The Think Tank

Any one who knows me is no doubt well aware of my political affiliations, so it should come as no surprise that Fox News blowhard Glenn Beck is not one of my favorite people.   He has said any number of things that I feel are utterly ridiculous and often shameful, and Fox has recently come under fire for creating events to report on like Mr. Beck’s own “9/12 movement”, so I suppose Mr. Beck’s suggestion last week to make September 28th a “day of Fast and Prayer for the Republic” really shouldn’t come as a surprise.  And at first blush, you might even think “Hey, who cares?”  After all a National Day of Prayer has been in existence since 1952 (it was later fixed on the first Thursday in May by President Raegan), so what’s the big deal with Glenn Beck’s idea?

The problem is that September 28th, 2009 is already taken.  That is Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the year for followers of the Jewish faith, also known as “The Day of Atonement”, a day when millions of Jews around the globe will pray for repentance and fast for 25 hours.

So does anyone really think that Glenn Beck didn’t know this?  Doesn’t it seem like an awfully big coincidence that he just happened to pick the exact date when millions upon millions of people around the world would be praying and fasting, to suggest that people around the world should pray and fast?  I for one am not buying it.

But then the question has to be asked: why would he do this?  Is he trying to get in touch with some deep seeded issues of faith?  Is he trying to reach out to his Jewish audience without appearing to overtly cater to the Jews who supposedly run the world?  (By the way, if it is true that Jews run the media, and its true that Fox News is actually part of the media – two assumptions which find highly doubtful – wouldn’t you think that Glenn might know the date of Yom Kippur?  Wouldn’t it probably have been mentioned around the water cooler at least once?  Wouldn’t he notice that all the bosses were at synagogue?)

Personally I think it is much more basic.  I think that Glenn Beck believes that most of the people who watch his show are ignorant and unlikely to know anything about Yom Kippur, including when it was held this year.  So I think he picked that date to hold his very own special holiday so he could take credit for all the millions of people around the globe who seemingly took his advice.  It’s like sympathetic magic: you see dark clouds on the horizon and predict rain, and when it rains you look like a prophet.  Glenn Beck asked people to fast and pray on Yom Kippur, and 10 million people did.

The only question in my mind is this: does Glenn Beck himself actually believe he convinced these people to pray and fast?  Or does he just hope that you are dumb enough to believe that he did?

Here are some interesting facts about Yom Kippur that Glenn forgot to mention:

Yom Kippur is the 10th day of the Jewish month of Tishrei, also making it the tenth day of the Jewish New Year (which starts with Rosh Hashanah)

According to Jewish belief, God transcribes each persons fate into a book on Rosh Hashanah and seals the verdict at the end of Yom Kippur.  During the Days of Awe a Jew will pray for forgiveness of the wrongs he or she has committed against God or mankind.  At Yom Kippur’s conclusion, the person is believed to have been absolved of sin, similar to Catholic confession.

Unlike most Jewish holidays which include a feast, Yom Kippur requires a fast, so the feast is held on the Eve of Yom Kippur instead.

Yom Kippur begins at sundown on what most non-Jewish people would consider the day before, and continues until sundown the following day.  During that time the following prohibitions are observed:

• No eating or drinking (except for extreme medical conditions)
• No wearing of leather shoes
• No bathing or washing
• No wearing of perfumes or lotions
• No marital relations
• No exchanging of money

Erev Yom Kippur (the Eve of the Day of Atonement) traditionally has two feasts, the giving of charity and praying or asking for forgivness, similar to the All Saints Eve traditions of Christianity.

There are 5 traditional prayer services for Yom Kippur: Ma’ariv (evening prayer); Shacharit (morning prayer); Musaf (the “additional prayer”); Mincha (afternoon prayer); and Ne’ilah (the closing prayer).  There is also a unique prayer which recounts the service of avodah, a practice originally recited by the Kohen Gadol by which one can achieve atonement without entering the Temple of Jerusalem, which was destroyed more than 2,000 years ago.