Last night at sundown marked the beginning of Rosh Hashanah, or, The Feast of Trumpets.
This is the celebration of the earth’s physical birthday (happy 5781!) on the 1st day of the month of Tishri (which happens to fall as the seventh month in the Jewish calendar.) Rosh Hashanah means head of the year.
Trumpets (shofars) will be blown today.
Those who still wait for a messiah consider the sound of the shofar a rousing call to repentance on the part of each individual. They will spend the next the next ten days seeking forgiveness from people they have wronged and searching their hearts for evil thoughts and deeds. Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement) will be spent fasting and praying and seeking God’s forgiveness for those sins.
For the followers of Jesus, the blowing of the trumpets is a sign of the return of Christ and a memorial of God’s grace to Abraham when he substituted a ram to be sacrified instead of Isaac (who foreshadows Jesus).
We will celebrate today by feasting and eating sweet things (traditionally, apples and honey; however, I have a bag of carrots so I’m making a carrot and apple cake.) The sweet foods represent the sweet year to come. This will be our prayer as we partake of the sweet dessert: Blessed are You, O Lord our God, King of the universe, creator of the fruit of the tree.” (Baruch atah adonai eloheinu melech ha’olam, borai p’ri haetz.)
Happy birthday, Earth! Happy New Year, friends!
