Now that Adar Has Arrived

To be recited responsively:

Loving God, it is said that when Adar arrives, which it now has, our joy increases, with Purim around the corner and Pesach just a bit further beyond. But without Your help, our joy is just an illusion in the world as it now is.

When Adar leaves four weeks from now, not just a new month but a new year will arrive, for You decreed Nisan to be “the first of the months of the year” for us, a chance for us to begin to turn illusion into reality.

In this month of Adar, help us to understand that Your Torah is the blueprint for a better world, that it is the guidebook leading us to become the caring people You want all humans to be.

Help us to understand that through its laws of life we can distinguish between what is just and what is not,
between what is right and what is wrong, what is good and what is evil.

On the eve of Your freeing us from bondage, You sent a message to us, a message of hope, when You reminded us of the cycles of time as they are defined by the heavenly lights that “serve as signs for the…days and the years.”

The moon waxes and wanes, but it waxes again. The sun rises and sets, but it rises again. Light turns to darkness, but it turns to light again. Even in the darkest of times, the light will return.

That is the message You first delivered when darkness covered the face of the deep, and You uttered the words “Yehi ohr,” “Let there be light,” va-yehi ohr, and there was light—a light from which all that exists began to emerge and evolve.

Our joy increases because we know how and where to find that path toward justice and freedom, brotherhood and sisterhood, that You created even before humanity, and long before You appointed us as priests to that world.

Together: Adar has arrived and it is our turn to say “Yehi ohr,” let there be light, and, im kayn yehi ratzon, if it be Your will, let it shine through whatever darkness we face. Our world will be a better place because Your words, all of Your words, will be our words, too.