Vidui: Ashamnu

The line a great Sage stood up for

The Gemara (the rabbis' discussions built on the Mishnah) tells of a man who stood before Shmuel, a leading Sage of the 200s, while the prayer leader said the Yom Kippur confession. At the words "But we have sinned," Shmuel rose to his feet. The man took that as proof that these words are the heart of the confession. The Tur (a code of Jewish law, 1300s) agrees: the heart is that one line, and people added the rest by custom.

God's answer to the angels

The Ohr Zarua (a law book by Rabbi Yitzchak of Vienna, 1200s) quotes a midrash that it calls the Pesikta. The angels object: the Torah says God does not show favoritism, yet the priestly blessing asks Him to lift His face toward Israel. God answers: how can I not, when they confess to Me and say it in these words, "Ashamnu, bagadnu, gazalnu." This is the Ohr Zarua's version of the midrash.

What the confession is for

The Ramchal (Rabbi Moshe Chaim Luzzatto, a thinker and Kabbalist of the 1700s) writes in Derekh Hashem that the confession is there "to stop the mouths of the accusers", so that nothing causes your prayer to be pushed aside. The Kaf HaChaim (a law commentary from Jerusalem, early 1900s) reports from the Sha'ar HaKavanot that confession is the only thing you may say between the prayer leader's repetition of the Amidah and the pleading prayers of Tachanun.

A list built from the alphabet

The list goes through the Hebrew alphabet: ashamnu, bagadnu, gazalnu, and on, with three phrases for the last letter. A prayer book from France around 1100, the Machzor Vitry, already has it. Peninei Halakhah (a modern law series by Rabbi Eliezer Melamed) says two scholars of around 1600, the Shlah and the Perisha, held that a confession must name kinds of sin. It adds one explanation: naming many kinds in letter order covers every wrong, openly or by hint.

Where the words come from

Abudarham (a commentary on the prayers, Spain, around 1340) matches most words on the list to a verse. Ashamnu: "our guilt has grown up to the heavens" (Ezra 9:6). Zadnu: "keep Your servant back from willful sins" (Tehillim 19:14). Latznu: "now do not mock" (Yeshayahu 28:22). Dibarnu dofi: "you give slander to your own mother's son" (Tehillim 50:20). For tzararnu he says openly that no verse has Israel doing it.

The last line comes from a real day of confession

"You are right in everything that has come upon us, for You acted truthfully and we acted wickedly" is a verse from Nehemiah 9:33. It was said on a day when the Israelites gathered fasting, in sackcloth, with earth on them. They stood and confessed their sins and the sins of their ancestors (Nehemiah 9:1-2). The Ralbag (Rabbi Levi ben Gershom, a Bible commentator in southern France, 1300s) reads it as: You judged us truthfully, rightly and with compassion.

The holy chutzpah of saying "I did it"

Rabbi Natan of Breslov (the main student of the Chassidic master Rebbe Nachman; Rabbi Natan died in 1844) notices something about the line "we are not so brazen." Sometimes a person is so ashamed in front of someone he hurt that he swears he never did it. Rabbi Natan says that denial is the real chutzpah. Confessing takes a different kind, a holy boldness, and he calls it essential for serving God.

אבל אנחנו אין לנו זה העזות חס ושלום, רק שאנו מתגברין בעזות דקדשה להתודות ולומר לפניך חטאנו

The list ends with being lost

Rabbi Natan says the heart of confession is admitting that we do not know where we are in the world at all, because we have sinned against God so much. He points out that the alphabet list finishes with "we have gone astray, we have led others astray" (ta'inu, ti'tanu). He reads it as someone who wanders lost and leads others to wander. Even so, he says, we believe God knows all our hidden things, and so we keep waiting and asking to come back.

שאנו מודים ומתודים שאין אנו יודעים כלל היכן אנחנו בעולם

Words that lift words

Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi (1745 to 1812, who founded Chabad Chassidut) writes that the soul's light gets scattered into the empty things of the world, through empty everyday talk, and has to be gathered back. Those scattered pieces are like "fallen letters." So dropping the wish for the wrong thing is not enough. You also have to say the confession out loud, because the letters of Ashamnu, Bagadnu lift those fallen letters back up.

וידוי דברים שהרי הם בחינת אותיות הנפולין וע״י אותיות אשמנו בגדנו כו׳ מעלים האותיות

A claim hiding inside the plural

Rebbe Nachman of Breslov (who died in 1810) once asked a man close to Rabbi Pinchas of Koretz, an early Chassidic master, for one of his teachings. Rabbi Pinchas had said: by right we should say "I am guilty," but we say "we," as if making a claim to God, that without the strength You gave us we could not have sinned. Rebbe Nachman said he reads Yehudah's plea to Yosef the same way, and he adds the catch: we say this only so our prayer will be heard, "but do not be angry with Your servant, for I know that I am the one at fault."

אבל אל יחר אפך בעבדך, כי ידעתי אשר אני החיב

Do I stand, and how far do I bow?

The sources say to stand, with a bow. The Kaf HaChaim (a Sephardic law commentary from the early 1900s) rules that you confess standing, as the Shulchan Aruch (the main code of Jewish law) says for the Erev Yom Kippur confession. Bow as at Modim, it says, but keep the bow small, so no one mocks and sins. The Mishnah Berurah (a central commentary on daily law, around 1900) adds: do not lean on anything that would fall if removed. An old or weak person may lean, says the Kaf HaChaim.

Some of these I never did. Do I say them anyway?

The Arizal (Rabbi Yitzchak Luria, the Kabbalist of Tzfat in the 1500s) taught yes. His teachings are recorded in Sha'ar HaKavanot. It says to say every item on the list, even if you know you did not do them and it sounds like lying. There is no concern about that, and you must say them. The reason is the one in the note on the first line.

Can I add my own mistakes?

Yes, quietly. The Arizal says that even after confessing in Shome'a Tefillah ("Who hears prayer"), you confess again here, naming your sins inside the group confession. The Shulchan Aruch, on the Yom Kippur confession, says you need not name a sin, but when confessing quietly it is right to. The Rema (Rabbi Moshe Isserles, who added Ashkenazi practice) says not to name it out loud or as the leader.

How do I hit my chest, and where?

The page for Selach Lanu (the forgiveness blessing in the Amidah) covers the basic custom of striking the chest. For Sefard, the Arizal gives the details: use your right hand, curled into a fist, and strike gently on the left side over the heart, one strike for each word, from Ashamnu, Bagadnu on. The Ben Ish Hai (Rabbi Yosef Chaim of Baghdad, 1800s) places the heart about four or five finger-widths below the breast. He says to strike there, not above the breast or on it.

Do I say it if I am davening alone or at home?

The Kaf HaChaim reports the custom that even an individual says the confession after the Amidah. The Rema notes that some say falling on the face (the plea after the confession, said with the face covered) is done only where there is an ark with a Torah scroll, and that elsewhere people plead without covering the face. The Kaf HaChaim, following the Arizal, says that even then you say the confession (and the Thirteen Attributes of mercy) first, then the psalm, so nothing is missing from the order of prayer.

My shul skips Tachanun today. Do I still confess?

Not as a rule. Tachanun means the pleading prayers after the Amidah. The note at the top of this page says that on days without it, the leader says Half Kaddish instead. The Ribono Shel Olam page lists them. One case differs: a public fast day with a bris. The Shulchan Aruch says they say the forgiveness prayers and the confession, but do not fall on their faces or say Vehu Rachum (another pleading prayer). The Arukh HaShulchan (a code of law, around 1900) says the same for a fast day when a groom is present.

Do girls say this?

Peninei Halakhah (a modern guide to Jewish law by Rabbi Eliezer Melamed) rules that women are exempt from all the prayers of pleading and the passages said after the Amidah. It adds that at Mincha, the afternoon prayer, men are accustomed to say Tachanun, but women are not obligated to. The book does not name this confession, but it sits in that group, right after the Amidah. Exempt means not required.