Turn, Turn, Turn – 5787

By Jonathan Brody

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We have all heard the song “Turn! Turn! Turn!” by The Byrds was actually written by Pete Seeger.

It takes almost all of its lyrics from Ecclesiastes 3:1–8 (Kohelet): “To everything there is a season…” The repeated word “turn” can be connected—not as the same Hebrew word, but as a powerful metaphor—to teshuvah, the idea of turning or returning.

“Turn, Turn, Turn”

As we approach Yom Kippur, we hear a lot about teshuvah—returning.

The Haftarah for Shabbat Shuvah begins:

“Shuvah Yisrael” — “Return, O Israel.”

And that word return got me thinking about an unlikely Jewish text: a song by The Byrds.

“Turn! Turn! Turn!”

Most people know the song from the 1960s. But the words aren’t really from the 1960s at all. Pete Seeger took them from the biblical book of Kohelet—Ecclesiastes:

“To everything there is a season,
and a time for every purpose under heaven.”

A time to be born and a time to die.

A time to laugh and a time to cry.

A time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing.

And after listing all these opposites, the song keeps coming back to one word:

Turn.

Turn, turn, turn.

That’s a pretty powerful message as we approach Yom Kippur.

Because life doesn’t move in a straight line.

We make good choices—and bad ones.

We move forward—and sometimes we move backward.

We say things we wish we hadn’t said.

We fail to say things we wish we had said.

And then Judaism gives us this extraordinary concept:

Teshuvah.

Return.

Turn around.

Try again.

The beauty of Yom Kippur is that Judaism doesn’t tell us that our mistakes have to define us.

It tells us that we can turn.

And maybe that’s what the word turn in the Byrds’ song can teach us.

There is a time for everything—but there is also a time to change direction.

A time to say, I was wrong.

A time to say, I’m sorry.

A time to say, I forgive you.

And sometimes, perhaps hardest of all, a time to say:

“I need to forgive myself and start again.”

The song ends with a simple idea:

“Turn! Turn! Turn!”

And the Torah gives us a similar invitation:

“Shuvah.” Return.

Yom Kippur isn’t asking us to become perfect people.

It’s asking us to turn in a better direction.

So as we stand at the threshold of Yom Kippur, maybe the question isn’t:

“What did I do wrong this year?”

Maybe the better question is:

“Where do I need to turn?”

Who do I need to turn toward?

What do I need to turn away from?

And what kind of person do I want to turn myself into?

Because every one of us has the ability to turn.

Turn. Return. Teshuvah.

And sometimes, one turn is all it takes to begin finding our way home.

Shabbat Shalom, and G’mar Chatimah Tovah.

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by Jonathan Brody, Executive VP Finance, New York Metro Region, Midway Jewish Center