Jew does not consider his past when going before God, but he turns his eyes towards future. Although he first has to face his faults and weaknesses. He first has to give the sincere testimony of this prayer to be delivered of all those things that are not coming from God.
He becomes aware of his human weakness and asks God to take the entire control over him so that he should be protected against others but even against himself.
He knows that the pronounced words do create. He knows that the main root of evil is the sin of the tongue.
Although these words are not always pronounced aloud but rather in thoughts that are silently acting in our spirit…
Thus we should put our thoughts, feelings and all our soul under God’s power so that His Holy Spirit should rule them. This way all our thoughts and words pronounced in our minds or loudly should be in complete accordance with the Word, the Law, the Promises, the Testimony and the Will of the Messiah.
So that we should never rule over anyone instead of God, not even over ourselves.
So that we should always live under the reign and the power of the King Messiah and the Law of God in common with our pairs.
KOL NIDRE - 5769 (September 2008)
At the beginning of this New Year in 5769, the Lord starts something new and something big in the whole world.
I can see it in my own life and I do prostrate with joy before the Gate which will open as soon as God will declare the new departure.
Not just because Rosh HaShana is the beginning of the New Year but also because in this day something new is being born.
Although, this is the date of the calendar that I consider as being a turning point.
Since Rosh HaShana 5768, I have lived a series of criminal attacks coming from the outside and from the inside. They tried to steal, to destroy and to make disappear all that belongs to me through robberies, lying and other kind of slander.
Many had left me. A big part of my work was visibly ruined and I had practically lost everything, all things we need to live daily.
Then suddenly, all these curses disappeared and became blessings!
The rebellious and demonized people who organized the rebellion suddenly vanished into thin air and all those who were expecting something from me had gone with them.
Even those who tried to submit me or our ministry to their own will had also left us.
All this happened because I prayed and I asked that the Unique Power of God would be in force upon me, upon all my brothers and sisters and upon all our material goods.
My own prayer of Kol Nidre pronounced during the year, first delivered me from others in order that the power, the testimony and the blessings of the King Messiah would function in my life.
This is how I managed to strip my human relationships of all that wasn’t coming from God.
It wasn’t me who pardoned to the sinner according to my own desires and laws. I tried to forgive to all according to the Law of God.
I did so to allow me and my enemies to live a new departure and to be able to go before God.
All this would have been impossible without Kol Nidre!
I mainly had to retract all promises, all curses, all exigencies and all things I owed to others and that were not in accordance with the Will of God and the Power of Yeshua HaMashiach.
I had to deny the Christian pharisaic power and all laws of rabbinical Judaism.
I was not the servant and the property of men anymore. But rather, the Will and Project of God could be fulfilled and start functioning in my life since that moment. I became able to accept the unique power of Christ. Now the one thing I want is to go on His path in entire submission to God.
And what is the result today? I am free from all ties and constrain and blessed in all things in my life. And I now prepare myself for Yom Kippur by declaring that:
I don’t want anything else in my life than what the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob wants and have prepared for me and for all of us.
And I would like to fulfill this calling with all those that God would like to see beside me according to His Will and during my stay upon the earth.
In the other hand, I move myself away from all those that God has taken away from me, forgiving them all and having an easy conscience.
I do no longer have anything to do with them. I have come away from them in everything. For this reason, I am not answerable for anything and they have no right upon me: everything I have belongs to God and Yeshua HaMashiach is ruling over it.
At the occasion of the coming Kol Nidre and Yom Kippur, I declare and repeat also through this teaching that:
As a messianic Jew, I ask God to give me all that is contained in the prayer of Kol Nidre.
I want Him to be the Lord upon all things and Yeshua to be the King.
And even if I would make a false step, even if I would fall into temptation…, I ask that I could never put myself upon anyone to surmount him.
I also wish that all people God wants to unite to me in the future as brothers would also experiment the following things in their lives:
″Sh’ma Yisrael, Adonai Elohenu, Adonai Ehad.
Baruk Shem kavod malhuto leolam vaed.″
Hear Isreal, the Lord our God is One!
Should His Heavenly Name be blessed for ever!
When we are reaching Rosh HaShana, the New Year, we are living the fact that any New Starting can only happen before God, under His Rule and His Will.
However, we only can go before Him after having been purified from all our sins in complete obedience.
It is only afterwards that He gives the chance to get released and sanctified if we ask for it. This is the moment when He delivers us from all that is human, carnal and psychical and that ruled over us since then at His place.
No matter if the other people are saying and experiencing this prayer from their side, the release of Kol Nidre happens anyway in us and its breathe of liberty blows in all our mind and life.
It’s the Savior who pushes us to feel the need of being delivered from all human power so that He should rule in our lives as the unique God.
In the other hand, if someone disobeyed to this warning, God does deliver men from one another despite of it. But in such a case, the rebels will have to experience and live the judgment and all the consequences of their rebelliousness yet in their physical life.
After the conversion, we have to ask for release from all alien yokes so that we would be able to be blessed under the new domination.
Revival can only start when we leave the Will of God fulfill itself in our lives and when we do not avoid this to happen in other people’s life too.
This new start will become reality as soon as nothing will tie us to the ancient anymore.
Now I put down every desire and personal interest. But being conscious of my human weaknesses, I ask God that His power should never stop being exercised upon my life and the life of others. I demand that the power of Yeshua HaMashiach should be complete.
And all that He will offer me during the next year will belong to Him too and will also be put down before the High Priest as the first of the first fruit.
Then, this is how I lay down all this New Year before Him and ask for never letting any other spirit to govern any minute of my life instead of Ruach HaKodesh, the Holy Spirit.
I demand that He should reign over my body and soul, over all my being so that I should never give in neither to the temptation of being ruled by anybody nor to the one of ruling over someone else or even to be adored by anyone.
Our personal Kol Nidre is not simply the declaration of our submission to God. It is also the demand and the acceptance of the power of Yeshua HaMashiach. Kol Nidre is also the consent to be led by the Holy Spirit who guides us into all truth in every moment and every domain of life.
To finish, I invite everyone to renew his life and ministry.
After Kol Nidre the Gate of the Sky does open.
This can be a reality for you at any moment of your life. But first let us live the liberty and free your neighbors at the same time.
Renewing can only become a reality when you declare before God:
I will never rule over anyone and will never be ruled by anyone again. Only You, Yeshua HaMashiach have the right to it!
All human power is the main curb to any renewing and to the functioning of the Will of God. Men’s yoke is no other than the unique source of rebelliousness and insubordination.
Ministries received by God can never serve human desires, aims, interests and wills. They all must come from the Spirit of God and be submitted to the Spirit of the Messiah.
Do never accept any spiritual authority from anyone that puts himself between men and Yeshua and whose will is against the one of Kol Nidre.
If you want that all the blessing that God wants to offer you as New in your life, with you and through you should be fulfilled.
Budapest, October the 7th, 2008
