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B. The shofar’s haunting, otherworldly wail symbolizes the plaintive call of the innocent soul. It is blown during Elul to arouse one to self-reflection, on Rosh Hashanah to inaugurate G-d as King of the Universe, and on Yom Kippur to cap off the day as it surmounts its spiritual peak.
C. Because of its powerful, thundering voice, a shofar was sounded at events of earth-shattering significance. A surround-sound shofar blast filled the atmosphere when the Torah was given at Mt. Sinai, Joshua conquered Jericho with seven assault-shofar city circlings, Jewish kings were inaugurated to the tune of Blow-That-Shofar, and the greatest shofar recital in all eternity will accompany the arrival of Moshiach.
The shofar’s haunting, otherworldly wail symbolizes the plaintive call of the innocent soul
1. Toot Your Own Horn
Hearing the shofar on Rosh Hashanah is Positive Mitzvah #170. Blown with the same lip-reverberation technique used for trumpet, a total of 100 notes are sounded on each of Rosh Hashanah’s two days, and one very long blast is blown at the very end of Yom Kippur.
2. A Noteworthy Performance
The blowing of the shofar on Rosh Hashanah consists of four sounds sounded in a specific order: tekiah (pronounced t-KEE-uh), shvarim (pronounced (sh-VAW-reem) teruah (pronounced t-ROO-uh) and tekiah gedolah (pronounced geh-DOH-luh). Each lasts approximately three seconds except tekiah gedolah. Tekiah is a straight, unbroken blast, shevarim (which means “broken ones”) is a tekiah broken into three one-second segments, teruah is a staccato division of the tekiah into nine rapid-fire notes, while tekiah gedolah is a triple tekiah, lasting a minimum of three consecutive tekiot, or nine seconds.
3. Blow It Big Time
Before the Rosh Hashanah Musaf services we blow the Shofar as follows:
Tekiah, shevarim, teruah, tekiah
Tekiah, shevarim, tekiah
Tekiah, teruah, tekiah
Tekiah, teruah, tekiah gedolah
Six times during the musaf service, and once after, the shofar is blown in the following order:
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