The Apology Episode, 5783: Ep 332

Tablet Studios

Tablet Magazine

Judaism, Society & Culture, Religion & Spirituality

4.6 • 1.5K Ratings

🗓️ 29 September 2022

⏱️ 61 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

This week on Unorthodox, we’re sorry. It’s our eighth annual Apology episode, and we’re bringing you stories of reckoning, atonement and… goats? Stephanie Butnick visits the goats who inhabit a steep, rocky patch of Manhattan each summer to learn about the biblical scapegoat of Yom Kippur, with help from Rabbi Jeremy Kalmanofsky and former Riverside Park Conservancy President and CEO Daniel Garodnick. What’s repentance all about, anyway? Rabbi Dovid Bashevkin joins us to explain the concept of teshuva, and what the medieval Jewish philosopher Maimonides has to say about asking for forgiveness. Professor and author Stewart Davenport, who grew up in Birmingham, AL, shares a candid reflection about arriving at Princeton as a college freshman and seeing the world differently. Plus, Liel starts a new Tzom Gedaliah tradition with a call to Rabbi Rachel Timoner. Don’t miss our previous Apology episodes: 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021. We’re heading back on the road! Find out about our upcoming events at tabletmag.com/unorthodoxlive. We love to hear from you! Send us emails and voice memos at unorthodox@tabletmag.com, or leave a voicemail at our listener line: (914) 570-4869. Remember to tell us who you are and where you’re calling from. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter to get new episodes, photos, and more. Join our Facebook group, and follow Unorthodox on Twitter and Instagram. Get a behind-the-scenes look at our recording sessions on our YouTube channel. Want to book us for a live show or event in your area, or partner with us in some other way? Email Tanya Singer at tsinger@tabletmag.com. Unorthodox is produced by Tablet Studios. Check out all of our podcasts at tabletmag.com/podcasts. Sponsors: Soom: Soom tahini is the perfect ingredient for your fall meals. Use discount code UNORTHODOX22 for 10% off your next order at soomfoods.com. HIAS: This High Holiday season, help HIAS help refugees in the United States, Ukraine and more than 20 other countries. Make a matched gift today at hias.org/unorthodox.

Transcript

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0:00.0	In my early 20s, when I first got really interested in Judaism and I thought, maybe I'll go to
0:05.3	high holiday services this year or maybe I'll even fast on Yom Kippur.
0:09.7	A few friends who got wind of what I was thinking about of these crazy new ideas of mine
0:14.5	started giving me books or sending me links to articles on the web and they all sort of
0:19.5	had this theme, how do you prepare for the days of awe?
0:23.3	They gave me books like Alan Luz legendary treatise.
0:26.8	This is real and you are completely unprepared.
0:29.5	And I would read these things and I would expect that the weeks leading up to Russia
0:34.4	Shana and Yom Kippur would be these profoundly transformational weeks where I would be in
0:37.6	deep meditation all the time where I'd forget to eat because I would be thinking so deeply
0:42.2	about what Russia Shana was going to mean to me.
0:44.3	And then when Russia Shana came, the next week would just be this blur.
0:47.1	I wouldn't even remember the days between Russia Shana and Yom Kippur because I would be
0:51.4	so deep into my mindfulness and my meditation and my apologies and my Tashuva and my outreach
0:58.2	friends, nothing like that has ever happened for me.
1:03.4	In fact, in those early years all I could think about was how hungry I was going to be on
1:06.8	Yom Kippur and whether I was really man enough, person enough, human enough, grown up enough,
1:12.2	Jew enough to do it.
1:14.0	And then before I knew it, I was married and I had children and I was involved in leading
1:18.5	the children services at my neighborhood synagogue.
1:21.6	And every year since for the past 15 years all I can think about is all the work I'm
1:26.3	going to have to do for Russia Shana and Yom Kippur.
	...

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