Zalman Shazar, the third president of the State of Israel, was a childhood friend of Rabbi David Cohen, Rav Kook’s most prominent disciple, better known as the Rav HaNazir. Years later, both found themselves in Jerusalem, where they renewed their childhood friendship.Shazar later described an extraordinary encounter that took place in Rav Kook’s home during Elul, the month of reflection and repentance leading up to Rosh Hashanah.
When I rediscovered Rabbi David Cohen in Jerusalem, I found him steadily ascending in the world of mysticism and silence. One day during Elul, I went to visit him at Rav Kook’s house. The High Holidays were approaching, and I wanted to absorb something of his spirit of purity and holiness.
When I arrived, I was told that the Rav HaNazir was in Rav Kook’s study. The two rabbis were reviewing the kavanot, the special Kabbalistic intentions associated with the blowing of the shofar on Rosh Hashanah.
I gathered my courage and quietly peered into the room.
I froze at the sight, utterly mesmerized.
Both scholars were standing with their eyes closed. Rav Kook called out the sequence of blasts: Tekiyah! Shevarim-teruah! Tekiyah!
And Rav David blew the shofar.
But these were no ordinary shofar blasts.
The sounds seemed to come from another world. As I listened, I felt that I was hearing not merely the shofar of Rosh Hashanah, but the shofar of redemption itself.
In my mind’s eye, I saw the words of the daily prayer: “Sound the great shofar for our freedom; raise the banner to gather our exiles.”
This was the messianic shofar, the shofar announcing the ingathering of the exiles and the redemption of Israel.
I was shaken to the depths of my soul.
The sight of those two holy men, and the sound of that shofar, remained forever engraved in my memory.
(Stories from the Land of Israel. Adapted from Mo'adei HaRe’iyah, pp. 61-62)