- 5786/2025
- Rabbi Eshel
- Rosh Hashanah
Rosh Hashanah 5786/2025
Rabbi David Eshel
Wilshire Boulevard Temple, Los Angeles
From Noise to Hope: A Shofar Call for Our Time
So much noise… we are surrounded, inundated by so much noise. Not just the ordinary hum of daily life, but a shrieking, unbearable storm of sound, with the volume turned all the way up to eleven. It comes at us from every screen, every headline, every conversation. The noise of distortion: half-truths dressed up as fact. The noise of painful truths we face head on. The noise of outright lies: shouted with such confidence that we are tempted to wonder if maybe, just maybe, they might be true. The noise of images: powerful, searing images designed to bypass our reason and pierce directly into our hearts, to hot-wire our emotions, to leave us trembling.
The noise is exhausting. It fills our days, interrupts our sleep, makes it hard to breathe. And it does something even more dangerous. It begins to make us doubt. We doubt ourselves: maybe I’m the one who doesn’t understand. We doubt each other: maybe they aren’t the partners or friends I thought they were. God forbid, we even turn against one another, tearing at the fabric that binds us together. And sometimes, maybe worst of all, we can turn against ourselves. Alone, disoriented, drowning in the volume of the world.
And then, silence. Sacred silence in this sanctuary… followed by the blast of the shofar. Tekiah! A single, strong, piercing note. Not a jumble of noise, not distortion, not confusion. A call. Clear, sharp, ancient, holy.
The shofar does not manipulate us; it awakens us. It cuts through the noise. It slices through the confusion. It pulls us back to ourselves, to each other, to God. It says: We are alive. The world is being created again today. What will we do with this gift?
On this Rosh Hashanah, the birthday of the world, we gather in awe and trembling. We gather in wonder and in hope. We gather as the shofar calls us… Tekiah! A single, piercing note to wake us up. It shakes us, unsettles us, and asks: What will we do with this new year?
And…I have to admit to you… when I hear that first blast of the shofar, the tekia… my mind goes immediately to another piercing sound… that shook me, unsettled me, and woke me up. Nearly two years ago, the first siren, at 6:29 in the morning on October 7th, Kibbutz Reim at the Nova Festival. That moment that changed our lives forever. Like the shofar, it cut through the noise, but it was not a call to renewal. It was a warning, a cry that danger had arrived, a blast that announced brokenness. From that moment forward, nothing would be the same.
And so we move from Tekiah into the next set of calls Shevarim. The three broken blasts. Shever, Shever, Shever…The cries that remind us of our own brokenness, of our people’s brokenness, of the world’s brokenness. For me, each Shever, each broken blast…my three journeys to Israel since that dreadful day. Each journey a broken note.
In December of 2023, just under two months after October 7, I went to Israel. my goal was simple: to be present. To hug, to cry, to let our people know they were not alone.
At the community of Kibbutz Hanita, near the Lebanese border, families had fled and only middle-aged fathers remained on guard. Men who looked just like me, holding weapons instead of laptops, guarding empty homes… but homes none the less.
I traveled south to Kibbutz Re’im, and the Nova Festival grounds, I walked among burned homes, bullet holes, and silence. The air itself seemed scarred.
And all I could do was hold someone’s hand, whisper ani itchem… I am with you. That was the first Shever. The first broken call…
Six months later, I returned to volunteer. This time, I put my hands in the soil for farmers who had no help. Alongside other volunteers, I picked, I pruned, I planted. The farmers told us, with tears in their eyes, “Without you, we would have lost everything.”
I was tired, and not just from the work. Every conversation circled back to loss, fear, the unknown. It felt endless, and hopeless…
This was the second Shever: brokenness, exhaustion. Weary bodies. Weary spirits. A sound of sighing, of stumbling.
But our tradition teaches that even in exhaustion, creation is possible.
Shevarim, brokeness is not the end; it is the passageway to repair.
You see, on my third trip this past April, something unexpected happened. I expected more despair, but instead I found courage. Visiting Kibbutz Hanita again, by this time a third of the population had returned. And of that third, three-quarters were families with teenagers.
The parents told me honestly it was not their decision to return. Rather, their children insisted. “We must go back. We must be with our people. This is our home.”
Their teenagers gave them courage. And in their courage, I rediscovered my own. Again with other volunteers We restocked the kibbutz general store, built sets for a Yom Ha’atzmaut, an independence day play the teens were writing. Even among shattered walls, creation had begun again.
I continued south to the community of Kibbutz Erez, right on the Gaza border, to visit 18 teenagers who had spent last summer with me at Camp Hess Kramer. For the first time since October 7, they were reunited. After displacement, after scattering, they returned home, not in theory, but in truth.
Together they created a mosaic of broken shards, laid at the kibbutz gates. There is a saying in Hebrew, Ein li Eretz acheret, I have no other land… Their mosaic instead reads,: Ein li Erez acheret. I have no other kibbutz erez, no other home. Out of broken pieces, they formed wholeness.
This third Shever, the third broken note is the turning point. Not only grief, but resilience. Not only brokenness, but the determination to create from fragments.
And so then, comes Teruah. Nine short, staccato blasts. Urgent. Insistent. Like an alarm that will not let us go back to sleep.
Teruah says: Do not stay paralyzed in despair. Do not freeze in fear. Let’s Act. Let’s Move. Let’s Respond.
And here, for us in Los Angeles, as a Wilshire Boulevard Temple community..Teruah means nine urgent actions:
- We will pray. every Shabbat service, each time we gather at a simcha or a memorial, we will raise our prayers aloud in community. Our prayers connect us across oceans, reminding us that Am Yisrael is one body, one soul.
- We will learn. Not just headlines or soundbites, but deep, honest learning. Through our Temple’s Israel-focused programs, through adult education and conversations with Israeli voices, we will give ourselves and our children tools to speak with honesty, clarity, and pride. In Los Angeles, where misinformation spreads quickly, learning is itself an act of courage.
- We will give. We have the power to sustain families in Israel who are rebuilding their lives, caring for displaced neighbors, or tending farms that feed thousands. Every dollar our community gives is not charity. It is partnership. Giving transforms distance into intimacy, turning our support into their survival.
- We will care for the displaced. Thousands of families are still uprooted, living in temporary homes, waiting for safety. We cannot house them all here in Los Angeles, but we can extend dignity through our giving, and we can remember them in our rituals: leaving an empty chair at our holiday tables, teaching our children that care extends beyond what we can see.
- We will volunteer. Right here in Los Angeles, through the Karsh Center, we serve our neighbors who need food, shelter, or medical care. Every act of kindness in our city strengthens outward Jewish identity. When we clothe the stranger, we remind the world that Jews act out of Torah and values. Our local volunteering is directly tied to the strength of Israel, because it proclaims who we are.
- We will mentor. Our teenagers here, like the teenagers at Hanita and Erez, are not waiting for permission to shape the Jewish future. We strengthen our children with Torah, with pride, with resilience. To mentor is to declare that Jewish identity is not a relic of the past but a responsibility of the present.
- We will stand. Publicly. Visibly. Courageously. At rallies, in conversations at work, on our campuses, in our neighborhoods. We will not whisper our Jewishness or our connection to Israel. We will stand tall. Every time antisemitism rises, our standing together is a Teruah blast that cannot be ignored.
- We will welcome. Los Angeles is a crossroads, a gathering place. Israelis will continue to come: families, students, artists, businesspeople, seeking connection. We will open our homes and our Temple doors so they know that Los Angeles Jewry is family. Hospitality is not extra. It is essential.
- We will go. When possible, we will travel. We will not only send funds but our bodies, our hands, our presence. To walk the streets, to embrace families, to put our hands in the soil. To say with our very breath: anachnu itchem. We are with you.
Pray… Learn… Give… Care… Volunteer… Mentor… Stand… Welcome… and Go!
Nine blasts. Nine actions. Teruah transforms trembling into courage.
Because then comes the long, unbroken note: Tekiah Gedolah. The blast that stretches as long as breath will allow.
It is the sound of endurance, of connection across time. It binds the clear call of Tekiah, the brokenness of Shevarim, and the urgency of Teruah into one great, seamless thread.
Yes, in the beginning I went to Israel exhausted. But I’ve come home exhilarated. Not because despair disappeared, but because hope was alive. And hope, real hope, is not passive. Hope is something we create.
I…We cannot forget that first piercing siren at 6:29 in the morning on October 7. It was a Tekiah of terror, a sound that shattered our sense of safety, a sound that changed Jewish life forever. But the shofar reminds us that Tekiah is not the sound of danger. It can be, it must be the sound of awakening, of renewal, of courage, of life.
The Nova siren was the Tekiah of brokenness. The shofar’s Tekiah Gedolah is the Tekiah of resilience, of return, of creation. It is the note that says the Jewish people endures. It is the note that insists our hope is not lost. It is the note that binds us to each other, across oceans and generations.
So let us not only pray for a sweet year. Let us make one.
Let us not only hear the shofar. Let us answer it.
Let us not only remember creation. Let us become active creators. Together. Shanah Tova u’metuka…may this coming year be a good, sweet year for us all.