The Ten Days of Repentance

The Ten Days of Repentance are the ten days beginning with Rosh Hashanah and ending with Yom Kippur.

But what are they? How is it broken up? How can we apply these ideas in 2025?

Rosh Hashanah (Day 1–2): A time of judgment, reflection, and crowning Hashem as King. The intermediate days (Days 3–9): A period of self-examination, prayer, and improving our actions. Yom Kippur (Day 10): The holiest day of the year, dedicated to fasting, confession, and seeking forgiveness.

During these days, Jews traditionally seek to:

·       Return to G-d (Teshuvah).

·       Make amends with others (also Teshuvah).

·       Increase in kindness, Tefillah (prayer), and Tzedakah (charity).

What lessons can we from the above in 2025?

In today’s world of constant noise, fast change, and conflict, the Ten Days of Teshuvah remind us that:

1. Every day counts. These ten days are a window of opportunity — a reminder that change doesn’t need to wait for a new year or a distant future. Even small steps can realign us with who we want to be.
   

2. Relationships matter. Much of repentance involves repairing bonds with people we’ve hurt. In a time when digital connections can feel shallow, this period urges us to nurture real trust, forgiveness, and empathy.
   

3. Self-reflection is power. Instead of being swept away by trends, busyness, or stress, we pause to ask: Am I living with purpose? These Ten Days are a structured chance to recalibrate.
   

4. Hope over despair. Even if last year was filled with mistakes, setbacks, or regrets, these days teach that renewal is always possible.
   

5. Collective responsibility. The prayers often use “we” instead of “I,” reminding us that our actions ripple outward. In 2025, with global challenges and challenges to the Jewish people, this collective perspective is especially meaningful — we must take responsibility not just for ourselves, but for our communities and the world.

While all of these lessons are important, we will relate more to one or two than the rest. So this year I am choosing to focus on point no. 4 – Hope over despair.

I am sure I am not alone in being exhausted by the slew of bad things that have played out in this world and across our screens: death, starvation, political wars, in Israel, America, Ukraine.

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks sums up no. 4:

“To be a Jew is to be an agent of hope. Every ritual, every command, every syllable of the Jewish story is a protest against escapism, resignation and the blind acceptance of fate. Judaism, the religion of the free G-d, is a religion of freedom. Jewish faith is written in the future tense. It is belief in a future that is not yet but could be, if we heed G-d’s call, obey His will and act together as a covenantal community.

The name of the Jewish future is hope…” (Future Tense, p. 252)

My hopes for the coming year are that our brothers and sisters that are still in captivity will be freed, the wars should end and that there should be peace for all.

As it says in אָבִֽינוּ מַלְכֵּֽנוּ Avinu Malkeinu:

אָבִֽינוּ מַלְכֵּֽנוּ כַּלֵּה דֶּֽבֶר וְחֶֽרֶב וְרָעָב וּשְׁבִי וּמַשְׁחִית וְעָו‍ֹן מִבְּנֵי בְרִיתֶֽךָ:

Our Father, our King! remove pestilence, sword, famine, captivity, destruction and [the burden of] iniquity from the members of Your covenant.

---

The Ten Days of Repentance reminds us to slow down, look inward, repair outward, and embrace the possibility of new beginnings — both personally and globally.

---