Kol Nidre

Introduced into the liturgy despite the opposition of rabbinic authorities, repeatedly attacked in the course of time by many halakhists, and in the nineteenth century expunged from the prayer-book by many communities of western Europe, it has often been employed by Christians to support their assertion that the oath of a Jew can not be trusted.

A person stands on each side of the Hazzan (in some communities holding the Torah Scrolls), and the three (forming a beth din or rabbinical court) recite: בישיבה של מעלה ובישיבה של מטה, על דעת המקום ועל דעת הקהל, אנו מתירין להתפלל עם העבריינין.‎In the Heavenly Academy and in the earthly academy, by the authority of Hashem and by the authority of this congregation, we hold it lawful to pray with these sinners.This invitation to outcasts is not specifically for Kol Nidre but for the whole of Yom Kippur, it being obvious that when even sinners join in repenting, the occasion is worthy of Divine clemency.

The cantor then chants the passage beginning with the words Kol Nidre with its touching melodic phrases, and, in varying intensities from pianissimo (quiet) to fortissimo (loud), repeats twice (for a total of three iterations) lest a latecomer not hear them.

"[11] Rash vows to God that for whatever reason were not fulfilled created painful religious and ethical difficulties for those who had made them; this led to an earnest desire for dispensation from them.

According to others however, it was customary to recite the formula in various lands of the Jewish dispersion, and it is clear likewise from Amram's Siddur that the usage was widespread as early as his time (9th century) in Spain.

But the geonic practice of not reciting the Kol Nidre was long prevalent; it has never been adopted in the Catalan or in the Algerian ritual, nor in the French regions of Carpentras or Avignon.

[15] At one time it was widely believed that the Kol Nidre was composed by Spanish "Marranos", Jews who were forced to convert to Christianity, yet who secretly maintained their original faith.

As stated in the Orot Sephardic mahzor:According to the holy Zohar, Kol Nidre is recited on Yom Kippur because, at times, the Heavenly judgment is handed down as an 'avowed decree' for which there can normally be no annulment.

Together with the Kol Nidre another custom developed: the recital before the Kol Nidre of the formula mentioned beginning "Bi-yeshivah shel ma'alah" (By authority of the Heavenly Court...), which has been translated above, and which gives permission to transgressors of the Law or to those under a ban "to pray with the congregation", or, according to another version, to the congregation "to pray with the transgressors of the Law.

[25] It has been suggested[26] that Kol Nidre originated with this invitation to avaryanim (sinners) to join the congregation's prayers, as an effort to inspire their return or at least prevent losing them completely, rather than as a mechanism for coping with Christian or Muslim persecution.

[40] There has been some criticism from scholars fluent in Aramaic that the text of Kol Nidre has grammatical errors; however, any efforts to introduce corrections have been frustrated because the changes would not comport with the traditional, and much-beloved, melody.

[44] However, some communities (apparently Sephardic and in the minority) consider it proper to wait until nightfall, when Yom Kippur officially begins, before reciting Kol Nidre.

In the eleventh century Rabbi Meir ben Samuel (Rashi's son-in-law) changed the original wording of Kol Nidré so as to make it apply to the future instead of the past, that is, to vows that one might not be able to fulfill during the next year.

This is shown by the following Biblical usage of the terms in Kol Nidrei: After this point Amram's Hebrew version ceases to list forms of vows and shifts to synonyms for the making of vows, the list in the present day Kol Nidre uses Aramaic non-Biblical synonyms for pledges, which do not have equivalents in Biblical Hebrew: Though these promises to God may have been ill-considered, the failure to keep them is a recurring offense – and acting as if promises made to God were so trifling that they could be thoughtlessly forgotten is a further offense;[57] the only remedy is, first, to admit that these promises will never be fulfilled, by formally cancelling them – which is one of the purposes of the Kol Nidrei, and then to repent for them – which is the purpose of the Day of Atonement.

[4] The Russian government, in 1857, decreed that the prayerbooks must include, as an introduction to Kol Nidrei, a Hebrew explanation to the readers of the limited nature of the vows that could be released by this ceremony.

As Prof. Ismar Elbogen said in his monumental study of Jewish Liturgy:It is well known how many baseless accusations the text of [Kol Nidre] has aroused against Jews in the course of centuries.

Because this declaration has often been held up by anti-Semites as proof that Jews are untrustworthy, the Reform movement removed it from the liturgy - temporarily, but there was enough popular demand for its restoration.

Saadia Gaon (early 10th century) wished to restrict it to those vows extorted from the congregation in the synagogue in times of persecution,[79] and he declared explicitly that the "Kol Nidre" gave no absolution from oaths an individual took during the year.

[76] Judah ben Barzillai (Spain, 12th century), in his work on Jewish law "Sefer haIttim", declares that the custom of reciting the Kol Nidre was unjustifiable and misleading, since many ignorant persons believe that all their vows and oaths are annulled through this formula, and consequently they take such obligations on themselves carelessly.

[76] For the same reason Rabbenu Yerucham (Provence, 14th century) criticized those who, relying on Kol Nidrei, made vows recklessly, and he declared them incapable of giving testimony.

Yielding to the numerous accusations and complaints brought against "Kol Nidrei" in the course of centuries, the rabbinical conference held at Brunswick in 1844 decided unanimously that the formula was not essential, and that the members of the convention should exert their influence toward securing its speedy abolition.

[86] Among Reconstructionist Jews, it was briefly omitted from the liturgy and then restored but with a slightly revised text that limited its application only to those vows that operated "to estrange ourselves from those who have offended us or to give pain to those who have angered us".

"[89] An English translation - "O come, day of God" - of Stein's hymn was used, in the place of Kol Nidre, in the American Reform Union Prayer Book (1945 & 1963) - the 1894 edition of the Union Prayer Book had a slightly different English translation but it appears that some editions between then and 1945 were defective and erroneously omitted most of the pages (this page among them) for the eve of 'Atonement Day', but Kol Nidre was returned to the Reform liturgy in subsequent prayerbooks.

[92] In the early 17th century, Rabbi Mordechai Jaffe of Prague, known as the Levush, mentioned that all cantors knew a set melody which was traditional for Kol Nidre.

However, these divergences are not radical, and are inevitable in a composition not due to a single originator, but built up and elaborated by many in turn, and handed on by them in distinct lines of tradition, along all of which the rhapsodical method of the hazzanut has been followed.

[95] Pianist Emil Breslauer of the 19th century was the first to draw attention to the similarity of these strains with the first five bars of the sixth movement of Beethoven's C sharp minor quartet, op.

The pneuma given in the Sarum and Ratisbon antiphonaries (or Roman Catholic ritual music-books) as a typical passage in the Gregorian mode (or the notes in the natural scale running from "d" to "d" ["re" to "re"]), almost exactly outlines the figure that prevails throughout the Hebrew air, in all its variants, and reproduces one favorite strain with still closer agreement.

The strain, in either form, must obviously date from the early medieval period, anterior to the 11th century, when the practice and theory of the singing-school at St. Gall, by which such typical passages were evolved, influenced all music in those French and German lands where the melody of Kol Nidre took shape.

Thus, then, a typical phrase in the most familiar Gregorian mode, such as was daily in the ears of the Rhineland Jews, in secular as well as in ecclesiastical music, was centuries ago deemed suitable for the recitation of Kol Nidrei, and to it was afterward prefixed an introductory intonation dependent on the taste and capacity of the officiant.

The Electric Prunes album Release of An Oath, subtitled and commonly called The Kol Nidre after the title of its first and thematically most central track, is based on a combination of Christian and Jewish liturgy.