Rosh Hashanah
The advent of the Jewish New Year is marked by the holiday of Rosh Hashana.
This holiday, multi-faceted and complex, is a combination of solemnity and
pleasant confidence, new clothes, sumptuous meals and holiday enjoyment. In
reconciling these completely different emotions and aspects of the holiday,
the rabbis relied on the sophistication and maturity of thought of the
Jewish people. For all of Jewish history and life is really the ability to
deal with somber events and a realistically uncertain future with aplomb,
hope and a resilient spirit of optimism and confidence. As such, Rosh
Hashana not only symbolizes the beginning of a new year on the Jewish
calendar, but it also represents the beginning idea of Judaism and its
tradition - the ability to reconcile opposite emotions and events and to
remain faithful and upbeat about life and its possibilities. For it is
Judaism that preaches, above all else, the sense of service to God and
humankind that allows such an emotion of forward-looking confidence and
serenity.
Rosh Hashana is seen as a day of judgment. It is this aspect of the holiday
that lends it its somber tone. In the description of the Mishna, all human
beings, individually and alone, file by the Heavenly Throne for judgment on
the day of Rosh Hashana. Thus the somber mood of the prayers of the day and
the magisterial quality of the melodies used by the leader of the services
in reciting the special prayers of the day. The most exalted set of prayers
recited in the Musaf (additional) service of Rosh Hashana consists of a
trilogy of sections of Musaf. These are called Malchiyot (relating to the
majesty of God), Zichronot (relating to the role of memory and history in
positively influencing the ultimate decision and judgment in our heavenly
trial) and Shofrot (relating to the sounding of the shofar, which is the
unique ritual mitzva - commandment - of Rosh Hashana.) The text of the
prayers used today in most synagogues in the world was composed by the
great second century Babylonian Talmudic scholar and leader, Rabbi Abba
Aricha, more commonly known in the Talmud as Rav - the rabbi/teacher. These
prayers have withstood the test of time over nineteen centuries and the
shedding of millions of Jewish tears.. They are unmatched for linguistic
beauty, clarity of thought and nobility of soul. Even in translation to
other languages from the original Hebrew, their holiness and shimmering
light is readily detected.
The most dramatic moment of the holiday is the sounding of the shofar. The
shofar is usually made of a ram's horn, though that of an ibyx or similar
animal may also be used. There are three basic notes that are sounded from
the shofar. One is a straight, flat note called tekiah. The second note
consists of three wailing blasts (called shevarim) and the third note is a
staccato sound of nine short blasts (called teruah). The wailing and
staccato sounds are always preceded by the straight, flat sound. The flat
sound indicates our mortality and limited life, much as a heart monitor
does when it goes flat marking the end of life. The wailing and staccato
sounds mark the turbulence of our lives, our strivings, ambitions and
goals, while we are alive. The flat sound therefore precedes and succeeds
the wailing and staccato sounds, for they symbolize our state of existence
before our birth and after our passing. The Biblical injunction of sounding
the shofar is discharged by sounding thirty blasts from the shofar. However
it is ancient Jewish custom to sound one hundred blasts from the shofar.
The shofar - ram's horn - is inextricably bound to the story of Isaac being
bound by his father Abraham on God's altar and to the ram that was
sacrificed in his stead. Jewish legend metaphorically stated that one of
the horns of that ram was sounded on Sinai when Israel received God's Torah
and that the second horn of that ram will be sounded to introduce the
Messianic Era. So, again, we see Rosh Hashana as encompassing past, present
and future, in both solemnity and joy.
Shabat Shalom and Shana Tova
Berel Wein
Text Copyright © 2002 Rabbi Berel Wein and
Project Genesis, Inc.
