A little horn with a long reach, the shofar's reverbrating sounds were to penetrate the soul of the Jewish people throughout the centuries.

| The Voice of the Shofar |

"..And all the people saw the thundering, the lightning, the voice of the shofar, and the mountain smoking. And when the people saw it, they were shaken, and stood far away." (Exodus 19:15)

The "People" were the Children of Israel, recently freed from Egypt. The place was Mount Sinai. According to the Torah, the sound was so penetrating that the people could actually "see the sounds."

| A Symbol of Faith |
That penetrating sound was soon to become a regular feature of Jewish observance. The wandering Jews were commanded to hear the shofar on every Rosh Hashanah, giving rise to the biblical name of Yom Teru'ah, "the Day of Blowing" (Numbers 29:1).

In Jewish tradition, the shofar has generally been associated with the ram's horn, recalling the ram offered as a sacrifice by Abraham in place of his son Isaac in The Akeidah, (the Binding of Isaac). Abraham's faith in God is a recurring theme of Rosh Hashanah, and the story of the Akeidah is read from the Torah on the second day of the festival.

| In Biblical Times |
In biblical times, the shofar was blown on different occasions:

• To announce the Jubilee Year, in which all slaves were freed: "Proclaim liberty throughout the land and to all the inhabitants thereof..." (Leviticus 25:10)

• To accompany other musical instruments during the Temple ceremonies in Jerusalem: "With trumpets and the sound of a shofar make a joyful noise before the Lord... " (Psalms 98:6)

• To call the Israelites to war or to arouse fear in the hearts of the enemy. "Shall a shofar be sounded in the city, and the people shall not be afraid?" (Amos 3:6)

| In the Middle Ages |
In the Middle Ages, Jews blew the shofar to mark the beginning of the Sabbath, or to announce deaths, fasts, and even excommunications. The practice of blowing the shofar each morning in the synagogue during the Hebrew month of Elul was also established. This custom prepared the people for the upcoming Days of Awe (Rosh Hashanah through Yom Kippur).

| In Recent Times |
In more recent times, the shofar has been used in Israel at the inauguration of each new president. In June 1967, after Israeli troops recaptured the Old City of Jerusalem, Chief Rabbi Shlomo Goren proclaimed the liberation of the Western Wall with shofar blasts. He used the same shofar that he had blown in 1956 during the Suez Campaign in Sinai - echoes of a sound heard there three thousand years earlier.