
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, September 24, 1995                   TAG: 9509220128
SECTION: EXTRA                    PAGE: 12   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

UNDERSTANDING THE HOLIDAY

Rosh Hashana: New Year's and the Day of Judgment. This is a time for contemplating the past year and reconciling with those from whom one is estranged.

The day begins a 10-day penitential period called the High Holidays, which conclude with Yom Kippur. The curved ram's horn trumpet, or shofar, is blown, as it has been for the previous month, as a call to the period of repentence.

Rosh Hashana begins at sunset with the lighting of two candles and the recitation of the blessing, which begins "Blessed are You, Lord our God, King of the Universe."

The holiday also has a sweet side, symbolized by the eating of apples and honey, as families gather for reunions and holiday meals.

"L'shana Tovah Tikatayvu" - May you be inscribed for life in the New Year - is the holiday greeting, often simplified as "L'shana Tovah."

Yom Kippur: The Day of Atonement. Perhaps the most solemn day on the Jewish calendar and the culmination of the Holy Days. In ancient times a scapegoat, and later a chicken, was sacrificed as a symbol of expiating sins from the people. Some families still observe ritualized ceremonies in which sins are symbolically transferred to a handkerchief filled with coins that are later donated to charity.

Yom Kippur also is a day of physical abstinence from food and sexual intercourse, among other things. The day is ended with the blowing of the shofar.

"Blessed are You, Lord our God, King of the Universe."

by CNB