Each town and culture has its time marker; Judaism has its own. This September 15, 2023, Judaism will be celebrating the entry of the year 5784. It is not a banal account; The new year is called Rosh Hashanah, and it is one of the most significant holidays in the Jewish calendar. It is the day on which the birthday of the first human being, Adam, is celebrated, and therefore, it is the crowning of a Hebrew New Year. It marks the beginning of a period of reflection, repentance and renewal. It is an ancient tradition: the idea that 5,784 years ago human activity began in the creation of the world.
The account of the creation of the world is the belief of the Jewish worldview of the time. Times are not simply an abstract measurement, but a tool through which God's will is revealed and the relationship between God and human beings is established. Judaism sanctifies time, giving a deep spiritual and moral meaning, which links history, tradition and the relationship of man with the transformation, use and care that we make of the universe day after day.
The Hebrew New Year toasts life, but the goal of a social gathering to relax is far from the goal; It is precisely the opposite. Rosh Hashanah is a time of deep introspection, a time to meditate on the actions and behaviors of the previous year. It is an opportunity to repent of mistakes made and commit to being better people in the future. This introspection implies recognizing that each human being is a unique and indispensable creation of God, who claims from each one universal responsibility for our actions, present, past and future.
But all these serious and dominant values do not take us away from the joy of the moment. We started the night eating apple with honey, as the apple is associated with the biblical story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. According to Kabbalah, the choice to eat an apple represents an act of free will and the ability to choose between good and evil. To bite into the perfection of the world to take a bite sweetened by honey, traditionally called the elixir of life.
Some customs also toast with white wine, the color of purity, and there is also the head of a lamb or fish, symbolizing the leadership power that man must exercise in his life, like the head that dominates the rest of the members of the family. her body. During Rosh Hashanah, the shofar, a ram's horn, is also blown as a call to wake up and reflect on the direction of our lives. To impose the spirit and the refined silhouette of the forms above the roughness of the material.
Finally, the Tashlich ceremony takes place, in which we get closer to nature, next to a fish pond, we shake our clothes to symbolize the elimination of our faults. And the nuance that the conscious man with the fullness of living on New Year's Day can begin a new cycle of life where the past has been healed and the future is about to be assumed.
Families and friends gather to share festive meals and pray together with prayers for health, prosperity and peace. We say a "Lechaim", the Hebrew toast to life, which is the scenic way in which our sublime desires are transformed into responsibility for a people who live clinging to their tradition.
