#jewish high holidays

[handmedownpocketpussy]

Signs that it's Elul...

[matan4il]

As Yom Kippur, the Jewish day of Atonement, descends upon us, I sincerely hope I haven't wronged any of you, my friends. But in case I did,even if it was unintentional, please allow me to apologize! I would never want to cause you any harm. If you tell me about it privately, I also promise to try and do better!

For all those who participate in the fast, may it be a meaningful one! G’mar chatima tova!

(Enjoy some footage of tens of thousands of people by the Western Wall singing the traditional piyut, religious Jewish hymn, asking for forgiveness)

[unlovablereject]

I got to play the drum and guitar during sukkot, in the beautiful sukkah they built at Shula. I was so lost in the music that I lost track of the time! I am so proud of myself for winning over my anxiety and being able to physically go to Shula and play in front of most of the congregation (it was a small party). I will be a Rabbi one day, and my congregation will flow with traditional music that pulses through you. I look up to my Rabbi with so much honor and she is a role model for me. She is able to talk to me and read me. She let's me know she's proud. She encourages me to pursue my dreams, and my faith. Being Jewish to me isn't just in my blood, but it's in my soul. I walk into my Synoguage and I feel warmth and love like never before. People actually want to get to know me!

I won one battle. A lifetime more to go!

[spitefullyjewish]

Okay, this is my third time trying to put this into words. I am very upset, hurt, and honestly terrified. I’m about to share a lot about myself, my family, and a very scary situation happening right now, so for my own safety, I won’t provide too many details.

I live in a secondary city in a South American country. The Jewish community here is very small—around 5,000 people total out of over 50 million. In my city, which has over 3 million people, there are only about 300 Jews. We’re literally on the other side of the world from Israel.

We own a family business, a small clothing factory where we make knitted garments. It was founded by my grandmother 48 years ago. My father is the current manager, and both my sister and I work there. We employ around 80 people. We pay fair and legal wages (not the industry standard in my country), and although times are really hard, we’ve never missed a payment, not once in our 48 years in business. My father paused his own salary and hasn’t received a cent since January, and my sister and I both stopped getting paid for three months. But the people who work with us have always received their salaries as they should.

Now, today, September 30th, (just a couple of days before the start of our high holidays and exactly one week before the first anniversary of October 7th) the biggest and most important public university in my city, in conjunction with the syndicate council, invited the Palestinian ambassador to give a conference about the current situation and the war. Well, apparently, it derailed into open antisemitism and ended up as a conference about how Jews are all thieves and scammers. Because, I kid you not, back in the '90s, a huge group of my country’s biggest companies went bankrupt and couldn’t pay their employees what they owed. One out of about 30 of those companies was owned by Jewish people. So, of course, "we Jews are all liars, scammers, and thieves, just like the Israelis—always trying to take what doesn’t belong to us"

So, what conclusion did they reach at this conference about Palestine and the current war happening on the other side of the world? Well, naturally, they decided to target Jewish-owned businesses in my city (which means our factory and two other small businesses in our area) to protest and vandalize, because we’re all thieves and scammers, and Israel is bad and horrible, and everyone in my city needs to be made aware of that. When are they planning to come? October 7th, of course, when else?

The only reason I even know about this is that one of my Jewish friends decided to attend the conference to hear from the Palestinian ambassador and, risking their own safety, stayed to hear the names of the businesses that are going to be targeted.

I'm hurt and scared and I've been trying not to cry since I found out. These are the people on the left, these we were supposed to be my people, I've marched with them, I've worked and voted with them. I don't know what to do? Please, please tell me how are they different from actual Nazis? How is this situation different from any other jew living in Europe in the 1930's? I guess shannah fucking tovah to me, as if last year wasn't a wake up call. I am fucking awake.

[honeysuckle-venom]

The Shofar Breaks Your Heart

by Dane Kuttler

When you give a girl a shofar –  no, not a proper instrument of G-d, but a rough-cut horn with no real mouthpiece her aunt brings back from a trip to Jerusalem, don’t make it easy.

Put it up on the shelf in the living room where its curled promise of a shout will tempt her until she can reach it on tiptoe.

Tell her no one has ever found its voice, that she will only make it grunt, bray and sputter like the animal it came from.

Then give her a few years.

Give her an empty garage and a neighborhood Jewish enough to understand what it’s hearing so she can practice until tiny tekiot burst forth from the scrap of ram.

She will be the only one who can ever shape its sounds, can bend the call to tekiah, round off nine drops of t’ruah wailing, fling the anguished cry of a sh’varim from its mouth.

Let her brag about this.  Remember that children are not humble creatures, that the simple act of being heard is their great triumph.  Let her be heard.

Bring her to Hebrew school. Teach her the story of the rabbi who told his students that he would put the words of Torah on their hearts; that the words would only find their way in when the students’ hearts broke. Let her sit with that tale for as long as it takes for her own heart to shatter, for torah and poetry and forgiveness  find their way inside,

play her Leonard Cohen. Let him croon about the cracks in everything, that’s how the light gets in, let her begin searching for light, ask her where she thinks the cracks come from, give her Auschwitz, give her Torquemada, give her pogrom and quota and blacklist, the ashes of all her burnt bridges, give her avinu malkenu, ashamnu, ashamnu, ashamnu, 

watch her break  her heart with her fist.

Give her the shofar.   Let the horn steal her breath, let her begin to understand that she’s not holding a dead piece of animal, but a living prayer.

Teach her: after every blast you can hear the echo of the still small voice.

If you listen for it, you can hear the calls for the wild cries they are; salute them with a straight back when they yank you from your amidah; and should you hear a shofar blower struggle and gasp and strain for each call, imagine yourself a trapped animal, desperate to be heard.

When it’s over, Close your eyes.

Be. Broken. Here.  Before G-d and your people. Be. Cracked.

feel the light and the words come in.

[ceaseless-exhauster]

I love Simchat Torah so much. We prayed for the Oct 7 victims in our circle; being in the middle while that happened since I had been taking these pictures beforehand was really powerful.

Our Torah is over 300 years old and survived in Poland through the Shoah, it was found in a town that had no Jews left. The man who brought it from where it landed in Cincinnati to our temple wasn’t entirely sure what to do with it overnight in a hotel so he stayed awake and hugged it instead.

I’m so glad we have it and get to love it and let it shine for the world. Chag Sameach, and don’t forget to carry the joy of Torah into the year ahead.

[zebratoys]

גְּמַר חֲתִימָה טוֹבָה אָמֵן שַׁבָּת שָׁלוֹם עֲדַת יִשְׂרָאֵל Gmar Chatima Tovah A good sealing May we will be sealed in The Book of Life for a good and blessed year 🤍✨בְּסִיַּעְתָּא דִּשְׁמַיָּא

[thejewitches]

Jewish Holidays coming up but poorly described:

Apple & honey industry celebration day

Be like an angel day (no food allowed)

Shake a lemon with cellulite at G-d in a hut

Holiday we celebrate because we said so

We finish the holy-book-holiday

[maimonidesnutz]

my friend made this back in 2020 but it still works today

[alienprophecy]

I love that my birthday is always around the high holy days. No matter how I’m feeling about getting older I can view it through a lens of growth and change, and I’m really grateful for that

[mental-mona]

No people has believed as lucidly and long as have Jews that life has a purpose; that this world is an arena for justice and human dignity; that we are, each of us, free and responsible, capable of shaping our lives in accordance with the highest ideals. We are here for a reason. We were created in love and forgiveness by the God of love and forgiveness who asks us to love and forgive. However many times we may have failed to live up to our aspirations, God always gives us the chance and the power to begin again. On Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, the holiest days of a holy people, God summons us to greatness.

Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks zt"l, Ceremony & Celebration p.3

[amyisraelchaiforever]

I was driving home from school (I only go to synagogue on the first day of rosh hashanah, not the second) and I see an chabadnik (i say in an affectionate tone) family, looking so happy but also worried.

Rolled down my windows and yelled, "Shana tova!"

The couple smiled at me and the kids laughed in delight. "Shana tova!" they yelled back.

I kept driving and they kept walking, but they looked so happy.

It's the small moments

Am yisrael chai 💙

[babka-enjoyer]

Autistic converts are braver than any marine because rawdogging a highly ritualized and scripted cultural event like the High Holy Days is so terrifying that Ari Aster himself could not dream it up

[aguineapigcouldntdothis]

in reality im a single man living alone in a crappy college apartment who only really needs to cook for one for the high holidays. the way I act is more like "ALRIGHT EVERYONE! we have 40 years in the desert now! that's right! for! ty! so eat eat eat! plenty of food to go around, don't be shy. it's not gonna eat itself!" and I think that's fun of me until I realize I cannot eat all this food and I have to find people who I regularly force to eat my cooking and they think its a sweet gesture when I actually just always cook like I'm feeding a family of 12

[pomegranateandhoney]

שנה טובה

✨🍎🍏🍯✨

אם אשכחך ירושלים תשכח ימינ

“We are all Zionists. In our services, in our prayers, three times a day we mention the name of Zion and we hope for the rebuilding of Zion.”

–Rav Meir Franco, the only Sephardic Rabbi to survive the 1929 Hevron pogrom

צֶ֥דֶק צֶ֖דֶק תִּרְדֹּ֑ף לְמַ֤עַן תִּֽחְיֶה֙ וְיָרַשְׁתָּ֣ אֶת־הָאָ֔רֶץ אֲשֶׁר־יְהוָ֥ה אֱלֹהֶ֖יךָ נֹתֵ֥ן לָֽךְ׃

[tzipporahs-well]

New Year: “Yay happy new year!” :D

Jewish New Year: *screams*