Will God Forgive Your Sins If You Did This?

Haredi and Orthodox Jews descended on Sheepshead Bay to cast bread crumbs – and their sins – in the water ahead of Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement which begins tonight. But will the symbolic dumping of sins into a body of water work if this is the end result?

The water off Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn where Orthodox Jews and haredim held tashlich ceremonies:

Perhaps this commercial needs to be remade in Yiddish:

 

[Hat Tip: Seymour.]

Comments

[Rebitzman]

Sigh.......

[David]

This is very sad, indeed, a Chillul Hashem.

A vast majority of frumma (except for BT's) have no respect for the environment.

As with so much the frumma do, if it is worth doing, it is worth overdoing.

Surely they could have made arrangements to clean up this mess?

[David]

I just noticed - it also looks like they threw in the plastic wrappers from the bread as well.

So typical.

[SML]

Ship them all to Israel in return for equal # of seculars or MO and be done with them. Unsocialized primitives.

[Chaim]

I threw my crumbs in the water and there was already junk/litter there. A bunch of bread crumbs are not hurting anything and I don't see evidence that the litter is from those casting bread. And while it would be nice that every time someone saw litter they cleaned it up, in suits on Rosh Hashana is probably not the opportune time to do that.

[Yochanan Lavie]

Apologies to Simon & Garfunkel:

When it's Tashlich; leaving shul,
When sins are on my mind, I will schrei gevalt
By water side oy, when tides get rough
And sins can't be lived down.
Like some bread on the troubled waters
I will make sins drown.
Like some bread on the troubled waters
I will make sins drown.

When you're davening;
when you're on the street;
when Yom Tov falls so hard
I will go to shul.
I'll make a new start,
oy with matzoh crumbs.
And chrayn is freshly ground.
Like some bread on the troubled waters
I will make sins drown
Like some bread on the troubled waters
I will make sins drown

Flail on Silverberg;
Flail on by.
Your time has come to whine.
All your schemes are gone, oy vey.
Wear Calvin Klein.
Oy, if you need a trend
I'm drinking kiddish wine.
Like some bread on the troubled waters
I will drink l'Chaim
Like some bread on thetroubled waters
I will drink l'Chaim.

[David]

And while it would be nice that every time someone saw litter they cleaned it up, in suits on Rosh Hashana is probably not the opportune time to do that.

Posted by: Chaim | September 25, 2012 at 05:03 PM

G-d forbid! I know manual labor is beneath the dignity of the frumma but surely they could have made a previous arrangment for non-Jews to clean up the chillul Hashem?

[Bassy the Haredi Slayer]

Ship them all to Israel in return for equal # of seculars or MO and be done with them. Unsocialized primitives.

Why ? The Israelis are already have problems with the Palestinians, the African immigrants and native haredim,

Why we do not ship them to the Pale of Settlement?

[God is not amused.]

new york city needs to FINE them for littering and hand them a bill for cleaning up the mess. this is the crap they pull in other communities too. they are so hated, for this reason. they are like locusts. descend, destroy, leave a mess behind. human locusts.
yl/ very amusing.

[Nobody]

Yeah, all that stupidity and at the end of the day - idolatrous to boot (minhag shtoot at best, derech haEmori more likely)

[The Anti-Schmendrick]

Well, in Chabad we do not scatter bread crumbs. We shake our tzitzis. Some of that dreck looks like it has nothing to do with tashlich. The gulls will eat the good stuff.

[Alter Kocker]

It looks like every Ultra Orthodox neighbourhood in my city; filthy, unkempt houses, rusted out cars not to mention the level of personal cleanliness which is virtually non existent.

[Abu Jihad Schneerson]

Another darkhe ha Emori practice of these cavemen!The Rambam is turning in his grave!

[1234]

Avinu Malkeinu, sesom piyos mastinieinu umekatrigeinu!!!

[Barry]

Will God Forgive Your Sins If You Did This?

In and of itself, no, however coupled with kaporos, teshuvah, tefilah and tzedakah, yes.

[Chazal Qaeda]

With all due respect, I think sheepshead bay looks like that EVERY day

[Yoel Mechanic]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tashlikh

Read this, and tell me if anything makes sense here.

[SML]

Why we do not ship them to the Pale of Settlement?

Too far. Maybe to Staten Island, then blow the bridges .

[PulpitRabbi]

I don't understand. There is no reason to throw anything in the water for tashlich, and on Yom Tov it is actually prohibited. And sins don't get swallowed down well with bread crumbs (actually, ancient sources do not mention throwing out sins that way, that's nonsense or folk religion - tashlich is about praying at the waterside, incorporates a variety of motifs, but not the one of us throwing out our sins to the fish - we merely ask G"d to forgive our sins, figuratively throwing them into the water).

[seymour]

With all due respect, I think sheepshead bay looks like that EVERY day

Posted by: Chazal Qaeda | September 26, 2012 at 09:53 PM

I took the picture because I was shocked. and I live right by the water so I know how it looks. you are right it is not the cleanest water but never as bad as this.

the simple reason is that many frum people have lost sight of the big picture. That rituals are a mean to an end . But has become an end. So they throw the bread in the water even when they see this mess. Instead of steeping back and saying maybe I should not throw the bread in. But then they think if they do not throw the bread they are breaking a commandment.

ritual are done in a robotic fashion that they have really become meaningless and worthless

[seymour]

in addition people great amount of bread why not one people or two per person why do people bring whole bread with them?

this is similar to what happens with shichtha the attitude was is was cut (the animal) according to halacha and they ignore all the other abuse that was going on or did not care because is was cut correctly and that is all that mattered . Again not seeing the big picture

[Shoshi]

in addition people great amount of bread why not one people or two per person why do people bring whole bread with them?

Maybe they have a lot of sins.

[Shoshi]

Posted by: PulpitRabbi | September 27, 2012 at 07:13 AM

The OU agrees with you: http://www.ou.org/index.php/jewish_action/article/28204/

[max]

BabbaaaBOOOOOOOEY