Today, September 4th, is the first day of the Hebrew month Elul. Elul is the month that leads us to the Hebrew month of Tishrei. During Tishrei we celebrate the Jewish New Year, the Day of Atonement, and the Harvest Festival of Succot. It's a big month; lots of thought, contemplation, introspection, revelation - at the personal level. So appropriately the month before is taken as a run-up to this most important of months. I woke up this morning and thought about the idea of New Year's resolutions - so popular in the US. Not quite such a thing here in Israel, or in the Jewish community in general. I suspect part of it is that the celebration of the Jewish New Year is not a single day, wait for the ball to drop, kind of moment. Rather we take two days to celebrate the arrival of the New Year with customs and traditions in the home and larger community. And then we follow that up with the Day of Atonement 10 days later, with those ten days being viewed as solemn days of contempl...