Episode Details

Image: Photograph of a traditional Jew sounding the shofar during the 1930s. A shofar is a ram's horn used as a trumpet to warn of danger or to announce an assembly. This recorded message was played on the John DeMasi program, Talk with a Purpose on Saturday, September 12, 2026 instead of the regular interview with Seth Grossman at 9:10am. John DeMasi's program is heard on WPG Talk Radio from 9am to Noon Saturdays, and 5pm to 8pm Sundays on 95.5 FM and 1450AM radio near Atlantic City, New Jersey and on wpgtalkradiocom online. I’m Seth Grossman, speaking for Liberty and Prosperity. I am recording this message because this weekend, starting on sundown of Friday, September 11, is the two-day Jewish holiday of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. I am Jewish and I observe the "high holiday." That is why I will not be at the Liberty and Prosperity breakfast or on the radio this weekend. I instead will be in synagogue with my family. The Rosh Hashanah holiday is described in the books of Leviticus and Numbers in the Old Testament of the Bible. However, there it is not called Rosh Hashanah, which means new year. It is instead described as Yom Teruah, the day for the sounding of the Shofar. When the Temple was standing in Jerusalem, it was a day when a ram's horn was sounded calling on all Jews to assemble around the Temple. There they gave animals to the priests to be slaughtered and sacrificed at the Temple. They also sang psalms and praised God. The ram's horn was also traditionally sounded to warn Jews of approaching danger or to assemble for war. Rosh Hashanah, together with Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement that comes ten days later, were also days when Jews also confessed their sins and prayed to God for forgiveness. Of course, God can only forgive sins we commit against God. He cannot forgive sins we commit against other people or against ourselves. The Jewish "high holidays" of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur are days of reflection. We think of how we hurt others during the past year. We ask them for forgiveness and think of ways we can behave better next year. We also think of the mistakes we made that caused harm to ourselves . We think of how we can grow and improve ourselves to avoid those mistakes in the year ahead. That is why Jews don’t say "Happy New Year" for Rosh Hashanah. We usually say "L’Shanah Tova", which is short for the Hebrew words for "May you be written for a good year." The Books of Exodus and Deuteronomy in the Old Testament of the Bible call Jews the “Chosen People.”  But we were not chosen to be superior to anyone. God did not choose us to rule over anyone else. We were chosen to live by a set of 613 laws and rules that are written in the Torah, the first five books of the Old Testament of the Bible. At Mount Sinai, the freed Hebrew slaves made a covenant, or contract with God. According to that contract, Jews agreed to live by God’s laws, and God agreed to let us live safe and comfortable lives in a "Promised Land" of Canaan, a land flowing with milk and honey. Last year I wrote a book called 1676 Project, How New Jersey Shaped America. In it, I explain how New Jersey established in 1676 in much the same way. Quakers, who were persecuted in England, came to Salem and Burlington here in South Jersey to create their own commonwealth. It was also based on the rules and values set forth in the Old and New Testaments of the Bible. The most fundamental law was the Christian Golden Rule of "Our Blessed Savior":  "Do unto others as you would have others do and to you." The Jewish Rabbi Hillel, who studied and taught in Judea a few years earlier summarized Jewish law in a similar way. Jews and Israel thrived when they kept their covenant and followed those laws. They suffered when they did not.  The same can be said about America. There is an old Jewish saying that goes, “What happens to the world, happens to the Jews first.” Jews are going through difficult times right now. Not all, but many o