By Rabbi Jacob Bitton
When I was a child I learned that HaShem judges us on Rosh Hashana. I often wondered: when, exactly, does that judgment take place? My childhood was spent across several time zones, and I knew that Rosh Hashana began in Israel long before it began in Buenos Aires, for example. Was HaShem judging me before the holiday had started where I lived? Was there something I should be doing differently at the moment of judgment? What time zone was HaShem’s “clock” set to? And for that matter, is God even subject to time? And wouldn’t God, whom we call three times a day “Melekh oheb tsedaqa umishpat,” be judging the world and all its creatures continuously, as the Gemara in Aboda Zara suggests? And more fundamentally: was it wise for me to draw conclusions about what I think I know of God, and about what God is supposedly doing at any given moment? Wasn’t Moshe Rabbenu himself turned down when he asked to know God?
Over the years I realized I had made a small mistake of focus with enormous consequences. I was looking at what God would be doing. I should have been looking at what I was being called to do. Instead of trying to peek at what we imagine God does on this day (something we know we cannot know), it is more interesting to look at this day from our own perspective and understand what we are experiencing. Put another way: instead of thinking of Rosh Hashana as the day when God, the Judge, appears in court, I should think of it as the day when I have to appear. This day is significant not because the Judge is presiding at that moment, but because it is the moment when I am ready to present myself and be judged. There is something special about Rosh Hashana where human beings are concerned.
In general, since the Torah is “letob lanu,” for our own good, I think it is more useful to try to understand how the Mitsvot improve our lives than to speculate about theology. Rather than focusing on the fact that God judges us, I prefer to focus on the fact that we, the Bene Adam, are capable of presenting ourselves for judgment. In the lines that follow I will explain why Rosh Hashana is special for us, and why we are special.
ROSH HASHANA: CELEBRATING WHAT MAKES ADAM UNIQUE
This Rosh Hashana marks the 5787th anniversary of the creation of Adam haRishon. We care because we believe Adam was our direct ancestor: with him began a line of creatures unlike anything created before. Although in many ways he resembled the other creatures created on the “sixth day” before him, there was something unique about Adam. That is what Rosh Hashana is about: it is a reminder of our uniqueness, of what sets us apart from every other biological creature.
The Torah describes the creation of Adam as something entirely separate from the rest of the animal kingdom. Adam was, without a doubt, special. And not because of his physical features, or because he walked upright, or even because of his intelligence.
Ask an average anthropologist, or an evolutionary biologist, what the difference is between a chimpanzee and a human being, and he will tell you it isn’t much. Chimpanzees are stronger and humans are smarter, but we are the same kind of creature. Today they might even borrow the language of artificial intelligence and say that humans are weak chimpanzees with a ChatGPT in their heads, and nothing more. The Torah has a very different answer. For the Torah, Adam haRishon was categorically different from every creature created before him, chimpanzees included. And I would add that what makes Adam haRishon unique cannot be replicated by any artificial intelligence.
Many theories have been proposed about what makes humans special, and most have been debunked. Ethologists and anthropologists have shown that apes can make and use tools. They can solve problems that require abstract reasoning. They can learn to read and write. They can overcome their innate fear of water. Some chimpanzees outperform human children! But there is one thing apes cannot do. Even if an individual ape, properly trained, is capable of remarkable intellectual feats, apes lack the social mechanism to pass that knowledge on to other apes. In other words: there is no accumulation of knowledge. Everything an ape learns dies with that ape.
Adam was created “betselem Elokim.” Of course, knowing these two words doesn’t help much. What does “Tselem Elokim” mean? Let us start with what it does NOT mean. Tselem is NOT an “image.” (HaShem has no image!) We are not made “in the image of God,” as Michelangelo tried to depict it in his frescoes. Yet whatever “Tselem” means, its construct form (semikhut) with “Elokim” implies that humans have SOMETHING in common with HaShem, and that SOMETHING is what separates us from the animals!
LIKE ALL ANIMALS: SELFISH
Let us first consider a fact that holds for every creature. HaShem created every living organism to think, first and foremost, of itself. A creature that put the interests of other creatures above its own would not seek what it needs to survive, and it would die. (Picture a lizard that stops eating because it is worried whether its lizard friends have enough food.) Bore Olam programmed every organism to look out for itself: by securing the survival of each individual, the continuation of life in general is guaranteed. The human being is also a selfish creature. We perceive the world as a set of resources at our disposal. We see other people as “human resources” we can use for our own benefit. When we first looked up at the stars, it seemed obvious to us that the cosmos had the Earth at its center.
UNLIKE ANY OTHER ANIMAL: ABLE TO “DECENTER”
Although HaShem intended us to be self-centered, as we have just described, because that is essential to our survival, Adam was given a unique ability: the ability to “decenter” from himself, to step outside himself and perceive things from the outside.
Animals cannot do that. An animal (and any human being who does not live up to his potential as a Ben Adam) is conditioned to process reality from a single, narrow, selfish point of view. It sees things only in terms of “this feels good” and “this feels bad.” It cannot truly grasp the existence of others (who might have their own “this feels good / this feels bad”); to it, everyone else is a character in the world it imagines and creates. What’s more, an animal cannot even grasp its own existence!
By stepping outside himself, Adam can achieve three things.
First, Adam is able to understand that there is a reality outside himself. A “beginner Ben Adam” would recognize only the immediate physical reality that extends beyond his body. A human being worthy of the title “Ben Adam” would realize that the world extends beyond what he can see. That, in fact, this planet is an infinitesimal dot in the vastness of the cosmos.
Second, a Ben Adam can perceive his own self, analyze his own actions, and judge his own direction and position. The first question HaShem asked Adam haRishon was “Ayeka?” (Where are you?). Those of us who choose to be more than animals can objectively contemplate our subjective self.
Third, as a result of stepping outside himself, a Ben Adam can turn that perception into action. When we realize that outside ourselves there are other “selves” and we decide to see things from their perspective; when we act on what is best for others and not only for ourselves, we are fulfilling the potential of our Tselem to the fullest. In Hebrew, that effort is called “Chesed.”
BENE ADAM ARE FREE. NO ONE ELSE IS
It is these qualities that allow Adam haRishon (and his descendants and followers) to be “free.” We can escape the trance of habit and the hypnosis of what our biological urges demand. We are masters of our bodies; nothing can force us to choose against our convictions.
FREEDOM REQUIRES MAINTENANCE
The freedom a Ben Adam can attain requires maintenance. It can also be lost. Very easily, in fact. And the gravest danger to our freedom lies in our own decisions. Make one bad decision, freely, ignore your Tselem Elokim, and your next choice will be less free.
David haMelekh asked God to save him from the loss of freedom that certain choices bring about (Tehilim 19:13-14):
שְׁגִיא֥וֹת מִֽי־יָבִ֑ין מִֽנִּסְתָּר֥וֹת נַקֵּֽנִי׃ גַּ֤ם מִזֵּדִ֨ים ׀ חֲשֹׂ֬ךְ עַבְדֶּ֗ךָ אַֽל־יִמְשְׁלוּ־בִ֣י אָ֣ז אֵיתָ֑ם וְ֝נִקֵּ֗יתִי מִפֶּ֥שַֽׁע רָֽב׃
“Shegiot mi yabin, ministarot naqeni. Gam mizedim chasokh abdekha, al yimshelu bi, az etam, veniqeti mipesha rab.”
THE SHOFAR: AN INVITATION TO BECOME ADAM AGAIN
If someone told me that among the creatures created on the sixth day before Adam there was one that looked like a hybrid of ape and man, and that it could communicate by speaking and by drawing on cave walls, I would say that this was not the Adam haRishon of the Torah. That creature would belong, rather, among the many mammals HaShem created before Adam haRishon. I would go further: even after Adam, not every “human being” automatically earns the title of Ben Adam. Some humans (most?) live lives not so different from those of animals: the same desires, the same instincts, and the same morality.
Rosh Hashana is an invitation to live up to the title “Ben Adam.”
When we hear the sound of the Shofar this year, I want to invite you not to use that moment to ask for the things we want in life. It is not a moment for asking. It is a moment for listening. The sound is monotonous, but the meaning is deep: “Ben Adam, ma lekha nirdam!” The Shofar is meant to wake us up and remind us of our potential as Bene Adam. Just as it sounded every Yobel, and at Har Sinai perhaps for the same purpose, the Shofar proclaims the liberation of all who are enslaved.
If I had to put into words the kind of thoughts the Shofar should awaken, they would go something like this:
“My Creator, here I am, a descendant of Adam haRishon, standing before You. On this anniversary of the creation of my ancestor Adam, whose unique qualities I recall today so clearly, I reflect on my own Tselem Elokim and on what it means for my life. I am different from every other creature, and I must be judged by standards that apply to no other. My Tselem allows me to pause, to perceive the world beyond myself, to realize that I was created and that You are my Creator. It also allows me to think objectively about my choices and about the potential I have not yet fulfilled.
With my Tselem Elokim comes responsibility for my actions, and with responsibility, accountability. So I present myself to be judged, God, our Father and our King. I have the capacity to be judged, and I know that for every mistake or failing I come to recognize, You have given me the capacity to correct it. More than that: I understand that I must strive to correct them, because not to do so would be to give up a part of my freedom. And the freedom You allow me to seek is what makes me special.
As I hear the sound of the Shofar, I commit myself again to living as a Ben Adam, exercising my Tselem Elokim. I will examine myself from the outside, recognizing that I am free, responsible, and accountable for my actions. I will perceive the world around me as Your creation, not mine, and I will relate to it as something real, not as a projection of my imagination.
So, Father, King, help me overcome my bad decisions, those I recognize and those hidden from me. I will devote the next ten days to this process. I trust that by Yom haKippurim I will have cleansed my soul and my mind of the burdens that have accumulated from my bad choices. Those burdens have held me back; they have kept me from making freer and wiser decisions. I must wake up. I must be freer. I have what it takes: I am a Ben Adam.”
