What does Rosh Hashanah say to us?

During Rosh Hashanah – and indeed during much of coming weeks – we will spend a lot of time saying things. And I am not talking about what we say when we meet those we have not seen since last year, or when everyone has something to say regarding what the rabbi said in his speech or how the chazzan led the services. I am of course referring to what we will all say in our tefillot, as we read those lengthy passages grafted onto the basic tefillot and their structure that we recognise from services year round.

But in an essay that serves as an introduction to the Koren Machzor, Rabbi Jonathan Sacks turned around this aspect of the days just ahead, asking: “What does Rosh Hashanah say to us? Of what is it a reminder? How can it transform our lives?”

His first comment in that regard is as follows:

“The genius of Judaism was to take truths and translate them into time, lived experiences. Other cultures have constructed philosophies and theologies, elaborate systems of abstract thought. Judaism prefers truth lived to truth merely thought. Ancient Greece produced the logical imagination. Judaism produced the chronological imagination, truth transposed into the calendar. Rosh Hashanah, as the anniversary of the creation of humanity, invites us to live and feel the human condition in graphic ways.”

So what does Rosh Hashanah tell us? Firstly, as per the famed “Unetaneh Tokef” prayer in Musaf we learn in stark poetic verse of mortality, that life is short. “Adam yesdo me’afar … man is founded in dust and ends in dust … he is like grass dried up … like a fleeting shadow … (until) kachalom ya’uf – like a dream he slips away.”

Nevertheless throughout the Ten Days we are reminded that life is the gift of God not to be taken for granted. Hence every Amidah has in its introduction (the often beautifully sung) “Zochreinu l’chaim – remember us for life, and inscribe us in the Book of Life.”

The third point we learn at this time is that we are free. The very fact that we can do teshuvah, that we can act differently tomorrow compared to yesterday proves that. Philosophers and scientists found this idea difficult but our ancestors proved it by defying every law in history, surviving against the odds, refusing to accept defeat.

Fourthly, life is meaningful – we were created rather than being mere accidents of matter – and we have a God given purpose to fulfil.

Nevertheless – and that is his fifth point – life is not easy. The sufferings of our ancestors haunt our prayers (especially musaf on Yom Kippur). Nevertheless even as we are in exile God is close to those who call on him.

And even so, life can still be sweet. The challah – the bread for which we toil – is dipped in honey. There is joy in the worship of God as in using this world in accordance with his wishes expressed in Torah law and custom.

As an additional point he notes that God as Creator, particularly celebrated on this day marking the creation of man, seeks that man too create. In fact teshuvah is recreating oneself. In Sacks’ words: “On Rosh Hashanah we step back from our life like an artist stepping back from his canvas, seeing what needs changing for the painting to be complete.”

Eighth, we are what we are because of those who came before us. From Zichronot (Remembering – the middle blessing of the musaf Amidah) on Rosh Hashanah through Yizkor on Yom Kippur we are reminded that our lives are not disconnected particles. And only through unity has the tiniest of peoples outlived the greatest of empires, from those of ancient times till no less than the Soviet Union. We recall our ancestors – back to Noah as well as the patriarchs and matriarchs – and remind God, as it were, of his words transmitted to us by Jeremiah: “Zacharti lach chessed ne’urayich … I remember of you the kindness of your youth … how you walked after Me in the desert, through a land not sown.” (Jeremiah 2:2)

The ninth aspect of Rosh Hashanah is that it reminds us that we are heirs to Torah with its high demands. We may be slaves or a nation without land but there is an unshakable conviction regarding a return. If we didn’t get there last year – physically or figuratively – Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur allow us to begin anew, forgiven and cleansed, ready for the challenge of the coming year.

And finally of course, there is the sound of the shofar. It is a wordless cry in a religion of words; a sound produced only by breath to tell us that that is life – a mere breath but one that is also the spirit of God. For as the Torah tells regarding that first Rosh Hashanah: “Then the Lord God formed man from the dust of the earth, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life – and man became a living being.” (Bereshit 2:7) We are dust of the earth but within us is the breath of God.

What I have presented here is nothing more than a brief summary of a lengthy introduction to the Koren Machzor of Rosh Hashanah presented by former Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks. Indeed for the original article in full alone, the Machzor, available at local book stores, is well worth acquiring and studying.

Ketivah vaChatimah Tovah,

Shabbat shalom,

Yossi

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