Page 10 - HaMizrachi 2 Chicago Edition
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Rabbi Benji Levy


       The Three Shofars









           n 1933, on Rosh Hashanah, in the   When Rav Kook began to talk of the least   biblical proportions for the Jewish nation
           Old  City  of  Jerusalem,  Rav  Kook   preferred shofar, the horn of a non-kosher   and is reminiscent of other legendary
       I delivered a powerful speech about   animal, he burst into tears. Six years before   shofar blasts such as the giving of the
       the different types of shofars that we are   the Holocaust, he talked of the third shofar   Torah at Sinai (Exodus 19:19), which
       allowed to use, comparing them to different   as a wake-up call from anti-Semitic nations,   transformed the moral landscape of
       types of Aliyah (immigration to Israel).  urging Jews to escape to Israel as a place of   civilization  forever,  or  the  announcement
                                             refuge. In this scenario, evil people become   of the Jubilee year (Leviticus 25:9),
       The  preferred  shofar  is  a  ram’s  horn,   instruments of redemption, sounding a   introducing one of the most decisive
       representing  Akeidat  Yitzchak  – the   final warning to leave foreign lands. If one   statements about freedom ever made.
       Binding  of  Isaac.  Its  source  is  spiritual   doesn’t respond to the first two wake-up   Joshua employed the shofar in conquering
       and compared to the motivations of    calls,  there  is  no  blessing  recited  on  this   Jericho, the first stage of claiming Eretz
       Nachmanides, Yehuda Halevy, Bartenura,   sounding.                          Yisrael for the Jewish people, and Isaiah
       the students of the Vilna Gaon, the                                         saw  the  shofar as  the  instrument  of
       Chasidim of the Baal Shem Tov and other   Rav Kook closed his speech with a prayer   reunification, captivating the hearts and
       righteous individuals who moved to Israel   for the ‘great shofar of redemption,’ one   minds of those lost in exile (Isaiah 27:13).
       as a response to a spiritual calling.  awakened from within and not from    And this was the same sound heard on that
                                             without. Today, in 2018, the State of Israel   fateful day next to the ancient stones of the
       The second best option is the horn of   is indeed a spiritual treasure and boasts a   Western Wall.
       any other kosher animal (except that of a   Jewish army and government. At the same
       cow), which albeit not the absolute ideal,   time, anti-Semitism is still rampant in many   This Yom Yerushalayim, may we, and
       still contains greatness – the calling to   countries. We need to choose which sound   our entire people, heed the call of the
       return for other benefits, such as to live as   we will hear.               first shofar and continue to grow in our
       a free people in our ancestral homeland,                                    faith, our relationship to Israel and our
       with a Jewish army and government,    It is no coincidence that the famous picture   connection with one another.
       punctuating our calendar with the Jewish   epitomizing the reunification of Jerusalem
       festivals in a Jewish environment. A   at the Kotel is that of Rabbi Shlomo Goren
       blessing is recited over both of these   blowing the shofar. Yom Yerushalayim in   Rabbi Benji Levy is CEO
       shofars on Rosh Hashanah.             1967 heralded a miraculous  awakening of   of Mosaic United























       Rabbi Shlomo Goren blowing the shofar at the Western Wall in 1967 (GPO)


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