Malchuyot: Reflections for Second Day of Rosh Hashanah, 2025
By Rabbi Susan Laemmle, RH Day 2
On Rosh Hashanah, we envision and speak of God in a multitude of ways including as Creator, Sustainer, Judge and Parent. But it is God as King —the Monarch who rules over the entire world — that forms the most sustained and comprehensive image for this two-part long day, and arguably of the High Holy Days as a whole. Avenu Malkenu relates to us as a compassionate parent — but also and notably, as the Sovereign who makes demands upon their subjects, who respond with reverence and awe. It’s fitting that Malkhuyot begins the three distinctive sections included in Rosh Hashanah Musaf, thus forming the foundation beneath God’s Zichronot remembrance of us and our soul-summoning Shofrot blasts into the universe. Lev Shalem notes that the image of God as sovereign had particular power for medieval and rabbinic Judaism. My sense is that modern Jews, even in countries with monarchs, typically handle the image lightly or even find it troublesome. And yet, in recent times some of us have found the idea, the vision really, of God as our only true king, newly meaningful.
Soon we will be praying Aleinu — in its original liturgical position, from which it went on to become the concluding hymn of every service. While we normally bow at the waist during Aleinu, on Rosh Hashanah the sheleach tziboor and some members of the kahal bring their whole bodies down upon the ground in an act of obeisance. Bowing and prostrating ourselves actualize an attitude of respect and obedience. These action somatically encode the awe – the Yirah – with which Jewish tradition urges us to relate to God.
One doesn’t hear much about Piety these days, although people are often described as “religious” or not, sometimes as more or less “observant.” But the attitude, character trait or value that can be rendered as “pious” in English is expressed in three Hebrew expressions that feature Yirah in a smichut construction: Yirat-Adonai, Yirat-Shamayim, and Yirat-Cheyt. Antiganus of Sokho, concludes the third Mishnah of Pirkei-Avot with the injunction to: “let the fear of heaven (morah shamayim) determine your actions.” We should do this not because God will punish us if we transgress, but rather “like servants who serve their master unconditionally, with no thought of reward or punishment.” Antiganus understood that God is the guarantor of our earthly Moral Order, the foundation stone of Truth. It is before that Moral Order, before Truth as a reality, that we bow during Aleinu. As we go about our lives, we do the right thing even when it’s hard in recognition of that Moral Order. We are afraid of doing the wrong thing because of Yirat Cheyt, fear of sin, which is the same thing as Yirat Shamayim (awe before the transcendent order of the universe), which is the same thing as Yirat Ha-shem (trembling before God with righteous fear, with an awe that elevates and enlarges us).
It’s not appropriate to approach fellow human beings, no matter their standing or power, with that same attitude. When their position, achievements or human qualities warrant, we can and should relate to them with respect; and follow their guidance, even their orders. When they violate Torah teachings and moral norms, then we should do the minimum necessary — practice strategic non-compliance — and sometimes we should engage in active non-violent resistance. We may well fear such people and the groups around them, but we should not be in awe of them. Like Shifrah and Puah when ordered to drown Israelite babies, we should summon Yirat Shamayim to sharpen our wits and strengthen our backbones. With Proverbs 1:7, we can then loudly proclaim: Yirat Ha-Shem raysheet daat hochmah: Reverential Awe before God is the beginning of wisdom.
And so it is that people around this country, including our own Pico Robertson area, have come together in small and larger groups, under the banner of “No Kings.” With them in mind, I close with a teaching by Yoel Bin Nun, for which I’m indebted to Rabbi Gordon Tucker of JTS and the organization A More Perfect Union: The Jewish Partnership for Democracy. Here is the teaching: “The democratic take on government — in which there is no all-powerful human actor, in which power is divided among different authorities, and there is no single personality who can be identified with the government either in whole or in part — this is the system that is closer than all other systems and all other models to what is correct from the point of view of the Torah. This is a resolution that is suitable and desirable because it strikes a balance between human sovereignty and the sovereignty of heaven. This is because a democratic position can also be respectful of the sovereignty of heaven and even subserve it.”
As the cornerstone of Malkhuyot, Aleinu gives meaningful expression to Judaism’s distinctive balance between particularism and universalism, its tribal Peoplehood and its existence as a universal religion. Far from seeking the exclusive enjoyment of God’s favor, we Jews pray for the day when “all the children of flesh will call upon Your Name.” May that day come speedily and soon — and let us say, Amen.
Shana Tovah.