Everyone Can Change

Wednesday evening begins Rosh Hashanah.

The holiday’s central message is this. We can change and start over. We can repair relationships and mend the hurt we have caused. No one is free from wrongdoing. And no one is beyond the possibility for change.

Judaism does not believe our destiny is fated. We can always write a new story for ourselves.

There is a story about Rabbi Israel Salanter who lived in the nineteenth century and founded the Mussar movement whose goal was to return ethics to the center of Jewish life.

Once Rabbi Salanter spent the night at a shoemaker’s home. Late at night, he saw the man working by the light of a flickering candle. “Look how late it is,” the rabbi said. “Your candle is about to go out. Why are you still working? The shoemaker replied, “As long as the candle is burning, it is still possible to mend.”

For weeks afterward, Rabbi Israel Salanter was heard repeating the shoemaker’s words to himself: “As long as the candle is burning, it is still possible to mend.” He continued, “As long as the candle burns—as long as the spark of life still shines—we can mend and heal, seek forgiveness and reconciliation. We can begin again.”

This year let’s be like the shoemaker.

We need not stay up late into the night, but we can always begin again.

We can begin to make changes at any hour.