Every year before Rosh Hashanah, the Ba’al Shem Tov, the founder of Hasidism, held a competition to see who would blow the shofar for him. In order to blow shofar, not only did you need talent, but you also had to learn the elaborate system of prayers that were said to direct the shofar blasts to heaven. All of the competitors practiced these prayers for months, years even. One such man approached the Ba’al Shev Tov with confidence, but immediately, when standing in front of him, he felt that nothing could have prepared him for such an important, holy task. He choked. His lungs wouldn’t bring up the air for the sounds and his mind couldn’t remember the special prayers. He stood there in silence, pained and embarrassed as he felt such tremendous failure. He began to weep; his body heaved with sobs.
“You’re hired!” The Ba’al Shem Tov exclaimed. The man didn’t understand. He had failed entirely. The Ba’al Shem Tov explained that it is not perfection he was seeking. It is the raw emotion, the broken-heartedness, it is our longing, pouring out of us, that will affect the heavens.
I’ve always loved the blowing of the shofar as a part of the Rosh Hashanah service. The call is so primal and so raw and real that it somehow expresses, even without words, everything that I need to say. The shofar’s blasts are like the sobs of that man, coming from the most real place inside of him. There is no language that can be paired with those blasts.
This year, we are blessed that Steve Lubin and Paul Rubin will be our official shofar blowers on Rosh Hashanah. But we want to involve more of you, because the shofar is such a universal language. On both days of Rosh Hashanah, there will be a part of Musaf where anyone that has a shofar will be encouraged to come to the bima. It requires no experience and the only special prayers you need are the ones already in your heart. If you have a shofar and you want to be a part of this (or your child does), please let me know, and I will follow up with more information. It will be an exuberant shofar jam-session filled with emotion and prayer.
We’ve been blowing the shofar every morning for the past few weeks, and each morning, I am moved by the sounds that emerge from this instrument, this vessel that used to be part of a living thing. And I remember, if that ram’s horn can be turned into such a beautiful sound, each of us has the power to transform as well.
