The reverberating call of the month of Elul

Rosh Chodesh Elul is this coming Sunday and Monday. And as of Monday the sound of the shofar will once again be heard across the Jewish world. The high holy days are indeed upon us.

Tradition has it the month of Elul is the opener to the high holy day sea- son. Not only do we blow the shofar, but in all our synagogues there are additions to the prayer services while Sephardi communities commence recitation of Selichot.

The Kitzur Shulchan Aruch, the shortened version of the Code of Jewish Law, is a very dry manual of religious practice. As a general rule, laws are stated briefly and succinctly. There are no sources in the text, let alone midrashic explanations.

However, there is one significant exception. Chapter 128 commences with a lengthy introduction giving a historical basis for the month of Elul and the high holy days being a time of repentance and forgiveness.

Those 40 days represent the third of three 40-day periods spent by Moshe Rabbenu on Mount Sinai, which culminated in his descent on Yom Kippur carrying the second set of tablets, thereby symbolising the forgiveness of the nation.

The Kitzur then notes that the great kabbalist, Rabbi Isaac Luria, generally referred to as the Arizal, compared the month of Elul to one of the cities of refuge in which even one who accidentally committed murder could find respite. This was based on the verse (Shemot 21:13) of which a portion reads that “v’haElokim inah leyado” (if the Almighty made it happen to him) that he accidentally sinned by causing death, “v’samti lecha makom” (I will make for you a place) to which to flee. The words “inah leyado v’samti lecha” begin with the letters that make up the word Elul.

Three other verses are also cited as containing words beginning with the letters of Elul. Devarim 30:6 tells us that Hashem will open up “et lev avecha ve’et levav” (your heart and the heart of your descendants). This is a reference to teshuvah – repentance.

In Shir HaShirim we find the oft repeated famous verse “ani l’dodi vedodi li” (I am to my beloved and my beloved is for me). The sages saw this as referring to the relationship between a person and God through tefillah (prayer).

And in Megillat Esther we are told that among the mitzvot of Purim are the giving of portions of food “ish l’re’ehu umatanot laevyonim” (each man to his neighbour and gifts to the poor) encapsulating the mitzvah of tzedakah (charity). Inasmuch as we say in the high holy day Musaf services that repentance, prayer and charity defer the evil decree, Elul is the time to intensify practice of all three.

More broadly however, teshuvah (repentance) symbolises the commandments that deal with a person’s duty to refine oneself.

Tefillah (prayer) also has a broader implication, symbolising a strengthening of the relationship between a person and God as well as self-judgement. And charity is the archetypical command regarding duties between people and their neighbours.

Thus the month of Elul is the time to strengthen the totality of our religious involvement – in all those three areas which effectively cover all religious duties.

Having said that there arises the inevitable question – which is the most important?

To answer one should look at the reference to the three elements in the high holy day prayer book (Artscroll Rosh Hashanah Machzor, p482-3). There we find something very interesting.

As in practically all editions of the high holy day prayer books, we see above the words teshuvah, tefillah and tzedakah three words in small letters which are not spoken as part of the service.

Above teshuvah is the word tzom, meaning fasting. Above tefillah is the word kol meaning voice. And above tzedakah is mamon meaning money. These words obviously symbolise our practice of each element.

But the most fascinating point about them is that each word has the same gematria (numerical value based on the principle that the Hebrew letters alef to yud have values of one to 10, kaf to koof are 20 to 100 and the remaining letters 200, 300 or 400).

The gematria of each little word is 136. The purpose of placing them there is to show that in Judaism there is no such suggestion that any one of these three basic groupings of mitzvot has weight over the others – all are an equally integral part of our obligations.

And in that vein I conclude with another gematria. We are told in Vayikra (16:3) that “Bezot yavo Aharon el hakodesh”, with “zot – this” Aharon the kohen gadol shall come to the holy temple on Yom Kippur.

While “bezot” in the verse refers to the requirements for the sacrificial aspect of the day, it has also been pointed out that “zot” has the numerical value of 408, which is three times 136.

In other words, when the kohen gadol entered the Holy of Holies to seek forgiveness for Israel on this most solemn of days, he carried with him the tzom, kol, mamon, the teshuvah, tefillah and tzedakah of all Israel.

The second paragraph of chapter 128 of the Kitzur prescribes that from Rosh Chodesh Elul when one writes a letter (those were the days) one should wish the recipient a “ketivah vachatimah tovah” – that they be written and sealed in God’s books for good. May we indeed all merit a “ketivah vachatimah tovah”.

Shabbat shalom,

Yossi

Yossi Aron OAM is The AJN’s religious affairs editor.