Dear Friend --

Rosh haShanah (literally "head of the year") is one of many Jewish New years on our calendar. It doesn't even mark the beginning of the Jewish calendar (that distinction we save for Passover). Rosh haShanah falls on the first day of the seventh month of the year, right around the time of the fall harvest.

The High Holy Day prayer book includes the Hebrew phrase, "ha-yom harat olam," "today the world is born." This epithet is in the present tense because the world is "birthing," not born yet. In other words, a day of infinite potential. This understanding syncs well with another perspective about Rosh haShanah: the designation of this day as the 6th day of Creation, the day humans came to be. With human beings in the mix – anything can happen!

The Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the most recent rebbe of the Lubavitcher Hasidic dynasty, taught that without human beings, the world would be like a "machine." The various components of the world, animate and inanimate, operate according to their instinct and their inherent nature. Only humans have the free will to choose the way we interact with the world and each other. It is those choices we begin to contemplate as a community on Rosh haShanah. The process continues through Yom Kippur, a period of ten days.

There are several occasions during our prayer gathering on Rosh haShanah when we recite long lists of the categories of wrong choices we made. The Hebrew word for these wrong choices is "chet." Often translated as "sin," "chet" is an archery term that means missing the mark. Jewish tradition assumes we attempted to act morally and uprightly in the world. Even though we try, sometimes, we "miss." The employment of the Hebrew word "chet" in this context is one of the earliest articulations of the assumption of innocence. 

We always recite these wrongdoings aloud, in the presence of our Jewish community. Notably, we articulate our transgressions in the plural. As Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel taught, "In a free society, some are guilty, all are responsible."

I'll leave you selections from a beautiful reading about Rosh haShanah and the High Holy Days in general written by Rabbi Stanely Greenberg, distinguishing them from "holidays."

At this season of the year our ancestors always wished one another a Shanah Tovah:  "A good year."

We usually wish each other:  "A happy New Year."

They emphasized the thought that life's central quest was for goodness, for uprightness.

With us the accent falls on the pursuit of pleasure…

"…On holidays, we run away from our duties; 

on holy days, we face up to them. 

On holidays, we seek to let ourselves go; 

on holy days, we try to bring ourselves under control. 

On holidays, we try to empty our minds; 

on holy days, we attempt to replenish our spirits. 

On holidays, we reach out for the things we want; 

on holy days, we reach up for the things we need. 

Holidays bring a change of scene; holy days bring a change of heart."

Shanah Tovah,

Rabbi Neil Comess-Daniels, CLUE Clergy in Residence

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