Take a look at the bottom of page four in the Machzor. If you take a look at the last two words on the bottom of page four, you will see in the Hebrew or in the transliteration that Rosh haShanah, literally the Head of the Year, or, New Year, is not called Rosh haShanah in the kiddush for Rosh haShanah. Instead, it is called Yom haZikaron, which means Memorial Day. It gets that name from a verse in Leviticus (23:24) which describes the day as a zichron t'ru'ah, a memorial of blowing a t'ru'ah call (on the shofar). From this we learn that we are to blow the shofar on Rosh haShanah, which we will do soon.

    Hebrew, however, is a multivalent language, and each word is made up of root words that carry concrete meanings forward, some of which become poignantly ironic in new situations. For example, zichron t'ru'ah, a memorial of blowing a t'ru'ah call (on the shofar), can also be translated as a "memorial to evil." This is because the word t'ru'ah comes from the word, ro'a, or evil, or ra', as the adjective for evil or bad. In its simplest meaning, t'ru'ah means an "alarm," an alert to nearby danger, or evil.

    Most years this "memorial to evil" reminds us that we all do so many stupid and mean things during a year, that Rosh haShanah is the time to awaken ourselves to the need to fix up what we have destroyed and maimed so that we can go forward. Blowing a shofar is like a police siren, scaring us into checking our moral speedometer, to see how fast and furious we are transgressing the limits of legality.

    Shofars are not mentioned by name in the Leviticus text, which is why I put it in parentheses when translating the verse a memorial of blowing a t'ru'ah call (on the shofar). However, the tradition of blowing the t'ru'ah on a shofar and not on a trumpet is appropriate, because "Shofar" comes from a word which means "to improve." The F (think of it as a Ph, as in Elephant) in shofar becomes a P (I can teach you about Hebrew grammar later), and in that way, l'shappeir means "to improve" something. The last name, Shapiro, means someone who fixes up stuff. If you know any Shapiros, their name is related to shofars, and both words carry the thought that Rosh haShanah is a memorial to the evil that we do that needs to be atoned for and made better by Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement.

New Meanings of Memorial to Evil

    So much for the traditional meanings of zichron t'ru'ah, a memorial of blowing a t'ru'ah call, or of being a memorial to evil. As of last year, the evil we remember most was the evil done on this generation's version of Pearl Harbor Day: September 11, otherwise referred to as 9/11, or as 9-1-1, the emergency number. This day changed our lives in many ways that are just now beginning to be felt deeply, and I wish to consider three of them. First, how those whose own memorial days, anniversaries, and birthdays have been affected by this. Second, how this memorial to evil and the subsequent war on terror has affected our relationship to Israel , and, third, how 9-1-1 has changed our own personal morale.

Effects On Personal Memorials

    Let me start with how this has affected those whose own memorial days are this day. On a personal note, my twins' birthday is 9/11. Last year we woke up to their birthday with the image of the twin towers burning, and then collapsing. Nobody knew at that time whether more attacks were planned, and of what and where, so the local Jewish Day School, which our children attend, closed. The doughnuts with which they were to celebrate their day just sat there. That night, amid hushed and nearly empty restaurants, we took them out for their birthday dinner. We had the same experience as another congregational family in the same situation—we were in mourning, shock, and anger, but we could not deny them their day, or at least as much of it as we could salvage for them. Still, we did not sing happy birthday at the restaurant.

    This year their day was the national day of mourning. And so it will be for the rest of their lives. For example, their bat mitzvah will be on their secular birthday, Shabbat, September 11, in 2004. G0d willing we will have good reason to see the national mourning aspect of this day decrease in vividness, so that they and others like them will be able to surmount the irony of the juxtaposition of personal happiness and national tragedy in that year, and from then on into the future.

    Those whose birthdays are September 11 are not alone in having their good memories marred by this memorial to evil, for some were married on that date. Their anniversaries will suffer similar issues. I have suggested that these people celebrate, if they can and wish to, on the Hebrew date of their birthday or anniversary. My twin daughters' birthday is always three days after Rosh haShanah, and they could easily remember that. But others may have a more difficult time with the change of calendars.

    Then there are those who lost loved ones on September 11. Two of our congregants, as I mentioned last year, lost relatives in the collapse of the World Trade Center. For them, this day will always be one of personal tragedy, one which the civil commemorations will enhance, and thus make more painful, by the constant repetitive replays of the video footage of the towers' collapse. If you can, try to imagine that every television station in the world plays video of your loved one's tragic death for a week every year, and that every radio station plays audio of people reacting to it. Our hearts go out to our congregants, and we hope they find ways to insulate themselves from the worst of it.

    There are others whose loved ones died on September 11 last year of their own causes, whose yahrtzeits, anniversaries of their deaths, are now overshadowed by this national focus on the attacks on New York and Washington. They will have to cope with their own losses more privately than they would normally have to, for the whole world will be otherwise engaged. For them, we wish a strong family and friendship network who can bolster them during this time.

    In truth, then, for all these people, the zichron t'ru'ah has become not just a memorial to evil, but an evil memorial, as their own personal memorials have been tainted by this evil done to us all.

Effects On Israel

    We now turn to a second zichron t'ru'ah, memorial to evil, of this year. This Rosh haShanah sees the second anniversary of the current Intifada. Last year, on this day, I wondered aloud whether US support of Israel would be blamed for the attacks in such a way as to shift the issue to being one of Israel, instead of being one of radical Islamic terror. I have been surprised by what actually happened. US public opinion has largely shifted to being pro-Israel after a long time of being pro-Palestinian, primarily because people in our country have come to see, through a victim's eyes, exactly what Israel has been up against for so long.

    This is even true among liberal Christian churches, whose peace activist leadership have long advocated for the Palestinians and against Israel. Though much of the leadership of those churches is still staunchly pro-Palestinian, the rank and file membership mostly see the Palestinian terror campaign in terms of Al-Qaida's approach to mass murder. This widespread support for Israel extends from the grassroots all the way to the treetops of Congress.

    This sentiment does not extend across the ocean, however. A new wave of anti-Semitism is sweeping Europe. The left-liberal media are scathing in their criticism of Israel. It has become fashionable in some European intellectual circles to uninhibitedly make anti-Jewish remarks at dinner parties. Synagogues have been fire-bombed, schools have been attacked and individuals have been cursed, harassed, and murdered. The reasons for this are a matter of debate, but without speculating on the reasons, the fact remains that European criticism of Israel has spilled over into hatred of Jews as people. But this is only the beginning. Just wait to hear and read what they will say when and if the United States attacks Iraq. The Europeans' psychosomatic ailments will be projected into psychoSemitic ones, as if all their woes came from Jews. (I thank Wayne Kennan for coining this term, though I am using it differently than he does.)

    Last year I tried to make some predictions as to what could happen over the course of the year of fighting terror. With the above exception of American popular support for Israel, I was mostly right. Here is a snippet of what I said: I wondered about "an increase in assaults on our civil liberties as we attempt to root out and destroy those who implacably wish to destroy just that, our liberties, and our sense of fair and equal justice. We will all put up with more severe restrictions on our ability to breeze through an airport on our way to a plane." End quote.

    In those I was right, but I did not foresee the push for national identity cards, nor the legal challenges to our civil rights raised by the ways our government treats the detainees in Guantanamo and those held for immigration violations.

    Let me anticipate my words to you a year from now, after, as it seems likely, our country goes to war against Iraq. I am sorry, but I have to paint a worst case scenario, for these are the potential consequences we could face.

    First, a world-wide disruption of oil would exacerbate the global recession by driving up the price of everything that needs oil to be made or shipped.

Effects Of A War In Iraq on Us and On Israel

    Second, Israelis are worried that Sodom Hussein (and I spell his name, S-o-d-o-m, as in Gomorrah), on his way down and with nowhere to run, might make a brutal final gesture by lobbing whatever weapons of mass destruction he can at Israel. Let me say that in this scenario, knowing how inexactly his forces aimed those things during the Gulf War, one of Israel's largest insurance policies might just be the close proximity of Palestinian Arabs. On the other hand, Sodom Hussein has gassed and bombed thousands of his own citizens when he wanted to get at rebellious forces nearby, so I would not bank on his reluctance to gas and infect and irradiate Palestinians as too much of a deterrent.

    These same weapons, if the Sodomite actually has them, would likely be used on our troops. And who knows how far and how fast a biological weapon's plague will spread in this age of global travel?

    Last, who will run Iraq when the US ousts him? So far, Afghanistan is holding together, but it is not a done deal, as Thursday's assassination attempt on President Hamid Karzai shows. US troops are going to be there for the foreseeable future. And remember that Afghanistan is a place where a viable alternative government was ready to take over. Iraq is a mess, with Shi'ites ready to rebel in the south and Kurds waiting to break away in the north, situations that our other allies, Kuwait and Turkey, totally oppose.

    If we attack Iraq, we better win, and win big. US troops will be fighting in the urban areas of Baghdad and other cities, next to the kindergartens and hospitals besides which the Iraqis have placed their defense installations, so it is sure that more of our men and women will die or be maimed. And this will generate a huge outcry among Americans for peace.

    Additionally, we will most likely end up killing thousands of innocent Iraqis caught in the way of our troops and bullets and bombs. Americans may find ourselves justifying this so-called "collateral damage" in order to keep our self-respect. If that happens, then we will find ordinary non-Jewish Americans identifying even more with the collateral damage Israel has caused in its war of self-defense against Palestinian mass murderers.

    Yet we can be sure we will be excoriated by the world press, which will associate every US move as being guided by misguided kowtowing to Israel and the Jewish lobby. So get ready for a rough year, internationally, as well as at home. I am sorry to say this, and though I am not a prophet, it is what I fear.

Effects Of Lack of Travel to Israel

    I also fear something more certain than war against Iraq, for there is still a chance that sanity will reign on both sides and war will be averted. What I fear is the results caused by American Jews already, for two years, not going to Israel. I understand how fearful we are of going to Israel, but the overall effect of each year going by without tenth graders taking their "confirmation" trips to Israel, and of college students not spending a year studying there, and of American Jews not traveling there on vacations and missions and tours, and of rabbinical students not studying there, will set back the Hebrew enrichment of American Jewry, as well as our first-hand knowledge of the country, in immeasurable ways.

    I can tell you that the amount of Hebrew I learned in my congregational religious school was minimal, and the only reason I am fluent in Hebrew today is because I went to Israel with my rabbinical school class for a year. Ever since 1970, Reform rabbinical students have been required to spend a year in Israel, and since the mid-seventies, Conservative rabbinical students and Reconstructionist students have, as well. This has had a profound effect on making the American liberal rabbinate more proficient in Hebrew and more intimately aware of Israel. It has been one of the engines driving the enrichment of Reform Jewish practice. I cannot tell you all the profound and subtle effects Israel has had on the Judaism of American Jews. But if this absence of travel continues, we will all begin to feel it.

    Here is one way, very close to home. About half of the families of our religious school students are participating in the "Gift of Israel" program, whereby the congregation matches money they save for their children to travel to Israel from High School to college. At each bar/t mitzvah where I mention this, the congregation prays for peace so that they may cash these savings in and travel to Israel. Each year that goes by with American Jews not traveling to Israel makes it more and more likely that few of these students will have the enriching relationship with Israel and Israelis that their older brothers and sisters have had.

    Last summer, as you may know, my family and I traveled to Israel. In no way did we feel in danger. Not because we are oblivious, but because we knew where and how to go. On the beach resort at which we stayed, Arabs and Jews mingled daily. There were no predetermined spots where the Arabs were, or vice versa. The beach was totally integrated, and, as a matter of fact, Arabs were doing the security on beach, as well as Jews.

    Each day my family and I traveled to see our friends and do business in the beautiful town of Zichron Ya'akov, we traveled through an Arab town next to it to get there. Some have asked me if I was surprised at the way the Arabs and Jews got along on the beach, and between the two towns, and I always answered, no, that this was the Israel I was used to from the past, and it was the one I had expected to find. I am glad it still exists.

    In any case this is a shameless self-promotion for the tour to Israel that I and my family are planning to lead next summer. If you saw the digital picture I emailed to the congregation from this coastal resort, you will know how gorgeous it is. If you did not see the picture because it took too long to download, you will be happy to know that our congregant, Roger Margulies, showed me how to shave that 21 Megabyte file into a 550 kilobyte file, with no appreciable loss in quality. I'll be sending it out again with more information about the trip next summer.

    I hope you can come with us, and turn your evil memories of the way you see Israel on the news into wonderful ones of your own experience.

Effects On Us Personally

    I mentioned how this evil memorial has intruded on the personal memorials of those whose anniversary dates are on 9/11. And I have made a concession to the fact that this Rosh haShanah is also the second anniversary of the current Intifada. Now it is time to look at the effects this evil is having on us personally.

    As Jews, we have had two devastating Septembers in a row. After the long decade of good news, both economic and political, beginning with the fall of the Soviet Union in 1990, then the Oslo accords in 1993, the new millennium has been a depressing bust. How are we to cope with changes we seem impotent to stop?

    I have no magic wand to wave away the pain that surrounds us. What I can say is that we are a community who turn out for each other in times of dislocation, grief and need.

    Our Mitzvah Chavurah reaches out to those who are ill with help in cooking and in other ways. They also visit the sick and to console those in grief. If this sounds like something you would like to be a part of, please call me.

    Many have lost their jobs over the last few years. Etz Chayim, along with Kol Emeth and Beth Am, sponsor a support group for those whose lives have been shattered by unemployment. Call our office for more information about this.

    Our three congregations also sponsor JACS, an Al-Anon type group for those recovering from addiction, and those who love them. If you could benefit from such a group, or know someone who could, please pick up a flyer from the back tables, or call me for more information.

    And our Shabbat services this Friday night will be only singing and meditating, allowing time for us to reflect on and share our thoughts about the past year, and its effects on us all.

    There will be a Jewish community service on Wednesday night commemorating the events of 9-1-1 from a Jewish point of view at Temple Beth Jacob in Redwood City. Details of this event, and of the next one I will mention, are on a flyer on the tables in the back.

    We are also part of the larger community, and I will be taking part in the Palo Alto Interfaith commemoration of 9-1-1 this coming Wednesday morning, at All Saints Episcopal Church in downtown Palo Alto, where I will be blowing the shofar at 6 AM. There will also be other events the rest of the day, but that evening I will not be at them. I will be celebrating my twin daughters' birthday again.

    Let me leave you with a vision from the prophet Zechariah (8:19). He had just come back from our people's seventy year exile to find Judah in ruins, in need of rebuilding. During their time in Babylon, the leaders of the Jewish community had instituted fast days on the anniversaries of the encirclement of Jerusalem, on the day the city's walls were breached, the day the Temple was burned down, and the day the last Jewish ruler of the country was assassinated. This was a much more total devastation than the one the US suffered on 9-11. The equivalent would be the incineration of every major city in the country, and our depopulation to countries around the world, with other peoples moving in to take over our land. This is, I believe, the ultimate goal of bin Laden and his allies.

    Still, despite this, Zechariah wished to inspire his people with a vision of a happier future. He took a radical view, that these days of evil memorial would, some day, be changed into good memories by the good days to come. Here is what he said: "G0d says: The fast of the fourth month, and the fast of the fifth, and the fast of the seventh, and the fast of the tenth, shall become times of joy and gladness, and cheerful feasts to the house of Judah; therefore love truth and peace."

    May Zechariah's words apply to our generation as well, so that the days of remembering Rosh haShanah as a day of memorials to global evil can give way, once again, to it being a time of personal renewal.