Happy New Year - or Shana Tova, for all you Hebrew speakers!
The Jewish New Year begins at sundown on Sunday, October 2nd, and is celebrated for two full days. During that time, families sit down to special celebratory meals, which will always include plenty of sweet things, eaten to symbolize our wish for a "sweet" New Year. In our household we have apples dipped in honey, and for a special dessert I always make sugar-free, diabetic-friendly cake or pudding. It doesn't sound wonderful, I admit, but it tastes great! And my blood sugar doesn't suffer.
The pomegranate is a special symbol of the New Year and appears on many tables. Round and red and bursting with nourishing seeds, it shows the blessings that we may expect if we are living with spiritual intent.
For observant Jews there are special synagogue services with once-a-year prayers and readings, and people greet each other with wishes for a happy year and that they, their friends and families be inscribed in the Lord's Book of Life.
The good news is that you certainly don't have to be Jewish to celebrate the Jewish New Year. And I much prefer it to the secular January New Year of Western custom, when people get drunk, make fools of themselves and get up to all sorts of mayhem just because of a change in the calendar! I never saw the point of that.
The spiritual New Year, however, is full of meaning for everyone on a spiritual path. I thoroughly recommend adopting at least one of the spiritual customs that Jewish people observe at this time, because the time of year is right for reflection now. We might add special prayers to our morning preparation, add more Work readings during the day. Perhaps we need to accentuate our daily appointments with ourselves, changing the times so that we include more "snapshots" of ourselves.
We can all practice the custom of making amends to those we've hurt, as I'll explain in a moment.
Why is the Jewish New Year celebrated at this time?
Cosmically, the position of the Earth in relation to the Sun and other stars has changed significantly since Midsummer. We have just passed the Autumn Equinox, when days and nights are of equal length, and now we can begin to see for ourselves how the hours of light are becoming less, the hours of darkness increasing.
It is this time that is most propitious for pondering spiritual matters, going within and reconnecting ourselves with our spiritual purpose, drawing closer to the God of our understanding and seeking His help in our new beginning. Over the summer we may have become immersed in the world of nature, in our secular holidays and our worldly ambitions, in other words, in Life; now, we turn our face to the world of Spirit and towards our Creator.
For, just like the secular January festival, this spiritual New Year is also marked by resolutions, this time concerning our relationship to God and to our neighbours.
In these special New Year days, we remember ourselves and why we are here.
We recall our spiritual aim, and review how far we have kept it and where we've strayed from it.
We renew our intention to be ever more aware of our need for God. The Jewish New Year mystically marks the anniversary of the day when God created man. What is our purpose? Have we lived up to it? What do we wish to be during the year that is to come? What do we need to work on?
Whom have we hurt, to whom do we need to apologize, to make amends? In many respects, preparing for the Jewish New Year is akin to making a Twelve Step amends list. If we can possibly do so, we make restitution to anyone we've harmed; if not, we swallow our pride, say we are sorry, and we mean it. And if the person has died, we resolve never again to repeat the mistakes we have made, and to become better people in the future.
From the standpoint of the Work, we ask ourselves which I's are helpful to our development? Which are harmful? What is the direction our personal work must take if the coming year is to see us develop as God would wish?
Without God, the Jewish New Year reminds us, we are nothing. We are dust. We did not make ourselves, as my Work teacher, Marian, often said. We think that we are "doing" in the world, when in reality every breath we take, every movement we make, exists only through divine decree. Without God, we can do nothing; indeed, without Him, we truly are nothing.
In the Jewish New Year, tradition holds, God decides who will live and who will die during the year to come; who will prosper, who will fail; whose health will improve, who will fall sick; and so on. Every decision God makes is planned for us, for our best and highest good, if we remember our connection to Him and truly intend to live out this connection in our daily lives.
That is why people wish each other the blessing of being inscribed in the Book of Life; there are other Books that are less propitious, and we certainly don't want to find our names written in them.
To each person will be given according to their needs and their merits. What seems like good fortune to us, however, may not be; what seems like a curse may be a blessing, to those with spiritual insight. We trust that, as long as we are doing our best to follow God's Will for our lives, He will give us exactly what we need for our best development.
The New Year is the time when God, the true and only Ruler of the Universe, picks up each one of us and gathers us into His bosom. He examines us with a loving gaze and sees where we are, what we need, what we may become.
To the spiritually aware, the prodigal son is home again in his Father's arms.
We have been lost, but now are found, as the hymn says.
We are loved.
We are remembered.
And we remember.
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