Seeking Forgiveness, With Help From Pros

What can Tiger Woods and Akio Toyoda, the grandson of the founder of Toyota motors, teach us about teshuvah?

With Selichot -- a service of repentance-centered prayers said in preparation for the High Holidays -- coming this Saturday night, Sept. 4, is there anything we can learn about saying "I'm sorry" from public figures?

The airwaves have been full of apologies this year. But unlike soon-to-be former BP chair Tony Hayward or South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford, we usually don't say selach li -- "forgive me" -- on television in front of a world audience.

Why compare ourselves to public persons? After all, we didn't dirty the gulf, create poorly engineered automobiles or destroy our relationships by seeking additional partners.

Most of us discover that even though the wrongs we commit never make front-page headlines, in our mind's eye, they can read just as large.

Behind all the staging and showmanship, there still seems to me a kernel of kavanah, of right intention, in these apologies. Some attempts, like Sanford's, often fall short, seemingly compiling a public Al Chait of how not to say you're sorry. But we can find insight in the attempts and learn from their mistakes.

"I have been unfaithful to my wife," Sanford declared before delving into the detailed how and why of his indiscretions.

In contrast to this public confession, Selichot prayers are not much interested in specifics. Standing in synagogue, we are not asked to offer up personal details.

Since Judaism has no word for "sin," the declarations in Ashamnu recited late on a Selichot night ask us to acknowledge collectively where we have missed the mark. We say instead, "We have been perverse. We have been wicked."

In his book Living Judaism, Rabbi Wayne Dosick relates that according to the Talmud, "God forgives transgressions committed against him, but offenses against another human being must first be forgiven by the injured party."

I know that when I screw up -- independent of TV coverage -- I have some real work to do.

Tiger Woods' admission of a life of philandering and deception, even if you think golf is a total snooze, probably stirred you awake this year.

"I know I have bitterly disappointed all of you," he said in a televised apology. "For all that I have done, I am sorry," he lamented.

Further into the apology, Woods even sounded Ashamnu-esque: "I was unfaithful. I never thought about who I was hurting. I felt I was entitled. I was wrong. I was foolish."

'Change for the Better'

This winter, appearing at a hearing before the U.S. Congress, Akio Toyoda apologized for his cars that would not stop. "I am deeply sorry for any accident that Toyota drivers have experienced."

In an almost High Holiday-ish tone, he asked his customers for forgiveness and faith. "I ask you to find room in your heart to one day believe in me again."

He said that the car company is dedicated to "continuous slow improvement" -- the "change for the better" concept upon which Toyota has been successfully built.

If applied to human relationships, it is this idea of gradual improvement -- of continuous teshuvah, if you will -- that among all the apologies I find the most useful for Selichot and the season's Days of Repentance.

It's a long, hard haul down an often curvy teshuvah highway, and steering toward "continuous slow improvement" sounds like a plan.

Edmon J. Rodman is a JTA columnist who writes on Jewish life from Los Angeles.