Secret of the Crescent Moon
Ps. 81:4
“Lost as we feel, there is no better
Compass than compassion.
We find ourselves not by being
The most seen, but the most seeing.”
Amanda Gorman, Compass (excerpt)
How do we see what is unseen, and what is it in the unseen that seems most sacred? We look up to see the moon’s phases, and something in that ancient sacred secret that keeps circling around us, resonates as a reminder of compassion. Gorman’s poem, feeling so needed now, winks at the secret shining like the moon inside today’s psalm.
A single verse in psalm 81 became the cornerstone of the Jewish New Year liturgical ritual and yet within it is both a mystery and a debate which has to do with the moon. Do we lift our eyes up and honor the lunar when the year begins - when it’s waxing or in full bloom?
That has to do with how one chooses to translate this verse and there have been debates for many generations:
תִּקְע֣וּ בַחֹ֣דֶשׁ שׁוֹפָ֑ר בַּ֝כֵּ֗סֶה לְי֣וֹם חַגֵּֽנוּ׃
Blow the horn on the new moon,
on the full moon for our feast day.
Ps. 81:4 (JPS)
Traditionally chanted in synagogues on Rosh haShanah, the first days of the Jewish New Year, just before we blast the shofar, this verse may be familiar to some of you. These days, and for many centuries, this new year is always on a new moon. So what’s the full moon doing here? Which is it - new or full moon? Why are both mentioned?
It depends on how one deciphers the Hebrew words ‘Chodesh’ and ‘B’Kaseh L’Yom’ that show up here.
“Chodesh” means ‘month’ but also ‘new’ so it could go either way between crescent and full form. B’Kaseh’ is trickier to decipher and some translations have interpreted as ‘complete’ though most often is understood to mean ‘the hidden.’
This obscurity might reflect much older traditions, now lost, in which the new Jewish year was ushered in on the full moon - just like the other major holidays on the Jewish calendar. This may be a tradition that vanished many moons ago- but somehow still alluded to in this fragment.
Robert Alter’s choice is to remove the full moon mention, and he explains his choice of translation:
“Blast the ram's horn on the new moon, when the moon starts to wax, for our festival day.”
The Hebrew keseh derives from the verb that means “to cover.” Although many interpreters understand it as a reference to the full moon, it is something of a stretch to imagine that the festive celebration of the new moon invoked in the first verse somehow goes on to a point in time fourteen days later in the second verse. In any case, “cover” accords far better with the time of month when the moon is only a thin sliver than with the time when it is bright and full.”
There is more to the notion of a hidden moon and its connection to the first days of the year, associated with our process of reflection and atonement, uncovering what’s hidden in our minds and hearts.
The Zohar links the secret of the tiny crescent to the blowing of the shofar as a way to deepen the spiritual awakening associated with this liminal time:
“We blow the shofar In order to break that covering, by which the moon is covered and can’t shine.. When we awaken the shofar in our world the sound issuing from it strikes the air, splitting firmaments until it rises to that mighty rock covering the moon.
..Once compassion has been aroused below by us, so too above in the Divine realm; another, supernal shofar is awakened, emitting a sound that is compassion; and sound meets sound, compassion meets compassion.”
{Excerpted and Adapted from Pritzker Zohar, translate by Dr. Daniel Matt]
According to the Zohar’s mystical meaning - what’s covering the moon is all that’s covering our hearts with fear, anger, judgment - the lack of compassion. When we hear the broken blasts of the shofar we do so to shake it all up, uncover the moon and grow along with it, increasing the light.
From the first days of the year, as we begin to uncover our hearts and grow our care and compassion - the moon grows bigger too. By Yom Kippur, ten days later, the moon is almost full, and by Sukkot, the harvest holiday, we celebrate the fullness of it all, activating our empathy, stretching ourselves, day by day, towards more love, with committed intention.
What’s hidden in a psalm? In a moonless night?
An old secret, the ancient lunar magic of the full moon and the crescent moon, contracting and expanding, right along with us.
The High Holy Days season is just around the corner, a few more moon cycles -- and today we received an invitation to begin this annual journey of return to center, to hear the call for compassion, to prepare ahead, to see what’s hidden, to see, and to be seen.
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