2^nd Tishri – T’ki’ah, T’ru’ah, Sh’varim

On Rosh Ha-Shanah, we are commanded ‘to listen to the voice of the shofar‘ – lishmo’a kol shofar.^[1] In traditional communities, 2^nd Tishri is the second day of Rosh Ha-Shanah, and when the first day falls on Shabbat, the shofar (ram’s horn) is only sounded on the second day. The reason for this is not because the shofar should not be sounded, but because the shofar-blower might inadvertently carry the shofar, and so break the Shabbat prohibition against carrying.^[2]

The blessing speaks of ‘the voice of the shofar‘, but the shofar has many voices: T’ki’ah, T’ruah, Sh’varim. T’ki’ah – a loud blast (T’ki’ah G’dolah: a ‘great’ loud blast). T’ruah – nine rapidly discharged short blasts. Sh’varim – three blasts delivered in a broken, undulating way. The meaning of these words partially explains the actual sounds they represent: T’ki’ah – from the root, Tav-Kuf-Ayin, to thrust, clap, give a blow, blast; T’ruah – from the root, Reish-Vav-Ayin, to raise a shout, give a blast; Sh’varim – from the root, Shin-Beit-Reish, to break.

In the Torah, the first day of the seventh month, which came to be known as Tishri, is recorded not as a new year, but as Yom T’ru’ah, the ‘Day of Blasting’.^[3] The first day of the seventh month was the time of calling the community together in readiness for the tenth day of the month: The Day of Atonement; Yom Ha-Kippurim, as it is called in the Torah.^[4] Rabbinic Judaism transformed the first day of Tishri into the ‘new year for years’^[5], and the ‘Day of Blasting’ became an occasion for an entire ceremony of blasting the shofar during the Musaf (‘Additional’) service, chiefly as a call to t’shuvah, ‘return’. And so, the ten days from the 1^st through the 10^th of Tishri became aseret y’mei t’shuvah, the ‘ten days of return’.^[6]

The journey of t’shuvah is essentially a personal journey for each one of us. As we consider the different voices of the shofar, the ten days are an opportunity to reflect on our own voices – not in a metaphorical sense, rather in the actual sense of the different sounds we make when speaking: when we speak loudly or softly, rapidly or hesitantly; when we speak to be heard and when we speak to ourselves, when we speak at moments of joy and celebration and when we speak at times of sorrow and despair; and when we feel unable to speak.

Jewish teaching is very much focused on words – first spoken and then written. The first creation story in the Book of Genesis presents God calling the world into existence.^[7] As we make our t’shuvah journeys, we may wish to reflect on how important words are to us – both spoken and written – and how important silence is to us. Words can be inspiring and uplifting, consoling and healing. Words can also be used like weapons. If we find the courage, we might think about when we use words constructively and when we use them destructively. Our challenge for the 2^nd day of Tishri.

3^rd Tishri – Malchuyyot: From Judgement to Acknowledgement

The first series of shofar blasts on Rosh Ha-Shanah is called Malchuyyot, ‘Kingdoms’. The Aleinu, the prayer that concludes all Jewish liturgical services, was introduced by the Babylonian sages for use on Rosh Ha-Shanah,^[8] when the Eternal One is perceived primarily as melech malchei ha-m’lachim, ‘the King above the King of Kings’; ‘the King of Kings’ being the designation used by Assyrian and Babylonian rulers in the Ancient Near East.

The most important dimension of Rosh Ha-Shanah as conceived by the early rabbis is expressed by one its names: Yom Ha-Din, the Day of Judgement. On Yom Ha-Din, the Eternal Judge of human affairs, sits on His throne – and yes, the Judge is a King – and pronounces judgement on human beings. Those considered thoroughly wicked are written in the Book of Death, those considered thoroughly righteous are written in the Book of Life, and the lives of those who are neither thoroughly wicked nor thoroughly righteous hang in the balance. Only those who mend their ways and repent in the days between Rosh Ha-Shanah and Yom Kippur, will be written in the Book of Life^[9].

It is a truly awe-evoking image. For some, it is the image of the Judge sitting on His throne that compels them to attend the Rosh Ha-Shanah and Yom Kippur services. For others, many of whom would not step inside a synagogue, it is a repellent image that keeps them away from connecting with Jewish communal life. As progressive Jews, who, perhaps, feel less commanded and demanded upon by an Eternal Commander, the image of God as a mighty Sovereign and Judge can be reimagined in terms that makes sense for our own lives. The voices of the shofar call us to reflect on our lives, to interrogate, and, yes, judge, our deeds and misdeeds. Yom ha-Din challenges us to examine ourselves and take steps to change.

One of the traditions associated with aseret y’mei t’shuvah, the ‘ten days of return’, is to conduct cheshbon ha-nefesh, an accounting of ourselves in much the same way as one would go about an accounting of one’s economic affairs.

So, for those who haven’t done this already, on this 3^rd day of Tishri, in the spirit of Malchuyyot, why not take a piece of paper, and like a profit and loss account, make a list of the good you have done in one column and the harm you have caused in another, and then reflect on ways in which you can increase the good and acknowledge the harm, and take steps to make amends.

If the either/or nature of drawing up an account doesn’t speak to you, then try thinking of your actions in a threefold way in terms of what you have done that has been helpful, what has hindered, and what has harmed. The process of hindering can go either way. What we do may hinder the help we can offer someone and we can also hinder the harm we may cause someone.

Alternatively, you might simply choose to begin the process of reflecting on your actions of the past year by tackling three areas for improvement. Cheshbon ha-nefesh: Our challenge for the 3^rd day of Tishri.

4^th Tishri – Zichronot: Remembering and Re-Membering

The second series of shofar blasts on Rosh Ha-Shanah is called Zichronot, ‘Remembrances’. One of the rabbinic names for Rosh Ha-Shanah is Yom Ha-Zikaron, ‘The Day of Remembrance’. According to the Torah, God remembered our ancestors in their plight again and again,^[10] and as the blessing for the shofar blasts of Zichronot puts it, the Eternal One ‘remembers the covenant’ – zocheir ha-b’rit^[11] – present tense.

The present demands our presence. We, too, are called during these yamim nora’im, literally, ‘awed days’, to remember. The Torah exhorts us again and again: ‘You shall remember that you were a slave in Egypt’^[12]. Every evening and morning, the blessing of g’ulah, ‘redemption’, after the Sh’ma, reminds us of our ancestors’ liberation from slavery. Each Shabbat is, both, a ‘memorial of the work of creation’ – zikaron l’ma’aseih v’reishit – and a ‘memorial of the Exodus from Egypt’ – zeicher y’tzi’at mitzrayim.^[13]

So, we remember our liberation – and we also remember the persecution we have suffered: ‘Zachor Amalek …. Remember what Amalek did to you by the way as your coming out of Egypt. / How he met you by the way and attacked the weakest in your rear.’^[14]

Remembering is a Jewish reflex transmuted into a liturgical refrain. But during the ten days of return, we are challenged to do another kind of remembering: to remember our own lives; to remember our deeds of the past year. It’s natural to want to block out this kind of remembrance. After all, remembering can be very painful. And while we may readily access the memories of the hurt done to us, we do not so readily remember the hurts we have inflicted.

But in order to repair ourselves and our relationships and begin the New Year, we must remember the hurt and damage we have caused ourselves and others. How can we commit to acting differently in the future, if we haven’t acknowledged how we have acted in the past?

Ultimately, remembering can engender re-membering; a bringing together of the disparate parts of ourselves, and the possibility of healing our broken relationships. But for this to happen, we have to be prepared to look back; to rake through the tangled undergrowth of the path trailing behind us. Our challenge for the 4^th day of Tishri.

5^th Tishri – Shofarot: The Call to Act

The third and final series of shofar blasts on Rosh Ha-Shanah is called Shofarot, ‘Horns.’ The voices of the shofar thunder through the Torah and more broadly, the TaNaKh^[15], the Hebrew Bible. Quite apart from the specific sounds of the shofar we are compelled to hear on Rosh Ha-Shanah, each time the shofar is mentioned in the TaNaKh, the context is one of loud proclamation. At Sinai, ‘the voice of the shofar grew louder and louder’^[16]. Chapter 58 of the Book of Isaiah, opens with the words: ‘Cry aloud, do not hold back, let your voice resound like a shofar; declare to My people their transgression, and to the house of Jacob, their sins’^[17]. Significantly, we read this passage during the Yom Kippur morning service^[18]. In the Torah’s account of the Jubilee year, the fiftieth year following seven cycles of seven, the shofar was to be sounded on Yom Kippur to ‘proclaim d’ror, ‘freedom’, throughout the land to all its inhabitants’^[19]. There is no evidence that the Jubilee year was ever put into practice, but elsewhere in the TaNaKh, the shofar also heralds the future time of restoration: ‘And it shall come to pass on that day that a great shofar shall be blown; and they shall come that were lost in the land of Syria, and they that were dispersed in the land of Egypt; and they shall worship the Eternal on the holy Mountain Jerusalem’^[20].

Above all the reasons for sounding the shofar on Rosh Ha-Shanah is its role in summoning us to sit up and take notice. As Maimonides put it in his ‘Laws of Repentance’, the shofar is an alarm call, proclaiming:^[21] ‘Awake you sleepers from your sleep! Rouse yourselves, you slumberers out of your slumber! Examine your deeds, and return to God in repentance’.

So, the shofar blasts are a call to action. A call to act in the context of our own personal lives. A call to act in the wider context of the society we inhabit and the world around us. The call is not subtle. It is urgent. Another year has passed in which poverty and inequality has continued unchecked. Another year has passed in which the voices of the persecuted and the oppressed, the vulnerable and the marginal have not been heard. Another year has passed in which the ecological crisis has deepened – albeit the early days of the coronavirus pandemic lockdown brought some respite.

The shofar calls each one of us to take responsibility and to play our part in whatever way we can in tackling injustice and engaging in tikkun olam, repair of the world. At the midpoint of the ten days of returning, let’s pause and think about what we can do, what practical steps we can take to generate change and make a difference. Our challenge for the 5^th day of Tishri.

6^th Tishri – T’shuvah: Returning to Ourselves and Others

T’shuvah is the goal of aseret y’mei t’shuvah, the ‘ten days of return’ that begin on Rosh Ha-Shanah and conclude at the end of Yom Kippur. The word is usually translated as ‘repentance’, but the root Shin-Vav-Beit means to turn, or return.

Repentance is the purpose of t’shuvah, but the notion of turning and returning is more dynamic. It reminds us that the process of acknowledging our misdeeds and taking steps to make amends involves a journey.

The word ‘journey’ has been overused in recent years, but it really does apply to t’shuvah. We all know that Life is a journey from birth to death. T’shuvah involves recognising that we have strayed off the path of our lives, or taken a route that has led to a cul-de-sac, and that we need to turn back and return to our path. Turning back does not mean going back; we can’t go back. The past is the past. We can only move forwards. When we turn and move towards the path and then find it again, we discover that we are further along. We have learnt from our experiences. In making the effort to turn and return we have become more self-aware and admitted our errors and mistakes and how and why we came to lose our way.

T’shuvah doesn’t just involve returning to the path of our lives, it also entails returning to ourselves and to others and rebuilding our relationships.

But none of this is easy. T’shuvah is elusive. If we approach it in a mechanical fashion, ticking off items on the list, we will not experience the sense of renewal it offers. T’shuvah requires our commitment, but not our drive. We cannot speed our way back to the path of our lives; in the awareness of our frailties, all we can do is put one foot in front of another, tentatively, and feel our way along. T’shuvah requires our humility.

Nevertheless, there is sense of urgency attached to t’shuvah. The purpose of our return is our repentance. We will not automatically be absolved on Yom Kippur. On the contrary, as we read in the Mishnah, tractate Yoma:^[22]

One who says: I shall sin and repent, sin and repent, they do not afford that person the opportunity to repent. [If one says]: I shall sin and Yom Ha-Kippurim^[23] will atone for me, Yom Ha-Kippurim, does not effect atonement. For transgressions between a person and God Yom Ha-Kippurim effects atonement, but for transgressions between one person and another, Yom HaKippurim does not effect atonement, until they have appeased their friend.

As the aseret y’mei t’shuvah turn towards Yom Kippur, the need to make amends and repair our relationships becomes more pressing. Acknowledging this is our challenge on the 6^th day of Tishri.

7^th Tishri – T’fillah: Addressing God and Ourselves

What is prayer? Some people never pray. Others only pray in desperate situations; their prayer a plea for help: Please God, please help me! Jewish prayer takes the form of liturgy, set prayers, mostly written hundreds of years ago.^[24] The majority of these prayers are not actually prayers in the commonly accepted understanding of the word. Most are peons of praise to God in the form of blessing. There are blessings connected with thanksgiving, and acknowledgement of God for the gifts we enjoy that nourish us and enrich our lives, and blessings concerning actions that we are commanded to perform, like lighting candles.

Petitionary prayer is largely confined to thirteen blessings recited on weekdays in the middle of the Amidah, which consists of nineteen blessings all together.^[25] Apart from the option of adding a personal prayer to the blessing for healing, the themes of the petitionary blessings are fixed, and include requests for understanding, repentance, forgiveness, justice.

On Rosh Ha-Shanah and Yom Kippur, the liturgy is even more extensive and includes special prayers, like Avinu Malkeinu, which addresses God as ’our Parent and ‘our Sovereign’. The tone of these prayers is utterly supplicatory. For example, the concluding verse of Avinu Malkeinu:

Our Parent, our Sovereign, be gracious to us and answer us, for there is little goodness in us; treat us with justice [tz’dakah] and lovingkindness [chesed], and save us.

As Yom Kippur approaches, the question arises, what role does prayer play in our efforts to experience atonement? Answers to this question emerge when we look at the Hebrew word for prayer, t’fillah. The root Pei-Lamed-Lamed means to intervene, interpose, arbitrate, judge, intercede. Interestingly, ‘to pray’, l’hitpalleil, is a reflexive form. Reflective forms express an action in relation to ourselves. In the context of praying, this is very significant. We assume that to pray is to address God, but l’hitpalleil suggests that when we pray, we also address ourselves.

If we think of prayer in terms of the root meanings of t’fillah, then what we are doing when we pray is interrogating ourselves. And so, to pray, l’hitpalleil, is to open our hearts and to acknowledge our frailties and our needs – for love, compassion, support, affirmation, forgiveness. To pray is to give thanks for our lives and all the ways in which our needs are met. To pray is to acknowledge that we have the power to shape and transform our lives. To pray is to acknowledge that in order to transform our lives, we must also be prepared to let go and move on and trust that we can renew ourselves and our relationships.

Our t’shuvah journeys began seven days ago. To allow ourselves to pray is to open up the possibility that we will be able to reach our destination and begin again. Our challenge for the 7^th day of Tishri.

8^th Tishri – Tz’dakah: Acting Justly

Where is the ten-day t’shuvah journey taking us? The obvious answer is: repentance – and so, at the end of Yom Kippur: forgiveness and atonement. But what is the point of our repentance? Repentance isn’t an end in itself. If it were, the journey would only be from the past to the present. But Jewish teaching is concerned with the work of renewal and repair for the sake of the future. So, the goal of the journey of t’shuvah reaches beyond repentance, forgiveness and atonement to tz’dakah; to the task of practising righteousness and justice after the yamim nora’im, the ‘awed days’, are over.

Tz’dakah is usually translated as ‘charity’. But the root meaning of charity, the Latin concept of caritas, is very different from the root meaning of tz’dakah. Caritas centres on the feelings of love that move us to feel compassion for others and to take action to support them, both materially and emotionally. Tz’dakah, based on the root Tzadi-Dalet-Kuf and related to the word tzedek, ‘justice’, focuses on the imperative of just action.^[26] Emotions cannot be compelled, so righteous acts that are dependent on our feelings are useless. We may feel moved to help others, but we may not. Tz’dakah, by contrast, is a commandment. It is our obligation to put right what is wrong in relation to the poor, including the homeless, those who are oppressed and persecuted, and, specifically, the most vulnerable groups in society, identified in the Torah as the stranger, the orphan and the widow.^[27]

In the haftarah^[28] on Yom Kippur morning from the Book of Isaiah, chapter 58, the prophet decries observance of the rituals of Yom Kippur that are not accompanied by acts of righteousness:^[29]

Is this the fast I look for? A day of self-affliction? Bowing your head like a reed, and covering yourself with sackcloth and ashes? Is this what you call a fast, a day acceptable to the Eternal One? / Is not this the fast I choose: to release the shackles of wickedness and untie the fetters of bondage, to let the oppressed go free and to break off every yoke? / Is it not to share your bread with the hungry and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to clothe them, and never to hide yourself from your own kin?

The unknown prophet who speaks in the later chapters of the Book of Isaiah was addressing the exiles in Babylon in the 6^th century BCE.^[30] The prophet’s words also address us and are just as relevant to the society we inhabit. So, how will we respond? We know that we live in a world in which injustice is rife. What will we do about it? Our ten-day t’shuvah journey will conclude at the end of Yom Kippur, and then it will be our task to harvest the fruits of our repentance with acts of tz’dakah. The moment has come to begin to focus our attention to how we will conduct our lives after Yom Kippur. Our challenge for the 8^th day of Tishri.

9^th Tishri – S’lach lanu, m’chal lanu, kappeir lanu

‘Forgive us, pardon us, grant us atonement’: Preparing for Yom Kippur

S’lach lanu, m’chal lanu, kappeir lanu. There are several poignant melodies for this phrase that concludes the recitation of the Al Cheit, the confession of our ‘sins’ on Yom Kippur^[31]; each tune designed to move us and open our hearts. I’ve put the word ‘sins’ in inverted comas because strictly speaking, cheit, expresses the kind of error we commit when we miss our way. There are many words for ‘sin’ in the vocabulary of Yom Kippur^[32]. We may find it difficult to identify with the word, ‘sin’, because it may feel far removed from the errors and misdeeds that most of us perpetrate. The text of the Al Cheit makes it clear that, even the ordinary errors we make that we so often excuse ourselves for, are serious and require our repentance.

S’lach lanu, m’chal lanu, kappeir lanu. On Yom Kippur, following our work of t’shuvah, our efforts are dedicated to confessing our misdeeds and seeking forgiveness, pardon and atonement. Although each one of us is on our own personal journey, confession is recited in the first-person plural, expressing our shared predicament as frail human beings who go astray.

Human beings need forgiveness. We need to feel forgiven so that we can let go of the past and move on. But Jewish teaching makes it clear that we can only be forgiven if we repent and do what we can to make amends. We also need to forgive others. In fact, if we fail to forgive someone who has sought our forgiveness three times, we are the ones in the wrong^[33].

But forgiveness on Yom Kippur takes on a deeper resonance. Having engaged in the process of t’shuvah, and having done what we can to repent and seek forgiveness from those we have harmed, we are seeking forgiveness from the Eternal One. More than forgiveness, we are seeking pardon. The Hebrew, m’chal lanu, ‘pardon us’, expresses a blotting out or wiping out, an annulment^[34]. But how can we be seeking an annulment, in other words, a cancellation of our misconduct? Because, ultimately, Yom Kippur represents the drawing of a line under all that has gone before, so that we can start the New Year afresh. The Hebrew, kappeir lanu, ‘grant us atonement’, literally, means ‘cover us’. We read in the Torah that the Ark was covered with a kapporet, a ‘covering’.^[35] The goal of Yom Kippur is a covering over of our misdeeds of the past year. They do not disappear or evaporate; they are not conjured away by the rituals of Yom Kippur; they are covered over. So, what we do with the covered over wrongs we have committed during the past year? Do we store them away? Do we bury them? We do neither. We recognise that they are covered over – and move on. But we are running ahead of ourselves. As Yom Kippur approaches, is there anything we can do to lighten the burden of our regret? We can acknowledge that we have left much undone on our t’shuvah journey and prepare for Yom Kippur. Our challenge for the 9^th day of Tishri.

1. The concluding words of the blessing recited before the shofar is sounded. For reference, see note 15. ↑

2. Babylonian Talmud, Rosh Ha-Shanah 29b. ↑

3. Numbers 29:1 and Leviticus 23:24. ↑

4. Lev. 23:27. ↑

5. Mishnah Rosh Ha-Shanah 1:1. ↑

6. This designation became common in post-Talmudic times. Maimonides, Moshe ben Maimon, also known as the RaMBaM (1135-1204) referred to ‘the ten days’ in Hilchot T’shuvah (Laws of Repentance) 2:6, in his code the Mishneh Torah. ↑

7. Genesis 1: 3 ff. ↑

8. Jacobson, B.S., The Weekday Siddur: An Exposition and Analysis of its Structure, Contents, Language and Ideas (2nd ed, Sinai Pub., Tel Aviv, 1973, p.307). ↑

9. Babylonian Talmud, Rosh Ha-Shanah 32b. ↑

10. See, e.g., Sh’mot, Exodus 2:24, Jeremiah 2:2, Psalm 98:3. ↑

11. Machzor Ru’ach Chadashah, Liberal Judaism, 2003, p. 150 ↑

12. R’eih, Deuteronomy 16:12. ↑

13. These phrases are included in birkat ha-yom, ‘the blessing of the day’, recited as part of kiddush on Erev Shabbat. The word zikaron evokes a tangible memorial; every living thing is a memorial of creation. The word zeicher denotes a conceptual memory; we remember the Exodus because the memory has been passed on from generation to generation. ↑

14. Ki Teitzei, Deuteronomy 25:17-19. ↑

15. TaNaKh: An acronym for the Hebrew Bible – which falls into three parts: Torah (Five Books coming now of Moses), N’vi’im (Prophets) and K’tuvim (Writings). ↑

16. Yitro, Exodus 19:19. ↑

17. Isaiah 58:1. ↑

18. Isaiah 58 is read as the haftarah, the ‘conclusion’ of the scriptural readings on Yom Kippur morning. See Machzor Ruach Chadashah, pp.271-273. ↑

19. B’har, Leviticus 25:9-10. ↑

20. Isaiah 27:13. ↑

21. Hilchot T’shuvah, Laws of Repentance, 3:4, Mishneh Torah. ↑

22. Mishnah Yoma 8:9. The Mishnah is the first code of rabbinic law edited around the year 200. Yoma is Aramaic for ‘The Day’. ↑

23. The name for Yom Kippur in the Torah. See: Emor, Leviticus 23:27. ↑

24. The rabbinic sages devised the first post-biblical prayers, but it wasn’t until the 9^th century that the first complete prayer book was written: Seder Rav Amram, the work of the head of the Babylonian Talmudic Academy of Sura at that time, Amram bar Sheshna. For an in-depth exposition of the development of Jewish prayer, see: Jewish Liturgy. A Comprehensive History by Ismar Elbogen. JPSA, 1993. ↑

25. The Amidah (meaning, ‘standing’) is the central prayer of Jewish worship, traditionally recited while standing. The thirteen petitionary blessings are not recited on Shabbat because it would be inappropriate to petition God while enjoying God’s gift of rest. In place of the thirteen petitions, a blessing for Shabbat is recited. The thirteen petitions consist of six that are personal, six that are communal, and a final one, asking God to listen to our prayers. ↑

26. The most famous phrase about justice in the Torah is in Shof’tim, Deuteronomy 16:20: Tzedek, tzedek, tirdof, ‘Justice, justice, shall you pursue’. ↑

27. Significantly, the word tz’dakah is used in relation to restoring the garment of a poor person given in pledge (Ki Teitzei, Deuteronomy 24:10-13). The code in Ki Teitzei also mentions all three of these categories of vulnerable people (Deut. 24:17 to 22). See also: K’doshim, Leviticus 19:9-10 and 33–34. ↑

28. Haftarah means ‘conclusion’. The haftarah is the concluding Scriptural passage taken from the biblical books of the N’vi’im, Prophets, and read on Shabbat and festival mornings. ↑

29. Isaiah 58:5-7. ↑

30. Isaiah 1:1 speaks of ‘Isaiah, son of Amoz, who prophesied concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezikiah, kings of Judah’. Isaiah 6:1 mentions Isaiah’s call to prophecy in the year that King Uzziah died (742 BCE). While chapters 1-39 belong to the period when Isaiah prophesied. Chapters 40 to 66 are later in origin, the work of a Second (Deutero) Isaiah. Sometimes chapters 55-66 are seen as the work of a Third (Trito) Isaiah. ↑

31. See Machzor Ruach Chadashah, pp. 198-200 and pp.259-261. ↑

32. See the Machzor, p. 164, for ‘A Vocabulary of Sin’ based on A Guide to Yom Kippur by Rabbi Dr Louis Jacobs (Jewish Chronicle Publications, London, 1957, pp.75f.) ↑

33. Hilchot T’shuvah, Laws of Repentance, 2:9, Mishneh Torah by Maimonides, Moshe ben Mamon, the ‘RaMBaM’ ↑

34. The Biblical Hebrew root is Mem Chet Hei. In Rabbinic Hebrew: Mem Chet Lamed. ↑

35. The kapporet that covered the Ark was a slab of gold, 2.5 cubits by 1.5 cubits. See: T’rumah, Exodus 25:17-22. ↑

Preparations for the High Holy Days this year began very early at the shul. I usually start working on my sermons for Rosh Ha-Shanah and Yom Kippur in August, but this year, the continuing coronavirus crisis led to the decision that we could not gather in the synagogue for the autumn festivals, which meant that I began thinking about them in July. And then, along with my rabbinic colleagues, I started to consider how we could adapt the services for an online experience.

Having decided to create a booklet of my sermons and reflections for the days between Rosh Ha-Shanah and Yom Kippur to help those who don’t have access to technology to feel included, the newly elected chair of the shul, Louise Mordecai, had the lovely idea of putting together Rosh Ha-shanah packages for those not online. So, we had a special meeting of the Pastoral Care Group and agreed that the packages would include honey-cake, apples and honey, my booklet – and also a loan copy of the machzor, the High Holy Day prayer book if needed. The next step was to contact those who had responded to the call for volunteers at the beginning of the coronavirus lockdown. Several people baked cakes. One member made New Year cards. As a result of the efforts of a number of people, in the past week deliveries were made to congregants in the Worthing area, Brighton and Hove, Lewes, Saltdean, Telscombe Cliffs, Peacehaven, East Dean and Eastbourne.

The coronavirus crisis has been marked by illness and death, suffering and loss – and also by an abundance of g’milut chasadim, deeds of loving kindness, as people reached out to their neighbours, in particular, to the isolated and the elderly. It is usual at this sacred high-point of the Jewish year to remind ourselves of our core values and the need to repair ourselves and our relationships. The coronavirus crisis has been a living lesson in how to go about this.

The coronavirus crisis has also been and continues to be a testing time. Our resilience is being tested. Our resourcefulness, endurance, self-discipline, empathy, generosity, optimism. Our capacity to remain hopeful in the face of uncertainty about what the future will bring is being tested. I’m using the first-person plural in the spirit of the liturgy. We are going through this together. And at the same time, each one of us, has our own particular circumstances and experiences, and is confronted with our own personal trials and tribulations and challenges. Each one of us is being tested.

In one of the Torah portions set aside for Rosh Ha-Shanah, Genesis chapter 22, known as the Akeidah, we read that our ancestor Abraham was tested:^[1]

And it came to pass after these things that God tested Abraham

Va-y’hi achar ha-d’varim ha-eilleh v’ha-Elohim nissah et-Avraham. 

‘After these things’ – a reference to the banishment of Abraham’s firstborn son Ishmael with his mother Hagar in the previous chapter.^[2] Abraham had been tested enough one might think. But then he was confronted with the ultimate test. The text continues:

And God said to him, ‘Abraham’, and he said: ‘Here I am’ [hinneini]. Then God said: ‘Take your son, your only one, whom you love, Isaac, and go for yourself to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains that I will show you.’

‘Go for yourself’ – Lech l’cha – the use of this expression reminds us of Abraham’s first momentous journey, when together with Sarah and his household, he left his land, his kindred, his parental home to go on a journey to a land that God promised to show him.^[3] Abraham went of his own volition back then. And he’s called to do the same now. But in place of the promise of a future for his descendants, on this occasion, he was challenged to take a journey that would involve obliterating his future. The enormity of the moment and all that Abraham ha already sacrificed is brought out in a 4^th century midrash, commenting on the staggered way in which this second call to ‘go for yourself’ is delivered:^[4]

God said: ‘Take your son.’

Abraham replied: ‘I have two sons.’

God said: ‘Your only one.’

Abraham replied: ‘This one is the only son of his mother, and that one is the only son of his mother.’

God said: ‘Whom you love’

Abraham replied: ‘I love them both.’

God said: ‘Isaac.’

Of course, Abraham loved both his sons – which made the test he was confronted with even more agonising. On the surface, Abraham’s test was a test of faith; his faith in God; that God would not, ultimately, demand the sacrifice of Isaac. But the story makes it clear that Abraham was prepared to sacrifice his son. And so it was, when Isaac was lying bound on the altar and Abraham had raised his knife to slaughter him, that It took an urgent call to get Abraham to stop:^[5]

Then the messenger of the Eternal called to him from heaven and said: ‘Abraham, Abraham!’ And he answered: ‘Here I am.’ And the messenger said: ‘Do not raise your hand against the lad, or do anything to him, for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only one, from Me.’

It’s a terrifying story. And as we follow it, we should ask ourselves about the mother of Isaac: Sarah. The mother who waited so long to have a child.^[6] What was it like for her to see her husband and son go off that day? Her death is recorded at the beginning of the next parashah.^[7] Did Sarah die of anxiety as she waited? The story is known as the Akeidah, the ‘Binding’ because Isaac was bound but not slaughtered. But the name confronts us just as powerfully as if Isaac had been killed by his father. We can read the story as a moral tale against the sacrifice of children. But the binding, evoking as it does the image of Isaac bound on the altar, also confronts us with questions about the way in which we are bound metaphorically, and bind others, not least, children, metaphorically, with the chords, restraints and constraints of our anxieties and fears. 

This coronavirus crisis has stimulated our anxieties and fears to an excruciating extent. It is testing our ability to resist the ways in which we tie ourselves and others into knots of anguish. And more challenging even than this, the pandemic is confronting us – at a time when our daily lives have been completely disrupted, leaving us in disarray – with the need to bind ourselves in ways that are helpful, like the routines and rhythms we create to structure our daily lives, which have become so essential as our lives have been turned upside down. Like the straps of t’fillin^[8], reminding us of our responsibility to direct ourselves to righteous action, binding can be liberating if it is enabling and life-affirming; or, to put it more bluntly, if it helps us to get out of bed each day and keep ourselves going.

This ancient story has still more to teach us for this coronavirus time. After the sacrifice of Isaac has been interrupted, we read:^[9] 

Abraham raised his eyes and saw, behold there was a ram behind him caught in the thicket by its horns. So, he went and took the ram, and offered it as a burnt offering instead of his son.

Among other things, the shofar, the ram’s horn blown at Rosh Ha-Shanah is a reminder of that moment, of that replacement of a ram for a son. For centuries, animals were sacrificed on the altar in successive Temples in Jerusalem. An agricultural people, our ancestors expressed their service of God by offering the fruits of their labours. A Temple has not stood for almost 2000 years, and since that time, as we read in the Babylonian Talmud, Jews have been required to offer in place of the service of the altar, the service of our hearts, that is, prayer.^[10] And more than this. We find this story in a 2^nd century collection of rabbinic wisdom:^[11]

Once, as Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai was walking out of Jerusalem, Rabbi Joshua followed him. Seeing the Temple in ruins, he cried, ‘Woe to us this place is in ruins, the place where atonement was made for Israel’s sins.’ Rabbi Yochanan said to him: ’My son, do not grieve, for we have another means of atonement which is no less effective.’ What is it? It is deeds of loving kindness [g’milut chasadim], about which Scripture says: “I desire loving kindness [chesed] and not sacrifice.”’^[12]

Deeds of loving kindness: g’milut chasadim. Yes, we are being tested during this coronavirus crisis; tested, above all, concerning how we treat others and the planet in which we live. At Rosh Ha-Shanah, we are commanded ‘to listen to the voice of [the] shofar’ – lishmo’a kol shofar.^[13] The voice of the shofar confronts us with urgent questions: How are we living? How are we relating to others: Within our families? Within our community? In the wider society? How are we relating to the world – to other nations and to the Earth? What are we going do to make t’shuvah, to turn ourselves around and make amends for all that we have done – and all that we have failed to do?

We are commanded ‘to listen to the voice of the shofar’. But there is also another voice we must hear. The shofar’s call to action to repair the world out there is also a call to repair the microworld that each of us inhabits in our individual lives, right down to the inner sanctum of our beating hearts.

Let us listen to the beating of our hearts this Rosh Ha-Shanah and face the uncertainties of the year ahead with courage and fortitude, determined to do what we can to renew our lives and the life of the Earth.

And let us say: Amen.

Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah

Brighton and Hove Progressive Synagogue

18^th September 2020 – 1^st Tishri 5781

1. Va-yeira, Genesis 22:1. ↑

2. Va-yeira, Gen. 21:14-21. ↑

3. Lech l’cha, Genesis 12: 1ff. ↑

4. B’reishit (Genesis) Rabbah 39:9 and 55:7. Also: Babylonian Talmud Sanhedrin 89b. ↑

5. Va-yeira, Gen. 22:11-12. ↑

6. See Va-yeira, Gen. 18: 9-15 and 21: 1-2. ↑

7. Chayyei Sarah, Gen. 23:1. ↑

8. T’fillin. The black leather bands and boxes (known as ‘phylacteries’). Derived from the words of the first and second paragraphs of the Sh’ma: ‘You shall bind them as a sign upon your arm and as bands between your eyes’ (Deuteronomy 6:8, 11:18). ↑

9. Va-yeira, Genesis 22:13. ↑

10. Babylonian Talmud Ta’anit 2a. ↑

11. Avot d’Rabbi Natan 4:5. Quoting: Hosea 6:6. This is a parallel collection to the more well-known Pirkei Avot, Chapters of the Sages, appended to Mishnah, the first rabbinic code of law, edited c.200. ↑

12. See also Rabbi Elazar said: Doing righteous deeds of charity is greater than offering all of the sacrifices, as it is written: ‘Doing charity and justice is more desirable to the Lord than sacrifice’ (Proverbs 21:3) (Babylonian Talmud Sukkah 49b). ↑

13. The concluding words of the blessing recited before the shofar is sounded. See Machzor Ruach Chadashah. Liberal Judaism, London, 2003, p. 140. ↑

The New Year has dawned and we are still living in this coronavirus crisis that began to overwhelm our lives back in February. And we don’t know when it will end. So, we are marking Erev Rosh Ha-Shanah this year, not in the shul sanctuary, with the congregation gathered together, but on a technological online marvel called Zoom.

We are not together in physical space, but as Jews in the Diaspora have done for millennia, we are sharing a long sacred moment in time. And in the course of 24 hours, we will also share this sacred day with Jews across the globe.

Why are we choosing to share this moment? Each of us will have our own personal answer to that question. The New Year beckons and, perhaps, we are fearful and hopeful in equal measure. Is the coronavirus on the wane or will there be a new spike in the late autumn? Of course, we don’t know and not knowing is the heart of the issue as we face each New Year. We can never know what lies ahead – all we know is what lies behind us and what is happening right now. But this sacred moment gives us pause for thought and reflection.

Of course, there are some things we do know – albeit not with 100% certainty. The year is marked not only by festivals and commemorative dates in the calendar, but by birthdays, anniversaries and milestones in our own lives and in the lives of our loved ones. As I look ahead, I know that I will be retiring at the end of April, after serving this congregation for over 20 years – and 32 years after my ordination as a rabbi. So much has changed at Brighton and Hove Progressive Synagogue since I first began working here in December 2000. We have been on a journey together as a community – a journey of exploration that has involved expanding our horizons and becoming more inclusive, so that the congregation is more diverse and also more focused on our shared progressive values. I am proud of what we have achieved together.

Twenty years ago, at Rosh Ha-Shanah, shortly after I had been appointed to the post – but before I started working – I wrote a poem which is included in the meditations section before the Erev Rosh Ha-Shanah service in our Liberal Judaism High Holy Day prayer book, Machzor Ruach Chadashah^[1] I would like to share it with you now because it expresses what it was like for me to make a beginning back then after a time of great trial, not knowing what lay ahead; fearful – and also hopeful:

Rosh Ha-Shanah

New Year

New moon of Tishri

Dawning darkly

First stars

Sparkling pathways

From the past

Into the future

Hinneini

Here I am

Standing on the threshold

Of the new year

Ready

But

Retreating

T’shuvah?

I turn back from the brink

Sarah’s laughter

Ringing in my ears

New life?

New beginning?

Is it possible?

For me?

And then

In the desert

Of those questions

Hagar’s eyes

Opening mine

Forcing me

To turn around again

Pressing me

To look forward

To gaze into the landscape

Beyond

To see

Wells of water

In the wilderness

Hinneini

Here I am

Standing on the threshold

Of the new year

Ready

To begin

Again

In order to make a new beginning, we all need to turn around, and as we look forward, be prepared to see wells of water in the wilderness. Alongside our personal circumstances and concerns, as we stand on the threshold of a new year, we all face the wilderness of the continuing coronavirus crisis – and beyond that, the wilderness of continuing climate change, which we can only begin to address effectively if we allow ourselves to learn lessons from the Covid-19 pandemic. One of the most bewildering aspects of the pandemic has been that it has not only been a negative experience. We have all witnessed the way in which the lockdown created a much-needed Shabbat for the planet. We have learnt from the retreat from a 24/7 existence that we can renew our lives and renew the life of the world by ceasing from so many of the activities which we have considered essential to modern life.

In my sermon at the end of July, I spoke about the Build Back Better movement, which is dedicated to ensuring that as the coronavirus crisis does begin to diminish, we don’t go back to our old ways, but rather build together a better, more sustainable and more equal and just society. Let me remind you of the key goals of the movement:^[2]

1. Secure the health and needs of everyone in the UK now and into the future

2. Protect and invest in our public services

3. Rebuild society with a transformative green new deal

4. Invest in people

5. Build solidarity and community across borders

Whatever our fears for the future, hopefully, our impulse to repair the world, will propel us forwards, or at least, enable us to take tentative steps that gain in momentum as we realise that the future really does depend on us, on what we do and don’t do tomorrow and the day after.

Ultimately, whatever my fears, I have always felt driven forward by a sense that what each individual does or doesn’t do matters and makes a difference to the world. But more than this, more than a sense of the demand for individual volition, one of the reasons I became rabbi was because I believe that individuals can make the most difference when we work together in community. Before I decided to embark on the rabbinate, I considered joining a kibbutz. I had lived on one for almost eight months in 1978 -79, and Marxist that I was back then, I loved the sense of collective endeavour. But my memory of living on that left-wing ha-shomer ha-tza’ir kibbutz in the Western Galilee, a couple of kilometres from the Lebanese border, was that, perched on top of a hill as it was, the kibbutz was a bit of an island and did not have much of an impact on the wider society. And so, I decided that becoming a rabbi and offering spiritual leadership to a progressive congregation that was part of a wider movement would provide the communal context for individuals to transform their lives and the lives of others. Considering, the journey we have been on as a congregation these past twenty years, I think I was right.

We have work to do in the world in the year ahead. But we must begin with ourselves and the work we need to do to repair ourselves and our relationships. And before we even start this work, we have to recognise where we are right now. At the end of July 2008, I wrote another Rosh Ha-Shanah poem. Aubrey Milstein, Zichrono livrachah, May his memory be for blessing, a long-serving lay leader who had been a stalwart to me and to the congregation had just died^[3], and I felt unsettled and sensed his passing marked the end of an era. We have been more than unsettled by the coronavirus crisis. For those of us who did not go through the Second World War, we have been experiencing an unprecedented period of upheaval – and it’s not yet over. I offer these lines as an acknowledgement of the place of uncertainty that we are inhabiting at this moment. May we find ways of leading ourselves and our loved ones, our community and our world, towards renewal.

Hinneini

Here I am

Here we are

Now

In this moment

The ancient beat of Life

Pulsing through us.

And yet

Not living

Deeply

Not being

Fully present

Forever rushing carelessly into

Traps in the

Undergrowth – Underworld

Caught by

Complexity

Ambiguity

Uncertainty

The terrifying indifference of

Chance.

And then simply

Conjugating questions

Why me?

Why you?

Why us?

Why them?

And still

Here I am

Here we are

Now

In this moment

A new beginning

Beckons.

And let us say: Amen.

Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah

Brighton and Hove Progressive Synagogue

18^th September 2020 – 1^st Tishri 5781

1. Machzor Ruach Chadashah. Liberal Judaism, London, 2003, p. 39. ↑

2. https://www.buildbackbetteruk.org/what-we-want ↑

3. On 25^th July 2008. Aubrey Milstein, Z”L, was born on 30^th October 1921. ↑

Hinneinu – Here we are, over nine weeks into the coronavirus crisis lockdown, unable to gather together in the synagogue. We have managed very well with our streamed services, but today, as we mark Shavuot, the fact that we are unable to congregate acquires an additional and deeper poignancy. Jewish teaching puts a major emphasis on community: the Israelites, who fled slavery in Egypt, together with the erev rav, the ‘mixed multitude’ that made the dash to freedom with them, became a community, the people Israel, when they stood at the foot of Mount Sinai.

The people Israel. Often referred to as kol adat b’nei Yisrael: ‘the entire congregation of the Israelites’^[1]. Reading Torah, similar phrases are repeated, reminding us of this collective entity that discovered what it meant to be a people as they wandered for forty years through the wilderness.

The people moved together, acted together. But the Book of B’midbar, Numbers, which we began reading last Shabbat, draws our attention, again and again, to the individuals that made up the people. From the opening verses that list the names of the leaders of the twelve tribes onwards, a host of individuals, and with their names and their stories – or at least, some of their stories. We encounter the individuals whose stories stand out.

In next week’s parashah, B’ha’alot’cha, at Numbers chapter 12, we gain an insight into the eldest of the sibling leaders of the Exodus, Miriam, who barely appears in the Torah, and whose name is only mentioned for the first time, following the crossing of the Sea of Reeds on dry land, back in parashah B’shallach at Exodus chapter 15.^[2] There, in two short verses that focus on Miriam leading the women in dances with timbrels and song, we learn three particular things about her: her name, that she is designated as the sister of Aaron, and that she is a prophet, n’vi’ah. But then, Miriam disappears completely from the narrative, until she turns up in an extraordinary chapter that kicks off a series of portions, in which the names of individuals are at the heart of each story.

And so, in parashat B’ha’alot’cha, Miriam – and to a lesser extent Aaron – challenge their younger brother’s exclusive relationship with the Eternal. Then, in the next parashah, Sh’lach L’cha, we discover that of the twelve tribal leaders sent out to reconnoitre the land beyond the Jordan, Joshua and Caleb alone show courage and determination.^[3] Finally, in the parashah that follows, Korach, who gives his name to the portion, the first cousin of the sibling leaders, along with Datan, Aviram and On, the leaders of the tribe of Reuben, foment rebellion against Moses and Aaron with the words: ‘You take too much upon yourselves, for all the congregation, all of them, are holy, and the Eternal One is in their midst; so why do you lift yourselves above the assembly of the Eternal One.’^[4]

Ki chol-ha-eidah, kullam k’doshim – ‘For all the congregation, all of them are holy’. With these words, the rebels assert not that the congregation as a collectivity is holy, but that all of them – each and every member of the congregation – is holy. Throughout the Torah, the people, the congregation, is referred to in the singular. Most of us will be familiar with the principal statement of Jewish belief: Sh’ma Yisrael, Adonai Elohein, Adonai echad – ‘Listen! Israel: The Eternal is our God; the Eternal is one.’^[5] Listen! – Sh’ma! is a second person singular imperative. Again, and again and again: Israel; a single entity.

But then, at key moments, the singular ‘you’, becomes plural – which brings me back to the festival we are celebrating today, Shavuot, ‘Weeks’, reinvented by the early Rabbis as z’man matan Torateinu – ‘the season of the giving of our Torah‘. We read in the parashah, Yitro, in the opening verses of Exodus 19, prior to the account of the Divine Revelation on Mount Sinai:^[6]

Thus, you should say to the house of Jacob and tell the children of Israel: ‘You have seen what I have done to Egypt, and how I lifted you up on eagle’s wings and I brought you to Myself. And now therefore, if you indeed listen to My voice and you keep My covenant, then you will be to me a treasure from among all the peoples, for all the Earth is Mine’.

The ‘you‘ addressed is plural: ‘You have seen’ … ‘I lifted you up’ … ‘I brought you‘ … ‘If you indeed listen … ‘and you keep’… ‘you will be’ … And then, the aseret ha-dibbrot, ‘the ten utterances’, better known by the Christian designation, ‘the Ten Commandments’, that follow in chapter 20 are all couched in the singular you: in this moment of encounter with the Divine, all the ‘yous’ addressed in the plural become a single ‘you’: the people.

And yet, crucially, the scene of Revelation concludes at the end of the next parashah, Mishpatim, which details a code of mishpatim – laws – with the sealing of the covenant with the people that once again acknowledges their plurality:^[7]

Moses took the book of the covenant and read in the ears of the people, and they said, ‘all that the Eternal One has spoken we will do and we will listen’– Va-yom’ru: kol asher-dibbeir Adonai, na’aseh v’nishma.

The people entered the covenant with the Eternal as a community together, but the obligation to keep the covenant rested – and rests – on each individual. We will act. We will continue to listen. Each one of us.

And so, we read at the beginning of parashat Nitzavim, in Deuteronomy chapter 29, in a narrative set at the end of the forty years of wandering, we find a statement addresses to the generation who did not stand at Mount Sinai. A preamble to their entry into the covenant, it begins:^[8]

You are stationed today, all of you, before the Eternal your God.

Attem nitzavim ha-yom, kul’ chem lifnei Adonai Eliheichem.

You – plural – are stationed – plural – all of you – plural – before the Eternal your God – plural.

Needless to say, for all the plurality of the plural ‘you’, it is in the masculine plural – just as the singular ‘you’ is in the masculine singular. The Torah is written by men, and addresses men. Nevertheless, as we read the Torah today for ourselves in the context of our own lives, we can include ourselves, our diverse selves in all our diverse genders in that plurality. Interestingly, this week’s parashah, Naso, acknowledges that it was not only men who felt addressed by the call to commitment. We learn in Numbers chapter 6 ^[9] that individual women as well as individual men, would take it upon themselves to consecrate themselves to the Eternal, by explicitly uttering a vow of consecration – neder nazir – to set themselves apart for the Eternal. The adoption of the neder nazir required each individual concerned to take it upon themselves to abstain from drinking wine and any other intoxicant, let their hair grow, and refrain from any contact with a dead person, even their father, or mother, or siblings.

Significantly, while the Torah reading set aside for Shavuot, aseret ha-dibbrot, ‘the ten utterances’, emphasises the singularity of the people, another scriptural text that is read on Shavuot, focuses on the individual. The early rabbis set aside five books from K’tuvim, the ‘Writings’, the concluding third section of the TaNaKh^[10], the Hebrew Bible, for reading as separate scrolls on five particular dates in the calendar.^[11] The most well-known of these five books or ‘five scrolls’ – chameish m’gillot – is the Book of Esther, read on Purim. The Book of Ruth, read at Shavuot, relates how a Moabite woman, following the death of her husband, decided to leave her home and go with her mother-in-law Naomi to Judah. That Ruth made this choice was remarkable enough. She also gave voice to her choice. Ruth’s declaration to Naomi is one of the most powerful passages in the whole of the TaNaKh, and, arguably, the most beautiful and heart-felt expression of commitment ever articulated. We read in chapter 1:^[12]

Entreat me not to leave you, and return from following after you; for wherever you go, I will go; and wherever you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God, my God; / where you die, will I die, and there will I be buried; thus, shall the Eternal One do to me, and more also, if anything but death parts me from you.

It may seem paradoxical that the covenant between the Eternal One and the people Israel is at its heart a commitment made by each and every individual. Of course, the marking of the transition from childhood to adulthood tells us this: at the age of 13 for boys, and, traditionally 12 for girls, an individual commits themselves to the mitzvot, the commandments. In Progressive communities that commitment is taken on by the bar or bat mitzvah on equal terms at the age of 13, and in this particular progressive community, Brighton and Hove Progressive Synagogue, the option of b’mitzvah, ensures that gender equality also encompasses gender inclusion. The reality is that even in an intensely, communally-focused community, everything comes down to the individual and the choices each of us makes.

Having distinguished between texts that use the singular texts that use the plural, there is a particular passage in the Torah, couched in the singular, which clearly addresses, not the singular people, but the individual. It’s one of my favourite Torah teachings, so I make no apology for sharing it once again. We read in parashat Nitzavim, Deuteronomy chapter 30:^[13]

For this commandment that I am commanding you today is not too wonderful for you, nor too remote. / It is not in heaven that you need to say, ‘who will go up for and fetch it for us that we may hear it and do it?’ / And it’s not across the sea, that you need to say, ‘who will cross the sea for us and fetch it for us that we may hear it and do it?’ / Rather, ha-davar is very near to you, in your mouth and in your heart to do it.

I have not translated ha-davar because it can be translated in at least two ways – as ‘the word’ and as ‘the matter’. Ha-davar; the word, the matter – and, in our current context of such great uncertainty, perhaps, the guidance we seek. The verses tell us that ha-davar is not remote from us; it is held within us; in our mouths and in our hearts. We are not re-enacting a glorious spectacle today. However much our imaginations may be stimulated and engaged by the images of the quaking mountain shrouded in cloud and smoke and fire. We recall the dramatic events of Mount Sinai back then in order to inhabit as fully as possible this moment, right now.

So: Hinneinu – Here we are. Of course, we aren’t actually here together. But each of us, wherever we are and whatever our particular circumstances, has chosen to log on and to connect; to be in this moment together, although we are physically apart. May each of us find courage and inspiration in this shared moment to commit ourselves to the Eternal and to one another. And let us say: Amen.

Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah

Brighton and Hove Progressive Synagogue

30 May 2020 – 7 Sivan 5780

1. See, e.g., K’doshim, Leviticus 19:2. ↑

2. B’shallach, Exodus 15:21-21. ↑

3. Sh’lach L’cha, Numbers 13-15. ↑

4. Korach, Numbers 16:3. ↑

5. Va-etchannan, Deuteronomy 6:4. ↑

6. Yitro, Exodus 19: 3-5. ↑

7. Mishpatim, Exodus 24:7. ↑

8. Nitzavim, Deuteronomy 29:92. ↑

9. Naso, Numbers 6:1-21. ↑

10. TaNaKh: Torah, N’vi’im (Prophets), K’tuvim (Writings). ↑

11. Arranged in the TaNaKh in the order of reading, the other books are: Shir ha- Shirim, the Songs of Songs read at Pesach, Rut, Ruth, read at Shavuot, Eichah, Lamentations, read at Tishah B’Av, and Kohelet, Ecclesiastes, read at Sukkot. ↑

12. Ruth 1:16-17. ↑

13. Nitzavim, Deut. 30:11-14. ↑