It would seem that one could hardly find two more dissimilar days in the Jewish calendar. Yom Kippur is the most solemn day of the year. It is a day of soul-searching and repentance; the day on which we connect with the inviolable core of purity within us—with the self that remains forever unsullied by our failings and transgressions—to draw from it atonement for the past and resolve for the future. So it is only natural that Yom Kippur should be a day of unfettered spirituality, a day on which we transcend our very physicality in order to commune with our spiritual essence. The Torah commands us to afflict ourselves on Yom Kippur-to deprive the body of food and drink and all physical pleasures. Yom Kippur is the day on which terrestrial man most resembles the celestial angel.
Purim, on the other hand, is the most physical day of the year. It is a day of feasting and drinking—the Talmud goes so far as to state that a person is obligated to drink on Purim until he does not know the difference between cursed be Haman and blessed be Mordechai. As our sages explain, Purim celebrates the salvation of the body of the Jew. There are festivals that remember a time when the Jewish soul was threatened, and are accordingly marked with spiritual observances; on Purim, however, it was the Jewish body that was saved, and the festival thus has a decidedly physical character.
On Yom Kippur we fast and pray, on Purim we party. Yet the Zohar sees the two days as intrinsically similar, going so far as to interpret the name "Yom Kippur to mean that it is a day like Purim!
A Throw of Dice
And yet, as one delves beneath the surface diversity, similarities emerge. Purim means lots, and the festival of Purim is so named after the lots cast by Haman to determine on which day of the year the Jews should be slaughtered, G‑d forbid. The casting of lots is also a central theme of Yom Kippur: in one of the most dramatic moments of Yom Kippur service in the Holy Temple, the kohen gadol (high priest) stood between two he-goats and cast lots to determine which should be offered to G‑d and which should carry off the sins of Israel to the desert.
A lot expresses the idea that one has passed beyond the realm of motive and reason. Lots are resorted to when there is no reason or impetus to chose one option over the other, so that the matter must be left to forces that are beyond ones control and comprehension.
Therein lies the significance of the lots cast by the kohen gadol on Yom Kippur. After all is said and done, implied the lots, no man is worthy in the eyes of G‑d. We all stand before Him with our faults and iniquities, and by all rational criteria, should be found lacking in His judgment. So we impel ourselves beyond the realm of convention and reason, beyond the pale of merit and fault. We disavow all the accouterments of physical identity-food and drink, earthly pleasures, and our very sense of reason and priority. We cast our lot with G‑d, confident that He will respond in kind and relate to us in terms of our quintessential bond to Him rather than by the existential scales of pro and con.
Hamans lot-casting was his attempt to exploit the supra-existentionality of the divine to an opposite end. The Jewish people, said Haman, might be the pursuers of G‑ds wisdom on earth and the implementors of His commandments, thus meriting His favor and protection. But surely G‑d, in essence, is above it all-above our earthly reason and its notions of virtue and deservability, beyond such concepts as good or evil. Ultimately, the divine will is as arbitrary as a roll of dice. Why not give it a shot? I might just catch a supernal caprice running in my direction.
What Haman failed to realize, say the Chassidic Masters, is that we are G‑ds "chosen people" in the ultimate sense of the word. He does not desire us and love us because of any reason or cause—because we are good or virtuous or wids. Also on the level on which darkness is as light and good and evil are equally insignificant before Him, G‑d chooses-for no reason save that such is His choice-the nation of Israel. In the words of the prophet, ``Is not Esau a brother to Jacob? says G‑d. But I love Jacob. Also when reality seems as arbitrary as a throw of dice-for the righteous Jacob is no more worthy (for worthiness is a moot point) than the wicked Esau-the divine lot inevitably falls with His chosen people.
Thus, the festival of Purim derives its name from the lots cast by Haman. For this is not some incidental detail in the story of Purim but the single event that most expresses what Purim represents.
Does Matter Matter
Yom Kippur is indeed a day like Purim: both are points in physical time that transcend the very laws of physical existence. Points at which we rise above the rational structure of reality and affirm our supra-rational bond with G‑d-a bond not touched by the vicissitudes of mortal life. A bond as free of cause and motive as the free-falling lot.
But there is also a significant difference between these two days. On Yom Kippur, our transcendence is expressed by our disavowal of all trappings of physical life. But the very fact that these would interfere with the supra-existential nature of the day indicates that we are not utterly free of them. Thus Yom Kippur is only a day like Purim (kpurim), for it achieves only a semblance of the essence of Purim.
The ultimate transcendence of materiality is achieved not by depriving the body and suppressing the physical self, but by transforming the physical into an instrument of the divine will. So Purim is the day on which we are our most physical, and at the same time exhibit a self-abnegation to G‑d that transcends all dictates and parameters of the physical-rational state—transcending even the axioms cursed be Haman and blessed be Mordechai.
Yom Kippur is the day that empowers the Jew to rise above the constraints of physicality and rationality. Purim is the day that empowers the Jew to live a physical life that is the vehicle for a supra-physical, supra-rational commitment to G‑d.
Based on the teachings of the Lubavitcher Rebbe
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