Archive for July 2018
How to Find a Machzor (High Holiday Prayer Book)
This comprehensive article serves as a guide to finding the right High Holiday Machzor for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur for you, including links to purchase a prayer book online or download free
Conservative Tashlich Texts (English & Hebrew)
This excerpt from the Conservative Machzor Lev Shalom for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur presents the special prayers and passages recited during the Tashlich ritual, in which Jews symbolically cast away their sins into a
How to Make High Holiday Synagogue Services Meaningful
This honest article presents six simple tips to transform lengthy, frustrating services into a meaningful prayer experience. With an emphasis on finding a personal connection to the words and their significance, rather than
How to Make a Shofar
This 4 minute long video shows how a ram’s horn is transformed into a shofar, the musical instrument and ritual object used throughout the month of Elul and during Rosh Hashanah and Yom
Maimonides’ 4 Steps to Teshuvah
This short video outlines the four steps to teshuvah (repentance), according to Maimonides: regret our actions, stop doing them, confess or apologize, and commit to changing our behavior in the future. Maimonides (Moses
Audio Recordings of Ashkenazi High Holiday Liturgy
This link will take you to the musical prayer navigator of Mechon Hadar, where you can find audio recordings for each part of the synagogue service for Shabbat, weekday, Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, Festivals
How to Light Candles on Rosh Hashanah
In this thorough instructional video (9:31), Dr. Rachael Turkienicz describes how to light the holiday candles for Rosh Hashanah, including technical and spiritual explanations for this mitzvah, as well as on-screen English transliteration of the
How to Blow the Shofar
This short instructional video demonstrates how to blow the shofar on Rosh Hashanah, including an explanation of the three different types of ritual blasts: tekiyah, shevarim, and teruah. Featuring Paul Root Wolpe, Ph.D.,
How to Braid a Round Challah for Rosh Hashanah
This short instructional video demonstrates three different methods for making a circular challah, as is customary for Rosh Hashanah. There are many explanations offered for this custom, such as the round challah symbolizing
Audio Recordings of Sephardic High Holiday Liturgy
This link will take you to the High Holiday section of the Sephardic Hazzanut Project website, where you can listen to audio recordings of many of the piyutim, prayers and Torah readings sung