Ideas for High Holy Day sermons begin to circulate in my mind as soon as Yom Kippur ends. And yet I find it very difficult to get those ideas onto paper and into finished form until the High Holy Day season truly approaches. Even though I know rabbis who are able to write their sermons in June, it never feels right to me. I need the sense of an impending fall season. I need to be more aware of the symbols that connote the High Holy Days.

First amongst these symbols is the shofar. In Israel this summer, we went to the northern town of Safed. There, I saw in a shop an unusual shofar. The shofar appealed to me because it retained the natural look of an animal's horn, which I believe it should. It appealed to me because, while it was still identifiable as a shofar and a symbol of the Jewish people and the high holy days, it was different. And finally, it appealed to me because it had a beautiful voice. The fact that I was able to coax that voice out of the shofar on my first attempt also added to the attraction.

Standing in that store in the center of a historically mystical city, I envisioned what it might be like to sound that shofar in our congregation. Would it be used during the Hebrew month of Elul on Friday night to begin to awaken within us the awareness that Rosh Hashanah was approaching? Would I keep it in my office and contemplate its presence as an inspiration to move my own process of teshuvah along? Might it become the tool by which one of you would experience an elevation of the Spirit which we so fervently seek during the Yamim Noraim?

Pondering all of the above, I had no choice but to buy this unique shofar and bring it back to our City of Holy Faith. It sits now on a stand in my office, and even when my back is turned I sense its presence. And I realize that an unsounded shofar is a very interesting symbol. It is a tool which is supposed to call us to repentance. It is a tool which is supposed to call us to forgiveness. It is a tool which is supposed to motivate us to become more generous than we have been in the past. And if it is allowed to sit untouched, unsounded and silent, it becomes a hollow symbol: a symbol of Judaism unpracticed.

It becomes a symbol of a cold, empty Judaism that focuses only on observance or identity without consideration of the higher and greater aspirations to which Judaism can lead. A shofar was never meant to be a museum piece, to be seen but never used or touched. Judaism was likewise never meant to be a distant part of our lives, a label with no particular obligation or importance attached to it.

As the shofar calls to us, so should our Judaism. It should call us to greater involvement in our community. It should call us to greater concern for social justice. It should call us to work in whatever way we can to eradicate poverty, homelessness, hunger, and needless suffering from this place we call home. To pray, to study, to congregate, without allowing or demanding that these endeavors impact our lives and our behavior is to pervert the existence of Judaism.
As we move through this holiday time, may the voice of the shofar, the voice of the choir, the voice of our ancient tradition, and the still small voice within you bring you to a place that causes you to ask more from life. May it cause you to ask more from yourself. May it cause you to inscribe yourself within the pages of a book of a meaningful life.

Shanah Tovah, may you be blessed with a new, happy, and healthy new year!