Mercy, Mercy Me: Justice and Mercy on the High Holy Days

Rabbi Yehuda ben Rabbi Naḥman began: “God ascends with a blast, the Lord with the sound of a shofar” (Psalms 47:6). When the Holy Blessed One sits and ascends on the throne of justice, God ascends in justice. What is the source? “God [Elohim] ascends with a blast.” When Israel take their shofars and sound them before the Holy Blessed One, God rises from the throne of justice and sits on the throne of mercy, as it is written: “The Lord with the sound of a shofar.” When? In the seventh month.

A MEMORIAL OF T’RUAH’ (A BLAST OF THE RAM’S HORN) — Thus it is clear that everything depends upon repentance, but on the New Year God is concerned entirely with the attribute of justice and conducts the world [by that attribute], and on the Day of Atonement God is concerned entirely with the attribute of mercy. It is this which is expressed in the saying of the Rabbis [with reference to these solemn days]: “The Sovereign sits upon the throne of judgment etc.” Thus the New Year is a day of judgment in mercy, and the Day of Atonement is a day of mercy in judgment.