This past weekend, our community took a beautiful step together as we opened the pages of Machzor Lev Shalem for the very first time. This new prayer book, now at the heart of our worship, carries both the weight of tradition and the freshness of contemporary voices. It will be our companion through the High Holy Days that lie ahead, helping us pray, reflect, and renew with depth and honesty.
At the very front of the Machzor is a kavanah entitled Preparing for a Good Year. It reminds us what it truly means to seek a “good year” — not just a sweet or happy one, but one rooted in integrity, compassion, and a commitment to growth. As we journey through Elul and into the Days of Awe, these words can be a compass, guiding our hearts as we return, reflect, and open ourselves to possibility.
I share them here with you, with the hope that they inspire your own preparation for the year to come.
From Machzor Lev Shalem: Preparing for a Good Year
Each year, as the month of Elul arrives, the Jewish heart begins to stir with a sense of urgency and hope. We turn toward the High Holy Days with the ancient and ever-new aspiration that this year might be good. Not merely happy, not merely sweet, but truly good — rooted in integrity, compassion and a commitment to growth.
The greeting we offer each other שָׁנָה טוֹבָה — Shana Tova — A Good Year — reminds us of this deeper purpose. It is tempting to wish only for happiness, for ease, for a year free of sorrow. But our tradition teaches us to aspire higher. A good year is one in which we confront ourselves with honesty. A year in which we mend what has been broken in our relationships and in our own souls. A year in which we strive to live in alignment with our highest values.
Elul inaugurates this journey of return. For thirty days, we prepare our hearts through introspection and reflection, knowing that transformation is neither instant nor effortless. Each morning of Elul, the Shofar sounds, piercing the stillness with its wordless cry. Maimonides likened this cry to an alarm, calling out:
Awake, you who are asleep! Rouse yourselves from your slumber. Examine your deeds and return in repentance.
The Shofar’s blast is both a reminder and a promise: that it is never too late to begin again, that the Gates of T’shuva (Repentance and Return) are always open to us. Its voice summons us to remember who we are and who we are yet called to become.
This Machzor is offered as a companion on that journey. Within its pages, you will find prayers of S’lichot, the ritual of Tashlich and readings and meditations to guide these days of preparation. May each word and each ritual help you draw nearer to your own goodness and to the Source of all goodness.
May we enter these days together with humility and with courage. May our seeking be sincere, our forgiveness wholehearted and our return complete. And may the year ahead be for all of us a year of life, blessing and peace — a Shana Tova, a good year.