A Sound and Time of Triumph and Alarm
In the seventh month, on the first of the month, there shall be a holy convocation for you…it shall be a day of teruah for you” (Numbers 29:1)
Everything, all events, all of time, the root-sparks of every one of us are focused by the Temple Mount, specifically the foundation stone where the bedrock of God’s holy hill emerges into light and the energies of the universe are visible. It is there, the sages teach that Adam was made of the dust of the ground and was created as a human being, b’tzelem Elohim, in the shadow of God (see my essay, “Jacob’s Ladder”); it was there that Jacob, on his way to Aram for a wife, rested his head and saw “a ladder set earthward and its top reaching to heaven, and angels of God were ascending and descending on it” (Genesis 28:12); around it was the innermost sanctum of the Jewish Temple, the holy of holies entered by the Kohen Gadol on Yom Kippur to invoke the Holy Name and achieve freedom from sins and return to inheritance (Numbers 29:7, cf. Leviticus 23:23-32; 25:8-13, the “Jubilee year”).
It is on both these days that Jews, on behalf of themselves and all mankind blow the shofar and sound the teruah “with a cry of joy” but also with persistent strength in supplication and of grieving. Only on two other occasions, the days of destruction of the two Temples has this complexity of response been more intensely present for today the Temple Mount is being destroyed. A process begun mostly underground in 1999 has been renewed “in the face of the nations” and in spite of God.
The sages teach that 1 Tishrei was the birthday of humankind, day six of creation and its purpose. It is “a day of teruah” and intimately linked to Yom Kippur, 10 Tishrei and the awe that judgment, the consequences of our acts and the need for mercy and rectification evokes. Thus it is written “praises to the people who know teruah; Hashem, in the light of Your countenance they walk” (psalm 89:16).
The Temple Mount is being destroyed; to put the same fact another way: the memory of civilization is being shattered and buried; the humanity of human beings is being debased and broken; the ultimate fact of the Eternal and Infinite One, the Creator is being charred and mocked; “nations are in turmoil, kingdoms totter” (Psalm 46:7). An open trench, up to four feet deep and thirteen hundred feet long has been dug across the surface of the Temple Mount. This is horrible for all the reasons noted above. But within this malicious and suicidal desecration there also is “a cry of joy” that may become “a shout of triumph” (l’hariah, remember this word) because it has exposed stones from the walls and courtyards of the Temples of David, Solomon, Zerubavel, Zechariah and Ezra. The Torah is truth; history is real; the past will not be forgotten…
“Blow the shofar in Zion; decree a fast. Call an assembly…Why should they say among the peoples, ‘where is their God?’ Then Hashem will take up the cause of His land and take pity upon His people.” (Joel 2:15, 17-18). “Does a shofar sound in a city and people not tremble?” (Amos 3:6). With the ongoing and now blatant destruction of the history, memory and integrity of humanity, and of the energies and coherence of creation, the full range of meanings in the sounding of the shofar come into play, vivify and illuminate our days of challenge.
Yes, the derekh, the way of Judaism is the way of remembrance and acknowledging God’s sovereignty and knowing our divine origins and providence. The days of teruah are “a remembrance of the first day…concerning countries judgment is pronounced… all creatures are brought to mind, to remember them for life or death…For the remembrance of every living being comes before You – man’s deed and his task, the actions and movements of a mortal, the thoughts of a person and his schemes, and the motives for the acts of a man. Happy is the man who does not forget You… for the remembrance of all Your works comes before You…And it is stated, ‘I will remember My covenant with Jacob, also My covenant with Isaac, and also My covenant with Abraham will I remember, and I will remember the land’… and there is no forgetting before the Throne of Your Glory. Blessed are You, Hashem, Who remembers the covenant” (afternoon service for Rosh Hashanah; Leviticus 26:42) [1].
Tekiah – Teruah – Tekiah….. The shofar sounds our creation, identity, healing, remembrance.
“Blow the shofar at the moon’s renewal, at the time appointed for our festive day; because it is a decree for Israel, a judgment [day] for the God of Jacob” (psalm 81:4-5). Remember; don’t forget (Ex. 17:14-16; Deut. 25:17-19; cf. Rambam, Melachim 1:1)!
Teruah can mean to shout or cheer. In its form, l’hariah, noted above, it can mean “to shout in triumph” but l’hatriah is “to sound the alarm or warn” and, as a noun, hatra’ah means “warning or alert” [2]. This range of possibilities alludes to the scope of human freedom and the range of judgments tempered by mercy and remembrance. Judaism is based on the understanding that “the wheel will come full circle,” that events, thoughts, words, intentions all have consequences unfolding their logic and truth in the overall context or ‘hard drive’ of divine providence. The shofar is calling out to all of us today not only about ourselves but about the ground, the literal ground of our existence and the integrity of the universe in which our freedom coheres within the parameters of mercy and justice.
The enmity of the tents of Kedar to the Children of Israel has been clear for a long time (psalm 120; Genesis 16:12, 21:9). The servility to Edom of the client regimes in David’s capital has been clear for decades, rarely more grossly than in their permitting the gutting and scarring of the Temple Mt which even in purely secular terms is the world’s greatest historical and archaeological site. But in a world bent on forgetting, Judaism, the Jewish people and their holiest sites must be shattered and buried.
Mt. Zion cannot be glad nor can the daughters of Judah rejoice, as commanded until they are able to “walk about Zion and encircle her; mark well her ramparts and raise up her palaces that you may recount it to succeeding generations” (psalm 48:12-14); there cannot be genuine remembrance and mindfulness of ourselves, and the One, the Unborn, Undying and Infinite Creator unless the “House of God,” Mount Moriah and the Temple return to their commanded purpose, the permanent resting place of the Mishkan built in the wilderness. For this is the crown of the “fairest of sites, joy of all the earth, Mt. Zion by the northern side of the great king’s city; in her palaces God is known as the Stronghold” (48:3-4).
In Hebrew the root-word for repentance and return are one and the same. Repair of the world, perfection of oneself, being “mindful that we are dust” as He is in mercy requires that Jews return to the Temple Mount and return it to its original beauty and purpose. And this in turn requires that they return to their entire inheritance that the Eternal One gave them in an everlasting covenant, a covenant always remembered. If this is forgotten there is no balance and wholesome forgiveness in the world; remember, return, and act.
When this happens, the milk and wine of Judah and kindnesses of David will flow out in liquid light as a healing stream to all people.
NOTES
- Machzor for Rosh Hashanah, Nusach Arizal arranged by R’ Shneur Zalman of Liadi, English translation by R’ Nissen Mangel (Merkos L’Inyonei Chinuch, 1997), 135-6.
2. A. Soldminick and D. Morrison, Maskilion I, Hebrew-English Dictionary of Verb-Roots (Milah, 1996).