On Rosh Hashanah, a rabbi reflects on pain caused by war and a call 'to work for understanding'
Wednesday night, synagogues throughout the city sound the shofar, our ritual ram’s horn, to herald the arrival of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year.
In Jewish tradition, the new moon, the phenomenon of the moon appearing absent from the night sky, signals the beginning of a new month. Thus Jewish liturgy recites Psalm 81 at tonight’s service: Sound the Shofar on the arrival of the new moon, as it is covered over, to mark our day of celebration.
Rosh Hashanah always arrives with a new moon, with the moon’s absence, with the moon’s appearing "covered over." Perhaps there is no greater metaphor for how many Jews feel welcoming this New Year 5785, especially after our past year was filled with tragedy and pain. On this day of celebration, too much seems "covered over," difficult to see, hard to appreciate.
The cloud of Oct. 7 covered this past year, just as it looms large over this new year. As the first anniversary of this gruesome day of rape, murder and massacre arrives, Jewish hearts burst in grief for losses suffered, including the unimaginable fate of more than 100 hostages still held by Hamas.
The lives of my friends and relatives in Israel have been upended since this terrorist attack: "It’s like having a constant migraine," said one relatively fortunate Israeli, namely someone whose family is neither held hostage nor murdered nor relocated from their residence because of incoming bombs and bullets.
My Jewish heart also knows too many bombs and bullets have been directed toward Gaza, that the Israeli prime minister— in his unconscionable zeal for an impossible "total victory" — has brought about horrors so unwarranted that 100,000 Israelis protest his government every weekend. Torah teaches that every human being is created in the Divine Image; lives of innocents and civilians matter whether Jewish or Muslim or Christian or Palestinian or Israeli.
Covering the joy of my new year is also the horrific rise in hate worldwide and in America. It is barely a year since Wadee Alfayoumi, 6, was murdered for no other reason than being Palestinian. Both the Downtown Islamic Center and the Muslim Community Center were vandalized in local acts of hate in a year that saw attacks against Muslims rise by over 70%.
Hate on Capitol Hill
Even Capitol Hill provides no safety from Islamophobia: Sen. John Kennedy attacked Maya Berry of the Arab American Institute, accusing her of supporting Hamas and Hezbollah, no matter how often she denied it. Ultimately, Sen. Kennedy urged her to, "hide your head in a bag." Hate in halls of Congress.
And there was hate at that same hearing when a protester crossed the line from politics to antisemitism when he shouted “f****** Jews.”
This hate fills halls of higher education, its quads and classrooms. Jews who are Zionist — even when to most that means that a state of Israel should exist alongside a Palestinian nation — were physically excluded from university buildings, or subjected to harassment and attacks, according to a federal lawsuit against UCLA.
More than a handful of college encampments spouted antisemitic rhetoric; some were literally weaponized arsenals. The public square has become a center where antisemitism is at best tolerated, at worst, valorized.
The public square is darkened by more than the absence of the moon’s glow. When, this Rosh Hashanah eve, I look at the sky and see nothing, it feels as if I’m looking back at this past year, in which, some might say, nothing good happened. But such is not the message — passed on 3,000 years — of sounding our shofar on the darkest of possible nights.
The shofar blats to awaken us to the possibilities of a new year. It doesn’t delude us to believe this will be the year when a wondrous peace embraces the Earth and all its creatures.
But that ancient call reminds us that out of darkness we have the opportunity to create light. That ancient call reminds us to return, at the head of the year, to the best that is in us, which includes working to find the best that is in others.
The shofar’s call calls us to work for understanding — in family circles and the public square. In an age filled with hate, it is easy to become hateful. Difficult is the work of building bridges, endeavoring to see the humanity in others. Yet that is precisely the work to which we are called by the ram’s horn.
We hear that call sitting in the presence of family and friends, even as we mourn and miss the loved ones now absent. Jewish history has unfortunately been filled with far more than a few dark nights. Even in this troubling time, may we find what is worthy of celebrating on this Rosh Hashanah. Especially in this troubling time, may we work toward making this new year one of greater understanding, justice and peace.
Rabbi Seth Limmer is the founder and principal of Open Judaism.
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