Torah Thoughts
On Yom Kippur, we come together as a community, to fast and pray, and ask that this year be good. Though the sins to which we confess are recited by all, regardless of whether the particular person committed them (I certainly hope no one in the community committed, e.g., murder!), for me the greatest significance of reading the sins is to remind us that they ARE sins. In particular, I feel it is so important to remember that things like giving bad advice, being disrespectful to teachers, etc. have terrible consequences. And that we are responsible for the results of our actions, WHETHER OR NOT WE ARE AWARE OF THE CONSEQUENCES.
That being said, I have always loved the cleansed feeling I have after Yom Kippur. We get to start anew.
The snack I have chosen illustrates G-d’s desire for us to help break the chains binding the oppressed. However, one could also understand that our PAST sins, if we do make ourselves into people who will no longer do so and thus become NEW people, chain us to them. We need to repent, renew resolve, and become the types of people who will no longer commit whatever sins are chaining us to our guilt.
Pre bar/bat mitzvah (age, not ceremony) may eat on Yom Kippur. However, if you are making this ON Yom Kippur (as opposed to in ANTICIPATION of YK), be sensitive that most children, by age 9 or 10 or so, will begin trying to fast to some extent, and by the year before bar/bat mitzvah will probably be doing a full fast.
