Sometimes It's Us

Pete Rose remains baseball’s all-time leader with 4,256 career hits. He was a 17-time All-Star, won multiple MVP awards, holds the Major League record for games played and plate appearances, and set a National League record with a 44-game hitting streak. With his brash, fearless style and relentless passion for the game, in the 1960s and 1970s, there was hardly a more exciting player in baseball.

But Pete Rose was also, infamously, one of baseball’s most controversial figures. In 1989, Rose was banished from baseball for gambling. For years, he vehemently denied wrongdoing. He paid a tremendous price for those denials. He was never admitted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, and he spent the final decades of his life in what can only be described as baseball purgatory.

To this day, his status remains the subject of vigorous debate. Some argue that Rose’s on-field statistics speak for themselves, he paid his price, and that it is time to let him into the Hall of Fame. Others argue that he never fully expressed remorse and that his offense was so serious that he should remain banned. But there is one moment in this entire saga that has always struck me.

In 1999, ten years after he was banned from baseball, Pete Rose was honored as a member of Major League Baseball’s All-Century Team, recognizing the greatest players of the previous 100 years. The World Series that year included a ceremony that featured most living recipients of that honor, gathering together in a historic collection of baseball talent. Rose received a standing ovation from the crowd. And then NBC reporter Jim Gray interviewed him.

Gray asked Rose a very direct question: “Pete, the American public is very forgiving. Are you willing to show contrition, admit that you bet on baseball, and make some sort of apology?” Rose responded: “Not at all, Jim. I’m not going to admit to something that didn’t happen.” Gray pressed him. “Pete, those who will hear this tonight will say you have been your own worst enemy and continue to be. How do you respond to that?” Rose was incredulous. “I’m surprised you’re bombarding me like this. I mean, I’m doing an interview with you on a great night, a great occasion, a great ovation. Everybody seems to be in a good mood. And you’re bringing up something that happened ten years ago.”

Jim Gray was bitterly criticized for the interview. He was benched by NBC, other baseball players refused interviews with him, and he received death threats. But who was right?

Was Jim Gray right? Was Pete Rose his own worst enemy because he refused to accept responsibility? Or was Pete Rose right? Was this a great night, a festive occasion, and the wrong time to bring up mistakes from the past? Why bring up my mistakes on my happiest night?

In some respects, this is precisely what we do on Yom Kippur. The Mishna in the fourth Perek of Taanis tells us:

לא היו ימים טובים לישראל כחמשה עשר באב וכיום הכיפורים.

“There were no happier days for the Jewish people than the 15th of Av and Yom Kippur.” Yom Kippur is, in many ways, lhavdil, our World Series. It is the most sacred day of the year. It is the day we reconnect with Hashem. It is the day we are given the opportunity to start again. There is something deeply uplifting and even festive about the day.

And yet, what do we do? We spend the day talking about everything we did wrong. Again and again and again, we beat our chests and say Vidui. Ashamnu. Bagadnu. Gazalnu. We sinned. We betrayed. We stole. And then the Rambam says something fascinating:

הַוִּדּוּי שֶׁנָּהֲגוּ בּוֹ כָּל יִשְׂרָאֵל אֲבָל אֲנַחְנוּ חָטָאנוּ וְהוּא עִקַּר הַוִּדּוּי.

The confession that all of Israel has become accustomed to saying is much longer. But the ikkar ha-vidui, the essence of Vidui, is just three words: אֲבָל אֲנַחְנוּ חָטָאנוּ, “But we have sinned.”

There is something strange about that formulation. Why does the Rambam emphasize the word אבל , “but”? Why not simply say: חטאנו — We have sinned? Why do we need the word aval? Why is that word part of the essence of the confession?

Perhaps the Rambam is teaching us one of the most important lessons of Yom Kippur. There is a fundamental difference between asking someone to forgive you and asking someone to excuse you. When I ask you to forgive me, I am taking responsibility. I am saying: “I did something wrong. I recognize it. I own it. And I am asking you to forgive me.”

But when I ask to be excused, I am saying something very different. “It wasn't really my fault.” “I couldn't help it.” “I didn't mean it.” “There were circumstances.” “You don't understand what I was dealing with.” “I had no choice.”

An excuse may explain what happened. But an excuse can also prevent me from taking responsibility for what happened. Sometimes we go through the entire process of Yom Kippur believing that we have done Teshuvah, when in reality all we have done is become better at explaining why we are the way we are.

And that is why the Rambam's formulation is so powerful. אֲבָל אֲנַחְנוּ חָטָאנוּ “But we have sinned.”

The word aval represents all of our “buts.” We say: “I wanted to help my friend who just had surgery, but life got busy.” “I intended to check in on my elderly neighbor, but work was crazy.” “I wanted to stop getting so angry at my children, but I’m under so much stress.” “I wanted to give more charity, but inflation went up and I had other priorities.”

And maybe all of those explanations are true. The question isn't whether our circumstances are real. The question is whether we use them to explain our behavior or to excuse it. But Yom Kippur asks us to say something deeper: Yes, there were circumstances. But I still have to take responsibility for the choices I made. Our lives are filled with lot of avals.

In the 19th century, hospitals across Europe were suffering from a devastating phenomenon known as puerperal fever, sometimes called the “childbed fever.” Women would give birth and then, tragically, die within days. The mortality rates in some hospitals were staggering.

Doctors and scientists worked desperately to figure out what was happening. And there was something particularly tragic about the way these hospitals operated. Doctors would conduct autopsies on women who had died in the morning. Then, without adequately cleaning their hands or instruments, they would go upstairs and deliver babies in the afternoon. Eventually, physicians including Oliver Wendell Holmes and Ignaz Semmelweis began to recognize the connection.

The doctors themselves were carrying something from the autopsy rooms to the maternity wards. The solution was remarkably simple: wash your hands. But accepting that solution required something much harder than washing hands. It required the medical community to admit: We are part of the problem.

For years, doctors searched for explanations everywhere else. But sometimes the hardest thing to recognize is that the problem is sitting right in front of us and sometimes, the problem is us. And that is one of the hardest things for any human being to say. If the problem is always somebody else, there is nothing I can do. But if I am part of the problem, then I can also become part of the solution.

That is what Yom Kippur is asking of us. Not to beat ourselves up and not to spend the day feeling like failures, and not to wallow in guilt. Yom Kippur is about something much more constructive: Honesty.

Pete Rose spent decades insisting that he had nothing to apologize for. And Jim Gray was right about one thing: sometimes, we can become our own worst enemies when we refuse to take responsibility.

But Yom Kippur teaches us something even more profound. Taking responsibility doesn't ruin the celebration. It is the celebration. Because the moment I stop making excuses is the moment I become capable of changing.

Sometimes the person standing between us and the person we want to become is not our circumstances, our spouse, our children, our boss, our community, or anyone else. Sometimes, it's us. And taking responsibility isn't about declaring that we are bad. It is about recognizing that we are capable of becoming better.

That is the gift of Yom Kippur.