Rosh Hashanah

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Rosh Hashanah Summary

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The Routledge Dictionary of Judaism

Rosh Hashanah

[1] The Jewish New Year, the first of Tishrei, marking the birthday of God’s creation of the world. On this occasion, God asserts his sovereignty and judges the world for the coming year. The holiday is marked by synagogue worship and, in particular, the sounding of the SHOFAR, symbolically awakening the community to the need to atone for sin. The idea of God’s sovereignty is expressed in this liturgical passage:

Our God and God of our fathers, rule over the whole world in Your honor … and appear in Your glorious might to all those who dwell in the civilization of Your world, so that everything made will know that You made it, and every creature discern that You have created him, so that all in whose nostrils is breath may say, “The Lord, the God of Israel is king, and His kingdom extends over all.”

The concepts of divine sovereignty, divine memory, and divine disclosure correspond to creation, revelation, and redemption. That is, God created the world and rules, God is made self-manifest in the Torah, and God will redeem humanity in the end of days from the condition of sin and death, and accord eternal life to his dominion. Sovereignty is established by creation of the world. Judgment depends upon law: “From the beginning You made this, Your purpose known….” And, therefore, since people have been told what God requires of them, they are judged:

On this day, sentence is passed upon countries, which to the sword and which to peace, which to famine and which to plenty, and each creature is judged today for life or death.

Who is not judged on this day? For the remembrance of every creature comes before You, each man’s deeds and destiny, words and way ….

As this story of judgment unfolds and people grow reflective, the Days of Awe seize the imagination: I live, I die, sooner or later it comes to all. The call for inner contemplation implicit in the mythic words elicits deep response.

The theme of revelation is further combined with redemption; the ram’s horn, or shofar, which is sounded in the synagogue during daily worship for a month before the Rosh Hashanah festival, serves to unite the two:

You did reveal Yourself in a cloud of glory.… Out of heaven You made them [Israel] hear Your voice … Amid thunder and lightning You revealed Yourself to them, and while the Shofar sounded You shined forth upon them.… Our God and God of our fathers, sound the great Shofar for our freedom. Lift up the ensign to gather our exiles.… Lead us happily to Zion Your city, Jerusalem the place of Your sanctuary.

The complex themes of the New Year, the most theological of Jewish holy occasions, thus weave together the tapestry of a highly charged moment in a world subject to the personal scrutiny of a most active God.

[2] Rosh Hashanah is a Mishnah tractate on the celebration of the New Year; the designation of the new month through the year, testimony as to the appearance of the new moon (chaps. 1–3); the shofar, or ram’s horn, sounded on the New Year (chaps. 3–4)

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