RABBI ARTHUR SEGAL: JEWISH RENEWAL: ROSH HASHANAH TORAH READINGS
Rosh Hashanah
Selected Readings:
Genesis 21:1-34
1 Samuel 1:1-2:10
Numbers 29:1-6
Genesis 22:1-24
Jeremiah 31:1-19
A Good New Year! La Shana Tova!
"We Can't Return, We Can Only Look, Behind from Where We Came"
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On many Jewish holidays there are special sections of parashot read to help us remember themes of the holidays. The theme of God's mercy and kindness is woven throughout these special readings. Genesis 21 tells of Sarah, a 90-year old woman, giving birth to Isaac. It also tells of Hagar and Ishmael being expelled by Abraham at his wife's insistence. God rescues them in the desert. Genesis 22 tells of the binding of Isaac, Abraham's faith in God, and God's rescue of Isaac. The reading in Samuel tells of Hannah who is childless, prays to God for intervention, and gives birth to Samuel. The section of Jeremiah tells of God rescuing Israel from her captivity and restoring her greatness. Lastly, the verses from Numbers tell of the rules for a holy convocation from which our sages derive the laws and customs of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year.
Numbers 29:01-05 reads, "In the seventh month, on the first day of this month, there shall be a holy convocation for you and you shall not do laborious work. It shall be a day of shofar-sounding for you. You shall make an elevation offering...one young bull, one ram, seven male lambs in their first year, unblemished. And their meal offering...one male of the goats for a sin offering to provide you atonement." There is a similar law given in Leviticus 23:23-26. Does this sound like our Rosh Hashanah celebration today?
We are commanded to celebrate an unnamed festival on the first day of the seventh month. No details are offered. The seventh month is later called Tishri. The Jewish first month is Nissan, in which we celebrate Passover. Pesach is our national new year, as we were liberated from slavery then.
We are to refrain from work and to make sacrifices on this first day of the seventh month. This is no different than any other holiday. The difference is that we are commanded to blow the ram's horn. The verse in Leviticus says we are to blow the shofar with loud blasts. A verse in Numbers says it is a day when the shofar will be sounded. No other explanations are given. In reality the commandment is for us to 'hear' the ram's horn's sounds.
The words "Rosh Hashanah" first appear in the Talmud in Tractate Rosh Hashanah 1A. The rabbis teach that we have four new years. The one in Tishri was designated for calculating the years for foreign kings, as well as for counting the Sabbatical and Jubilee years. It was also a time for planting trees and vegetables. We also are told that on this day, "all who come into the world pass before God like legions of soldiers." Some translations say, "like a flock of sheep." The rabbis say that this means that God passes judgment on all humans on this day.
Rosh Hashanah's significance is tied to the Holy Day of Yom Kippur. This is the day we make expiation for our sins (Lev. 23:28). The rabbis extended Yom Kippur's reach back to the first day of the month of Elul. The rabbis decreed in the Talmud that the shofar be sounded a month before Rosh Hashanah to aid us in our annual process of self-evaluation and Jewish Spiritual Renewal. Eventually, Tishri replaced Nissan as the first month. This comes out of a debate the sages had that is recorded on this tractate's folios 10B and 11A. It has to do with the precise time the world was created. Rabbi Joshua claims that the world was created on the first of Nissan. Rabbi Eliezer says it was the first of Tishri. The rabbis agree with rabbi Eliezer. This is why after the three shofar blasts, we say, "Today the world came into being."
The rabbis made Rosh Hashanah into a time of universal renewal. They want us to be reminded that we can bring order into our chaotic lives. We can say good-bye to the old and welcome in the new. A traditional blessing is, "May the year and its curses end, may the year and its blessings begin." Just as the Sabbath does to weeks, Rosh Hashanah does to years.
We ask that we can be written into God's Book of Life. We do this writing, not God. The scripts of our lives are written by each of us individually. Rosh Hashanah is a time to take stock of ourselves and put our bad habits and our old selves into God's Book of Death. As rabbi Neil Gilman writes, "we say good-bye to our old selves and hello to our new ones." This is why the Talmudic rabbis took these six verses and turned them into a large Tractate of the Talmud.
Traditionally, Jews welcome the first of the month with a special prayer for the new moon. Rosh Hashanah always falls, as per the law in Numbers, on the new moon of Tishri. Yet no new moon prayer is said. The rabbis say that this is "in order to confuse Satan." The sages say that Satan is waiting for Rosh Hashanah in order to speak ill of us before God. The rabbis decree that if we do not say the new month prayers, Satan may not know it is Rosh Hashanah and could miss his chance. The day before Rosh Hashanah the rabbis decree to be "hattarat nederim." This is a release from all vows that one may have made but has forgotten about. Gravesites are also visited at this time. It is a time for charitable giving. The rabbis decree that giving to charity helps absolve one from past sins.
Tractate Rosh Hashanah continues on 16B: "All are judged on Rosh Hashanah and the verdict is sealed on Yom Kippur." Rabbi Kruspedia says, "Three books are opened on Rosh Hashanah: one for the utterly wicked, one for the perfectly righteous, and one for the intermediates. The perfectly righteous are straightaway inscribed and sealed for life; the wicked are straightaway inscribed and sealed for death; the intermediates are suspended and wait from Rosh Hashanah until Yom Kippur. If they merit, they are inscribed for life; if not - they are inscribed for death." In Leviticus 16:30, Yom Kippur was the day when "atonement be made for you to cleanse you, from all of your sins you shall be clean before the Lord." The rabbis made Rosh Hashanah into a day of reflection, repentance, and judgment. The Midrash says that "the gates of repentance (renewal) are always open," yet the Talmud alludes to certain hopeless evil people who have no hope of forgiveness.
It also talks of purely righteous people. The rabbis decide that both categories rarely exist, and that humans fall into the third, intermediate category. As rabbi Ismar Schorsch writes, Rosh Hashanah is called Yom Hazikaron, a day of remembrance. It is a time for us to accurately remember our past year. We are to judge our own actions and to find a correct direction. It is a time to right any wrongs that we have not yet corrected. It is a time for introspection, tefilah (self-judging), repentance, and teshuvah (returning, spiritual renewal).
Maimonides, of 12th century Spain, writes, "The merit of penitents is higher than that of the perfectly righteous, because the former have struggled harder to subdue their passions." In the Talmud, rabbi Abahu says that a person who has sinned and stopped is of a higher religious order than one who has never known sin. He says, "In the spot where penitents stand, there is no room for the perfectly righteous." Rabbi Yochanan disagrees, but the sages agree with rabbi Abahu. The sages write in Talmud Bavli Tractate Beracoth 17A, "It does not matter whether you pray a lot or a little. What counts is that you direct your heart to Heaven."
They further posit, "Whether we succeed in observing a lot or a little, what counts is that our heart be solely directed toward God." The Talmud is clear that it is the purity of our intention in relating world around us and to others that is important, and not the mechanical or obsessive doing of ritual minutia.
As the old year closes and the new one opens, many of us search for answers. We pray to God to "feel for us, pity us, embrace us with mercy, restore us, don't forsake us, don't abandon us and to answer us." We read of Hannah's and Sarah's pleas for children being answered. We see Isaac being rescued from sacrifice. We hear the promises of Jeremiah promising our nation salvation, which may seem trite now to some American Jews, but provide words of comfort to so many of us who have not been so abundantly blessed. We also read of Hagar, lost, thirsty and hungry in the desert, after being expelled from Abraham's camp. God hears the cries of her son, Ishmael, and "opens her eyes and she saw a well of water" (Gen. 21:19). The well had always been there. Hagar just could not see it. God opened her eyes so she could see the answer. Many of us are too oblivious to the wells of change and salvation that lie within our reach. We really can change our lives if we find ourselves in a rut. It is hard, but it is possible. We have to want to see that we can do it.
Real teshuvah, turning our lives around, does not come from a spring of divine grace. It comes from pure human effort. As Spiritual Jews, we know that we will receive forgiveness from God by asking, but we must make teshuvah to those humans we have harmed. Even the Talmud says that the consequences of our actions can be mitigated, but not erased or reversed. We can learn from them and not do them again, but also not wallow in our past sins.
The rabbis say, "penitence, prayer and good deeds can annul the severity of the decree," but do no more. We as people must fix the hurt we have caused others and ourselves. Judaism does not believe we are "captives on a carrousel of time." We do not have to let ourselves be caught going "round and round in the circle game" repeating our same destructive behaviors. We can break free and change via Jewish Spiritual Renewal. This is how we can assure ourselves that on Rosh Hashanah we will be inscribed in our books of our lives, and on Yom Kippur we will seal it. Amein!
Jewish Renewal www.jewishrenewal.info
Jewish Spiritual Renewal http://rabbiarthursegal.blogspot.com
Jewish Spirituality
Eco Judaism
facebook.com/RabbiArthurSegalJewishSpiritualRenewal
Hilton Head Island, SC, Bluffton, SC, Savannah, GA
Jewish Renewal www.jewishrenewal.info
Jewish Spiritual Renewal http://rabbiarthursegal.blogspot.com
Jewish Spirituality
Eco Judaism
facebook.com/RabbiArthurSegalJewishSpiritualRenewal
Hilton Head Island, SC, Bluffton, SC, Savannah, GA
