("expiation"). The custom whereby, during the night or early morning of the day preceding the Day of Atonement, an adult Jew takes a live fowl (male for a man, female for a woman) and, holding it by the neck, swings it around his/her head three times, saying, "This is my atonement, this is my ransom, this is my substitute. This cock/hen shall meet its death but I shall enjoy a long and pleasant life." The fowl is then slaughtered and either given to the poor directly or its monetary value donated to charity; the innards are thrown to the birds, also deemed an act of charity. The sins of the penitent person (an adult may also make separate expiation for his children) are thus symbolically transferred to the fowl, rescuing the individual from a possible negative judgment on the Day of Atonement. In modern times, 18 coins are often substituted for the fowl. Prior to the ceremony it is customary to recite verses from Psalms 107 (10, 14, 17-21) and Job 33 (23-24) which relate to God's readiness to forgive those who sit in gloom and darkness. The ceremony of kapparot is not mentioned in the Talmud and apparently originated in Babylonia in the geonic period (9th cent.), but the first description of the entire procedure appears in the Maḥzor Vitry, the liturgical compendium produced by Simḥah Ben Samuel, a pupil of Rashi. The details are similar but not identical to those of the present-day practice.
While the custom of kapparot is still observed in certain Orthodox circles, historically it has been opposed by numerous authorities, including Naḥmanides and Joseph Caro, who viewed it as both pagan and superstitious. Other authorities, however, approved and the kabbalists gave it a mystic interpretation. The mainstream of rabbinic thought maintained that, rather than atoning for sins directly, the ceremony provides an opportunity to reflect upon one's sins and to make true repentance for them.
