Do You Feel Lucky?

In business, we are taught to celebrate merit: hard work, intelligence, and strategy. Yet behind most success stories lies a quieter, less comfortable truth – luck. Not superstition, but a structural force that quietly shapes outcomes in business, health, and life. One of the most solemn rituals of the Jewish calendar captures this reality with startling clarity: the Yom Kippur ceremony of the two goats.

On Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish year, two identical goats are brought before the Kohen Gadol. By lottery, one is chosen for G-d, its blood sprinkled in the Holy of Holies. The other is sent to Azazel, carrying the sins of the people before being cast suddenly off a cliff. Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch emphasized that the goats must be indistinguishable, because their destinies are not determined by merit or by any visible quality, but by goral, chance, or more precisely, divine lottery.

It is a powerful metaphor for life. The difference between being lifted up or suddenly cast aside often has less to do with inherent worth than with forces beyond our control.

Business is no different. UPS once teetered on bankruptcy until its chief executive, in a last act of desperation, gambled the firm’s remaining funds in Las Vegas – and won. Reckless, yes, but also a stark reminder that survival sometimes hinges on fortune as much as foresight.

Even visionaries benefit from chance. Steve Jobs is celebrated for his genius, but his path was altered by happenstance: a visit to Xerox PARC, where he discovered Xerox’s new invention – the computer mouse. He did not invent the use of a mouse with a graphic user interface, but he recognized its potential. Genius mattered, but timing did too.

Entrepreneurs often joke that success is 90 percent luck and 10 percent intelligence – and if they could change one thing, it would be to increase the luck. The quip hides a serious point: skill and effort matter enormously, but they are not always enough.

This perspective resonates with Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers. Bill Gates had rare access to early computers. The Beatles refined their sound in Hamburg nightclubs. Their brilliance was undeniable, but circumstance played a crucial role. Health tells the same story: genetics, environment, and access to care tip the odds long before diet and exercise enter the equation.

The same dynamic defines today’s AI arms race. Some companies are wagering fortunes that large language models (LLMs) will rule the future. Others are betting on smaller, faster, more specialized systems. Both stand side by side, like the two goats – their fate unknown until business adaptation reveals the winner.

Judaism, however, teaches that luck is more than randomness. The Torah uses two words: mikreh and goral, generally translated as “chance” or “lottery.” The interpretation is more nuanced. When Ruth “happens upon” the field of Boaz, the text calls it mikreha – her coincidence – suggesting divine orchestration beneath chance. Amalek, the eternal foe, embodies keri: the belief that life is random, mere accident. Judaism insists the opposite: that hidden within coincidence is orchestration. A chance meeting becomes a marriage. A delayed train leads to a transformative encounter. A lottery between two goats points to the mystery of fate and our humble place within it.

This tension is embodied in the story of Yosef. Betrayed by his brothers, sold into slavery, imprisoned on false charges, forgotten by those he helped. His life appeared as a chain of cruel misfortunes. Yet years later, standing as viceroy of Egypt, Yoseph reframes it: “It was not you who sent me here, but G-d.” What felt like chaos was, in hindsight, choreography. In Yosef’s arc, we see a Torah model of luck reinterpreted as destiny.

Yosef’s story reminds us that randomness and providence are not mutually exclusive. What feels like disaster in the moment may, with time and perspective, reveal the trace of a larger design.

As Yom Kippur approaches, we are called to reflect not only on our choices, but also on the apparent randomness that shapes our lives. The two goats remind us that outcomes often rest on forces beyond our control. Recognizing this truth should not lead to fatalism, but to humility, empathy, and gratitude.

We cannot control the lottery. But we can choose how to live within it – with integrity, compassion, and faith. When the lots are drawn and the goats stand side by side, we are reminded: life may appear random, but within that randomness lies the imprint of the divine.

We live as if our choices shape everything. Yom Kippur reminds us: they shape only some things. The rest belongs to goral. Yet in that surrender, we are called not to give up, but to give more: more kindness, more perspective, more awe. And above all, greater faith that even in the face of uncertainty, there is a divine purpose unfolding.