Rosh Hashanah Morning Sermon – 5786
“I don’t want to die, but I don’t know how to live.” I have heard quite often, variations of suicidal feelings described in this way. I have the Book of Life in front of me, and I don’t even feel the strength to open it. How can I be inscribed for good, when I can’t bring myself to read even the title page? The heaviness of those in pain is hard to imagine if we are not in the depths of it ourselves. I have to say that I don’t use the term “committed suicide” anymore. Although this is still the most common phrase used to talk about someone who takes their own life, through my experience and training in mental health and suicide prevention, and working with surivors of suicide loss, I have found that this language is not helpful. And if there is one thing that we as Jews rely upon, it is language. We put such a great emphasis on words. Remember, God spoke the world into existence, so the words must be important. I have attached myself to terms such as “took their own life,” or even the more blunt “died by suicide.” Suicide is a difficult topic, and one that I did broach on Yom Kippur in 2023. Since the High Holy Days those two years ago, a lot has happened in our Jewish world. It is surely worth revisiting and re-examining so much. We are all very aware of what occurred in Israel on October 7th, 2023, only days after Yom Kippur. It is not time to stop returning to these moments.
Flashback to The Nova music festival in Southern Israel, not far from the border of Gaza. On the morning of October 7th, Hamas terrorists brazenly attacked. 364 of those dancing and singing were killed, and many dozens more were taken and held as hostages in Gaza. We do know that around 1,200 people in Israel were killed on that day. We have heard these numbers so much over the past two years…we are told these figures as if that is where the day ended. The fact of the matter remains…October 7th is not over. For many, it never will be. Enter 21 year-old Shirel Golan. Shirel was attending the Nova Music Festival with her boyfriend Adi and friends that October morning. She is not included in the official number of those killed. She did not die that day, but let us make no mistake, she did not survive that day. More than a year later, on her 22nd Birthday, Shirel Golan died by suicide. She succumbed to the chronic psychological and spiritual injuries of October 7th. Since her death, Shirel’s brother Eyal has worked tirelessly to be her voice. He wants the world to know that Shirel suffered from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. She physically escaped, but she never truly left those festival grounds. Eyal wants the world to know that the little sister who he used to help change and feed, who loved his own children, who was young and vibrant, WAS murdered on that fateful day. Her body lived longer, but her soul never recovered from the wounds. Another Nova survivor is anonymously quoted as saying: “There are so many who are technically still alive, but who basically died on October 7th.”
At first glance, Jewish law seems to be cold and unfeeling regarding suicide. In Genesis, the line “And surely the blood of your lives, will I require,” was examined by commentators, sages, and rabbis as God’s prohibition against suicide. Judaism, a tradition that sees the preservation of life as paramount, has had much trouble reconciling the idea of suicide with a life lived with Jewish values. Our own book of Leviticus tells us: “And you shall observe My laws and My judgments, which a person shall do, in order to live by them; I am Adonai.” We are told to LIVE. Later rabbinic texts do tell us that someone must be considered sound of mind in order to have actually engaged in suicide as it is prohibited. There is still a rabbinic prohibition against suicide for someone who is “lada’at” or of sound mind. That begs the question, “who of sound mind would take their own life?” Someone who is thinking clearly does not kill themselves. I firmly believe that to be true.
Suicide and mental health struggles in general can touch anyone, and most likely have impacted everyone here this morning in one way or another. In fact, one in five adults in the United States experience mental illness in any given year. That means that at any one time, approximately 60 million people in our country are struggling. Globally, up to one billion people are suffering, or dealing with, mental health concerns. While the Nova music festival and the surrounding events of October 7th are high profile, we lose so many to invisible distress and misery that we rarely, if ever, hear about. So many suffer in solitude and silence. So many “died unexpectedlys” crowd the obituary section. When we read the Akeida, or the binding of Isaac on these Holy Days, I can’t help but think that there are so many who might feel as Isaac on the altar right now–Bound, convinced that their fate is out of their own hands. Remember the sentiment, “I don’t want to die, but I don’t know how to live.” It is as if those in emotional peril are staring at the blade being held over them as Isaac, and perhaps they do not want to receive the punishing blow, but they feel bound by the trauma life has offered, as if they cannot move. It is hard to understand the inability to dodge the strike, especially when examined from a healthy perspective. Both the bindings holding shut the Book of Life and Isaac down, are themselves technically weak and insignificant. Mental health can be the quiet but absolutely mighty adversary. “I don’t want to die, but I don’t know how to live.” How can we help the ones who don’t know how to live; who do suffer in silence? How can we help free them from the bindings, to open the Book of Life that feels weighted with dread and hopelessness.
Additionally, and in the spirit of these holy days, what about those whose stories don’t fit neatly into a box that so easily garners sympathy? Those whose experiences and deaths are not as easy to reconcile as singularly tragic. Let me share. I have to admit that I wrestled with whether or not to bring this up, but I think it is too important to avoid: In September of 2009, two days before Rosh Hashanah, a lifelong friend of my family took her own life at 41 years-old. She died by suicide. This is a woman who, admittedly, on paper, is difficult to sympathize with. She had a successful career, a husband, and three beautiful children, whom she and her husband adopted. I was very much present and a part of all of their adoptions. I used to babysit when I could. I played catch with the kids, and took them to the mall in the summers. The friend who passed and I used to laugh together for countless hours. We had a special connection. She was there through so many of the ups and downs of my younger life. She spent so much time in the living room of our house, that she even had her own chair…at least unofficially. Things started to decompensate for her in 2009, but she did not go through any externally obvious Nova music festival-level traumatic incidents. It is difficult, if not impossible, to identify any specific triggering events that led to her death. It often is. Nevertheless, she began to suffer. She held on for as long as she could before she took her own life, leaving behind family and those three young children in her wake. There was initial shock, I have flashbulb memories of a funeral with one of her children on my lap; it felt like some sort of horrific dream. Later came the anger. “Why would she do this? She had a good life. How could she leave these children behind? Those beautiful children. What will this do to them?” The anger was easier. I spent many years not truly honoring her memory, but labeling her in my own mind as selfish. Beneath that, I missed her, and wished she could have seen so much. Again, her story, as written on paper, is not one that garners much sympathy. That’s why I think we have to talk about it. How can we forgive when it is not easy?
On this Rosh Hashanah, 16 years later, I publicly want to ask for her forgiveness. Yes, she who took her own life. Some would say it was morally wrong for her to do what she did. This is why I no longer say “committed” suicide. The word “committed” implies a sin, a crime, or the like. She was sick, she was unwell, she died, and I judged her. It was easier to be angry and to judge her actions than to even begin to try and understand how her mental health must have impacted her life. As I said before, a truly well person does not die by suicide. Not everyone has a loud and very public Nova music festival horror to point to. The difficult parts of forgiveness happen not in the public vigils or the headlines, but in the quietude. God approaches Jacob in the sparseness of the desert, and Moses in the solitude of a cave. Our challenging encounters with God are not always for the general public to view and understand. There is no T’shuvah-repentance or return, for my late friend. She passed away from this world. She does not have to return. The teshuvah comes from those left in her wake. Our Unateneh Tokef prayer, after asking, “How many will pass away from this world…” further questions, “Who will be tranquil and who will be troubled; who will be calm and who tormented?” 16 years later I know that my friend was troubled, and not tranquil, she was not calm, she was tormented.
Our Rosh Hashanah liturgy brings up so many ways that one can be taken from this world. Fire, water, war, beast, drought, plague, and so many more. While these deaths can be tragic and horrible, we must also be sure to consider the troubled and the tormented. Whether someone is suffering with post traumatic stress from a horrific incident, such as Shirel Golan, or dealing with something less blatant, my own friend, we do the work of forgiveness wherever possible. Let us ask ourselves on this Rosh Hashanah and the days of awe in between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur: Can we forgive those who are not so easy to forgive? Are we ever the ones who need to ask for forgiveness? Do we project our own inability to forgive onto others? When we engage in Cheshbon HaNefesh, or an accounting of our souls, will we be able to dig into the darker and more difficult aspects of the power of these days? Can we hold ourselves to a higher and holy standard of forgiveness? Now, this does not imply that we have to forgive those who have hurt us badly, those who have mistreated us. If we have not been asked for forgiveness, we are not required, in our tradition, to forgive. What about my friend? I have only been able to “forgive her” by realizing that she is not the one who needs forgiveness. I am.
These days give us the opportunity to reconcile the relationship between ourselves, others in our lives, and God. “Ut’Shuvah, Ut’filah, Utzedakah, maavirin et roa hag’zeirah- through return to the right path, through prayer and righteous giving, we can transcend the harshness of the decree.” If we refocus our spiritual attention, we can uncover so many opportunities for a re-creation of our lives.
On this Rosh Hashanah and these days of awe, we have these difficult conversations, we open up our souls to what we once might have labeled as taboo and uncomfortable. Rabbi Yisrael Salanter said “If you wish to change your personality, study Torah and implement it in your daily living, and pray to God to remove your undesirable traits. You cannot do it by yourself.” The Torah is not about being comfortable, it is about challenging us to be the most holy and elevated versions of ourselves that we can possibly become. It is a constant turning over and over of the scrolls of our character to find the best passages, to hold fast to them. Rabbi Salanter makes it clear that we can’t do it alone. There is a reason we pray together on these days; a reason we all take responsibility for one another. There is power in this day, power in our God, but also power in all of us as a collective.
Let us be blessed during these High Holy days to not only consider our own souls, but in doing so, to find a place for those who feel they are fighting alone. Let us open up our hearts and awareness to Shirel Golan and my old friend. Let us be slow to judge, quicker to forgive, and even more hastily take action. Life is not easy, and we honor those we have lost to suicide as not having committed a sin, but as having been sick and dying. We forgive ourselves for not forgiving. We remember that any internal struggle is just as legitimate as fire, water, drought and beast. We leave this space more in tune with the spiritual flow of the world around us. Let us be the empaths, the ohr l’goyim, the light unto all the nations of the world. When someone says, literally or proverbially, “I don’t want to die, but I don’t know how to live,” let us not turn from them, but take their hand and walk hand-in-hand with them as we return to God, to love and light. Check on your friends and loved ones, normalize the taboo. Call or text the Suicide & Crisis lifeline at 988 if you or someone you know is struggling. When we turn thoughts into action, we return to the Source of Life and Light together.
Shana Tovah U’Metukah
