Yom Kippur
The words of Jonah 2 have been read for centuries on the Day of Atonement, or Yom Kippur - the most solemn fast day in the Jewish liturgical year.
Still today, Yom Kippur marks the time when Jewish people come in penitence before the Lord and seek restoration with the human community, including not only the immediate circle of family, friends and colleagues, but also the wider human community of peoples and nations.
Lisa Lorraine Baker describes the festival like this:
“Yom Kippur is considered the holiest day in Judaism, one of solemn repentance when Jews seek to atone for their sins. Yom Kippur closes the Ten Days of Awe. The Ten Days of Awe begin by commemorating the Jewish New Year (Rosh Hashanah), another important day in the Jewish religious calendar. Yom Kippur marks a time for Jewish people to get ready for the upcoming year with times of confession, repentance, and fasting.
In biblical times, Yom Kippur included the sacrifice of animals when the high priest passed into the Holy of Holies. Because God instituted the observance (as recorded in Leviticus 16:29-32), its significance is very important. He told His people it’d be a statute forever, and they were not to do any work. “For on this day shall atonement be made for you, to cleanse you. You shall be clean before the Lord from all your sins” (Leviticus 16:30).
The priest made atonement for the people with the sacrifices as they practiced self-denial and refrained from work. He followed a strict procedure as he bathed and then dressed in white linen attire before he entered the Holy of Holies. He presented two sin offerings, a bull for himself and his family and a goat for the people. There the priest spoke and then placed the people’s sins on the head of a second goat (scapegoat), and that goat was taken away into the wasteland.
Contemporary observant Jewish people spend time making peace with people before the Ten Days of Awe arrive. It’s their way of preparing their hearts to come before God with as pure a heart as possible.
A Yom Kippur feast usually precedes their fast during the twenty-four hours of atonement, and families often light candles in remembrance of deceased loved ones. Synagogues will have special prayers for the day.
According to Jews for Jesus, “The day of Yom Kippur itself is observed by abstaining from work and practicing self-denial, as mandated in Leviticus. In the Talmud, “self-denial” is interpreted to mean: “it is forbidden to eat or drink, or bathe or anoint oneself or wear sandals, or to indulge in conjugal intercourse” (Yoma 8.1). Abstaining from regular tasks is supposed to cause them to ponder and repent of any known sins, followed by acknowledging that they depend upon God for the remission of sins”.1
1 https://www.christianity.com/wiki/holidays/what-should-christians-know-about-yom-kippur.html