Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Understanding Rosh haShana

You are a scientist. Your mission is to find the cure to Alzheimer disease. A powerful and wealthy INVESTOR is ready to spend 100,00 dollars in your wisdom. He gives you the money, one year at a time. The agreement is that in twelve months, He will meet with you again to reexamine His investment. He will not expect you to find the cure in one year. And He is willing to keep investing in you. To reinvest, however, He wants to make sure that you stick to His plan. And if you made mistakes (you probably will) he wants to know that you are capable to learn from them. You should identify your own flaws and ideally to articulate them our in front of Him. He knows that if you clearly acknowledge your mistakes, you will probably avoid making them again. And precisely those mistakes, have the potential to get you closer to find the cure for Alzheimer. On the contrary, if you deny your mistakes, and you neglect to look back and detect where did you fail, you will probably make those mistakes again. You are a questionable investment...


God is the INVESTOR. He invested in us. He gave us our lives. Expecting that we will make good use of the resources that He generously granted us . Every year, in Rosh haShana, we meet with our INVESTOR to submit our annual report, knowing that the money for the next term (life), is not automatically guaranteed. First, we have to show that we have followed (or tried to follow!) the Investor's plan. Second, that we have not wasted his investment doing nothing, and third that we are capable of identifying our mistakes and learn from them.


In Rosh haShana, we have to persuade God that it is worth it for HIM to reinvest again in us, in our lives.