When throwing sins into the water don’t forget
it’s dangerous to follow them by diving in,
and if you leave them high and dry, not washed and wet,
it’s putting them like plastic in a bin,
as when on Rosh Hashanah many Jews perform
Tashlich, our sins into restless water casting
away what realistically the ritual we can’t reform;
its repetition proves reform is not long-lasting,
not actually managing to destroy our sins
any more than we destroy rejected plastic
that dutifully we put each week in bins.
Both futile moral rituals merely are fantastic,
not based on any chance we may succeed
in getting rid of what may cause us harm
performing with each ritual a worthy deed
whose repetition is its crowning charm.
In a podcast on 9/18/24 by Meir Soloveichik, “The Tashlikh of Micah and the Omens of Rosh Hashanah” he mentioned that his father taught him that Tashlikh, a ritual which is not performed in his family, teaches us that sins are disposable and can be removed, thus preparing us for the repentance that we plan to perform on Yom Kippur. He added that when we perform the ritual by a suburban water’s edge soon after hearing the shofar, when we ritually crown God as our king, we recall how Zadok the priest behaved as he crowned Solomon by the river Gihon in Jerusalem, King David’s city, in the country Jews call Israel, though its Roman name, Palestine, seems to be as indestructible as plastic.
1 Kings 1:38-39 states:
וַיֵּ֣רֶד צָד֣וֹק הַ֠כֹּהֵ֠ן וְנָתָ֨ן הַנָּבִ֜יא וּבְנָיָ֣הוּ בֶן־יְהוֹיָדָ֗ע וְהַכְּרֵתִי֙ וְהַפְּלֵתִ֔י וַיַּרְכִּ֙בוּ֙ אֶת־שְׁלֹמֹ֔ה עַל־פִּרְדַּ֖ת הַמֶּ֣לֶךְ דָּוִ֑ד וַיֹּלִ֥כוּ אֹת֖וֹ עַל־גִּחֽוֹן׃
Then the priest Zadok, and the prophet Nathan, and Benaiah son of Jehoiada went down with the Cherethites and the Pelethites. They had Solomon ride on King David’s mule and they led him to Gihon.
וַיִּקַּח֩ צָד֨וֹק הַכֹּהֵ֜ן אֶת־קֶ֤רֶן הַשֶּׁ֙מֶן֙ מִן־הָאֹ֔הֶל וַיִּמְשַׁ֖ח אֶת־שְׁלֹמֹ֑ה וַֽיִּתְקְעוּ֙ בַּשּׁוֹפָ֔ר וַיֹּֽאמְרוּ֙ כׇּל־הָעָ֔ם יְחִ֖י הַמֶּ֥לֶךְ שְׁלֹמֹֽה׃
The priest Zadok took the horn of oil from the Tent and anointed Solomon. They sounded the horn and all the people shouted, “Long live King Solomon!”
Gershon Hepner is a poet who has written over 25,000 poems on subjects ranging from music to literature, politics to Torah. He grew up in England and moved to Los Angeles in 1976. Using his varied interests and experiences, he has authored dozens of papers in medical and academic journals, and authored “Legal Friction: Law, Narrative, and Identity Politics in Biblical Israel.” He can be reached at gershonhepner@gmail.com.
