Ki Tisa (I'll Try Again)

God said to Moses, “Chisel out two stone tablets like the first ones, and I will write on them the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke. (Exodus 34:1)

God said, “I have forgiven, as I have promised you.”  (liturgy for the Days of Awe)

I’ll try again

Until I get it right

I’ll try again

Who knows?  This time I might.

I wanna win

The love that’s in your heart

Right now, somehow

I’m gonna make a brand new start

            (“I’ll Try Again,” sung by Kelly Willis, written by Jim Lauderdale)

We’re living in an age of apologies. 

Hardly a day goes by without some celebrity or politician expressing remorse for some misdeed exposed by the media.  But how do we know when their intent is sincere?  Under what circumstances do we offer them a second chance?  And, closer to home, how do we find forgiveness for our own offenses?

Jewish tradition has a great deal to say about these matters as it discusses the nature of teshuvah—the steps that we must take to repent of—or more accurately, turn away from—our transgressions.  Not surprisingly, our sages disagree over aspects of that path, but, as Rabbi David Blumenthal notes, almost all insist that genuine teshuvah requires five key elements.

The first step—recognizing that we have done wrong—is an act of moral intelligence.  It demands that we examine our motives and contemplate the consequences of our offences.  The second—remorse—is an essential emotional state in which we feel real regret for what we did and desire to make it better.  The third step—confession—is the (often public) acknowledgement of our failings.  The fourth and fifth steps—restitution and desisting from our bad behavior—are both concrete actions: we do everything in our power to make amends to the offended party and commit ourselves to an ongoing, determined effort to behave significantly better in similar situations now and in the future.

When a person sincerely follows this path, Jewish tradition sees them as repentant and worthy of forgiveness—though this does not absolve them from facing the legal and moral consequences of their initial transgression.

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This week’s Torah portion, Ki Tisa, describes the Israelites’ most grievous sin in the entire Torah: their idolatrous worship around the Golden Calf while Moses is up on Mount Sinai.  This deep breach of faith appalls both God and Moses; in its wake, God threatens to utterly destroy the community, and Moses smashes the tablets of the Law.

There are other, serious—even dire—consequences.  Thousands die by plague and by the sword of the avenging Levites.  Yet ultimately both God and Moses forgive the people and offer them a second chance.  Moses goes back up the mountain and returns forty days later with a new set of tablets.  The text doesn’t describe the details of the Israelites’ path to  teshuvah, but we can assume that they acknowledge their failures, do their best to make amends, and learn from their mistakes.

Our tradition (Talmud Bava Batra 14b) also notes that the broken tablets were kept in the ark together with the intact second set.  Brokenness and wholeness coexist together in our most sacred space—the heart of the holy ark.  They remind us of both our failure and our commitment to growing from it.  Forgiveness is a complicated matter, but none of us would really want to live in a world without second chances.

Kelly Willis sings soulfully of this part of our humanness in her song, “I’ll Try Again.”  She recognizes that forgiveness is not granted casually, noting:

It must be hard for you to sit and listen

I can understand if you’re afraid

If you need to see some proof

I’m here to make it up to you

She adds:

Even when you shouldn’t have

You gave me another chance

That’s just what I need from you today

And then she launches into the chorus, in which she—like all of us flawed, frail, imperfect people—begins the hard work of getting—and doing—better:

I’ll try again

Until I get it right

I’ll try again

Who knows?  This time I might

I want to win

The love that’s in your heart

Right now, somehow

I’m gonna make a brand new start

We all need that chance to make a new start.  As the primary work of Jewish mysticism, the Zohar notes: Without teshuvah, the world would not be able to exist, for in its absence, no one could grow, adapt, create or heal. 

The broken tablets sit, side by side, with the whole ones.

Both are holy.

To hear Kelly Willis singing “I’ll Try Again”: