Rabbi Eliyahu Schusterman's 2021 Rosh Hashanah Message

When I look into my crystal ball, I see 5782 as an amazing year of opportunity to assist the world, our fellow humans and our Jewish community in its transition to alignment with its inner core; the spark of G-d that is in everything and in everyone.

It appears to me that if we zoom the camera out, away from the individual pixels of our own little world, we can see an amazing picture coming into focus. The era we live in, the globalization, openness, diversity, and acceptance. As well as the crazy challenges of COVID, unrest in the world, polarization in politics, science, and religion to name a few are all the messiness that comes along with the birth of a new world, a new reality.

This reality is one of resolving the inherent we experience within ourselves, with each other, and the material world as a whole. It is alignment with Hashem and the Godliness in the world.

The opportunity that is available for us as a Jewish people, the “People of the Book” is to lead the way. Not to live in fear of the tensions around us. Rather, to stand up, and know that we are being called upon to stand strong and to be an example.

The opportunity is to truly liberate ourselves by beginning to see the “Masterplan” and its alignment in our own lives. We do this through Torah Study (intellectual alignment) and in prayer (emotional alignment).

We then are positioned to engage in action, to bring others into alignment, resolving addiction, self-doubt, and tensions’ relationships. It also positions us to live fully with excitement about each day, contentment that we are living our purpose and our best life.

I invite you to join me in moving away from our own misalignment and dysregulation, and to zoom your own camera out and see the new baby being born, the new world coming into reality.

Mazal tov! And SHANA TOVA!

Eliyahu Schusterman is a rabbi and director at Chabad Intown, founder of Jeff’s Place, grandfather, father, husband and Hasid Hipster.