Rosh Hashanah - Enthroning Hashem

An improved version of something I posted last year:

You shall intone ‘Kingship’, ‘Remembrance’ and ‘Shofar Blasts’ before me on Rosh Hashanah. ‘Kingship’ – So that you should enthrone me as king over yourselves. ‘Remembrance’ – So that you are brought to my mind [only] for good [reasons]. And with what [should you enthrone him]? With the shofar. (BT Rosh Hashanah 34b)

Just as the shofar is sounded at countless coronation services in the Prophets, so too do we use the shofar at Hashem’s ‘coronation’ on Rosh Hashanah. This symbolism is made absolutely explicit by the recital, seven times, of Psalm 47 at the start of the shofar blowing service at Musaf:

God has ascended [to his throne] with a blast; Hashem, with the sound of the shofar…For God has become king over the nations; Hashem is
seated upon his holy throne.

Note how the nature of this ‘enthronement’ is elucidated by the Sifre:

Why did the Sages see fit that ‘Kingship’ should be said first, and that ‘Remembrance’ and ‘Shofar Blasts’ should only be said afterwards? Rather that you should enthrone him over yourselves first and after
that ask mercy of him, in order that you should be remembered [for good] before him. And with what [should you enthrone him]? With the shofar, [because] the shofar signifies freedom, as it says (Isaiah 27:13) “On that day he shall sound the great shofar [and the lost ones will come from the land of Assyria and the rejected ones from the land of Egypt and they shall prostrate themselves to Hashem on his holy mountain in Jerusalem”].

This is not an act performed under duress; the significance of the shofar, as the Sifre notes above, is that it is a symbol in scripture of the free acceptance of Hashem’s sovereignty. In the Sifre’s proof text the dispersed of Israel are not ‘gathered up’ from the four corners of the earth as other texts state, rather the shofar serves as an invitation to the dispersed of Israel to enthrone Hashem willingly and the dispersed ‘come’, apparently of their own accord, to Hashem’s holy mountain. There ‘they will prostrate themselves’; they do so as a collective and voluntary act.

That the community of Israel is able to freely choose to enthrone Hashem as king over themselves, an opportunity the individual does not have, testifies to the power of the community within Jewish thought. The sheer power and audacity of this theological claim is nowhere more evident than in the last verse appended to the Aleinu prayer, the central pillar of the ‘Kingship’ section of the Musaf service. The verse is from Deuteronomy 33:5, part of the blessing with which Moses blesses Israel before his death, and reads as follows, “And there was a king [i.e. Hashem] in Jeshurun [i.e. Israel], when the heads of the people gathered, when the tribes of Israel were together”. It almost seems as if Hashem’s being king was dependant on the actions of Israel. It is precisely this audacious theological claim that the Sifre on Deuteronomy (Piska 346) makes at length:

“And there was a king in Jeshurun” (33:5): When all of Israel is united in their counsel below, His great name is praised above, as it is said, “And there was a king in Jeshurun”…Similarly Scripture says: “This is my
God, and I will glorify Him” (Exodus 15:2) – When I acknowledge Him, He is glorious, but when I do not acknowledge Him, He is [not] glorious, if one may say such a thing (kivyakhol) – “When I proclaim the name of Hashem; ascribe ye greatness unto our God” (32:3) – when I proclaim His Name, He is great, but when I do not, [He is not great,] if one may say such a thing (kivyakhol) – “Therefore ye are My witnesses saith Hashem, and I am God” (Isaiah 43:12), when you are My witnesses, I am God, but when you are not my witnesses, I am not God, if one may say such a thing (kivyakhol) – “Unto thee I lift up min eyes, O Thou that art enthroned in the heavens” (Ps. 123:1) – were it not for me, Thou wouldst not be enthroned in the heavens, if one may say such a thing (kivyakhol). So too in this case [“And there was a king in Jeshurun…]when the tribes of Israel were together” – [He is King] when they form one [unified] group; [He is] not [King] when they form several groups.

It is on Rosh Hashanah that we (re)enthrone Hashem as our king, as the central orientating aspect of our lives; despite “our beginning in dust and our end in dust”, it is only we ourselves, as a community, who have the power to set our priorities and right our ways. The individual human being on Rosh Hashanah may be hopeless and frail, “a broken shard, withering grass, a fading flower, a passing shade, a dissipating cloud, a fleeting breeze, flying dust and a fleeting dream”. Yet the community on Rosh Hashanah can sound the shofar and proclaim:

God has ascended [to his throne] with a blast; Hashem, with the sound of the shofar…For God has become king over the nations; Hashem is seated upon his holy throne. (Psalm 47:6, 9)