MAPLEWOOD — Oheb Shalom Congregation of South Orange held a Rosh Hashanah celebration in Memorial Park on Wednesday, Oct. 3.
About 200 people were in the park’s natural amphitheater for the service billed as “a free service of love, forgiveness, and new beginnings for families of all faiths, no faiths, and the faith curious.”
Rabbi Abigail Treu and Cantor Eliana Kissner of Oheb Shalom led the service that celebrates the Jewish new year and is a time of introspection, abstinence, prayer and penitence.
“At a time when there is so much hate in the world,” Treu said that it meant a lot to see the hillside filled with not only Jewish people but also people from other faiths.
Victor De Luca, township committee member, was among those at the service, which was the second time that Oheb Shalom Congregation held a Rosh Hashanah service in Memorial Park.
“The service is designed to bring the entire community together to celebrate Jewish culture and tradition and the new year,” DeLuca said. “I’ve attended the service in both years and appreciate joining friends and neighbors in celebration. It is particularly important to stand together now to confront the growing antisemitism in this country and around the world.”
Rosh Hashanah celebrates the creation of the world and is a time to reflect on the year that has just concluded and the one that has just begun. In the Jewish calendar, the year 5785 began at sunset on Oct. 2.
“We’re celebrating the birthday of the word,” Treu said. “We don’t celebrate with cake but with apples and honey.”
The event included eating apples and honey and reflecting on the past year and the year to come.
“We turn from one year to the next and to being our best possible self,” Treu said.
Treu suggested to the audience that they bring to their mind’s eye, someone they need to ask for forgiveness.
“We can’t grow until we ask for forgiveness,” she said, later asking: “Who will you become this year.”
The service ended after the traditional blowing of the shofar.
“The New Year is marked with a sound, the shofar, the ram’s horn,” Treu said. “We sound it so we can turn to love and forgiveness.”
Kissner blew into a shofar several times.
“God grant us peace in our families, our communities and in Israel,” Treu said.
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