{"id":331,"date":"2007-09-10T10:43:16","date_gmt":"2007-09-10T10:43:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/virtualtalmud\/2007\/09\/the-power-of-sin.html"},"modified":"2007-09-10T10:43:16","modified_gmt":"2007-09-10T10:43:16","slug":"the-power-of-sin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/2007\/09\/the-power-of-sin.html","title":{"rendered":"The Power of Sin"},"content":{"rendered":"

With Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur fast approaching, Jews around the world are supposed to be reflecting on our behavior over the past year by acknowledging our wrongdoings, asking forgiveness, and committing to doing better in the year ahead. It is interesting to note that I use the terms \u201cacknowledge our wrongdoings\u201d and \u201cask for forgiveness\u201d instead of \u201cconfess our sins\u201d and \u201crepent\u201d \u2013-it\u2019s language that is much more comfortable to many in the Jewish community than language dealing with sinfulness and repentance, despite the fact that this is the traditional language of the season.
\nThere are several reasons for our discomfort with the language of \u201cconfessing sins.\u201d Besides the general sense that it sounds like Christian rather than Jewish language, sin is a difficult concept for many, acknowledging that our behaviors may not be \u201cmerely\u201d transgressions against ourselves or other people, but against God\u2019s will. We can certainly acknowledge that some actions, like murder or child abuse are undeniably evil but, thank God, most of us have not done such things. So where does that leave the rest of the bad behaviors we\u2019ve engaged in from lying to cheating to being emotionally absent from our children? Are these actions sins<\/em>?<\/p>\n


\nIt is clear from the Torah that private actions are not in fact simply personal matters but have an impact on the community and upon God. Wrongdoing, unexpiated, contaminates the moral fabric of society. Moreover, Rabbi Maz Artz writes that sins \u201cdistort and diminish the divine image in which man was created.\u201d In acting contrary to the divine image in which we were created, we alienate ourselves from God and community. Just as a factory that dumps pollutants into a river poisons those who live downstream, our private actions can poison our relationship to ourselves, to those we love, and to God.
\nThe language and labeling of sin can be a very powerful tool and it is thus susceptible to abuse. When people point the finger at others of whom they disapprove, the language of sin becomes a rhetorical power grab, a way of labeling someone else\u2019s behavior as unequivocally beyond the pale. The great potential for abuse that we have seen played out in our own times is the most important reason that sin is such an uncomfortable topic for many, breeding instead a \u201clive and let live mentality.\u201d The remedy is to focus less on what we believe to be sinful in others and more on what we find sinful in ourselves: those actions and attitudes devalue ourselves or devalue others as divine creations, thus diminishing the holiness in ourselves and in society.
\nIf we are going to make a real change in ourselves we must start by recognizing, rather than minimizing, the importance of our behavior. It\u2019s time to reclaim the language of sin–the power it has both to indict and transform–and to truly repent during these coming holy days.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur fast approaching, Jews around the world are supposed to be reflecting on our behavior over the past year by acknowledging our wrongdoings, asking forgiveness, and committing to doing better in the year ahead. It is interesting to note that I use the terms \u201cacknowledge our wrongdoings\u201d and \u201cask for…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":100,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-331","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-jewish-holidays"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Power of Sin - Virtual Talmud<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/2007\/09\/the-power-of-sin.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Power of Sin - Virtual Talmud\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"With Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur fast approaching, Jews around the world are supposed to be reflecting on our behavior over the past year by acknowledging our wrongdoings, asking forgiveness, and committing to doing better in the year ahead. It is interesting to note that I use the terms \u201cacknowledge our wrongdoings\u201d and \u201cask for…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/2007\/09\/the-power-of-sin.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Virtual Talmud\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2007-09-10T10:43:16+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Rabbi Joshua Waxman\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The Power of Sin - Virtual Talmud","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/2007\/09\/the-power-of-sin.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"The Power of Sin - Virtual Talmud","og_description":"With Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur fast approaching, Jews around the world are supposed to be reflecting on our behavior over the past year by acknowledging our wrongdoings, asking forgiveness, and committing to doing better in the year ahead. It is interesting to note that I use the terms \u201cacknowledge our wrongdoings\u201d and \u201cask for…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/2007\/09\/the-power-of-sin.html","og_site_name":"Virtual Talmud","article_published_time":"2007-09-10T10:43:16+00:00","author":"Rabbi Joshua Waxman","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/2007\/09\/the-power-of-sin.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/2007\/09\/the-power-of-sin.html","name":"The Power of Sin - Virtual Talmud","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/#website"},"datePublished":"2007-09-10T10:43:16+00:00","dateModified":"2007-09-10T10:43:16+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/#\/schema\/person\/b2c907457be70b05b78f556cde42041f"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/2007\/09\/the-power-of-sin.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/2007\/09\/the-power-of-sin.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/2007\/09\/the-power-of-sin.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"The Power of Sin"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/","name":"Virtual Talmud","description":"Rabbi Brad Hirschfield, where politics and pop culture meet 3,000 years of Jewish wisdom","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/#\/schema\/person\/b2c907457be70b05b78f556cde42041f","name":"Rabbi Joshua Waxman","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/6ea\/6eaad0ba16ec89046c9580c3b08d2e4cx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/6ea\/6eaad0ba16ec89046c9580c3b08d2e4cx96.jpg","caption":"Rabbi Joshua Waxman"},"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/author\/jwaxman"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/100"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=331"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=331"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=331"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/virtualtalmud\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=331"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}