Two years ago, during the week of Shiva for my wife and daughters, a woman named Galit came to comfort me. She told me her story. In 2002 her fiancé was killed in the Palestinian city of Jenin, where Israel sent soldiers door-to-door to root out terror. Twenty-three of our young men died because we chose to minimize civilian casualties. Then, as now, the world accused us of “genocide.” She was left bereft, her wedding dress never worn.
In her grief she turned to Heaven and cried: “You owe it to me! I demand a husband! I demand sons to replenish those we have lost!” Within a year she was married. Today she is the mother of nine children, eight boys and one girl. At my Shiva she offered me this advice: “Demand miracles. God owes it to you!”
Who shall live and who shall die?
Those words echo in my head this week as we approach Yom Kippur. We recite the haunting words of the U’Netaneh Tokef prayer: “Who shall live and who shall die?” Many people tremble at the thought. Yet paradoxically, we dress in white on Yom Kippur and sing melodies of joy, and we believe that Yom Kippur itself – as the Day of Atonement – erases our sins. It is both a day of awe and a day of confidence.
This year, I cannot approach it with fear. Not when I look at the Jewish people today.
I see our youth fighting, not for glory but for humanity, confronting the murderous regimes of Hamas and Iran, who invest their energies in creating nuclear weapons that could end the world. I see civilians sustaining soldiers and their families for two long years, supplying what the state could not.
I see young men and women competing to join the toughest regiments, boasting not of fewer days of reserve duty but of how many months they have served. I see national service volunteers staffing hospitals and schools, and teenagers working shifts for Magen David Adom, giving up their night life to save strangers’ lives.
I see the hostages who returned from captivity in Gaza telling stories of faith: keeping kosher in impossible conditions, marking Shabbat as best they could, and whispering blessings over food. In the darkness, they cherished the light, and since their release, they have inspired us with their shining examples of courage in the face of the most terrible adversity.
This year we are worthy
If Yom Kippur is about showing God that His people are worthy, then surely this year we can stand tall. We have done our part. God owes it to us!
This is not arrogance. It is our covenant. Judaism has never seen history as a contract signed once and forgotten. It is renewed in every generation. God has bound Himself to our destiny. He promised that if we walk with Him, He will walk with us. We have walked. We have given. We have sacrificed. Now, on this Day of Atonement, we say: Bring it on!
Justice is not just about punishment. It also vindicates those who are innocent. It is the recognition that people who have suffered, endured, and devoted themselves to their nation deserve life and blessing.
This Yom Kippur, let us enter the fast not in terror but in trust. We are not asking for miracles; we are demanding them, as Galit once did, and as our covenant allows. We have earned the right to live, to flourish, to see peace, and to witness more miracles.
On Yom Kippur, our message is simple: We are ready! Bring it on!
The writer, a rabbi, is an educator living in Efrat. His book Transforming the World: The Jewish Impact on Modernity was republished in English and Hebrew in memory of his wife Lucy and daughters Maia and Rina, who were murdered by terrorists in April 2023.