Today is Eternally Pregnent

A teaching from Rabbi Greg Wolfe, Rosh Hashanah 5768:

"There is, on the other hand, a more spiritual response to the fragility of life. This insight, taught to me by Reb Marcia Prager, is based on a re-reading (and perhaps a more accurate reading) of that familiar verse from the Shofar service that we will chant in just a bit: HaYom Harat Olam. Traditionally it is translated... as "Today the world is born" or "Today is the birthday of the world." But "Olam" in Hebrew can mean "world" (as in Melech ha olam) or it can mean "eternal" (as in L'olam va'ed, forever and ever.) The actual phrase "harat olam" originally comes from Jeremiah 20:17 where Jeremiah bemoans his fate as a prophet and wishes that he had never been born; that his mother had been "harat olam", eternally pregnant. (Harah can mean birth or pregnant) So, now, our verse in the Shofar service reads: "HaYom Harat Olam, Today is eternally pregnant." Today, the now, each moment, is always pregnant, eternally filled with potential and possibility; even when we are confronted with great sadness and loss, as we all inevitably are at some time... Today is eternally pregnant and Rosh Hashanah's blast of the shofar stirs us, calls us to awareness, so that we might embrace our lives with open arms."

For more information on shofar, download Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn  at www.HearingShofar.com, and subscribe to www.HearingShofar.blogspot.com.

We need more shofarists

Why should you learn to blow shofar? Because you may have the opportunity to create a miracle for someone, as told in the following story:

A Miracle in Firenze: Shana Tova 2006

Rosh Hoshanah in Florence. I didn’t want to go to the main synagogue because although it is incredibly beautiful, the service wasn’t what I was looking for. It is very orthodox, all in Hebrew and Italian, and the women are separate in an upper balcony behind bars, hot, stuffy and too far from the “action.”

A few years ago, a group of Italians and ex-pats started holding Progressive Jewish services in a classroom of a local school. I made sure their schedule for the High Holidays was in our paper along with that of the Synagogue, and I decided to attend myself.

Saturday morning, I rode my bike to the “classroom”. There were maybe 25 people there. There was a small ark, holding a single Torah. We sat on plastic chairs surrounded by schoolwork and blackboards. An Italian gentleman, greeted us in Italian, and told us that the man who was supposed to blow the shofar wasn’t able to come because a friend of his had died the night before.

Then he asked what I considered an absurd question. He asked if anyone there knew how to blow the shofar. The group present consisted of several tourists, who had heard about these services from our paper, or their concierge, a handful of Italians, a few ex-pats and a couple of students. Then a darling American girl of around 23 years old... who was traveling in Florence with her parents raised her hand, and said she did. I looked back at her, thinking maybe she had picked one up in Sunday school, and would be able to play it at the level that I can play a kazoo, and the service began.

The author continues by describing the service and the feelings it arouses in her about Judaism.

Then, time for the blowing of the shofar. The girl came up front, a little embarrassed, apologizing because she hadn’t done this since she was 13. And she blew the shofar, not just getting some sound out, for which we all would have been grateful. But she really knew how to blow the shofar, she knew the correct response to each incantation, and she was magnificent. 

We tell the story at Chanukah, of the oil that was only enough for one day, lasted eight. That what I kept thinking about when I heard the shofar last week. It was Rosh Hoshanah, the shofar needed to be blown, only 25 people there….I am Jewish from birth, I know a lot of Jewish people, friends, family, neighbors, teachers, colleagues, and I do not know personally a single person who knows how to blow the shofar. And at all the different services over the years, it was always some older man who blew it. Who would think? A young, hip, beautiful, American…..girl, in Florence for a couple of days? It was a miracle.

It is easier than you may think to blow shofar. My book, Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn describes how to do it, see Volume Two - For the Shofar Blower, at www.HearingShofar.com. You can call any synagogue and ask the rabbi or the congregation's shofar blower for help. Or any trumpet or brass instrument player or teacher can show you the basic technique.

The author of the quoted blog, Nita Tucker, is editor in chief of The Florentine, an English-language newspaper published in Florence, Italy.  Photo is of the main synagogue in Florence and is by Alberto Jona Falco from A Guide to Jewish Italy by Annie Sacerdoti, Rizzoli International Publications, 2004.

For more information on shofar, download Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn  at www.HearingShofar.com, and subscribe to www.HearingShofar.blogspot.com.

"Ancient" Shofar in Florence?

Help me find out more about this treasure! In a New York Times article on July 16, 1989 titled "The Flip Side of Florence," music historian Harvey Sachs writes:

"Florence's (Italy) art treasures make an extraordinarily strong claim on travelers' attention, but few visitors realize that the city played as great a role in the history of music as in the history of art and architecture..." 

The author then takes us on a tour through the city, pointing out landmarks in the history of music. He continues,

"Re-cross the river on the Ponte Vecchio and head for the nearby town hall - Palazzo della Signoria, also called Palazzo Vecchio. Its Great Hall of the Five Hundred has often been used for musical performances, despite its inadequate acoustics; in the 19th century, such major choral-orchestral works as Haydn's ''Creation'' and Mendelssohn's ''St. Paul'' had their Florentine premieres here. Today, the Signoria houses the Medicis' magnificent musical instrument collection, which includes string instruments by Stradivari, Amati and Ruggeri, an ancient Jewish shofar and an ancient Roman tibia (an ancestor of the flute) found at Pompeii. The first curator of this collection was Bartolomeo Cristofori, who invented the piano at the Medici court in 1709. No examples of his work have remained in Florence, but the Signoria's collection contains an early (1739) upright piano by Domenico del Mela."

 I cannot locate information on this shofar. There are very few shofarot verified to be over 100 year old, so it would be very interesting to know about this one.

If you have been to the museum, or will be traveling to Florence this summer, or have a working knowledge of Italian, please help me find out more.

For more information on shofar, download Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn  at www.HearingShofar.com, and subscribe to www.HearingShofar.blogspot.com.

What will YOU blow for?

“Whenever you are beset by any calamity such as drought, pestilence, locust, etc., you are to offer up supplications concerning it and sound the trumpets. And this conduct is one of the ways of teshuvah, for when calamity befalls the people, and they offer up supplications concerning it – sounding also the trumpets – all are bound to realize that it is owing to their bad ways that misfortune has befallen them, as it is written, ‘Your iniquities have withheld these (blessings) from you; your errors have lost you the good’ (Jeremiah 5:25). And it is this conduct which will cause them to remove the calamity from them. However, if they neither offer up such supplications nor sound the trumpets, declaring that what has befallen them is but a natural event or that this misfortune is the result of chance and accident, then their course is one of cruelty, and it causes them to persist in their bad ways. Thus their misfortune is bound to be followed by many others.” (Maimonides, Mishneh Torah – The Laws of the Fast Days 1:1-3)

For more information on shofar, download Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn  at www.HearingShofar.com, and subscribe to www.HearingShofar.blogspot.com.

Harmonizing Shofarot

Cantor David Goldstein provides recordings of the shofar calls on his website, including a trio of three horns -- kudo, sheep, and gemsbok as shown from top to bottom above. It is an interesting demonstration of the harmonic potential of shofarots.  Listen here.

His site also has recordings of tekiah, teruah, shevarim, and tekiah gedolah played on solo instruments.

In personal correspondence, Cantor Goldstein says, "I was the Ba’al T’kiah on all the Shofarot.  This recording was done in three separate takes.  It resembles the combined sound of our young Shofar blowers making their simultaneous calls during our Rosh Hashanah service."  Having the youth of the congregation serve tutti - all together - as shofar blowers is a lovely minhag - practice - that gets the children involved and possibly draws the adults into closer listening.

For more information on shofar, download Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn  at www.HearingShofar.com, and subscribe to www.HearingShofar.blogspot.com.

Apostate Could Not Sound Shofar

A story from Hemdat yamim, Yamim noraim 43b (retold in Aryeh Wineman’s Ethical Tales from the Kabbalah, pg 122) tells of a shofar blower that converted away from Judaism. When he found that he could blow tekiah and shevarim, but not teruah. "He was so perplexed that his heart died within him."

He became distressed "for ever since he had changed his religion he never found the strength to sound the teruah." When he consulted Rabbi Abraham Yakhini, a 17th Century mystic and preacher from Constantinople, the rabbi informed him, "It is so, and it is explained in the biblical verse, 'Blessed is the people who knows the sound of the teruah.' (Psalms 89:16) The verse specifies neither tekiah nor shevarim, but only teruah, for this is the gift that is given to the people of Israel alone."

The convert's "heart melted within him." He fled to a distant land, and fully repented.  After that, he was able to sound teruah.

The story points to the broken-hearted kavanah required to blow shofar.

For more information on shofar, download Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn  at www.HearingShofar.com, and subscribe to www.HearingShofar.blogspot.com.

Wineman also suggests the story dates to the Inquisition and was intended to encourage Jews to resist conversion.

My thanks to Holly Robinson for bringing this teaching to my attention.

Shawn Weaver's Shofar Ensemble

Just a few days ago, I proposed a shofar orchestra composed of horns with different fundamental pitches. Today,  I learn that such a musical society is already in existence.


The composer and conductor is Shawn Weaver, the piece featured in the video was performed during the Yisker (afternoon) service on Yom Kippur, 9/28/2009 (5770) at Temple Beth Am, Seattle, WA.

In personal correspondence, he says, "Most shofar players can get 1 - 3 pitches. No shofar is exactly the same in length. The larger shofars can produce a low pedal tone. The piece is essentially a rhythm piece."

What a wonderful way to breath energy into the late hours of the fast. As the audience can be heard exclaiming, "Yasher Koach!", may you have strength.

The composer offers the sheet music for "Shofar Piece" and other compositions at http://web.me.com/shawnsax/Site_3/Ensemble.html.

For more information on shofar, download Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn  at www.HearingShofar.com, and subscribe to www.HearingShofar.blogspot.com.

Shofar Beer Bong?

I have written at length about how shofar was used in the ancient world as a drinking horn, aka "rython".

A "Nordic" ryton, available on the Internet

Apparently it is being used in another type of primitive society, the college drinking party.  There is a Facebook Fan Page called "The Great Shofar Beer Bong." It is an elite society with 11 members.

As a cultural phenomenon, it ranks with the shofar used as a pot pipe in Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle."

At least one observer has already seen the connection between rhyton and bong: "Rhyta were commonly horn-shaped in the early millennia BC, with the pointy end of the horn corked until you wanted to drain some wine from it into your mouth. In which case you'd hold the horn at arm's length above your head, uncork the tip, and let 'er gush, hopefully into your mouth. It was the Beer Bong of the ancient world. Practical? No. But fun and decadent."

It is nice to see our youth so interested in their Jewish heritage.

For more information on shofar, download Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn  at www.HearingShofar.com, and subscribe to www.HearingShofar.blogspot.com.

Shofar Orchestra?

I have recently discovered the Russian Horn Cappella, a group reviving the 18th and 19th century horn ensemble style. Unlike modern brass bands composed of "valved" instruments each capable of playing a wide range of notes, this Russian technique uses as many as 72 unvalved instrument ranging in length from 10 cm to 2.5 m long, each tuned to a single note.  The concept is like a pipe organ, but the sound is much more mellow as the output of each player blends.

 According to a history on the group's website, the first Russian horns were made of animal horns. These gave way to metal hunting horns that were eventually tuned for musical performance.

This inspires me to consider a Shofar Capella, a group of shofar players each with a shofar with a different, tuned fundamental note. As it is, I have a "piccolo shofar" bearly longer than my hand with a high, shrill pitch, and longer horns in the baritone range.

With the overtones of a natural horn, we would never sound as refined as the Russian ensemble. but the effect would be interesting.

The Levites in the Temple had a shofar choir. Perhaps they used this technique. Even if they did not play specific melodies, interesting effects could have been achieved by separating the high, medium, and low pitched horns.

For more information on shofar, download Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn  at www.HearingShofar.com, and subscribe to www.HearingShofar.blogspot.com.

Shofar Box

Today, it is common to display shofar as a decoration in our homes. During most of the past thousand years or so, I believe that most shofarot were stored in boxes both as protection and as a form of hiddur mitzvah - honoring the ritual implement. A similar idea survives in the custom of using an etrog box, perhaps because an etrog is more perishable and susceptible to bruising or damage. Just as no ancient shofarot exist, few antique shofar boxes have survived. Here are a few examples:

Date unknown, from Ben-Ami Endres Auction catalog.

Shofar and Case by Marcus Jonas, Gift of the Family of Marcus Jonas of Oakland, California to the Skirball Cultural Center, used with permission. Identified elsewhere as 19th Century.

Perhaps other boxes are not recognized as serving a unique function because they were rectangular in shape as shown in the following example: 

This shofar is over 100 years old and was used at Cardiff's Cathedral Road Synagogue from the 1890s to the 1980s. Notice the rare shofar storage box behind it, the lovely patina of the horn, and the delicate scalloped end. (Now in Cardiff Story, a new museum opening Cardiff, UK's Old Library in autumn 2010.) (Photo from BBC.)

"A traditional Moroccan shofar and case. The case is decorated with polished camel bone. Shofar and case courtesy of Dr. Ari Greenspan."

At least one pair of contemporary artists offers a shofar box; contact David Moss and Noah Greenberg at http://www.davidmoss.com/category.aspx?id=33&subcategory=69.

Shofar and Case.

(In the Great Synagogue, Aldgate, London.)

Photo from Jewish Encyclopedia.

IF YOU KNOW OF OTHER EXAMPLES, PLEASE BRING THEM TO MY ATTENTION.

If you are interested in importing a shofar box, the following will be of interest:

"United States International Trade Commission Rulings And Harmonized Tariff Schedule, 1995  The 'Shofar Box' consists of a ram's horn ("shofar") held in a fitted, hinged wooden case with ebony wood screen. The applicable subheading for the "Shofar Box" will be 9208.90.0080, HTS, which provides for whistles, call horns and other mouth-blown sound signaling instruments. The rate of duty will be 5.3%. http://www.faqs.org/rulings/rulings1995NY808529.html

For more information on shofar, download Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn  at www.HearingShofar.com, and subscribe to www.HearingShofar.blogspot.com.

New Year of the Kings

The Talmud defines four "new years" in the Hebrew calendar. The first of Nissan, the month, the first month of the calendar and the month during which Passover occurs, is called "the New Year of Kings,"

Since kings are inaugurated with shofarot, this may be reason to bring a shofar into your observation of Passover.

For more information on shofar, download Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn  at www.HearingShofar.com, and subscribe to www.HearingShofar.blogspot.com.

"Minstrels" and Shofar

"And Elisha said... 'But now bring me a minstrel.' And it came to pass, when the minstrel played, that the hand of the LORD came upon him." (2 Kings 3:15)
וְעַתָּה, קְחוּ-לִי מְנַגֵּן; וְהָיָה כְּנַגֵּן הַמְנַגֵּן, וַתְּהִי עָלָיו יַד-יְהוָה

The above is a nice kavanah for a shofar blower. We are like that minstrel, and we pray that through hearing shofar, listeners will have the experience of knowing inspiration from God.

"As the minstrel, the servant of God, becomes like his instrument, then the spirit of God comes upon him."  (Maggid of Mezritz, from Joseph Weiss, Studies in Eastern European Mysticism, Oxford University Press 1985, pg 71 as quoted in Zornberg, 2009)

How does a shofarist become like a shofar? 

• By becoming hollow, so the call of shofar flows through usrather than projecting our own egos.
• By identifying with the ram that was sacrificed instead of Isaac, knowing that our blowing is service to God.

Let me know what it means to you to become "like a shofar."

For more information on shofar, download Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn  at www.HearingShofar.com, and subscribe to www.HearingShofar.blogspot.com.

Zornberg on Akedah

A midrash on the Akedah says that God told Abraham that his children could invoke Abraham's merit by blowing the shofar. What shofar? "and he saw - Behold! - a ram, behind, caught in a thicket." (Genesis 22:13) Avivah Gottlieb Zornberg comments on this in The Murmuring Deep: Reflections on the Biblical Unconscious (Schocken 2009), pp 205 - 207:

"Essentially, He denies Abraham the closure he asks for - the absolution that will inoculate his children against future sin, indeed against the traumas of history. Instead, he refers him to the shofar as the means for evoking forgiveness. By blowing shofar, future generations will continue Abraham's work, rather than just banking on it.

"...The closure offered by the midrash is a vision of an animal caught in a thick, a tangle (in modern Hebrew, sevakh indicates psychological complexity) by its horns. Here, the ram substitutes for Isaac, but the emphasis is on the shofar, the instrument wrought of these complicated horns, and on the animal's position - "behind."  The shofar blown on Rosh Hashanah to evoke God's forgiveness may not be straight or "simple" (pashut). And it should be directed upward. As emblem for the complex human being, subject of many attempts to de-translate and retranslate his experience, the shofar cries with a human cry, produced by human breath.

"Most strikingly, however, the midrash focuses on the ram's position: And Abraham lifted up his eyes and he saw - behold! - a ram - behind (achar)..."  In order to see it, he is told, "Chazot l'achorekha - Turn around! Look behind you." In this way, the midrash addresses the anomalous use of achar - behind - as though it were syntactically detached from its context: not acharav - behind him - but simply and enigmatically achar. The flow of the sentence halts; questions gather. Does this refer to space, the space behind Abraham, hidden, other? Or to time - after? The ram, whose horns will offer atonement for the future is to be found in the world of achar ha-devarim ha-eileh, of after these things, where what lies behind the apparent facts, what happened before, the residues of the past, suffuse the present.

"...What lies behind [Abraham] is the future of his past, the once inevitable consequences of those traumatizing messages; and a dynamic possibility -- that his children, like him will work to transform and translate the enigmas of their own past. This is God's offer: the perpetual return of the shofar cry, for memory and transfiguration."

For more information on shofar, download Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn  at www.HearingShofar.com, and subscribe to www.HearingShofar.blogspot.com.

Cholent, Shabbat, and Shofar

Cholent is a stew that can be made before the start of Shabbat, then kept warm to serve for lunch on Shabbat. It eliminates the need to light a fire on Shabbat. Its importance to Shabbat-keeping Jews can be ascertained from the following teachings that contrast cholant and shofar:

The Tzemach Tzedek, third Lubavitcher Rebbe, made an association with a non-religious Jewish doctor. The doctor attended several public discourses of the Rebbe and these piqued his interest. Subsequently, the Rebbe invited the doctor to spend Shabbat with him. At the afternoon meal, steaming plates of cholent were put on the table (Cholent is a traditional Shabbat stew, served piping hot.). The doctor's expression was one of bewilderment.

The Rebbe understood that the doctor was wondering how could there be hot food on Shabbat, since cooking was not allowed. The Rebbe explained that the cholent was made prior to the Shabbat and was left to simmer the whole night.

Upon hearing these words, the doctor pushed the plate of food away, demurring that it was not healthy.

The Tzemach Tzedek responded, "Please reconsider. A person that eats cholent brings blessing into the world."

 (The custom of eating cholent was begun more than two millennia ago. A splinter cult of Jews, known as the Tzadukim, or Sadducees, believed that rabbinical law was corrupt and that the Bible should be interpreted literally. They interpreted the verse, "You shall have no fire burning in your dwellings," to mean that one should sit in the dark and eat cold food. In reality, the verse means that a fire may not be lit on Shabbat. To demonstrate the falseness of their belief, the Rabbis established lighting Shabbat candles to provide light during Shabbat and eating hot food on Shabbat day from a heat source prepared before Shabbat. Thus, one who eats cholent on Shabbat is considered to have upheld both the Written and Oral Torah.)

The doctor responded, "Rabbi didn't you tell us that the blessings draw down into the world by our blowing shofar on Rosh Hoshana?"

The Rebbe nodded to the affirmative.

"So why then," continued the doctor, "do we need to eat cholent on Shabbat?"

The Rabbi smiled and said, "It is true. And when Rosh Hoshana falls out on Shabbat we don't blow the shofar; we eat cholent."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
[Adapted by Yerachmiel Tilles from the parsha mailing list of Rabbi Herschel Finman (shliachp@aol.com), who heard it from Rabbi Dovid-Shalom Pape of Tzivos Hashem Newsletter fame some 30 years ago.]

The above is reposted from Ascent of Safad. 

Another telling of the story is found in Smiling Each Day, Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski for the second day of Tishrei (the second day of Rosh Hashanah):

...The angel assigned to supervise the mitzvah of shofar is the same one who is sent down to insure that the cholent and kugel remain hot on Shabbos moring. Since an angel cannot have two simultaneous assignments, whenever the two conflict the shofar is sacrificed. According to this scenario, hot cholent and kugel on Shabbos transcend shofar in importance. Gastronomically correct for sure, but hardly sublime.

In truth, however, the custom of hot cholent on Shabbos is far more than of gustatory or gastronomical significance. The Talmudic sages interpreted the Biblical verse prohibiting a fire on Shabbos to mean that one may not cook or build a flame, but precooked foods may be kept hot on a stove that was in lit before Shabbos. The Saducees, on the other hand, who rejected Talmudic interpretations, and translated Scriptures literally, prohibited the use of any manner of fire on Shabbos.

Thus, eating hot foods on Shabbos serves to stress our acknowledgment of the Divine authority of the Talmudic sages, and acceptance of their interpretation of the Torah as singularly authentic. It is that authority which empowers them to dispense with the performance of shofar out of concern that it might result in an inadvertent Scriptural transgression. And so, in a since, hot cholent on Shabbos exists on a plane above that of shofar.

Cholent may be only a custom, but established Jewish customs are Torah (Mateh Ephraim 610).

Of course, there is a practical consideration: If you try to simultaneously eat cholant and blow shofar, food particles might get stuck in the horn.

For more information on shofar, download Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn  at www.HearingShofar.com, and subscribe to www.HearingShofar.blogspot.com.

Kosher for Pesach Horn?

I have written about using a shofar on a seder plate and to drink wine during Passover seders. If the horn had been used during the rest of the year, one may have to make the shofar horn kosher for Passover (if koshering your kitchen is part of your observance).

If you know how to kosher a horn, please let me know.

For more information on shofar, download Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn  at www.HearingShofar.com, and subscribe to www.HearingShofar.blogspot.com.

Shofar in Indonesia

I have noted elsewhere that shofar has become very popular among some Christian denominations during the past decade (See posts tagged "Christianity"). As further evidence of this, I recently received an email from A.S., a Christian in Indonesia. His questions and comments illuminate this phenomena:

On Wed, Apr 7, 2010 at 9:42 PM, A.S. wrote:

I read your writing in the "Hearing of Shofars" and found the articles are very interesting. Really appreciate the dedication & thorough study you have done. I'm based in in Indonesia and currently I'm doing some research regarding the use of shofars in the modern day of Jewish community. Got some questions on that:

1) You have covered some portion mentioning that shofars were / are used in the prisons, visiting the sick or even for exorcism. Do Jewish people still use shofars for these purposes?

One does not stop being Jewish even in prison, and the Jewish community makes an effort to support Jews in prison so they can continue to practice as Jews. This includes providing prisoners with prayer books and spiritual guidance, for example. In Los Angeles, California, for example, the Jewish Community pays the salary for Rabbis to visit prisons to meet with prisoners. Every year for the past four years, I have gone to local prisons to blow shofar for prisoners. I know others who do the same.

The Torah commands Jews to visit the sick. For the New Year holiday, Rosh Hashanah, it is appropriate to bring a shofar so the sick person can hear the shofar. I visit hospitals, nursing homes, and individuals who are too sick to go to synagogue, and blow the shofar for them. While the shofar can not cure somebody, hearing it can provide hope and comfort, and that can help give someone the strength to get better.

Exorcisms are rare, but are still performed. I have never been to one.

2) There are Tekiah - Shevarim - Teruah - Tekiah Gedolah sounds of shofars. Is it possible to sound the shofar beyond those 4 sounds ? I have several shofars at home and I've tried that my shofars could sounds up to 4 notes (depending upon the situation).

Yes, it is possible to make many types of sounds and many patterns of blasts with the shofar. I know people that play music on shofar. See, for example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z_XIfd4wpp8.

3) What to do when animal horns are getting into " threatened" or "endangered" ? That will cause shofars to be very rare and we will be accused of jeopardizing the equilibrium of the earth eco ? What is the solution for that ? Silver Trumpets or other source of animal?

Most shofarot are made from the horns of domestic sheep. Sheep are plentiful throughout the world and most breeds are not threatened or endangered. I caution, however, about using the horns of "exotic" species such as endangered wild animals. Silver trumpets and trumpets made from other types of animals, like sea shell trumpets, are very beautiful and have their own spiritual use, but the shofar from a ram's horn is the special instrument for Jews and is part of the required observance of the New Year.

Hopefully you consider the above questions are worth of inquiring.

Your questions are excellent, and I invite you to write again. Please tell me why you are interested in shofar?

Fri, Apr 9, 2010 at 12:08 PM, A.S. replied:

It is my joy to get your prompt response with thorough & crystal clear explanation. Many thanks for that.

I'm a Christian and happened to learn shofars about 3 years ago. It was our Passover retreat 2008 (I believe that God is restoring our celebration from "Easter" into "Passover", the thing that is related to what Jews celebrated) when I learned from a visiting Minister specializing in Praise & Worship spoke about his worship team using shofars. Since then, there was a great desire for me to learn more about shofars. There are lots of Indonesians go to Israel as tourists and buy shofars, but use it only for a display in their living room. I really love to go to Israel but since it is a quite expensive trip for me and family to go there (someday for sure I will!!).

Therefore, I tried to find shofars from the nearby country, Malaysia. I purposely went to Kuala Lumpur and bought some shofars from a shofar maker there. Since then, I went back and forth there to buy some more shofars. i dedicated the shofars to our church and I've been teaching some of our church people how to blow shofars. My wife, my son & my daughter (10 & 8) also can blow shofars. Our church is now having a shofar blower team (I call it Shofarot since spiritually we are all shofarot - God's mouth pieces to proclaim His Name). Praise God that this team has been ministering in some national prayer events or other church's celebrations. 

But the Lord wants me to do some other thing. I feel like called to make a writing about shofars and its Israel tradition roots. My vision is to see many churches in Indonesia have shofar blowers with the right / correct knowledge of the real meaning of why we blow the shofars. 

Today in my church, we blow shofars on every Sunday service during the time of proclamation of the Word of God (like what you were asked to blow the shofar in a christian church ). We even have traveled to different parts of Indonesia to proclaim the Sound Of Heaven in those cities. We saw the great move of God to liberate the dry lands into fruitful land and business recovered after we visited there. God is good.

The Lord also gives me desires to learn and to love your people as to Christianity, actually we are very closely knitted together.

I believe there are still a lot of burning questions during my write up and hopefully you're willing to help me to explain from accurate reference and understanding of your traditions.

Many thanks for your great support and I'll write again soon.

Shalom,

For more information on shofar, download Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn  at www.HearingShofar.com, and subscribe to www.HearingShofar.blogspot.com.

Tapping on Shofar during Storytelling

One of the participants in my Passover seder stood up to share a drash - a commentary - to bring insight to part of the Pesach story. As he did so, he picked up the shofar that is part of my seder tradition, and holding it in one hand, he began tapping, ever so gently, the side of the shofar where it widens. At first, I thought the tapping was due to nervousness. But as he continued, it became clear that the tapping was the heartbeat of his tale.

Master storytellers from many traditions play a drum or other rhythm instrument as they speak. The beats create a rhythm that carries the narrative forward, engaging the body as the words engage the imagination. The beat continues through pauses used to give the listener time to reflect on the words. Changes in the beat indicate transitions in the story or provide emphasis.

The seder maggid - storyteller - used the shofar for all these effects and more. Each beat drew me deeper into the spiritual realm, the world of mythology and archetypes. The tapping on the shofar was not loud, but could clearly be heard in the hushed quiet of the seder.

In addition to tapping, another sound effect can be made by clapping one hand over the bell - wide end - of the shofar.

These techniques complements the use of shofar as a percussive instrument and as a "talking stick" in council circles, topics about which I have written.

For more information on shofar, download Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn  at www.HearingShofar.com, and subscribe to www.HearingShofar.blogspot.com.