Boys Scouts Blow Horns

Commemorative sheet of postage stamps from St. Vincent.

 Lord Baden-Powell

A History of the Kudu Horn and Scouting.

Following a tradition stretching back more than [100] years, the troop is often called to assembly with the traditional sound of the kudu horn at many Wood Badge courses [training program for for adult scouting leaders] and Junior Leader Training Conferences.

It may seem strange that the horn of an African antelope, a type used by the Matabele as a war horn in the 19th century, should call Scouts and Scouters together in America and in many countries around the world. But it was just such a horn that roused the first Scouts ever called together. In the summer of 1907, Baden-Powell held his first experimental camp on Brownsea Island in Poole Harbor. Retrieved from his African trophies, the kudu horn entered Scout service.

Brownsea, England -- 1907
Hillcourt: "The day began at 6 a.m. when Baden-Powell roused the camp with the weird notes from the long, spiral horn of the African koodoo -- the war horn he had picked up on his expedition into the Somabula Forest during the 1896 Matabele Campaign."

Thurman: "As a colonel in southern Africa during 1896, Baden-Powell commanded a flying column in the Matabele Campaign. It was on a raid down the Shangani River that he first heard the kudu horn. He had been puzzled by the speed with which alarms were spread amongst the Matabeles, until one day he realized that they were using a war horn of great carrying power. A code was used. As soon as the enemy was sighted, the alarm was sounded on the kudu -- taken up right and left -- and, thus, carried many miles in a very short space of time.

"When he assembled the first Scouts at Brownsea, Baden-Powell remembered the kudu horn he had brought back with him from the Matabele Wars, and used it too add a touch of adventure and fun to the camp.

"After Brownsea Island the kudu horn was returned to B-P's home and was silent for 12 years, while the movement it had announced was fashioned and spread throughout the world. Then, in 1919, Baden-Powell entrusted the horn to Gilwell Park for use in the first scoutmaster training courses."

Gilwell Park, Epping Forest, England --1919
Hillcourt: "The first scoutmaster's training camp held at Gilwell started on 8 September. It followed the pattern B-P had used with boys at Brownsea twelve years before. The patrol system was again put to the test with nineteen participants divided into patrols and living a patrol life. The instruction took the same form as on Brownsea. Each day a new subject was introduced and covered in demonstrations, practices and games. The Matabele Koodoo horn that had called the boys into action in Brownsea was used for all signals."

Arrowe Park, Birkenhead, England -- 1929
Ten years later, at the age of 72, Baden-Powell brought the kudu horn with him to open the Third World Jamboree. That the kudu is a challenge to sound is seen clearly in his experience at Arrowe Park. The results, however, was as impressive as any could ask.

Hillcourt: "The opening day of the Third World Jamboree started with a heavy rain that increased during the day; but by the appointed hour ... the weather had turned "windy and fine." B-P had brought with him to Arrowe Park the old koodoo horn of Matabele War days he had used to awaken campers at Brownsea for the world's first Boy Scout camp and to open the first scoutmasters' course at Gilwell Park. Now he lifted it to his lips to blow a blast that would reverberate over the vast parade ground in front of him. But, in his excited state, his lips refused to do his bidding. The sound of the horn was only a feeble "pfft.

"Nevertheless, as if called to action by the koodoo horn, the March Past got under way, with contingent after contingent swinging by the saluting base, with the flags of practically every civilized country in the world snapping in the brisk wind, with the grandstands' thousands of onlookers greeting each nation with enthusiastic applause."

The Kudu's Call
To this day, the kudu is still used to call Scouts together in training courses around the world. To all who follow in the Founder's footsteps, it is a summons to live Scouting at its best.

Adapted from John Thurman, The Gilwell Book, British Boy Scout Association, and William Hillcourt, Baden-Powell: Two Lives of a Hero, Boy Scouts of America, 1964, and reposted from http://pinetreeweb.com/kudu.htm.

Personal Reflections

I was a scout (and a scout leader) as was my father before me and my sons after me, and have the highest respect for the sciytubg movement. During my tenure as a scout, I never heard of the kudo horn, but then I never participated in the adult training programs. Interest in the kudu seems to have been revived with the centennial anniversary of scouting.

I find it interesting that Baden-Powell adopted a symbol from a subjugated tribal people, just as scouting in the US adopted arrows and other symbols of subjugated North American tribes.

Perhaps scouting was, in the early 20th Century, a reaction to modernism: Bringing boys into the countryside at a time the population surging to cities; learning to hike at a time automobiles were making feet seemingly redundant; and learning to see into firelight at a time eyes were being dimmed by electric lights. Perhaps grasping for the artifacts of "primitive" people was part of a search for something that was lost from modern culture.

Modern Jews are in something of a similar condition, longing to hear the echos of our past. Fortunately, we do not have to borrow from another tribe, as many of our primitive rituals remain intact, including the hearing of shofar -- the horn that in an instant transports us to the earliest days of our tribe.

Shofar Whistle

Ram's horn shaped whistle by Gorham Mfg. Co.

 

Maybe not right for Rosh Hashanah, but it would be great for Purim.

Shofar Composer: Judith Shatin

Judith Shatin (b. 1949) is a professor at the University of Virginia and an active composer working in a variety of genre. At least two of her compositions feature shofar:

“Elijah’s Chariot,” commissioned by Kronos Quartet, uses digital recordings the shofar. The quartet premiered the piece in 1996, and has been recorded by Cassatt String Quartet, 2009

“It ranges from being very clearly shofar sounds to using filters and other techniques and layering and finding ways to turn it into a symphony of sounds. It’s very emotional. I am very intrigued by how one could use modern technologies but still speak to the emotions and the spirit.” (The Forward)

A brief excerpt can be heard here.

“Teruah” or “Shout of Joy,”  Co-commissioned by Pittsburgh Jewish Music Festival and Jewish Music Commission of Los Angeles in 2006.

It uses the "stripped, raw tones" of a 36-inch kudu-horn shofar to sound tekiah, shevarim, teruah, and tekiah gedolah. Shatkin says, “The shofar part incorporates these rhythms, and the brass ensemble and tympani respond to them, taking up the joyous shout,” (The Forward)

About the premiere, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette says: "...Shatin wonderfully used the other instruments in "Teruah " to extend the essence of the shofar. ...After an opening round of stout tekiah blasts...the brass played a dark, dissonant and gritty chord, infused with flutter tonguing, creating a musical metaphor for how the shofar has inspired worshipers during the High Holidays for centuries. A gorgeous Rosh Hashanah melody that emerged in the horns only drove that further, serving as the emotional response to the sound."

Shofar Composer: Bob Gluck

Robert Gluck, associate professor of music at the University at Albany and director of the school’s Electronic Music Studio, is a Reconstructionist rabbi. He experiments with electronically enhanced shofarot and says, “I played with the idea of the sound being wild, untamed. I think of music as being expressive and reflective, and that’s how I relate to religious life. There isn’t much of a separation.” (Quotes from The Forward)



He uses shofar on several recordings:
  “Sideways,” with jazz trio

  “Electric Brew”

  “Electric Songs.”

Gluck described his intention this way in a 2006 interview on ArtsElectric's website:

The shofar is a raw, purely emotive instrument. It commands attention and demands that you listen. In fact, to listen closely. Well, this encouragement of attentive listening is, for me, a core reason why music is so valuable, and so the shofar inherently interests me as a composer.

Personally, shofar blasts are among the first musical sounds that I can remember. There was a mystery and a mystique to the shofar that I experienced first in my grandparents' synagogue in the Bronx. I felt its sound to be timeless, utterly alien to anything modern, and so unlike anything that I later experienced at Juilliard!

I consider shofar sounds to be akin to a Rorschach Test. For those who like me grew up with its sounds as part of my sonic wallpaper, the shofar calls to mind an array of associations from the historical to personal, from biblical narratives to more complex religious yearnings. I've found that when people freely associate while listening to the shofar, they often draw from this vast reservoir of referential qualities that have breadth and depth.

About five years ago, when I returned to live performance after many years away from it, I became interested in electronically expanding acoustical instruments. This desire was sparked by my love for the sonic richness of acoustical instruments and the excitement that I experienced in spontaneous invention. Now, fast computers and new electronic technologies are able to keep up with how fast a performer thinks and creates. I find it fascinating to use these possibilities to bridge the old and the new, to revisit that which is ancient through a new, very personal lense. With computers, I can focus more closely and combine sounds in new ways, and I find that I enjoy listening in detail to the ins and outs of the shofar's sounds.

I feel fortunate to sense no conflict between the ancient religious nature of this instrument and its usage as part of a contemporary performance interface. When expanded with electronics, the shofar becomes a new instrument, a hybrid standing between the traditional and the modern. The shofar is not a museum piece, nor is it an object that cannot be used respectfully in new ways. Making music, with or without new technologies, remains a human expressive act, ever unfolding and never frozen or objectified.

A personal anecdote: As a child, I always aspired to play shofar. All of my male peers felt this way. But for some reason I was afraid to try. It seemed so difficult to make a sound and I didn't want to be seen failing. Now I've found a new way to channel the unpredictability of the outcome of blowing into a shofar by walking an even more fragile tightrope of fickle electronics. Now I think: "how interesting!"

Ram's Horn/Phallus

The connection is obvious. It is nice to know that Hebrew recognizes the imagery. Since the traditional shofar is cut at its narrow part, this supports my thesis that Jews don't use side-blown horns in favor of a horn that is circumcised.

Shofar as Drinking Horn

I have written in Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn about the use of shofarot as a drinking vessel. Here are new pieces of linguistic evidence.

A variation of the Sh-P-R root of "shofar" means "drinking horn". Another variant, in Aramaic, means "solders' horn", leading further credibility to my theory that the soldiers who "drank water like a dog" for Gideon were those that were so poorly equipped, they lacked even a horn to drink from.

This second work is "keren", usually translated as horn but also meaning "vessel". The reinforces my theory that Biblical references to "k'lee", a utensil or instrument, can also mean "keren" or "shofar".

The first definition is from A Dictionary of the Targumim, the Talmud Babli and Yerushalmi, and the Midrashic Literature, Marcus Jastow, 1903. I thank Google for making the entire book available online and as a download. The second definition is from A Dictionary of Jewish Babylonian Aramaic of the Talmudic and Geonic Periods, Michael Sokoloff, 2002, with a preview available on Google.

Blowing with One Foot Raised

Vienna Machzor shows man blowing the shofar with one foot on a stool – a common custom in Germany.

Watch for more on this topic.

Mosaic of Goat with Shofar

A featured design of the great mosaic floor underlying the bell tower of the Aquileia basilica. It depicts a ram bearing a sizable shofar, or ram’s-horn, a musical instrument employed uniquely by Jews in their religious rites.
Photograph by Samuel Kurinsky by courtesy of the Aquileian Museum

What would be the significance of an image of a goat carrying a large horn, possibly a shofar, on its back?

The image is part of a large mosaic found in Aquileia, a town at the northern end of the Adriatic Sea.   According to historian Samuel Kurinsky, the town was an active center of Jewish life and commerce during much of the Roman Era. Jews brought skills in textiles and glass making from the Eastern Mediterranean and prospered. While much of the town's Jewish history has been lost, the archeological record suggests that the Christian basilica in town was built over a large synagogue.*

Kurinsky describes:

The basilica rises above a vast and magnificent mosaic floor which had lain more than a meter below the actual floor of the basilica before its accidental discovery. It extends the entire length of the great basilica and passes below its presbytery out to an undetermined end... A campanile, or bell tower, rises majestically at a short distance from the basilica. Its base... thrusts crassly through another set of mosaic floors of a complex of buildings connected to that under the basilica. The mosaics of the basilica, of the bell-tower, and of the connecting structures lay buried, unchronicled and unremembered, until accidentally discovered in 1962 as a consequence of repairing the floor of the basilica.

The design of all the floors... is a configuration of multiple panels. Many contain exquisite faunal figures, others the portraits of donors, and all are interspersed with the Nodo di Salomone, "Solomon's knot." Brilliant glass tiles are included in the tesserae that compose the mosaics. Glass tesserae was known to be used in mosaics only in the Near East up to this time. The brilliant renderings attest dramatically to the artistic and technical competence of the mosaicists. 

The floors under the bell-tower conjoined with that of the basilica The complex of buildings thus delineated by the layout of the ancient floors is reminiscent of other such synagogue complexes, as for example, that of Duro-Europus, in which the layout of the floors and the function of the synagogue are remarkable similar to those at Aquileia.

The area of the floor under the basilica rivals, and may prove to exceed, that of the hitherto largest synagogue of ancient time at Sardis in Anatolia. The exposed area alone measures some eight hundred square meters!

It is undeniable... that the building with the mosaic floor had to have been in existence before the year 320 CE. 

Returning to my question, what is the iconographic significance of the horn tied to the back of a goat? It is hard to know without seeing the image in context. Still, I am willing to offer my interpretation. The goat appears to be saddled and carrying other items along both of its flanks. On its right side, along with the "shofar" is what appears to be a short shepherd (goat herder?) crook. This suggests that the herder is using the animal to carry his gear. From this, we have an indication that a shofar was a basic tool among herders.

If you have another idea, please let me know.

------------------
* See dissenting opinion.

For a better, color photo of this design, click here.

Shofar and Drum Circle

I have written about shofar as a percussion instrument elsewhere in this blog. Here is a new wrinkle: shofar played along with percussion. This should not be a surprise. After all, "drum and bugle" corps are as old as Psalm 81 that proclaims: "sound the timbrel...blow the horn."

Shofarist at drum circle. Photo (c) Joy Krauthammer.

A horn can blow a rhythmic pattern to complement the drummers, or create sustained tones that soars above the beat. It's fun. And when I get tired blowing, I start tapping on the horn, using it as an idiophone. 

Combine the heartbeat of the drum and the breath of shofar with fire, and you can go deep into a primal state of being, as one can gather from this Toronto Jewish Community's Lag B'Omer festival.

Photo by Roger Cullman, from http://www.flickr.com/photos/wordfreak/3532090567on

Scrimshaw Shofar

The wolf will live with the lamb. Isaiah 11:6

I want to encourage more artistic crafting of shofarot. With that in mind, I was delighted to discover these examples of scrimshaw engraving applied to a shofar. The artist is Mark DeCou, whose does beautiful ecclesiastical furniture as well as scrimshaw "powder horns" and other crafts.

Shofar inscribed with Ezekiel 20:12;

The artist describes the making of this shofar:

Project Story:
Late last year I met a nice woman at an art show where I was showing pieces of my scrimshaw artwork and powder horns. She approached me with a special project to consider.

She had visited Israel in 2001 as a tourist right after the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center Towers in New York City. Tourism to Israel and the region had come to a screeching halt, and she decided it was a good time to visit. She said the time was wonderful, she felt very safe, and the local people treated her better than on previous trips where she enjoyed the local hospitality.

During her visit to the land of the Bible, she bought a Ram’s Horn* that had been made into a blowing horn called a Shofar, or Shophar. She asked if I would do some scrimshaw style artwork on the horn depicting a verse in the Book of Isaiah of the Holy Bible, and some text from the Book of Ezekiel.

I started the project with a few hours of hand sanding and polishing to get the rough surface of the horn smooth, and crack free. I have worked on a lot of different animal parts from deer, elk, big horn sheep, cow, bull, bison, water buffalo, elephant ivory, sea shell, abalone shell, river muscle shell, and others, and this Ram’s Horn was by far the hardest, and the stinkiest.

By “stinky,” I mean that the dust from the horn has a horrible smell. All animal horn, antler, and bone has some bad smell to it, and after a few years of working with it, I’ve gotten to where I hardly notice it. However, just try going to the supper table without changing your clothes at the end of the day after working Ram’s Horn! Doesn’t work, unless you live alone. I don’t. Ha.

Normally, Scrimshaw artwork is done by scratching and cutting with a knife and scribe, and darkened with black India Ink. Any scratches, delaminations, cracks, or porosity in the base material will cause the ink to spread, blurring the picture. So, there is a quite a bit of prep work involved.

After the polishing, I made an original drawing of the Lamb laying down with the Wolf, and transferred the artwork to the horn with carbon paper.

I started the work with a knife and round pointed scribe, and after a couple of hours of hard work I realized that the Ram’s Horn material was just too hard to do an adequate job of scrimshaw artwork. So, I decided that I was going to have to compromise and add some rotary engraving with the scrimshaw lines to develop the dark outlines, and text on the horn. Jim Steven’s is also a Scrimshaw Artist, and I just received his second book called “Advanced Scrimshaw Techniques” where he shows how to do rotary engraving. So, I skimmed through his photos, and went to work.

This is a hard decision for a staunch scrimshaw artist, as myself, and it is probably comparable to doing drawer dovetails with a router for a staunch handtool woodworker. But, I swallowed my pride, and proceeded with the rotary engraving, and used the old style knife/scribe scrimshaw artwork for the details and shadowing.

The white lettering is a process that many artists call “reverse scrimshaw” where white paint is used to highlight artwork on a dark surface. I have done this type of reverse artwork on American Bison Horn before, and so I adapted that concept to this Ram’s Horn.

To give you a sense of scale from the photos, the horn was about 36 inches long measured down it’s length.

Close up of Scrimshaw Shofar.

Example of artist's scrimshaw work on a powder horn made from a cattle horn.

* Comment from Michael Chusid: The horn appears to be from a kudu bull, an African antelope, not from a male sheep or ram. Kudu horn is much tougher than sheep horn to work.

Copied by permission of the artist. See http://decoustudio.com and http://lumberjocks.com/projects/8972.

Triptych

A simple image, yet so full of meaning:

Akeidah: The turning of the subject in this painting reminds me of the Binding of Isaac. When the angel called out to Abraham to avoid harm to Isaac, Abraham turned (or at least turned his attention) and saw a ram for use as a sacrifice.

The Shofar Blasts: There are three shofar blasts: tekiah, shevarim, teruah.

The Rosh Hashanah Mussaf Service: We hear shofar three times, for Malchuyot, Zichronot, and Shofarot.

Teshuvah: Hearing shofar stimulates the process of teshuvah in which we can see our behavior from a new perspective.

Past Present and Future: The eternal call of shofar unites past, present, and future.



I found this painting online, but am unable to identify its owner. Please help me.

Lost Shofar

The following tale about a shofar comes from the Lubavitch publication, L'Chaim, Vol. 638, September 29, 2000.

The shofar blowing, "tekiyot," of Reb Yoel Chaim Weissfinger were legendary among the Jews of the Old City of Jerusalem. Every year on Rosh Hashana, hundreds of people would flock to his synagogue for the unique experience of hearing him sound the shofar. It was also rumored that the ancient ram's horn had a long and colorful history.

When Reb Yoel Chaim passed away a few days after Yom Kippur in 5674 (1913) he left behind two sons, Shimon and Leibel. But which one should inherit their father's shofar, and along with it, the honor of blowing it in shul? In the end a compromise was reached: Shimon, the eldest son, inherited the small grocery store his father had owned, while Leibel, the younger brother who was also a Torah scholar, inherited the prized shofar.

Several years later Shimon sold the grocery store and emigrated to America, where he started his own business. The business flourished, and soon Shimon was a wealthy man.

In the meantime, a war broke out between the English and the Ottoman Turks in the Holy Land. One day Leibel, who was an English citizen, was walking when he was captured by Turkish soldiers, thrown into jail, and deported to Egypt. The only possession he took along was his father's shofar.

Not long afterward, a ship arrived in the Holy Land with a cargo of food donated by American Jews for their less fortunate brethren. Among the passengers was a Mr. Sam White, one of the directors of the aid committee. Before he anglicized his name, Mr. White had been known as Shimon Weissfinger.

When Sam learned what had happened to his brother he immediately set sail for Egypt and, with G-d's help, he managed to locate him. Sam gave Leibel a large sum of money, which enabled him to return home and get back on his feet.

On the day Sam was to leave for America, Leibel, overcome by emotion, presented his older brother with their father's shofar as a token of his gratitude. Sam was very touched, and the whole way home kept the treasured object in full sight. Indeed, the shofar was the only thing he talked about upon his arrival. But when he went to show it to his friends and family he almost fainted: it was nowhere to be found! The ancient shofar had somehow disappeared.

Years passed, and the financial circumstances of the Jews of Jerusalem deteriorated even further. Leibel and his family emigrated to Poland, where he found a position as Rabbi in a small village. Perhaps, he hoped and prayed, his worries were over.

But such was not to be, as the Second World War soon erupted. The Germans, may their names be erased, invaded Poland. Over the next few years Leibel endured the tortures of the Holocaust, but miraculously survived. When the War ended he spent several years wandering from one D.P. camp to the next, hoping to eventually return to Israel.

One Rosh Hashana eve the group of Jewish refugees with whom he was traveling arrived at the home of a kindly Italian farmer who agreed to let the group stay over Yom Tov. The refugees were saddened by the fact that they had no shofar, but grateful for the opportunity to pray together.

Rosh Hashana came and went. Leibel and his friends were about to depart when the Italian farmer asked them to sit down for a minute. "I have something on my conscience that has been bothering me for years," he told them. "I'd like to get it off my chest once and for all...

"Many years ago I was a seaman on a ship that sailed from Palestine to America. One of the passengers was a wealthy American Jew, who held on to a small package the whole time as if guarding a great treasure. When the ship docked in America it was a tumultuous scene, and I'm ashamed to say that I seized the opportunity to steal it. But I was very disappointed when I opened it up, because all it contained was this strange-looking thing..." The farmer then withdrew a very old shofar from its case.

"I know that this is some kind of Jewish object, and for years I've been hoping to meet some Jews so I could give it back. Please take it."

Dismayed that the farmer hadn't mentioned it before Rosh Hashana, no one noticed that Leibel Weissfinger had paled. Indeed, he was white as a ghost - for it was none other than his father's shofar!

When he had recovered enough to speak, Leibel told everyone the amazing story of the shofar, whereupon it was their turn to be speechless...

Leibel eventually returned to Jerusalem, where he was reunited with his brother. (In the wake of the Holocaust, Sam had sold his business in America and returned to the Holy Land; he had also reverted to the name of Shimon Weissfinger.)

The reunion was particularly emotional, especially when Leibel showed his elder brother the long-lost shofar and told him how it had come to him. And everyone marveled over the mysterious ways of Divine Providence.

If you know the Weissfinger family, I would love to get a photo or audio recording of such a miraculous shofar. Additional documentation about the story, such as an older publication, would also be appreciated.

Shofar Humor

Murray, a deeply religious man, went to temple one Sabbath and forgot his Tallit, so he borrowed one from "the rack" at the temple. At the end of the service, he realized that he really liked this Tallit -- so much that he actually decided to stuff it down the front of his trousers and take it home.

After the service when he was walking thru the reception line, the Rabbi stopped him and whispered, "Murray, I am sorry, but I saw you stuff a Tallit down your pants. Why would you do this?" Murray, totally embarrassed and ashamed, explained the situation, whereupon the Rabbi suggested he remove it from his trousers and give it back.

By now, the Tallit had managed to slide half-way down his leg. While Murray was bent over pulling the it out of his pant leg, he accidentally let out a loud fart.

The Rabbi, exasperated, said, "Murray!... You took the Shofar, too?!?"

Reposted from http://jewishjokes.tripod.com/h--jewholiday.html. As it says on the site, "I tried to give credit whenever I know the author/source, but most of them are anonymous or from a friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend. If you know the author of an "anonymous" joke, please email me."

Shlomo Carlebach on Shofar

From our Holy Teacher, Reb Shlomo Carlebach zt'l as we approach his 16 Yahrtzeit:

Reb Shlomo Carlebach (c)Joy Krauthammer 

Our holy rabbis teach us that the sound of the shofar is the sound of our innermost soul and heart but also the sound of a newborn baby. It is everything. It wakes us up, gives us strength, reminds us how holy we are and how holy we can be, and also how close we are and how easy it is to be the best and most exalted. September 2nd, 1994

Our holy rabbis teach us that when we blow the shofar, G-d is blowing a new soul into us. And aren’t we all longing to become new people? How much would we pay to remove our perverseness? To takeout all the negativity, the pettiness and the selfishness from our heart? September 9th, 1991

The question is what I do unconsciously, naturally. If I see a poor man do I have to think and think what to do? What I do, I do by reflex. What is the unconscious about? My unconscious is connected to the highest light... The Shofar is a cry from the unconscious. I blow the Shofar in order to connect to that part of myself, to hear the Inside of me crying. The month of Elul G-d is opening up for us gates so that we hear the crying of our own soul, how much we want-d in the deepest depths of our soul. Elul 5750

We live in the world of
thinking
and in the world of
beyond thinking.
The Tree of Knowledge level means
“everything is thinking”.
The Tree of Life level means
beyond thinking,
"a first flash".
If you only live
on a thinking level
you never put
your life together….
Beyond thinking goes
much deeper.
Love does not come
from thinking.
It’s so much deeper.
Doing a friend a favor
without hesitation
is also beyond thinking.
How much does a person
have to work
on himself
to know
when to think and
when not to think?
Why does Rosh Hashanah come
before Yom Kippur?
Rosh Hashanah is
like the tree of life.
It’s beyond thinking.
The whole value of
doing teshuva
before Rosh Hashanah
is that something inside of me
wakes up....
Whatever we need to fix
can be fixed
in one second
if we pay attention
to the moment.
To know the moment
is so deep!
The Shofar doesn’t come
from thinking:
the Shofar has no words.
It comes from the
deepest deepest depths…
September 27th, 1988

So, how long ago was last Rosh Hashanah? How long ago we were together for twenty-four hours and at the end heard the trumpet of the Messiah? How long ago did we kindle the lights of Chanukah? How many minutes ago were we drunk on Purim and ate matzo on Pesach? The truth is it was a second ago and the truth of the truth is all the holidays are with us all year long. A Jew always blows a shofar, a Jew fasts all year, a Jew sits in the Succah all his life, a Jew dances with the Torah into all eternities. September 9th, 1988

The teshuva of Rosh Hashanah is crying from the deepest depths of one’s soul, because the shofar is the voice of the deepest deepest depths of our soul and humanly speaking, of G-d’s Soul... On Rosh Hashanah a great miracle happens. G-d takes us out from the cycle of death; the cycle of not having the strength to change what we do wrong nor having the guts to do what is right with all of our hearts. When we blow shofar G-d takes our souls, cleanses them like from before we were born, gives them back to us free from our past and with so much G-dliness and holiness that we feel everything and let everything touch us. The last rehearsal before blowing the shofar is the blessing we give one other Rosh Hashanah night. The more we bless each other with all our heart, which is how much soul G-d breathes back into us the next day. September 29th, 1987

On Rosh Hashanah we as Jews begin the year with the blowing of the shofar which reaches the highest place in heaven and the deepest, deepest depths of our souls. Everyone knows that there was a shofar blowing on Mt. Sinai, in the Holy Temple, and there will be great shofar blowing when the Moshiach comes.

On Rosh Hashanah when we blow shofar we experience all of this and we experience what life will be like after the Messiah has arrived when G-d is one and the whole world is one. Yet the finding of the shofar was when Abraham and Isaac were still on top of the mountain ready to give their lives for G-d. What we need the most in our generation is to find that shofar again — when a Jew and his child are both ready to give everything they have for G-d –and then the Messiach will come so fast to blow it.

Let it be you and I, your children and my children.

Let it be your shofar and my shofar that the Messiah will want to blow.
September 9th, 1979

Shofar Brand

I miss Shofar brand Hot Dog carts. Not that I ate many hot dogs, but I always felt pride in seeing a symbol of my faith so prominently displayed. Alas, the brand was purchased by a conglomerate and then shut down.

If you have Shofar brand images, please send them to me. And if you have a Shofar brand umbrella, please make me an offer -- I would like to buy one.

This image is from Flickr, taken March 2008 by "Fire Monkey Fish".

Left Side or Right Side?

Enjoy!

Clay "Shofarot"

Shown at http://earthmanarts.com/pottery.htm

When blowing a shofar, I am very aware of the element of earth from which the ram came. It is represented by the rawness of the material, its smell, and the way it channels energy from the lower realm into the higher realm.

Photo by Adoniram Sides, used courtesy of Ethan Hamby.

I am delighted to discover a crafter that goes a step further, making blow-horns from fired clay. The maker -- Ethan Hamby, the Earthman -- offers acoustical samples that sound as if they came right out of our primeval past and illustrate the musical and expressive power of simple instruments. See especially his tracks -- under the name of Clay Voice -- for "Shofar" and "Snake and Horn" at http://www.myspace.com/clayvoice.

Terra Cotta Model of Roman Bugle, 4th cent. (British Museum). Illustration from 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.

Clay horns have an ancient provenance and are found in South America, India, Europe, and Africa. Mr. Hamby's instruments share similarities, for example, to 4th Century Roman models. They may not meet halachic requirements for shofarot. But whether from horn or clay, the instruments reflect the human desire to communicate.

Shofar Mandala

The artist explains:

David Moss has written about this piece:"Over the years, a thread running throughout my work has been an interest in the revival of abandoned, overlooked, or neglected Jewish objects, texts or art forms. I am fascinated by the interplay between old forms and their translation, reinterpretation and transformation into contemporary pieces. The breathing of new life into old forms has been a lifelong artistic obsession. A similar process has been at work in the art of pueblo pottery. Though the creation and decoration of functional pottery has been an uninterrupted process for hundreds of years, it is clear that at a certain point a conscious decision to look back at old forms and designs was made". This Moss design derives from a low-form round bowl he painted with the repeating motif of the shofar. The result is not only a new interpretation of this ancient motif using the language of the pueblo tradition, but also reminds one of the mandala found in Eastern art.

This print is one from of a suite of seven Moss gicleé prints that were based on pottery he had painted. He relates that walking one day in Jerusalem he noticed Hebron pottery being sold at a local nursery. The pottery drew him back to the time he had spent in Santa Fe, New Mexico and the pueblo designs he had seen on the pottery of that area. He began painting the surfaces of the Hebron pots purchased at the nursery using Jewish motifs expressed with pueblo designs and colors. Inspired by his pottery he produced The Pueblo Portfolio in which the gicleé technique brought to his "pueblo" designs the deep intensity and flat surface colors of this printing medium.

Artist's Website: www.davidmoss.com/category.aspx?id=36&subcategory=79

Gallery: www.artatthecenter.com/html/artists.cfm?id=37

Mark Podwal Calendar

This image captures many aspects of shofar. It is from Mark Podwal's 2011 calendar, A Sweet Year published by Calendar Holdings LLC. Another example of Podwal's artistry is at http://hearingshofar.blogspot.com/2010/01/rams-horn-of-akedah.html.

Artist's website: www.markpodwal.com 

Image locaton: http://images.chron.com/blogs/iconia/Shofar.jpg and www.markpodwal.com/works.html

Interview with calendar's publisher: http://blogs.chron.com/iconia/2010/08/mark_podwal_calendar.html

Shofar en Argentina

The call of shofar is heard around the world. The Arlene Fern Community School in Buenos Aires, Argentina, sponsored by the Fundacion Judaica, has an annual shofar blowing contest.

The post on their website explains:

On Friday September 3, and after several weeks of preliminary selections and preparation, was the long awaited final to crown the best Baalei Tokea (master blaster) of the school year.

Congratulations to all who. every year, are encouraged to come forward, to excel, and keep practicing!"

-------
Mucho gracias a mi amiga Perla por la información.

Book of Revelation

The New Testament's Book of Revelation, like the Hebrew scriptures, says that shofar (or trumpet) will play an important part in its eschatology. Here are several wonderful images that portray the shofar at the end of days:

 

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/79/BambergApocalypseFolio019v7AngelsWith7TrumpetsAnd1WithCenser.JPG/463px-BambergApocalypseFolio019v7AngelsWith7TrumpetsAnd1WithCenser.JPG

 

http://img293.imageshack.us/img293/1282/ps297856lvc2.jpg

http://www.pitts.emory.edu/woodcuts/1560Soli/00004779.jpg

http://img201.imageshack.us/img201/5324/41234927nr2.jpg

http://beatus.saint-sever.fr/folios/f141.JPG

Kavanah

"The Midrash states that there is one angel that has a thousand mouths, each one with a thousand tongues, whereby it sings incomparable hymns of praise to G!d. But what of it? It cannot give even one cent of tzadakah to the poor.Every person can surpass it in merit."

Every shofar blower should keep this in mind. Even if you could blow a thousand shofarot in praise of G!d, doing justice and living rightly are of greater importance.


Told in the name of the Rabbi of Talna by Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski, MD in Smiling Each Day,

Outpouring of the Heart

Shofar Blowing Chassid, or

Outpouring of the Heart 

Guache on paper. 16x13inch

Artist Natan Dov's website says, "When a picture ‘speaks’ to  you, it is acting as a mystical or dream journey calling  to your soul, beckoning a message from the Divine, resonating with the Truth of your soul’s longing for its Maker. Its call unfolds over time, its Life giving message ever new."

Radiolab Podcast: Jericho

Public radio program Radiolab asks the question: "could a team of trumpeters really bring down the walls of Jericho?"

The Fall of Jericho, from Providence Lithograph Company, 1901

"Sure, sound can be a powerful - an alarm clock can get you out of bed and headed for the shower, a pop song can send you back to Junior Prom. But what about sound as a physical force? In the bible, the walls of Jericho fall to the sound of seven shofar players (shofars are basically trumpets made of rams' horns). In this podcast, [we] talk to engineer and sound expert David Lubman to find out how many shofars it would actually take to level a Bronze Age wall. To get a sense of the power of the shofar, we pay a visit to Cantor Daniel Pincus to hear him and his students blow some horns. Then, we talk to inventor Woody Norris for a modern approach to this biblical challenge."

There are some interesting comments at the Radiolab site.

Here is the podcast:


I express my theory in Volume One of my book, Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram's Horn:

"For six consecutive days, 40,000 shock troops escorted the Ark of the Covenant – symbol of the Hebrew tribe’s national might – in a march around the city’s wall. Ahead of the Ark marched seven priests continuously blowing shofarot. On the seventh day, as the “psy-ops” intensified, the procession marched around the city seven times. With each circuit, I imagine more residents of the city climbed to the ramparts to watch the spectacle as their anxiety increased. At the completion of the seventh circuit, the troops broke their silence and joined the shofarot in a mighty shout. My theory is that the sudden aggressive acoustic blasts terrorized the citizens. In panic, they started shouting and running, creating tremors that ruptured the already overloaded city walls."

Shofar as Telephone of its Day

Wilma Flintstone had it right.

Blowing Shofar at Night

On the first night of Rosh Hashanah 5771, a friend asked, "Why don't we sound shofar at night?"

An internet search on the phrase "shofar at night" will bring up a variety of halachic discussions on the topic. But this is a question where practical considerations seem ample to provide an answer.

For example, my immediate reply to my friend was, "Because it would wake up the children."

Consider, too, that there is no visible moon on Erev Rosh Hashanah. Until only recently in human history have we had the practical ability to light up the night through non-celestial illumination. I believe this is the reason why services in the Miskon and Temple were daytime affairs, and nighttime gatherings of worshippers were few.

ON THE OTHER HAND
One notable example of nighttime blowing is the story of Gideon, in which his troops blow shofar in the darkness as part of a surprise attack on the enemy camp.

Gideon: Blowing Shofar at Night

Psalm 91 says to blow shofar when the moon is new and when the moon is full. Does this not suggest blowing shofar at night?

From a paleo-anthropological point of view, would it not make sense to blow shofar at night, either to scare away the unknown threats lurking in the shadows or to call, like wolves and birds, to announce one's territory.

What's your insight into this?

View of Shofar at Sinai

Shofarot and trumpets blare from heaven as Moses receives tablets of the Law. From the "Tripartite Mahzor" in the David Kaufmann collection ((MS A 384), written in Southern Germany around 1320.

http://www.jewishpress.com/pageroute.do/43462

Shofar Hunting Horn

The "Tripartite Mahzor" in the David Kaufmann collection ((MS A 384) was written in Southern Germany around 1320. It shows a horn being blown in a hunting scene.  This is a curious image for a Hebrew prayerbook. However other images in the volume suggest that the illumination was done by a gentile artist using themes that were familiar to him from work on non-Jewish manuscripts.

Plated Mouthpieces

These shofarot have gold and silver plating near their blowholes. They illustrate  Mishnah 26 from Tractate Rosh Hashanah.

The shofar of Rosh Hashanah should be the horn of a wild goat, which is straight, and its mouth is plated with gold...  And on fast days, we blow with the horns of males, that are bent, and their mouths are plated with silver...

The Mishnah is describing horns blown in the Temple. Later rabbis clarified the teachings for shofarot used outside the temple. In our time, the curved horn of a ram is the halachically preferred shofar, and any plating on should be held back from the blow hole.

Photo is from http://www.bibarch.com/music/Music%20and%20the%20Bible.htm (also at http://www.bibarch.com/Music/Music-ancient-instruments.htm) and is attributed to Advanced Photo and Graphic Service, Afula, Israel. Emil Gal, manager, courtesy of the Haifa Museum. I have attempted to contact them for permission to use the image.

Learn Shofar via Telephone

In a radio interview today, the movie director Stephen Frears talked about hearing when the actors have the scene right. He claims that director "John Huston used to direct with his back to the action because he could hear it."

My experience teaching shofar has reached a similar point. In many causes, I can hear a person's technique without seeing what they are doing, even via a telephone call. In fact, I have been able to telephonically teach several individuals to blow shofar.

One recent student offers the following accolade.

I didn’t know that I could learn to blow shofar over the phone. It doesn’t matter that Michael’s in L.A. and I’m in Atlanta. He hears what I am doing and offers suggestions that improve my playing. Without his encouragement, I would never have tried to learn to play, but his humor and expertise keep me going. His generosity with his time is inspirational."  Rabbi Elana Zelony,  Congregation Shearith Israel, Atlanta.

Send me an email at shofarot at gmail.com if you want to schedule a lesson.