A Rosh Hashannah Message - On Jews and Windows

On this eve of Rosh Hashanah, my mind has returned to a passage in the Talmud I last thought about when we revealed the magnificent Cyril Korn stained glass at the Synagogue.

Rabbi Chiya bar Abba said in the name of Rabbi Yochanan: "A person should only pray in a house with windows.” (Brachot 34a)

It’s an instruction that makes its way into the Shulchan Arukh where it is combined with an additional mandate not to pray in a Makom Parutz, a wild or open space.

On the one hand, we need windows. We do not pray in seclusion. The world affects us and concerns us. We need to feel the turn of the season and – in ten days’ time especially – the turn of the day.

But on the other hand, we need some level of insulation from the chaos and noise of the world.

The Talmudic necessity for windows is accompanied by a prooftext – “And the windows of [Daniel’s] upper chamber were open towards Jerusalem.” (Daniel 6:11) And so it is, from the attacks of almost two years ago, to the pains and loss of life since – both Jewish and Palestinian – to the politics of the last few days, the windows of our chamber are open towards Jerusalem.

The verse from Daniel emerges from the stress of its own scary political time. King Darius is persuaded by his satraps and governors to issue an irrevocable ban on “anyone issuing a petition to any god or man other than the King himself on pain of being thrown into a lion’s den.” And so, Daniel retreats to his upper chamber, with its windows open to Jerusalem, and prays “Di Hava Avad Min Kadmat D’nah – as he had always done.” This dance, in which we pray in private with windows open, is old, it is the thing we have always done.

 

Judaism does not exist apart from the stresses of the world  - we need windows. But religion and I think every attempt towards growth, requires a moment to step back from the Makom Parutz – the wild space. This is our task this year, as it has always been.

 

For those able to join us in our beautiful windowed sanctuary, I look forward to sharing this special journey with you. For those who will be able to join us only on the stream – www.newlondon.org.uk/digital - your company is most warmly welcomed. To all, my blessings for a sweet and healthy year, a year of peace for us all both inside and beyond the windows of this time of prayer.

Shannah Tovah,

Rabbi Jeremy