Tefillah - 077 Making the Most out of Time

A ‘Blessed Year’: Is This A Blessing Merely About Grain?

ברך עלינו ה' אלוקינו את השנה זאת– “Bless upon us, Hashem, our G-d, this year.”This blessing is called Birkas HaShanim (the blessing for a good year) by Chazal.

It seems in this blessing like we are just asking Hashem for grain and for rain in its time (which implies our source of livelihood), as we ask for later in the blessing,ואת כל מיני תבואתה לטובה. But in the beginning of this blessing, first we ask Hashem to give us a year of blessing. So it must be that first we are asking for a good year in general - besides for how we ask to have blessed grain and rain.

Let us try to understand what this is – why we first ask for a blessed year in general, and why we ask that our grain should be blessed and that we should have proper rain in its time.

Chazal say that there are four kinds of Rosh HaShanah – for grain, for water, for trees, and for people. Although our livelihood is decided on Rosh HaShanah, there is a separate Rosh HaShanah for grain, water, and trees. In this blessing of Shemoneh Esrei, we ask that the grain and water should be blessed.

Why are we asking specifically for blessed grain and water, though? Isn’t this already included in asking for our livelihood, which is what we ask for in the beginning of this blessing that we should have a blessed year in general?

Time and Above Time

In order to understand this, we need to understand what time is about.

In the Jewish people, there is a concept of Rosh Chodesh, the new month; and there is also Rosh Chodesh Nissan, which is called Rosh L’Chodashim, the head of all the months.

In Creation, there was always a concept of time. In the original state of Creation, there would have been only six days, and on Shabbos, Adam would have entered the eternal Olam HaBa. Each day represented a thousand years of Creation; the sefarim hakedoshim state that a day of Hashem equates to 1,000 years of a man’s life. Thus, our entire 6000 years of this world, which represent the 6 days of the week, were all encapsulated into the original 6 days of Creation. The plan was for Adam to enter the 7^th day of Shabbos.

When Adam sinned, the original concept of time disappeared, and a new kind of time began, in which there are years. Our entire mode of time became demoted from Heavenly time, which is to have 6 days, to human time, which takes up 6000 years. Before Adam’s sin, there were only “days”, and no years [and no months]. So whole the concept of “years” came about entirely through sin. If not for the sin, there would be no concept of “years”, because in the original concept of time, there was only “days”.

Thus, when we ask Hashem in this blessing for a “blessed year” – and then we ask for blessed grain and water in its time – we need to realize what a ‘blessed year’ implies, what ‘time’ is. We must have the proper perspective towards time. A Jew really lives in a whole different plane of time than a gentile. Rosh Chodesh is called lachem, “for you”, and not for the gentile nations of the world. The Jewish nation’s calendar goes by the moon, and the non-Jews go by the sun. This is not just a difference in the calendars. It shows that we live in a whole different plane then they do.

When we daven in ברך עלינו for a blessed year, we must know what we are asking for, or else this is an empty request. We are really asking to become connected to what the year is – in other words, to understand how to view time. We need to realize that although we live in time, we are really above the current time, because deep in our soul there is a place that lives in the state before Adam’s sin, which was above all current time, where there are no ‘years’ at all – where we are not ruled by whatever the time brings.

In Time, But Above It

Now let us try to understand this in a way that we can draw this closer to our soul so that we can apply it to ourselves.

The Jewish nation is capable of sanctifying time. Beis Din each month would sanctify the moon; in the Shemoneh Esrei we daven on Yom Tov, we mention how the Jewish people has the special ability to sanctify time. The gentile nations, by contrast, are bound to time; they are below time and not above it, therefore, time rules over them. But a Jew, deep in his soul, is above time; “Mazal (the astrological signs of the Zodiac) do not apply to Yisrael”. A Jew is really above time, but he has to get his sustenance from this lowly earth, which is within time; all the produce in the earth depends on certain times of the year for it to grow and sprout. But although a Jew is sustained and fed by the times of this earth, in essence he is still above time, and the sustenance is merely coming to him in the ‘garment’ of time.

There are two ways how a person can live his life: to identify himself as part of time, or as part of a place. We find in Chazal that there are certain auspicious times of the year, such as what month it is or what Yom Tov it is. We also find that Chazal attribute importance to places that people came from, for example, that different areas in Eretz Yisrael have different advantages. These are two deep points about our soul – the concept of time, and the concept of a place.

However, in the innermost depths of a Jew’s soul, there is a point that is above both the current time and place. Hashem is forever, and so is the soul of a member of Yisrael forever, because Hashem and Yisrael are one and thus interconnected. Therefore, although we live in a world of time and thus we have to deal with time, time is really like a ‘garment’ we wear, but it is not our essence. Our essence is to be above time. The proof to this is that the Jewish people have the power “to sanctify the times”.

So a person is davening in Shemoneh Esrei byברוך עלינו that Hashem should give him a blessed year. What is his perspective towards these words of Shemoneh Esrei? One must not think that he is bound to time, to the year 5774 that he is in. Your soul is eternal! It is not bound to the year you are in!  Thus, even if the year will not be blessed, that does not mean that all is lost, because Hashem can take you out of that situation too!

The sefarim hakedoshim state that even if a person’s soul ends up in She’ol (the lowest abyss of Gehinnom), Hashem can take him out. A similar concept is expressed in the statement of Chazal that “Tisha B’Av is destined to become a moed (festival)”, and the depth of this is that even the worst time possible will eventually transform into a good ‘time’ – it will be a revelation of how we are not bound to ‘time’.

Experiencing Time

Therefore, if a person feels that he can only connect to Hashem through certain times of the year, that he can only have a relationship with Hashem through certain auspicious times of the year when all is good, then his connection with Hashem is sorely lacking. Such a person, when he asks Hashem for a good year, thinks that he is bound to this year, and he views time with the same perspective of a non-Jew’s time. A Jew must realize that he is above regular time.

The true perspective is that indeed, we need to experience time, but in the right way - to experience the holiness of Shabbos and Yom Tov. Most people don’t feel the holiness of a special time; they don’t feel the holiness of Shabbos, and all they feel during Shabbos and Yom Tov are superficial pleasures of nice clothing, good food, and a pleasant atmosphere. This is because most people think they are bound to time, therefore, time rules over them and constricts them - so they aren’t able to really experience what is contained in a time.

Thus, when we ask Hashem for a blessed year, it is because we want to become connected to what the year is, to connect to time in the correct way. A person might daven this blessing his whole life and think that it’s about davening for grain and rain. He never became aware of what he was really asking for in this blessing.

Dealing With Changes

We must therefore be aware that we have two parts to us.

There is a part in us that is not bound to anything on this world. “You are children to Hashem” – we are always connected to Hashem, no matter what situation we find ourselves in. This is the deep part of our soul.

On the outer layer of our soul, we go through various times and changes. The word shanah, year, is from the word shinuy, change. With each year that goes on, the world completes its cycle and repeats the cycle, but in addition, each year brings new changes. No matter what changes we go through, we ask Hashem that we remain connected with Him. This is the implication of what we ask for in this blessing of ברך עלינו את השנה הזאת.

It is written, “A tzaddik falls seven times and rises.” If a person loses his connection with Hashem when he goes through changes, he will keep getting disappointed and frustrated at himself for failing. But if he remains connected with Hashem in spite of changes, he will find the strength to get up no matter how many falls and turbulent changes he goes through.

When a person davens for a good shanah\year, he might feel very disconnected from this blessing, feeling like “What does this have to do with me? It must be some deep matter that Chazal discuss.” But the meaning is to connect to Hashem no matter what you go through in this shanah, whether it’s summer or winter.

As for the rest of the year – having blessing in our grain and having proper rain its time – those things will be blessed as a result of a “good year”, of utilizing time as well as realizing that we are not bound to time. But the essence of a “good year” is when we can remain connected with Hashem no matter what we go through in this shanah, no matter how much shinuy\changes we go through.

All of the tests we go through in life involve changes. The only way we can handle changes is when we deeply connect with Hashem as we are going through the changes, and this will lift us above all the changes so that we can handle their turbulence.

If there is no rain during the year, it must be that we didn’t handle those ‘changes’ in the right way. When we handle the various changes of the year in the right way - a “blessed year” will result from it.[1]