“When the ram’s horn sounds a long blast, they shall go up on the mountain” (Exodus 19:13). The original intention was for all Israelites to be like priests, and experience YHWH’s revelation on the mountain. But when YHWH descends and the horn sounds, the people recoil and remain below.
Rosh Hashanah in the Torah is described as a day of teruah, a reference to one of the two types of blasts: a regular horn blast (tekiah) and a teruah blast. Interpreters ancient and modern understand the distinction as differing in sound, length, or pitch, but the biblical description of the shofar blowing during the siege of Jericho implies that the nature of a teruah lies in the people’s response to the blast.
Israelite women are conspicuously absent from the Decalogue’s Shabbat law. Three stories in the Prophets featuring female characters—Rahab the prostitute, the great woman of Shunem, and Queen Athaliah—each tie to Shabbat in some unconventional way.
The Book of Joshua describes Israel waging a military campaign against Jericho and other southern cities. The Song of the Sea (Exodus 15), on the other hand, depicts Israel crossing the Jordan, and YHWH bringing them directly to a temple.
Deuteronomy’s requirement to destroy a city whose inhabitants worship another god and to leave it as an eternally desolate mound, can be understood in the context of ancient Near Eastern vassal treaties. Specifically, Hittite texts describe how kings dealt with rebellious vassal cities, by destroying them utterly and dedicating their land to the gods.
Hoshana Rabbah, the final day of the High Holiday cycle, has a fascinating ritual service, the hoshanot, which includes the making of seven circuits around a Torah scroll and ends with the beating of willow sprigs against the ground. What is the significance of this ritual?