Three Days Before Rosh Hashanah: A Written Shofar Alert

Does time go by as quickly for you as it does for me? I’m never sure if that’s good or bad. Or an “it is what it is” thing. But what I can say with certainty is that Rosh Hashana begins on Sunday evening, just three days from now. And it will happen regardless of how fast or slow time flows for either of us. So this letter is my wake-up call to myself and anyone else that could use one. Consider it a written Shofar alert. The Terua would be the most annoying alarm sound, is my guess—the one where you wake up angry at the sound that you yourself scheduled.

I am working with a Biblically customized three-days-before-Rosh-Hashana alert. “What in G-d's name is he talking about?” Totally fair question. Allow me to explain.

But first a small preamble. One would assume that the central motif of the new year involves a massive New Year's party. That would of course be way too easy and far too much fun. For us Jewish folks, instead of celebrating a new year, we spend two days begging for one. Though it is solemn, we are still feeling celebratory— like the subject of the king who isn’t worried about whether the king will give him another chance. Why? Because the king also happens to be his dad. Still, our faith in the love of our Father in heaven notwithstanding, we don’t take chances; this is our life we’re talking about. We want to be sure we get that much-needed extension so as to take another crack at decoding our elusive destinies. We need more time to get to where we need to be, and are hopeful for yet another shot at redemption. “This time...I’m serious, for real,...damn, I was so close...etc.”

The theme recurs throughout the liturgy, one famous example being the verse “Zocharaynu Lchaim Melech Chafetz Bachaim” (“Remember us for life, oh King who favors life”), sung in that tune that every Jew seems to know from either this life or a past one. It’s almost as Jewish as chicken soup and the Evil Kaneedles.

Another one is part of the Avinu Malkaynu. “Our Father, our King, inscribe us in the Book of Life” (see, I told you). So let's talk about the book for a second. While many of us certainly believe this to be true on some esoteric soulful level, it is ultimately a metaphor used to describe something that occurs celestially, in a way that is categorically inexplicable and lives beyond the human consciousness —in clearly understandable human terms. But this still begs the question: why choose this particular metaphor over any number of others...though for the life of me I can’t even come up with one example that isn’t totally ridiculous.

So, in keeping with my brand-new motto, “metaphors have feelings too,” or whatever, I want to suggest a possible explanation for this one. I have always loved reading since I can remember. I spent many after-school afternoons with my head in a book at the Northeast Public Library, across the street from where I grew up in Philadelphia. But there has always been a list of books that have been special to me. Mind you, it's a list that keeps growing. They include books that have moved me deeply, and others that held me spellbound. Books that have shaken me to my core, where I sensed that the author knew me creepily well, and reading it felt like him turning me inside out, like peering into a mirror that reflects back the most innermost dimensions of your soul. Books that have nurtured my mind and expanded my heart, that have awakened my curiosity and fed my imagination. I’m referring to books that have lifted me up, that had read me more than I had read them, books that plucked me out of my “narrowness” and pointed me in the direction that held the promise of “expansiveness”... yes, like a shofar, but not for now; we will cover that on Rosh Hashana itself. So, in short, books that give you LIFE! Not existence. LIFE!

For us as Jews, we come by our connection to literature honestly, by way of the central role that Torah study occupies in our collective consciousness and our daily experience. So much so that we have been known, and still are described, as the “Nation or People of the Book.” Is it any wonder then that this is our go-to metaphor?

So back to the alarm business. I have chosen to use the Book of Joshua as an overall High Holiday text this year. How this particular book will be a book of life remains uncertain. I sincerely believe, however, that discussing these themes and the very act of studying them communally fills them already with the holiest elixir of sacred intentionality, positivity, and spiritual connection. If these aren’t among the main ingredients that inject us with spiritual life, then I don't know what else could. I intend to LIVE and “Farbreng” with these ideas in ways that might help me, G-d willing, set up the new year aligned with the most authentic version of myself that I can manage to summon. I am asking much of these ideas, but only because I believe they can handle it; they were born for this! I’m trusting them to work with me to deploy with more revved up enthusiasm, a more robust intentionality, and a desire to crust my overall life with more crispiness. I would encourage you to do a deep dive into the book of Joshua in the hopes that you too discover and learn the amazing ways that this book seems to conceptually capture and illuminate the key aspects of these heady days to come.

Feel free to set and customize the tone and volume of this Shofar alarm from the book of Joshua, chapter one, verses ten and eleven:

10. And Joshua commanded the officers of the nation, saying:

11. Go through the midst of the camp and command the nation, saying: Prepare provision for yourselves, for in another three days you will cross this Jordan to come and inherit the land that the Lord your God is giving you to inherit.

יוַיְצַ֣ו יְהוֹשֻׁ֔עַ אֶת־שֹֽׁטְרֵ֥י הָעָ֖ם עִבְר֣וּ | בְּקֶ֣רֶב הַמַּֽחֲנֶ֗ה וְצַוּ֚וּ אֶת־הָעָם֙ לֵאמֹ֔ר הָכִ֥ינוּ לָכֶ֖ם צֵדָ֑ה כִּ֞י בְּע֣וֹד | שְׁלֹ֣שֶׁת יָמִ֗ים אַתֶּם֙ עֹבְרִים֙ אֶת־הַיַּרְדֵּ֣ן הַזֶּ֔ה לָבוֹא֙ לָרֶ֣שֶׁת אֶת־הָאָ֔רֶץ אֲשֶׁר֙ יְהֹוָ֣ה אֱלֹֽהֵיכֶ֔ם נֹתֵ֥ן לָכֶ֖ם לְרִשְׁתָּֽהּ:

OK, it’s almost Shabbat. The last Shabbat of the year, in fact, so it needs to be a joyous one and set an example for all the upcoming Shabbats of the new year following RH! So enjoy! Be happy! And don't forget to raise a little glass of Schnapps or seltzer and say Lchaim, or, as we should say in Hebrew on this auspicious Shabbos, “Zochraynu Lchaim!”—meaning “don't forget to say Lchaim!”