There’s No Crying in… Rosh Hashana

Rosh Hashana 

 by Rabbi Avi Billet 

There is a tale in the book of Nechemiah, a tale of Rosh Hashana. It was in the initial years of the Return from the exile of 70 years following the destruction of the first Temple.

The crowd who returned was very assimilated – many had intermarried, the people were not well versed in Torah, and yet they returned to their ancestral homeland to reestablish the commonwealth that had been destroyed by the Babylonians, who were now gone.

Be that as it may, Nechemiah chapter 8 relates the following tale: “The people gathered to the square that was before the Water Gate, and they said to Ezra the scholar to bring the Torah… and he brought it before the congregation of men and women… on the first day of the seventh month. He read in it… from the [first] light until midday in the presence of the men and the women and those who understood… And Ezra opened the scroll before the eyes of the entire people… And Ezra blessed the Lord, the great God, and all the people answered, "Amen, Amen," with the uplifting of their hands, and they bent their heads and prostrated themselves to the Lord on their faces to the ground… Then Nehemiah and Ezra… said to all the people, "This day is holy to the Lord your God; neither mourn nor weep," for all the people were weeping when they heard the words of the Law. And he said to them, "Go, eat fat foods and drink sweet drinks and send portions to whoever has nothing prepared, for the day is holy to our Lord, and do not be sad, for the joy of the Lord is your strength." And the Levites quieted all the people, saying, "Hush, for the day is holy, and do not be sad." Then all the people went to eat and to drink and to send portions and to rejoice greatly, for they understood the words that they informed them of.”

Rashi says the people were crying because they realized they had not been fulfilling the Torah properly. Ignorant of Torah they may have been, but sincere people trying to do what was right they also were. When the Tur compares Rosh Hashana to a Judgment Day of anyone in the world, he says people wear black and they may forget to groom, because they don’t know how things will turn out. But we wear white, and wrap ourselves in white, and we shave and cut fingernails, and eat and drink and we are happy and joyous and confident for our outcome.

The Talmud in Sukkah tells us that from the verse “the days of your joy, and your holidays, and your Rosh Chodeshes” we learn that the only Rosh Chodesh not celebrated as Rosh Chodesh, namely Rosh Hashana, is a special day of Simcha/joy! After bringing a number of rabbinic opinions who felt that Rosh Hashana should be a day of fasting, Rabbi Ovadiah Yosef notes that the simple understanding of Nechemiah’s response is that there were people who didn’t understand Rosh Hashana and felt they were supposed to fast! Nechemiah was explaining to them not to fast because Rosh Hashana is a day of joy.

Rav Ovadiah writes that not only is it wrong to cry on Rosh Hashana, but on the contrary, a person should go through the prayers with pleasantness and with joy. Kaddish and kedusha are said with the selichos melody because there is an element of rejoicing which should be accompanied by trepidation. But the overwhelming attitude of this day is one of great joy.

Yet Rav Ovadiah recounts a seeming contradiction. Rabbi Chaim Vital noted how the Arizal cried all day on Rosh Hashana, and even moreso – obviously – on Yom Kippur. And the Ar”i felt anyone who didn’t cry had a soul that hadn’t been self-molded properly.

On the other side, the Vilna Gaon felt that one is NOT ALLOWED TO CRY at all, and he would have the chazzan say a Kaddish with a melody more reflective of Yom Tov than of Selichos.

Rav Ovadiah explains that there is no contradiction. A person should not be making himself cry. But if his intensity and his kavvanah brings him to cry, there is allowance for this. This was certainly the case with the Arizal, who carried the weight of the world on his shoulders because of his deep understanding of the Zohar and the secrets of the universe – he could be drawn to crying. Rav Ovadiah compared this to a known passage about Rabbi Akiva, who would cry on Shabbos when he read Shir HaShirim. When his students asked him how he cries when it is forbidden to be sad on Shabbos, he replied that it was therapeutic for him to cry, citing a fulfillment of “oneg Shabbos” – enjoying Shabbos.

Perhaps the same means of getting to cry is ok here – if the crying comes from a place of Kedusha, and from a deep connection and longing for clinging to God – such as the Arizal approach, rather than out of fear.

Rabbi Ovadiah puts it this way – “but to bring oneself to cry through a mournful act of crying is not permissible.”

And he concludes with this important message:

The bottom line is one should not cry on Rosh Hashana. And the prayers of the days should be recited with joy and with holy pleasantness, and with great kavvanah and intensity, for prayer without intent is like a body without a soul. However, one who stirs himself to cry on account of his kavvanah is not violating a prohibition. He should be blessed all the same.

Teshuvah that is accompanied by joy is a fulfillment of what the Tur spoke about – a confidence we have that our repentance and our prayer has been accepted. The two – Teshuvah and joy – go hand in hand.

May we be blessed to enjoy our High Holidays, with the confidence that our joy will carry us to where we need to be when Yom Kippur is over – to a fulfillment of “Serve God with joy!”

Sukkot: Only Joy (from the Jewish Star)

See my article in the Jewish Star over here or read it below.

Sukkot: Only Joy

Oct. 2, 2009 / 14 Tishrei 5770

The Torah commands us twice to rejoice on Sukkot. For Shavuot it only says to rejoice one time. For Pesach “joy” is not mentioned at all: it’s hard to rejoice when you’re thinking about the chametz you might still have in your house.
“V’samachta b’chagekha… v’hayita’ akh sa’me’ach.” [Devarim 16:14-15] You shall rejoice, and be only happy.

Only happy! Does that mean you can’t be sad at all? Does that mean you can’t have any not-so-happy thoughts or feelings? How does a person do that?

Rabbi Nachman of Braslav introduced the idea which has become a popular song — most of us probably know the song better than we know how to live up to its teaching — Mitzvah Gedolah Lihyot B’simcha Tamid. It’s a great mitzvah to be joyous always.

Rabbi Nachman acknowledges that it is human nature to be more easily depressed than overjoyed, and that life has its ways of doing that to a person. So a person must strive to overcome the difficulties. “For all ailments come only from sadness and depression. Therefore we must rejoice with all that we can, even with words of nonsense.” This could mean to tell jokes. It could mean to talk about nothing. It could mean to act silly. Whatever it takes to help you be happy, that’s what you need to do.

The Talmud (Taanit 8a) says, “Rabbi Yehoshua Ben Levi says, ‘if you are happy (or accepting) of the trials life gives you — you bring salvation to the world!’”

Life is a test. Sometimes there are ups and sometimes there are downs. The economic climate this year is not what it was a year ago. Some of us are not doing as well as we were before things took a bad turn. Some of us are out of work and are struggling.

The Mishnah in Avot (4:1) says, “Who is wealthy? The one who is happy with his portion.” In other words, non-physical wealth is determined by the state of your heart. If you are at peace with the situation life puts you in, you are “wealthy.”

The Torah tells us in the middle of the tokhacha of Ki Tavo, one of the reasons why these curses come upon us is “when you had plenty of everything, you would not serve G-d your Lord with happiness and a glad heart.” When times were good, the Torah is saying, we needed to serve G-d with pure joy. We need to remember to thank G-d for the good things in our lives: “Thank you, G-d. Thank you for all the good in my life. Thank you for the friends and the love in my life. The joy I experience from being alive. The joy I experience from serving you. The joy I get out of being a Jew. The joy I get out of doing for others. The joy I get from learning Torah. The joy I get from living Shabbos. The joy I get from celebrating that we have the Torah. The joy I get from having a relationship with You!”

On these verses in Devarim, Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch says, “the joy of your blessedness comes not from your source of income, or your sources of entertainment, but from the Lord your G-d Who bestows this bountiful blessing on you from the place of His Torah and through the means of His Teaching, if you dwell in His tent faithfully.”

It was King David who wrote in Psalm 122, “I rejoiced with those who said ‘Let us go to the House of G-d.’” David himself provided an example of how a person can completely rejoice — letting go of all inhibition — in the service of G-d. Samuel II chapter 6 tells the tale of how he danced in front of the Ark as it was brought to Ir David, Jerusalem, in anticipation of the building of the Temple.

This is how we begin to experience true joy.

Twice a day synagogue-goers have been saying “L’David Hashem Ori” for close to two months. “One request I ask of G-d,” L’David reads. “Let me dwell in the House of G-d all the days of my life. To gaze upon the pleasant ways of G-d and to meditate in His sanctuary.”

If you had one request to make of G-d, what would it be? Why would King David write this as his sole request? Maybe King David did not have a mortgage and tuition bills.

Only one thing mattered to King David — the joy he could get out of life. And he knew, all real joy emanates from where it begins. Joy starts in the House of G-d where we seed our relationship with Him; where we can let go of every inhibition, where we can sing and dance and rejoice in our lives dedicated to the service of G-d. When everything else goes, we still have G-d.

And that is something for which we all can be truly joyous.