High Holy Days

It is a great honor throughout the year to represent the Jewish community of Temple Oseh Shalom in articles for the “Bluffton Sun.” I always hope that the article will be worth reading and will explain something meaningful about Judaism. It is especially important now, because three weeks from now, Jews around the world will be recognizing Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, the Yamim Noraim or High Holy Days. While Jews everywhere have commemorated these sacred days for thousands of years, this High Holy season will be unique. If you are familiar with the High Holy days, you know they are usually in the month of September, as this year. But it is not always so. Both last year and next year, the High Holy days will occur in October. You might ask, “can’t you make up your minds?” Well, it is not so simple!

Judaism uses a unique structure for our calendar and sacred days, which makes the dates change from year to year, at least according to the lunar calendar, rather than the solar calendar with which we are all familiar. The names of the Hebrew months are much older than those known to us, as they are Biblical in their source. The Jewish religious year begins with the month of Tishri, in the autumn, with Rosh Hashanah always on the first day of that month, and Yom Kippur coming ten days later. As in our secular calendar, the Hebrew calendar also has twelve months, with the first month of the calendar year, Nisan.

Nisan commences in the spring and includes our special holy day of Pesach (Passover). And seven months later, we arrive to where we are now, with the seventh calendar month of Tishri, and Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. Like Christmas and Easter for many Christians, the High Holy Days are the times of the Jewish year when most people come to the synagogue for worship, even if not as often during the rest of the year.

Rosh Hashanah is a day to look back on the old year as an opportunity to begin the new year by remembering special moments that have gone by, and the privilege of starting over again. We pray to God to be inscribed in the “Book of Life” for a good new year.

As Rosh Hashanah means “head of the new year,” so Yom Kippur has its own Hebrew translation, the “Day of Atonement.” This is the day when those in the Jewish community who are able will fast for 26 hours. No food or drink. Our tradition also teachers that those who cannot “fast” due to their health or medication, are excused from that responsibility. Ironically, the Bible teaches that we fast on this special day to “keep from thinking about food,” even if for most people, this long fast reminds you even more of food and drink!

As I mentioned, this year contains a unique and deeply poignant personal contiguity for all of us, because on Rosh Hashanah evening, the first day of Tishri, 5787, it is also September 11, 2026, the twenty-fifth anniversary of that harrowing day of 9/11, when in so many ways, our world was changed forever.

All of us can recall where we were, what we were doing, and whom we lost in those tragic terrorist attacks on our country. At that tragic moment, our world was brought together in grief and sadness yet inspired by patriotism and community. I our Jewish community, this Rosh Hashanah will be unique and complicated, when the joy of the new year will be touched by the grief and sadness of this tragic day’s anniversary.

I am reminded of the profound words of Israeli activist Rachel Goldberg-Polin who wrote “May we be showered with healing and resilience, and in this new year, may we rise again.” So may it be for us all, of every faith, tradition, and nationality.

Rabbi Ken Kanter currently serves the local Jewish congregation at the Temple Oseh Shalom in Bluffton, SC.