Rosh haShana is upon us… a new year… and as this year draws to a close, I feel ready for a new set of paradigms, cause the old ones have gotten really stifling. Even the plants are feeling it… For the sunshine and rains of last year that gave them all their vibrance last spring, have left them dry dusty and even prickly.
But that is the natural cycle…All the things I once held as my truths and inspiration and loved to talk about that spurred me on my own path since last Rosh haShana have by now congealed into my own prickly self, that is holding on to what it now sees as Truth- and I am somewhat closed to those who don't fit in to the molds I've constructed. In a sense, we are always struggling to stay in the process of human becomings… I liked how Gertrude Stein tried to destroy the noun, because if something in life has been named- why are we still talking about it?
This is a unique place of spiritual consciousness- the obsession with improvement of our condition, of fixing our selves and the world around us. While the individual creatures of the earth are searching for a daily routine, the spiritual consciousness of humanity, and especially the Jewish vision of Tikun Olam, is constantly telling us not to be satisfied… Grateful, for sure, but not apathetic toward our chance to manifest a better reality.
One more metaphor, and we'll see how Rosh Hashana provides the fixing for all the static nature we've morphed into… When the air rushes from my lungs up towards the entrance at my mouth- it is a pure wind. But as it passes through my mouth, it is formed and limited in the scope of its expression to whatever my mind is telling it to tell. These could be the sweetest words of encouragement, or they could be me deriding someone for not thinking like I do. As each of us "congeals" in our thoughts over the year, we become more attached to our own thoughts, and closed to the thoughts, beliefs and souls of others. It is in our words - the vessels that distinguish my thoughts from those of another- that divisiveness grows.
The gemara teaches us that on Rosh Hashana there is only one method of praying…There is only one way to get our desires for this next year through to Hashem without them being sullied by the limits my own mind-set places on them. If we would the New Year be truly sweet, we must be ready to let go of that which makes us closed to others, and refine our sense of discernment to make the next year filled with a sweetness that will encourage those around us to live out their potentials… This is the blast of the shofar, a sound without limits- a pure voice drawing and expressing the simplest desires for life with a naturally formed sound- free of the limits of human individuality. It powers through the heavens breaking all the firmaments we have established that block out the divine potential of this world from being the status quo…
I just wish us all to be blessed with a year of such truth seeking and manifest potential and beautiful expression of what we can do- and for it to be in a way that draws and attracts others to it- that is inclusive and inviting and also a source of unity for all the holy peoples.
Shaul David Judelman
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Shaul David Judelman currently resides in Jerusalem. After growing up amongst the Douglas Firs of Seattle, Washington, he came to Israel on a quest for Judaism alive in its land. He spent six years in the Bat Ayin Yeshiva Rabbinical program and now teaches at Yeshivat Simchat Shlomo while working on several different environmental initiatives in Jerusalem. He is the founder and coordinator of Simchat Shlomo’s Eco-Activist Beit Midrash, a program offering holistic in-depth Torah study around issues of ecology. |