{"id":32,"date":"2010-05-14T17:07:41","date_gmt":"2010-05-14T15:07:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ish-tam.com\/blog\/?p=32"},"modified":"2020-10-06T21:37:25","modified_gmt":"2020-10-06T19:37:25","slug":"rosh-chodesh","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/ish-tam.com\/blog\/2010\/05\/14\/rosh-chodesh\/","title":{"rendered":"Rosh Chodesh – Fresh Start every month"},"content":{"rendered":"
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New Moon – Rosh Chodesh<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Rosh Chodesh<\/a>: Start of a Lunar month.<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Literally Rosh Chodesh means “Head of the Month”. New Moon Festival is described in the Torah as the day of rejoicing (Bamidbar (Numbers) 10:10)\u00a0, the time of renewal. Even the word \u201cChodesh\u201d \u2013 month \u2013 comes from the root \u201c\u05d7\u05d3\u05e9\u201d \u2013 \u201cChadash\u201d \u2013 \u201cNEW\u201d.<\/p>\n

Rosh Chodesh: \u00a0Time of opportunity.<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Like all \u201cmoadim\u201d \u2013 appointed times \u2013 Rosh Hodesh is the time of opportunity. The deeper meaning of Holidays<\/a> and special times in Torah is not \u201ccommemoration\u201d of some event.\u00a0Holidays are an active opportunity to use the flow of energy that is descending at that time into the physical world. On Rosh Chodesh, the surge of energy that is creating the reality of the upcoming month is available to us! The way to receive this\u00a0surge of energy\u00a0is to be joyous!<\/p>\n

Rosh Chodesh: Why the Joy is the key?<\/strong><\/h4>\n
The Joy is fundamental to any Jewish Holiday because it\u00a0causes us to be expansive and enables us to receive Hashem’s light. On the contrary, negative emotions e.g., sadness, make us contract and unable to turn on our “receptive mode”<\/div>\n
After ensuring that we do fulfill Torah\u2019s directive to be joyous, we can harness that energy of Rosh Chodesh withTefillah. We can target specific issues in our prayer \u2013 because it\u2019s much easier to change the month in its conception.<\/div>\n
\n

Rosh Chodesh: Why beginnings are important.<\/strong><\/h4>\n<\/div>\n

We can compare the energy of a new month to a garden hose that can create various shapes of a spout\u00a0by twisting the nozzle; The jetstream of water changing the shape in the nozzle, in the place where it is forming. So is each month is taking shape at Rosh Chodesh.<\/p>\n

Rosh Chodesh: Best time\u00a0for a change.<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Of course when we talk about \u201cChanging the month\u201d, we really mean \u201cChanging ourselves\u201d. We create the new month of opportunities for spiritual growth. The change is always easier when level of energy is high. If we direct the energy of ta month into changing ourselves in Tefillah, we\u00a0will use it constructively.\u00a0If we are oblivious to the chance, the energy can even destabilize us or dissipate inconsequentially.<\/p>\n

In a sense, Rosh Chodesh is similar to Rosh HaShanah \u2013 just with a different scope.<\/p>\n

Just like Rosh HaShanah helps us to create a new year full of opportunities, so does Rosh Chodesh give us a chance to break out of our routine and rise up.<\/p>\n

Rosh Chodesh: Female Connection.<\/strong><\/h4>\n

New lunar month\u00a0is also regarded as a special time for Jewish women. You can read the standard explanation \u201cwhy?\u201d here<\/a>, but I think the deeper reason for women\u2019s special connection to Rosh Chodesh, is that our ladies are much more in tune with the dynamics of time and renewal.<\/p>\n

Men need rigorous halachic times<\/a> laws just to be basically in sync with spiritual reality.<\/p>\n

While women are exempt from those laws \u2013 because they are generally already in tune with times; so women\u00a0do not need specific Halachic instruments to achieve the alignment with zmanim. Interestingly, many Chassidic Tzaddikim were known to be very liberal with halachic times<\/a> \u2013 perhaps because they reached the level of being in tune with times \u2013 similar to what most women have from birth.<\/p>\n

So while women might be more in tune with the energy of Lunar renewal, men also try to catch up with Kiddush Levanah. Kiddush Levanah<\/a> is another wonderful mitzvah using the Lunar energy of growth and rejuvenation.<\/p>\n

Rosh Chodesh to Shavuot<\/a>.<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Today is the first day of Sivan and in 4 days we have Chag Shavuot \u2013 holiday of receiving the Torah. The energy needed to form the Holiday is also descending today \u2013 so we start defining our receiving of the Torah already today!<\/p>\n

Good Month Sivan to everyone!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rosh Hodesh is an active opportunity to use the flow of energy that is descending at that time into the physical world. On Rosh Chodesh the surge of energy that is creating the reality of the upcoming month is available to us – and the way to receive it is to be joyous!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":210,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15,41],"tags":[47,22,20,102,7,42,55,19,43,84,46,44,49,45,48],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/ish-tam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/ish-tam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/ish-tam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ish-tam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ish-tam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32"}],"version-history":[{"count":29,"href":"http:\/\/ish-tam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":586,"href":"http:\/\/ish-tam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32\/revisions\/586"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ish-tam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/210"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/ish-tam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ish-tam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ish-tam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}