Rabbi Paul Hoffman: This Rosh Hashana, let’s think about the next generation

There is one aspect of Rosh Hashana that never ceases to intrigue me. Jewish tradition calls this day “hayom harat olam,” today the world was born. We teach that Rosh Hashana is the anniversary of creation. And this being said, we would naturally expect the biblical reading for the day to come from our Torah’s opening chapter of Genesis, “In the beginning God created.”
However, when we open our Rosh Hashana prayer books, we find that, although this answer is logical, it is incorrect. And so instead, on the first day we read the story of the birth of Isaac from the Torah, and from the stories of the prophets we read about the birth of the prophet Samuel. Both are stories which center around two great matriarchs, Sarah and Hannah, who longed to have children, but could not until they were blessed by God.
Why these two stories? Beautiful, absolutely: But what is their connection with Rosh Hashana? The answer tells us much about the human intuitive vision at the heart of Jewish life. If you wish to fully understand the ethical implications of the creation of the universe, don’t study astrophysics, just contemplate the birth of a child. Throughout the centuries Judaism has been the great child centered civilization. Only once does the Torah tell us why Abraham was chosen. “So that he will instruct his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord.” Abraham was chosen for the sake of his children.
On the brink of the exodus, Moses gathers the people and addresses them. However, he doesn’t speak of any of the things that we might expect, topics such as freedom, the journey, the gift of the promised land (a land flowing with “milk and honey”) that the Hebrews are about to receive. Instead he speaks no less than three times about children. “And you shall tell your child that day how the Lord your God took you out of Egypt with a mighty hand.”
Children have been the casualties of our age. In the West they have suffered from the breakdown of marriage and the exploitations of a consumer culture. They have been trained in the Middle East to become terrorists and suicide bombers. The voices of protest sadly have been too few. There are cultures that live in the present.

Eventually, inevitably, they lose their way. There are cultures that live in the past, they nurse grievances and seek revenge. Judaism is a supreme example of a culture that, while celebrating the present and honoring the past lives for the future, for its children. If I were to choose one Jewish message for the world in these tense times I would say: forget power, pride, violence and instead ask: will our next act make the world a little better for our children? That is the message of Rosh Hashana, the day on which, to understand the universe, we think about the birth of a child.

Hoffman is the spiritual leader of the South Shore Jewish Center in Island Park.