Rosh Hashanah: Celebrating the Day of Judgment

The Tools and the Goal

Rosh Hashanah is almost here, and Rabbi Adi opened by looking back at what we have been learning in recent weeks: the different tools to be ready for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur: teshuvah (returning to Hashem), tefillah (prayer), and tzedakah (charity). Ultimately, he said, those are tools. To really be ready for Rosh Hashanah, we also have to understand what the goal of the day is. If we understand the goal of the day, then we can appreciate the tools and, hopefully, successfully use the right ones.

He gave an analogy from his own childhood. Growing up in Los Angeles, Rabbi Adi loved playing sports, and he played basketball in a Jewish league of about two hundred boys. It was known that he and one other boy, whose name was Momo Bauman, were probably the two best players in the league. Momo was phenomenal: dribbling with both hands with creativity and ease, an instinctive understanding of the court, passing, faking people out; it all came to him so naturally. Then, in ninth grade, Rabbi Adi began playing even more organized ball in yeshiva, with a coach, competing against all different types of non-Jewish players, and he had to understand the fundamentals on a completely different level: how to play against boys much taller and stronger, how to run certain types of defenses, a box-and-one, how to counter the way the other team guards you and approaches you. Toward the end of that year, the team wanted fresh competition, so Rabbi Adi brought his friend to a game. In warm-ups, Momo clearly still had one of the best shots on the court, if not the best shot on the court, and clearly knew how to dribble with a creativity and ease that most of the other players did not. But once the game began, everyone who had been coached properly knew how to use defenses to overcome another player's strengths, and he did not. Within the confines of that game, the most talented player on the court was minimized tremendously, because he had never been trained in the concept of the game itself.

That, Rabbi Adi said, is how to think about the tools Chazal give us. The goal is not just to blow a shofar. The goal is not just to give tzedakah. The goal is so much more than that, and if we understand what the goal of Rosh Hashanah is, we can accomplish what we are meant to accomplish by the end of the day, to the best of our abilities.

What Happens on Rosh Hashanah

So Rabbi Adi laid out a few of the things that happen over Rosh Hashanah, each one a question in itself.

First, Selichos, the special prayers in which we ask Hashem for forgiveness in the days leading up to Rosh Hashanah. The Ashkenazim began this past Motzaei Shabbos; the Sephardim have been saying them for weeks already. We get up late at night or early in the morning, asking and praying for forgiveness, and then Rosh Hashanah comes, and we pause. There are really no Selichos on Rosh Hashanah itself, outside of perhaps one line in Unesaneh Tokef, one of the central prayers of the day:

וּתְשׁוּבָה וּתְפִלָּה וּצְדָקָה מַעֲבִירִין אֶת רֹעַ הַגְּזֵרָה

And teshuvah, tefillah, and tzedakah remove the evil of the decree.

It is not like Yom Kippur, when we ask for every form of forgiveness. We ask beforehand, we stop, and then we continue. That is the first thing to notice.

Second, Rosh Hashanah is called Yom HaDin, the Day of Judgment. If we are being judged by Hashem Himself, you might expect a day that looks like Yom Kippur: no eating, no drinking, many people barely even talking. Instead, the halachah says to wear nice clothing: buy a new tie, a colorful tie, a colorful suit. We are supposed to have beautiful meals, invite company, have people around, open a nice bottle of wine. In Rabbi Adi's home the preparations have been under way for a while; the menu has been gone over multiple times, and he has already picked up the wine he wants to serve on the first night and the second night. If you were thinking only of a Day of Judgment, that is not what would come to mind. Clearly Chazal want us to have a celebratory day. It is not just “will we live or will we die”; it seems to be more than that.

Third, there is the shofar. What exactly are we blowing, why are we blowing it, and why is it tied to Rosh Hashanah specifically? And there are the simanim, the symbolic foods of the Rosh Hashanah table: the apple dipped in honey (Rabbi Adi's children come home every day singing “dip the apple in the honey”), the pomegranate, the head of a fish (many Sephardim in Israel have the head of a sheep), dates, and all the different customs. Why are these symbols such a part of the day?

And finally, Musaf, the additional Amidah that is the highlight of the day's davening. On Rosh Hashanah, Musaf is not one simple paragraph the way it is every Shabbos. The rabbis teach us, from the Gemara all the way down to the halachah, that it must contain three components, Malchuyos (verses of Hashem's kingship), Zichronos (verses of remembrance), and Shofros (verses about the shofar), with ten pesukim (verses) expressing each one, and the shofar sounded at the conclusion of each. As the Mishnah (Rosh Hashanah 4:6) counts it:

אֵין פּוֹחֲתִין מֵעֲשָׂרָה מַלְכֻיּוֹת, מֵעֲשָׂרָה זִכְרוֹנוֹת, מֵעֲשָׂרָה שׁוֹפָרוֹת

We recite no fewer than ten verses of Kingship, ten of Remembrances, and ten of Shofaros.

Why isn't it just one big prayer? Why must it be broken into kingship, memories, and the shofar? So, as a summary: there are Selichos beforehand that suddenly pause and then continue; a Day of Judgment that is nevertheless celebrated with nice clothes, great company, good food, and good wine; the shofar; the simanim; and a Musaf of many different components, not just one.

The Birth of Mankind

The answer he built is based on the Ramchal, Rabbi Moshe Chaim Luzzatto, in his sefer Derech Hashem, “The Way of G-d.” The Ramchal lived in Padua, Italy, at the beginning of the 1700s. He was ahead of his time, writing about Kabbalah, mysticism, and philosophy, and the controversy it caused led him to move to Amsterdam, where he wrote Derech Hashem; his last years were spent in Eretz Yisrael. The idea is the Ramchal's, as Rabbi Adi heard it elaborated by his rebbi, Rav Berkowitz.

The Derech Hashem teaches that the world was created with a yearly cycle, and there are days in the year with different abilities we can tap into. The way we see why each day of the year is special is based on history: on what happened on that day, on what we see in the Torah. So what exactly happened on Rosh Hashanah? When you are younger, you think Rosh Hashanah is the day the world was created, but it is not. On that cycle, Creation began on the 25th of Elul, a few days ago. Rosh Hashanah is the birth of mankind: the day Adam HaRishon, the first man, was created.

Why is that so important? Because with the creation of man, Hashem gave the world bechirah, free will, the ability to choose good or evil. This was Hashem's ultimate purpose in creation: to create people who, like Him, can create, who can then make other things in the world, impact the world, make a difference in it, or, chas v'chalila, do the opposite and ruin the world, creating the atomic bomb. And a byproduct of being able to choose is accountability: there are consequences when a person's actions create positive things or negative things.

Celebrating Responsibility

This is the first idea of Rosh Hashanah. Yom HaDin means there is a concept of responsibility, and responsibility is something to appreciate, to be excited about, and to celebrate.

Rabbi Adi asked: why is it that, statistically, Jews are so successful, from a business perspective and from an academic perspective alike? Since 2001, 22 percent of all Nobel Prize winners have been Jews, out of a minuscule fraction of the world's population. Six of the fifteen wealthiest individuals in the world, about a third, are Jews. Roughly 24 percent of undergraduates at the top elite American universities. Thirty-eight percent of US National Medal of Science recipients. Sixty-four percent of Fortune 500 CEOs. Those are not anomalies across one little spectrum; they run across the entire world of academia and business. Rabbi Adi said he does not have a great answer, but he offered a very simple one: ingrained into the teva (the nature), into the DNA and the fabric of the Jewish people, is that we are not happy with what the Gemara calls nahama d'kisufa, the “bread of shame,” sustenance a person did not earn. We don't want handouts; it is not in our DNA. What we want is to demand excellence and to value responsibility, and therefore we try harder and harder. Built into us is to do the best that we can possibly do, as much as we can.

That is the first thing Yom HaDin represents: understanding that there are repercussions to our actions, and being excited that we are human. To be part of mankind is to have the ability to choose good, to earn the right to our existence, to choose to succeed in life rather than to give up. On Rosh Hashanah we are not just in fear of judgment; we are celebrating judgment, because that is what we want.

Davening for Life

The second idea: what does it mean that we are davening for life on Rosh Hashanah? The Gemara says that the tzaddikim (the righteous) are written immediately in the book of life, and the resha'im (the wicked) are written immediately in the book of death. What exactly does that mean? We do not see people dropping dead right after Rosh Hashanah, certainly not in statistical numbers.

Rabbi Adi pointed to the first time Yaakov meets Pharaoh. Pharaoh asks him, “How many are the days of the years of your life?” And Yaakov answers him (Bereishis 47:9):

יְמֵי שְׁנֵי מְגוּרַי שְׁלֹשִׁים וּמְאַת שָׁנָה, מְעַט וְרָעִים הָיוּ יְמֵי שְׁנֵי חַיַּי

The days of the years of my sojournings are one hundred and thirty years; few and hard have been the days of the years of my life.

Yaakov distinguishes between his chaim, his life, and his megurim, his existence in this world. What is the difference? As the Seforno, one of the classic commentators on the Chumash, explains: life means being put into a position where you can be productive. Rabbi Adi drew the picture of two people who barely eat all day. One is a surgeon, running from the house to daven, then to a first surgery, a second, a third, then running home to help with the kids, then off to study a little, barely eating anything. The other cannot afford any food; he is starving through the morning until he finds a crumb and puts it in his mouth. Being alive means being productive, growing, having opportunities. If, chas v'chalila, you or someone in your family is very sick, your life looks different than if everyone were healthy. If you cannot easily put lunch and dinner on the table for your family, then what you think about on a daily basis is very different.

So what are we praying for? We are hoping that, throughout the year, Hashem will give us the ability to earn the right of existence, the ability to be as productive as we possibly can be, that He will allow us the opportunities to do amazing things and not put in front of us additional challenges that will inhibit us from becoming the best version of ourselves. That is the difference here between the tzaddikim and the resha'im: if we are good, we will have more opportunity, and that is what we want: more opportunity to work harder, not to not work. And on the flip side, the resha'im are given challenges in front of challenges, so that maybe they are not able to earn as much of the right of existence.

Within this, Rabbi Adi explained the saying of the Yerushalmi that a person shouldn't sleep on Rosh Hashanah, that if you sleep on Rosh Hashanah, you will have a sleepy year. Do we believe in heebie-jeebies? Not really. But look at the stories about Napoleon, who barely ever slept, or the stories about the Gra, the Vilna Gaon, and plenty of famous rabbis. Why? When you have so much ambition, when you want to accomplish so much and there is so much opportunity, you can hardly think about sleeping; you don't want to be held back by the time. On Rosh Hashanah, when we are thinking about how much we want to accomplish and how much can be done, sleeping through the day means not realizing what a powerful day this is. And if you need to close your eyes in order to have the strength to daven and to have meaningful conversations, the rabbis say there is nothing wrong with that.

Malchuyos: Crowning Hashem, Even Within

The third idea: we cannot talk about Rosh Hashanah without the concept of Malchus, that Hashem is King. From the very beginning of Rosh Hashanah, and many times through the davening, we say that Hashem is Melech al kol ha'aretz:

מֶלֶךְ עַל כָּל הָאָרֶץ, מְקַדֵּשׁ יִשְׂרָאֵל וְיוֹם הַזִּכָּרוֹן

King over all the earth, Who sanctifies Israel and the Day of Remembrance.

On one level, that means Hashem is the Creator and He runs the world, and not any form of idol worship. That is definitely true, but there is probably much more to it than that.

Rabbi Adi described a moment we all know. You want to get up really early, to go on an early morning run, to spend time with your kids, to daven, and the alarm goes off at 4:30, 5:00, whatever time it is, and a little voice inside says: hit snooze, you're really tired, you won't be able to function. Or, chas v'chalila, a person has an inclination to steal a little something from somebody else. We usually picture it, Rabbi Adi included, as the yetzer tov and the yetzer hara: a little white angel sitting on one shoulder saying get up, it's a good idea, and a devilish character in red, maybe with a pitchfork, sitting on the left shoulder, saying snooze, snooze, snooze. We feel that this figure, the yetzer hara, the inclination inside us that pulls us away from what we should be doing, is something external, a separate thing trying to distract us. But the real idea of Malchus, of accepting that Hashem is Melech al kol ha'aretz, is realizing that everything in this world is Hashem's, including that little voice. As many rabbis describe it, the yetzer hara is not a little devil; it, too, is an angel that Hashem placed on us. Why do we have it? Because when we overcome challenges and temptations, we become the best versions of ourselves. Rabbi Adi compared it to the crazy, grueling training of the most elite army units, the Rangers, the Delta forces, training designed to make a soldier the strongest he can possibly become, both physically and mentally, because that is the best version of himself. The same is true for us on a spiritual level: every challenge and temptation we surpass, or fall prey to and then figure out how to get beyond the next time, is what allows us to be the best versions of ourselves and to get the greatest opportunities we can in life.

So when we crown Hashem as Melech al kol ha'aretz, it does not just mean that we believe He created the world and runs it. It means that even on a personal level, within my own decisions and my own challenges, everything is there for me to become the best version of myself, in order to serve Hashem in the world in the greatest possible way.

Zichronos: The Promise

Now, even if we do all of this, even if we are so excited about responsibility that we drink a bottle of wine and have our friends over to celebrate the Day of Judgment, because we do not want it any other way, at the end of the day, it is still the Day of Judgment. Hashem is going to judge whether to give us more opportunity, more time, in the next year, and maybe not. If we haven't done enough this past year, what happens then?

That is really where the next two parts of Musaf come in: Zichronos and Shofros. Rabbi Adi gave the basic understanding this way. In Malchuyos, we are saying: Hashem, I am going to work as hard as I possibly can. I am going to take everything You have given me in my life, all of my strengths, my speaking abilities, the place that I live, everything, and I am going to try to do the best that I can to become a greater person in this world, for myself, my family, and the Jewish people in Israel. That is what I am going to be doing this coming year. But at the end of the day, there were some things that were challenges this past year that I may not have passed, where I may not have done the best that I possibly could do. And that is Zichronos, remembrances, ultimately a promise from Hashem. Hashem says: I knew and I loved your grandfather, and your great-grandfather, and your great-great-great- grandfather, and because I loved them, I know you are trying, and I am going to take care of you. Rabbi Adi described how, in his own house, his wife prepares lunch for each one of the kids: this one gets this sandwich, this one gets a tuna sandwich, three vegetables, one version of a snack, and she tells them to put it away in their bags and be responsible. Of course we teach them responsibility: how could they forget it? But on the day a child forgets his bag and has no food in school, his wife goes to the school and delivers the food, because that is what a parent is to a child. And that is what Hashem is telling us. Yes, you have to work hard. You have to prepare, you have to have a plan, you have to earn responsibility and be excited about responsibility. But don't worry. Don't worry, I've got you, because I love you, and I loved your grandfather and your great-great-grandfather.

Shofros: Choosing the Relationship

And that is what the shofar is all about. The greatest test that ever existed in mankind, says the Nefesh HaChaim (the sefer of Rav Chaim of Volozhin), was the test of Avraham and Yitzchak, the Akeidah, the binding of Yitzchak. Avraham lived at a time when no one believed in one G-d; everyone believed in all different forms of gods: the sun god, the moon god, this god and that god. As the Rambam says, Avraham looked at the sun, the moon, and the skies, and came, using his own personal intellect and deduction, to the realization that there must be something much greater, that there must be a Creator of the world. And then, after all of that intellect he used to realize and understand that Hashem exists, Hashem told him, essentially, to set aside all of the knowledge he had come to on his own, because right now, you have to go take your son and slaughter him. Avraham knew that this is not something G-d wants: G-d does not want anybody to kill their children. So Avraham was faced with a dilemma. Do I choose the understanding of G-dliness that my intellect built, the very intellect that brought me to believe in Hashem in the first place? Or do I choose Hashem Himself, who is telling me what to do even though it makes no sense, because I am choosing the relationship with Him? That, says the Nefesh HaChaim, is a test no one in the history of the world will ever be faced with again: to choose Hashem for the relationship over Hashem as the conclusion of the intellect. And Avraham passed. When he passed, Hashem said: do not slaughter your son; here, take this ram instead.

וַיִּשָּׂא אַבְרָהָם אֶת־עֵינָיו וַיַּרְא וְהִנֵּה־אַיִל, אַחַר נֶאֱחַז בַּסְּבַךְ בְּקַרְנָיו

And Avraham lifted his eyes and saw, behold, a ram, afterward caught in the thicket by its horns.

On Rosh Hashanah, we take the horn of that sacrifice, and we stand there during Musaf and blow it. And as we blow it, with all the different voices that come out, we say to Hashem: choose us for the relationship. We are excited to accept responsibility, and we want to get better and better and better, but remember who our father was, and who our grandfather was, and choose us, because we love You and You love us back. That is what is symbolic about the shofar.

Bringing It All Together

So what is the idea of Rosh Hashanah? Rosh Hashanah is all about celebrating the birth of mankind, the day Adam HaRishon was born, the day we were born. The difference between man and all the other creations is that Hashem gave man bechirah, the ability to choose and to earn the right of his existence. So we celebrate that we love responsibility; we do not want freebies in our life. We daven for life, and life is not just existence in this world, but the opportunity to do good: more and more opportunity to utilize what we have to contribute to the Jewish people, to Israel, and to society. We recognize that Hashem is Melech al kol ha'aretz, that not only is He in control of everything, but even on an individual level, every challenge that comes up inside us is from Him, and every time we overcome a temptation or a desire, that too is us anointing Hashem as King, because we realize He is giving it to us so that we can earn greater and greater opportunities in this world, just as the elite units work like crazy to become better versions of themselves. And nevertheless: we are going to try as hard as we can and do as much as we can, but even if we do not reach the potential we believe we want to reach, and everything we told Hashem, we are also thanking Him, that He loves us and cares for us, and not just us, but our father and our grandfather and our great-great-grandfather, all the way back to Avraham Avinu, who passed the greatest test that ever was. And so we blow the shofar to showcase the relationship that we have with Him.

If we put all of that onto our minds as we are davening, for everything that we do, individually and as a foundation, then, im yirtzeh Hashem, we will use all of these tools to make it the best possible year: for each one of us individually, for our families, and hopefully for all of the Jewish people.