Yom Kippur is the Day of Atonement and Repentance (Wikipedia). Leading up to this day of fasting (no water either!), the Jew is supposed to ask others to forgive him. From the Chabad folks:
On Yom Kippur, G‑d mercifully erases all the sins we have committed “before G‑d”—but not the sins we may have committed against our fellow man. If we really want to come out of this holy day completely clean, we need to first approach any individual whom we may have wronged and beg their forgiveness. This applies whether the offense was physical, emotional, or financial (in which case, seeking forgiveness is in addition to making appropriate monetary restitution).
A couple of months ago I asked “Can Judaism survive the smartphone age?” Maybe the answer is “yes, as long as we reconfigure it ever so slightly.” Here’s something from Facebook:
Today is Yom Kippur, which is usually translated as “Day of Atonement.” I prefer to call it the “Day of At-ONE-Ment.”
On this day, I cut myself slack for all the ways I’ve fallen short, made mistakes, intentionally or unintentionally been a jerk, been rude, impatient, bitchy or unkind.
I apologize to myself for being so hard on myself, for getting less done than I wanted to, for taking my iPhone to bed, and for making myself wrong for no reason (except that it’s an old habit I learned a long time ago that I am gently unhooking myself from now).
Readers: Is she on the right track for making Judaism more popular among younger Americans?
I don’t think so. People are drawn to religion for more structure in their lives not less.
Well I am pretty bad at this, but I believe both portions and more, are part of the process. The latter part, on forgiving yourself for your sins, comes later on near the close, but it’s an important part of moving on and acknowledging the need to do better.
At r/judaism someone did share a text message from a person A reminding others that they had just a little bit of time for them to consider their deeds and then get back to and apologize to person A. (I think that was a bit of a joke.)
@jerry
I find that text message to be quite humorous.
Vanity of vanities: all is vanity.