Summary of the festival

Rosh Hashanah (ראש השנה, “the head of the year”) opens the month of Tishrei, the seventh month counting from Nisan but the first of the year of creation. The Talmud makes it the day of Judgment (Yom HaDin): “On Rosh Hashanah all creatures pass before Him like sheep” (Rosh Hashanah 16a). Yet it is also the day when we crown God as King (Malkhut): the prayers of the day are a proclamation of His kingship far more than a list of fears.

The festival lasts two days, in Israel and abroad alike, what the Talmud calls yoma arikhta, “one long day” (Beitzah 30a). It is lived in the synagogue around the shofar and a special liturgy, and at home around a festive meal that begins with symbolic foods and something sweet. In every community it is both solemn and full of hope: we do not fast, we dress well and we eat, because “the joy of the Lord is your strength” (Nehemiah 8:10).

The mitzvot of the festival

• Hearing the shofar (Numbers 29:1). The central mitzvah, fulfilled in synagogue during the morning service. Three series are sounded (tekiah, shevarim, teru’ah) according to the Talmudic tradition, for about a hundred blasts in all, some after the Torah reading and some during Musaf. If Rosh Hashanah falls on Shabbat the shofar is not blown, but the day keeps its meaning.
• Resting from work (melakha): as on any festival, cooking and carrying for the needs of the day remain permitted (except when the festival falls on Shabbat).
• The prayers of the day: Musaf contains the three special blessings Malkhuyot (kingship), Zikhronot (remembrance) and Shofarot (the shofar), each supported by ten verses from the Torah, the Prophets and the Writings.
• The festive meal and the simanim (signs). After Kiddush and bread dipped in honey (or salt and honey), we eat symbolic foods, each with a “Yehi ratzon” (“May it be Your will”). The Talmud lists five (Keritot 6a, Horayot 12a): gourd (kra), fenugreek (rubia), leeks (karti), beets (silka) and dates (tamri). North African and Eastern communities add the pomegranate, the head of an animal (lamb, fish) and other dishes, each with a Hebrew or Aramaic wordplay that becomes a blessing. Ashkenazim mostly eat apple in honey.
• Tashlikh (תשליך, “you shall cast”): on the first afternoon we go to flowing water (sea, river, well) and say the verse of Micah: “You will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea” (Micah 7:19). It is a custom, not an obligation, attested since the Middle Ages.
• Greetings: we wish each other “Shanah tovah umetuqah” (“a good and sweet year”), and many communities perform hatarat nedarim (annulment of vows) on the morning before the festival.

Origin in history

The Torah does not speak of a “New Year” but of a day of Teru’ah (Numbers 29:1) and a memorial of Teru’ah (zikhron teru’ah, Leviticus 23:24) on the first day of the seventh month. It is the oral tradition that recognises in it the Day of Judgment and the date of the creation of man: according to Rabbi Eliezer “the world was created in Tishrei” (Rosh Hashanah 10b), and the liturgy says “Hayom harat olam”: “Today the world was conceived”.

The first account of the day being celebrated is in the book of Nehemiah (chapter 8). When the exiles returned from Babylon, on the first of Tishrei Ezra read the Torah before the whole assembly from dawn until midday, and the people wept as they heard its words. Nehemiah and Ezra then told them: “Do not mourn… eat rich food and drink sweet drinks… for the joy of the Lord is your strength.” That verse is the model of the day’s double nature, grave and joyful at once.

The Talmud (Rosh Hashanah, chapters 1 and 2) fixes the rules of the shofar, of the testimony of the new moon and of the two days. Originally the Sanhedrin proclaimed the month on the word of witnesses; the uncertainty about the exact day explains why both days were kept even after the calendar was fixed, out of caution and loyalty to the custom of the elders. Maimonides (Laws of Repentance 3:4) gives the meaning of the shofar: its voice says, “Awake, sleepers, from your sleep; examine your deeds and return.”

The message for today

Rosh Hashanah is the one day of the year on which we ask almost nothing for ourselves: the prayer begins with God’s kingship and not with our needs. The day first says who is the King, then asks who we want to be before Him. That is what gives it depth: a new year begins when we decide to whom we entrust it.

The Talmud explains that the shofar is blown twice, before and during Musaf, “to confuse the Accuser” (Rosh Hashanah 16b): even our fears must give way to trust. The kabbalistic tradition connects the shofar with Binah, deep understanding, the source of teshuvah; the sound without words says what words cannot. And the two readings, Sarah and Hannah on the first day, Abraham and Isaac on the second, teach that the merit of a year rests both on a mother’s prayer and on a father’s faithfulness: two faithfulnesses, two ways of calling down a blessing.

A simple gesture for the festive table: before Kiddush, ask everyone to say in one sentence what they want to “sow” this year. The honey and the simanim then become a promise spoken aloud, not just a ritual.