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Speaking of the Shofar,
Would you Believe…”
- That the Shofar is sounded on Rosh Hashanah as the
“climax” to the month-long daily Shofar blowing after Shaharit during the
entire month of Elul, except on Shabbat;
- That the Shofar is the earliest musical instrument
mentioned in the Torah which is still in use;
- That the Shofar is mentioned in Psalm 98 as a musical
instrument;
- That the Shofar is mentioned 69 times in the Tanakh
(Jewish Bible);
- That the first reference to the use of the Shofar was to
call the Jewish people to gather at Mount Sinai prior to the Revelation;
- That only a ram’s horn may be used as a Shofar. This
commemorates the ram that was sacrificed to God by Abraham instead of his son,
Isaac. The animal sacrifice was a dramatic indication that the God of Abraham
rejected human sacrifice. This was monotheism, in opposition to the various
Fertile Crescent civilizations, which practiced human sacrifice to their gods;
- That the Shofar was also used to call able-bodied men to
wars in the days of the judges;
- That the Shofar has been used to signal other messages
besides those mentioned above (see Amos, Chapter 3, and Samuel, Chapter 15);
- That a cow’s horn may not be used as a Shofar because it
reminds us of the worship of the Golden Calf;
- That the Shofar was used to proclaim the beginning of
the Jubilee (the fiftieth) year. The Jubilee marked the end of forced slavery
and the forgiveness of the debts of the poor. The Talmud describes which
types of debts were forgiven.
- That the statement on the Liberty Bell was first
heralded by the sound of the Shofar (Leviticus, Chapter 24, Verses 9-10);
- That the Shofar was sounded in the siege that Joshua
organized and led around the ancient city of Jericho.
It is not surprising, therefore, that Rosh Hashanah is also
referred to in the Kiddush as Yom Teruah, the Day of the Sounding of the Shofar.
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