Vayeilech/Shabbat Shuva: Remember the Shofar?

There is something strange going on in weekday morning services this week... or rather, what I find strange is the thing NOT happening. Over a month ago, we began the Season of Repentance - to help us prepare for the High Holidays - by reciting Psalm 27 every morning, and also

blowing one set of shofar blasts. "Get ready! Prepare yourselves! Rosh Hashanah is NEARLY here!!" That is what the shofar blowing is meant to convey. So essential to the season is the shofar itself, that the Torah never even calls the holiday "Rosh Hashanah"; it's known as "Yom Teruah," "A Day of Blowing the Horn." Even though Rosh Hashanah is behind us, the Season of Repentance continues to Yom Kippur, and even a little further into Sukkot and Hoshanah Rabbah; and we continue chanting Psalm 27 all the way to the end. So... where did the shofar go?

In addition to our special psalm, other significant prayers are added, e.g. Selichot, the Avinu Malkeinu prayer, and a few changes to the liturgy that remind us we are DEFINITELY still in the Season of

Repentance. There's just one thing missing: the shofar. Interestingly, both the presence AND the absence of the shofar are intricately part of the holiday experience. I mentioned that the Torah calls the holiday "Yom Teruah," which can be found in the Book of Numbers, 29:1. But in an earlier place, Leviticus, 23:24, the Torah ALSO refers to this day as "Zichron Teruah," "A Remembrance of the Blast." Somehow, the holiday itself should be about blasting the shofar AND about remembering that we DID blast it at some point. Like I said, I find this very strange.

The shofar is there to help us remember something important. Can anything else convey "WAKE UP!!" quite the same way? Does any other sound, or Jewish paraphernalia for that matter, connect us more viscerally and audibly to the holiday spirit? It really gets us in the mood like nothing else. Which is why, I would argue, it is actually VERY

important that we also take the symbol away. The shofar does something on our behalf... and it's something we need to learn to do ourselves. In this week's Torah portion, Vayeilech, Moses is close to the end of his life, and he sounds almost frantic about making sure the Israelites take responsibility for the Torah, for the relationship with God, and for this entire religious enterprise. The word "Teruah" that I mentioned earlier can also mean "shouting," and our parashah certainly seems to contain a lot of that. Moses admonishes the people, yelling: "I know how defiant and stiff-necked you are: even now, while I am still alive in your midst, you have been defiant toward Adonai; how much more, then, when I am dead!!" (Deut. 31:27) He knows he cannot keep doing things FOR them any longer. He NEEDS them to take it seriously.

The shofar, like Moses, can say the things we cannot say ourselves. They both seem to speak plainly, simply, and clearly, so we let them do the work for us. But the scaffolding is gone now. We need to march along on our own, and get ready for Yom Kippur even though the shofar has stopped reminding us to prepare.

"Yom Teruah" is behind us; it's time for "Zichron Teruah." Is there a way to hear the ringing of the shofar in our ears, even after the "shouts" themselves are gone? And if we hear it, how can we push ourselves to be better in the new year, as a result? Our Season of Repentance continues. In fact, we've still got more than two weeks to go. But no amount of time will make a difference, if the message falls on deaf ears. I pray that we each "listen up" and think about how to start the new year off right... AND keep it going as long as possible. It's a message worth remembering.

Photos in this blogpost:
1. CC image courtesy of Matanya on Wikimedia Commons
2. CC image courtesy of Alhen on Wikimedia Commons
3. CC image courtesy of Jim Padgett on Wikimedia Commons
4. CC image courtesy of Jewsforliberation on Wikimedia Commons