Teshuva for the secular

The Jewish High Holy Days concluded on September 21. This is a time of intense self-reflection that begins in the prior month of Elul and intensifies with the holidays of Rosh Hashana—the New Year—and Yom Kippur—the Day of Atonement, which is a day of fasting and is the holiest day in the Jewish calendar. The entire period lasts forty days.

Because I retain close ties to Judaism, I read the constant calls for Teshuva, which is commonly translated in English as “repentance” but actually means in the Hebrew “turning” or “return.” During the month of Elul, one tries to repair relationships with others. Only after that task is performed does one try to repair one’s relationship with God.

This sounds more profound than it usually is in practice. Like a lot of things, religion can be rote and perfunctory. When I was a practicing Jew, I never consciously sought during Elul to apologize to anyone I had wronged and no one ever came to me. A lot of calls for Teshuva amount to exhortations to do more of the things everyone knows we should do. Not all that different from secular New Year’s resolutions to give up smoking and work out more.

"Good without God" or secular repentance?

For all their limits, however, these Jewish practices offer potential benefits for secular people and, modified, could be part of a new kind of secular practice. I never see references to repentance in secular settings. The whole idea of repentance would probably be heard as insulting. We secularists like to say we are “good without God.” What do we need repentance for?

I’m sure down deep we all know this is nonsense. We secularists cheat on our taxes and our spouses. We belittle our political opponents. We lash out in traffic. We get addicted to drugs, alcohol and gambling. Just like religious people. Our slogan ought to be, “no worse without God.” We are not good. We are not even fine.

All people are like this. We can act decently, but mostly this occurs when our self-interest is not at stake. When it is, we lie, cheat, steal and commit violence. And we would do worse if we thought we could get away with it. And even when we are not malevolent, we are often thoughtless, lazy and stupid.

The reference in the First Humanist Manifesto of 1933 to “the complete realization of human personality” as the goal of life to be sought in the “here and now” was a part of modernism’s exuberant overconfidence. Yes, this is a goal, but it is not going to be realized.

The problem with the idea of secular repentance is not that we don’t need it. The problem is that without a god, repentance may not be possible. The purpose of repentance in religion is the forgiveness that God can bestow. Without forgiveness, intense awareness of our failings can amount to self-flagellation and lead to crippling guilt and shame. And if the effect is not that dramatic, simply falling short, which we all do, can still lead to a fatalistic dulling of possibility in our lives. When you have disappointed yourself and others often enough, you may stop trying to live differently. Many people live their lives in regret for the past.

Conversely, the religious person can ask God for forgiveness. That forgiveness wipes the slate clear of sin and allows a genuinely new beginning. In that new beginning, without the weight of regret, guilt and shame, the religious person can begin anew and become a—somewhat—better person. Granted, this dramatic possibility never happens for most religious people. But it is a hope and makes repentance possible.

The power of the myth

This account of Teshuva might sound positively dangerous. People do terrible things, God forgives them, and then they do them again. Judaism avoids this danger by insisting that God’s forgiveness frees people only to try to assuage the damage they have done and requires an intention to change.

Secularists call this account of Teshuva a myth. After all, there is no God to grant forgiveness. But that does not mean that the myth lacks real power for the believer. For example, I freely acknowledge that there is no God. That is why I left Judaism. But I nevertheless experienced in my own life, years ago, the power of divine forgiveness. I know personally what it feels like to be mired in sin and then to be forgiven and to live thereafter in a new freedom. Obviously, I cannot explain how such forgiveness happened. I have been told that I just forgave myself. But that explanation is alien to the experience. Forgiving myself was precisely what I could not do at that time. At a time when my life was filled with anger, recrimination and failed relationships, I was forgiven. And I did try to begin again.

In fact, although this event occurred more than thirty years ago, that sense of forgiveness has permeated my life ever since. I have done many stupid things in all these years. But never again have I felt hopeless.

Won’t a good therapist accomplish the same thing without divine intervention? Yes, for some people. But for others, therapy is a poor substitute for human transformation. All therapy can do for many people is increase their capacity for coping with a bad life.

So, given all these inherent differences between secularism and religion, is a secular Teshuva possible?

The religious person says no. The root of Teshuva is return and there is no moral tradition for the secularist to return to. But this is a shallow objection. Returning to a tradition already established is not usually going to lead to the kind of transformation that Teshuva promises. Doing a better job of keeping kosher or studying more is not much different from attending yoga classes more faithfully.

Genuine repentance promises transformation, not some slight self-help change. That is hard and undoubtedly unusual, even within religious traditions. Not many Jews in Israel woke up the day after Yom Kippur and said to themselves, “I now see that my legitimate concern for security has made me indifferent to the suffering of the Palestinian people.” Not many American Jews came to the realization that their economic success might have led to callousness toward Trump voters who have been left behind.

These two examples of transformation reflect my own biases. The reader can come up with other possibilities. The point is that such transformations rarely happen. We want to be better people but we usually remain who we are.

Secular Reconciliation and Secular Reconstruction

Nevertheless, as unlikely as it may be, secular Teshuva is still needed. Seriously needed. So, we will have to experiment. I suggest the following as one starting point for consideration. Let’s match the Jewish calendar in a general way so that the practice of repentance can become ingrained. Next August, let’s proclaim Secular Reconciliation Month. We will pledge to review our lives with moral seriousness and try to reconcile with the people we have harmed, or have simply become estranged from, during the past year.

Then, during the first week of September 2027, let’s resolve to improve. We’ll call this Secular Reconstruction. We will examine our habits and tendencies and compare them to the upright, honest, caring and brave person we could be. We know we will never close that gap, but we will keep that goal in mind.

After all this, on Saturday night, September 4, 2027, we will seek out some cosmic immensity—a place we can see the stars or the ocean or even just Lake Erie. In the presence of this immensity, we will acknowledge that the universe is conducting an experiment. For almost 14 billion years, the universe has gone from producing hydrogen to bringing forth life. And from single-celled creatures to producing life forms that are self-aware and live lives of choice.

No one knows how this experiment will come out. Or where else it may be taking place. But we do know how hard it is to be a human being—to live this life of choice. In contrast, it is easy to be a lion or a rattlesnake or an ant. So far in our lives, we admit we have not vindicated the universe’s experiment. But we acknowledge in the presence of the immensity of the universe how important this experiment is. And we pledge to try to make the experiment more of a success in the coming year.

The feeling of release I expect us to experience at that point is as close to forgiveness as a secularist can get.

And then let’s celebrate ourselves and each other. And help each other in the coming year to try to reach this goal.