Patrick Comerford
These are the ‘Ten Days of Awe’ or the High Holy Days in the Jewish calendar. I was in the synagogue in Milton Keynes on Tuesday morning (23 September) for the Rosh Hashanah service, with the traditional blowing of the shofar or liturgical ram’s horn marking New Year’s Day.
Yom Kippur or the Day of Atonement begins with the Kol Nidre service on Wednesday night (1 October) and continues on Thursday.
The Sabbath between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, which begins this evening, is called Shabbat Shuvah (שבת שובה), Sabbath of Return, or Shabbat Teshuvah (שבת תשובה), Sabbath of Repentance. Its name derives from the special Haftorah reading, from the prophet Hosea, that begins with the words ‘Shuvah Yisrael’ (‘Return, O Israel’).
This special Sabbath during Ten Days of Repentance emphasises the themes of teshuvah (תשובה) or returning to God or repenting, as Yom Kippur approaches. Shabbat Shuvah provides a crucial pause to reflect on the past year and to plan for a better future.
Leonard Cphen’s song ‘Who By Fire,’ is deeply connected to the High Holy Days through its reinterpretation of the Jewish liturgical poem, Unetanneh Tokef (וּנְתַנֶּה תּוֹקֶף), recited on both Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. His inspiration from the Days of Awe is also found in his song ‘You Want It Darker’, which incorporates the Kaddish and the Hineni prayer from the story of the binding of Isaac, and his song ‘If It Be Your Will’.
‘Who by Fire’ by Leonard Cohen was released in 1974 on the B side of the album New Skin for the Old Ceremony, sung as a duet with Janis Ian.
The prayer Unetanneh Tokef (ונתנה תקף) on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur describes God reviewing the Book of Life and deciding the fate of each and every soul for the year to come – who will live, and who will die, and how.
Jewish tradition dates this prayer to the 11th century when, it is said, Rabbi Amnon of Mainz was punished for not converting to Christianity by having his hand and feet cut off on Rosh Hashanah.
As he was dying from his wounds, he had a vision of God sitting and writing in a book. In his dying hours, Rabbi Amnon wrote the prayer that begins with ‘Who by fire? And who by water?’ The prayer concludes:
Who will live and who will die;
Who in his due time and who not in his due time;
Who by water and who by fire,
Who by the sword and who by beasts,
Who by famine and who by thirst,
Who by earthquake and who by plague,
Who by strangling and who by stoning.
Who will rest and who will wander,
Who will be tranquil and who will be harassed,
Who will be at ease and who will be troubled,
Who will be rich and who will be poor,
Who will be brought down and who will be raised up?
But Repentance, Prayer and Charity avert the severe decree.
In Jewish tradition, the Book of Life lays open on these days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, and the greeting among Jews in those days is: ‘May your name be written in the Book of Life’ (Gmar Hatima Tova, וגמר חתימה טובה)
Leonard Cohen heard this traditional prayer as a child in the synagogue. In Montreal In his own words, he recalls the tradition: ‘On Rosh Hashanah will be inscribed and on Yom Kippur will be sealed how many will pass from the earth and how many will be created; who will live and who will die; who will die at his predestined time and who before his time; who by water and who by fire, who by sword, who by beast, who by famine, who by thirst, who by storm, who by plague, who by strangulation, and who by stoning.
‘Who will rest and who will wander, who will live in harmony and who will be harried, who will enjoy tranquillity and who will suffer, who will be impoverished and who will be enriched, who will be degraded and who will be exalted.’
At the age of 39, the poet and singer was famous but unhappy and imagined he had reached a creative dead end. In October 1973, he left his home on the Greek island of Hydra for the chaos and bloodshed of the Sinai desert during the Yom Kippur War.
Cohen travelled around the war front with of local musicians, entertaining the troops. In his book Who by Fire, the journalist Matti Friedman told the story of those weeks Cohen spent in the Sinai, with a kaleidoscopic depiction of a harrowing, formative moment for both a country at war and a singer at a crossroads.
The war transformed Cohen. Instead of abandoning his music career, he returned to Hydra in Greece and to his family, became the father of a second child, and released his album New Skin for the Old Ceremony. References to war can be heard in a number of the songs, including ‘Lover, Lover, Lover,’ written during fighting, and ‘Who by Fire,’ inspired by this prayer about human mortality.
The traditional catalogue or listing includes deaths that are natural, accidental, punishment, by decree, and that are unjust. Like the original, Cohen’s ‘Who by Fire’ tells of a litany of ways and reasons one might meet one’s death. To this list he adds avalanche, greed, hunger, suicide, drugs and the abuse of political power, to the original prayer, and even the cruelty of failures in love: ‘Who by his lady’s command.’
When Cohen introduced the song live in Melbourne, in March 1980, he explained the melody is based on the one he ‘first heard when I was four or five years old, in the synagogue, on the Day of Atonement, standing beside my tall uncles in their black suits.’
He continued: ‘It’s a liturgical prayer that talks about the way in which you can quit this vale of tears. It’s according to a tradition, an ancient tradition that on a certain day of the year, the Book of Life is opened, and in it is inscribed the names of all those who will live and all those who will die, who by fire, who by water.’
The line: ‘And who shall I say is calling?’ can be understood in the context of hearing the Shofar or liturgical horn being blown on Rosh Hashanah. It is a symbolic wake-up call, stirring those who hear it to mend their ways and to repent: ‘Sleepers, wake up from your slumber! Examine your ways and repent and remember your Creator.’ Who is calling? At one level, it is my own heart calling me to Repentance, Prayer and Charity. But, ultimately, it is God who is calling us to Repentance, Prayer and Charity.
It is not surprising that as families in Israel tried to come to terms with the Hamas massacres on two years ago on 7 October 2023, Leonard Cohen’s ‘Who By Fire’ was given new lyrics in memory of the 1,200 people murdered in southern Israel.
Meanwhile, Leonard Cohen’s 1973 visit to the frontlines of the Yom Kippur war was dramatised for a new limited TV series Who by Fire: Leonard Cohen in the Sinai, an adaptation of Matti Friedman’s book.
This year that is shrouded in hatred, war and death – from the increasing hatred here and across Europe towards refugees and migrants, and the wars in Ukraine, Russia, Gaza, Israel and the West Bank, to the hateful pronouncements that come almost daily from Donald Trump and the Oval Office.
This sad and depressing global political ey combine to give an urgency to the words of the Unetanneh Tokef (ונתנה תקף) in the liturgy for the Days of Awe, which conclude: ‘Through repentance, prayer, and charity [righteous giving], we can transcend the harshness of the decree.’
Teach us to number our days, O Lord, that we might apply our hearts unto wisdom.
Leonard Cohen, Who By Fire:
And who by fire, who by water
Who in the sunshine, who in the night time
Who by high ordeal, who by common trial
Who in your merry merry month of May
Who by very slow decay
And who shall I say is calling?
And who in her lonely slip, who by barbiturate
Who in these realms of love, who by something blunt
And who by avalanche, who by powder
Who for his greed, who for his hunger
And who shall I say is calling?
And who by brave assent, who by accident
Who in solitude, who in this mirror
Who by his lady’s command, who by his own hand
Who in mortal chains, who in power
And who shall I say is calling?
And who shall I say is calling?
And who by fire who by water
Who in the sunshine, who in the night time
Who by high ordeal, who by common trial
Who in your merry merry month of May
Who by very slow decay
And who shall I say is calling?
And who shall I say is calling?
Shabbat Shalom, Gmar Hatima Tova!
!שבת שלום וגמר חתימה טובה
Leonard Cohen, ‘Who by Fire’ (Live in London)
