The Goal of Every Mitzvah Is to Draw Us Closer to Hashem
The Meaning of the Mitzvah
The mitzvah of שופר תקיעת is among the more difficult mitzvos to connect with—because we don’t properly understand the meaning behind it. For this reason, when discussing shofar, people immediately gravitate to the esoteric meaning behind it rather than to the simple meaning and reason. People tend to speak of the transformation from judgment to mercy, how HaKadosh Baruch Hu moves from His throne of דין to the רחמים כסא when His children blow the shofar, and so forth. This is different from mitzvos such as honoring parents and other rational commandments with which we can more easily connect.
When we teach children about שופר תקיעת, it’s not very difficult—because they don’t demand much depth from us. But when it comes to older people—people who may be new to Yiddishkeit and are seeking to understand the meaning behind the mitzvos—we would have a far more difficult time, and we’d likely struggle to convey the basic significance behind the mitzvah of shofar.
But in reality, there’s great value in connecting to the basic meaning of this mitzvah—in addition to the deep and esoteric aspects of it—just as the Sefer HaChinuch, a Rishon, focused on the simplest explanation for every mitzvah.
The Purpose of All Mitzvos
Let us thus discuss an element that really applies to all mitzvos—and especially to the mitzvah of shofar.
The truth is that even regarding mitzvos that are difficult to understand and connect with on a basic level, the mitzvah is still a levush, a vehicle through which we connect to the Ribbono shel Olam Who commanded us to perform the mitzvah.
The 613 mitzvos aren’t disparate commands without any connection to each other—they’re really all connected, and they share a common purpose. We say in בה התלויים מצוות ותרי"ג, the 613 mitzvos that are connected to this mitzvah—that all mitzvos are interconnected, and they all share one purpose: to draw a Yid closer to the Ribbono shel Olam.
So, when a Yid is about to perform a mitzvah of which he doesn’t understand the deeper meaning, he may say, “One thing I do know; this mitzvah was given to me so that I will grow closer to the Ribbono shel Olam Who created me. I may not know exactly why it must be performed in this precise manner—but I know that the essence of the mitzvah is for me to become connected to Hashem.” This Yid has now truly connected to the essence of the mitzvah.
Connecting to the “Heart” of the Mitzvah
We must know that even if we don’t comprehend the depth of the meaning of the mitzvah, we have still carried out the mitzvah with completeness. When we approach a mitzvah in the Torah—such as תקיעת שופר and מינים ד'—we must know first and foremost: I may be lacking the understanding of the mitzvah, but I can still perform the mitzvah with completeness by understanding that it’s a means to connect with Hashem. I may not know why there are one hundred blasts, and why specifically a ram’s horn is used, but I understand the heart of the mitzvah. The essence of the mitzvah is that it’s a means to come closer to the Ribbono shel Olam.
Before we learn the kabbalistic aspects, and before we study the “tiny letters,” the Ribbono shel Olam wants us to connect with the most basic aspect of the mitzvah, and allow this to permeate the depths of our soul: to feel the mitzvah connect us to Hashem, and through this we can perhaps hope to attain higher and deeper levels of understanding.
