ראש השנה 5770

 Rosh Hashanah is filled with many special Tefilos that signify the specialness of Rosh Hashanah and inherently elucidate some ideas of what we are supposed to be getting from Rosh Hashanah. There is one Tefilah that we say on both nights of Rosh Hashanah that can give us a slightly different perspective on Rosh Hashanah. That Tefilah is “Ledavid Mizmor” that we say right after Shemoneh Esrai of Maariv.

 The piyut begins by establishing the fact that God created the world and that everything truly belongs to God. The next Pasuk seems to go off on a tangent to discuss who can get close to God in the Beis Hamikdash. Dovid Hamelech answers that it is someone who is one hundred percent honest who never swore falsely.

 If we look at the first four Pasukim, the first two don’t seem to relate to the next two. What is the connection between the knowledge that God created the world and the fact that a person who is honest can get truly close to God. Furthermore, why is this particular piyut said on Rosh Hashanah? If the whole purpose of Rosh Hashanah is to discuss the kingship of God over us, why don’t we pick a Tefilah that relates to the kingship of God?

 In order to answer this question properly, we first must try to understand what it means to have God as a king over us. What we do on Rosh Hashanah when we express our feelings that God is our king is the recognition that (unlike a mortal king) everything that we have in life is from God. There is nothing we can achieve or receive if it is not the will of God. With this idea we can now answer our questions.

 Most believing Jews, if you would ask them, would surely say that God created the world. However, if you would ask those same people if the amount of money they can earn in any given year is based on their actions, most of them would say yes. It is this seeming contradiction which is the explanation of the connection between the first four lines of this piyut. In order for a person to merit being truly close to God he has to be on the level where his true belief in both the concepts of God’s creating the world and the fact that God runs all facets of his life are the same.

 Now let us use this idea to explain why this piyut specifically is said on Rosh Hashanah. Rosh Hashanah is a preparation period for most of us who fit in the category of Baynonim whose judgment is sealed on Yom Kippur. In order for a person to truly prepare himself to do a proper Teshuva he must first believe that God runs the world in a way that impacts his daily life and that there is a consequence to his actions. Only once a person realizes that, will he be able to feel the remorse necessary to jump start him to doing a real Teshuva.

 One way for us to get to this level is to bring God actively in our daily lives. When we need to do something, whether at work or in any other instance, we should pray a silent prayer to God for success. When something good happens to us, we should immediately thank God. All of these steps help us bring God into our lives and help us internalize the point that everything we have is from God and our actions have the ability to impact the life that God will decree on us for the coming year. This will hopefully enable us to do a true Teshuva and merit to have a ksivah vechasima tovah. 

 5768 ראש השנה

 We know that Rosh Hashanah is called the day of judgment, the day that all of Bnei Yisroel is judged. We also know that on Rosh Hashanah we make no mention of the fact that we did sins. Unlike Yom Kippur we don’t say viduy even once. What we do almost exclusively is to mention over and over the idea that God is our king.

 The question that arises is what does this have to do with the fact that Rosh Hashanah is the day of judgment? How does this impact our Teshuvah, forgiveness from our sins or being judged favorably for the New Year?

 There are several different explanations given to explain this. One idea I had is the following:

 We know that on every Yom Tov and Shabbos and Rosh Chodesh when we conclude the middle portion of Shemoneh Esrei there is a final summary paragraph that ends with a Bracha. On Shabbos it is ”Retzai” on the ”Shalosh Regalim” it is “Vehasiaynu”. On Rosh Hashanah it is a different Beracha than the rest of the Yomim Tovim which is ”Meloch al kol haolam kulo” . This is the summary Beracha that we say in Shemoneh Esraisix times over Rosh Hashanah. If we examine this Beracha more closely maybe we can understand what we are supposed to be doing on Rosh Hashanah.

 The first sentence of the Beracha says the following:

  You should rule over the world with your honor and be exalted over the land with your splendor reveal yourself in the grandeur of your strength over the inhabitants of your land. Let everything made know that you are its maker and let everything that has been molded know that you are its molder and let everything alive say God the God of Bnei Yisroel is king and his kingdom rules over everything.

 The question that can be asked is as follows:

 We are asking in this Tefilah that God should rule over the world and that all creatures should recognize that God is the king of the world. If this is what we want why is it so important for every creature to realize that God created them. If a person realized that God was all powerful even if they didn’t realize that God created them, then they would still say that God is the king and let themselves be ruled by God.

 In order to answer this question, we must first understand what does it mean for someone to rule over someone else?

The answer is that they must feel that the “ruler” has full control over everything in their lives. However, there is another requirement. We know that there are times that even the most powerful kings are overthrown. This tells us that just being powerful is not enough to keep control, so then what makes a successful kingdom. When the people in the kingdom feel that the king cares about and is interested in their lives, they do not desire to overthrow the king. The opposite is true. The people will do whatever the king requests since they know he cares about them.

 This is exactly the reason that when we want the world to recognize that God is the king, it is imperative that they also recognize that God created them, since if you look at the first line it doesn’t say that God should rule over the world only with brute force but rather with his honor and splendor. The only way for a king to rule from honor is when the people understand that God created them and cares about them.

 The question still remains though, why is it so important that the nations of the world recognize that God is their king through honor,  the result would be the same if they were subservient to God due to force since we know no one can overthrow God.

 In order to answer this question, let us see if this idea of recognizing thatGod is our creator has any other impact other than what we discussed already.

 The truth is that this Yesod it is also an imperative to us being able to do a proper Teshuvah.

 If we were to ask ourselves why do we do Teshuvah? Most people will give the answer that we want good things in this world (livelihood, health, children etc) or we want to get Olam Haba or because it is a Mitzvah. However, even though all those answers are true, they all miss the underlying point which is that there is a G-d who created us and constantly does tremendous kindness to us, who asked us to live a certain way and we rebelled against him. This is why in truth that we have to repent. However, for 355 days of the year, due to the incredibly hectic lives we live, this small piece of information falls to the back of our minds. That is unfortunately why we are not as perfect in our service to God as we should be.

 When it comes to doing a proper Teshuvah, it is imperative that we bring to the forefront this idea that there is a G-d who created us and who cares for us and who we rebelled against. You can’t ask for real forgiveness if you don’t know what you really did. One of the purposes of Rosh Hashanah is to ingrain into our hearts the magnitude of what we did and to prepare us to do a real Teshuvah during the ten days of repentance and on Yom Kippur.

 Having said this, we can also understand why we need the Goyim to recognize that God is king through the understanding of his relationship to them. This is because we are discussing the time of Mashiach when the entire world will understand the truth and actually repent for their past sins. This can only occur when they recognize that God is their creator not only that he is their king.

 If we can began to appreciate the magnitude of what we actually did, this should bring us to do a proper Teshuvah and we should merit that God should give us a complete kappara and merit us to a year of all good and Beracha.

 ראש השנה 5767

 We say in the davening on Rosh Hashanah after the blowing of the shofar the prayer of “Hayom Haras Olam”. In that Tefilah we ask God  to treat us either like children or like servants , but to either way judge us favorably.

 This prayer always bothered me, what is our relationship to God. Are we children or are we servants? Are we both? Are we sometimes one and not the other?

 In order to answer this question, we have to look at the prayer a little bit closer.

 Depending on our relationship with God our request for mercy takes two different forms. When our relationship to God is that of a child we just ask for fatherly mercy which we see in the words “have mercy on us like a father on a son. However, when we have a master/servant relationship with God then our request takes on a totally different look. The language of the Tefilah is:

Our eyes are turned to you until you find favor in us and give us a good judgment.  

This seems to be saying that we look to God until he finds favor on us and gives us a good judgment.

 It is interesting that only when we can claim a father/ son relationship can we ask for mercy, however when we have a master/servant relationship we have to wait until we find favor in the eyes of God before we can merit a good judgment.

 The question is what is the difference between a father/son relationship and a master/servant relationship?

 There are several answers given, however I was thinking that one major difference is that to a father a son is indispensable. A father would do anything and everything in order that his child is well and good. A master, on the other hand doesn’t have that feeling. If this servant doesn’t do the job properly then he will get a different one. There is no loyalty or feelings towards any one particular servant.This can answer our second question. If we have a father/son relationship with God we can ask for mercy, since our father wants to help us even if we aren’t perfect. However, if we have a master/servant relationship with God we need to wait for God to see the good in us so we can find favor in his eyes as somewhat good servants to get a good judgment.

 However, we still do not have an answer as to what defines when we have a father/son relationship or a master/servant relationship with God.

 There are many possible answers that could be given, but I believe the answer could very well lie in our approach to God. If we treat God like a father, then God will treat us like a son. If we treat God like a master he will treat us like a servant. What does this mean? How can you treat God like a father? For the answer let us look at our own relationship with our parents.

When a person has a problem whether it be financial or emotional or even physical who do they call first; Mom and Dad. Why is that? It is because we know they love us and care for us and will do anything and everything in their power to ease our troubles. If we want to have a father/son relationship with God this is how we have to act with God. When we have a problem, no matter what it is, our first thought must be to daven to God. God is our father. He loves us and wants to help us. However, if when we have a problem, we turn everywhere but to God, then we create a master/servant relationship.

 The obvious question is how can we get ourselves to feel this way? Our natural inclination is to look for things in the physical world to help us solve our problems. The answer is that we have to ingrain into ourselves that everything happens only because  God wants it to. This can only be done by appreciating everything that God already does for us.

 I once heard from Rabbi Yosef Kramer the following idea that I believe can really help us achieve our goal and that is that every day when we say ”Modim” in Shemoneh Esrai by the words “on your miracles and your wonders and your good”   we should think about the true miracles and wonders and good God is doing for us. For example, we are healthy and have healthy children; we have a good job, a good marriage, good children and grandchildren. If we remind ourselves every day that all this and more comes from God then we can truly merit to a father/son relationship with God.