My mother was a modern woman with a limited interest in religion. When the sun set and the fast of the Day of Atonement ended she shot from the synagogue like a rocket to dance the Charleston.

If the history of the Day of Atonement has anything to say to us now it is: never relieve individuals of moral responsibility. The more we have the more we grow.

On the Day of Atonement Jews are commanded to seek forgiveness from the people we have hurt.

Murder is unique in that it abolishes the party it injures so that society has to take the place of the victim and on his behalf demand atonement or grant forgiveness it is the one crime in which society has a direct interest.

Yom Kippur the Day of Atonement is the holy of holies of Jewish time. It is that rarest of phenomena a Jewish festival without food. Instead it is a day of fasting and prayer introspection and self-judgment when collectively and repeatedly we confess our sins and pray to be written into God's Book of Life.