Rabbi Shefa Gold - Shofar Chants

Rabbi Shefa Gold teaches chanting as a way to go deeper into spiritual discovery. Her website offers downloads of these beautiful chants:

From the Psalm for Thursday:

(Psalm 81: 4-5)

Tiku vachodesh shofar

Ba’keseh l’yom chagaynu

Ki chok l’Yisrael hu mishpat L'Elohai Ya’akov

(Sound a shofar at the New Moon…. at the moment of concealment/potential for our Celebration Day.

It is a statute for Israel; it is a rule for Jacob)

Click to download "Tiku VaChodesh" chant.

Rosh Hashanah Chant

Ashrei HaAm yodeya T’ruah Adonay B’or panecha y’haleychun Oh God, Happy are the people who know the blast of the shofar; they walk in the light of your presence. Download: Single Part Round

Translating Hebrew to English

The following posting by Steven Ovitsky is helpful in understanding the seemingly inconsistent translation of shofar terms from the Hebrew Bible into English:

"The metal trumpet (based on Egyptian models) of the Hebrew Bible is called 'hatzotzera' (plural 'hatzotzerot') and is mentioned 29 times. The 'hatzotzerah' was always used in pairs which explains why the Bible uses the plural except once. 'Hatzotzerim' is the term for the players. The Septuagint - the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible - correctly translates it into Greek as 'salpinx'.

"The ram's horn, 'shofar', is mentioned 72 times. The problem is that the Septuagint translates 'shofar' as 'salpinx' 42 times, confusing the two very different instruments; especially since they were used together in parts the ancient Temple services.

"In Latin, the Vulgate translates 'shofar' 38 times as 'buccina', 29 times as 'tuba'. It also translates 'hatzotzera' as 'tuba'. When both 'hatzotzerot' and 'shofrot' are mentioned in the same sentence "shofar" is "tuba cornea".

"Here is a comparison of a line in Psalm 81:
Hebrew - Tiku baChodesh shofar
Latin - Buccinate in neomenia tuba
English - Blow the trumpet on the new moon

"Most of the English (King James and I'm sure others) translations are based on the Greek and Latin, not Hebrew. They translate shofar as trump, clarion,
trumpet, bugle, etc; and Hatzotzera as trump, trumpet, bugle, cornet, etc."

Beautiful Painting of Shofar

Just beautiful, an oil painting by Israeli artist Roee Yossef Suffrin. On the website, the artist expresses a sentiment I have felt as a shofar blower:

“Now, let us maintain together this perfect equilibrium
from our feet on the ground
to our entire bodies, hearts, heads and celestial antenna,
steeping ourselves directly in the spirituality of the divine love.
A song rises within us, capturing and preserving
all the strength of Creation.”

New Book: Secret Shofar of Barcelona

Just published by Karben, this book tells the story of Spanish Jews struggling to observe the mitzvah of shofar during the Inquisition. According to the publisher:

"Musician Don Fernando longs to hear the sounds of the shofar on the High Holidays, but, like the other secret Jews in Inquisition-era Spain, he must hide his religion. When he is asked to perform a symphony celebrating the new world, he and his son Rafael devise a daring plan to usher in the Jewish New Year in plain sight of the Spanish nobility!"

The story of Don Fernando is often repeated, I have yet to discover the source or veracity of the story. Please let me know if you know.
_________
I congratulate the author and illustrator for getting the book to print. It is not easy. There are a number of children's books about shofar, but few for adults. I tried to find a publisher for Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn but kept being told there was no market for such a specialized book. So now it is available to all at www.hearingshofar.com. Enjoy.

Painted Shofarot

Talmud, in Tractate Rosh Hashanah 26b, allows a shofar to be covered with gold -- so long as the covering is held back from the end where the mouth is placed on the shofar. This is to assure that the sound we hear emanates from the contact between the lips and the horn -- and not from between the lips and the gold. By extension of this, some might argue that painting the shaft of a shofar -- except by the mouth place -- is also acceptable. Yet by the custom many Jews follow, shofarot used for the High Holy days are not painted. Leaving a horn in its (nearly) raw state symbolizes the humility with which we stand before the Judge.

For others not bound by this tradition, decorating a shofar can be a satisfying craft that can add visual praise (to God) to their shofar's audible praise.

For examples of beautifully painted shofarot, emblazoned with quotes from scriptures, see www.shofarsrus.com. The shofarot are handcrafted by Ya'akov Rice and Painted by Don Clarke.

The one above is "iridescent electric blue fading into iridescent pearl. Pearl and blue lettering in English, Joel 2:1, "BLOW THE SHOFAR IN ZION", and in Hebrew, "BLOW THE SHOFAR IN ZION, AND SOUND AN ALARM IN MY HOLY MOUNTAIN". Beads are glass, semi-precious stones of turquoise and lapis lazuli."

The one below is "end to end fire on a dark blue background. Turquoise blue lettering with a flame over each letter in English, Deut. 4:24, "OUR GOD IS A CONSUMING FIRE", and in Hebrew, "FOR THE LORD YOUR GOD IS A CONSUMING FIRE, A JEALOUS GOD". Beads are glass, miliori, semi-precious stones of lapis lazuli and turquoise." 

One Horn Short of a New Year

According to legend, one horn from the ram of the Akedah was sounded at Sinai and the other will be sounded when messiah comes. This image reminds me of that ram, reconstituted from its ashes, awaiting redemption.

Or is this ram like all of us, approaching Tishri and feeling incomplete, waiting for the horn to sound.

In anycase, the inside of this "shofar note card" from Cafe Press has a picture of a shofar, the missing horn, and the greating, "shana tova".

"Blow the Blowing"-Ezekiel 7-14

The shofar is identified or implied in Torah by a variety of terms, for example:
Shofar
Yovel
Keren
Teruah

An interesting term is in Ezekiel 7:14: JPS translates it as, "They have sounded the horn, and all is prepared; but no one goes to battle."

The phrase translated as, "they have sounded the horn" is, in Hebrew:

תקעו בתקוע (Transliteration: ta-koo b'takoo-ah)

This translates something like "blast the blaster". It does not specify horn or trumpet. It employs the rhetorical device known as paronomasia to poetic effect. It is the only instance in Tanach where the phrase is used.