Aspaqlaria

“Aspaqlaria: Aseres Yemei Teshuvah” (44 pages) is a collection of essays adapted from those that appeared here on the subjects of teshuvah, shofar, vidui, and the Aseres Yemei Teshuvah. It is in Adobe Acrobat (PDF) format, ready for printing.

Table of contents:

Chassidim have a tendency of finding lessons in Jewish practices on the basis that “if they are not prophets, they are the ‘children of prophets’”. (“Children of prophets” is an idiom in Tanakh for those studying for prophecy.) Along those lines…

I don’t know about the rest of you, but I lack the patience to sing the entire Dayeinu, all 15 stanzas, to that “Dai, dai-, -einu, dai-, dai-, einu…” tune. So, we tend to only bother every fifth stanza or so.

However, even something as late and as trivial as this may have a deep holy lesson for us!

From the Y-mi Berakhos 67b-68a, in a discussion of things that the sages decreed down below and was ratified in the heavenly court:

R’ Avun in the name of R’ Yehoshua ben Levi: Even maaser [tithes, which is rabbinic when the majority of Jews aren't living in Israel]. As it says (Malakhi 3:10) “Bring all the maaser[, so that there may be foor in My house... would I not open the windows of heaven and pour for you a blessing ad beli dai]”

What is “ad beli dai” [until there is no enough]?

R’ Yosi bar Shim’on bar Ba in the name of R’ Yochanan: Something that is impossible to say about it “enough” is a berakah.

R’ Berachah, R’ Chelbo, and R’ Aba bar Ilai [68a] in the name of Rav: until your lips tire of saying “dai — enough”.

So it would seem there is value to a tune that thanks Hashem for all the berakhos He bestowed on us during the Exodus that tires out our lips saying “dai“!

(Updated again for 2009.)

One line in Ma’oz Tzur I particularly love.

The 5th verse of Ma’oz Tzur describes the Chanukah story. One phrase in this verse is “ufortzu chomos migdalai“, which would be literally translated “and burst open the walls of my citadel”. Mentally, I always pictured breaking down the walls of the Beis haMiqdosh, or perhaps a fortress. However, I found the following mishnah in Middos (Ch. 2, mishnah 2 in the Yachin uBo’az edition, mishnah 3 in Kahati’s — who splits up the Yu”B‘s mishnah 1 into 2 parts). The second chapter describes the Beis haMiqdosh as it would appear to someone walking in from outside the Temple Mount to the Altar. This mishna picks up right after you walk through the gate and onto the Temple Mount.

Inside of it is the soreg, 10 tefachim [appx 2'6"] high. It had thirteen peratzos (broken openings) there, that the Hellenist kings partzum (broke open). They returned and closed them off, and legislated corresponding to them 13 prostrations.

To help you picture what a soreg is, the root means woven. The Bartenura describes the soreg as a mechitzah woven out of thin wooden slats running at diagonals. The Bartenura compares it to the part of the bed used to support the mattress, with plenty of open space inside the weave.

He goes on to say that the Hellenists opened up holes in the soreg opposite each of the gates in the outer wall to let anyone see in. Note the shoresh used /p-r-tz/, the same as in the piyut. The soreg marked the limit for gentiles, they were not allowed in beyond that point. To the Hellenist mind, this havdalah bein Yisrael la’Amim, separation between the Jews and the other nations, was repugnant. It ran against their assimilationist efforts.

Rav Hutner (Pachad Yitzchaq, Chanukah 1:5) explains that emphasizing this division is why the mishnah has no mention of Chanukah. It is the Oral Torah which separates the Jews from non-Jews. Anyone can pick up a text and study it. But it’s the fact that the majority of the Torah is “written” on the hearts of the Jewish People, that halakhah is dynamic, not written ink-on-parchment, but a creative partnership between Hashem and the Jewish People, that makes it uniquely ours. This is why there is a prohibition against teaching Oral Torah to non-Jews, a prohibitions our sages debate is a kind of theft, or akin to marital infidelity. Therefore, there was special resistance against codifying the laws of Chanukah in particular, a desire by Rav Yehudah haNasi to keep them oral.

Chomos migdalei, the walls of my citadel, were not the mighty walls around the Temple Mount or the walls of a fortress. They were a see-through mechitzah, the realization that the Jew, as one of the Mamleches Kohanim, has a higher calling.

One possible reaction to assimilation is to build up the fortress walls. We can hope to stave off negative influences by reducing out exposure to the outside world. The idea that we need to stay distinct is not necessarily one that isn’t heard, but perhaps one that we are overly stressing.

I think this too is a message of the soreg. Yes, there is a separation between Jew and non-Jew, but it is only waist high and woven of slats with far more space than wood. The “walls of my fortress” are a reminder, not a solid barrier.

We are charged to be G-d’s “mamlekhes kohanim vegoy qadosh — a country of priests and a holy nation.” We need to balance the separation implied by the concept of qedushah with our role as kohanim, a priesthood providing religious leadership. We can not be priests if we do not stay to our special calling, but our special calling is self-indulgent if we do not use it to serve others. “Ki miTzion teitzei Sorah — because from Zion the Torah shall come forth.” By wallling ourselves in we not only protect ourselves, we prevent ourselves from teaching others.

This is an important facet of R’ SR Hirsch’s concept of “Torah im Derekh Eretz“. Yes, it does mean that we are to import derekh eretz, the ennobling elements of our surrounding culture and its sciences. But it also means that we are are to be the world’s moral voice, to contribute to the nobility of that society.

In the centuries of passion and scorn our mission was but imperfectly attainable but the ages of mildness and justice now begun beckon us to that glorious goal that every Jew and every Jewess should be in his or her own life a modest and unassuming priest or priestess of God and true humanity When such an ideal and such a mission await us can we still my Benjamin lament our fate?

- R’ SR Hirsch, “The Nineteen Letters”, 9th letter, tr. R’ Dr Bernard Drachman, pg 86

For this future which is promised us in the glorious predictions of the inspired prophets whom God raised up for our ancestors we hope and pray but actively to accelerate its coming were sin and is prohibited to us while the entire purpose of the Messianic age is that we may in prosperity exhibit to mankind a better example of Israel than did our ancestors the first time while hand in hand with us the entire race will be joined in universal brotherhood through the recognition of God the All One On account of this purely spiritual nature of the national character of Israel it is capable  of the most intimate union with states with perhaps this difference that while others seek in the state only the material benefits which it secures considering possession and enjoyment as the highest good Israel can only regard it as a means of fulfilling the mission of humanity Summon up I pray you before your mental vision the picture of such an Israel dwelling in freedom in the midst of the nations and striving to attain unto its ideal every son of Israel a respected and influential exemplar priest of righteousness and love disseminating among the nations not specific Judaism for proselytism is interdicted but pure humanity…

- Ibid. pp 162-163

Noach blessed two of his sons, “Yaft E-lokim leYefes, veyishkon beohalei Sheim — G-d gave beauty to Yefes, and dwells in the tents of Sheim.” To Rav Hirsch, this is a description of a partnership, Yefes’s mastery of derekh eretz and Sheim’s spiritual gifts.

When David Dinkins ran for mayor of New York, he called the city’s diversity a “glorious mosaic”. Not the melting pot metaphor that my grandfather encountered when they came to the U.S., the idea that convinced so many others of that generation that being a “real American” meant to assimilate. Being part of the whole and contributing to the whole by maintaining and celebrating our nation’s unique identity and perspective.

This too underlies the tefillah of Aleinu. The first paragraph is all about the uniqueness of the Jew. “It is up to us to praise the Master of Everything… For He did not make us like the nations of the world, and didn’t position us like the nations of the land… For they bow to vanity and emptiness… and we bow, prostrate and acknowledge before the King, King of Kings…” And then, the second paragraph switches to a universalist theme. “… That we soon see the Splendor of your Might… to repair the world into a kingdom of Shad-dai, and all children of flesh will bow to Your Name, to turn to you all the heads of the land…” And what’s the connector between these themes? “Al kein nekaveh — therefore we are expectant.” Because we are Hashem’s unique people with the unique role He entrusted to us, we await the day that all of mankind come together, and “they will recognize and know, all the dwellers of the globe, that to You all knee bows, and every tongue swears allegiance.”

Unfortunately, by building up the fortress walls, we miss many opportunities to act as a priesthood. It is a shame that it’s not the most observant Jews who are most vocal about Darfur. If we accuse the world for their silence during the Holocaust, then people who feel that the events in Darfur do qualify as genocide can not stand by when it happens to someone else. How much more so if we recognize ourselves as kohanim to the world! More recently, the Union for Reform Judaism is currently raising money for the Nothing but Nets program, an initiative to distribute mosquito netting in malaria ridden parts of Africa. (Communities in which they have distributed $10 nets show a 90% decline of incidents of malaria.)

Similarly, helping out at the local soup kitchen. Earlier today I received an invitation from a synagogue to serve meals there. I was disappointed, although not surprised, to see that the synagogue was not Orthodox. Yes, we need to worry about Jewish causes; there are far more people out there to see to the general need. But I was proud of the local Young Israel, who used to staff a similar kitchen on days like the upcoming Thursday (Dec 25th), when non-Jewish volunteers tend to have family obligations.

Let me be clear: I am not suggesting all this as a nice Shabbos-morning style derashah on the concept of a woven 2-1/2′ mechitzah as “the walls of my citadel”. I believe this is the actual meaning of the serug, which was sufficient as a reminder, and yet allowed Jew and non-Jew to serve the same G-d at the same Temple. “For My ‘home’ shall be called for all the people ‘a house for prayer’.”

Antiochus breached the soreg in an attempt to unify his empire as a melting pot, everyone Hellenized. This would have destroyed our goy qadosh, our nations unique voice in the world. However, the ideal soreg defines a distinction, not forces a separation. Once the tile that is the Jewish people, our role as teachers, moral guides and a conduit of sanctity, is protected and intact, then it can and must be part of Hashem’s glorious mosaic. Only by having a serug can we balance integrity and priesthood.

The word migdalai not only means “my towers” or “my citadels”, it can also be read “those things that make me great.” Only by having both separation and contact of a soreg can the walls of our miqdashei me’at, our synagogues and batei medrash, truly be chomos migdalai.

(My first attempt at this post was seriously flawed, both typographically and in flow. This is a significant reworking. If you have ideas for further improvement, they’re eagerly invited.)

I

Why is it that we established the custom to read the Torah once annually from Shemini Atzeres to Shemini Atzeres, thereby turning the second day of Shemini Atzeres (the only day, in Israel) into Simchas Torah? What’s the connection between completing the Torah and Shemini Atzeres in particular?

Second, Rosh haShanah is called “Yom haZikaron“, or “Yom Zikhron Teru’ah” (the Day of Remembrance, or the Day of Remembrance of the Broken Shofar Cry). At of the three berakhos that make up the heart of the Rosh haShanah Mussaf, Zikhronos is the longest. But what do we mean when we praise Hashem for remembering? What does He remember? For that matter, what does “memory” mean when speaking of the One Who created time, rather than a person who lives within its flow?When a person remembers, his brain is reliving now something that happened in the past. For Hashem, though, there is no first-hand experience of time, no “now” and no “past”. What then does Zikhronos mean?

I assume you’re now wondering a third question — what do the previous two questions have to do with each other?

II

When we look at the Jewish Year, we find the holidays mentioned in the Tanakh are grouped around two seasons: fall and spring. In the fall, we have the Yamim Nora’im, Sukkos and Shemini Atzeres. In the spring: Purim, Pesach and Shavu’os. The gemara compares Purim and the holiday the Torah calls “Yom haKippurim“. It also compares Pesach and Shavuos, learning many laws from one to the other on the basis of a gezeira shava (comparison due to similar terminology) because both are placed on the 15th of the month. And Shavuos is called by our sages “Atzeres“, a parallel to Shemini Atzeres.

Purim commemorates the completion of the process that began on Shavuos. On Shavuos, we accepted the Torah because “He held over them the mountain like a barrel”, Hashem threatening to crush the Jewish people if they would decline. This situation lasted all through the prophetic period, where sin often had supernatural consequences. It’s only after G-d “Hides his ‘Face’” on Purim, acting while hiding through nature, that “qiymu vekiblu haYehudim“, the loyalty to the Torah took on a higher level. (And the centrality of willing acceptance by the Jewish People is also why Purim had to be rabbinic, from us, rather than decreed by Hashem.)

And so, given those pieces of the structure of the year, I would expect reflections of Shemini Atzeres to illuminate our understanding of the Yamim Nora’im, as there should be a connection between them similar to that between Shavu’os and Purim.

On each day of Sukkos there is a different number of bulls offered in the mussaf offering. On the first day, 13 bulls; the second day, 12, and so on until on the 7th day 7 were brought. All together, 70 bulls. The gemara (Sukkah 55b) teaches that these 70 bulls are one each for the 70 nations of the world. The medrash (Yalkut Shim’oni, Bamidbar 684) references Tehillim “Instead of My love — they hated Me.” (109:4) “R’ Yehudah said, ‘How foolish are the nations! They lost something, and they don’t even know what it is they lost! When the Beis haMiqdash stood, the mizbei’ach would bring them forgiveness.” — Through these 70 bulls — “Now – who will bring them forgiveness?”

And then on Shemini Atzeres, one bull. An offering for the Jewish People. “This can be compared to a king of flesh and blood who said to his servants:, ‘prepare for me a great banquet.’ On the final day he said to his beloved, ‘prepare for me a small meal so I may enjoy your [company].’” (Sukkah 55a)

The connection between Shemini Atzeres and Simchas Torah is that expressed in the berakhah said before studying Torah. When the gemara asks what that berakhah should be, Rav Hamnunah’s answer, “asher bakhar banu mikol ha’amim venasan lanu es Toraso… — Who has chosen us from all the nations and given us His Torah… who gives the Torah” is called the elite of the various suggestions.

Shemini Atzeres, the one day at the end of the fall holiday series dedicated to the special relationship between G-d and the Jewish People is therefore also the day of commemorating that He gave us the Torah.” To be “the Chosen People” is to be the “benei beris“, people of the covenant.

And, as I wrote, that implies that we should expect the notion of covenant to be central to the Yamim Nora’im as well.

III

The Zohar writes, “‘אַבְרָהָ֣ם ׀ אַבְרָהָ֑ם’ (Bereishis 22:11) has a pesiq [a pausal trop mark “׀”] between the two names, whereas ‘מֹשֶׁ֥ה מֹשֶׁ֖ה’ (Shemos 3:4) has no break.” When Hashem calls Avraham at the Aqeida He uses Avraham’s name twice and there is a mark there telling us there is a pause, in how we read it. When Moshe is called, also with a doubling of his name, as the Burning Bush, there is no pause. What is this distinction the Zohar is drawing our attention to?

Rav Chaim Volozhiner (Ru’ach Chaim 1:1) answers this question using a description from the gemara. In Yevamos 49b, the prophecy of most prophets is compared to seeing through a cloudy lens or mirror (aspaqlaria shei’na mei’ra), but Moshe’s prophecy was through a clear lens or mirror (aspaqlaria hame’ira). Even the prophets have a layer of physicality which clouds up their view, which divides our souls into a higher level that is more aware of the Divine and a lower level that lives in a body. For most of us, our consciousness stays with our lower selves. A prophet can sometimes “see” from the perspective of the higher soul above that barrier. But it’s a cloudy vision. Moshe entirely lacked that barrier. He had only one self.

Rav Chaim explains that for all his greatness, Avraham too experienced that split. Therefore Hashem calls two Avraham’s – the one where his awareness resides, and the higher soul in heaven. Moshe’s call lacks that “pesiq”, that pausal line, representing a lack of barrier, a unity of the lower “Moshe” and the upper one.

At the moment a person is first born, he is pretty much all potential. Everything that baby will accomplish in life lies before him. He didn’t yet build that line, that gap between who he is and who Hashem created him capable of becoming.

IV

The contents of birkhas Zikhronos doesn’t describe a memory of the past, it describes remembering for the future. “You remember all the actions of the world… And upon the nations, it is sentenced: which to the sword, and which for peace….” The berakhah continues asking Hashem to remember us the way He remembered Noach, “and also Noach you remembered in love, and You appointed him in a statement of salvation and compassion…” And then citing the pasuq, “And G-d remembered Noach and all the living things and all the animals with him in the ark, and Hashem made a wind pass over the earth, and the water subsided.”

The other nine verse of Zikhronos are also about Hashem remembering his covenants with us. More so, His remembering that which He found in us making us worthy of the covenants. Among them:

“And G-d heard their cries, and G-d remembered His covenant with Avraham, with Yitzchaq, and with Ya’aqov.”

“And I will remember My covenant of Yaaqov, and also My covenant of Yitzchaq, and also my covenant of Avraham I will remember, and I will remember the land.”

“He gave food to those who are in awe of Him, and He always will remember His covenant.”

“Go our and call in the ears of Jerusalem to say, ‘So says Hashem: I remembered for you the lovingkindnesses of your youth, the love of your wedding, your walking behind Me in the wilderness, in the unfarmed lands.”

“I remembered my covenant with you in the days of your youth, and I established with you an eternal covenant.”

And finally, “My dear child Ephraim, isn’t he a delightful child? For often I speak about him, I will remember him still…”

Yahadus has a focus on the notion of beris, of a covenant where two parties join together for their common good. (Unlike a contract, where each is aided in their own good in exchange for helping the other.) Man is redeemed through the covenent, through joining together with other and with G-d to work for a good that is greater than Himself.

Teshuvah on our part is critical. But Hashem controls the situations we face. Whether we live in a world that poses challenges to our efforts or makes them easier.

Just as Shemini Atzeres, the day of celebrating our chosenness as a people, naturally became Simchas Torah, the day we celebrate the covenant, the mission for which we were chosen. Zikhronos is a call to remember the person who entered the beris, the person for whom hopes were so high. But since we are speaking of the Creator, when say the word “Zokheir” we really mean “acting in a manner that, if done by a person, would be interepreted as being driven by memory”. When we ask Hashem to “remember”, we’re asking Him to help us reignite the plans we made together.

Zikhronos is G-d remembering our potential, and from that, His plans for us. As it closes “… Zokheir haberis – Blessed are You .. the Rememberer of [or Who Remembers] the Covenant.”  It is our calling out to Hashem to invoke that beris. To remember the “delightful child” He created us as, and to make that potential manifest.

We can use this idea to enhance the notion of teshuvah – which literally translates to “return”. Not only is it a person’s return to Hashem, it’s a person’s reapproachment to the person Hashem created him to be, and the role for which He was created.

This  is the “dear child Ephraim” of the berakhah of Zikhronos.

q

אמר רבי יהודה משום רבי עקיבא … אמר הקדוש ברוך הוא: … ואמרו לפני בראש השנה מלכיות זכרונות ושופרות. מלכיות: כדי שתמליכוני עליכם. זכרונות: כדי שיעלה זכרוניכם לפני לטובה. ובמה? בשופר.

Rabbi Yehudah said an idea from Rabbi Aqiva …: The Holy One, blessed be He said, “… say before Me on Rosh haShanah, Malkhios, Zikhoronos and Shoferos.
“Malkhios: so that you shall make Me King over you;
“Zikhoronos: so that your memories shall come before Me;
“And with what? With a shofar.”

- Rosh haShanah 16a

(Sidenote: There is a dispute as to what this implies as to the nature of the obligation. Rashi holds that these berakhos are mandatory from the Torah, if said with / as part of shofar blowing. He says that Malkhios is the essence of the day, as we see in practice we combine it with the usual holiday blessing for the day. And the words “yom zikhron teru’ah — a day of memory of horn-blasts” obligates us in Zikhronos and Shoferos. The Ritva in general holds that asmachtos, usually translated as mnemonic devices, are actually hints from G-d that an idea is a good one, but not mandatory. Thus a law from an asmachta is one that was suggested by G-d but made obligatory by the Chakhamim. Here, the Ritva says it’s an asmachta — G-d said “say before me”, but it wasn’t made mandatory until the Chakhamim codified it.)

מתנ’: כל השופרות כשרים חוץ משל פרה מפני שהוא קרן אמר רבי יוסי והלא כל השופרות נקראו קרן שנאמר (יהושוע ו) במשוך בקרן היובל:

גמ’: … עולא אמר היינו טעמא דרבנן כדרב חסדא דאמר רב חסדא מפני מה אין כהן גדול נכנס בבגדי זהב לפני ולפנים לעבוד עבודה לפי שאין קטיגור נעשה סניגור

Mishnah: Every shofar is kosher except for that of a cow, because it’s called “qeren“. Rabbi Yosi said: but isn’t every shofar called “qeren“,  as it says “In the middle of the qeren of the yoveil” (Yehoshua 6)?

Gemara: Ula said: What is the reason for the Rabbanan [the unnamed first opinion in the mishnah]? [Because they rule] like Rav Chisda. For Rav Chisda said: Why doesn’t the kohein gadol wear the bigei zahav — [his full uniform, including] the golden clothes when lifnai velifnim — before Me and within [the Holy of Holies]? Because a prosecutor can not be turned into the defense attourney.

- Rosh haShanah 26a

Rav Dovid Lifshitz addressed these gemaras in his pre-Rosh haShanah shiur of 1989. (See here for an entry that opens with another thought from that talk.)

Notice that the kohein gadol did wear the full bigdei zahav the rest of Yom Kippur, including when doing the other parts of the service of the very same qorban! The notion that ein qeteigor naaseh saneigor, that the prosecution can’t become the defense, is not a law in atonement, it’s a law in lifnai velifnim.

What then does it mean when this rule applies to shofar? Rashi points out that the gemara is assuming a comparison — listening to the shofar is tantamount to entering the Holy of Holies, only performed by the kohein gadol on Yom Kippur!

To add something of my own to this thought, in the Sifra’s version of the thought Rabbi Yehudah repeated from R’ Aqiva, it concludes, “ובמה? בשופר של חרות — And with what? with a shofar of freedom.”  As Yeshaiah writes (27:12) “יג וְהָיָ֣ה ׀ בַּיּ֣וֹם הַה֗וּא יִתָּקַע֮ בְּשׁוֹפָ֣ר גָּדוֹל֒ וּבָ֗אוּ הָאֹֽבְדִים֙ בְּאֶ֣רֶץ אַשּׁ֔וּר וְהַנִּדָּחִ֖ים בְּאֶ֣רֶץ מִצְרָ֑יִם וְהִשְׁתַּֽחֲו֧וּ לַֽה’ בְּהַ֥ר הַקֹּ֖דֶשׁ בִּירֽוּשָׁלִָֽם׃ — And it will be on that day, he will blow a great shofar, and those lost in Ashur and those taken captive in Egypt will come and they will bow to Hashem on the holy mountain in Jerusalem.”

Similarly, the shofar‘s blow at the shemittah year declared the freedom of slaves. A slave who refuses his freedom, preferring to live under his master’s patronage, has his ear pierced.  The ear that heard “ki avadai heim — for they are My servants” (Vayiqra 25:42) should know “My servants — and not servants to my servants” (Bava Metzi’ah 10a).

Cheirus appears associated with the tablets, which rested in the ark in the center of the Holy of Holies.”חָר֖וּת עַל־הַלֻּחֹֽת׃’ “אל תקרי חָרוּת אלא חֵרוּת — ‘engraved (charus) on the tablets’ (Shemos 32:16) — don’t read ‘charus‘ (engraved), rather ‘cheirus‘ (freedom).” Note also how Yeshaiah associates the shofar’s call with coming to the Temple Mount. The shofar‘s call to freedom would seem to be an echo of the freedom engraved on the luchos.

Back to rebbe’s shiur…

Remember the feeling when you first came to the Kotel. The wall which Hashem promised us would stand until the end of time, whose persistence is testimony to our relationship with Him. And you reach the stones, the wall around the Temple Mount, and the feeling is overwhelming. Picture the emotions one would have being able to actually enter the courtyard. To be a kohein entering the Temple itself. To be the kohein gadol, after a week of preparation, now on the holiest day of the year busy with the holiest of service, to enter lifnai velifnim.

That’s Shofar.

How does one accept Hashem as Melekh, and remember our faults so that He remembers our potential? At that moment — “with the shofar.”

(Rebbe actually presented this thought before giving a source. After the students were entranced with the rebbe’s great chiddush, his passionate novellum, he asked one of them to read the Rashi and Tosafos. Had they known it was “just a Rashi”, they wouldn’t have listened the same.)

(Significantly enlarged from the 2005 version. -micha)

I

Melukhah (kingship) is a major theme, if not the major theme of Rosh haShanah. Aside from the ubiquity of the word in our liturgy for Rosh haShanah and the Ten Days of Teshuvah, we find another indication in the Amidah for Rosh haShanah‘s Mussaf. Three blessings are inserted to the middle of that Amidah – Malkhios (statements about G‑d being King), Zikhronos (about His acting on His “Memory”) and Shoferos (about shofar, about the glory and noise of divine intervention). Like every holiday and Shabbos, though, there also has to be a Birkhas haYom, a blessing about the day. For Rosh haShanah Mussaf, Malkhios is fused with the Birkhas haYom, because kingship is the message of the day.

When Yoseif tells his brothers his dreams, they ask, “מָלֹ֤ךְ תִּמְלֹךְ֙ עָלֵ֔ינוּ אִם־מָשׁ֥וֹל תִּמְשֹׁ֖ל בָּ֑נוּ?” (Bereishis 37:8), which the JPS translation renders “Shalt thou indeed reign over us? or shalt thou indeed have dominion over us?” Usually this is taken to be a repeated question, the two halves meaning roughly the same thing.

The Ibn Ezra suggests otherwise. When commanding us to appoint a king, the phrase is “שׂ֣וֹם תָּשִׂ֤ים עָלֶ֨יךָ֙ מֶ֔לֶךְ – appoint for yourselves a king” (Vevarim 17:15). A melekh (king) is appointed by the masses, he rules by the acclimation of the people. This stands in contrast to the mosheil (ruler) who, however well intended, has to rule by imposing his (or His) will on them.

The brothers are saying that they weren’t ready to place Yoseif as a king over themselves. “You think you would be melekh, an accepted king over us? No, you would only stand as mosheil, in opposition to our will.”

The Vilna Gaon takes this idea and applies it to several verses we know from the siddur.

” כִּ֣י לַה’ הַמְּלוּכָ֑ה וּ֝מֹשֵׁ֗ל בַּגּוֹיִֽם׃ – For G‑d’s is the Kingship, and He rules over nations…” (Tehillim 22:29) Hashem has the Melukhah, in potential He is King. However, as the nations do not yet accept Him willingly as their King, Hashem serves for them as their mosheil.

” מַֽלְכוּתְךָ֗ מַלְכ֥וּת כָּל־עֹֽלָמִ֑ים וּ֝מֶֽמְשַׁלְתְּךָ֗ בְּכָל־דּ֥וֹר וָדֹֽר׃- Your kingship is a kingship for all eternity; and/but your rule is in every generation and generation.” (Tehillim 145:13, said in “Ashrei“) Malkhus is truly eternal. Memshalah will only last from generation to generation, through the course of history.

At the culmination of history, ” וְהָיָ֧ה ה’ לְמֶ֖לֶךְ עַל־כָּל־הָאָ֑רֶץ בַּיּ֣וֹם הַה֗וּא יִֽהְיֶ֧ה ה’ אֶחָ֖ד וּשְׁמ֥וֹ אֶחָֽד׃ – Hashem will be King over the entire world, on that day Hashem will be One, and His reputation will be One.” (Zechariah 14:9, Aleinu) In the messianic age, after the “generations”, Hashem will be Melekh over the other nations as well. At that time, “veyei’asu kulam agudah achas la’asos ritzonicha… – and they will all make a single union to do Your will” (High Holiday Amidah) as willing subjects of the King.

II

In Pachad Yitzchaq for Rosh haShanah (ma’amar 11), Rav Hutner notes a curious question in the gemara. (I discussed this earlier, in the class I gave on VeHayah im Shamo’ah, you can listen to it here.)

The first paragraph of Shema is said as a daily acceptance of G-d as King. Qabbalas ol malkhus Shamayim – accepting the yoke of the Kingdom of [the One in] heaven. However, nowhere in the paragraph does the word “Melekh” actually appear! In what sense is Shema accepting Hashem’s Kingship?

The gemara in Rosh haShanah describes the structure of the Mussaf Amidah for the day, and tells us that each of the three additional berakhos should be buttressed with 10 verses from Tanakh: three from the Torah, three from Kesuvim, three from Navi, and a final verse from the Torah. In practice, this last verse is the opening verse of Shema. But the gemara, while our norm was still developing, asks whether that verse, “Shema Yisrael…” may be used as one of the verses for Malkhios. (Rosh haShanah 32b)

Rav Hutner asks: What’s the question? If we say this very verse every day for the sole purpose of accepting Hashem as King, how could it not be viable for the very same declaration on Rosh haShanah?

More so, the gemara’s source-text on the previous page (32a) for saying Malkhios altogether is from the end of Shema, “ani Hashem E‑lokeichem – I am Hashem your G‑d.” How can this be the entire basis of the obligation, and yet the words “Hashem E‑lokeinu Hashem Echad” are not only non-ideal, but the gemara can ask whether they are even sufficient to fulfill it?

Third, in order to fulfill the mitzvah of qabbalas ol Malkhus Shamayim that is part of Shema, one must also say the words “Hashem Echad“. So then why is the source for Malkhios given as “ani Hashem E-lokeichem“, a formulation that doesn’t declare Hashem as One? Why wasn’t the first verse of Shema cited?

It would seem that the manner in which this daily acceptance of ol malkhus Shamayim without actually calling Him “Melekh” is fundamentally different in kind than what we are trying to accomplish on Rosh haShanah.

Rashi explains Shema as saying, “Listen and accept Israel, Hashem, Who is our G-d now, in this world, will be, in the World to Come, One G-d [accepted by all].” In what way is G‑d’s presence in this world not unified? We do not perceive Him as One. As we learn in Pesachim (50a), it is because we do not perceive Hashem as one that we have two distinct blessings. When something good happens, we say “haTov vehaMeitiv – the Good and the Bestower of good”, but when something bad happens we say a berakhah that calls Him “Dayan haEmes – the Judge of truth”.

(As we saw in another essay, the Ketzos haChoshen understands this berakhah as accepting G‑d’s judgment as to when to hide truth, and when to allow it to be visible. The process of revealing the truth, of letting “the truth spring forth from the ground” is what we call ge’ulah. And so, this judgment of the truth only occurs before the final redemption.)

In the redeemed world, we will be able to see the good in everything, and thus Hashem’s Oneness. As we quoted from Zechariah, ” וְהָיָ֧ה ה’ לְמֶ֖לֶךְ עַל־כָּל־הָאָ֑רֶץ בַּיּ֣וֹם הַה֗וּא יִֽהְיֶ֧ה ה’ אֶחָ֖ד וּשְׁמ֥וֹ אֶחָֽד׃ – Hashem will be King over the entire world, on that day Hashem will be One, and His reputation will be One.”

In the first verse of Shema, we are speaking of this future time, when Hashem will be King over everything. For this idea, speaking of the latent “Hashem Echad” which we know is there, but can’t be perceived, is a critical component of the obligation. The gemara’s conclusion, that the verse may be used for Malkhios after all (which we do, as the last, 10th verse) is based on the clarification given in the rest of the paragraph, “Ve’ahavta — And you shall love Hashem your G-d and serve Him…” that the intent is also making that Platonic Kingship manifest in this world. Even though this is not explicit in the verse itself.

We also touched on this kind of Kingship along the way in our previous discussion. On the verse “כִּ֣י לַה’ הַמְּלוּכָ֑ה וּ֝מֹשֵׁ֗ל בַּגּוֹיִֽם׃ – For G‑d’s is the Kingship, and He rules over nations…” my explanation took it for granted that when speaking of malkhus as Hashem’s possession, we were referring to Kingship in potential.

Similarly, we say in Adon Olam,

אֲדוֹן עוֹלָם אֲשֶׁר מָלַךְ בְּטֶרֶם כָּל יְצִיר נִבְרָא

לְעֵת נַעֲשָׂה בְחֶפְצוֹ כֹּל  אֲזַי מֶלֶךְ שְׁמוֹ נִקְרָא

Eternal Master Who was King before all things were created

Once He, with His Will, made all, then his name was called “King”.

Hashem is unchanging, He was King in some ideal sense even without creation. But to be a king, “ein melekh belo am – there is no king without a nation” declaring Him their King.

In Shema, we are referring to “asher Malakh”. On Rosh haShanah the goal is to make that manifest in this world – “azai Melekh shemo niqra“. Not the theory of Kingship, but actually declaring Him as King. “Hashem E-lokeikhem” even before we reach the point of “Hashem Echad“.

This is why the gemara can be unsure if Shema can be used for the obligation of Rosh haShanah. It describes the ideal of Kingship but lacks an outright statement of calling Him “Melekh“.

III

Why is it so essentially part of Rosh haShanah to declare our active acceptance of Hashem as King?

As we saw from Adon Olam, this is one of the reasons for which man was created. The shift from Asher Malakh before we existed to “Melekh” shemo niqra. We therefore declare His Kingship on the anniversary of the creation of Man, Rosh haShanah.

It’s interesting to note that the man-Melekh relationship is a sub-theme in Purim as well. There is no over mention of G‑d in the book of Esther. However, the Talmud tells us that each occurrence of the word “melekh” that appears in that book (without naming the king) can be understood midrashically as a reference to G‑d. When Esther approaches the king, which is apparently Achashveirosh but has some parallel in her approaching the King as well, she opens her request with the word “Uvchein” (“therefore” or “with this”). Similarly as do a number of requests in the blessing of the day for the High Holidays (and therefore the Rosh haShanah Mussaf berakhah about Divine Kingship).

When Moses asked “הַרְאֵ֥נִי נָ֖א אֶת־כְּבֹדֶֽךָ׃ – Please show me Your Glory” (Shemos 33:18), Hashem’s answer was to give to him the 13 terms describing the aspects of Divine Mercy. Hashem’s Glory is his Mercy. And so, on Rosh haShanah we ask, “Meloch al kol ha’olam kulo bichvodecha -  be King over all the entire world in Your Glory” (Siddur). Thus, his “throne” is Mercy, as we say in Selichos “Keil Melekh yosheiv al kisei rachamim – G‑d, King, “sitting” on the throne of Mercy.

A Melekh need not impose His will in the same way that a Mosheil does. A Melekh, therefore, has the opportunity to act with kindness and mercy at times when a Mosheil could not. We therefore introduce High Holidays, the days of judgment, by declaring G‑d’s melukhah. By voluntarily accepting Him as king we obviate the need for G‑d to direct us on the right path through trials and tribulations. The point of Rosh haShanah is accepting Hashem as our Melekh not just in theory, but declaring our acceptance of His Reign, thereby changing His relationship to us from one of Mosheil to that of Melekh.

We, on the anniversary of Hashem creating His subjects, declare Him as King, and thereby enthrone Him as a Merciful one.

A couple of years ago I collected some of my own thoughts and others from around the web into a commentary on the Haggadah shel Pesach. I took special care to give the seider a definite structure, as in this blog entry, in accordance with the meaning of the word seider, order.

Blogged Divrei Torah about Pesach are all available by  visiting this category.

Earlier divrei Torah for Pesach:

Toras Aish 5762 Lekhem Oni and Packing Peanuts

Aspaqlaria 5764 Who Knows Four?