Rosh Chodesh Cheshvan - making sense of the New Moon

Rosh Chodesh Cheshvan this year (5782/2021) begins at sundown on October 6^th to sundown on October 7^th between the Parshiyot of Bereishit and Noach, which are the first two readings in Sefer Bereishit, or the book of Genesis.  Rosh Chodesh Cheshvan also begins the new month after our High Holiday Season, connecting the holy month of Tishrei with the ordinary month of Cheshvan.  But the Rosh Chodesh of  Cheshvan also contains a secret meaning, one that joins the spiritual and physical worlds together.

Rosh Chodesh, the celebration of the new moon in the lunar calendar (which is the calendar of the Bible) is the start of a new month but also has the energy of a mysterious holiday.  We read in Torah from the book of Numbers, “And on your joyous occasions—your fixed festivals and new moon days,” tradition teaching from Ta’anit 17b in the Talmud that both “your fixed festivals and new moon days” are considered to be a Yom Tov, or festival day.  As a Yom Tov, just like other festival days, the Rosh Chodesh celebrates with the Musaf sacrifice when the Temple stood, today instead we pray with the Musaf Amidah and sing the Hallel (Psalms 113-118).  Aside from notable differences like the aliyot (Torah readings) being more than a regular weekly reading (3) but less than the Shabbat or Yom Tov, (7), the Rosh Chodesh also does not have a haftarah reading again like the Shabbat or Yom Tov.  In fact, Rosh Chodesh is not a Holy day like a Shabbat or a Chag (holiday) where we refrain from work and familiar daily life to devote ourselves to spiritual deeds or quests, but instead it is a normal day where we conduct business and engage in regular life activities.

Rabbi Zvi Ryzman, a Los Angeles based Orthodox Talmudic scholar,  makes the distinction between a Chag (holiday) and the Rosh Chodesh (new moon) in comparison to the Holy and the ordinary, or mundane.  In so doing he calls upon Ephraim and Manasseh, the Egyptian born sons of Joseph, to better support his view of these connected but differing Yomim Tovim (festival days).  Rzyman points out that although Manasseh was born first Jacob (Josephs father) gave the blessing that should been for the oldest to Ephraim the youngest (Gen. 48:14).  Yet, the “order” of Ephraim and Manasseh was interchangeable at times as the writers of the Torah also made the preeminence of Manasseh before Ephraim (Numbers 2:20 as opposed to 26:28).  For Ryzman it was not that one was greater than the other more so than each played a different role in the life of the Jewish people; Ephraim being more prominent “only in spiritual matters” as a reflector of what is good, whereas Manasseh was more prominent in “worldly matters,” an overcomer of the bad, a teaching Rzyman learned from his studies of Rabbi Naftali Zvi Yehuda Berlin, or the Netziv (19^th Century).  

Ryzman questions why Moses allowed the half-tribe of Manasseh to settle with Gad and Rueben in the fertile land east of the Jordan instead of Ephraim who settles in Canaan with the rest of the tribes. Ryzman’s contention is that if Moses was concerned about the spiritual lives of Gad and Reuven why did he not send the half-tribe of Ephraim instead given that they were the Torah scholars?  For Ryzman he justifies the choice of Manasseh by saying; since the tribe of Ephraim was “devoted exclusively to Torah study,” Moses wanted Manasseh since their “Torah scholarship worked hand in hand” with all worldly matters as well.       

Manasseh was able to mesh holiness and worldliness together, a unique ability. Rabbi Rzyman therefore connects the Rosh Chodesh to Manasseh for the same reason:  the Rosh Chodesh is a mundane normal weekday observance that was given the status of a Yom Tov, making the Rosh Chodesh – like Manasseh – unique.   Rosh Chodesh Cheshvan coming out of the Holiday months of Tishrei is also unique, taking on the journey of the mundane after we concluded our Moadim l'simcha, our time of rejoicing in conclusion of the Holidays themselves.  We see this in the beginning of Genesis from 3:9 with the very first question God asks Adam; “v’yomer lo Ay’ekah, “God said to Adam - where are you?”  The root of Ay’ekah can be “aych,” which means “how,” so when God asks Adam, where are you, Adam is really being asked; how are things with you now that your eyes have been opened and see the world, and yourself, as it is - broken and in need of repair?

You see God’s question to Adam is one about awareness, and in the same way, the Rosh Chodesh of Cheshvan is also about awareness.  Sure the Rosh Chodesh is recognition of our connection to the creation, and to each other, which asks us to be aware of the ecology of this world in which we live and are asked to protect.  But as said before, the Rosh Chodesh also juxtaposes the spiritual and physical worlds, reminding us that behind the rhythms, its unfortunes and uncertainties of life, or the mundane, there are hidden mysteries of the divine and our perceived sense of the spiritual, or the Holy.  Rosh Chodesh reminds us that the human journey is multidimensional.